While the real execs got to live in up in Vegas, we are going to have to make due with this crappy blog. I thought we could get some discussion going regarding any rule changes/expansions for 2009 on the blog instead of having to sift through old emails.
Issue #1: Expansion
There has been some discussion for adding more teams to the league. I am definitely in favor as a 6 team league is a bit limiting. We expanded the rosters last year to compensate for only having 6 teams and I think it worked out pretty well. Without doing any sort of calculations based on position scarcity, I feel like we could add one more team with the current roster configuration. If we added 2 teams, I think we would have to eliminate a pitcher spot.
The next question would be how to add keepers to the team(s). It could be as simple as letting them have their pick anyone remaining after the original teams select their keepers.
Issue #2: Draft Order
Last year I think we took the bottom 3 teams and assigned them draft picks 1-3 and then took the top 3 teams and assigned them spots 4-6. I think this gives too much incentive to try to punt your season as you will at least be guaranteed a top 3 pick. It probably isn't fair to change the rules for this season, but we should for next year I think.
If anyone has any other issues to discuss, let's try to keep everything on this blog for easy access.
19 comments:
As far as draft order goes, should we just make it completely random, but weighted based on rank? So last place has a 6/21 chance, 5th place 5/21, 4th place 4/21, 3rd place 3/21, etc. If anyone is wondering how the percentages work out and don't feel like doing any math, it's about 5% (more or less), chance out of 21. So 6th place has about a 30% chance, while 5th has about a 25% chance. This seems pretty fair to me, but what does everyone else think?
I'd like the bottom part of the odds to be "flatter". I also think there should be some kind of minor penalty for finishing last. How about odds looking like this (chances/22)
1st: 1
2nd: 3
3rd: 4
4th: 5
5th: 5
6th: 4
So the percentages would look something like this:
1st 5%
2nd 14%
3rd 18%
4th 23%
5th 23%
6th 18%
Why would you penalize for finishing last? First of all, none of this can happen this year, as that would be grossly unfair to me. Second of all, I don't think people really tend to punt their season. I've never seen any evidence of it; on the contrary, people (i.e. me) tend to think they are "in it" for far longer than they actually are.
In terms of league expansion I am very in favor. 8 Teams would be great, and I think the drafting of non-kept players would work - the expansion teams would be pretty good, but that's fine.
I definitely agree that penalizing the last place team is unnecessary, and that I really don't see people punting the season. I said it last year at this time, and Spencer's right that he demonstrated last season that we're all gonna stay in it and keep playing. Pride is all that's on the line, but in a league where people generally know each other I think it's enough to keep people behaving. This isn't a Yahoo league full of strangers - if someone punts they're gonna alienate themselves. I don't think we need any other preventions than that.
I wasn't really crazy about limiting the top 3 teams to the bottom 3 picks and vice versa last year (mostly because it gave the 4th place team a huge advantage since they couldn't pick in the bottom 3, the 3rd place team a large disadvantage because they couldn't pick in the top 3), but I'm also not crazy about leaving open the possibility that the top team (that's me!) could get the first or second pick, or that the worst team could get the worst pick. I'm not sure why we would make that a possibility. I don't think the first place team should be able to get the first pick (or the second, really), or that the worst team should be able to end up with the worst pick.
I'm no math whiz, so I'm having a little trouble understanding Andrew and Bill's proposals. These chances would the chances of what exactly - the chance of picking first? Of getting the first choice of draft position? What happens when the first pick has been determined, do we just pull all the balls for that player? I'm unclear about the proposals.
I'm very apprehensive about league expansion, mostly because I fear diluting the talent pool to a frustrating level. The football league expansion worked really well, though Mark brought up legitimate concerns about QB availability midseason, and there was some obvious frustration there. We have deep rosters and deep benches in this league, and I really think we're going to find our players stretched very thin if we add two teams without a significant decrease in roster spots.
I'm also not really sure why people feel the need to expand. What is it that drives you to say we should add teams? Are there people who want into the league, or would we be looking for people? I've heard people say that increasing the league size would add "legitimacy," but I don't really understand how or why that would be the case. Mark says that a 6 team league is limiting - but how? What can't you do that you could do with 2 more teams? It would open up trade possibilities, but it's not like we've had a lack of trading in our league. A larger league would decrease your chances of winning, as well. It might sound otherwise, but I don't have strong feelings against expansion (except for my concerns about player depth), I'm just confused as to why people have strong feelings in favor of it.
