I'm wondering what everyone's opinion is on blacklist leagues.  I want to start up another one similar to Area51Man's league.  I've been in it for all six seasons now, we're up to 276 blacklisted players.  Obviously, not seeing a dozen Addies, Roberts and Ruths in a league is what originally pulled me in.  And I love the vastly different rosters each season while growing the blacklist with each following season.  I'm trying to see how many people would really be interested, what are their most/least favorite things about them and what things they would like to see incorporated into a blacklist league.

I've thought of doing something like this before, but never took it all the way through design. My suggestion would be this...

Start by blacklisting every player in the top 25 records: http://www.whatifsports.com/mlb-l/records.asp - This would be all current recordholders in single game and season for Open League, Theme League and Champion League for Individual Batting and Individual Pitching. This will give you one heck of a starting point to cut out the cookies.

Next, have everyone who signs up add an additional player to blacklist. This allows for some customization and might nix some additional cookies. Only do this for the first time they sign up or for a replacment owner though. Why limit this? I think that a dynamic blacklist based on usage is more fun...see below.

Once the seasons begin, I'd add every player that appears on 3 or more rosters in a single season to the blacklist. If 1/8 of the league thought they were good enough to draft, then they probably are. This makes team building more fun as owners will try to dig deeper for different players and would prevent copy-catting rosters going forward. You could also blacklist based on career usage, meaning if that player is used 7 times by any team in the history of the league, then he is also blacklisted.

This means that as you progress, teams will be more and more obscure and tougher to build because you will be truly blacklisting the cookies that appear in your league. Just my thoughts...

Thanks for your input frazzman!

I would also considering moving the cap around every season. Changing the cap from season to season would keep the team-building fresh for everybody. The reason I only play in the odd-numbered years in Area51Man's league is that a good chunk of the league can remain static, and anybody who played last season can see which players succeeded. Even a 5M cap change can minimize the tendency to redraft last season's team.

There used to be a league, run by amycox I think, that blacklisted the top 250 most used pitcher and hitter seasons so that 500 players were blacklisted. It was this league that helped me find some of the under the radar type players who have become regulars for me.

More interesting ideas.  Thanks Bribar and trd3!