Fangraphs has "certified" the collective intelligence of fans, to a certain extent, by including fan defensive ratings on their player cards.  

I approve of this.  I don't think that fans are infallible, but I do take collective intelligence seriously.  Baseball-fan CI is a very crude form of it :- ) but it's one source of data to exploit, and one that comes from a welcome-ly different paradigm.

Roto champ Justynius has a "secret weapon" during trade season ... he scrambles over to the hometown fans' boards and absorbs everything they have to say about the players they watch every day.  ... you do this and you think MUCH more of Casper Wells and Charlie Furbush than you did previously.

A sample, these from the Detroit Free Press:

Tigers are giving up way too much
so these pitchers better be extremely good and get the Tigers into the playoffs.

Wells is a better player right now than Austin Jackson (who strikes out too much and does not hit enough).
Wells should have been starting in RF over Magglio.
Wells plays all 3 OF slots very well, has speed, power, a rocket arm and great defense(ESPN play of the days).

Furbush will be a great #3 or #4 starter for the Mariner and is a much better pitcher than Penny right now.

The point isn't that this fan is Pedro Grifol; the point is that Casper Wells looks to them, like Mike Carp looks to us.

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Good trade I did not like seeing wells go but you got give players to get players. So anyone whining about it are problaby the ones who were whining all along for pitching and now wont be happy about this.

This is a theme you see constantly - ouch, hate to see Casper Wells go.

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Another trade that could come back to haunt Tiger fans for ten or fifteen years. Their GM either cannot draft the right players or is too impatient to wait for them to develop.

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[Another poster] DD (Tigers GM - Jeff) needs to go. He's making desperate moves now and is trading away the Tigers future to win this division with no real prospect of going anywhere in the playoffs if they do win it. And trading away any third base prospect with the big hole we have there is a really dumb idea.  Losing Wells also would not be a good idea as he has lots of potential.

Wells is slugging .490 in his first run through the bigs.  Interesting to see the theme of upside echo'ed.

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Desperation time for Dumbo. He knows they have to win the division or he's gone. Personally, I would rather have stood pat than given up Wells and Martinez for these guys, but with Mr. I lifting the ax DD had to do something and certainly no one was going to take Raburn or Inge.

The general emotion is as though the M's had given up Smoak and Taijuan Walker :- )

The fans have a hometown tilt, to be sure, especially on Martinez.  But what I like to see is the citywide optimism on Casper Wells.

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Rule No. 1 -- You have to give up something to get something. Memorize it.

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Those complaining about DD making a desperation trade, are the same that would be bashing him if he stood pat and did nothing. What I do like, is if this Fister turns out to be the real deal, then we have 4 very good starting pitchers under contract for quite some time ...  Hated losing Wells, and Martinez with such a gaping hole at 3rd, but our starting pitching should now be stronger, and the bullpen should have just improved, too. 

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Trade Casper Wells and keep Ryan Rayburn, real smart Tigers Wells will be a star, JL was just too stupid to play him everyday.

If Carp were traded, you'd go over to the Times blog and see some fans disappointed and other ones saying that Carp was nobody we cared about losing.  Nice to see the Tigers' fans -- more baseball-savvy than those in Seattle -- so sold, so soon, on Wells.

I don't say it's the gospel truth; it's just a piece of info-tainment that counts in Wells' favor.

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Fun stuff,

Dr D