Drafted League Rules Summaries for New Managers

Help me out here guys... we've posted so many explanations of rules/policies in so many places that I don't know where to send prospective managers! So I'm copying & pasting those that I find into this thread so there's a central source. Please do the same with any posts I miss.

Not wanting to commit the cardinal sin of publishing by plagiarising, I want to be clear that Hal is the author of the vast majority of these carefully written & detailed posts. If you're impressed with the effort, pass him some rep!

I propose that discussion on this thread be limited to questions posted by new recruits. We're a chatty bunch which is one of the great things about this league, but it does tend to clutter up our threads. Let's keep this one simple to navigate.

Would someone more tech savvy please sticky this so it remains easily found?

 

For all of the participates in the 3 Rocks drafted leagues this year, please post your general comments and suggestions for improvement for next season in this thread. Also, don't forget to send me a PM with your email address so I can easily contact you when we start to organize for the 2007-2008 season.

Let me suggest a few typical issues we may want to discuss.

1. The Draft Process(es): Over the years we've been doing this, this one subject seems to have the most energy each year. Personally, I think we have evolved into a fairly balanced process using a BigSoccer.com thread and some combinations of a Go Slow phase and a Go Fast phase, along with proxy pick authorizations and guidance, to accomodate the different time zones and to keep the draft moving when someone will be away from the computer for quite a while. Here are some of the tips we've used:

a. The quicker you settle on the league's roster, the more flexibility you have in planning and conducting the draft. This means that we get firm re-commitments of returning managers, sort out the additiional promotions due to non-returning managers, and recruit enough new 'committed' managers to fill out our three leagues of 8.

b. It is helpful to exchange phone numbers with some of the others in your draft, so we can call each other and tell them they are on the clock. In addition, we send Private messages to someone when it's their turn. They can have the PM alert them via email and just monitor email while going about their life and work.

c. It's helpful, when you will be away from the computer for an extended time, (work, enjoying life, sleep, etc), to provide a few specific proxy selections to an active draft manager. For example, in the past, Michel has sent me his proxy picks when he goes to bed in Europe and we are still working the draft among the US based managers. We send proxy picks via PM only to be opened and exercised when that manager's turn to pick comes up and he/she is not online to make his/her own selection.

d. I always recommend that any new recruit managers review our draft threads from the previous season.

e. If we start off a go slow phase perhaps two weekends before the season starts and, if not finished during the week, switch to a Go Fast (1 hour or some other agreed time between picks) phase the last weekend before the season, we find we can comfortably complete the draft while accomodating most people's work and vacation schedules and the difference in time zones.

f. It helps to have an experience manager administer the Draft Process and answer all the questions that come up.

g. As many of us have competed against each other for years, we are more into long term relationships. That leads us to being flexible and accomodating to our fellow managers over all the conflicts that arise during the draft.

h. It is also recommended that players subscribe to the draft thread to get alerts when someone posts a pick.

i. We like to keep the non-pick banter to a minimum in the draft thread to avoid spamming those who subscribe to the draft thread.

j. When you've made your pick, we ask that you PM the next manager to tell him/her that he/she is on the "clock".

2. Post-Draft, pre-Season Transfer Window. There are always the late, great signings to the EPL each season. Our consensus experience is that few of these great signings immediately live up to the hype (Shevchenko anyone?)
First, there are usually some quality players who are not selected in the draft or have been added to the EPL since the drat started.

a. One rule we stick to is that a player must be in the Fantasy.Premierleague data base. One can't guess the valuation that FPL will put on the player. We do try to notice the time, each night, when the new players are typically added by FPL. For the big names, several aggressive managers (who shall remain nameless, (cough Hal, Mark, Michel, cough) watch for the nightly update, typically around 11 PM EDT, but it can vary and FPL could make more than one update to their player database in a day.

b. We've tried several scenarios of mining the free agent pool, post-draft, pre-season, by trying to go in reverse order of the draft initially. These schema usually fizzle out in less than a round and a half. Based on our experience, the first-come, first-served scheme seems to work best.

3. Season Transfers: We use the following process, for both post-draft, pre-season transfers and regular season transfers.

a. Plan your transfer: (1) Ensure the player is a free agent and not already on someone's team; (2) Ensure your planned transfer complies with FPL game restrictions on salary cap and on the limit of players from one team

b. Post your transfer in the FPL Message Board for your league.

c. Re-open the message board and check to ensure your posted transfer was the first for that player. If so, go and make the transfer. If not, then someone else gets that player. If you posted a multiple player transfer, your entire post is void, go a repost a legal transfer for the player who was not taken by someone else.

d. FPL has a wild card transfer function, only one per season, where a manager can make as many legal trades in one week as he wants and will not have to pay the transfer penalty points of 4 points for all transfers that week in excess of 1.

e. We've tried various schema regarding the January transfer window, and for similar reasons stated above, we've settled on first-come, first-served as long as the player is in the database.

