First Pitch June 15, 2007 - The Unwritten Fantasy Rules

There has been a lot of talk recently about the "Unwritten Rules"in baseball. When Alex Rodriguez rounded third in Toronto a couple of weeks ago and shouted "hey"at the fielder, causing him to miss the ball, the "unwritten rules of baseball"conversation became a hot topic. Supposedly, its "bush league"to do what A-Rod did when running the bases. Baseball Almanac has compiled a decent list here. Some other rules that I thought of that are not included on this list are:

1) You hit our guy, we can hit yours
2) Don't "show-up"the other team (this rule is slowly getting swept under the rug).
3) Its legal to take out the middle-infielder when breaking-up a double play, just don't do it "dirty."
4) You don't really have to touch 2nd base when turning the double-play. Umpires usually concede the area around the bag as "good enough." I've never seen an umpire call someone safe for not touching the bag when turning-two.
5) Don't slide into first base (unless you're trying to avoid a tag). You don't get to first base faster by sliding. If you did, wouldn't you see sprinters or marathon runners sliding across the finish line?

Of course, there are dozens more of these rules that we could all come up with. But how about fantasy baseball? Are there unwritten rules to playing fantasy baseball and if so, what are they? Each league has different parameters and rules, but there are some general rules that, from my experience, should be applied across the board to every league. Props to all of the guys in one of my main head-to-head leagues that helped brainstorm some of these rules:

1. Have the courtesy to respond to a trade offer with a 48-hour period. There is nothing worse than having a trade offer linger for weeks without any response. Always respond to trade demands. ALWAYS. I've made at least 2 trade offers this year that never even got a response. When getting a trade offer, there are 3 acceptable actions: (1) Reject, with explanation of why you don't think a deal can work; (2) Reject, with a counter-offer; or (3) Accept. Just do something. Please.

2. Give a Reason When You Reject a Trade. Once you do reject a trade offer, try to give a valid reason to the person who offered you the trade. If you counter-offer with something, the opposing party will have a better idea what you might need. If it is a ridiculous offer, say its ridiculous (eg. Somebody once tried to trade me Troy Glaus and Bill Hall for Miguel Cabrera and Grady Sizemore. I didn't just reject it - I also called him names and asked him if he was living in somewhere where they didn't have televisions, the Internet, or newspapers).

3. 24-hour Trash Talking Rule. If you get beat (or you beat somebody), there should be a 24-hour lag before you can rub it in. This is especially true for Head-to-Head shutouts, the playoffs, or the Championship week. This should also be an unwritten rule between actual rivalries like Red Sox/Yankees (right Lou?)

4. Make an Effort. It takes 5 minutes to set a lineup everyday. You're never SO busy that you can't take an extra few minutes to set a lineup in the morning (unless somebody suddenly got a job working on some sort of 24-hour nuclear threat watch or something). If you join the league, you should commit to putting the time in to taking it seriously for the full season.

5. Team Name Changes. Team names should be locked-in by the All-Star break. I hate it when teams change their names like 15 times throughout the season. It's confusing and not necessary (unless a HUGE event occurs that warrants a name change - discretion must be used to determine the immensity of the event).

6. Don't Whine About Your Team's Injuries. Every team has to deal with injuries. Unless each of your top-10 round picks go down with season-ending injuries in the first week, we don't want to hear about how Rich Harden is on the DL and that's why you're in last place.

7. Never Talk About Your "Other League". This is an ongoing joke with my friends. I'm sure you have guys in your league that say, "Well, I'm not doing too well in this league, but I'm winning my OTHER league right now." Well, great - who's in your other league? We have no clue how competitive that other league is and if it even exists in the first place. All this shows is that you're not good enough to win the league you're in and you're forced to play in a less competitive league somewhere else where you can actually win. Avoid talking about your other leagues.

8. Show up for the Draft. Of course, there are always circumstances that may prohibit you from going to the draft, but at the very least, you should pre-rank your players. Its terrible to be at the draft and you can predict a person's pick because the computer is picking based on the vanilla pre-sorted rankings.

9. Limit the "Woe is Me" Message Posts. Our league gets a couple of posts from frustrated owners every year. You know the ones - "Oh, I have it so bad!" It is especially annoying coming from people who, in fact, don't have it so bad. Look, we all have injuries and we all experience inexplicable bad weeks. Heck, sometimes people get lucky with free agent pickups and sometimes our first-round picks go into slumps. On the same note, if you drafted someone like Mark Prior, don't pretend to be shocked when he has a season-ending injury on April 1st.

2) Never quit. If you quit a league mid-way through a season, you should be banned for life.

I'm sure you have plenty of your own - feel free to send them along to jribando@fantistics.com. I would love to hear them. In the meantime, let these unwritten fantasy rules guide you and your leagues going forward. Have a great weekend!