THE CYBER DIAMOND BASEBALL LEAGUE LEAGUE RULES 1995 SEASON COMMISH & STAT KEEPER: Mike Littau CDBL Web Site: http://www.nmia.com/~littaum/cdbl.html Group e-mail address: cdbl at googlegroups.com LAST UPDATED: August 16, 2008 INTRODUCTION The Cyber Diamond Baseball League (CDBL) is an internet e-mail computer simulated baseball league using Diamond Mind Baseball version 9c. The CDBL began with the 1984 season. Diamond Mind Baseball (DMB) is a computer-simulation baseball program. It allows you to have a team of major leaguers. You are the general manager as well as the coach. You can build a team to fit your style and philosophies. The computer uses real-life player stats to generate baseball games. In effect, this is cyber-baseball. DMB can be ordered directly from DMB's web site at http://www.diamond-mind.com. There are several differences between computer-simulated baseball and rotissere baseball. Rotissere baseball's goal is to lead other teams in statistics such as homers, stolen bases, batting average, saves, etc. In computer-simulated baseball, there is only one stat that is important: Wins. There are many ways to win. Some win by building a team based on pitching, defense, and speed, while others win by building a team based on knocking the ball out of the park as often as possible while trying to win as many slugfests as possible. DMB uses real life stats, but some stats are essentially meaningless to our league (such as wins, RBI or saves). A pitcher in real life could get 25 wins, but have a rotten ERA/WHIP (essentially getting all the wins due to run support). Chances are he won't get 25 wins in the CDBL. Likewise, just because someone gets 100 RBI in real life doesn't mean they'll get 100 RBI during the seaeson. However, guys like Frank Thomas, who have high RBI/run numbers as well as good batting averages/OBA/SLG averages will do well. There is no guarantee that a player who was a monster at the plate in real life will be the same in the CDBL, nor no guarantee that a player who stinks in real life will do the same in CDBL. But, chances are they'll perform similar to how they did in real life. There are many factors which influence the Cyber Diamond Baseball League. If you have guys who get on base a lot, the cleanup hitters will usually generate a lot of RBI's. The ballpark is a factor. Playing in Dodger Stadium will generally make your hitting worse & pitching better. Playing in Coors Field will generally make your hitting better & pitching worse. If you wish to send an e-mail to the entire group, you can send an e-mail to cdbl at googlegroups.com (replacing the "at" with @). An archive of sent messages is kept at http://groups.google.com/group/cdbl. There are 24 total teams. Each team has a minimum of 25 active players and a maximum of 33 active players. There are six teams each in four divisions as follows: American Conference Aaron Division Paige Division Geof Hobday - Arkham Investigators Phil Clayton - Largo Longshots Camden Yard Joe Robbie Stadium ghobday at hhlaw.com claytonpjc at yahoo.com Jamie Ogle - Point Lomas Friars Thomas Rhodes - Seattle Decaf Jack Murphy Stadium Yankee Stadium jogle at lloydpest.com skiboy66 at msn.com Jeff Brown - Elk Grove Trout Chris Cannon - Tualatin Thunder Comisky Park Kauffman Stadium jeffbrowncu at yahoo.com gobills29 at verizon.net Brian Stromblad - Manhatten Beach Mashers Mike Edge - White Rock Phantoms County Stadium Oakland Colleseum scorpion at ix.netcom.com mike_edgeman at hotmail.com Joe Clark - Shoeless Joe's Bill Parker - Springfield Isotopes Riverfront Stadium Metrodome clark444 at comsouth.net billparker79 at gmail.com Justin Burson - California Komados Will Hobday - Dewey Beach Lush Mile High Stadium Fenway Park justin.burson at gmail.com will at hobday.org National Conference Gehrig Division Tiant Division Robert Ogle - Ocean Beach Surfers OPEN - Birmingham Cloverleafs Jacobs Field Astrodome bob_ogle at hotmail.com Kevin Pennington - Concord Minutemen Greg Basso - Orange Whoop Candlestick Park Wrigley Field pennington.kevin at gmail.com gbasso at oakpackaging.com Daniel Goldberg - Topeka Stingers Jeff Goldberg - Boston Bulldogs Olympic Stadium Tiger Stadium dgold25 at yahoo.com jeff24k at hotmail.com Joe Thomas - Hong Kong Cavaliers OPEN - San Diego Stars Dodger Stadium Anaheim Stadium fresno16 at pacbell.net Mike Littau - Albuquerque Maul Kyle Pope - Dedham Destroyers Kingdome Fulton County Stadium littaum at nmia.com ndpope at mit.edu Jeff Jones - Boulder County Trustafarians David Kuehn - Avila Dragons Busch Stadium Shea Stadium jones99 at us.ibm.com david.kuehn at oracle.com GENERAL RULES PART 1 -- THE MANAGERIAL PROFILE 1. Each team needs to fill out the following for the regular season: * Managerial tendencies: * Bunting, Hit and Run, Stealing, Running the Bases, Pitching Around, Intentional Walks, Holding Runners, Infield In, Guarding the Lines, Pinch Hitting for batters, Pinch Hitting for Pitchers, Pinch Hitting for Platoon Players, Pinch Hitting in a blowout, Using Relievers, and Using Closers. * Each can be rated as: Most Frequent, More Frequent, Normal, Less Frequent, or Least