[JosephC]

Originally Posted by bam-bam

So, I'm going to bring this thread back for a bit. Small ideas, but hopefully something that could improve the community a bit.

Could it be possible that we could do drafts within Google Docs? This can allow for some banter between the members of the of the FF teams, perhaps giving a better sense of community here. On top of that, it eliminates a lot of the problems on Chief Delphi for the last rounds, where there are minute updates. After each draft, the drafts can be listed in the Chief Delphi thread. I can come up with a small template in Google Docs, and keep all drafts in one location as necessary. Is it possible that we could implement this into the league-wide FF drafts for next season (MAR, FiM, etc.)?

In addition, I really like the idea of keeping the scored drafts in Google Docs. Granted, the current format is not really in the best shape right now, but that's no big deal as we had to rush the formatting a bit. I can take the summer to figure out something, and see if the scorers could just enter awards and record of each team. I can also come up with a live ranking list like something similar to Brennan's to prepare for the next season.

Unfortunately, I don't know enough to actually be able to pull data out from the Blue Alliance online for records and whatnot, so the scorers will still have to search each team and put down the record for the event. If someone could point me in the right direction, that would greatly be appreciated.

If anything for the future, as it seems like we have the general format of the FF set in stone, something to improve the waiver system would be... well... awesome. It's a massive headache, especially when a team drops like earlier in the season. There may be something that could be done in Excel, but this seems like a HUGE task for me to do, anyway.

I would gladly help you with making a Google Doc/Excel automatic system after the Season is over. I was already planning on working on it myself.

I know a couple of teams do live picks, but would it really be the end of the world to have every make lists in google docs (or excel) and send them in? Most teams already do this. I'm pretty sure I can come up with a way to compile all of the lists in one Google Doc/Excel and run drafts automatically, building upon what EricH has already built. That way, when it comes to scoring, the team lists can be automatically pulled in and scored, since taking the team lists from CD and putting them into Google Docs is the worst part of scoring(and the most time comsuming). I'm also 99% sure there's some way to automatically score the events, using twitter data perhaps? I'm going to get into contact with whoever runs TBA and see how they pull the data into their site, I'm sure there's a way to incorporate that into FF and automatically score events.

With everyone using google docs for their picklists, we wouldn't have to set "draft dates" anymore. Instead we could have "due dates" when your pick list is due by. This way, we wouldn't have to worry about scoring 2-3(possibly even 4 with the way FRC is growing) events everyday, and instead draft runners could come in on a day they have off, run a couple macros really quick, and have 10 drafts done, and post the results on CD.

We already use the honor system to make sure draft runners use their own picklists and don't steal other teams, so compiling all the lists in one place where only the draft runners have access to the doc would be really simple, all it takes is copying and pasting from one doc to the automatic draft running one.

This would also make scoring much faster, team lists would already be in google docs, and by using whatever system TBA uses, team scores could be pulled in, event scored, and then posted to CD.

The only thing issue it doesn't solve is the burden on teams. If we stuck with the current system, teams would still have to make a picklist for every event. While this isn't a problem for me since I like doing it, it is an issue for a couple teams.

EDIT: Waivers could be done with a Google form. Use Excel to check the current team list against the old one, and make a list of all the teams that joined recently, and those that have left. Use Google forms for teams to submit which teams they want to claim, since Google forms dumps results in a predictable manor in a Google Doc, use that to automatically cycle waivers, and post the results on CD, Also automatically updating the priority list.

And yes, I'm volunteering to have this done by next season, I don't have anything better to do. Thoughts?

EDIT #2: It took me about 5 minutes to create a refreshable web query in Excel pulling ranking/team list data from Here.

Goal listed above seems a lot easier than I first thought.