Idea for the league start

[MIJB#19]

Freaky, I can't see Narcizo's first post of this thread.

Edit: Even freakier, this post shows up as the first post of the thread...

[Narcizo]

I know a number of people are great fan's of having a league with history and stats and stuff ready from the off so I thought I'd throw this idea out to see what people think. I'm not even sure I think it's a good idea but here goes.

Rather than have all owners join the league on the day of it's inception with a preference draft it should be possible for the commish (whoever he (or she) may be) to create the league and run through multiple seasons with all teams under computer control. With the AI being much better at keeping teams together the results shouldn't be too wacky (as they would be if the same thing was carried out in 2004, for example). This way when the owners take over their teams they will already have a history and a sense of continuity in the league. Basically it will be pre-simming the league.

Advantages:
A whole bunch of stats already existing to set everything in a "historical" perspective.
A better feeling of who your rivals are, who the traditional power houses are. Etc etc. So, a historical perspective again, then.
Ability for owners to start before the draft (hey! Lots of people have been moaning that "you can do that in EA's Head Coach, why not in FOF?" Their voice must be heard. (Fortunately mostly by SkyDog )

Disadvantages
No control over your roster from the start. Your team's make-up would basically be decided by the AI.
Lots of people, myself included, are excited about being in a league from the inception. This sort of set up would basically mean that all 32 owners would be joining a league, rather than starting a new one.
Probably a much more uneven playing field in terms of roster quality compared to the preference draft. Probably more realistic but maybe not as much fun.
The commish would have hours of fun ahead, simming through all the different stages.

It's probably a wanky idea but there you go. That's what I excel at.

[wade moore]

Funny thing is, I gave this same suggestion to SkyDog via IM when he first invited me to the league.

personally, I'm all for it.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by wade moore

Funny thing is, I gave this same suggestion to SkyDog via IM when he first invited me to the league.

personally, I'm all for it.

Yes, wade did make this suggestion. I made the same suggestion when we started IHOF, but it got shot down. I liked it then. I liked it when wade suggested it, and I still like it now. Here are a few more advantages and disadvantages not mentioned by Narcizo:

ADVANTAGES

• We sim past the first few years, when stats are different.
• I've always found it a bit mind-boggling that a 10-year veteran can exist in a fictional league with no stats.
• Avoid the strange "chess match" that is the preference draft.

DISADVANTAGES

• Advantages of "level economic playing field," such as VG stadiums and ability to improve whenever you want, are lost.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

Yes, wade did make this suggestion. I made the same suggestion when we started IHOF, but it got shot down. I liked it then. I liked it when wade suggested it, and I still like it now. Here are a few more advantages and disadvantages not mentioned by Narcizo:

ADVANTAGES

• We sim past the first few years, when stats are different.
• I've always found it a bit mind-boggling that a 10-year veteran can exist in a fictional league with no stats.
• Avoid the strange "chess match" that is the preference draft.

DISADVANTAGES

• Advantages of "level economic playing field," such as VG stadiums and ability to improve whenever you want, are lost.

Do you see any/many instances where stadiums/finances completely deteriorate after 20 years?

[Narcizo]

I forgot to mention that it will make potential hall of fame discussions, and basically any vulture stuff at all, much easier. And maybe someone could provide a brief rundown of each year.

[CraigSca]

Not to be a party-pooper, but I see a disadvantage here.

Fast simming seasons will remove us from the satisfaction of control over every aspect of the team from day one. I've never started a league from day one, and I've always felt a little on the "outside looking in" because of it. I always hated seeing previous statistics of some of my players because they weren't part of "my" team. While this may purely be psychological, I didn't feel the team was mine until a major transition took place (e.g. new quarterback, runningback, etc). For some reason the team felt artificial to me until the team was "mine".

[CraigSca]

Are we absolutely sure that statistics are different between a mature league and a pure fictional with preference draft? Are the stats different because of cohesion?

