Roto baseball rules change suggestions March 2007 Currently DL and waiver moves cannot be made until the first Sunday of the season. Albert suggests changing the first move deadline to the night before opening day. [Note that a benefit to waiting UNTIL on or after opening day is that most ML teams will have made their official DL moves by then.] June 2007 From Sobo, to address when a DL replacement also gets placed on the DL Player A goes on the DL, replaced with Player B. While in that status, Player B goes on the DL. Right now, you have to reverse the original move, wait a week, and replace Player A with Player C. I understand why it's that way to keep owners from playing matchups, etc, but it the intent is to allow an owner to replace the original DL'ed player (Player A), it seems reasonable (to me) that you could drop Player B and immediately replace him with Player C. Player B goes back into the free agent pool, and Player C is treated like any other DL replacement. Sept 2007 IF we keep the stupid replacement draft I need to clarify that the position imbalance created will then be carried forward through the rest of the year ICC Late Sept 2007 (this goes on for awhile ...): Yes, it’s a hell of a race. Just two little old points separates Andy, me and Jack. Just two little old points. Just like last year in the race between Sobo and me, it will come down to which team plays the best in the final weekend of the season. The title is up for grabs. Hans’ Cutters have come like a bat out of hell in the last week to pass me in RBIs and SBs. Hurt me bad. I’ll say again that I think the current rules are great. Yes, it’s critically important to draft well, but the current rules allow you to stay competitive during the season in the event you have lots of injuries. Roto Baseball is a blast! Buster ... Good luck to all three of you in the final days. I just hope it’s decided during the regular season, and not in the playoffs due to the impact of any extra games. I agree the rules are great- up until MLB expands the rosters. At that point, the way our DL rule is written makes it virtually irrelevant. I think the way Fox has written the rule does a great job of mirroring the actions a team takes during the regular season as long as they are limited to a 25 man roster. When it gets to September and the rosters expand to 40, they just bring up a replacement without DL’ing the injured player. Without NR moves, a Cyberzahm owner is screwed. And that wasn’t supposed to be the primary reason for NR moves anyway. Fox- I’d like to propose another change for next September 1. We already have the replacement draft. Why not allow unlimited moves that month, but require an owner to maintain position integrity? If that is too unwieldy, then let’s expand the DL definition (at least for September) to include any player with a red cross by their name as of Sunday night. In that way we can continue to minimize the injury impact in the last month. Sobo ... I think something along the lines of Sobo's suggestion has merit. Maybe just two additional NR moves (SR moves?)that can be used only in September, or something like that. And I still think the September call up draft blows. --T,Ex ... I think the September call up rule would be better if you didn't have to drop a player. I also think that we should leave NR moves at the same number as rules currently allow. Everyone now knows the value of saving one or two for September. Mazins ... Mazin- I don't have a problem with expanding the roster for the "call up" rather than replacing someone. That player is likely a non-contributor anyway. If you look at who was replaced this year, it was mostly offensive players who were non-entities. And we can leave NR moves the same, or even cut them if that's what folks want. But why should they be used for injuries in September when they are not the rest of the year? Sobo ... You can use them for injury replacements if you so choose to do. I think that the unlimited injury moves throughout the season is great. NR's need to be used more selectively. More selectively than I did. So be it. And I don't believe that the player dropped in September is by any means an automatic "non-contributor". I think that you just had a team full of non-contributors and it was magnified in September when you didn't have any NR's left. There should be a premium placed on the "skill" of projecting on draft day. There will always be "luck" of the draft. More NR's put that luck in even greater position to have an effect on season ending positions. ... Mazin- You do a wonderful job of avoiding the point. Whether or not we replace or add someone in the September draft is a nit. My point is that we need a way to replace injured players in September when the DL list is a moot point. The rule as it exists now is perfect for the first five months of the year, and ineffective in the stretch run. If we say that "that's the luck of the draw" then why did we fix it for the first part of the season? And before you tell me how to save my NR moves to fix the problem, you might want to check the facts. And after you do so, I will accept your apology on how to use NR moves. Sobo ... Oh... I see your point. But I'm not allowed to argue that NR moves could be saved for September? Well ... How many NR moves did you use in September? And how many injuries did you have in September? You can tell me. It will save me the time