Automated Draft System

Figure 1
Administrator's rights required

click the area of which you require more information
  

League name: League name and Draft name are combined to display in the header of the draft pages.  It is displayed as "<League name><Draft name> Draft".
 
Draft name: League name and Draft name are combined to display in the header of the draft pages.  It is displayed as "<League name><Draft name> Draft".
 
Number of rounds: Number of rounds in the draft.
 
Type of draft:
 

Standard:

The initial draft order found in round 1 remains the same in all rounds.

Serpentine:

The initial draft order found in round 1 is reversed for all even numbered rounds.  This is done by automatically trading draft picks in those even numbered rounds.

Reset All Picks:

This option resets all draft picks to the original owner.  All picks reassigned for any reason including trades are cleared.  This is equivalent to setting the draft to Standard.
 

Enable Email: Through the "My Profile" screen, each owner can choose if they wish to be notified through email when a draft pick has been made.  Check this box to enable that option.
 
League uses salary: Check this option if the league uses salaries.  When checked, the salary input boxes become active when defining which standard players, or auxiliary players are available or non-carded players being drafted.
The administrator controls the following:
· Each owner is assigned a certain amount of money, a budget.
· Each player is assigned a salary.
· When drafted, the salary is deducted from the team budget.
· The remaining budget is shown on the "My Draft" and "My Competitor's Draft" page.
 
Allow teams to monitor others in the league: Check this option if the you wish to allow teams in the draft the ability to see how their competitors are doing in the draft.  Specifically this refers to the page "My Competitor's Draft". If not checked league members are restricted from this page.  Information that will become visible if this option is turned on is:

- Players that have been drafted.
- Whether auto draft is on or off.
    - No information is displayed on who will be drafted or when.
- Funds available if the league uses salary.
- Free Agent status if the free agent option is in use.
    - Who is available.
    - Who has been pulled back.
    - Who drafted the player if drafted.
    - Pullback priority IS NOT shown.
 

Display time that last pick was made: Displays the banner shown below in Figure 2 near the top of the main page when checked.  When the 'Enforce Time Limit' option is checked this option is grayed and by default a time banner is displayed.
 


Figure 2
 

Enforce Time Limit:


Teams taking too long are skipped

This allows the draft to subject each pick to a time limit.  If the pick is not made within the time limit, the team violating the limit is skipped and the "Team On Deck" is then able to draft.     If the skipped team is to be allowed a draft pick at another time, check that option also listed in this section.

Time limits may be enforced with either a fixed deadline or a variable deadline that is dependent upon when the previous pick was made.  Which type of deadline your league uses depends upon how you set the option "Equal Time Slices".
 

Equal Time Slices: When you check this option your league will be using a fixed deadline for each draft pick. The deadline for each pick will be staggered by the amount of time you have set in the option "Maximum time before pick's skipped". The option "Minimum time before clock starts" will not be available. The deadline for the first pick of the day will be the time set in the option "Enforce clock from" plus the time set in the option "Maximum time before pick's skipped". The last pick is determined by the second time set in the option "Enforce clock from". The deadline for the pick will be displayed in the cell. The format of that time frame will be determined by the option "Allow drafting before beginning of individual time slice". If the time of the last pick would extend beyond the second time set in the option "Enforce clock from", that pick will be scheduled for the next day to ensure that the pick is allowed the same amount of time as the previous picks.

By not using this option your league will be using a variable deadline for each draft pick. The option "Minimum time before clock starts" will be available. Each pick's deadline is dependent upon the pick before it. When the previous pick is made, the time frame for the next pick begins. As long as the deadline for the pick before or on the second time of the option "Enforce clock from" the time frame for that pick will be within the current day, otherwise the pick rolls over into the next draft day.
 
Allow drafting before beginning of individual time slice: This option is available when "Equal time slices" is checked.  This option determines if the draft pick's beginning time will be strictly adhered to or if the pick may be made as soon as all of the previous picks have been completed.  If this option is not checked then the draft pick can only be completed within the beginning and ending time frame for that pick.
 


Figure 3


Figure 4

If not checked the format of the time displayed within the cell will contain two times, the beginning and ending time. It will appear as <beginning time - ending time> with the time format as HH:MM:SS as in figure 3. When checked the time displayed within the cell will contain only the deadline and will appear as <"deadline" - ending time>. The format of the ending time is HH:MM:SS as in figure 4.

You may notice that the time displayed ends in that you think is a "strange" time, perhaps on an odd minute or second.  This is by design.  Everyone needs to know the same point in time as being the deadline, but everyone's time as kept by their PC will most likely be off by some minutes or seconds.  Perhaps your league crosses time zones.  Still, everyone needs to see a time stated as the deadline that matches the same physical point in time.  As a result, the computer hosting this website keeps the official time.  Your computers calculate the correct adjustment and display a time meaningful to you, but that matches the correct deadline.  As a result, the deadlines displayed on each computer will be different from each other, but in fact match the identical point in time.
 

Allow drafting in "off" hours: Allows teams to draft players outside the hours set in the option "Enforce clock from".   If the option is not set, no team may make a pick outside the hours set in the option "Enforce clock from".
 
Skipped owners may catch-up:


Allow skipped team to catch up


Check this option to allow any team skipped because of a time violation, to draft at any time so as to catch up.  When the offending team logs into the system, they will be allowed to draft a player.  The drafted player is then placed in the draft cell in which the time violation occured.
 

