The relegation thing is a fun concept and I almost suggested it instead of the extra $50 from last to first. But in both cases I find myself thinking, who really cares about 12th vs 11th? They both sucked.
I think its probably better to let people do side bets who want to do side bets, consider increasing the buy in for 2025, and if we want incentive for owners to stay competitive it can be done with weekly high score payouts (once we have a larger prize pool) and we could also explore the idea that the winner of the losers bracket gets priority for picking draft slot the following year. Something along those lines.