Possible Draft Issue
 

I haven't spend too much time with the game yet, but I did start a quick career just to mess around with some of the new features. During the first rookie draft, I noticed that Dallas selected a kicker with the 2nd overall pick in the draft, and followed that up by taking a punter with the 2nd pick of round 2 and another kicker in one of the later rounds. Not only that, but looking at their roster, they already had a pretty good kicker under contract, and their punter from the previous year had the franchise tag on him. Other than Dallas, the highest kicker or punter taken was not until the early 3rd round. I thought that was a bit unusual, but probably not a huge issue unless it happens with regularity. Anyone else noticed anything like this?

Also, I noticed that if you leave the draft window during the draft and then come back to it, the list of picks resets to blank. I don't remember if that was the case in previous versions or not.

Related to this, I would love it if it were possible to click on players that have already been drafted and bring up the player information screen. I'm very pleased that this was added to many other screens where it had been previously lacking, and the bottom half of the draft screen might be the only place where this isn't possible.

Other than these things (which seem fairly minor), I'm really enjoying the game. You'll notice that this is my first post, but I've been lurking for a long time, and have owned every version of the game.

Yea', this is how it's always been.

Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

Unfortunately, that such a thing happens at all sends up a warning flag. Simply put, that is in an impossibility in the NFL.

Re: Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

It may be a warning flag, but it is one I haven't been able to reproduce.

I've quick simmed through the 2015 season. The highest drafted kicker or punter was the 12th pick in the 4th round. I went through every teams roster to confirm this.

I've handled round one of all of my drafts and have never seen the computer take a punter or a kicker in round one.

Maybe someone else can reproduce this so we can figure out an exact scenario of where and how it happens.

TroyF

I want to hire all of you

Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

It's such a multi-headed beast, as gabeschw stated:

1. Taking a kicker with the 2nd pick of the draft. (never)
2. Taking more than one kicker in the same draft. (extremely unlikely)
3. Taking a punter with the 2nd pick of the 2nd round (extremely unlikely)
4. Taking a kicker AND a punter in the same draft (unlikely), but in a combination of high rounds to boot (never).
5. Taking kicker/punter with competent ones on board, including a franchised punter. (odd)
6. FRANCHISING a punter? (unlikely)

In what round/pick did the Raiders select ol' Sebass?

The Raiders selected Janikowski in the 1st round

Dola,

This was an issue in FOF4 as well, but it was a pretty rare one.

Re: Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

Yeah, I just did a double check. . . I can't find anything in my game that resembles anything like the above issues.

I've checked 1, 2, 3 and there were zero instances of that happening. (remember, I'm 12 years+ into my league)

There were no franchised punters or kickers, though that can change from year to year and I can't go back to double check that.

I just ran the 2017 draft and had my scout run it. I'll post the results from that in a second.

TroyF

Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

It was. The way I get around it is before closing the draft windows highlight the players selected so far (ctrl-a or with mouse) and hit crtl-c -- then paste the list into a text file that you can keep open the whole time.

Wasn't Ray Guy the 8th pick overall? Just throwing that out there to keep my post per day count up, and add that it may need addressing.

Can you post the game files?

No he was taken #23 overall, but still in the 1st round.

2017 draft;

First kicker taken with the 14th pick in round #4. (if anything, I'm worried that in 15 drafts, I haven't had a kicker/punter picked before the fourth round. It seems like in my copy of the game kickers are never picked earlier than that)

13 kickers/punters were selected. No team took more than one.

I'll restart sometime tonight and do some more draft tests if people are curious.

So far, the breakdown of the first player picked in the draft looks like this:

QB - 3
RB - 3
T - 1
DE - 1
DT - 4
CB - 2

Only 2 of the overall #1's flat out busted. (A QB and an RB) Another 2 are very average players. (RB and CB) 6 are flat out mega stars and sure fire hall of famers barring serious injury (2 QB, RB, DE, DT, CB) The others are all solid starters who will make a few pro bowls but never be considered HOF calibur players.

TroyF

Without doing a whole bunch of research, that sounds pretty stinkin' good to me.

