This is the only idea I like. Instead of a random team the player gets ____, they can arrive later and change it out or after the draft it will be filled randomly.
I don’t like the locks on the drafts until the day before the competition.
You mean after, right? As in, after the draft? Because if you didn’t read it that way, then I think you’re misunderstanding me.
I’m not sure I like the blank spaces idea. Could it be done? Probably. But let’s say that Elgin Clock is playing and says, I want all random picks in the Hawaii Regional. Do you a) give him random teams in the draft while it is still going on, or do you b) wait until the end, when the random list is mostly empty and has no good teams left on it? Either way, somebody’s going to be unhappy about it.
[Note: I’m picking on Elgin because he has the tendency to make random picks late in the season; no other reason.]
At the risk of overwhelming this thread with a bunch of different suggedtions I’m going to throw mine into the mix.
I recommend leaving the random team system the way it is. It still penalizes players for missing drafts and does so much more severely than systems in other fantasy sports which assign the next highest player on a projected points list.
My idea for team pickup is to institute a waiver wire. What this means is that each player is assigned a waiver priority. The initial priorities would be reverse order of finish from last year’s season league with new players inserted at the top in random order. When new teams are added to events or a player is booted the team will be placed on waivers. A team remains on waivers for some set period of time (probably 24 hours) where players can submit waiver claims, then the team gets processed. The player with the highest priority that puts in a claim is awarded the team. That player then moves to the bottom of the priority list. If a player wants to make multiple claims during one waiver period they must list the order they want their claims processed in. If a team passes through waivers with no claims they become free and anyone can pick them up at any time.
Reading my explanation, it sounds really confusing, but the system is really not quite as complicated as it sounds.
The waiver priority list and claims would all be handled in one thread which I would volunteer to handle.
I’m in (also for my first season).
So, what you’re saying is that new players and players who did poorly last year get first crack at newly available teams. Anybody who wants X newly available team submits a claim, then the team goes to whoever has top priority and wants them. If you claim a team successfully, you’re automatically at the bottom of the priority list–and if nobody wants a team during the waiver period, they’re designated a free agent, first-come-first-serve.
I like it.
- Koko Ed
- Vikesrock
- rtfgnow
- Barry Bonzack
- Chris is me
- Akash Rastogi
- dodar
- hill
- Clinton Bolinger
- EricH
- R.C.
- Karibou
Yep, that summary is pretty much right on. We can tune the waiver period to make it closer to first come-first serve or closer to giving good teams away to players that haven’t performed as well to help balance things.
For the small number of inseason changes that happen, the priority would likely be the inverse of the standings as of that week.
I was thinking more like this:
newly-available team: Any team that becomes available for any reason more than X time after a draft (say 24 hours–that’s usually enough time to settle down any post-draft trades).
During the drafting/build seasons, newly-available teams go through the waiver process as outlined above.
During competition, the priority is based on number of missing teams, and current standings (each missing team being equivalent to Y leapfrogs higher up the list, and standings in reverse order).
The problem is that it penalizes the people diligent enough to actually care who they draft too. I don’t see how replacing a team with a blanked out square for a half hour will kill the drafts.
If someone is making a lot of random picks, they’ll probably get the boot anyways. If someone simply missed a draft due to unforeseeable circumstances, then they’ll be much relieved that they got a good team. Or, what’s more likely, they ran out of teams on their list and will take whoever, so it’s not like the teams are going to be the greatest anyway. If 111 slips to the third round of a draft with one or two random teams, and gets picked by the randomizer for somebody, there are much worse problems than the randomizer!
I fail to see how replacing a team with a blanked-out square will help anything at all.
I just feel that giving people that miss a draft the absolute bottom of the barrel is too harsh.
I don’t see the randomizer as penalizing people that show up, the randomizer will never be better than people who are actually putting time into their lists over the number of events in this league. What the randomizer does do is give some chance of getting a decent team or two if you miss a draft for whatever reason. For example, I missed one draft all of last season because I fell asleep before the draft and had forgotten to send in my list, the randomizer helped soften the blow a little by giving me at least one team I held onto.
I would like to hear Ed’s take on this.
In for now.
- Koko Ed
- Vikesrock
- rtfgnow
- Barry Bonzack
- Chris is me
- Akash Rastogi
- dodar
- hill
- Clinton Bolinger
- EricH
- R.C.
- Karibou
- RMiller
As for issues:
- There needs to be a better method for when people are dropped from the league than who can hit enter fastest. In a sports fantasy league there are “undroppable” players to prevent people from having first round draft picks all over. It is also quite unfair when there are multiple tiers and one ends up with 10 people and the other ends up with 5. I know, I benefited from this multiple times.
I don’t think the waiver line quite addresses this, particularly when there are an unbalanced number of people in each.
A proposed solution: Break people into actual tiers (maybe 6-8 people each) that you always draft against. For instance, perhaps Barry and Kevin would always be tier 1 and Eric and I are always tier 2 (for this year). Base it on previous years’ (note plural) initially. After that, have promotions/relegation at the end of the year like soccer in Europe. Maybe the bottom two drop a tier and top two go up a tier. That way a lot of the issues are solved. Folks in tier 1 and probably 2 at the least will not have people dropping, missing lots of drafts, etc.
Even if someone drops from a tier, you are not going to have a major advantage (see below for a couple of ideas on what to do with the teams).
Potential issue: is only tier one in competition for “awards”? (you probably can’t use overall point total, particularly if the number of people in each tier is unbalanced)
Maybe have this for the “regular season” and then for the “postseason” (MSC, Championships) have a mass event.
- “New teams” - I like the waiver wire approach here, but I think that the team needs to be announced in the draft that it has been added once it is noticed with 24 hours or so after the announcing to claim the team.