 

5 Days until Fantasy.Premierleague.com opens their 2007/2008 EPL fantasy soccer season!

It's time to establish the league administrators for the three divisions, start serious recruiting for the 3-4 new managers we have openings for, identify who will run the drafts for each of the three leagues, and work out the draft schedules.

As I posted in the ITC thread, let's give current managers a week to recommend/refer/recruit new managers before we create an open invitation thread.

Job Openings:

League Administrator:
Duties:
1) Create the private league
2) Notify the other league members of the password to join the league
3) Moderate the league forums
4) Help the new managers understand the various processes we've established to run this competition.


League Draft Administrator:
1) Coordinate the time and schedule for this year's draft.
2) Conduct the draft and deal will all the challenges of vacations, work, different time zones etc.
3) Establish the draft order. In this off-season, a standard approach has been offered and seems to have consensus of the posters so far.
4) There were some suggestions that somewhat randomly varied the order of the various draft rounds, but the consensus of the responding posts was to continue with the snake method.

Tournament Directors:
We've established several types of internal, inter- and intra-league Cup Competitions and have been blest with creative managers who have run these. Volunteers are welcome to offer to run any of the established competitions or suggest a new type of competition.

Webmasters:
Again, we've been blest with the various managers who have created websites that are used to: 1) Keep track of the current squads to help managers avoid trading for a player already on another team; 2) Lay out the rules, brackets, and display results of our competitions; and 3) Serve as blog reporting space over and above what we do in the BigSoccer Season Threads for each of the three Rocks Leagues.

Overall Rules Committee? Up to now, we've evolved rules and established precedence on how we handle lots of situations, and it's based on our collective experience and recollections. At the end of each season, we collect new ideas for ways/rules to improve our draft league experience through a thread where we discuss proposed changes. In the past we've started various threads to try to explain the rules. Should we formalize it in a committee that keeps and promulgates the rules and arbitrates how to handle new unique situations? Of is our informal method working of having various senior members weigh in and help explain rules and processes and resolve situations as they arise?

Volunteers for some of these functions?

 

I shall run a goals only cup competition this season, open to all 3 divisions.

It's still a work in progress getting it all set up, but shall be running and updated with all the particulars upon completion of the draft order.

Now, since goals are at a premium, and landing the upper draft positions will greatly impact your ability to win the comp, I think for the sake of parity, the initial group stages will have all the various members of each league that have the upper draft slots, play each other for the right to advance.

Hence, we have the initial group as such..
http://www.freewebs.com/stamfordblue/
(first group stage will take you to the tables).

After 10 weeks, those that were not so lucky to have the upper draft slots, will have had ample time to adjust their rosters to the 'surprises'.

 

Rocks Draft League Rules / FAQ (Updated 7/9/2007)

New Managers Wishing to Join:

1. Absolute Rule: Any manager wishing to join the Rocks drafted leagues has to absolutely COMMIT to staying active the entire EPL season from August to May. Let me emphasize how serious we are about commitment. Please, don’t even bother reading any more of these FAQs if you cannot COMMIT to staying active the entire season.
2. Between seasons, we will create an Intent to Continue thread in the England / Games and Fantasy board at BigSoccer.com. Managers wishing to join can indicate with a post there. That thread will also indicate to whom new managers should send their email contact information via a BigSoccer.com Private Message. We use the emails to send out notifications when we are organizing for the next season.
3. One veteran manager usually takes on the task of keeping track of the various new managers and when they requested to join our leagues. We operate on a first come, first served policy as to how we choose which new managers to accept.
4. Despite our best efforts, we've occasionally (maybe 3 times in 6 years) had to find a mid-season replacement manager. Once, as commissioner, I ghost managed the abandoned team in the other league as a last resort.

General Purpose Rule:

1. We've come across most situations and have evolved precedents on how to deal with them. For new situations we speak our mind and usually get consensus or at least a plurality on how we deal with it. Our league administrators/commissioners do not have dictatorial power. We survive and succeed because we've built relationships and like competing with each other.

