Starting in 1902, I’ve listed every other three-year period chronologically and divided them up into divisions where teams will be playing other teams from the same period. The format for this round is fairly simple.

Team Building: Figure out which league/division appeals to you and pick any team from that three-year period. Once your division is full, the four of you will pick a second and third team from which to build your roster. Draft for the second and third teams will take place in “Thejuice6’s Theme League Draft Forum.” Each draft will be ran as 1-4, 4-1 and 1-4.

An example of a team you could end up with in the N.L. East of League One would be: the 1902 Pirates, the 1903 Americans and the 1904 Giants. There will be no separating the A.L. teams from the N.L. teams in this round.

There will be NO CLONES in this round.

You must have a minimum of eight players from each of the three rosters you’ve chosen. You CAN have multiple teams from the same franchise (i.e., 1903 Americans, 1903 Pirates and 1904 Americans, etc.) – but just remember that there’s no clones allowed.

Since all teams will be playing the majority of their games against teams from the same timeframe, statistics will “hopefully” be somewhat realistic.

League Alignment: The top 20 owners from Round Two will get to choose which league/division they want to participate in. They don’t need to pick their first team at that time – they can wait until their division is full and the draft thread for that division is set up in the forum. Once the first 20 league/divisions have been chosen, the remaining leagues participants will be posted where everyone will know which league they’re in. As in Round Two, once all of the participants know what league they’re drafting in, a 24-hour trading period will begin where those not happy with their spots can seek a trade with someone else.

NO CAP – Build the best roster you can from your three-team combo.

Clones: None.

Designated Hitter: Yes
Waiver Wire: No
Injuries – Turned On
Trades: No
A.A.A.: No

You may use either partial or full season stats of any player who had a split season - as long as the stats indicate it was for your franchise.

Stadium – You must use one of the ballparks that was the home ballpark of one of the three teams that make up your roster.

Who Moves On?

Once Round THREE is complete, the owners who own the eight playoff teams in each league will earn a spot in Round FOUR. 8 x 10 = 80 spots. That leaves 88 spots to fill. The final 88 spots will be awarded to the teams who had the most wins across all 10 leagues (who didn't make their league's playoffs). The tie-break (should it come into play) will be (1) Highest Exp. %, and (2) Most Home Wins.

Rounds Four through Seven will all be completely different than Rounds One, Two and Three. I’ve already got them figured out but will post them later.

Here’s what’s available for each league in Round THREE:

LEAGUE ONE:

N.L. East 1902-1904
N.L. Central 1904-1906
N.L. West 1906-1908
A.L. East 1908-1910
A.L. Central 1910-1912
A.L. West 1912-1914 (including 1914 Federal League teams)

LEAGUE TWO:

N.L. East 1914-1916 (including 1914 and 1915 Federal League teams)
N.L. Central 1916-1918
N.L. West 1918-1920
A.L. East 1920-1922
A.L. Central 1922-1924
A.L. West 1924-1926

LEAGUE THREE:

N.L. East 1926-1928
N.L. Central 1928-1930
N.L. West 1930-1932
A.L. East 1932-1934
A.L. Central 1934-1936
A.L. West 1936-1938

LEAGUE FOUR:

N.L. East 1938-1940
N.L. Central 1940-1942
N.L. West 1942-1944
A.L. East 1944-1946
A.L. Central 1946-1948
A.L. West 1948-1950

LEAGUE FIVE:

N.L. East 1950-1952
N.L. Central 1952-1954
N.L. West 1954-1956
A.L. East 1956-1958
A.L. Central 1958-1960
A.L. West 1960-1962

LEAGUE SIX:

N.L. East 1962-1964
N.L. Central 1964-1966
N.L. West 1966-1968
A.L. East 1968-1970
A.L. Central 1970-1972
A.L. West 1972-1974

LEAGUE SEVEN:

N.L. East 1974-1976
N.L. Central 1976-1978
N.L. West 1978-1980
A.L. East 1980-1982
A.L. Central 1982-1984
A.L. West 1984-1986

LEAGUE EIGHT:

N.L. East 1986-1988
N.L. Central 1988-1990
N.L. West 1990-1992
A.L. East 1992-1994
A.L. Central 1994-1996
A.L. West 1996-1998

LEAGUE NINE:

N.L. East 1998-2000
N.L. Central 2000-2002
N.L. West 2002-2004
A.L. East 2004-2006
A.L. Central 2006-2008
A.L. West 2008-2010

LEAGUE TEN:

N.L. East 2010-2012
N.L. Central 2012-2014
N.L. West 2014-2016
A.L. East 2016-2018
A.L. Central 2018-2020
A.L. West 2020-2022

Great theme idea. Love it. Pretty much impossible to anticipate which 2nd and 3rd round teams will be available, so most of the research will be in trying to make the best first round selection.

