In which I submit a radical alteration to draft strategy

You know what really grinds my gears? Asterisks. Asterisks imply some sort of hijinks like PEDs. If this is true, why not do what the NFL surely has already done... look the other way and let everyone juice. So, in honor of my "tainted" championship I submit a radical idea. Let's have a snake draft this year.

HW: Great Draft Moments

The Spirit of Fantasy Football has shined his face upon us for many exciting drafts. There have been a lot of memorable bidding wars (Justin v. Kiah for Terrell Owens in 2007, Nate v. me for Frank Gore in 2010), but a lot of things slightly tangential to the draft itself (why Abe called Marques Colston "Baby Colston," and why the nickname stuck, is a mystery to me).

Please, I beg you to include some of your specific memories of Hazelweird drafts past. I'm sure your memories are different than mine.

(note: I don't always remember the precise numbers, hence occasional asterisks).

"What the heck, I like him: Larry Fitzgerald"

In 2005 we had our first of three snake drafts (also '06 and '08). Larry Fitzgerald, entering his second year, was selected by Justin somewhere in the middle of the draft. And sometime late in the draft, we're talking last few rounds, Brad uttered the infamous words written above, and spent the rest of the night getting us all drinks.

It's not just that Brad tried to draft a player that was already drafted; it was that he did so with a sort of "Oh, I know this is a silly pick, but I'm going to make it out of emotion anyway, oh well" tone that made it legendary.

Nobody saw how it ended; we all hit our heads when we fell out of our chairs.

In 2008, Jerod put out an interesting bid for the Viking Defense: $15. "Thunderstruck" might be how I would describe the reaction of the table. Well, most of the table. Brad said $16. Then Jerod said $17.

Well, I might have started that differently, but different strokes and all.

In 2010, Justin already had Tony Romo on his roster for $36*, and if memory serves me, he had another QB already on his roster too. Yet when his turn to throw out another player came up, he said "Philip Rivers $49*." Everybody just sort of gave each other funny looks as we mechanically flipped our cups over. The look on Justin's face at that moment was sort of like, "Oh."

Little did I know what the future held.

In 2003, the bidding was going on for Brett Favre. I had no interest in drafting Brett Favre. In fact, I hated Brett Favre and wished nothing but ill upon him and everybody who rooted for him. Yet I thought I had a responsibility to bid Favre up, to make one of those sorry Packer fans pay as much as possible for him. But this was the one year Rob decided he shouldn't take Favre (I traded Favre to him after week 3), and as it was down to Brad and I, and I raised the bid to $29 expecting it to march on its way much, much higher, Brad flipped his cup and said "You can have him." I jumped out of my chair and cursed. I set aside my beer and began drinking gin mixed with Mountain Dew Code Red (that's how I rolled c. 2003).

Brad is involved in a lot of these.

Some of you may think that Brad passing on players and ending up with a lot of money when everybody else is busted is some new phenomenon. Well, let me tell you a little story about 2003. Near the end of the draft I had a few measly dollars left, and I was all hot and bothered to draft D'Wayne Bates, the Vikings #2 WR that I had high hopes for, playing across from Randy Moss. Brad had $47 left and only one roster spot to fill it with. I think I threw out D'Wayne Bates for a $1, grinning like the purple-blooded piss-ant I was. Brad said $2. All energetic about the Vikings, I said $3. Brad shook his head and huffed. "47 dollars!" he shouted. I was crestfallen. What's more memorable about that draft: that Brad paid $47 for D'Wayne Bates because he had too much money left at the end of the draft, or that I was crestfallen that I didn't get D'Wayne Bates?

Fine, Jerod, Fine. You'd want me to include this.

I wasn't always so great at hiding my love for the Vikings. In 2004, everybody knew all I really wanted out of the draft was Randy Moss to be on my team. Maybe that's why, in a league where the most expensive player the year before had been under $80, Abe started the bidding on Randy Moss at $100, then looked at me laughing and grinning maniacally (Abe started on the whiskey early in that year's draft, lest any of you think that is also a new development). I, my face ashen, said $101. Rob said $120. All blood out of my face, I said $121, and set a record for the most expensive player. And a few picks later, I paid $102* for Priest Holmes, and my draft was pretty much over.

HW Rule Changes Over the Years

As we enter the 10th Hazelweird season, I may do some retrospective posts to help us think about it. Today: significant rule changes over the years. Later: greatest draft moments (we relive a lot of the pre-draft party and draft party moments, and probably ought to save those for the bit more closed circle of email anyway, but I'll refresh us on some great moments during the draft).

Open Bench

Hard to believe: the first year we actually had fixed backup positions: you were required to draft a backup kicker, backup defense, etc. The second year we opened up three random bench positions, then going forward we opened the entire bench (actually at this point the entire roster is open: you don't have to draft a full starting lineup).

Fractional Scoring

A great move once we started using Yahoo for FFB (another crazy note: we didn't start that until 2007. From 2002-2006, either Justin or I got everybody's lineups through email, then MANUALLY ADDED SCORES. Ridiculous. 2007 was also the start of this blog). Now every yard is equal.

From 25 yards per point to 20 yards per point

It's still a TD heavy league, but we've created more scoring and given more credit for yardage. Fractional scoring and the 20 yards per point changes have greatly increased excitement, I think.

