Today's Fantasy Rx

Back when she taught in Chicago, my mom carpooled in to work most of the time. While she left the Chicago school system when I was born, she kept in touch with the other teacher with which she rode. We occasionally visited Ellen back when I was a kid, and I was always fixated on the couple of slot machines that Ellen kept in her basement.

Obviously there was no real reward for winning as all the proceeds went right back into the machine; I played for the no-risk fun of occasionally hitting the jackpot. However, that's the essence of all slot machines, aside from the no-risk part. It's also one of the primary reasons why casinos are so successful. Nearly all the winnings wind up going straight back into the slots, along with all the money wasted by people trying to beat the odds and the system.

The only difference between casino slot machines and the STATS fantasy game is that in the STATS game, you put all your money in up front, and you have no chance to win any back at the end.

Internet Fantasy Baseball Contest Review of:

STATS, Inc. Fantasy Baseball

As we're limiting these reviews to 2002 fantasy baseball games, I'm not going to bother discussing any of STATS classic options. Unfortunately, all that this leaves us with is STATS 2002 Fantasy Baseball.

Now we should mention that we really appreciate the role that STATS plays in this industry. Without the Red Book (Major League Handbook), Green Book (Minor League Handbook), and Blue Book (Player Profiles), we'd have to spend an exhaustive amount of time searching for a statistical resource nearly as useful. The Minor League Scouting Notebook, written by John Sickels for the last several years, is probably the best single resource on minor league prospects other than their actual statistics. The Scouting Notebook provides the same function for major leaguers, and the Baseball Scoreboard offers a wonderful compilation of short essays on statistical curiosities throughout the game, covering both current and historical contexts.

So we poured over stats.com trying to find the obviously missing sections of the fantasy rules. Despite our efforts, all we were able to find under prizes was this:

Each league winner will receive an engraved plaque stating that you were league champion in the year 2002. Approximate retail value ("ARV") of each league prize is $50. Total ARV of the League Prizes is dependant on the number of eligible entries received.

Please understand that we don't play fantasy baseball exclusively to win money. We do make every effort to cover expenses with our winnings each year, but we have been known to occasionally draft an awful team and then build for the future by the end of April.

The danger is that on-line games almost as a rule don't allow any degree of forward thinking. Once you're out of the money in a given year, you have no chance to apply your investment to future winnings. STATS does offer some keeper options, but you really want to find a privately-run league if you're interested in keepers.

As their primary offerings do not feature keepers, we're left with the following in our cost-benefit analysis as what we need to spend to have a chance at that plaque:

FEES

All returning franchise owners and new franchise owners are charged an annual fee of $49. During the season, each franchise owner will be billed monthly for all of their successful transactions effective during the preceding month. Any successful move of players will be charged at the rate of .50 per player moved (signed as a free agent, released, traded away, acquired in trade, demoted, promoted, shifted, etc.)

Example: Promote Johnny Damon to the majors and demote Greg Vaughn. Cost: $1.00

Example: Team A trades three players to Team B for two players. Cost: $2.50 to each team.

Example: Shift Damion Easley from second base to shortstop. Cost: $.50

Example: Sign two free agents and conditionally release two players in connection with those signings. Cost: $2.00

Even ESPN only charges $20/team and gives you the chance to win something useful like a T-shirt, or if you're incredibly lucky, some type of digital device duplicating one you already own.

STATS appears to cost in the neighborhood of at least $150, given a reasonable amount of transactions, and even we wouldn't hang up a plaque saying that we won our STATS, Inc. league. I just can't believe they're not offering any more substantial incentive to play their game.

For the sake of completeness, here's the rest of the breakdown on the game:

League size: All leagues appear to include twelve teams in three different divisions, playing head-to-head via a points-based system. Every league appears to include all major leaguers, leaving no options for those of us that prefer drafting deeper into the talent pool.

Scoring: They appear to have designed this game to be as close to "real" baseball as you can manage in a points' environment. Since there's no need for me to waste bandwidth on their scoring system, please take a quick look at it here. Unlike most fantasy games, you appear extremely subject to luck with such inexcusable choices as making the All-Star team earning points for your players, a modification that removes a degree of skill inherent in traditional roto.

Roster Breakdown: 20 active players with a 6-man reserve list; your active roster must include one C, 1B, 3B, 2B, SS, LF, CF, and RF, along with 4 starting pitchers, 3 relievers, and one other pitcher. The remainder of the roster is at your discretion.

Draft options: Multi-list like ESPN, live snake draft, or e-mail snake draft. For the e-mail draft, each team has 24 hours to make a pick, and if you don't finish drafting 312 players by March 29th, they fill out the rosters on all the teams with automatic selections based on 2001 stats. We can't even comprehend why anyone would want to release that much control over your roster, so please, if you have to play this game for some reason, don't choose the e-mail draft option.

If you still want to play, here's how to win:

To borrow a line from one of the best war movies ever made:

The only way to win is not to play.

I apologize if the last day or two of reviews have been somewhat depressing, but we're completely offended at the insubstantial offerings from MLB and STATS, two organizations that should be offering gameplay of significantly higher quality.

Tomorrow I hope to complete these reviews with the last of the suggested games. If there's another 2002 on-line fantasy baseball contest of some sort that you'd like reviewed, please e-mail me ASAP.

Today's Fantasy Rx: I'll be spending a couple days early next week reviewing the LABR drafts. Today, please go take a look at the AL rosters here from last night's draft. If you have a chance, feel free to drop me a note with your thoughts on any of these rosters, picks, and prices.