That said, I guess one thing to consider when thinking about league expansion is the future of the teams that are currently in the league. I'm gonna be entering clinical rotations in May, and then next May will be going into practice. I'll probably be working a hell of a lot in the next 5 years, but I fully intend to stay in the league and be very active. I just might not be as present as I am now. I know Luke will be graduating and going into the Navy in May 2010, but I don't know how much he'll be able to take part in the league or what his plans are.
I should probably take the next 5 minutes and pay attention to the end of this lecture, but I really don't care about equine foot lameness. No foot, no horse.
We will change the draft format for next year. The current format gives too big of an advantage for finishing last, but I guess it would be unfair to change it now- although if we had a different system in place already I doubt it would have changed the standings any. I don't see a need to penalize the last place finisher either, so I'd be in favor of Andrew's proposal (1/21.... 6/21)
For this upcoming draft we can do the same thing as last year:
Top 3 teams draft 4,5,6
Bottom 3 teams draft 1,2,3
We allowed teams to chose their draft pick though, so even if you finished last and got the #1 pick, you could decide to use that pick for the 6th pick.
Not sure what the odds were... does anyone remember?
For expansion, I think Kate would be good as she was pretty active in the football league. My other suggestion would be Taylor- maybe Spencer can spend a little social capital to get him on board?
However, I think if we had 8 we would also be pretty thin on the infield positions... here are my rough calculation of position scarcity using 8 fantasy teams and 14 AL teams.
C = 8/14 (57%)
1B/3B = 24/28 (86%)
2B/SS = 24/28 (86%)
OF = 32/42 (76%)
UTL = 8/24 (33%)
SP = 40/56 (71%) (5 starters per fantasy team/4 starters per AL team)
RP = 16/14 (114%) ~assuming everyone wants 2 closers~
This doesn't take into consideration cross overs. I suspect that there are more outfielders that are 1b/3b eligible than are 2b/ss, so there may be a little more wiggle room in the CI.
When you factor in the bench and some teams using a MI as a UTL spot, you may get into a situation where there are not any starting players to pick up in the event of an injury or trade (especially if someone else grabs the injured/traded player's replacement before you).
I think having 6 teams is too few, but maybe we add one team this year and then one next year with the elimination of the ci/mi positions.
Thoughts?
I thought about the draft order for a bit longer (yeah, I didn't pay attention to the last 5 minutes of lecture), and I think I understand the draft order proposal. The odds are the chances that someone gets the first pick of draft order location.
Why the team that finished last would have the same chances of the first pick as the team that finished 3rd is completely beyond me. We'd basically be saying that there's one winner in the league and 5 losers, and that after first place is determined it doesn't matter where you end up in the league rankings. I disagree strongly with this. Bill had a much, much better team than Spencer. I don't see why we should set it up such that they have the same chance of getting the best pick in the draft.
What about giving each team a standard deviation of 1 in draft picks? I'm not sure how to explain this, but:
1st: Equal chance of drafting 6th or 5th
2nd: Equal chance of drafting 6th, 5th, or 4th.
3rd: Equal chance of drafting 5th, 4th, or 3rd.
...
6th: Equal chance of drafting 2nd or 1st.
didn't read caleb's post before i posted mine, so I'll add some additional comments regarding expansion.
First, completely understand whatever situations may come up with work/life/etc. Those we can deal with then and I am sure we could find someone to take over or provide interm GM duties.
Having 6 teams is limiting in a few ways. Trading is one as your legitimate trading partners towards the end of the season are relatively few. It's not terrible, but having more teams, even just 2, would give you a lot more options of adding the skill sets you need. If the top 3 teams are most active in trading and instead of having the bottom 3 interested in trading you have the bottom 5 trading you have just increased the players you can look at by 67%.
Also, in terms of the standings, having 8 teams would make it more interesting. You would see more opportunities to gain points in the standings than we currently have with 6 teams. This would help increase trading beyond the typical dump trades I think.
But, as I laid out in the previous post, I think we would have to scale back the rosters as there doesn't seem to be enough talent in the AL to support our current roster format (which I like). So I guess it comes down to whether we like our current roster format enough not to expand or if we want to scale it back for expansion.
Alright, I guess a penalty for last is out, and it should be regressed more. But I think it is important for every team to have at least a chance, albeit very slim, to get their first choice of pick.
Last year we did this:
4-6th place had guaranteed 1-3 pick.
6th place: 50% (3 "pingpong balls")
5th place: 33% (2 "pingpong balls")
4th place: 17% (1 "pingpong ball")
And an analogous format for the teams that finished 1-3.
