“In battle, there are not more than two methods of attack – the direct and the indirect; yet these two in combination give rise to an endless series of maneuvers.”

When opening up your trade talks, it is important to remember people like to communicate in different manners.  Some people prefer to send trade offers back and forth while others prefer to lay everything out in a chat. For home leagues, you may already know how people in your league prefer to start a trade discussion. If you do not know the tendencies of your league mates, it has been my experience that some combination of these two methods is the best approach.

I recommend sending an offer through the league software with a note attached letting the other team know what or who you’re interested in. Giving an explanation of your thought process while assembling the trade offer can provide some clarity to the other team.

Another method would be to send an email, DM, chat, etc. with similar information in regards to what or who you’re looking for and provide some information about who may be available from your roster. In this communication, you may also choose to lay out some trade offer ideas that you were looking into and give the other owner some options or a general starting point.

It is also important to avoid tunnel vision and stay open to new players and ideas during the course of trade negotiations. If you are focused on getting a single player, you may miss out on the opportunity to expand the discussion to incorporate other players.

For instance, if you keep asking about a certain player the other team refuses to move, you may not look at the rest of the roster or reach out to the other team. If you close yourself off, you may decide to give up on a particular player or decide that the team has no interest in trading while communication and having an open mind may have yielded a good return.

@DonkeyTeeth 87 and I recently found out that our podcast, Ditka, Sausage, and Fantasy Sports, will now be hosted at Razzball! We are both very excited for this opportunity and are ready to start getting more great shows out to you all.