Exploring an old suggestion

[Jerlins]

Last year, after 2 years of 40 plus teams, I limited myself to 12 leagues. Of those, 3 were theme leagues, 2 were from keeper leagues, and only 7 were from autodrafts. After my initial draft with the 2009 set, I'll most likely continue with this trend.

While I often have said, 95% of the fun is the challenge of building a team, it can be a bit disheartening when at times, you need to build a team almost from scratch. Waking up and finding that not only did you miss on most of your players, the replacements obtained are so contradicting to the "theme" of your team, park, or both leads to frustration.

In my short history here in SOM online, I've seen many improvements, but for the life of me I don't understand why we continue to be subjected to an antiquated draft system. Others, including myself, have in the past suggested a draft option similar to that of Yahoo autodrafts, where, amongst other things, is the option of "do not draft". I still recall a few years ago when drafting a Minute Maid team selecting A. Jones as my first choice, only to end up with a door prize of J. Edmonds (2nd highest CF), who was totally useless with a 3/16 (if my memory serves me correctly) HR slant. This morning, this nightmare reared its ugly head, only multiple times.

Is there anything more of an extreme opposite of C. Figgins than M. Reynolds? And in a LH'd slanted pitcher's park? Sure, maybe C. Crawford and M. Ramirez, another "booby" prize that ended on my team. May as well add insult to injury by substituting a LH'd 5L C. Lee for a RH'd 7R R. Wells.

I did mention building the team was 95% of the fun. Well, I'll sure have fun over the weekend. :evil: :evil: :evil:

[bernieh]

If you could please describe in more detail what those "other things" that you like about Yahoo's autodrafts, I can consider them. Thanks!

[Jerlins]

Thanks Bernie.

1. "Do not draft" list
2. Player ranks. Your first ranked player not taken is actually the one that ends up on your team, as opposed to the "next" player at the same position. This at least allows you "some" players you desire, as opposed to none at all with the present system now in place. I'd prefer to have my 12th ranked player as my first player if I am unlucky enough to have the 12th pick and my first 11 are taken, rather than missing out on not only my #1 pick, but #'s 2 and #3 and ending up with a player in each slot that has ZERO business on my team.

That's really it in a nutshell. I honestly love this game, and have turned on more than my share of players to the game. This was a minor issue in the past, kind of an "if it happens, fine, if it doesn't, I can live with it". After this morning, it's now become a tad more than minor. Like everyone here in this community, I was excited and anxious for the new set. What happened today took the wind out of my sail. I understand everyone has the same advantage/disadvantage come draft time, but when you receive total extreme opposites as I did, well, there has to be a better way. If this happened to a 1st timer exploring the possibility of becoming a long-term customer, I'm afraid we would lose him.

[voovits]

I like the "do not draft" list idea.
I always supported a depth chart of sorts for the autodraft.
For example, if you list Pujols as #1, you could list P. Fielder as your alternate pick, so if you miss out on Pujols, the system will try to draft Fielder instead of whoever is the next highest 1B on the list.

So many times I have missed out on a player at a certain position, and have gotten an undesirable as compensation, only to see at least 1 or 2 other guys I would have much rather have instead, and were cheaper than the guy I got I originally got.

[joethejet]

Jerlins,

I know what you mean, but realize making the computer figure out what you would have done if it were a live draft isn't all that simple.

If it's as simple as a "do not pick list", that's one thing that wouldn't be very hard. Or, are you just expecting to put multiple choices in for every pick?

Player ranks are tricky as what if you have, let's say, Tulo and Han Ram as your 1-2, you certainly don't want both.

I'm sure it can be improved (e.g. picking non * starters when you have 3 *'s already, or picking a LHSP when you specified a RHSP). I'm just saying it's a challenge to get right and not cause even more consternation.

I think it's an interesting discussion however. What exactly would you propose?