Game Site:

1. For our drafted leagues, we use the Fantasy.Premierleague.com EPL fantasy soccer game.
2. We follow all the Fantasy.Premierleague.com game rules except for our draft which only allows a player to be on one team within his/her drafted league.
3. Many of us also have a second FPL team that we manage in the standard open competition without the draft restrictions. No restriction against it.
4. Each year Fantasy.Premierleague.com adjusts their rules and we develop strategies to adjust to using the new rules. We'll typically have a thread to discuss our understanding of the possible impacts of the rule changes.

Trade Process:

1. After completion of the league’s draft, we allow 24 hours for managers to load their teams with their drafted players.
2. 24 hours after the league’s draft is completed, the trade/transfer window is opened and operates on a first-come, first-served policy. We’ve tried various waiver drafts and other post-draft schemes but have found out that first-come, first-served works simplest and best as far as dipping into the player pool. Even in the January transfer window, most waiver drafts didn't even finish one round before everyone passed. It just wasn't worth the bother. Acquiring new players presumes you have the funds available, and are not maxed out on players from that team.
a. HINT: Minimally active managers have so much valuation in their players that they get heavily taxed and can't buy equal value when they release that player. So they usually hang onto that player and can't afford some of the new transfers into the premiership.
b. HINT: This gives the managers two considerations. Do they want to minimize points lost in the overall table by minimizing trades and try to get promoted or avoid relegation? In addition, some managers are more active early in the season to build up their transfer value so they can field a more valuable team once this year's performers start identifying themselves. Our weekly head-to-head competitions are based on weekly scores. Promotion/Relegation is primarily based on League Table position.
c. HINT: Some managers try to have it both ways, but once the top of the table is no longer feasible, focus on our many cup competitions. The extent to which Cup Competition results could impact promotion/relegation is perennially under discussion. Check this season’s Rules Thread for what’s applicable this season.

3. These are the steps to take to drop a player from one’s team and acquire a player from the “free agent” pool (those players not already on another team in your drafted league).
a. First, ensure that the player(s) you want are not already on another team in your league. You can do this by a) looking at each other team’s roster; b) keep an EXCEL sheet of your league’s rosters and update it with each posted trade; c) Check the blog site of someone who posts a composite of the league’s current rosters (Note the time when it was last updated and then check for League forum posts and BigSoccer Season Thread posts since the blog’s last update to ensure no one of the other managers in your League has the targeted acquisition player on his/her team.)
b. Second, ensure your proposed trade is executable – it must be legal within Fantasy.Premierleague.com rules. In other words, you must have sufficient funds to acquire the new player and the acquisition can not violate the limits on number of players from one team rule.
c. Third, post your proposed trade in your drafted league’s Fantasy.Premierleague.com’s League Forum. As a minimum, the post should include the following information:
i. Your Team Name
ii. Player(s) OUT, Position, EPL Team, Current Valuation
iii. Player(s) IN, Position, EPL Team, Current Valuation
d. Fourth, Check back in the Fantasy.Premierleague.com’s League Forum to ensure you were the first to post an acquisition of this player. If you proposed a multi-player trade and someone else “beat” you to a trade of one of your acquisitions, your entire trade is voided. You’ll have to post another proposed trade that does not include the player whom someone else swooped for before your post.
e. Fifth, once you’ve confirmed that your proposed acquisitions were the first posted for the player(s) you wanted, immediately go to your Fantasy.Premierleague.com Team Page and make the transfers, releasing the dropped players and adding your new acquisition.
f. Sixth, as a courtesy, post a copy of the completed trade in the BigSoccer.com Season Thread for your Rocks League.

Penalty / Procedures for Making an Illegal Trade:

1. During the Post-Draft, Pre-Season period (1-2 weeks), most draft league managers make about 4-5 adjustments to their drafted squads.
a. If a manager tries to acquire an illegal player, the entire trade under which he made the illegal acquisition is voided. For single player acquisitions, the manager just has to reverse the illegal trade, dropping the player that is already on another’s team and either adding back his dropped player (if the dropped player is still available and has not been acquired by another of his league’s managers in the meantime between the posting of the illegal trade and the time the illegal trade was discovered and corrected) or by posting a legal acquisition of another player. For multiple player acquisitions, his claim for the legal player is voided and another manager within his/her league could post a trade for that player.
b. We all have unlimited free transfers before the season starts, so there are no points or financial penalties for post-draft, pre-season illegal trades. Just correct it as soon as you can.
2. Illegal Trades made During the Season:
a. If a manager tries to acquire an illegal player, the entire trade under which he made the illegal acquisition is voided. For single player acquisitions, the manager just has to reverse the illegal trade, dropping the player that is already on another’s team and either adding back his dropped player (if the dropped player is still available and has not been acquired by another of his league’s managers in the meantime between the posting of the illegal trade and the time the illegal trade was discovered and corrected) or by posting a legal acquisition of another player. For multiple player acquisitions, his claim for the legal player is voided and another manager within his/her league could post a trade for that player.
b. Each team has one free transfer per week during the season, except for the one time use of the unlimited transfer wildcard. Additional transfers incur a 4 point penalty that gets deducted from the overall season score at the next update to the league’s table.
c. As soon as the illegal trade is discovered, the offending manager has to correct the situation. As a minimum, assuming it was a single player trade, he needs to release the illegally acquired player and either reacquire the player dropped or acquire another legal player. This means at least 2 more trades that week or a penalty of 8 points that the game will deduct from your season’s total score. (No one wants to lose points needlessly, as they are determinant in promotion and relegation between our drafted leagues.)
d. Points are not the only penalty for making an illegal trade. The Fantasy.Premierleague.com game taxes valuation gains in players. Let’s say you acquired a player with a 7.0 valuation and before you decided to release that player, his valuation increased to 7.3. The game will take .1 of that gain and if you tried to re-acquire the dropped player, unless you have reserve funds available, you may not be able to reacquire the same player, regardless of whether another manager swooped for your dropped player before you realized and corrected your illegal trade.
e. Bottom line: Making illegal trades is very costly. That’s why we emphasize that the first step to making any trade is to ensure you are acquiring legally available players.

Draft Process:

1. Our drafts have evolved into sort of a combination go slow, then go fast to wrap up on the last weekend before the EPL starts. We might do a week or more of go slow where we get in a round or two in a day and accommodate all the different time zones. Then we finish up the draft with time limits between picks on the last Saturday before the Premiership starts. Each drafted league will have their own Draft Thread where they clarify the rules and conduct of their draft for the coming season.
2. We are also firm in our position that a player must be in the FPL database in order to be drafted or later traded for. Just because some trade has been announced in the press, the player is not fair game until included in the database. This also argues for not doing the draft too early.
3. We also use specific instruction proxy picks by managers who want to keep the draft moving but it's their time to sleep or work or otherwise enjoy life.
a. HINT: Various strategies have been tried. You can check out some of our previous draft threads. Originally, we had a run on strikers, midfielders, goalkeepers, and defenders, in that order. Then we evolved to a half dozen midfielders having equal or greater value that all the strikers except Henry. This was based in part on the shut-out points that midfielders received. Then the game reduced that bonus.
Last season, I went for Cech and Terry with my first two round picks and that strategy served me well. At least better than some of my other trade decisions and my blind attempt to rely on Downing late in the season.
4. We’ve tried various locations to conduct the draft. Based on our experience, even with occasional “BUSY” periods, we’ve found that conducting and posting the draft in a BigSoccer.com thread seems to work well. By posting there, as opposed to the Fantasy.Premierleague.com league forum, some of the managers in the other leagues, especially new managers, can monitor the conduct of and actual draft that Small Rocks League usually conducts and completes first.
a. HINT: All new managers should read through a draft thread or two from last season to see how we handled the various situations and to get a sense on the drafting strategies that the veteran managers use. It might also be helpful to read one or two of last season’s post-draft analysis threads.
5. Draft Process: This is under discussion for a possible change this season. Previously, we’ve used the serpentine method. We’ll still use the serpentine method for Rounds 1 and 2, but are considering other methods for Draft Rounds 3-15. Check out the BigSoccer.com discussion threads to find out what will be used this season.
6. Draft Order Selection: We’ve been somewhat flexible in this. As most of us have long-standing competition relationships, we allow one manager to conduct a double blind draw and announce the results without worry of any manipulation. This year, in an effort to bring more transparency to the process, we are using a method based on submitting a number between 1-999 to the league’s draft administrator who has already sent a closed Private Message or email with his number before the other managers submit their draft pick number. The numbers are posted and should be seen as on a circle line. Then the draft administrator announces in advance the specific date that the draft center number will be determined. For this year, we will be using a PA lottery number. Once the draft center is determined from the PA lottery number, the draft order is determined by how close on the circle line a manager’s submitted draft number is to the draft center number compared to the other draft selected numbers. Closest gets Round 1 Pick 1 and Round 2 Pick 8, (subsequent draft round picks are currently under discussion). Next closest to the draft center number gets Round 1 Pick 2 and Round 2 Pick 7, and so on.

