Looking Back... 2020 was..umm..unique. That's certainly an understatement. But we (and the NFL) managed to muddle through it. It looked dicey there in the early going but here we are with a champion and an off-season to think about what's next.
I made some rules adjustments going into the year and made a few changes on the fly. Thanks for being flexible and understanding. I damn sure hope 2020 was a one off.
Looking Forward... It's funny. We went for years (YEARS!) without a change in rules and regulations. We were a dinosaur league, scoring touchdowns and kicker points well past the point when nearly every other league was using yards, dedicated tight ends, PPR, half PPR, defenses/special teams and IDPs. OK, we don't use some of those still, but you get my point. However once we moved into the modern world of fantasy football we've kept progressing. I've come to embrace change to keep the league fresh and challenging. Not every idea is a good one. Many of you remember when we had 'farm teams'...NFL teams that we 'owned' which formed a player pool we could draw from when we needed a replacement. It was ummm...interesting.
Then we went to performance scoring, keepers in Phase One, Draft Values, the Dalvin Cook Rule and other crazy stuff. We are still evolving and more changes are in the works. Here are a few things I've been working on and where I stand on them at the moment.
Taxi Squad: I'd played around with the idea of a Taxi Squad, a place to 'stash' a player (or players), normally rookies and/or second-year guys. I fostered a team this year that used this feature. I found it interesting until it dawned on me that it's kind of pointless when all you really need to do is adjust your roster size if you want space for a prospect. The TS would add more stuff for me to monitor (even though MFL has provisions for one) and who needs another layer of rules and regulations?
But having said that, I think there may be a way to make drafting rookies less of an exercise in dart throwing at immediate returns. More on this below.
Verdict: Idea Nixed!
Playoff Qualifiers: I'm fairly certain we will add another team to the mix next year. We'll go seven teams deep with the added team being the highest scoring non-qualifyer. This isn't new and those of you who have been around awhile (which is most of you) know that I've been a proponent of this for years. FF has such a luck factor and nearly every single season a good, high output team sits it out due to scheduling that they can't control.
Yes, I know. This year it was my team but as I said, you all know how long this has been a priority of mine. The Flyer situation has nothing to do with moving this once again to the front burner. Look back through this year's emails and newsletters and you'll find I was saying this even when my team was an upper seed.
I don't want to make the points seed the #6 and have just one 'traditional' wildcard qualifier. I think the four division format means we need the 4 division winners and two w/l wildcards. But there's no reason we can't add another one. Here's how I see this working: Four division winners get slots 1-4 with seeding based on the usual regulations. Two more teams qualify as usual based on record with the standard tie-breaks used (see below). The seventh team is the PPG qualifier.
Now here is where it gets interesting. The three non-division winners are seeded 5 thru 7 based on PPG. Here's why... in a seven team playoff only the #1 seed gets a bye. That's sort of revolutionary but we haven't always had byes and we've had plenty of teams that got byes that really were not deserving. Seeding the 5-7 based on PPG also sets up the #2 seed against the #7 which should be the weakest of the wildcards. You could consider it a 'bone' thrown to the #2 seed.
I'm still playing around with this in my mind as I take my dog for walks so don't pitch a fit just yet. There are other ways to seed the wildcards (including a more traditional approach). The Draft Order section will touch on a few things that MFL offers us in ways to rank teams. One of those might work for sorting out the seeds as well. This is probably as good a time as any to point out that had we not gone back to only w/l qualifiers, we would have had a different champ. Rick would not have made the playoffs. Do with that as you wish. Verdict: 99% a done deal with final details TBD.
Roster limits including IR slots: This sort of falls under the 'Let's see what the situation looks like in the summer/fall' category along with Waiver Money, claim limits, etc. If we are at a more 'normal' point where COVID isn't that big a possible factor I think we will go back to a more standard limit although the old 15 player roster thing might get tweaked a bit. 16/17 might work. We've done both of those before. Same with the six IR spots we allowed in 2020. Look for it to be two at most. Verdict: It Depends
Tiebreaks: Referring here to standings and seeding tiebreaks, not game results. I tweaked these last summer and made PPG more of a factor. I'm going to look at this again. If you had the misfortune to check our tiebreak regulations this year you saw how complicated it can get. I'd like to streamline it some with continued emphasis on points scored. Verdict: Minor thing to make my life easier so, yeah.
Draft Order: Oh boy, here we go! Here's what I know... we will modify how the draft order is set beginning this fall.
Here's what I don't know (for certain)... how will we establish the order? Will we split the draft so that the non-playoff teams all get a first round slot before the playoff teams? How will be determine that order? Record? PPG? Power Rank? Potential Points (the max you could have scored with your best lineup)? All-Play standings (your record if you played all 11 other teams every week)? MFL's Victory Points (awarded for wins, ties, losses plus ranked scoring tiers)? Or some combo of the above. Or all of the above?
And will we just assign slots based on one or a combo of those or use a 'weighted' draft lottery with 'virtual ping pong balls' assigned for whatever categories we use? Should we base a category on the full 13 week season or cut it off at 10 to minimize the temptation to tank? Do we do a serpentine draft the whole way through based on the above or just through a few rounds and then go to a randomized order? So many questions!
