Think something should be done with the auto draft...UPDATE!

[JONCHUCKERY]

[quote:0da6efd0e4="voovits"]I'm a fan of the current way the auto draft works. It adds an additional layer of strategy to the game. It's one of my favorite aspects of this game.
Who you try to draft and where you put them on your card are critical. You know you're taking a risk when you put the popular players on your card.
It's all about combining the risk of the popular players along with the relative safety of the less popular players.

I have had my fair share of bad drafts, but I've had plenty of good ones. I have had what I thought were bad drafts lead to good teams and what I thought were good drafts lead to bad teams. No matter how many guys I miss, there is always someone out there who I could pick up in preseason that I am happy with using on my team.

On that note, I have been a fan of YountFans option 2 for a long time, and I think that would only enhance the strategy and the fun of the autodraft.[/quote:0da6efd0e4]

I would have to disagree about the adding strategy part for this reason...if 3 players list the same guy as their #1 card then you are only dealing with the luck of who drafts 1st. Say Stargell is #1 for 3 teams and those teams draft 1,2,3 in the random order of the draft...rather than compensate them with at least a viable option among players not even listed by any team, say Yas, Reggie, or Clemente in this case...those 2 teams are left with Hisle and Watson as the leftovers. If teams draft stars and there are stars available, just at a higher price, then why not compensate with that?

I also don't get the whole not drafting stars thing...I don't see how you win year in year out without 1-3 star players unless you just hope to get lucky and hit top flight cards of lesser player...I understand that F Howard can have seasons like Stargell but year for year you'll never get the consistency from Howard that Stargell gets you. I've had Stargell's worst card hit 45HRs and drive in 113...in a million years you won't get that from a guy of 6mil or less' worst card

[voovits]

Your #1 and 2 picks are always going to be the biggest gamble, there's not much you could do about that. I do find though, that if I miss on my superstar picks, there's usually someone else out there who I would be OK settling on. The gamble you take on the top picks is one of the reasons why I'm a big proponent of a depth chart to the draft card. The real strategy is how the rest of the card is filled out.
I'm not nearly as schooled in the 70s player pool as I am in the 80s, but in the 80s game, I always place McReynolds and often times Lezcano at the bottom of my draft card and I get them both almost all the time. Neither are superstars, but both are solid contributors who could help the team in 3 out of 5 seasons. I know most people don't like McReynolds, and I hope it stays that way because he's always been good to me.
I'm sure the 70s has that same group of guys (I'd bet Lezcano is one of them there too) who are solid but usually go undrafted.
There are 25 players on your draft card. If you could work on getting #'s 3-25 right, then if you happen to miss out on the first 2 picks, you won't take nearly as big of a hit. That is part of the strategy of creating the draft card and one of the aspects I love about it.

On that note, you can't beat a live draft.

[The Senators]

As far as Watson goes, I believe he is a great value in a pitcher's park. I have listed him last many times when I play in a pitcher's park and almost always get him. In other words, for my 25th player listed, I get a .300, 20+ HR, 100+ RBI guy. That ain't too shabby. He's not cheap by any means but he's consistently very good. In a hitter's park there are better options, I believe.

[kenhutchings]

After reading this thread, something I got to wondering about was why a manager has to be locked into the ball park he chooses before the Auto Draft. I realize that the program would have to be tweaked, but why shouldn't a manager be able to choose which ball park he wants after the Auto Draft but before the season starts? That way, if you draft with the intention that you're building a team for Yankee Stadium, but you fail to get the players you wanted, then you can choose a ball park more tailored for the players you end up with.

:?: :?:

[ggrover15]

they did that with ATG i think and everyone got upset. I think it is a great idea for the 70's and 80's game. I love to play in yankee but in an auto draft it is a scary thing to try. I would love to have the choice of changing parks before the season starts.

[PracticalDoc]

Interesting thread here and I agree that there is strategy for the lower picks. I also strongly agree and have often wondered why I can't pick the stadium or at least change my stadium AFTER the draft. My strategy could change from hitting to pitching, or offense to defense just based on having a lousy draft!

