PETROSIAN'S NEW WEEKLY BLOG (unlocked).

Just want to note the utter lack of live new leagues filling since SOM's unleashing of the 6 team league concept on the SOM community. Perhaps the Barnstormers 2014 Tournament starting tomorrow has contributed to this situation, and March Madness as well. Perhaps...

Well my boycott of the tour is over for now. My main reason for returning is that they seem to have done away with the horrible diamond dope drafts, at least for the 6 seasons prior to the semi's and finals. That plus the lack of other leagues forming, not to mention Dr. Foster's personal invitation, caused me to reconsider my participation. Hopefully they will see their way to using SOM's live draft app, which is a much sterner test of skill than the autodraft and glitch free the past half dozen drafts I participated in.

Here is my current list of active teams. All, except the pending Barnstormer's entry, are unlimited SOM live drafts (except the unfortunate 200M live event). I note this because it illustrates my contention that these are the ultimate test of what it takes to win in ATG (not the unlimited cap, the live draft itself).

The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Petrosian's Minute Live Draft League Park '34 1st 84-60 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season The Big Freeze Ebbets Field '20 1st 86-58 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Maybe this will work Fenway Park '71 1st 87-57 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Live and Quick Fenway Park '41 1st 81-63 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Friday Night Lights Live Polo Grounds '41 1st 73-71 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Saturday Night Live Feb 1 at 1... South End Grounds '11 1st 70-53 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $200M regular season Smart Live Draft Comiskey Park '41 1st 47-34 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season SNL @10pm League Park '34 2nd 51-51 2.0
The Wrong Stuff #4897 ATG7 $999M regular season US Weather Warfare Snowstorm League Park '34 1st 63-39 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season SNOWSTORM LIGHTNING Minute Maid Field '05 1st 46-35 -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Hump Day Quickie Minute Maid Field '05 3rd 22-17 1.0
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $999M regular season Strato Night Live Dodger Stadium '78 1st 14-4 -
The Wrong Stuff Quickie ATG7 $999M choosing players - - -
The Wrong Stuff ATG7 $100M preseason Barnstormers 2014 Event #1 - L... Hilltop Park '11 - - -

I wish that we could get Nev and super typhoon in as well. You three are very successful owners and have helped many players, myself included. I look at the Barnstormers as the Olympics, where all religion, politics, and animosities can be put away. Let's just have some healthy competition among good owners and see what happens. No system is perfect. Even our own human view points are flawed.

We have a few days left, and I welcome all players, PARTICULARLY Nev - Salty - Typhoon - love to see Munich Man come back - MajorDeegan - B.o.b.b.y heck even Dobak himself. As much as I kid Nev, he's a vital and important part of this group and he should be here. Believe it or not, I do listen to the opinions of others - Petro and BruceF's gentle nudging to include the 200 Mil event wouldn't have flown with me a few years back, but as it has increased in popularity, now is the time. The current schedule of 2014 events was 100% from Bruce's recommendation.

As far as the future rolling forward with live draft, that's up to SOM - they have said the 2-3 hour per draft pick is coming so let's see if they come through. With now over 150 players, you logistically cannot do a 1-2 minute format.

And D Dope definitely has it's flaws, not to mention the lack of any reasonable speed.

Petro, I'm GLAD to see you back.

Nev deleted his post - things that make you go hmmmmmmmm.......

I wish to disagree with our esteemed blogger on a couple of points.

1. 2014 BS league #1 is league # 349076; league #11 is 349120. That means in a little more than a week, 46 teams were created. I don't see that the open league list is a lot longer than normal, so that means (to me) that they filled something like 40 leagues in 9 or 10 days. That's pretty active for this community.

2. Saying that live drafts are a truer test of skill than autodrafts is like saying that blitz chess (each player has typically 5 minutes for all his moves) is a truer test of chess skill than a slow game with a time limit of a couple of hours per player or more. It just ain't so. Autodrafts require a lot of thought in order to get the opportunity to put together a team for your ballpark and cap, live drafts require a lot of quick decisions.

No, saying that live drafts are a sterner test of skill than autodrafts is much more like saying that slow chess is a better test of chess skill than blitz. No serious chess player would argue with that. The temporal red herring aside, autodrafts involve an element of randomness or luck. That is not present with live drafts, where you, not HAL, control exactly who you get each round for your team. Autodrafts, are to a great extent a guessing game, which although a skill set in itself, does not afford the level of control of the composition of your team as does a life draft. I would argue also that even the fastest time limit per live draft pick does not require "quick" decisions, like chess you are also allowed to think while your opponents clock is ticking.

I haven't seen any ATG public live draft leagues with 12 teams or any 200M leagues forming recently and I've been looking for about two weeks now to start a new team. I was actually surprised to see even a phantom post by NEV as I haven't seen his name associated with a filling league for quite some time, so much so that I have wondered if he is still playing ATG or just playing out his existing teams. Now I don't normally attend to league #'s, but I imagine that most of the leagues that have filled recently are 2013 leagues, not ATG leagues which, for me at least, are two orthogonal communities as I have never played even one team in the 2000x series.

I also appreciate Moose's gracious post. I would argue though that if there were 13 times set for 13 live draft leagues and people sign up by choice as they did with the 1st round leagues in 2014 Event 1, it should probably not be difficult to accommodate everyone's schedules. And I would imagine that the 12 finalists could find a way to make a scheduled draft time if the event date and time were scheduled months in advance.

I wish to disagree with our esteemed blogger on a couple of points.

1. 2014 BS league #1 is league # 349076; league #11 is 349120. That means in a little more than a week, 46 teams were created. I don't see that the open league list is a lot longer than normal, so that means (to me) that they filled something like 40 leagues in 9 or 10 days. That's pretty active for this community.

2. Saying that live drafts are a truer test of skill than autodrafts is like saying that blitz chess (each player has typically 5 minutes for all his moves) is a truer test of chess skill than a slow game with a time limit of a couple of hours per player or more. It just ain't so. Autodrafts require a lot of thought in order to get the opportunity to put together a team for your ballpark and cap, live drafts require a lot of quick decisions.

I prefer hand to hand combat or dueling as a true test of one's skill. I'm hear alligator wrestling is a close second. I've not tried it but I will take Janet Reno's word for it.

For SOM, live drafts with equally matched owners is a fair test. The last Barnstormer finals revealed that much to me.

Semper fi!

I am always in favor of live drafts, because I do not want to allow Hal to pick for me at anytime. I want the luxury of choosing the very best value on every pick. Once Start goes to 3-hour picks, I think that we can run a live dart every round. Another competitive sim has been running their tournament with 3-hour picks for over seven years now.

Live Drafts are just more fun. 80 mil Live next Tuesday?

Oh yeah and caps are wherein the true skill lies. Or maybe that's fun again...

Seen enough patterns, randomness that's not so random and other nonsense that even with 7 Titles in my last 11 completed seasons and 21 credits remaining I've had enough.

Seen enough patterns, randomness that's not so random and other nonsense that even with 7 Titles in my last 11 completed seasons and 21 credits remaining I've had enough.

I can't tell you how much I agree with this statement.