I'm interested in the concept. As others have noted, I think there are still some wrinkles to be worked out.

I’m in.

IN!

This sounds like a good variation on a suggestion I submitted as a ticket. In any case, I'm interested.

A serious owner puts in a minimum of 50 hours of effort every season...the contest is for 5 seasons...for $250 and 250 hours of your time, you too can "win" $1,000, or $4.00 per hour. Oh, and it's taxable! Winning!

Posted by jholthus on 9/16/2021 4:13:00 PM (view original):

Hello Everyone,

With the MLB playoffs quickly approaching the WIS staff has been busy trying to think of a fun, new idea for HBD. We thought, wouldn't it be great to provide users with great rewards? Wouldn’t it be great to see who can truly be a dynasty building GM? Wouldn’t it be great if someone could call themselves the best of the best?

We’ve come up with an idea to see who can be successful at Hardball’s version of the Premier League. This would be an “exclusive” league dedicated to experienced, successful owners to go head to head for a chance to not only crown themselves league champion, and be engraved in the HBD/WIS history books but also earn some pretty awesome rewards by doing so.

Eligible owners would need to meet the following criteria to be eligible to enter the league.

1. 20+ HBD seasons completed

2. 1+ World Series ring

3. 1+ Active HBD franchise

The league rules would be pretty simple. Evenly matched teams would be created. This would be like a normal HBD season where trades, draft, budgeting and of course winning all still play a role, the catch… you only have 5 seasons to achieve as much success as you possibly can. At the end of the 5 seasons, the bottom 6 owners (by win %/overall success) are relegated out of the league. The rest of the owners have the option to pay the league fee again to be a part of the next set of 5 seasons. After each set of 5 seasons the league is “reset” where the teams are evenly balanced again and everyone gets a clean slate to try to win.

What is the league fee you ask? Well the investment you would make to be a part of this league would be an upfront total of $250 for the 5 season cycle. This ensures that for a minimum of 5 seasons there won’t be waiting for the world to refill, there won’t be new owners coming in and messing up franchises in the middle of the season and everyone is in it to win it.

I haven’t even gotten to the best part of this exclusive relegation league yet. Not only would you get normal HBD rewards/payouts for success, but we have decided to sweeten the pot even more. Additional payouts at the end of the 5 season cycle would be given out as follows:

1st place - $1000

2nd place - $600

3rd place - $300

4th and 5th place - $100 in WIS site credit

We would like to get the ball rolling on this ASAP and wanted to get user feedback to see if this is an idea that the community would be on board with.

Interested but I don't love the idea of a reset - prospect market (draft and IFA's) is one of my favorite aspects of the game and this feels like it would eliminate that entire part of HBD for a win now mentality. With the level of interest here, setting up a promotion / relegation system across multiple levels seems viable. Simply rank the leagues by the number of championships won and owners have a chance to move up or down with each season and build for the long-term. Payouts would have to be tweaked but feels like that could be managed by increasing the per season payouts and creating a point system for longer-term aspects of the competition.

To those doing the math and pointing out how much WIS would make off of this, am I wrong in thinking WIS is a for-profit company? And the cash payout is significantly higher by % than it is for your regular world you're playing now - if you're active. One thing WIS needs to consider is that I'm sure I would drop a world or two to do this and I imagine I'm not the only one. So, I'll look at it as a new challenging tweak and not a money grab but what do I know.

Posted by mal247 on 9/16/2021 5:58:00 PM (view original):
A serious owner puts in a minimum of 50 hours of effort every season...the contest is for 5 seasons...for $250 and 250 hours of your time, you too can "win" $1,000, or $4.00 per hour. Oh, and it's taxable! Winning!

Don’t worry, I will make sure the best you will do is $600.

Like it

Very interested, though I agree with the others who've noted that drafting will be irrelevant in a five-year cycle. Why not keep the league open in perpetuity, with regular relegation and a waiting list comprised of the most successful recent owners? (This would also be a good opportunity to officially re-rank the private worlds, so a title in, say, the fifth-ranked world gives you a better chance of making it in.)

I'd love to hear more about how the teams are balanced in the beginning. When new worlds are born in HBD there have been good teams, middling teams and lousy ones. Are we talking closely balanced teams for this new game? If so, how will this be accomplished? Inquiring minds want to know!

I'm in on the concept but after a lot of the above suggestions have been factored in and a smarter version is presented.

I’m in. Where do I sign up?

I would like to loose. Thanks

Interested.

I would be interested!