I think that the UPL is moving in a new direction, at least for basketball and baseball. Keeper leagues. Yahoo is giving us some new features, so starting with this upcoming season's rosters, we'll be using a keeper format.
Basically, the idea here it so promote a longer term perspective for the UPL games. By keeping much of the same roster, you force the balancing of short and long term goals (winning this season, versus building for upcoming seasons). Hopefully this keeps more owners returning, we'll have more of an incentive to play out the entire season, making each season more fun.
The tentative plan for basketball is to expand from a 14 man roster to a 16 man roster, with 10 keepers per season. Baseball would be similar, expanding from a 22 man roster to a 26 man roster, keeping 18. So going into the following season, you'd have your core roster, and your draft would serve to a) incorporate rookies, and b) round out the rest of your roster. Of course, the actual numbers for both leagues are up in the air, but those numbers seem about right, if you want to aim for continuity for the teams, while still incorporating fresh talent.
The draft order is still up for discussion. Do you just go reverse order of finish? Or do you draft in the order of finish? Maybe you try to balance it out and reward excellence, and have the champ draft first, followed by the last place, then the 2nd to last? Or the other way around, and have the 2nd place team draft first, the 3rd place team draft 2nd, except for the champ, who drafts last?
I'm not exactly sure where I stand on that one, actually.
This may allow for interesting possibilities. Maybe someone could trade one of their keeper slots for a player that could help now. And this probably needs to lead to some rules regarding trading players and then giving them back after the season.
In any case, I think that this is a fun direction for the UPL. Comments with regard to roster sizes, the number of keepers, and draft format are very much appreciated.
-Chairman (aka O.N. Thugs)
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Baseball would be similar, expanding from a 22 man roster to a 26 man roster, keeping 18. So going into the following season, you'd have your core roster, and your draft would serve to a) incorporate rookies, and b) round out the rest of your roster. Of course, the actual numbers for both leagues are up in the air, but those numbers seem about right, if you want to aim for continuity for the teams, while still incorporating fresh talent.
Hmm... Right off the bat, I do like the idea of a keeper league and expanding the roster size to 26. Although, if it's a keeper league, I'd be in favor of putting restrictions on trades and waiver wire moves. For instance, a team could make no more than two trades in a year and the trades would have to be limited to at most two players for two players. For waiver wire moves, why not cap it at a certain number? That way if somebody is aggressive in their moves on the waiver wire early in the season, they'll certainly have an advantage for that season, but will eventually run out of moves, at which point, they might miss out on a pick up that could affect next season (and beyond). I think it would add another layer of strategy.
I'll give it a shot, for baseball at least.
Greg - It would be nice if they let us do something like 25-man active rosters and 40-man extended rosters, like in real baseball.
In most leagues, they charge for transactions, so that helps in restricting moves. I believe that Yahoo! lets us limit free agent pickups , so we can do that. I think that limiting it to something like 1.5 per week (about 40 per season) would definitely change strategy for a few teams. That lets you pick up players as needed when injuries arise, but also makes you think about what to do for borderline cases.
Why do you think that we need to restrict trades? We don't have a ton of trades, as is. Obviously, I'll need a different set of evaluations for my veto power. The commissioner's office will likely be more vigilant in approving trades from here on out. But I'm not sure that capping the number of trades matters much. And I sort of like the idea of seeing more trades (the prospects for veterans) so that teams can mortgage the future for a chance at winning now.
I like the idea of a keeper league, but I suspect that this is your ploy Roland to keep yourself at the top of the UPL, since the rest of the league is starting to catch up to you. I mean, this is the fantasy equivalent to the NY Yankees deciding that spending $200 million in salary money isn't enough and so they decide to up it to $300 million.
If anyone is going to figure out how to master a certain format, it would be you first, followed by any one of 15 jabrones next (hopefully, it'd be this jabrone). Even so, I'm down with a little keeper league action.
And I sort of like the idea of seeing more trades (the prospects for veterans) so that teams can mortgage the future for a chance at winning now.
I actually agree with the above statement. But the slippery slope that it likely leads down is the reason I would be in favor of putting some restrictions (as well as a cap) on trades.
Under our current UPL baseball league rules, the only way a trade can be considered "fair" (and thus approved) is if there is a reasonable chance that the trade could benefit both teams--or at the very least not disturb the "balance" of the league.
However, under your proposed rule changes, a whole new dynamic is being introduced to trades. Rather than saying that this trade has to appear to be fair today, tomorrow, and next month, the trade now only has to appear to have the possibility of being fair in 5 years, 10 years, or whatever arbitrary number that nobody in our league will ever exactly agree upon.
From the standpoint of playing a game and having fun, I agree, the speculative trades on the young prospects can be the most intriguing. I also agree that it would result in more trades being made. But I wouldn't want to see the league become a contest in who can make the most rip-off trades. After all, most of these extra trades going through would involve the top teams in the league trading away some "prospects" for a true major league player who can help them win now. If anything, the disparity between the top and bottom teams would grow in the short term. In theory, the teams on the bottom would be setting themselves up for the future, but in reality they're mainly filling their cupboards with Homer Baileys and Felix Pies.
Every year I see trades go through that I would personally consider "borderline at best." The teams that tend to be on the right side of these trades tend to be the same ones over and over. If these teams are given another tool, I'll call it the "the hot prospect carrot," then there will be even more opportunities to rip off other teams. I don't necessarily have a problem with that, I'm just saying put a cap on it (kinda like David Stern has capped how many number 1 picks an NBA team is allowed to give up at a time).
In my view, every mortgage-the-future-to-win-now trade is inherently "unfair" in the short term. Knowing which ones will be "fair" or even which side of the trade will "win" in the long run is impossible. So why not put some restrictions in place to minimize how much snake oil a team is allowed to sell in one season?
Greg - your point is well taken. I think that overall, what I'm going to propose for baseball is something like:
a) I increase the scrutiny that I put into evaluating trades, as Commish, and
b) decrease the threshold to nix any trade that I'm involved in.
In general, the hurdle to clear has been, can I make a case for it on behalf of the weaker team, and if so, then I allow the trade.
Now, it will be, more like, can I make a (reasonable) case for the weaker team to reject, and if so, reject the trade.
So things on the fence, which used to be let through, will now be rejected.
Obviously, this is most important in baseball, since "can't miss prospects" are (historically) much riskier in baseball than in basketball.
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