Maximum time before pick's skipped: Minimum length of time given each team to decide on and draft a player. Violation of this time causes the pick to be skipped and the next team is allowed to draft.
 

Minimum time before clock starts: Minimum time between three picks. As an example, assume 3 picks (a), (b) and (c). The minimum time between when the clock starts for (a) and the time the clock starts (c) is the time set here. Further assume the minimum time is 10 minutes and the maximum time is 30 minutes. If pick (b) is made 3 minutes after pick (a), the time limit for pick (c) is 37 minutes, (max time 30 minutes plus the unused minimum time).
 

Enforce clock from: Enforce the time limit between these hours. As an example setting the hours 9:00 to 20:00 will prevent the time limit being set to anytime between 20:01 to 8:59, thereby preventing someone being forced to draft at an unreasonable time such as 3:00 a.m. Setting the two times to the same time will create a draft in which the draft will run 24 hours a day.

If the time limit would normally fall outside drafting hours, the time limit will be set to the beginning of the next draft period plus the maximum time between picks.
 
League drafts minors or other non-Majors players: Check this option to allow the members to type in the name of the player that they are drafting. This option is useful when a league drafts minor leaguers, college players, high schoolers or anyone else. When checked the "Draft of the Non-Carded Player" page is made available.

There are two methods for allowing the drafting of non-standard players.  The first is for the administrator to enter players as 'auxiliary' players.  The advantage is the that the league administration has complete control in which players are drafted.   This method is ideal for drafts that contain a limited number of such players such as players who've not been carded recently.  The second method is to use this option. The advantage is it opens up anyone anywhere to being drafted. In this case it it is up to the league administration to ensure the same person is not drafted multiple times under different names. The system will check that no one with the same first and last name is drafted more than once. However if one team uses Jim for the first name and the second team uses James, the system will allow both to be drafted. If possible it would be advisable to use a specific set of standard names. Perhaps dictating that all names must come from www.minorleaguebaseball.com or another site to avoid confusion.
 
Automatically force all "minors" into Group: By checking one or more of these options it is possible to restrict the number of "minors" drafted  For example to restrict the number of "minors" drafted to 3, set one of the Group options accordingly and force these "minor" draftees into that group.
 
League uses auction: By checking this the league can set up an auction of one or more players.   Both start times and end times are set on each individual player in the auction.  Owners may place bids on the players in the auction.  When the end time is reached, the player is awarded to the owner who registered the highest bid.
  Maximum contract length: This is the maximum number of years a contract may run.  Bids placed by owners can not exceed this time frame.
  # year preference: The salary offered in a bid may run more than one year (see Maximum contract length).  Players may prefer contracts of longer lengths.  The salary offered by an owner is multiplied by the number entered here only for the purpose of comparing offers.  For example, suppose the 2 year preference is 1.1 and the 3 year preference is 1.2.  If team A offered $100 for 1 year, team B offered $100 for 2 years and team C offered $100 for 3 years, the player would consider team A's offer to be worth $100, team B's offer to be $110 and team C's to be $120.  Thus team C would be ahead in the auction.
  Competing multi-year contracts: Using the example in # year preference if team C had offered $93 for 3 years, team C would still be ahead in the auction (93*1.2 = 112).  Leagues can define that succeeding offers be a minimum x% of the previous offer.  Thus if this were set to 95%, $93 for 3 years would not be a valid offer (93 is less than 95% of the previous offer of $100).
  Auction only, no draft: If checked, the home page is Auction rather than Draft.  When Draft is the home page, people reach the auction page through Draft Players -> Auction.
  Notify league by email: If bidding is heavy, receiving an email after each bid is made could become tedious.  If checked, each bid will send notification to the league that a new bid was received.
  Hide identity of bidder:  Each bid contains the identity of the bidder.  This information is not disclosed until after the bidding ends on a player.
  Bidding must be silent: Prevents bidders from waiting until the last second to slip in and "steal" a player with no time left for further bids.  If an auction is to end within the the next few minutes as defined here and a new bid is received, the auction end time is extended to insure everyone can get their bids in.  The remaining time will be the amount of time defined here.
Free Agents: Free agents are considered to be certain players which are already the "property" of another team, placed into the draft and made available to other teams to be drafted.
 
  Maximum players one team may lose: If there is a limit to the number of players any one team may have drafted off their team, enter that number here, otherwise enter 99.
 
  Maximum players one team may draft: If there is a limit to the number of free agents any one team may draft, enter that number here, otherwise enter 99.
 
  Allow pullbacks after loss of player(s): If after one or more players have been drafted off a team, that team is allowed to call back one or more free agents by removing them from the draft, check this box.
 
  Pullback X player(s) after losing Y player(s): Specify X as the number of players that will be called back to the original team after Y other players have been drafted off the team.
 
Group A:  User defined.  This allows a league to add additional limits on teams that are not available in the standard options above.  Players may be optionally assigned to this group to enforce restrictions.
Group B:  User defined.  This allows a league to add additional limits on teams that are not available in the standard options above.  Players may be optionally assigned to this group to enforce restrictions.
Group C:  User defined.  This allows a league to add additional limits on teams that are not available in the standard options above.  Players may be optionally assigned to this group to enforce restrictions.