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By: Jay Pounds (@JayPoundsNFL)
Dynasty Owner Constitution – Tanking
We do not endorse tanking but as long as the starting lineup is set each week with active non injured players and not on the BYE week, then we shall not micromanage how you operate your team.
Dynasty Owner Constitution
Three things in life are an absolute guarantee and that’s death, taxes, and Tom Brady playing in the Super Bowl every year (even without “The Hoodie”). In the early 2000’s as I was just becoming a huge football fan, a kid named Tom took over for the Patriots for injured vet Drew Bledsoe and as we know the rest is history. I am the biggest Brady hater you will ever find, but I will always give the man his respect. 10 super bowls is one of the most absurd stats I have ever laid eyes on in all of sports because of how hard it is to win multiple championships in the NFL, the NFL has truly done a fantastic job giving teams a level playing field. The only comparison we have in this era is LeBron James and his 10 NBA championship appearances.
On February 7th we will see the biggest names at the quarterback position we have ever seen on the biggest stage of them all with the next potential G.O.A.T quarterback Patrick Mahomes against the G.O.A.T himself, Tom Brady. Super Bowl LIV has every narrative any football fan could hope for from, the Buccaneers hosting the first ever home game in a Super Bowl, the QB matchup, the guy who could lead the next great dynasty against the guy that just finished one, and coaches that could not be any more opposite of each other. I want to touch on Brady a bit more before we get into the article, because well lets face it he deserves it.
Brady came in as an unheralded prospect getting drafted 199th overall in the 6th round which is something he has used as a “chip on the shoulder” his entire career. Brady’s first Super Bowl came out of nowhere beating the exceptionally talented Oakland Raiders on his path there, but it did not come without controversy, something Brady would grow accustomed to throughout his career.
Some may take the last comment as a shot at Brady but in all honesty, it is nothing more than greatness and people trying to influence that greatness in a negative way. After beating the Rams in his first Super Bowl appearance he went on the greatest run we have ever seen in the NFL going to 10 Super Bowls winning 6 of them, with the tenth yet to be played. Win or lose it is safe to say we are all extremely lucky to witness the greatness of Tom Brady on a football field, enjoy it while it lasts, he may only play until he is 74. Buckle up people this Sunday we could see the greatest game ever played.
This article will be focused on owners who are in a position where they need to offload vets to gear their team towards the future (also known as tanking). I will touch on 4 different topics on rebuilding, hopefully giving owners a better understanding on how and when to make certain moves.
There are plenty of ways tanking can upset the other owners in your league so be sure you are not one of the ones ticking people off because of your lineups. My rule of thumb when you don’t have many producing players is to look at your lineup and ask yourself “would I be mad if another owner used this lineup with the options available?” if the answer is a sound no then you should be safe to play that specific lineup.
Is Tanking Acceptable
As self-explanatory as this title sounds it is something that should be talked about in detail. We have seen tanking from professional teams in every single sport, which does not seem like it will ever stop because of the draft capitol it produces.
There are plenty of wrong ways to tank and honestly only one way to correctly do it. Let us start with the negatives, the most important being that tanking the wrong way can really upset some of the other owners in your league to the point they will ask that you are removed. The easiest way to avoid a scenario like this is to always play the most competitive lineup your resources will allow (see tanking policy in constitution), for instance if you had Calvin Ridley this past season and you decided you wanted to tank the rest of the way for higher draft picks, so you play someone like Michael Gallup over Ridley, which causes you to lose a game instead of winning.
While you may say “Hey Jay, I am trying to lose that is the point?”, and while yes this is true you also went against the integrity of the game not playing your best players. Setting a lineup this way can really bother someone if it were to cost them a playoff shot when you could have won by playing your better options, leaving them on the outside looking in.
Now you may be wondering how do I tank while still playing my best lineup? The answer there is simple, once you decide you want to tank/rebuild you then start trading players like Ridley away, so you have no choice but to not have him in your lineup.
This route does two particularly important things, the first being you gained draft capital for Ridley instead of leaving him on the bench during a low salary year, and you also will not upset any of your league mates if you go this route. If you have ever been in a league where owners do not set lineups or blatantly set bad lineups, you will understand what I am saying here.
The definitive answer here is no tanking is not acceptable BUT if it is done in a professional manner you can suffice. Always remember while the main objective in rebuilding is to lose the second goal is to do it in a way that makes at least most of the other owners happy.
Different Ways to Prepare Your Team for the Future Without a Full-on Tank
As we have discussed tanking is a no-no, here are a few ways to prepare for the future without tanking and upsetting other owners. The first and correct path is trading players and salary away for draft capital, cap space, and younger players.
As an owner, if you know the 2021 season is more than likely going to be a bust then start tearing your roster apart now to set yourself up to overhaul this season. I would start this reconstruction by looking at my roster and picking out players over $10 million a year that still produce and find the 3 best looking teams heading into 2021 and try to unload these players to those three owners.
This should make you and the other owner happy about the aftermath of said trade. Once you have unloaded as much big salary deals as you can you then start trading the less expensive producing players, though I recommend keeping 1 or 2 cheap young studs to build your team around.