[JONCHUCKERY]

Proving again I'll never figure out this game...The team in question on page 1 just won the championship of the league. Game 7 of the Finals was tonight at Yankee Std. J Hunter had a no-no broken up in the 7th, got hurt and was out of the game in the bottom of the 7th, and Heaverlo & Tekulve finished it off for a 3-0, 1 hit shutout to win the series.

Crazy because I ended up with the best overall record in the league and managed to set a new personal high in team victories. It also marked the 1st time I've had two 20 game winners on a team. I can only assume HAL and the SOM Gods felt bad for me and decided to unleash a wave of good fortune! :lol: This of course means my next 6 teams will be 90 game losers :evil: :x !!

Team link...
http://fantasygames.sportingnews.com/baseball/stratomatic/70s/team/team_other.html?user_id=77186

[Hakmusic]

i think this is part of what Voovits was saying. If we always got our drafts, we'd always play the same team. By getting bad drafts, we have to be creative, take chances, make moves etc.

I like it.

that said, I still think that Yount Fan's first suggestions, the using the waivers model to slide your picks up when one is taken ahead of you, is the best solution.

[Outta Leftfield]

[quote:0483e258f7="Hakmusic"]i think this is part of what Voovits was saying. If we always got our drafts, we'd always play the same team. By getting bad drafts, we have to be creative, take chances, make moves etc.

I like it.

that said, I still think that Yount Fan's first suggestions, the using the waivers model to slide your picks up when one is taken ahead of you, is the best solution.[/quote:0483e258f7]

I'm OK with the current autodraft. Like others I've had my bad drafts and my good drafts, but it adds to the challenge. One redeeming feature of a bad draft is that if you have an early waiver pick, you can sometimes scoop up a great player that way. For example, in my first 90s league I had the second waiver pick and got Chipper and Pedro...not too shabby. Working waivers effectively is at least as important as working the autodraft.

Assuming the autodraft isn't going to change any time soon, YF's suggestion that you avoid drafting too many popular players is good advice. I've pretty much given up on Stargell for the 70s (though I could get him when the game first came out) because he's just too darn popular--for good reason. If you try for him, since he's more expensive than all the other popular LFs, you end up with somebody like Watson. I find I CAN get Brett or Schmidt or Foster or Rice #1, so I'm often going to go for one of them. But I wouldn't try to get Brett, Rice and Foster all in the same draft. After round 1, I try to draft a player one level higher than I think he's probably going to get drafted by others. So if I think Ferguson Jenkins is going to go in round 4, I'll try for him in round 3. This means asking for a little less than you'd really like to have, but it often leads to better results. After you've gone through a few autodrafts, you get a sense of what's realistic, and what isn't.

BTW, the tricky thing about YF's Option 1--which I otherwise like-- (and this is perhaps what he means about it causing other problems that might be just as bad) is that if Rice slides up to #1, and then your next guy and then your next guy, it creates problems when you have to draft a roster of 25 players. If you get, say, 17 of your top 25, as The Senators got in the same draft, Option 1 would mean that you've only got 17 players on your roster. So, either the rules would have to allow going into waivers with short rosters, or you'd need a list of 50 players going into the autodraft to be sure you had a roster of 25 at the end of the autodraft. Either of these situations might create worse problems than

[Outta Leftfield]

[quote:eca2fa02cc="Outta Leftfield"]
Assuming the autodraft isn't going to change any time soon, YF's suggestion that you avoid drafting too many popular players is good advice.[/quote:eca2fa02cc]

BTW, perhaps I should add that there's a distinction between popular players and GOOD players. When veteran managers advise avoiding too many popular players, what they mean is that there are certain players (e.g. Stargell) who are really, really, REALLY popular. Three or four people might try to draft Stargell in round one, and six or seven would be drafting him if they thought they could get him. OTOH, there are other players who might be as good, or almost as good, who aren't quite so popular. For example, Foster. He has 4 really good years, but for whatever reason, he's not quite so popular, so you might be able to get him in the 2nd or 3rd round.

So if you try to draft, say, five really popular players in the first five rounds, you're probably not going to get all of them and you might not even get any of them. A balance of popular and not so popular (but still very good) players can make for an effective draft list. I tend to have a list in the back of my head of players I think are good and somewhat underappreciated. Probably half my draft list is generally stocked with such players. Finding the good but underappreciated players is part of the challenge.