[Narcizo]

Now Northwood's post has disappeared. This thread is the Marie Celeste of FOFC.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by CraigSca

Not to be a party-pooper, but I see a disadvantage here.

Fast simming seasons will remove us from the satisfaction of control over every aspect of the team from day one. I've never started a league from day one, and I've always felt a little on the "outside looking in" because of it. I always hated seeing previous statistics of some of my players because they weren't part of "my" team. While this may purely be psychological, I didn't feel the team was mine until a major transition took place (e.g. new quarterback, runningback, etc). For some reason the team felt artificial to me until the team was "mine".

What you'll realize is that it's no different with a preference draft. MAYBE if we did a live dispersal draft, but that would be PAINFUL. With a preference draft, you still don't quite get what you want. Look at the IHOF... 9 years into the league and people are still blaming their current woes on the preference draft.

Originally Posted by CraigSca

Are we absolutely sure that statistics are different between a mature league and a pure fictional with preference draft? Are the stats different because of cohesion?

SkyDog can answer much better than I can but - Yes and I'm pretty sure.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by Narcizo

Now Northwood's post has disappeared. This thread is the Marie Celeste of FOFC.

Northwood deleted his post.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by CraigSca

Are we absolutely sure that statistics are different between a mature league and a pure fictional with preference draft? Are the stats different because of cohesion?

1. I'm absolutely sure that they are different.
2. I *think* it is due to cohesion, but I'm not certain about that.

I won't have much FOF time this evening, but I did start a new test 6.0c league with a pref draft that I think is around 10 years in. I'll look at it later tonight, if someone else doesn't want to do so before then. I haven't done a comparison with 6.0c yet, but I know it was pretty significant with 6.0, at least, as in around 3ppg in league scoring average, and around 3/4 yards per pass attempt across the board. It's not a *huge* issue, as stats do change in real football, and you could even argue that it is more fun for offensive records to get broken very often in the first decade or so.

[Ben E Lou]

To be fair, it should be pointed out that the preference draft was patched at some point after the IHOF pref draft was done. The pref. draft feature works better now than it did when IHOF drafted, so that's not really a great comparison.

[CraigSca]

Originally Posted by wade moore

What you'll realize is that it's no different with a preference draft. MAYBE if we did a live dispersal draft, but that would be PAINFUL. With a preference draft, you still don't quite get what you want. Look at the IHOF... 9 years into the league and people are still blaming their current woes on the preference draft.

Sorry, I didn't make myself clear. I'm sure I'm in the minority on this one, but for some reason I don't mind having a team picked for me. What I do have is a(n) (admitted psychological) problem with the statistical data surrounding that team (the way they are used and their statistical history).

Let me also say I'll be okay with whatever the league as a whole chooses. This isn't a deal-breaker for me, nor will I whine about it .

[Northwood_DK]

What was the problem with the IHOF preference draft?

[RedKingGold]

Another thing to keep in mind is the enhanced scouting error in FOF2K7. It appears that Jim has made a real concerted effort to make us look at statitstics to determine the true value of players.

Therefore, it does make good sense to pre-run some history to allow us to evaluate our own teams and players better. I also like the idea of someone filling in the rest of the league of what is going on year-per-year while simming.

I am onboard for simming up some history.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Northwood_DK

What was the problem with the IHOF preference draft?

The worst problems were addressed in a patch, but basically, if you chose to put higher emphasis on a position, it went wayyyyyyy overboard. For example, by the 9th round, I had eight offensive linemen and one defensive linemen. By round 15, I had eight offensive linemen, six defensive linemen, and a QB. Then, it took 4 CB's with my next four picks. After 22 picks, when you'd expect your team to be somewhere in the vicinity of filled out at every position, I had:

8 offensive linemen
6 defensive linemen
4 cornerbacks
1 quarterback
2 linebackers
1 safety
0 wide receivers
0 tight ends
0 fullbacks
0 running backs

Many other teams were drafted in such an imbalanced manner, too. It certainly did make for some robust trading before the first season started, that's for sure.


