Build Through the Draft, an FOF2k4 dynasty

[Samdari]

This is my first attempt at a dynasty, and will be following a set of house rules I created for myself. The basic premise is that I want to create a championship team by old school “building through the draft.” with the parenthetic phrase strictly enforced. I will spend seven seasons assembling a roster from an empty cupboard style beginning. The roster at the end will be composed of the 49 draft picks, plus my favorite additions during the run. Those players will be kept together as long as possible, to see how far they can go.

Because I am too lazy to learn how to switch universes, the dynasty will take place in the IHOF realm, and I will be controlling my beloved Springfield Isotopes.

The house rules will be:

(1) The roster should be primarily composed of the 49 players from seven drafts. Other house “guidelines” will be broken in attempts to adhere strictly to this rule.
(2) In order to ensure that these players remain together, renegotiations will consist of giving players with one season remaining on their contracts their requested extension. If needed, other contracts will be renegotiated in attempts to clear the cap space necessary to keep the draftees together.
(3) In order to adhere to #1, no drafted players will be allowed to be released or traded, no matter how badly they bust, or how outrageous their contract demands.
(4) No trading of draft picks. It is too easy, IMO, with an empty cupboard to trade the inevitable #1 pick down to acquire more picks. We don’t like fancy draft machinations, so we’ll stay where we are in the draft and pick who we like.
(5) Only rookie free agents allowed. This dynasty will start off with all players released, and FOF rules require more than 7 players. The remainder will be rookie FA’s. They may only be given their requested contracts however. In order to ease the mind numbing search for rookie FA’s every year, I will allow giving RFA’s that I signed as rookies their requested extensions also.

Points of emphasis will be:

(1) Team chemistry.
I would like to have as much affinity and as few conflicts as possible. This will be checked on draftees, but some conflicts are inevitable, as it is impossible to check if draftees will become leaders.
(2) Line play.
Since this dynasty embraces the seemingly old school concept of building through the draft, we shall also embrace the also seemingly old school concept of winning in the trenches. In general, if a potential draftee is on the first page of the draft board, has higher potential than a current starter, and has skills that fit our scheme, he’ll be considered ahead of other positions. I don’t want to restrict myself into passing up superstars for marginal linemen here, but we are looking for linemen first.

[Samdari]

Sim through the 2004 season with full AI control. The Istotopes go a mediocre 8-8, landing the all important 14th pick in all rounds.

We need a new head coach and defensive coordinator, so we hire the HC with the best injury rating (Excellent!) and the DC with the highest rating in DL (also Excellent). We get to FA and release everyone, then skip the remainder of FA and move on to the draft.

In the first round, a number of skill players go early, thus when we pick, there is a stud DE still on the board. With our line play bias, we jump on him. Later picks produce little in the way of linemen, with us only nabbing a mediocre LT and C in the 4th and 7th rounds respectively. The draft class looks like:

Finch	 Emmanuel	LDE	22	68
Troy	 Ron		RB	49	61
Hatton	 Jon		WILB	18	57
McNeil	 Anthony	QB	20	49
Ridgeway Daniel		C	15	44
Crane	 Perry		LT	11	42
Whiteman Gene		RCB	14	38

We fill the rest of the roster with, well, roster filler. Few of them show promise for being long term keepers, and disappointingly, none of those are linemen.

Attitude report:
We signed 55 players, and there are two conflicts. These are easily resolved, cutting nobody who is a leader. This could be much more difficult in later seasons, when draftees will unsuspectingly usurp leadership positions. We’ll be a happy winless team.

Its an ugly year for the Isotopes, we manage to win one along the way, the Asheville Axemen should be embarrassed. Since we had nothing to gain this season but experience for our draftees, lets see how they progressed and performed.

Finch	EmmanuelLDE	31	67 - 57 tack, 17 asst 5.5 sack, 4 blk, 17 hurry, 5.6 prp
Troy	Ron	RB	53	61 – 174 att, 667 yds 2TD
Hatton	Jon	MLB	21	52 – 82 tack, 38 asst 2 sack, 2 hurr, 9 PD 16.9 tack%
McNeil	Anthony	QB	27	48 – 207/416, 49/7%, 2090 yds, 3TD, 19 INT, 47.8 rate
Ridgeway Daniel	C	23	44 – 16/67 KRB, 2SkA, 0.4 Sk%
Crane	Perry	LT	13	34 – 5/21 KRB, 13SkA, 3.0 Sk%
Whiteman Gene	RCB	19	32 – 1INT, 7 PD, 22 caught, 19.7 pdp

.

Finch, Troy and Hatton look like keepers. Wait, they're all keepers, those guys look like starters. McNeil is a borderline starter/capable backup, and Ridgeway looks like a career backup. Since being drafted by the Isotopes is like being given a lifetime guaranteed contract, Crane and Whiteman will be stealing the rest of their careers.

Also, somebody won the division, and the Solecismic Bowl, but you did are not reading this dynasty to hear about them.