 

I went through a few more old posts and felt these were worth sharing as potential candidates for adding to our FAQs.

Why would a manager make more than one trade in a week an incur the 4 point penalty for every additional trade?

Newbies might wonder why any sane manager would make more than one trade a week and cost themselves points in the season long table and hurt their promotion/relegation chances.

Here are some reasons for active transfer activity regardless of whether they cost an extra 4 points.

1. Say a manager has already used his free transfer that week, and a new, hot prospect gets added to the database. Your competitors will not wait until next week to swoop for that player, so you bite the bullet and go for him even at the expense of 4 points.

2. The long-term injuries, discipline absences, multiple game weeks and no game weeks for some players really come into play. In order to field a full team for the inter and intra cup competitions, you may have to make multiple trades in a week.

3. For financial reasons: Early in the season, you may make multiple trades to swoop for some hot, in form, previously little known player, and ride that player's increase in valuation by 1-3M, then sell him and increase your team values by the discounted .2 - .5. It is important to build your team value to be able to acquire discarded better players later in the season, especially during the January transfer window.

4. Even though these are valid reasons, other things being equal, try to plan your trades to only use the one free trade per week. For example, say West Ham United and Wigan are going to be the only two teams with a double game week in about 4 weeks. You might start acquiring available starting players from those teams 3-4 weeks prior at 1/week.

Of course, if you drop a hot prospect from your team, expect him to be snatched up by other managers trying to improve their teams or be unavailable for you to reacquire the same player because you cannot afford him, due to his rise in value since your acquisition and the way the game taxes you between 50-80% tax on his valuation rise. The game has a weird sliding scale of how much you get to keep of the valuation rise.

Do we ever make manual adjustments to the season scoring table?

Promotion/Relegation is based on the official table, possibly adjusted, and don't forget the Cannon Twist possibility for promotion by winning the Rock Hard Challenge Cup.

One example of an adjustment. We had a manager quit, and unable to find a mid-season replacement, and as the quitter was in the VSR division, I created a team in that division in mid season identical to the quitter's team when he left. By signing up a team mid-season, my replacement team had 0 points. Each week, I would post the table standings, and then the adjusted table standings crediting my replacement team with the 180 points or so the quitter's team had when they quit.

We also have assigned penalties on occasion and posted weekly adjusted scores to include the penalties. We have also allowed, after some egregious complaint how someone was screwed through no fault of their own, (they had a great and compelling sob story), some credit adjustments. Perhaps the official scorer gave an assist to a wrong player. And from watching replays of the game, we agreed that player Y, not player X should have the assist. We'd try to get the site to correct the error, but if they didn't, we might manually keep our own adjustment.

That said, adjustments are rare!

How do we handle the situation when a manager quits or becomes inactive during the season? (Despite the absolute commitment we all make to be part of these drafted leagues.)

Here is how we handled a team quitting after GW5 last season in Sand League.

Originally Posted by Cannon

I think that the inactive teams should be replaced by new managers that register new teams from scratch even if it means having to add in the early scores from the inactive teams to get the real standing. Both of the inactive teams are worth less than 100. They could easily be recreated by a newly registered team or the new manager could form a new squad by picking the newly registered team from the inactive team + the available database. That would allow them to have more players that they actually want, start off with a full 100pt to spend, and prevent them from having to use a wild card or take penalties to make all the transfer needed to get the team into shape. That sounds like the most fair way to add a new manager and you wouldn't need the login info for the inactive teams.

Hal concurred with Chuck: I think Cannon has got the right approach. This works because the team values are less than 100. Otherwise, you'd have to have different options. I like how Cannon's recommendation preserves the transfer wildcard.

I would suggest a moratorium on free agency pick-ups by current managers in the Sand Rocks League and give the new manager(s) through midnight Thursday night to create their knock-off team from the skeletons of the manager they are replacing adjusted by which free agents they'd select in lieu of current players. Then, reopen the free agency pool on Friday for other managers to make pre-GW 6 adjustments.

Some Post Draft Analysis Thoughts from previous seasons:

Djangone’s 2006-07 Small Rocks Post-Draft Analysis Comments:

Everyone has a way of looking at their team. Mine is between partially shut eyes as I wait for a render and try to remember whether Rehman really looked good enough to get minutes or not. Most people I'm sure also look at theirs with some trepidation: will this big-ticket guy really be as good as I hoped? Was that guy a One Year Wonder? Will my injury-prone midfielder have yet another season off the PhysioRoom list? How crowded is that squad really, and are the new guys threatening my boy?