EDIT TO ADD: I just wanted to make sure to emphasize that the above issues were addressed in a patch to FOF2K4. I haven't looked heavily at the pref drafts in FOF2K7, but from the leagues I have started with it, I would certainly assume that it is now much better than what we experienced in IHOF

[gstelmack]

I'm not sure I have a real preference. I see pluses and minuses either way. I am willing to do either.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by CraigSca

Sorry, I didn't make myself clear. I'm sure I'm in the minority on this one, but for some reason I don't mind having a team picked for me. What I do have is a(n) (admitted psychological) problem with the statistical data surrounding that team (the way they are used and their statistical history).

Let me also say I'll be okay with whatever the league as a whole chooses. This isn't a deal-breaker for me, nor will I whine about it .

Yeah, I did misunderstand what you were saying ...

I do see your point now, it's just a non-issue for me personally. I actually have thought in my head that we could build some sort of "story-line" around doing this (yeah yeah, I know, I get too immersed sometimes) where like we are a massive 32 person group that buys the entire league away from whomever owned it before or something - this helps me mentally get around the stuff you're mentioning.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by wade moore

Do you see any/many instances where stadiums/finances completely deteriorate after 20 years?

I'll have to look tonight. I'm not sure what we could expect.

FYI, my suggestion if we do this (mainly for commish sanity) would be that we only do 10-15 years. There's no reason I can think of to do 20. After 10, a large majority of players i n the league will have come in through the amateur draft. After 15, there shouldn't be more than 5-10 original players left. If we do this, the shorter the timeframe, the more we minimize the potential negatives.

[Emiliano]

I'm all for it, definitely. I'm a great fan of starting a league with some history, I love it. I'm finding myself doing this with SP as well, and I really enjoy it.

We could do, let's say, a 20-year sim, and then jump in as a owners in the "Staff Hiring" stage, choosing our staff, doing stadium plans, planning FA and drafting strategy. If you think about it, that's perfectly realistic. We would already have records to beat, all-time legends, guys in the HOF...

Plus, nobody has ever done it. I mean, are we elitists or what???

Obviously, not a deal-braker if we choose to go "preference draft", at least for me.

[CraigSca]

Originally Posted by wade moore

Yeah, I did misunderstand what you were saying ...

I do see your point now, it's just a non-issue for me personally. I actually have thought in my head that we could build some sort of "story-line" around doing this (yeah yeah, I know, I get too immersed sometimes) where like we are a massive 32 person group that buys the entire league away from whomever owned it before or something - this helps me mentally get around the stuff you're mentioning.

Immersion is one of the key aspects in keeping a league healthy, so I'm all for it if you think this will aid in that matter.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by CraigSca

Immersion is one of the key aspects in keeping a league healthy, so I'm all for it if you think this will aid in that matter.

In the end, either is fine with me. I think some will find more immersion from this (like me) and some will find less.

I guess when we have 32 everyone will have to weigh the pluses/minuses of both and we'll vote on it. Just trying to get my say out there as to why the minuses of starting in year 15 aren't a big deal to me personally.

[Flasch186]

Just wanted to throw out there that I am not a fan of this approach and would like to be involved from the inception...but thats just one person's opinion.

[primelord]

Originally Posted by wade moore

What you'll realize is that it's no different with a preference draft. MAYBE if we did a live dispersal draft, but that would be PAINFUL. With a preference draft, you still don't quite get what you want. Look at the IHOF... 9 years into the league and people are still blaming their current woes on the preference draft.

For the most part the people still complaining about the preference draft are the ones that complain about everything. What makes you think a live dispersal draft would be a pain? We did one in GEFL and it went just fine.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by primelord

What makes you think a live dispersal draft would be a pain? We did one in GEFL and it went just fine.

How long did it take?

