With eman7400 unavailable for the next few hours, I just wanted to take this lull in the action to share some thoughts on this draft:
First, I just want to thank all of you for being such excellent owners. I'm really happy with how smoothly the draft has gone, especially since this is the first time a draft like this has ever been done. It's a credit to everyone here that things have kept moving at a steady clip for more than 2 weeks now, and we remain on pace to finish comfortably ahead of our February 22nd deadline. I'd gladly welcome all of you back if I end up running a second season of this league.
Second, I wanted to share some thoughts on how I might tweak this draft for potential future seasons. I've really appreciated the feedback that you all have provided on the draft experience, and I have been thinking about it as I contemplated ways of making this draft even better and more fun in future seasons. Since I consider all of you to be "founding owners" of this league, I would value your thoughts on some of the following ideas.
I know this is premature--we haven't even finished the first draft yet!--but let me take advantage of this pause in the action to share these thoughts.
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There has been some reasonable feedback that the "snake" style doesn't entirely suit this kind of draft since it means that the owners on either end get to choose from random teams half the time while those in the middle of the draft order get a hand "dealt" to them by another owner in every round. I think it remains to be seen how much of a competitive advantage this actually confers (if any), but I sense a perception among some owners that picking in the first or last position gives these owners an edge.
In addition, there is the fact that a static draft order means that each owner in the middle is always being "dealt" to by the same two owners on either side of them. Again, I'm not sure how much this will actually impact competitive balance, but there is at least a possibility that some owners are at a disadvantage because the "dealers" on either side of them are being more ruthless than other owners in the draft order.
To this end, I want to see how folks would feel about the following tweaks for a possible second season:
Idea 1: Instead of a static snake-style draft order, have the draft order update each round based on salary.
There are two ways we could do this:
- Cumulative team salary: The team with the lowest cumulative salary at the end of each round gets the first pick in the next round. The team with the highest cumulative salary at the end of each round gets the last pick in the next round.
- Salary of last player picked: The team that spends the least money in any given round gets the first pick in the next round. The team that spends the most in any given round gets the last pick in the next round.
While some owners have suggested that we simply randomize the draft order each round, I think these are better designs because they introduce a new wrinkle to the draft strategy.
Do you spend heavily in the early rounds when more players / teams are available, even though that means you will be picking near the end of the draft in future rounds? Or do you conserve your cap space early on so that you can pick earlier in future rounds? I don't know which strategy is better, but I like that this approach puts more agency in the hands of the owners rather than just leaving things to chance.
Idea 2: Have a carousel-style draft order where each team drafts once in each draft slot.
This idea would really only work if this league were to expand to 24 owners. With 24 owners and 25 rounds, you could randomize the draft order once, then have each owner move up one slot with each passing round. So if you started with the 2nd pick in Round 1, you would have the 1st pick in Round 2, then the 24th pick in Round 3, then the 23rd pick in Round 4, etc.
This would leave one round unaccounted for: Round 25. If we did this, I think Round 25 would become the a special round where the draft order is recalculated based on cumulative salary (a la Idea 1 above), giving the team with the lowest salary the first pick. Then,
this final round would become the Exclusive Ballpark round, where each team gets to draft a "stadium manager" with a low max salary (say $1M) who comes with exclusive rights to the home park they played in. (This round would not follow the "teammate chain-and-twist" rules--you would essentially just be picking your exclusive home park.)
If we did adopt a carousel-style approach with 24 teams, I could see us adding one further wrinkle, which would be to
let the team with the first pick in each round choose the player and team that starts each round (rather than each round starting with a random team). This would introduce another strategic nuance by making the first pick especially valuable, since it would be the one time that each owner gets to have a "called shot" rather than being dealt a hand to play by their fellow owners.
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I think both of these ideas would add new strategic wrinkles to the draft, which could make it feel more fun or more fair. However, the potential downside here is that the draft might take longer, since changing the draft order each round would inevitably slow things down (as would expanding from 16 owners to 24).
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Obviously, these ideas are just ideas at this point, and they don't have any bearing on the draft we are currently conducting. But I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on whether these seem like desirable changes for a future version of this league, or whether you would prefer to keep the draft the way it is now.