My analysis of things is like this: Will my guy play? Is he a guaranteed starter? Or does he platoon on his (leftsidedArsenalLiverpoolChelseami dfielders / TottenhamChelseastriker / anykindofTottenhammidfielder) spot? Then everything else is after that. Such as, if he's a midfielder, is he an attacking midfielder? Or does he really need (AlonsoFabregas) to shoot more? Is he healthy, or is he (ScholesGiggsSahaformerlyGerrard) fragile? Is he getting (HasselbainkHyypiaGiggs) too old and will he suddenly face a Keane-ing? Finally, and I don't ask this enough, is he accustomed to the Premiership?

I say this because last year's analyses by various people seemed to ignore the most basic question: Will the player be on the field? It's the Arjen Robben question.

Now, we all dig in and play and realize that for all our careful prep, fantasy games are a thing you play for ten month and then my brother wins.

Here are Hal’s analysis of the Small Rocks Drafted Teams that picked first and second last year and finished 2nd and 1st: (Note how much importance he places on reserve funds available, defenders from teams likely to get more that their fair share of clean sheets, a top quality choice or two for the weekly captain bonus points, the importance of having a strong bench to take advantage of the auto substitution rules

Let's analyze Craig's Team. Picked 1st and finished 2nd. Should be awesome as he had the first pick and took Henry.

VegasVirgins - vegas2u (Craig Powell)
3.5 M funds in the bank

Goalkeepers:
Keily, Portsmouth, 4.0
Reina, Liverpool, 6.5

Defenders:
Bridge, Fulham, 4.5
Ferdinand, Man. United, 7.0
Gallas, Chelsea, 7.5
Konchesky, West Ham, 5.5
Taylor, Portsmouth, 5.5

Midfielders:
Jagielka, Sheffield United, 5.5
McNamee, Watford, 4.5
N'Zogbia, Newcastle, 7.0
Quinn, Sheffield United, 4.5
Young, Watford, 6.0

Forwards:
Andy Johnson, Everton, 8.5
Henry, Arsenal, 14.0
Zamora, West Ham, 6.0

1. He has 3.5 M in funds to be able to grab a hot shot new to the EPL player before the transfer window closes. He and Michel are best situated for that extra boost.

2. He has King Henry for his Captain. As long as Henry stays fit and his hamstring doesn't bother him, he can carry a team all by himself.

3. Liverpool should have lots of clean sheets, so he gets an A for his goalkeepers. Kiely is a good starting back-up.

4. Defense. One of the best coups of the draft. Craig picked up Chelsea's, soon to be Fulham's Wayne Bridge for a palty 4.5 M with an 11th round selection!!!. His stock will almost surely rise as he plays regularly for Fulham. With Rio Ferdinand and Gallas, he has a solid anchor in defense. An A for the starters. I know he has Henry, but I think Craig also drafted the strongest defense of all 8 squads.

5. Midfield: Ouch. He has four cheap midfielders who are on promoted teams and at least two are major midfield figures on those teams. Good news is that their prices will rise. The bad news is that they are still on promoted teams who historically have a tough time adjusting to the pace of the premiership. N'Zogbia, as his only experienced premiership midfielder does not strike fear into other teams. With the cash he has on hand, expect Craig to strengthen his midfield either pre-season, or after the first couple of weeks once we all see who are the starters this year and who takes the team's free kicks, corner kicks, and penalty kicks. I think Jagielka is a keeper, but the rest of the midfield better keep their bags packed.

6. Expect Craig to play two strikers, possibly a 5-3-2, or more likely a 4-4-2 with Henry and Andy Johnson starting. Even though Andy came up on a promoted team, he has proven he can score in the Premiership and is no rookie. That's a solid pair up top. Now if Zamora gets hot, or if he replaces Zamora with an on form striker, then he could play a 4-3-3.

7. Overall Assessment. Henry and the defense of this squad make it a favorite, but the midfield needs shoring up to be the odds on favorite. And woe to this team if Henry misses a significant number of games.

Let's analyze Jay's Team. Picking 2nd this year.