to look it up, which I really don't give a rat's ass about doing. And I do apologize for you having a bad team. I wish that there was something the rules could do about that. Mazin ... Mazin- Don't apologize for my bad team. They are competitive when they play. But to answer your questions, I saved 2 NR moves into September. Even after that, I have 8 players- that's right, 8 of 25- out with season ending hurts. Makes it tough to compete. This year is what it is; I have no bitch with the rules. I think the NR decision was a great way to level the field, and give an owner a chance to mitigate something out of his control. It just doesn't work in September. It just so happens I'm drawing the short straw, so I'm trying to make the point to fix a glitch going forward. Sobo ... I'm not proposing this as a rules change, because I don't care to get into that mode. But from year to year, generally the leading teams have significantly more ABs and Innings pitched than the bottom dwellers. The DL moves were instituted in part to try to correct the imbalance caused by players not being on the field and they have to a large degree succeeded at this. This year's race, with dramatic standing swings over a couple weeks timeframe throughout the season are, I think, evidence of that success. It has been a fascinating race. Generally the results are reflecting the overall performance of an owner's picks and replacements. It has been recognized however that in September, injured players are less likely to go on the DL (for whatever reason). I haven't heard a good solution to that problem. But, one way to further minimize the injuy effects would be to play reduced rosters throughout the season, setting lineups, say monthly or biweekly, of 8 offensive (one at each position) plus 4 Ps, basically half of your team roster. DL and NR moves could still be used, but on the monthly/biweekly cycle instead of weekly. Maybe even fewer NR moves would be needed (did you here that Fox?). The September injuries should not be an issue, as you would not have them in the lineup. I don't think it would be any greater burden on Fox or Hans in terms of roster changes either. Overall, this approach would be more like those perfect Rotogolf rules and the defunct Rotohoops rules. By the way, my team, and my management of it, sucked this year. So I'm not making any excuses for that. Mags ... Dearest Roto League members, First I want to say: Phils Rule, Mets Drool!!!! ------ I'm thinking of dropping the September call up draft thing. It's a pain to administrate, it's out of whack with the rest of our roto universe, it doesn't add that much "fun", it throws our rosters out of balance, its a mole on an otherwise unblemished set of rules. We have a nice set of rules. A good number of NR moves. It feels right. DL moves for officially hurt players. Seems to be working well. Most of the clamoring for rules changes to address things such as ML September roster expansion come from the hard core roto freaks amongst us. But we are serving a wider community. If we instituted extra Sept moves or moves for red crosses in Sept that would mostly benefit the aforementioned hard core freaks .. the more complicated we make it, the more management that is required, then the more it favors the hard core amongst us. And that's what the hard core people want .. they think that is "fair" and "good" and "right". It's not. I see us with three levels of players ... I'm not exactly sure who fits where but here's a guess: Intense: MIGHT (emphasis on the "potential" tense here, to each his own and we all deserve to have our own fun where we can get it) be too serious, hard core, follow the stats, possibly over think things and tend to suggest lots of rules changes because they feel the current rules are keeping their teams from their rightful 1st place position ... These would include Sobo, Mags most years, Gabes although he probably won't admit it and Terry who might be having the most fun of any of us. Into it: Are into it but let other things get in the way although sometimes they pay attention a lot .. and other times they forget to keep track of what's going on ... Albert, Andy, MeSelf Having Fun: Maybe the purest level, play for the fun and camaraderie of it, follow the rules but don't worry about changing them, are most likely to draft a home town player or someone they just like .. and are at a disadvantage because they don't follow everything as closely as the others .. have fun no matter where they finish because that's the way they approach things .. Jack, Hans, Prep. All three levels are enjoying the league. All three are important. But, we used to have more people at the "Having Fun" level .. specifically John and Ike ... I wonder if they were lost because of things getting too complicated or too intense. I don't think we should change much. I don't want to lose anybody else. We should leave things be. Except for dropping the September thing. Its stupid. Its called a replacement draft yet Andy doesn't want to replace players. Illogical. Does not compute. Peace out. ICC ... Fox, The rules as they are are fine by me. If you drop the September replacement draft, that's fine by me, too. See, I'm not as intense as you think I am. Mr. Fun ... How dare you lump me with those intense guys. Just for making an astute analysis. You're a divider, I'm a uniter. So there. Mags ... I AM NOT INTENSE!!!!!!!! SOBO ... End