[Dutch]

I'm not exactly sure, but this thread makes it look like it took roughly 2 weeks.

http://www.fof-gefl.com/phpbb2/viewt...er=asc&start=0

[RedKingGold]

For a live draft, we'd have to make some stricter time rules between picks or else it could drag on for a long period of time.

[Eaglesfan27]

I see advantages to either method. I agree that the built up stats would be a huge advantage as they are more important than in the past. However, a part of me shares Craig's desire to be in complete control of the team from day 1, and I think that the preference draft has been greatly tuned over time. That being said, I'd lean slightly towards simming some history.

Edited to add: If we didn't sim ahead to create history, I'd be all in favor of a live dispersal draft even if it takes 2 weeks. This is going to be a long term adventure, and I don't mind if it adds to immersion which I think it would over a preference draft.

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by primelord

For the most part the people still complaining about the preference draft are the ones that complain about everything. What makes you think a live dispersal draft would be a pain? We did one in GEFL and it went just fine.

The two weeks referenced below is definitely manageable. The "pain" was just a gut feeling from my draft experience in leagues other than IHOF. I'm not sure if you're in any other leagues, but it can be a very painful experience just for the 7 rounds of the amateur draft.

I would be much more in favor of a dispersal if it was manageable and done live vs. a preference draft.

All of that being said, my preference is still for a mature league for many of the other reasons mentioned.

In the end, I'm game for whatever.

[Ben E Lou]

As this discussion continues, I can definitely see benefits and disadvantages of all three options. Right now, here's where I'm sittin':

1(T): 53-player "live" draft or presim
3. pref draft

[Dutch]

The GEFL 53-man draft was particularly effective at getting you to "know" your team. You drafted it, you crafted it.

I'd be pretty excited about that, but it would *NEED* a utility such as VPI97 draft utility to work. Without it, I'll echo Wade Moore's concern that it could get painful and ugly. One pick in North America, the next in Europe, the next in North America, rinse, repeat and ad nauseum.

[Icy]

I'm all for this idea of simming some years in advance.

We have started the WAFL already with 2k7 and ran the preference draft. All went nice and every owner got more or less what he wanted but... one of the things i don't like a lot from our start from zero there is how the contracts are assigned to your players when you start without any history.

Two examples:

- One of my players is a great rookie with awesome future but not developed to be a starter... and that has 1 year contract and doesnt' want to renegotiate for more than a year so probably he will end as FA at the end of the season.

- One of my players is a great 13 years veteran totally maxed out... with a huge contract for 5 more seasons that grows up to $22M cap space in his last year that will be his 18th season.

Stuff like that won't happen if you sim let's say 10 years in advance as the contracts will match the experience years when you take over your team. As we are going to be 100% fictional, i don't' care about the players in my team when i take over it, and i really like to have years of history and stats to judge them.

[Narcizo]

Originally Posted by Icy

- One of my players is a great rookie with awesome future but not developed to be a starter... and that has 1 year contract and doesnt' want to renegotiate for more than a year so probably he will end as FA at the end of the season.

I know this doesn't really have to do with your point but you can just offer him more to get him on a two year contract. There's a lot of that in 2007 but they will normally take a deal if you increase what they're asking for in this year's wage by, say, 25%, have the same salary for next year and increase the bonus by 50-100%.

[wade moore]

fwiw, the Rookie would be an RFA, so you should be able to get him back without competition.

The point still stands though. Although I don't know that contracts will be THAT much better with a mature league either, at least for the veterans.

[gstelmack]

So time for a poll?

[JeeberD]

I'm fine with just about anything. A live draft, like we did in GEFL, would be lots of fun...but my work schedule would make it more difficult for me to get the exact players I want than it was back then. I think a preference draft would be just fine, and it would be cool if we did the 20 year history/ My only concern with that method is one that's been mentioned before...the teams will be random as hell when we take over.