Yellowcake Phantoms - DoctorJones24 (Jay Jones)
0.0 funds in the bank

Goalkeepers:
Crossley, Fulham, 3.5
Given, Newcastle, 5.0

Defenders:
Chimbonda, Wigan, 5.5
Hreidarsson, Charlton, 5.0
Shorey, Reading, 4.0 (Short, Sheffield United, 3.5)
Sommeil, Sheffield United, 3.5
Young, Charlton, 5.0

Midfielders:
Duff, Newcastle, 8.5
Giannakopolous, Bolton, 8.0
Montgomery, Sheffield United, 4.5 (P. Neville, Everton, 5.0)
Ronaldo, Man. United, 10.0
Scholes, Man. United, 8.5

Forwards:
D. Bent, Charlton, 9.0
Harewood, West Ham, 8.0
Shevchenko, Chelsea, 12.0

1. Let's do the analysis considering Jay's replacement transfers for his Round 14 and 15 selections. OUT P. Neville, EVE, Mid, 5.0; Short, BR, Def 3.5. IN: Montgomery, Sheffield United, Mid, 4.5; Shorey, Reading, Def, 4.0. Still 0 in the bank.

2. GK: Given is a solid GK, but it's not clear which Fulham GK will start the season as #1. If Crossley wins the job, then Average depth at GK. If Crossley does not win Fulham #1, then Jay will need to get a solid back-up keeper and will probably have to make two trades to do so to create enough cash. I expect Jay to strengthen his GK options before the season starts.

3. Defenders: Chimbonda may be his star defender, but what team will he play for? If he goes to Tottenham, will he play as much compared to playing with Wigan? Jay likes the Charlton defenders and his defense will primarily rise or fall based on the early season performance of the Charlton defense. In Charlton's 1 7 games, they play MANU and Arsenal at home and Chelsea away. I don't fancy their chances at clean sheets against these three. So their defense will have to perform well against West Ham (A), Bolton (H), Portsmouth (H), and Aston Villa (A).
Overall, I think this defensive squad is weak and needs at least two better defenders. Jay may get a pleasant surprise with his two newcomer defenders. If SU or Reading start off hot in the EPL, the value of these players will certainly rise. That's a big if.

4. Midfield: I think Duff is a great pick. If he stays healthy, he should score lots of fantasy soccer points playing regularly at Newcastle rather than platooning for Chelsea. Ronaldo is the big, expensive question mark. First question to be answered is will he be on MANU when the season starts? Second question, how much of an impact will be all the negative press about Ronaldo's diving in the WorldCup and his perceived (by English fans) role in getting Rooney sent off? I also like Scholes, but his fantasy production has fallen off. With Carrick coming aboard, and with the questions around Ronaldo and with Smith becoming a striker again, it may take some time for this team to gel. I like Gia for Bolton. Montgomery is a total EPL crapshoot.
Overall, I see Duff, Sholes (if stays healthy and starts off season in form), and Giannakopoulos as being long term for Yellowcake Phantoms, but I expect Jay will tinker with the midfield and replace Ronaldo and Montgomery.

5. Forwards: WOW! The strength of this team. Only long term injuries could get Jay to dump any of these three. Shevchenko and Bent are Captain material along with Duff.

Overall, I would have expected a little more stable and stronger team from someone who picked 2nd. Expect pre-season or early-season adjustments to make this team solid back to front.

From djangone:

I'll fill in with squad ratings for the 2006-07 Small Rocks Draft if nobody else has the Umbros to do it.

Yellowcake Phantoms
Ronaldo, Duff, Sheva, Harewood and Darren Bent. Wow. Scoring monsters this season, I'd wager, all of them. And now let me take a moment to say how much I dislike C Ronaldo. I really really dislike him. Okay, that's done, so onward--I don't think Scholes will get back to his 2003 playing time, but if injury hits anyone else, that 8.5 will look like a very good deal. So that makes this my favorite team...except for that girl wearing the #7 jersey and those shocking defenders. Yes, after closer examination, that is Zat Knight in there, avert your eyes! How did five managers (uh, including me at first) take Fulham defenders? I mean, Fulham has 3 of their first 5 on the road, where they play like a D2 team. But, you know, Jay won this last summer by being opportunistic and quick, so watch how he swaps those spots as scheduling indicates.

Pork Soda
It's mostly Lampard. Just got a big boost by Fergie's placing his faith in Saha and Crouch heading one in against the Blues. Midfield, Defense and GK will carry it, but Hyypia is a major risk for hitting the age wall and Toure for all his quality still needs someone other than a hastily recruited ball-boy to play alongside him. But other teams should beware that despite his occasionally confusing which teams have off-weeks, lady Fortune seems to favor this manager, likely in appreciation of his mature good looks and exemplary personal hygiene. (Hey, Quentin, lay off, I wasn't talking about your ma.)

