As it turns out, I really have no problem with player selection. I know what players I want. For example, I want a pitching staff of Kershaw, Hernandez, Price, Sale, Strasburg, Bumgarner, and Scherzer with Kimbrel and Chapman as my closers. Easy-peasy. As long as I can get Goldschmidt, Cabrera, Donaldson, Altuve, Rendon, Gordon, Posey, Lucroy, Trout, Stanton, McCutchen, Gomez, Bautista, and Encarnacion, well, I should finish in the money. But money is the problem. Unless I am going against a bunch of five year olds who bid on Big Bird, I am unlikely to fashion my dream-team for $260. That is where Jackass Funding comes in.
You see, the rules for the NFBC auctions are designed to give everyone an equal chance, equal rights under the rules as it were. But we are not all “equal”. I am not as good as Dobies (nor with such style when it comes to how I wear my hair), or Low(no r)y, or Childs, or Clum, or Lindy. I am sure there is an easy function in math that will allow to add to the list the necessary exponent to the list above of the people who are better at fantasy baseball than I am, but for the sake of space, let’s just say the list is long and (a little less than) distinguished. So, while the rules do not explicitly allow, I think the rules true intent is not equal chance/rights, but rather the rules implicitly mean we should have equal distribution of the returns, or stated slightly differently, equal condition.
So with that point of clarification out of the way, when I enter my next auction, I will be presenting a bill. For the current year auction, it will be for a ratable portion of the other auction members’ $260 budget. I will rightfully expect each of the other billed participants to gleefully accept and pay the bill because, after all, it is not THERE endeavors that allowed them to be so successful in the past, it is the environment graciously provided by the NFBC and its rules that gave them their good fortune.
I am a little light on the specifics, and in an attempt to be fair, but no one owner will be billed more than 40%, except for the person who has won the most. Let’s call him or her a “One Percenter”. They will be billed 50%. After the One Percenter, the second most successful will be billed 40%, then down to 35%, and, in a graduated scale, down to 15%. Also, I will limit the bills to the top 47% (seven owners), who ultimately will be responsible for 100% of the fair and equitable redistribution burden.
Based on my calculations, I generate $559 in incremental budget to be fairly redistributed to the bottom four owners. Numbers eight through five are obviously doing just fine (many I am sure are already retired or are new to the NFBC and have not had to suffer the indignity of loss) and do not need or require (in my judgment) any assistance. It is us poor folks at the bottom, through no fault of our own (though we suspect the top seven lead by the One Percenter have in fact colluded against us to keep us down) have not had enough fantasy success. I mean, we are all equal, right? So it could not be OUR fault. But I digress.
So, the least successful team will get $150, next $100, then $75, then $50. Now the boat is beginning to balance (though I am sure I can see MUCH more work to do here). Now that supercomputer KJ Duke mind has already run a tape on my redistribution numbers about and that steel trap has discovered that $184 dollars of 2015 auction money is “missing”. Well, not missing actually. That approximately one-third of the available funds for fair and equal redistribution will be used for the benefit of the person who will administer this democratic redistribution. After all, there are costs and efforts associated with enforcing equality. Strangely enough, that administrator will be me.
Now the positon of administration will be an elected one in the future. I am sure I will get my vote as well as the votes of at least three others residing with me at the bottom, leaving me with needing four for a majority. I think I can convince three of the owners in the middle that they are doing just fine in this equitable world. Then I only need to get one of the top seven to feel guilty about their good fortune. That incremental guilt vote will put me over the top year after year.
Now as I consider myself the most vulnerable to the unjust and illogical “equal” starting point of $260, I will add $150 to my budget. With the $184 administrative fee, I might finally have a “fair” chance. So, the new budgets will be, starting with the One Percenter and ending up with poor, unfortunate me, will be $130, $156, $169, $182, $195, $208, $221, $260, $260, $260, $260, $310, $335, $360, and $594.
I still may not get my dream team, but next year, I can always change the rules to further address my constituent’s valid and progressive needs.
