Redistribution of Inflation Dollars: A Real Life Example

Eugene Freedman is a proponent of shifting inflation dollars toward the top hitters:

I skew my inflation dollars toward the top players. I don't distribute it linearly. I delete any inflationary dollars that have been attributed to players $10 and under and redistribute it to players over $25. If I add $1 to everyone and there still is money left it goes to those over $30 and then when that's done over $35 and $40 until it's all gone. If there is a huge amount of inflation I might start at $20.

I haven't gone back and kicked the tires too much on my A.L.-only auction yet, but I'm curious to see if an experienced group of owners did just that.

Top 10 by Cost, Billy Almon Brown Graduate 2009

NOM	#	Player	Cost	Inf Bid	+/-	BUY	LB
QUI	1:9	Carl Crawford	$43	$43	0	BEN	QUI
GLA	1:10	Matt Holliday	$42	$37	-5	GLA	GUE
GLA	1:1	C.C. Sabathia	$42	$45	+3	QUI	JIH
JAB	1:6	Dustin Pedroia	$41	$39	-2	GLA	BEN
JSC	2:14	Joe Nathan	$38	$42	+4	GLA	TOW
JIH	3:31	Vladimir Guerrero	$36	$33	-3	JAB	COP
GUE	3:28	Ichiro Suzuki	$36	$37	+1	GUE	TOW
BEN	2:20	Curtis Granderson	$35	$33	-2	BEN	JIH
BEN	1:8	Jason Bay	$34	$31	-3	JAB	BEN
GUE	2:16	Josh Beckett	$32	$34	+2	JIH	DOZ
		average	$38	$37	+1

Definitely on the hitters...not so much on the pitchers.

Although I'm using separate inflation for the hitters and pitchers. If I use one inflation number across the board, Sabathia goes from +3 to -1, Nathan from +4 to 0, and Beckett from +2 to -1.

Eugene is correct; there definitely are owners who are pushing the best players at the auction past inflation par because they don't want to get caught with too much money at the end.

But there is another factor at play

BEN, JAB, and JIH entered the auction with the three strongest projected freeze lists. It makes the most sense for them to pay for production and worry about dumping into their weaknesses later (Part of their strength, of course, is the fact that they have young, cheap freezes, which allows them to more easily dump into those holes than a team in the middle or at the bottom).

GLA is in a different position. He's playing Stars and Scrubs, but his freezes aren't nearly as strong. He ran out of money quickly (he also bought Kerry Wood for $30) and had to fill in with a bunch of $1 players at the end. Some of them might work out, but his freezes won't make up for buying these stars at inflation par or higher.

Your freeze list should determine your bidding strategy on the top players as much as the predictability of those players. If you have a stronger freeze list, I recommend paying par or even $1 over par for the best players on the board. But if you don't, you might want to play your cards a little closer to the vest.