Frequent. * Basically, setting these to normal means the manager plays the percentages. Juan Pierre will still get tons of steals with a manager tendency of normal stealing. More frequent generally means they're more aggressive in the area of question, but can mean more mistakes. Unless you change them they'll be at normal. * A batting lineup vs left & right handed pitchers * For each batting lineup, you can: => Have a defensive substitute for each position, which would put the player in question in the field late in the inning where defense is needed. => Have a platoon player that comes in if a pitcher of different handedness comes in the game => Have up to 5 backups (called utility players) with the percentage of time they play in place of the starter. * Up to 5 pinch hitters vs each side (left/right) * A starting pitching rotation, either 4 or 5 pitchers. A 4 man rotation will burn out your starters faster, however. * A rotation usage: Time, skip, or strict. Time is where the starters are based on the # of starts they had in real life, and gives those with more starts a larger proportion of the total starts. However, Time uses *all* starters on your roster, not just the 5 you specify in the rotation. As such, Time is not recommended for use as it can lead to unpredictable rotations. Skip will go through your rotation straight until there is an off-day, in which case it will jump up to your first rested starter. Strict will just go through your rotation 1 through 5. * You can designate a spot starter for each spot in the rotation which start a specified percentage of time in that spot (such as the #5 pitching spot). Spot starters are not used with the Time rotation usage option. * You may also designate the following: => Mop-up pitchers. These come in when the score is lopsided in either direction and the winner/loser is not in question anymore. It helps save your relievers for later games. => Long relievers. They come in when the starter gets bombed. (NOTE: These have to be relievers). Up to three. => Setup men. They can be either vs left handed or right handed batters. Up to three vs each may be defined. => Closers. They can be either vs left handed or right handed batters. Up to three vs each may be defined. * You can have pitchers in multiple spots. The long relievers can also be setup men, a closer vs left handers may be the setup man vs right handers, and a guy who is closer for one side may be closer for the other (to cite a few examples). Just remember that the more you use the pitchers the faster they burn out. All relievers must have a durability rating for relief. 2. POSITION ELIGBILITY: In order for a person to play catcher, 2B, SS, 3B or center field, they must have a defensive rating for that position. A person can play either left or right field if they have a rating at left or right field (IE-RF & LF are interchangeable). Players rated at the center field position can play all three outfield positions (but people rated at LF and or RF only can't play CF). Hitters without any defensive ratings whatsoever (IE-DH-types) will be allowed to play first base. NOTE: Only DH-types are allowed this. Other people who are rated at a position which isn't first still cannot play first. This rule is meant to allow DH-types to play a position and to avoid reducing them to the role of a glorified pinch-hitter. Also note that these DH-types will field very poorly, and will be ranked at the bottom of the fielding ratings for first basemen. Starting pitchers are those who have a durability rating for a starter. Relief pitchers are those who have a durability rating for a reliever. People with ratings for both catagories can both start and relieve. But a relief-only pitcher can't start, and a start-only pitcher can't relieve. Mop-up, Long, Setup & Closer are relief roles, while start and spot start roles are for starters. NOTE ON CLOSERS: Closers do *NOT* have to be those in real life. You can have guys like Mike Maddux circa '92 be your closer in the game and you probably won't suffer too much, although tradional closers still probably get the job done better because they are usually good relievers in general. 3. PLAYING TIME: DMB determines the amount of playing time a batter will get over the season by starting time %ages. For batters, you can have either of two settings on how to gauge playing time: Track Starts, or Game By Game. Game By Game chooses a player without regard to past playing time. Track Starts takes into account how much playing time someone has had during the season. Frank Thomas set to 50% with track starts may get more playing time in the first half of the season but as he hits the halfway point he may be benched more. The gauge for playing time is plate appearances for batters, and batters faced for pitchers. This is what DMB uses to determine how close someone is to reaching their real life playing time (displayed by a %age on my computer, and on the playing time status report). PART 2 -- THE REGULAR SEASON 4. Each team will play 162 games, with 12 total games being played with each in-division team, 9 games being played against the other division in the conference, and 4 games being played against teams in the other conference. 