OK...Here's what I'm thinking....
Separate the non-playoff teams and apply the following (I'm referring to lottery 'ping pong balls' as 'tix' just to make it easy)...
On a sliding scale of 10-8-6-4-2-1 (or something similar) we assign tix to the teams in reverse order for each of the following...
- W/L with our standard tiebreaks applied
- Potential PPG
- All-Play Record
We could include the system's power Rank Ratings as well. BTW these categories (and more!) can be found on one page of our league home... Reports-->Standings-->Power Rank. Add up the tix 'earned' and use this Draft Pick Lottery site to run the lottery. It costs just $2 to have the site email the results directly or we could do a Zoom session or video as documentation.
I made up some numbers and put this spreadsheet together just for fun.
So I'd put in the teams and using the 'custom' option at the lottery site I'd assign 26 tix to Team C, 26 to Team E, 18 to Team F, and so on. Hit the button and the lottery order for those teams gets emailed. We could do the same exact thing for the playoff teams. Maybe dock the Hughes Bowl champ 25% of their tix. Or maybe not. Or just assign their slots based on record or some other of the categories.
Still to be determined is how the second and subsequent rounds go. MFL itself has the capacity to randomize any or all rounds. Lots to think about indeed. Verdict: It'll get done in one form or fashion.
Keepers/Draft Values: I've received a few suggestions for changes in the way we keep players from year to year. OK, so some of these 'suggestions' are actually complaints, but whatever. I've made an adjustment or two in the last year. Now no player can be held in a round beyond Round 10. Maybe more tweaking is needed but to be honest I really like the system. I like the continuity of carrying 'core' players from year to year. Truth be told we'd be a dynasty league if I didn't think most of you would bail. I'm too old to recruit these days.
I believe that what you get out of the draft is generally equal to the work that you put into it. Teams are made through drafting well in the middle rounds, keeping up with free agents, and just paying attention in general. If you go into the draft just relying on the ADP list that MFL provides on the draft room page you're gonna be disappointed. That list averages results from drafts covering every system imaginable. It has little relevance to ours.
One specific 'complaint' pointed my way was that it doesn't pay to draft a rookie in the first or second round. The likelihood of him contributing in his first year is debatable and then you're going to lose him due to the rules anyway. To which I say "OK, then don't draft a rookie in the first two rounds." With the keeper rules forcing top players into the market every year and restricting teams to one player at any position there should always be talent available. Grab those rookies in the middle rounds.
But having said that I am always open to suggestions. Some issues will take some very persuasive arguments to get me to buy into. The keeper system, I admit, is something I'm pretty proud of. It's worked the way I envisioned it to this point. But I've moved away from stuff I loved in the past and will do so again I'm sure.
The last poll I put up for a vote concerned allowing two keepers from the same position. The results, which were 9-3 against, sort of surprised me. I like the one player per position limit for the simple reason it helps churn talent back into the draft. But I wouldn't have pitched a fit if it had gone the other way. Let's see how drafting is affected over the next year or two and we can revisit this.
Another suggestion, one that sort of piggybacked the Taxi Squad idea, was to put in place an additional keeper slot for retaining a rookie. That's got merit. I'd like to hear ideas on doing that without necessarily adding a Taxi Squad. Maybe allowing one rookie to be kept in a specific slot after his rookie year no matter where he was drafted. Then again I can see that becoming problematic in cases of rookies that really make an immediate impact. Not sure there's a perfect solution. I'm all ears for your thoughts. Verdict: Nothing likely to change unless I add the rookie thing but that won't effect the 2021 season keepers.
The Dalvin Cook Rule: I'm going to just quote what I said in a previous post...
I'm thinking of tweaking the Dalvin Cook Rule for next season. The last qualifier reads like this: "He was active for five or fewer games during the Hughes League regular season" I may make that read "...the Hughes League season, including playoffs." That would mean NFL weeks 1 thru 16. And I will definitely adjust the wording to reflect my original intent as to the number of games. It was supposed to be 'fewer than five games'.I am also going to add a provision that restricts qualifying players to being Round One keepers. as currently written players can be slotted into the round they were drafted/kept in in the year they qualify. Verdict: Probably a done deal.
I think that covers most of the things that keep me up nights. And then some. LOL As always, your thoughts and constructive criticisms are more than welcome.
This is Joey a.k.a 'Joey Chestnut' cause he chows down like he's in an eating contest. He's been with us a few weeks and is getting to be cool with life at Hughes Central.
Hard to see just how big he is in those. But here he is on the biggest bed PetSmart sells.
That's it from here. I've finished the Draft Value page and will mail it out once I've re-checked the numbers. I am working on the spreadsheets that are found in the 'Links' section of the league site...All Time W/L, Playoff results through the years and so on. Once those are done I'll update the site and then take a break.
Last Reminder: The Post Season NFL Playoff tournament will commence once the playoff teams are confirmed in the NFL. I'll remind you then to select your players. Please sign up if you haven't done so. It's an easy way to get some extra waiver cash for 2021 and remember that we likely won't be at the crazy $500 per team allotment next season.
Happy New Year to all, stay safe!
-Commish
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