6.25.2007

Potential 2008 Rule Changes

I am opening a discussion thread here to encourage participants to post regarding possible rule changes for next season. To get the discussion started, I am listing five areas that I have thought about that could need further refining. If you have already voiced your opinion on these matters in the past, I would ask you to allow other people to have the opening salvo.

1) adjustments to the amount of keepers allowed;
2) adjustments to the arbitrary keeper values from last year;
3) adjustment of the cost of inflation;
4) adjustment of the minimum keeper cost;
5) implementation of minor league keepers idea.

8 comments:

Rich said...

Just to provide an additional elucidation on the minor league keeper idea, I recall some discussion early on about allowing us to draft and retain minor league players. However, here were logistical problems that were not really solved related to how they would be reserved on your roster when they aren't in the system, how they count against your keeper limit/budget, and what happens when they are called up, among other thigns. Lots of logistical problems when you think about it. We didn't really talk about this much later b/c we were dealing with big issues. Does anyone think we could or should overcome these problems and try to do it now?

Anonymous said...

In general, I think the league rules are working out pretty well. I was recently thinking about whether extra keepers would be a good idea. My only thought, teaming it with a minor leaguer idea, is to add a fifth keeper that must have cost less than $5 or have been picked up during the year. This would provide a spot for lesser players with potential and give good reason to hold a bench spot.

Dave said...

I generally think the league rules are working well as well, though I am open to the idea of either raising the minimum value for keepers and/or increasing the amount of inflation, though probably not both in conjunction. I also continue to be interested in this minor league keeper idea. One way it could work is to at the beginning of each season have a supplemental, one round minor leaguer draft where the only people eligible are those who have never played an inning of major league ball. That player will cost nothing for a team in its budget. The question then becomes how that player relates to the roster. One possibility is to not have that player take up a roster spot while he remains in the minors but once he reaches the majors an owner is forced to either activate him (i.e. put him on the bench of his team or in his active roster spots) or release him to the pool. I think that's the initial issue we'd have to deal with, how this player affects the roster at Yahoo and how we handle "promoting" him to the active roster.

Rich said...

Regarding drafting minor league players: the supplemental round might work where we forget about budgets. In that round, we could give an advantage to the lower teams where they can draft minor league players first.

Regarding promotion: we could add an extra bench spot available only to put minor leaguers in, in the event they are in the system. Once they play, we could incorporate them into the keeper format by having their value be below the normal minimum value, like $10 (which probably means they have to be good but not great to make it worth your while to keep).

Rich said...

to continue with my previous post, another possible problem would be how the lower value might work in connection with YPIA. I would propose something along the lines of a 3 year moratorium on using YPIA on one of these minor league players. This way, his cost probably won't be grossly out of proportion to his value. If he is still under 25 after YEAR 3, you can get the YPIA, and then normal inflation continues.

Oh, and for players who don't get promoted, you can keep him at no charge. I think you should be able to draft another minor leaguer each year and keep as many each year as you want and they only start costing you money/slots when they get promoted to the majors. Thoughts?

Dave said...

I agree that the supplemental draft would be in reverse order of the previous year's standings. As to the value of that player once in the majors, I had actually thought that a more limited valuation of $5 for the first year might be appropriate, then raising the value up to the minimum keeper value for the next year and letting that player then stay at that value for another year under the YPIA provision. That would allow the player to be free the first season he's active, then $15 for the second and third seasons he's active, then upwards from there with inflation. I think that 3 years at $10 may be too much, but I'm open to discussing all this further.

Anonymous said...

First, perhaps there is a threshold of who is considered a 'minor leaguer'. Plenty of teams bring of Double-A talent in September when they are realistically two years away from being in The Show. There should be a max number of innings or at-bats, set low, but not zero.

Second, I would go for a free draft of a single minor leaguer next year. Then, add cost of $5 for each of the next three years perhaps.

Last, as per my first point, there might come a time during the year where a minor leaguer in your extra bench spot gets called up for one game. Do you then have to drop a regular player to accommodate a minor leaguer with limited valued?

Rich said...

I was thinking that the extra bench slot would be for a minor league player only, so there wouldn't be an issue about dropping a real player if the minor leaguer is called up for one game since that slot is only for him. However, clearly it would require less policing if the extra slot was for anyone, which is preferable. This rule would create your dilemma, but it is not that bad when you think of the extra slot as a privilege. You should have to make a decision at that point if your guy's potential is worth keeping over the last guy on your bench.