Greg,

Quit beating around the bush. Are you saying that this owner is using collusion to build his team? Are you saying that these other teams mysteriously trade good players then become unmanaged, only because this owner is setting up additional accounts to harvest good talent for his "real" team?

Personally, I don't think any of the above is true. If it were, that guy needs a life. Secondly, Bravard wouldn't let it happen. Yes, these trades are curious and sometimes questionable, but if it were to damage the integrity of the league, I don't think Mike would let it happen (I've had so many of my trades vetoed or questioned it would make your head spin, Tim can back me up here with some personal experience, hehe).

In 99T3, I took over one of the "Force" teams that had come off of a championship and was hovering around .500 after 70 games. Looking at the collection of trades before I arrived on the scene, it would seem to be the same owner you are talking about. Many of the trades on this team were of the blockbuster variety and sometimes involved the same teams and even the same players. After making 16 trades of my own, in a 5 month span, I got to know most of the league pretty well and did not find anyone to have ill-will towards the previous owner. I'm not sure why this team was dropped in 99T3. It had won the championship last season and was in good shape for '99. With some early tweaking and deadline trades, I managed to get the #1 record only to give up a 3-0 series lead in the playoffs. My theory is that this guy has ADD and works these teams like a parasite. He takes over a franchise, trys to compete and trade for a bunch of different players...then when people stop trading with him, he'll dump the team and move on.


Looking at some of the trades you posted in an earlier thread, there's nothing that says an owner can't trade the same player back and forth from one team to another. We see this alot in MLB, where a team will re-acquire a player they had just traded in a previous year. Granted, they usually don't give up a top prospect to acquire said player, but we have to have some latitude to make trades happen. If every trade is gone over with a fine toothed comb, two thing will happen:

a) nothing will ever get done because Bravard will spend all of his team pouring over each trade before they get processed.

b) trading will slow down because of the amount of trades that would get vetoed and the league would become very boring.

Without trades, and sometimes not-too-bright managers to take advantage of, you'd have too much parity and the skills of the human manager would be less important. You can only rip someone off to a point, that is why we have trade review. Based on my personal experience, if a trade is close enough to pass Bravard's scrutiny, then it's probably not all that bad. I've disagreed on many many trades that I've seen processed, but I'm sure others have looked at my own trades with the same disappointment. In all 3 of my leagues, I'm one of the more active owners and have made many trades on each team. Rarely, if ever, have I traded for a player that I gave up in an earlier deal, but if I liked the guy enough, I would always consider it.

In conclusion, I think this is just a case of a very active owner taking advantage of newbies. Why some of these trades were able to pass under the Bravard radar is beyond me (I got railed for trading D. Nilsson for a FA5/FA8 upgrade). I'm not in that league (yet) but if and when I am able to acquire the Spiders team, you can be sure that I'll be talking shop with the Arizona team.

Jon, St. Louis Trash