What % is skill?

Is hitting the waiver wire first really a skill? I don’t think paying attention should be called a skill.

What about injuries? No controlling those, but how many teams go down every year due to them? After thinking about it, I think I might be underrating luck quite a bit. It might be more important.

That all depends. I think roto is less luck dependant than head to head with a playoff system. At least with roto the overall best team is not based on which of the playoff teams in your league is best the final couple weeks of the season.

Players can also get injured- some are just more injury prone than others. Unless there is a rash of injuries on your team though you should still be able to compete. That is assuming the injury replacement is at least MLB average.

Off the top of my head I think the best way to determine how much luck vs. skill is involved is to wait until the end of the season and take a look back at the original draft results. It seems a lot of times many leagues are won by making some shrewed draft picks later in the draft.

Also understanding what all goes into the “value” of a player is important. Value can be a composite of many things- position scarcity, playing time, upside. Drafting players is a lot like buying stocks. You try to have a portfolio which has varied investments. Have a base in the solid investments (players taken at the beginning of the draft who have a history of producing); you also invest in upside by seeing value in a player later in the draft others may be undervaluing (players coming off a bad year, players who can get playing time this season-as opposed to true platoon players, players who have new teams or new team members or managers/hitting coaches/pitching coaches who can make a difference in their overall stats, etc).

There is luck involved. But I think bad luck happens if a player has an off year or injury. That’s just part of the game I suppose although I don’t think it is usually a big part- maybe 15-20% or so at the most.