Issue: two people claim a team… who gets it.
The issue I have with the proposed waiver line is thus: 1) I was first in line, but yesterday 1816 showed up as an option for Wisconsin. Knowing it would be an upgrade, I grabbed them. Today, 67 showed up as an option for Kettering. I have no chance of getting them now. 2) I just grabbed 1816 for Wisconsin. Now I can lay a claim to any team I want with no repercussions to my waiver line position until someone actually grabs a team.
Also, who is going to keep track of the waiver line order and how will it be done? With random tiers, two people grab 67, who gets put last on the waiver line?
Proposed solution(s): I like the idea of different levels of claims. For instance in case 1, I am willing to grab 1816 at a level three, but 67 at a level one. If someone wants 1816 at a level two, they have a higher priority, but if I am first in line at level one, I get 67 even if I just got 1816. The issue is this is even harder to keep track of.
Maybe you have to give up a team in the that draft and the person with the highest offer (in terms of draft position) gets the new team, but drops the old team. The newly dropped team then has the same procedure. Only issue is that changes close to the add/drop deadline are very difficult. This might not be a big issue though.
I think overall, I like the second method better. It can also be used when someone quits the league or is kicked out.
- Random picks. I am fine how things went this season for the random picks. Yes, it sucks when the random pick before is what you want, but it is very rare.
If it is a major sticking point, perhaps for the first round only, leave the space blank until the end of the round and then fill with a random. I would want to leave an exception there for someone who specifically says random, whether via PM or in the draft thread. It might be because they have looked and are okay with what they see.
Just some ideas.
I know that I do my best to have the same number of people in each tier when running a draft. Having the same number of people in each tier in every draft is well-nigh impossible.
We did used to run where players X, Y, and Z could expect to be all in the same tier, given the same number of tiers. It was determined that more people seemed to like completely random, so that was switched to. (Something about always getting stuck with Barry or Kevin in your tier being, well, annoying, to say the least.) The main reason the tiers changed size was that people dropped out. Some tiers were decimated due to the first 5 drops randomly winding up there.
We’ve had the promotion/demotion idea proposed before. Ed declined it, saying that if someone wanted to run it that way, then they could start their own league.
The idea with the waivers is that, whenever somebody drops or a new team is detected in the list, any teams affected would go on waivers, with waiver priority given to lower-ranked players (higher on the priority list) and the addition announced.
To address your issues with the waiver idea:
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If you want to make multiple claims before a waiver period expires, go right ahead and specify which one is to get priority. Let’s say that 1114 enters Los Angeles and 67 enters Arizona later the same day. You claim both, and I claim both, but you specify that 67 is to take priority and I specify 1114 as top priority. As long as the waiver period has not expired for team X when team Y is claimed, if Y is specified as a priority, then Y would go to you instead of X.
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Pretty much. That’s a problem? If they’re any good, somebody farther up the list will claim them. (Look, if 1114 passes through an entire waiver period without being claimed except by the person on the bottom of the priority chain, then that person deserves to get them, because nobody else is awake!)
Two people in different tiers grabbing the same incoming team: maintain current list order would work pretty well.
I was thinking that any teams dropped as a result of waiver trades should also go on waivers, but free-agent (pool) trades would be pretty much unregulated, the same as previously. Specify the waiver trade team (i.e., 67, 111, 16 are your alliance in Midwest, and 1114 becomes available, you specify that you’d ditch 111 to pick up 1114).
As for who would run the waivers, Kevin has volunteered, and I can assist as well (hey, I’m the guy who’s always looking for missing teams, why not add new teams?).
Two things to remember: 1) any teams not claimed off waiver go into the pool.
- Unless and until Ed says to go for it, all the talk we’re having is merely speculation.
All who are running it have done a great job of keeping things as close to even as possible initially. The people dropping with random tier assignments is not the league’s fault - it happens. I just wonder if there is a way to make this issue less of an impact.
I wasn’t clear about the assigned tiers. I was only thinking of using that in a promotion/demotion situation (I think I put the cart before the horse there). Without that, I would agree that it is best to stay random.
How are the rankings determined, particularly pre-competition season? A random initial followed by going to the back of the line? Does this change to order based on points during the season?
I think I was a bit unclear. So, 1816 decides to join the Wisconsin regional. I was in front of the line. I know they are a good team - good chance to make eliminations, win an award, maybe go deep in eliminations, but they are by no means a perceived guarantee. They are probably a second round draft or maybe late first depending on who is at Wisconsin. They are a clear upgrade over my third round pick. I pick them up, moving to the back of the line. The day after I pick them up, 67 decides to join Kettering. Obviously, they are a first round pick anywhere. Now I am at the end of the line though with no chance of getting them.
So now people clam up and wait for the next powerhouse team. Will 111 go to Boilermaker? 217 to FLR? 330 to Arizona? etc While waiting, the last person is just happily upgrading with teams like 1816 that are upgrades, but not powerhouses. I know an 1114 type team will not make it to the end of the waiver line (unless everyone ends up in a day long coma), but what about teams that are very good teams, but not powerhouses?
Personally, that is what I like about the pseudo-auction. The only issue is that it could lead to a long string of “auctions” if an exceptionally strong team shows up.
Count me in! I’m excited and slightly scared at the hardcore-ness of fantasy FIRST.
The last day to sign up would be Tuesday November 30th though I’m leaning to start the drafts a little earlier on Friday the 26th of November.
If you guys think the whole waiver thing is more fair than the first come first serve basis then by all means let’s try it.
- Koko Ed
- Vikesrock
- rtfgnow
- Barry Bonzack
- Chris is me
- Akash Rastogi
- dodar
- hill
- Clinton Bolinger
- EricH
- R.C.
- Karibou
- RMiller
- fireyoshi