Green Onions
Lives by the unspoken truth that the draft is a mere preamble. So Michel needs a good start to build value, and then he likely plans a swoop on new signees. I think Berbatov will be a monster in the league and could, by himself, provide all the value boost that this team needs. Pennant looks nice on Liverpool in the place Garcia and his ball-bobbling ways couldn't hold down. Other than that, what do you say about a team drafted with the intention of being replaced while its manager was frolicking with his girlfriend on the romantic coastline of Dalmatia and Istria? There's just a lack of dedication here that I find execreble. So...where'd you meet that girl? Does she have a sister? Any good deals on hotel rooms in Dubrovnik...?

Kopite Juniors
Went for the midfield and has been snakebit by Joe Cole's injury. I'm not a fan of two of strikers, one of whom I've repeatedly wrung out myself only to find no goals in his Richie Rich frame. But Keane, no matter how you insult him, bench him, mock his goal celebration or deride his $6 haircut, always seems to score. Speaking of lovely hair, I wonder about Nolan being not so much another Nolan, but another Brett Emerton. I mean, how will this guy stay healthy with so much exposure and zero subs on that thin Bolton bench? Budget defenders, half from stingy teams, half from teams that leak like a BP oil pipe in Alaska. Okay, so I can lay out all that slag, and there's Stevie G sitting there, my favorite player on earth, on any given season capable of ringing up 250 points.

Aviators
Needs another midfielder if Robben isn't an every-gamer, but I bet Robben will be just that and will love not having a peeved Damian Duff breathing down his neck and rubbing Nair into his jock. Will MGP have another year like last? I bet he does. Will Downing have another year like 2004? I bet he doesn't. Quality defenders, with Silvestre possibly a steal and of course Finnan el Magnificente. Strikers are awfully good, but for some reason this isn't exactly Yellowcake--could have something to do with Yakubu's short attention span, Rooney's simmering rage and King's utter rube-ness. But like Michel, this is prelude: cue Hal to start transfering his way into a completely different team.

FC Springfield
The midfield is built around two guys who've never played in the Prem. Ballack and Rosicky, quality both, and I bet that narrow-eyed assassin Rosicky is what everyone hoped Hleb would be. What's more he's loving it on that side of the Arsenal attack that Wenger seems to forget exists. But there's still a diminutive male model named Ljungberg to steal his minutes. I like Bullard on this team as he's an exemplary competitor with rare smarts and chances on free kicks. Two very strong defenders, a Tottenham defender who tends to score more than most, and two fillers--I love this defense. Strikers, well, I'm dubious as to whether the top two, Adebayor and Defoe, will get enough time, let alone be guaranteed starters, not after what I've seen of Berbatov last season in the Bundy and everyone's favorite whiner Van Persie at the WC.

Nocturnal United
Oh, do I love the potential of Bellamy on that LI team--he's like Cisse with a brain. But why do people still choose Reyes? Beats me--ask Marakana about that homesick halfwit. The midfield is oddly comprised of guys who don't shoot so much, though this season could be the dawn of Fabregas 2.0, replacing that annoying feature which had him passing the ball into the net with a new feature that has him shooting the ball into the net. It could also be the dawn of Barry 2.5, though his improvement is mainly between the ears. Speaking of between the ears, it's Jens Lehmann! But you know what? I think he has a chance to lead all GKs this season due to his late-appreciated ability to not only stomp evilly on the feet of Jermaine Defoe, but to stop penalties. But then, that'd also require Arsenal to fill their central defensive hole, and I haven't seen anyone picking up Jonathan Djourou.

And last but not least:

Vegas Virgins
He'll win.

 

Copied from a Clan post:

"The PA state lottery has two drawings, one at noon and one at 7.00.
We've used the evening drawing as most people like to follow it live on-line.
It's a 3 digit number, known as the daily number.

http://www.palottery.state.pa.us/

The league admin, when it's decided who it shall be (or who actually wants it ) sends his/her three digit number via PM to all league players, who, upon receipt, return theirs.

When the league admin has received all 7 in return, the 8 three digit numbers of all league members are posted in the league specific thread for everybody to see and to make sure no mistakes have been made.

After all have been posted, the first drawing that goes off at 7.00 PM (EST) is then used to determine the draft order.

Who ever gets closest to the drawn number goes first, next closest goes second...etc etc etc.

The numbers are open ended, meaning, if you give 999 for your number, and the lottery number is 100, it is deemed 'closer' than 203.

NOTE.
000 is a number in the drawing, and must be counted as such in the open ended determination of draft order."

I know we don't have a date yet, but I wanted to bring this over for all to review prior to a call going out to send their numbers.