If my calculations are correct there are 2,616 possible teams to be drafted in this theme. For the record, I will NOT be building a roster for each one...

Especially since in this case "building a roster" simply means populating a spreadsheet with each team's players. I haven't yet decided on the best way to research this theme, but that would not be it.

I'm trying to think through how these drafts will go. Each even-numbered year appears in two different divisions. Can each team only be drafted once, or can a team appear in two different divisions? For example, can the 1904 Pirates be drafted in both the NL East and NL Central of League One?

My guess is that each draft is separate and 1904 Pirates can be drafted in both NL East and NL Central. thejuice6 themes often will have overlap on teams being used. I'm juice will chime in and clarify.

Also, your 2616 estimate on possible rosters is way too low.

A single division has 3 years available to draft from and there are 16 teams per year (in the early eras... more in the later eras). That means there are 48 unique teams, where you will choose three. Using combinatorial mathematics, that's N-choose-K or 48 choose 3 which is equal to 48! / (3! * 45!) = 17,296 possible 3-team combinations. That's just in ONE DIVISION. The modern era has more teams and even more possible roster configurations. 3-years x 30-teams = 90 teams --> 117,480 possible combinations (again, for just one division).

Posted by schwarze on 1/31/2023 10:47:00 AM (view original):
My guess is that each draft is separate and 1904 Pirates can be drafted in both NL East and NL Central. thejuice6 themes often will have overlap on teams being used. I'm juice will chime in and clarify.

This is correct - each draft will be run and populated separate from the others. Both divisions will be able to use the same 1904 players.

Posted by schwarze on 1/31/2023 11:49:00 AM (view original):
Also, your 2616 estimate on possible rosters is way too low.

A single division has 3 years available to draft from and there are 16 teams per year (in the early eras... more in the later eras). That means there are 48 unique teams, where you will choose three. Using combinatorial mathematics, that's N-choose-K or 48 choose 3 which is equal to 48! / (3! * 45!) = 17,296 possible 3-team combinations. That's just in ONE DIVISION. The modern era has more teams and even more possible roster configurations. 3-years x 30-teams = 90 teams --> 117,480 possible combinations (again, for just one division).

I didn't mean 2,616 possible rosters, I meant 2,616 different teams to research.

Posted by thejuice6 on 1/31/2023 11:22:00 AM (view original):

Posted by schwarze on 1/31/2023 10:47:00 AM (view original):
My guess is that each draft is separate and 1904 Pirates can be drafted in both NL East and NL Central. thejuice6 themes often will have overlap on teams being used. I'm juice will chime in and clarify.

This is correct - each draft will be run and populated separate from the others. Both divisions will be able to use the same 1904 players.

Thanks!

Posted by barracuda3 on 1/31/2023 11:49:00 AM (view original):

Posted by schwarze on 1/31/2023 11:49:00 AM (view original):
Also, your 2616 estimate on possible rosters is way too low.

A single division has 3 years available to draft from and there are 16 teams per year (in the early eras... more in the later eras). That means there are 48 unique teams, where you will choose three. Using combinatorial mathematics, that's N-choose-K or 48 choose 3 which is equal to 48! / (3! * 45!) = 17,296 possible 3-team combinations. That's just in ONE DIVISION. The modern era has more teams and even more possible roster configurations. 3-years x 30-teams = 90 teams --> 117,480 possible combinations (again, for just one division).

I didn't mean 2,616 possible rosters, I meant 2,616 different teams to research.

Ahh, that makes more sense. It was still fun to work out the math for possible rosters.

Just to be clear (yes, I'm just now looking at this..thats how we bottom tier owners roll) we can take any team in that 3 year period, not one from each year? For example, 1902-1904 I could choose 3 1904 teams?

You assume correctly.

I think it would be helpful to identify which teams go in which grouping. The draft filter if you do AL Central for 1922-24 is empty. I know some teams changed names/cities but would be nice to know vs. guessing who is included.

I believe every team in history has had a 100+ IP pitcher on their staff. In the example used above, just go to the search page and type in IP 100 minimum for American League between 1922 and 1924 and every team that qualifies will show up with at least one pitcher. Just sort by team name...

That would be a heck of a lot easier than typing every team for every season...

Posted by The_Creeper on 2/28/2023 7:04:00 PM (view original):
I think it would be helpful to identify which teams go in which grouping. The draft filter if you do AL Central for 1922-24 is empty. I know some teams changed names/cities but would be nice to know vs. guessing who is included.

I think you are confused. The AL Central in league 2 is reserved for all 1922-24 teams. You don't need to set any search criteria for AL Central.