The Trade Research Center exists within the Fantasy Assistant, and is a feature that I alluded to in my previous blog post about position based analysis. This new tool will allow you to easily research various trades and even receive personalized trade suggestions. The development of this feature was heavily influenced by users of FantasySP with testing and/or suggestions by Michael, Steve, and Rob.
The Trade Research Center is based off of the position ratings that were released two months ago. It consists of three separate areas: Position Ratings, Research Area, and Trade Suggestions.
Position Ratings
Position based ratings show you where various positions on your team rank against other teams in the league. This is slightly different for each sport, but works exactly the same for all sports. We also chart each team’s data on a daily basis so you can easily see where you are trending.
The ratings are generated based off of the average of your player ratings for each specific position grouping.
Based on what we see on the right, it appears that I have a fairly balanced team. My worst position is Corner Infielders, but not by much. The blue line for each box indicates the current trend of my players. For the most part, all positions are gradually improving over time.
Any time you see a big spike or dip, it generally indicates a waiver wire move that was performed on my part.
Research Area
The research area of the Trade Research Center allows you to delve deeper into what other team’s look like. You can see all the teams in your fantasy league and see exactly where they rate and rank in each position. It also shows you the depth of each position.
To start with, let’s look at the Corner Infielders position and see why this tool is helpful and what you can do with the data. Based on the screenshot to the right, I am currently ranked 7th of 10 teams in my league. Based on the Starters rating, I am 12 points behind the top team.
Clearly my Corner Infielders need help some help, so let’s try and develop a trade based on this need.
The top team, Arods, only has two players and they are the best in the league right now. My chances developing a trade with him may not be in my favor. Instead, let’s focus on the 2nd ,3rd, 4th place teams.
All of those teams have more than 2 position players, so we know they have a surplus. That may work in our favor.
The other key ingredient for a trade is to be able to fill a need of another team’s weakness. Outfielders just so happen to be my strongest position, so the goal here is to give up an outfielder to help bolster my Corner Infielders.
BAMF Bulldogs and Commo Dawgs are in desperate need for an outfielder and are ranked 9th and 10th. There is no question that I should narrow down my list of teams to them and see if a deal can be worked out.
But what if I don’t want to do all this work researching? What about automatically suggesting a trade based on this type of data?
Trade Suggestions
We’ve got you covered for that in our Trade Suggestion area! As I stated in the previous area, we’ve already narrowed down the choices of teams to trade with. If this feature works as advertised, then it should be selecting BAMF Bulldogs or Commo Dawgs.
Right now the Trades that are suggested involve team BAMF Bulldogs. Getting Edwin Encarnacion and Desmond Jennings would be nice additions for the right price.
You can click on the “view analysis” button to view more information such as latest player news, graphs, and player breakdowns. This works exactly like Waiver Wire Suggestions.
So the real question is, are these trades helpful in any way? These trades are listed as in our favor by 100% and are certainly in the ballpark. I personally do not think my opponent would accept the first trade for Josh Willingham and Allen Craig, but it can’t hurt to propose it?
As for the second trade, giving up McCutchen and Craig to get Encarnacion and Jennings is a bit too much for me. I would, however, consider giving up David Ortiz since I know that he can be played in the Utility spot and may not keep up his current pace.
In any case, I can go on and on here about potential trade scenarios but I think you get the picture. You can see how quickly and easily I can come to a trade by doing a bit of research with our new tool.
I can easily pinpoint their strengths and weaknesses as well as my own. I also get trades suggested to me that I can use as a starting point.
This feature will work with all major fantasy sports including NBA, NFL, MLB, and NHL. Right now I still consider this feature to be in BETA so expect there to be changes down the road to further increase its accuracy.
Go ahead and sign up for FantasySP and enjoy a free trial to gain access to the Fantasy Assistant.
Update 5/11/2013: The CBSSports App now has this feature as well.