[Celeval]

I'm flexible. That applies for nearly all these discussions, so I'll probably be quiet unless I have a strong opinion.

[Ben E Lou]

Ok. Here are some details, for those curious about the financial/stadium implications of an extended quicksim. I ran this career satring with 6.0c, fictional rosters, level economic playing field. This league is at the very beginning of 2018. Here are the turf rankings of the 31 AI teams:

EXC: 3
VG: 11
G: 12
AVG: 4
FAIR: 1

Additional stadium/financial info:

• 5 teams have completed new stadiums. (All have Exc. or VG turf.)
• All teams have done at least one renovation. (In other words, no stadium is exactly 70,000 any longer.)
• Two renovations and one construction are in progress.
• Available cap room ranges from $0.35M to $69.61M.
• The team with only $0.35M in cap room has the best QB in the league, and 89/89 guy with a lifetime 98.4 QB rating. He is taking up 24% of the cap. (NOTE: This is prior to renegotiation stage.)

[Narcizo]

I think 2 weeks might be a bit of a optimistic estimate given the number of non-US based people involved. I can fill in a preference list with the best of them but I doubt I'll manage to keep it more than 2 rounds ahead of the draft when I finish for the day.

[Northwood_DK]

I will proberly vote for the 53-player "live" draft.

That way we are sure that nobody can come back later and complain about their opening-day team. I like the idea of starting the league with some history but at the same time it will completely erase the advantage of a level playing field.

[3ric]

I'm in the opposite camp - I'd rather have 20 years of history than full control of the starting roster.

[stevew]

I'd hate a live draft, but i understand how some would like it. I do like the option of the quicksim for about 10 years, and then a start. If for the last 2-3 seasons of the quicksim, all the teams were set to human, and the computer filled all the rosters on an emergency one year contract at a time basis, basically you could be looking at a situation where we'd be starting at the coaching stage, with about 15-20 players each, and a bunch of cap space. The rest of the players would be pending FA. Then we could perhaps do some sort of draft lottery going into the first season(maybe if you franchise a player you go to the end of the line?). You basically be in the position to be able to control 50-70 percent of your roster, and you wouldn't have a situation where we'd be drafting 53 players to start with.

[MIJB#19]

Keep in mind that the GEFL draft was designed to run for 2 weeks. Only the first half of the 53 rounds manually (I can't find the numbers, but think it was 30 rounds).

Fantastic Flying Froggies and I have proven in the GEFL draft that living overseas in a time zone with a 6 to 9-hour difference doesn't have to mean holding up the draft. It's just that with VPI97's utility, it was easy to fill a list of names and wake up the next morning with 2 new players on your team. I can't remember holding up that draft at all. Of course, with only 2 European based owners (Dutch still lived in the USA), it was easier to set things aside and feel like you (me) are going to make some sacrifices to get your team.

My own preference would be a non-preference draft, we could go the quick-draft the last 15-30 rounds like we did with the GEFL. I'm not all excited about the pre-sim idea, but I think I could live with it, though my brain already hurts from the possible trading spree I could get into...

[Narcizo]

I suspect I might have rather different time parameters than your average person living in Europe. Because of my circumstances at home at the moment I, basically, can't be assured of getting to the Internet after 16:00 CET (what, about, 10:00 EST?). That doesn't mean that I won't be able to, just that I can't predict it. It's worked out alright for me in normal drafts because there's only 7 rounds and I only really have to prepare for the first two rounds (after that I stock the preference list with players I'm pretty sure won't get taken where I'm likely to take them). That system just wouldn't work in a league-wide draft, and my brain hurts from the thought of setting up a 2-round preference list like that every day. In fact I doubt it's possible for me.

Of course this is just my problem and I've always accepted that there are drawbacks from living in the wrong part of the world, particularly if your time schedule is screwy even by the standards of your own time zone. If the league decides to go with a live draft then I'll do everything I can not to hold things up but I'm just explaining why I'm opposed to it.