Jet
www.angelfire.com/games5/joethejet

[Jerlins]

I understand your point that you don't wish to get both Tulo and Ramirez, but it's at least a better option than what is presently constructed. My proposal is similar to the Yahoo fantasy leagues. I rank my players in order of desirability. It entails having to rank more than 25 players, and depending on how lazy you are, might entail putting 100 plus players in order of desirability. Let's say I want to build a pitchers park team based on good hitting, good D, and good pitching. My draft list is as follows:

1. Figgins
2. Crawford
3. Span
4. Markakis

As luck would have it, I have the 9th pick overall and my #'s 1, 2, and 3 players get taken. This is what happens in both draft systems:

Yahoo:
1. Figgins (taken)
2. Crawford (taken)
3. Span (taken)
4. Markakis (received)

TSN:
1. Figgins (receive Reynolds)
2. Crawford (receive M. Ramirez)
3. Span (receive Guitierez)
4. Markakis

In Yahoo, at least I receive my 4th desired player, and with my next 3 picks might receive my 10th, 21st, and 28th desired, which if that being the case, most likely still leaves me with a very workable team. My 21st ranked player might be a Bourn, Ellsbury, etc, and at least I'll get a CF that I can use. In the TSN scenario, I might have Markakis, but unless I listed 4 each of LF's, CF's, or 3rd baseman, I'll end up with those players mentioned as my "booby prize" and have to build a lineup from scratch using whatever undesirables are left to pick from. Having to rank 100 or 150 players as opposed to being limited to 25 at least gives everyone a chance to at least keep their team's theme somewhat intact.

As a veteran, I can make do with having to build a team needing EVERY position in my lineup save for 2nd, SS, and 1st. I've had to do it many times in the past. As a new player coming in, I'd find myself totally disenchanted with having to build my team from scratch, especially when I thought I built a decent competive team. If I ended up with the team that was totally foreign to what I envisioned and CONTRARY TO THE EXTREME as was my case, as a noob I wouldn't be back for another team.

[Al Hogg]

Bernie,

If you are considering improvements in the draft function, please think about setting up a "live"/"manual" draft function within the game itself. I'm talking about something like www.somdraft.com, only with time limit enforcement, so if somebody doesn't pick during their time allotment, the draft engine would automatically given them a random 50-cent player. This would avoid requiring people to all be online at the same time, as the current "live draft" does.

A certain competitive baseball simulation site has done this quite well. I won't name names here, but could let you know which I am thinking about if you want to PM me.

Also, it would be nice if those setting up leagues could set salary caps other than $60 million/$80 million/$100 million, but that is another topic.

Note also the 2009 Ramon Ramirez card seems to combine the stats of two different Ramon Ramirez's. I noted this in another post.

[LoopsandRolls]

The ballpark is known. How about we add three choices to each player on the draft list.

Next best available
Next best RH
Next best LH

[Jerlins]

And to clarify from my last post, I'd also have Reynolds and Manny on my "Do not draft" list. Playing in a non-dh league with Oakland as my park, I'm guessing there are fewer worse choices than those two.

[The Godfather]

I can tell you as a new player, this is the biggest obstacle keeping me from trying an Auto-Draft league. Trying to set up a draft card that will leave you with a decent team is a pretty daunting task and when I hear veterans having trouble with it, that tells me that it's probably over my head. I don't have an issue with having a salary cap and have actually enjoyed playing in two different 2-Team Theme Leagues that had salary caps. But I feel like in that type of theme league (drafting whole team rosters) and Live Drafts, you have much more control over who you get.

Is there any way that a salary cap could be incorporated with the Live Draft system? I don't know how much work that would require besides listing a current running total (or "cash available") for each team. Obviously the computer may have to set draft choice restrictions at a certain "cash available" level in the draft (only letting you draft $500k players, etc.) depending on the salary cap. Maybe there could be some type of indicator like "average $ available per player" so you can gauge which positions you can spend a little more or less on during the draft?

I know some people don't like to sit through a Live Draft, but I think the Live Draft w/ salary cap would be the best of both worlds. And I think the adjustable time for each draft pick may help speed things along...