The last bit of advice I have on this type of tanking is never make a player untouchable, everyone is for sale at the right price. The other type of rebuilding I want to talk about is what I like to call a “Tanker” (briefly mentioned above). When you have an owner that is neglectful while rebuilding/tanking it can really ruin a league.
Imagine being week 10 fighting for your playoff life because of injuries and the owner with the same record as you play the “Tanker” (a free bye week) and wins putting you a game back in the standings. I am sure that would be one of the worst and most unpleasant experiences of anyone’s fantasy career.
While it may not be obvious there is an enormous difference in trading your studs away versus just not playing players, or playing horrible players, there is a substantial difference, especially to your league mates. The main difference here is that the owner who traded his talent away got younger players with upside in return, as well as draft picks, meaning they will still be competitive some weeks when the young guys get going.
The neglectful owner will not have these types of up-and-coming players to plug in they will just have their bench and practice squad players to rely on, with some on their bench being stars. If you remember how bare free agency was most of the year, you will really understand that a neglectful tanker has zero shot at building a competitive team, so do not be that owner.
The Pros and Cons of an Overhaul
Pros – There are multiple positives when it comes to giving your team an overhaul, but they all are terribly similar in ways that I am going to tell you. There is one objective for owners who rebuild and that is be bad enough to get high end draft picks and speed up the process.
If you rebuild correctly with a little luck you should be able to land a top 3 pick while having a few building blocks on your roster. A splendid example I have is from my personal team is that I ended the year with Gibson, Dobbins, Pittman, Cooks, Reagor, and Tannehill as my core moving forward, while landing 2 top 5 draft picks (2nd, 5th) to add some of the high-end talent from this rookie class.
I am absolutely thrilled with the core I have and the potential I have in draft capital to hopefully turn my team around quickly. If you look at all 3 major sports you will constantly see teams that are rebuilding each year, just look at the Jets this past season trading Jamal Adams away when he was easily their most talented player.
The Jets turned Adams (and his upcoming massive contract) into a couple 1st round draft picks as well as a ton of cap space, which is the same route some of our owners should be looking to go.
Cons – When you are a “Tanker” there will always be a lot more negatives than positives. The main reasons for this are the guessing game fantasy football can be, as well as injuries. I know injuries happen to championship teams as well as losing teams, but injuries can hurt a “Tanker” just as much as someone competing for a championship.
If one of the guys you were hoping to trade before their new contract hits gets hurt you are going to get so much less in return than if they were healthy balling out, unless you wait until the player is healthy which is no guarantee either. The other issue I want to touch on is the uncertainty of Fantasy football in general.
What I am meaning is that your draft picks are nowhere near a guarantee to hit or even produce at a mediocre rate. If you happen to be tanking and you miss on a top 3 pick that may set you back another 2-3 years because you now must wait, hope, and depend on another rookie hitting. My biggest concern with tanking is that so many things can go wrong compared to right, yet it is one of the best ways to expedite your rebuild.
Handling Free Agency While Rebuilding
One of the strangest things to handle while you are full on rebuilding is what to do with free agents. Do you pick good free agents up, or leave them be? What I like to do with free agency while rebuilding is still take part but change what criteria I am looking for.
If I went in to 2020 in a full-on rebuild, I would not even try to acquire free agents like Mike Davis. The reason I would not target Davis is because he is highly likely to only help me win this season, which when rebuilding is not good. I am looking for players like Fulgham (even though he did not pan out) because he is young, he was producing at an extremely elevated level, has a friendly contract, and most importantly there was potential for a future role with the team.
If Fulgham was 30 years old on a $14 million contract I would not even consider him, but since he was cheap, young, and putting up numbers he was exactly the type of player rebuilding owners should be salivating over.
Take chances on every young free agent that has a good game or is seeing a lot of opportunity. In the NFL opportunity is usually king! I also want to touch quickly on a bit of a dilemma I had this past season while rebuilding.
The courtesy flush (extra rookie draft pick for winning losers’ bracket) is an excellent idea that adds even more strategy to your thinking. I had a solid team compared to the rest of the field in my league (loser’s bracket teams only) and am still not sure which route was the better to go with.
I ended up picking up Tannehill to make a run at winning the extra pick and while it almost paid off, I lost in the championship game, losing the extra pick. When I look back at it more, I feel I made the right choice because none of the wins caused me to drop in the draft and I planned to pick up Tannehill for next season anyway. If any of you ran into this issue yourselves please message on Twitter, i would love to see which route you decided to go.
If You Must Tank Have Some Courtesy/Conclusion
A lot of this article was geared towards good “tanking etiquette” I just did not lay it out in front of your face. At Dynasty Owner we do not endorse tanking but if you are going to you must show Tanking etiquette. Tanking Etiquette is the art of not making other owners mad when tanking.
As I mentioned earlier, no one wants to play in a league where someone does not set their lineups most weeks because they want to lose it is not fair to the owners not playing that team. If you are putting out the best lineup available to your roster you will be fine, but I have seen the opposite happen more times than it should.
I hope you are all enjoying this rebuild series as well as gaining valuable information from it. In last week’s article I discussed one of our owner’s trades, which was a lot of fun and I hope to do more of. Please feel free to send any rebuilding trades and I will gladly break them down as I did last week. One more game left and it is on to 2021, with that being said good luck on your 2021 Chase for the Ring!
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