Three Starting WRs

A very recent move: until 2009, we started two WRs (though we evolved flexible lineups so that you could start three WRs, but it meant starting only one RB).

Preseason Free Agency: One Pick Each

We started our preseason free agency system because (a) we have closed rather than open FA system and (b) we started doing the draft very early in summer to accommodate various things. I think our new change--away from the injury picks, to everybody getting one and only one preseason FA pick--is going to be a major change. There had been other evolutions to this rule (including removing retirements, trades, and cuts from preseason FA pick eligibility).

A few other changes of note:

--We changed our auction salary cap from 265 to 275 to 300 and may (Abe! Brad!) change to 300 with $0 bids.

--AP recognition: We've been through the grisly history of this recognition before, but I do think it has value: you want to score as many points as possible in fantasy football, and this gives you recognition if you score the most. It's another fun thing to follow and chase.

Am I missing anything: are there some other significant changes we've made? Which of these changes has been the biggest?

Football News Discussion

Here is a place to discuss current NFL news, and how it might affect fantasy football (in other words, here is where you can make wild claims about how much you'll pay for players).

Catastrophic Free Agent Discussion

Justin proposed a "catastrophic free agent pick" concept. Since his proposal is conceptual without the details fleshed out, I'll just repost his message here:

Okay, I really like the 1 Free Agent rule because it does give us all a chance to pick up a player to improve our team

However, the rule was there to help if a team was devastated by injury. Is there a way we could have a catastrophic "injury" rule.

For instance lets say I draft 3 QBs and all 3 get hurt and are going to miss week 1 then the QB I take with my FA pick I take a QB who then gets hurt also and is going to miss week 1.

Could we have some sort of catastrophic rule (that more than likely would not ever need to be used...sort of like a "nuclear option") or do we say no and say that would have to be addressed via trade with another team?

Just wondering.

Skills Competition (Updated with Course Info)

The game is minigolf, at Goodrich Golf Dome. Two teams, selected by the 2010 skills champion (Justin) and runner-up (Nathan). The team scores will be added, and the winning team gets seats 1-5, losing team seats 6-10 (within those groups, ordered by individual score). If the individual on the losing team has the lowest individual score, he still gets seat 1, with the winning team scooted down a seat. The game takes place Saturday before the draft, at our leisure.

That's what we've discussed so far: here is the post for a skills competition discussion thread. Flame on!

Update: The Course

A few notes on Goodrich's Minigolf Course, and some matters we'll need to agree on for the contest itself.

--the course itself is very casual, and very isolated: probably precisely what we want. There aren't too many gimmicks. It's $5.25 per person.

--each hole has two cups (white and red). We should decide which color cup we're playing ahead of time, though there'd be no harm in letting each golfer choose either cup on each hole.

--There's no precise tee box: we'll probably just start from behind the rock marker.

Some things we'll need to set:

--some sort of out of bounds rule: several holes have very open gaps to get O.B.

--how to split up groups (each team going, or mix teams, or go in three groups, or go in five pairs?).

--how to deal with balls hitting balls (I think marking balls when necessary, replacing a ball that gets hit, is fine).

2011 Proposed Rule Changes

Rule Changes #1, #2, and #3 PASSED

Rule Change #1: Firm If-Then Lists: PASSED

current voting: 6 yes (Bryan, Joe, Kiah, Justin, Jerod, Tony)
Under IF/THEN RULE

(insert as final paragraph):

“Any changes to a lineup require an If-Then list sent to the league prior to the start of a game where a player in that game will either be removed from or added to the lineup: no retroactive changes are possible without the If-Then list ahead of time. It is the responsibility of the manager to send the If-Then list if there is any possible need for a lineup change.”

Rule Change #2: One Preseason FA Pick: PASSED

current voting: 6 yes (Bryan, Joe, Kiah, Justin, Jerod, Tony)

Under PRESEASON FREE AGENCY:
(replace entire rule with):

“Each manager is granted ONE preseason free agency pickup, where he may drop a player on his roster in order to pick up a free agent player. This pick may be used at any point from the immediate completion of the draft until the beginning of the final game of week one (subject to the rule excluding from the free agent pool any player whose team's game for that week has begun). The manager may use this pick at any point for any reason, but once it is used, that manager has no more preseason free agency pickups. Preseason Free Agency picks are tradeable commodities.”

Rule Change #3: Zero Dollar Bids: PASSED

current voting: 6 yes (Kiah, Bryan, Justin, Joe, Tony, Nathan), 1 no (Jerod), 1 abstain (Jon)

Under Auction Draft:
(replace):

“The manager must reserve money to pay a minimum of $1 for each of the 16 required positions. This means that the most money a manager can bid on one player at any time is X minus remaining roster spots plus one, which is here called ‘Maximum Bid.’ Otherwise,”

(with):

"A manager has $300 with which to fill his 16-man roster. Bids in whole number dollar increments may not exceed the remaining dollars in a manager's account; the minimum bid for any player is $0. Any player acquired for $0 is automatically added to the winning manager's roster with no subtraction to the manager's account. If the bidding for a player exceeds (or, if another manager in the bidding reaches) a manager's remaining money, that manager is automatically out of the bidding."

(replace):

“minimum bid of $1”

(with):

“minimum bid of $0”

(cut):

“There are no “cents:”