First Month Industry League FAAB Spending Trends

Along with being showcase leagues for some of the best and brightest fantasy baseball analysts to compete head-to-head, Tout Wars prides itself as being a test bed for new innovations. One example from long ago was going to the now-standard 5×5 scoring format, with another being moving past batting average to on-base percentage, done so far in the past, I can’t recall when it occurred.

A more recent innovation was the Vickrey Rule, which was deployed for weekly free agent bidding. It set the purchase price for each free agent at $1 more than the second-highest offer. This enabled more aggressive bidding and ultimately, FAAB dollars to be stretched longer.

For whatever reasons, after several years, the Tout board decided to abandon Vickrey. Personally, my initial take about Vickrey was skepticism, but I had gotten used to it. Then again, I was indifferent when it was taken away.

Interestingly, in an attempt to partially compensate for the loss of Vickrey, the Tout board decided to basically devalue the dollar. The following season, the base amount given each owner for free agent acquisitions was increased from $100 to $1000.

This created the perception that there was more money to spend, an idea I thought was an illusion.

I decided to test this in a first-month comparison to LABR, which remains on the $100 base system. One other difference is at the low end, as LABR does not allow $0 bids like Tout.

As an incentive to owners to compete hard all season long, Tout also has a penalty system that docks low-scoring participants FAAB dollars the next season. So, in the comparison, I had to take that into account.

Here are the first-month spending totals in the three American, National and Mixed Auction League formats for Tout and LABR.

With the exception of AL Tout, the owners in the other three –only leagues spent between 21 and 25 percent of their full-season budget in the first month. Both of the mixed leagues came in at just under one-third of the total allocation available, between 31 and 32 percent.

In this small sample survey, I see no negligible difference in spending patterns during April in the $1000-base leagues compared to the $100-base ones.

The other takeaway from this is that the resolve many owners have to spend aggressively early is much more pronounced in the mixed leagues than in the –only formats. My guess is that this is due to the deeper player pool in mixed offers more palatable free agent choices.

Considering a flat monthly spend percent over a six-month season would be 16.7 percent, the mixed leagues used double that, while the –only league owners spent roughly five to seven percent more. The latter is actually less than I had expected it would be.

Of course, real spending is never on a flat monthly basis, with the largest amount of FAAB deployed when MLB trade activity reaches its peak in late July into early August.

In the final table, I look at whether the spending is coming from a handful of aggressive owners or the behavior is more pervasive across the leagues.

The focus is on the number of owners who seem to be squirreling away money for later. I drew the arbitrary line at those holding at least $90/$900 heading into May. (One other league difference to note is that FAAB can be traded in Tout, but is not allowed in LABR, so an owner in the former leagues could alter strategy in-season. However, there were no significant FAAB trades in April.)

Another footnote is that two owners in each of the Tout leagues lost more than 10 percent right off the top, for poor 2017 finishes. So of course, they have less than 90 percent a month later. As a result, they were excluded.

For whatever reason, significantly more than half of the owners in the AL leagues are curbing spending, while a third or less of the NL-only owners are holding at least 90 percent of their cash. I must admit I do not understand this difference between AL and NL behavior.

I might have thought it would be a reflection of the quality of April call-ups being greater in the NL, drawing out more cash. However, in these leagues, all of the name-brand prospects were already taken on draft day and held in reserve for their eventual promotion to the majors.

In the mixed leagues, only one of the 28 qualifying teams came into May with more than 90 percent remaining. Almost universally, these owners are not holding back in spending on free agents.

Perhaps some of you can use this data as a checkpoint for your own early-season behavior. Or you could undertake a similar analysis for your leagues to see where you stand.

Brian Walton was the 2009 National League Tout Wars champion, scoring the most points in the league’s history. He also holds the all-time NL Tout single-season records for wins and saves. His work can also be found daily at TheCardinalNation.com. Follow Brian on Twitter.