DRAFTS ARE FUN! This league will conduct a 24-person draft, where there are 24 positional "buckets", where each person will pick one player from each bucket.
Upon entry into this league, each owner will select a unique franchise from the 24 franchises listed below. The franchise you select will not directly impact the strength of your roster so there is no advantage to picking early or selecting a "better" franchise. You are simply determining which players are being added to the draft pool. The owner of each franchise will submit (in a site-mail to me) a 24-man roster (13 hitters and 11 pitchers), including the season of each player. I may suggest changes to your roster, if I think you are missing the spirit of this theme.
There are rules to how you build your 24-man roster. The idea is to build a roster that represents your franchise's best players. I'm not referring to "one-hit wonders" like Rico Petrocelli. We are using years 1961-2021. So, the Cubs roster might expect to include iconic players like Ernie Banks (ss), Ryne Sandberg (2b), Ron Santo (3b), Billy Williams (of), etc.. If you are building the Orioles franchise, and don't include Cal Ripken Jr. (ss), then you missing the point. You should select a good season of each of your players. This isn't a "screw your neighbor" type of theme. Guys who played only one or two years with your franchise shouldn't be included on your roster.
Roster Build Rules
1. You must select 13 hitters and 11 pitchers. Salary does not matter. The players should be usable and not scrubs.
2. You will select one full-time 1B, 2B, 3B, SS and 3 full-time OFs, each of these players must have 600+ PA/162*.
3. You will select one catcher who should have at least 500 PA/162.
4. You will select one catcher who should have between 100-300 PA/162.
5. Your other four part-time hitters (each with <200 PA/162) should include any positions, include pinch hitters or defensive replacements (i.e., useful in some way). Obviously, these backups don't necessarily have to be iconic players.
6. You will select five starting pitchers (must be designated as SP) that total at least 1000 IP/162. The fewest IP/162 for any individual SP is 150. There is no lefty/right requirement.
7. You will select six relief pitchers (must be designated as RP) that total at least 400 IP/162. If possible, try to select pitchers with a good range of IP totals. There is no lefty/right requirement.
*The exception to the 600-PA rule is if the player costs at least $8 million (or won the MVP), then <600 PA is allowed (i.e., 1980 Brett)
The Draft
Once all 24 rosters are submitted to me, I will post all the player buckets (edit - many of the buckets will be combined to help alleviate the issue listed at the bottom of this page). Each full-time starting position will have it's own bucket. I will have one combined OF bucket. I will have one or two SP buckets and one or two RP buckets. The backup catcher will have it's own bucket and there will be one combined part-time player bucket.
Now, here's the key to drafting --> You must roster exactly ONE PLAYER FROM EACH FRANCHISE. So if you draft Nomar Garciaparra (Boston) from the SS bucket, then you can't draft Red Sox Pedro. As the draft progresses, there will be opportunities to skip ahead since those picking in front of you won't be able to draft from certain buckets and/or can't draft from certain franchises.
The first round of the draft will be determined randomly, but each successive round will be based on lowest cumulative salary. Also, the division alignment will be based on final team salary (the four most expensive rosters will be in the NL East).
What about the 25th Player?
I will create a 25th bucket that will contain 24 players at various positions (pitchers and hitters) from expansion teams. This bucket will be drafted lasted, and the draft order will be based on lowest cumulative salary after the 24-round draft has ended. Players like Randy Johnson (Ariz) and Ken Griffey Jr. (Sea) will be included in this bucket, so you may not want to spend wildly during the initial draft.
Other Details
Eligible Seasons: 1961-2021
Salary Cap: None
DH: No
WW: No
AAA: No
Injuries: No
Trades: No
Clones: Yes (during the draft, it's allowed to draft clones) - But each submitted franchise roster should not have clones.
Ballpark: Must use a park that one of your drafted players played in during that season
Alignment: Based on final team salary (Top 4 salaries in NL East)
When sending me your roster via site-mail, it's easiest to simply copy/paste the entire roster from the Team Center (with no editing needed)
*** END OF DRAFT ISSUE ***
After thinking this through a little bit, I believe that it may be possible to get to a point late in the draft where you need a player from a bucket and all the available players left in the bucket are from franchises that you already have rostered. This is a problem. I will set up some contingency plans for this, including combining some of the lesser buckets and also allowing for a <300K replacement if you get stuck. You should make EVERY EFFORT to AVOID this issue from happening. For example, if there are only five full-time 1B left and four of those players play for franchises that you already have, then you should be grabbing the one remaining 1B that fits into your roster, even if it's not the best pick at the time.
3/9/2022 3:01 PM (edited)