5. The DH will *NOT* be used. A player who was DH only (indicated by not having any positions whatsoever) will only be elligible to play first base. *WARNING* their fielding will be that of Frank Thomas on a bad day, so be sure to ask yourself if it's worth it. 6. Each week's worth of games (7), are played once Monday-Friday, with two games played on Saturday. League stats are sent on Saturday. All trades must be confirmed by both sides, and occur immediately upon such notice. After game 81 (or approximately around there) the all-star break will occur. One week is taken off for the all-star game. The deadline for trading for the current season is game #120. After game 120 has been played, no trades may occur until after the season. 7. I'll be posting the standings, league leaders, game results,notes, tidbits, etc, as well as team stats every week. I will post the transaction list (trades, drops and free agent signings) periodically. All league info is always viewable at the league web site which is posted in the title of this document. 8. For free agent signings, the team with the worst current record who files a claim within 24 hours of the transaction list posting gets the free agent (this is for people who were just waived). Any other free agent signings are first-come, first-serve. 9. Teams may only request to sign players to replace burnouts after the weekend standings have been e-mailed. "Pre-burnout requests" will not be allowed. 10. If you waive someone, you may not re-sign that player until 2 full game weeks have passed. If you waive someone during week 3, you can't re-sign them until week 5, where the beginning of the week is the moment after I post the weekly deluge of stats. This allows for other teams to have a shot at signing that player, as well as making it a lot easier on the commish. 11. Regular season playing time criteria: a. Any drafted players with less than 30 plate appearances (for hitters) or 67 batters faced (for pitchers) are inelligible to play during the regular season (these are usually prospects). You may immediately sign burnout replacements, as long as you drafted enough IP & AB to meet team minimums before signing such burnout replacements (IE-you can't just draft 33 prospects and then sign burnout replacements for all of them after the draft). b. A batter can only play up to 225% of their actual plate appearances on a side vs a particularly handed pitcher. If a player has 10 PA vs lefties in real life, he may only get up to 20 PA vs lefties in DMB. If he reaches 225%, then his starting %age vs that side must be set to 0 for the rest of the season. This is to help prevent "super-extrapolation" where a guy who hit really well over 30 PA gets those stats extrapolated for the whole side, stringing it out to 150 PA. c. DMB handles batting playing time by "% starting" which basically is that person's chance out of 100 that they will start at a given time. I am leaving the percentages up to you. If you want to set everyone at 100%, you are free to do that. HOWEVER . . . d. After each week's worth of games, I deactivate any batter who exceeds 124% of their real life plate appearances, and any pitcher who exceeds 124% of their real life batters faced. Batters faced is roughly proportional to innings pitched. e. I usually stop checking burnouts after game #150 or so. I will announce the time I stop checking during the season. If your players are not burned out after the last check, they can play an unlimited amount of time until the end of the regular season. f. There is no minimum plate appeareances (for batters) or batters faced (for pitchers) to be mentioned anywhere in the regular season profile. They just have to be an active player and have a rating to play that particular position. g. All owners will have to do their own depth charts. I won't allow people to use the computer generated ones. This is to try and get as few teams on autopilot as possible. h. If a player is burnt out, you are able to sign someone to temporarily take his place. If your team makes the playoffs, you will have to specify who is on your 33 man playoff roster. All excess is inelligible for the rest of the playoffs (but may be protected for next season if they qualify). Players who burn out are still elligible to be kept after the season (provided they were drafted or on a keeper list for that year). i. If a player burns out vs a particular side, he may not be waived. He must either be traded or played vs the other side so that he burns out. One the player burns out, he can be replaced under normal burnout rules. j. This is just a general plea: Don't try to abuse the playing time, by trying to burn out as many people as possible. Try to pace your guys, so that the workload is reduced for both of us. k. Teams that are out of playoff contention may not completely bench players who would obviously be playing in an attempt to lose enough games to reach the magic 95 game barrier. Obvious starters can be reduced down to 75% of full time to simulate "giving the farm system some at bats." Final judgement as to who is an obvious starter is left to the commish. ADDENDIUM TO RULE #9k: Once a player reaches 80% of their real life playing time, they may be benched if the team so desires. The above rule #9k is meant to have guys who are obvious starters get most of their playing time in. l. The maximum # of burnouts + active players is 60. This isn't something I can change, as this is the max # of slots DMB will allow me. Try not to hit this limit. 