What I don't like about that format is that it creates a HUGE gap in draft position between 3rd and 4th. Also, I don't like the guaranteed draft pick. If you're in the middle of the pack, and decide to punt the season, aren't the good keepers you're picking up enough? Why should you be guaranteed a great draft pick as well?
I think, that for next year we should just do 1 ball/place, which yields:
Place %
6 29%
5 24%
4 19%
3 14%
2 10%
1 5%
With this format, the teams that finished in the bottom 3 have a 70% chance of getting the #1 pick, and it doesn't have any artificial breaks.
I'm pro expansion as well - another team would also lead to more volatility in the scores, along with the more trading opportunities that Mark pointed out. I think we could add a team this year without any roster problems, but an 8th might require losing the CI and MI slots, which could possibly be replaced with a second utility slot, if we wanted to keep larger rosters.
Blogger just ate my long reply to you guys.
Short version:
I see Mark's point (especially the increased standings volatility thing), and can get behind that.
I like Bill's new draft chances a lot better.
I would suggest eliminating a few roster spots, even to add just one team. I'd eliminate one P, the MI, and either the CI or a bench spot, for a total of 3. If we all had rosters that were smaller by 1 pitcher, we could fill a new roster of pitchers without dipping significantly into the free agent pool. The MI class is pretty destitute as it is, and we'd stretch it very thin by adding a team.
Also, before you give me too much credit, that was Andrew's initial suggestion about the new draft setup.
My short version:
I don't see why every team should have a chance at the number 1 spot. I think we should view the top 2 spots in the league as "making the playoffs" - they are automatically not in consideration for the top pick. The rest could then be allocated %s. Why would we hope for an outcome where Caleb (or whoever next year) would get the top pick? That would be more grossly unfair than the gap between 3rd and 4th (or 2nd and 3rd in my suggested format).
I'm very in favor of expanding the league. I for one like having to dig deeper into the rosters so that's one. Secondly, it just creates more chatter/talk, which is fun as well. I'd suggest adding 2 teams to the league and then elminating the CI/MI positions. I think the pitchers can stay since there are plenty of middle relievers and it would be fun to get them involved (as we were trying to do last year).
In terms of people, I agree Kate will be good. Taylor is 1) unlikely to be convinced unless it is daily and both leagues and 2) is not very active on trash talking etc. But unless other people have other options (that vaguely fall within this social group, which I think is fun) he might be our best one.
I agree with all the arguments against our current draft setup. Mainly, it gives too much incentive to punt the season (i.e. get a good keeper or two PLUS a good draft pick).
So we'll keep the bad system for this year and change it to Andrew's system next year unless everyone is on board with the new system for this year, which I suspect the bottom 3 teams won't be.
I think we should add one team this year and then possibly one the next year. I haven't given this much thought, but I think just letting the new team keep anyone not kept might be too good. We might go with a system where the new team can only pick one non-keeper player from each team. That might even it out better.
damn it, stop posting while I am writing my responses, ok>?!?!
In response to Spencer:
I don't think that it is a big deal for the top team to have a shot at the top spot. The difference between teams 1 through 3 were slim. If once every twenty years, the champion gets the top spot, I am OK with that given that it smooths out the odds. I would also be OK with just taking the #1 team's "ball" out of the hat for the first pick in the draft and then put it back in.
I am not in favor of eliminating any roster spots this year (other than a P, maybe) because it will affect what players are kept. If people had known the rosters would be changed, it may have changed how they traded for keepers.
I guess I would be ok with just removing the top team's "ping pong ball" - I just think as a rule the winner should not get the top draft pick, period.
The expansion team would be good (if picked well) but of course not better than any one else's team by logic. I'm sure they would take remaining keepers from Bill and Mark's team and be pretty darn good. I'd be fine with either system. A more natural expansion process (where the team is almost always worse in its first year) would be the suggested take one player from each team that wasn't kept - that would probably work fine.
also logistically adding just kate would probably work well, since we don't necessarily have a good candidate for team 2.
I'm fine with a more gradual expansion. That would allow the expansion teams to be competitive right away - there will likely be lots of "unkeepable" talent on rosters next year as well. Also, since it is rotisserie we don't need to worry about always having an even number of teams.
I agree with Mark - it would be nice to keep the starting positions the same for next year, and allow my 2B fetish to continue for one more season. I'm OK with leaving a P slot in as well, we'd finally include middle relievers as viable players.
I like adding one team and seeing how it goes. As far as draft order goes, I kind of like Spencer's idea of taking my initial idea and just removing the top person's chance at the number one spot, then add it back in once that is done. What do people think about that? Would you want me to do up percentages?
Post a Comment