Barnstormers 2010 new rules announced

[mighty moose]

[b:2469d6ecb3]Changes in the Barnstormers Tour 2010 are as follows:[/b:2469d6ecb3]

1. Ballpark groupings will be eliminated. You will need to use a different stadium for each event, but you will no longer need to choose a stadium by "type". A 25-point penalty will now only exist if you duplicate a single stadium.

2. The tour will consist of 6 rounds, with only 5 rounds being mandatory. Which means you can skip a round. However, only those playing all 6 rounds will be able to drop their lowest event total. If you play 5 rounds, you will score all 5 rounds. If you play 6 rounds, you will drop your lowest scoring event.

3. The top 9 scoring players will receive a BYE into the Championship Round (last year it was top 6). The other 3 players will be determined by a semi-final round of 36 players in 3 leagues, with the World Series Winners advancing to the final 3 spots in the Championship.

4. The Championship format will be determined by a vote of all 12 players in the Championship League. The vote will consist of salary cap and DH/NO DH.

5. Subsets will not be used this year, but a more broad salary cap spread will be used. For example 80/100/140/60/100/80 in that order is being considered. It is also [u:2469d6ecb3]under consideration[/u:2469d6ecb3] to use TSN's live draft application for one of the events, in lieu of the listed cap.

6. Some of the events above will be live draft but will switch from Major Deegan's somdraft, to Adrians (agabriel) new live draft site. The "clock off nights and weekends" will probably no longer be used.

#5 and #6 above are subject to change and are not finalized at this time.

TSN Prizes are also not finalized yet until Bernie get's the word from management.

Feel free to comment on the rule changes for 2010.

[rjohaire]

I like the changes.
When do we start?
How much time between each event?

[mighty moose]

The schedule will most likely be very similiar to the 2009 tour. You can look at last years schedule here.

[url]http://fantasygames.sportingnews.com/stratomatic/tournament/barnstormers/2009[/url]

[dukie98]

Thanks for putting this together.

My thoughts-- I would prefer to keep the ballpark groupings requirement. With so many stadiums now in the mix, it seems like it would be too easy for someone to use, for example, only RH-power parks or only pitching parks, even without repeating individual stadiums. In turn, that means that players would not need to use as many different strategies throughout the tournament, and they could stay within their own tactical comfort zones. If it's simply a matter of not having classified many of the new stadiums, I'll be glad to help out on classifying them into the existing framework.

Also, I liked the AL/NL and pre-war/ post-war subsets, as they required us to dig deeper into the player pool-- though this is a lesser concern as compared to the ballpark groupings.

In any event, these are just my thoughts on the proposed changes. I'm fine with the other ones. Thanks again!

[mighty moose]

I understanding how the groupings adds an element of strategy, but it also adds complexity too. The truth is, a lot of players don't really understand groupings and it leads to penalties. 10% of Barnstormers players are what we call "skilled" or "vets" but the 90% of "casual" players - amazingly enough (it seems) don't really pay attention to the posted rules. And then they get hopping mad when it leads to them being penalized.

It'a also a logistical nightmare for me to keep track of them. I appreciate your willingness to help.

As far as the subsets, the truth is - very few people play them. I think I would garner more people willing to sign up by varying the caps than I would by keeping the subset idea. And again, it's ALSO a matter of recordkeeping on my end. Giving people a CHOICE of AL/NL or PRE/POST leagues means I have to keep track of that and create the seperate leagues necessary.

I'm sorry to say that many of the changes are driven by making things easier for me, but I offered Barnstormers out to several people to take it over for me and didn't get much in the way of any volunteers willing to do it.

If I am to continue it, I need ways to make it easier to manage.

[caimrisek]

I like it Moose...whatever is good for you...cuz I just wanna play... :D

So...let me know by email at caimrisek@hotmail.com when you start putting things together...sign ups and such...

Thank you once again for keeping it going!!!!

[Hank O]

I’m sorry to hear parks might not be a part of the next Barnstormers. It was really what set it apart for me. The different parks requirement was why I joined my first tour. While I’m just starting to look at ATG V, it seems to me that mispricing is down from IV. That makes player-park matchup more important.

In analyzing all the new parks, it occurs to me that our old Hitter-Neutral-Pitching categories weren't very meaningful. In each of those categories, we have singles parks and homerun parks, and within those categories we have Leftie—neutral—righty parks.

Forbes ’54 (5-16-1-1) is Moderate Pitching—singles--righty, for example. Cleveland ’63 (7-1-13-7) is Neutral—homerun—lefty.

That leads to a lot of potential categories, but some are empty sets. As you might expect, there are no Extreme Hitting-singles parks. And there is no Extreme Hitting-neutral-Lefty park, for example. Fenway ’71 (13-19-9-17) and Stars Park (16-19-12-19) are the only EH-neutral-Righty parks. Baker Bowl (19-12-12-16) is the only EH-n-N park.

The categorization gets arbitrary at the boundaries, isn't always meaningful, and depends on how you value HR vs. singles. That analysis is complicated by the likelihood HR park’s managers will shun pitchers with #.

But requiring players to select a park in a different category each round--including the finals-- would force players out of their comfort zone, say small ball in Forbes (17-17-1-1), Terrapin (14-14-2-1) or Royals (14-14-3-3), the 3 N-s-N parks; and the counter—sluggers at Polo in ’41 (0-0-20-20) MH-hr-N.

Enforcement would be no problem if the penalty were automatic disqualification from any final round. If you published the park selections of the finalists, the players would check for compliance.

Barnstormers needs something to set it apart from Good Peoples.

Best,

Hank

[rjohaire]

last year we started the 1st week in May. Is that when we're starting this year?

[mighty moose]

It's penciled in for May 10 - but of course I'm waiting for Bernie to wrap up some tasks before I can come out with a signup list, so the date will likely be pushed back.

[b:2090619109](I'm ALWAYS WAITING on Bernie for stuff, FYI)[/b:2090619109]

[mighty moose]

Hank O- please check your PM for a discussion about groupings. - thanks

Moose