12. TEAM MINIMUMS: At the start of the season (before burnout signees are allowed after the draft), each team must have at least 490 total plate appearances for each position, at the same time other positions have 490 total plate appearances. This (sort of) insures that you'll have enough plate appearances for the whole season. In addition, you need 4670 total team plate appearances. You need 1155 total team IP as well (at least). Figure around 860 IP for starters, but I won't be measuring that. This is at the beginning of the season. As the season progresses, I will *NOT* be keeping track of the total plate appearances/IP for each team. For batters, you may "split" someone's PA's to cover the minimum. For instance, say you have 500 PA's each for 2nd, SS, 3B, LF, CF, and RF. Let's also say you have 90's era Tony Phillips, and say that he played all these positions, and that he has 300 PA. Divide the PA's by 6, add 50 to each position, and you are qualified for those positions. In addition to the total playing time criteria, you also need to have the following: * At least 2 active players who are rated at a fielding position at all times. It is OK to have 1 player with multiple fielding positions used to satisfy this criteria. * At least 4 active pitchers who are rated as starting pitchers. * At least 10 active pitchers. * At least 25 total active players. * Have all 8 batting positions specified vs. left handed and right handed pitchers. Failure to satisfy these minimums will result in the commisioner signing or making roster moves for you to meet the minimums. While this is usually the best guy for the job, the commisioner may decide that the 38 year old veteran on his last legs needs to play a few extra games and will do it on your team. So it is best to make sure your team always meets the minimums. PART 3 -- THE PLAYOFFS 13. A total of 8 teams will make the playoffs. In addition to the 4 pennant winners and wild card teams from each conference, two more teams, the two with the best record who don't have a playoff spot will be given "league" wildcard spots. The playoff format is dependent upon where the league wildcards come from. If the league wildcards come from different conferences, then each league wildcard will face the pennant winner with the best record in the conference, while the conference wild card will face the other pennant winner in the conference. If both league wildcards come from the same conference, things get a little more piggly-wiggly. In order to keep teams in the same conference bracket, both wildcards will face each other in a "pre-first round" match. The winner will go on to face the pennant winner with the best record in the conference, while the conference wildcard will once again face the other pennant winner. In the case of the conference where there are not league wildcards, the pennant winner with the better record will recieve a bye for the round. League wildcards will never have HFA against conference wildcards, while conference wildcards will never have HFA against pennant winners. In the case of teams meeting in the same "class", the team with the better record/winner of the tiebreaker will get HFA. The games will go H-H-A-A-A-H-H, where H denotes the home stadium of the home field team. PLAYOFF SETUP _League WC/League WC winner/Bye_____ _Pennant Winner w/best record (HFA)_|------------| _Conf WC _____________________ |____Conf Winner___ _Pennant Winner (HFA)_________|------------------| | __CDBL Champs_____| _League WC/League WC winner/Bye_____ | _Pennant Winner w/best record (HFA)_|------------| | _Conf WC _____________________ |___ Conf Winner___| _Pennant Winner (HFA)_________|------------------| If teams are tied for a playoff spot (or a chance to get into the playoffs altogether), then the following criteria will be used to break the tie: Team with better record against other team, then the team with best differential between runs scored and runs allowed. SPECIAL NOTE ON STATS USED IN RULES: All playoff stats refer the the players actual MLB stats. 