[Samdari]

2006 Season

We need to replace our offensive coordinator, so we find the one rated highest in OL, paying his asking price. We leave ticket prices alone. We enter free agency with 7 players under contract, having given all rookie FA’s last year the 1 year contracts they requested. In the first week of FA, we resign about 20 of our best RFA’s giving them their requested contract. We breeze through FA, to get to the all important draft.

Disappointingly, there are no offensive linemen among the top 10 players. There is an absolute stud CB at the top of the draft, but our first draft only netted one starting caliber lineman, so we need to look at the DE and DT rated 2 and 3 overall. The DE has ratings in categories not highly valued by the organization, but the DT looks to have top ratings everywhere, is a AAA guy and no conflicts with our current leader (who unfortunately, is unlikely to last long with the team).

The second round has only a C on the first page, the same position as the one decent OL player we took last year. I am a fan of drafting centers and trying to move them, and this guy is better than Ridgeway anyway, so I take him.

The rest of the draft brings a promising G, a backup T, an honorary OL in a run blocking TE, and a KR/ST running back with some promise late. Another corner is also taken, but does not have much promise. With only so many spots in the core 49 available for CB’s this is quickly shaping up to be a weakness on the team, perhaps we will address that next season. Our roster of draftees now looks like:

Finch	Emmanuel LDE	2	31	66
Troy	Ron	RB	2	51	62
Hatton	Jon	MLB	2	20	48
McNeil	Anthony	QB	2	27	48
Ridgeway Daniel	C	2	23	45
Crane	Perry	LT	2	13	30
Whiteman Gene	RCB	2	18	28
Gist	Darnell	LDT	1	29	74
Dirnbauer Jackie C	1	35	65
Baskin	Kelvin	TE	1	35	72
Clancy	Joseph	RCB	1	14	49
Hampton	Brad	RG	1	5	46
Patterson Casey	LT	1	10	37
Gerhardt Larry	RB	1	19	38

Attitude report: No conflicts, 9 affinities, 3 mild affinities.

Cohesion report: Last in all categories, rated 83-84. With the guidelines here to keep the core group together, I expect this to go up as the seasons go by.

Again, an ugly year for the Isotopes. Not only are we early in the struggle to rebuild the talent base, but it’s a bad year for injuries. Not only do we need to scrape the bottom of the barrel to replace the injured rookie FA’s with worse rookie FA’s (some positions only have 2 or 3 players left) but three of our draftees suffer scary injuries. C Daniel Ridgeway, now a backup, suffers a torn quad and misses the entire season. MLB John Hatton plays 11 games before being lost for the season with a severe hamstring pull, and LT Perry Crane, already a bust from his initially limited potential, suffers a 55 week ACL injury in our 13th game. That may be a blessing in disguise, as he would be a burden as a mandatory keeper. We manage our second straight 1-15 campaign.

Our draftees after 2006:

Finch	Emmanuel LDE	45	66 - 40 tack, 15 asst 1 sack, 2 blk, 14 hurry, 3.2 prp
Troy	Ron	RB	58	62 - 265 att, 984 yds 1 TD
Hatton	Jon	MLB	24	48 - 71 tack, 21 asst 2 sack, 9 PD 20.9 tack%
McNeil	Anthony	QB	33	48 - 192/403, 47.6%, 1971 yds, 10TD, 20 INT, 49.7 rate
Ridgeway Daniel	C	26	45 – did not play
Crane	Perry	LT	16	30 - 5/32 KRB, 6 SkA, 1.9 Sk%
Whiteman Gene	RCB	23	28 -  2 INT, 7 PD, 26 caught, 19.7 pdp
Gist	Darnell	LDT	44	71 – 69 tack, 25 asst 4 Sck, 2 blk, 9 hurry, 2.9 prp, DRoY
Dirnbauer Jackie C	44	61 - 14/56 KRB (.250), 2SkA, 0.5 Sk%
Baskin	Kelvin	TE	54	70 – 30 rec, 241 yds, 5 TD, 3 drp, 4/13 KRB (30.7)
Clancy	Joseph	LCB	20	42 - 2 INT, 2 PD, 26 caught, 19.0 pdp
Hampton	Brad	RG	15	39 – 17/60 KRB (.283) 6 SkA, 1.3 Sk%
Patterson Casey	LT	20	36 – 20/69 KRB (289) 5 SkA, 1.1 Sk%
Gerhardt Larry	RB	19	32 – 39 KR, 608 KR yds, 15.5 avg

Finch progressed in ratings, but regressed in play on the field. Troy performed as well as expected with only one starter caliber player on the OL. Hatton played very well before being injured, McNeil made disappointing progress (perhaps a WR would help) and the Crane injury will doom him to dead weight until he retires.

The 2006 draftees look good, obviously Gist winning DRoY is huge, our first honor of any kind. Baskin will hold up to his draft ratings, and Dirnbauer, Clancy and Hampton look like decent picks for their round. Gerhardt looks like he will be effective at what he was drafted for - kick returning.

[Peregrine]

Interesting idea Samdari, though I worry you'll end up with a bunch of no-talent or injured players in starting positions. Maybe it will work out though!