I'm going to piggy-back another issue on this thread, since we already have an orgy of FOF 2004 threads as it is. I believe this point has been raised in the past, but I'm curious if it has been addressed in this version of the game (and I've already heard references to it still being a potential concern).

Are franchise-quality QBs still popping up frequently as free agents? I'm referring to top-tier guys. One of the references I heard referred to Peyton Manning as a free agent score for the Arizona Cardinals (I think).

I would agree.

The running back who is a sure fire hall of famer was the best rookie RB I've ever seen in the FOF series. He was nearly maxed out RED on everything, including a 99 in breakaway running. Jacksonville took him in 2004. They won 4 of the next 5 Super Bowls as Leftwich and the back led an unstoppable offense.

In their best year, Leftwich threw for 5000 yards and 47 TD's, while the RB ran for 1850 yards and 14 TD's. (he caught another 12 TD passes)

The RB left via free agency after his 6th or 7th year. Here are their numbers thus far:

Leftwich

Career QB rating 97.4
63.3 % completion rate
55,606 yards passing
350 TD's, 153 INT
133-68-1 record as a starter

The running back (you'll love this name)

Hunter Thompson

17,666 yards rushing
132 rushing TD's
400 career catches
3558 receiving yards
35 receiving TD's
He had a stretch of 8 consecutive 1,400 yard rushing seasons.

When those two played on the same team, they were tough to beat.

TroyF

I think there are too many FA superstar QB's that hit the market. Leftwich stayed in Jax until late in his career. Carr and Palmer both became great QB's and left after 6 years.

TroyF

Well, a guy with the name Hunter Thompson should be a great player. With the amount of speed and pain killers he could ingest before games, there is no way anyone could stop him.

In my first try (I didn't play at work, really, I promise) Manning ended up with the imfamous Delta Rays in season two. McNair and Leftwich never moved teams in about 8 seasons though.

Re: Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

Actually, I think this does happen from time to time. Wasn't Sauerbrun franchised?

Re: Re: Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

Not sure, but I do know that Elam (a kicker, admittedly) most definitely was. It actually isn't that bad of a move.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

It's a pretty good move assuming you have a good kicker you don't want to lose. Even if you can't come to terms on a contract, if you have to pay the salary of the top 5 kicker in the NFL, you don't have a heck of a lot of cap room tied up.

Astral,

I agree about Hunter 100%. I'm surprised the Jags didn't have any major drug suspensions during his time with the club.

TroyF

Maybe Gabe just has the Retarded Cowboys? Could just be that the Barr brothers finally quit football, took their millions and bought a team to focus on the horrible draft showing of kickers in the league?

this still needs work, i think. in my first off-season (right after season 1) Peyton Manning is a free agent. this is made much worse when you look at his first season totals:

401/584 (68.6%) 5,595 yards 45 tds, 20 ints. 110.6 rating.

of course, he is asking for 6 yrs, $111 million...$28.5 mil signing bonus...

If the old team just can't afford him, what were you expecting? Overdrafting the cap, like the NBA? Doesn't work that way...

Now, if his old team has $40mil in free cap room, it's a different story, maybe.

Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

I have yet to see anything along these lines. Anything unusual in your settings?

one more f/a question, rather than start a new thread....an olb who is listed is a restricted free agent from the rams is showing up on the free agent list, and i can offer him a contract. hes in his 4th year. his player card says restricted free agent, not unrestricted. how is this possible?

nevermind, he was cut by the rams. his card still says rfa, but hes really unrestricted. i see now.

Re: Re: Possible Draft Issue
 

Nothing that I can think of. I started the game with a preference draft using the original player file, simulated quickly through the first season, and this happened during the first draft. Like I said, this is the only unusual thing I noticed, and I'm glad to hear nobody else is having the same problem. You can see screenshots of the Dallas roster screen and of the kicker here:

http://home.comcast.net/~gabesch/

Not that the screenies show something normal, the Punter is Free Agent and 14 years in the league and maybe they didn't want to resign him. The other K may have been a dud and they were replacing him.

No doubt that should be a .01% occurence. I'm sure will recognize the code that was responsible for that.