100 plate appearances (PA) means 100 MLB PA, 45 innings pitched (IP) means 45 MLB IP, etc, etc, etc. The stats they compiled in the CDBL regular season has no effect on a players usage in the playoffs. Managerial profile constraints: * A maximum of 33 active players on the roster. All excess players are deactivated an inelligible for the rest of the playoffs. * The starting rotation will consist of 4 starters with a "strict" rotation style. * Relievers may only be mentioned in the profile if they have 40 IP or more. Relievers with less than this can be on the active roster but may not be mentioned in the profile. * The depth charts will use "Game by Game" (as opposed to "Track Starts") Playing time minimums: * 4 starting pitchers must be specified, with each starting pitcher having a minimum of 90 IP and 9 starts. No spot starters may be used. * Pinch hitters, defensive replacements and players specified in the platoon role (where they are inserted into the lineup once an opposing reliever makes an appearance) must have at least 30 PA vs their specified side. * Each fielding position must sum up to 100%, and exactly 100%. A player's starting %age may be split up among positions, as long as the percentages add up to the original starting %age (IE-a person allowed to play 30% of the time vs lefties can split that into three positions of 10%, 5% and 15%, since it still adds up to 30%. * Each position must have 490 PA worth of players assigned to it, with no player exceeding either 225% of their real life PA vs a particular side or 124% of their real life total PA. Each fielding position must sum up to 100%. A player's starting %age may be split up among positions, as long as the percentages add up to the original starting %age (IE-a person allowed to play 30% of the time vs LHP can split that into three positions of 10%, 5% and 15%, since it still adds up to 30%.) * For positions where multiple players have playing time, the person with the largest percentage must be designated as the starter. Assigning playing time percentages to batters in the playoffs: * * * * * * * * * * * * IMPORTANT * * * * * * * * * * * * Please read the following carefully if you have players with less than 490 PA that you want to play in the playoffs. While you can play a full time player part time if you want, you are not allowed to play a part time batter full time in the playoffs. You didn't get to the playoffs on the back of a guy who had 100 plate appearances, so you shouldn't get to the championship by playing a part time guy proportionately longer than he played in the regular season. All %'s mentioned range from 1-100 in this case, and are rounded to the nearest integer. * Each player has 3 different sets of PA: Total PA, PA vs LHP, PA vs RHP. Adding the PA vs LHP and the PA vs RHP will yield the total PA. PA vs LHP can be found in the batting stats vs LHP, the PA vs RHP can be found in the batting stats vs RHP, and the Total PA can be found in the total batting stats. * If you want to play a person 100% of the time vs LHP and RHP, he **MUST** have 490 total PA, with at least 80 PA vs lefties and at least 165 PA vs righties * To play a person 100% of the time vs LHP only (0% vs RHP) he **MUST* have at least 160 total PA and at least 80 PA vs lefties * To play a person 100% of the time vs RHP only (0% vs LHP) he **MUST* have at least 330 total PA and at least 165 PA vs righties If your player doesn't meet the above qualifications, then it gets even more complicated. * "The 225% of their real life PA vs a particular side rule" If a player is going to hit only against left handed pitching, but they have less than 80 PA vs LHP but more than 160 total PA, the maximum percentage they can start vs LHP is: 100%*(LHP PA)*2/160 for facing only left handed pitching If a player is going to hit only against right handed pitching, but they have less than 165 PA vs RHP but more than 330 total PA, the maximum percentage they can start vs LHP is: 100%*(RHP PA)*2/330 for facing only right handed pitching For example, Player A has 45 PA vs lefties, 255 PA vs righties and 300 PA overall. The manager wants to play him as much as possible vs left handers with no playing time vs right handers. The maximum percentage he can start vs LHP is: 100%*(45*2)/160 = 100%*(90/160) = 100%*0.56 = 56% of the time vs LHP * "Player has > 80 PA vs LHP, > 165 PA vs RHP, but < 490 total PA" If a player has less than the required PA to play 100% of the time vs both pitching sides (490 total PA) but has at least 80 PA vs LHP and 165 PA vs RHP, you can use this formula to determine his playing time vs. either side: If playing equally for each side: Each side is 100%*(Total PA)/490 If playing unequal percentages for each side: (%age of time vs LHP)*0.327 + (%age of time vs RHP)*0.673 is less than 100%*(Total PA/490) For example, Player B has 150 PA vs LHP, 250 PA vs RHP for a total of 400 PA. One way of using player B is to play him the same percentage for each side, which would be 100%*(Total PA/490) = 100%*(400/490) = 82% of the time vs LHP and vs RHP. The other way to use player B is the skew his percentages vs. LHP and RHP, as long as the formula results add up to a total usage of 73%. For example, Player B could be played like this: (59% of the time vs LHP)*0.327 + (80% of the time vs RHP)*0.673 = 73% (59%*0.327) + (80%*.673) = %73 total playing time 19.293% + 53.84% = %73.133 ==> Rounds to 73% total playing time * "Player has < 490 total PA and either < 80 PA vs LHP or < 165 PA vs RHP and the manager wants to play him vs both sides" You will need to use the formulas from the previous two cases. Each side (LHP/RHP) has a maximum playing time percentage of: 100%*(LHP PA)*2/160 for facing only left handed pitching 100%*(RHP PA)*2/330 for facing only right handed pitching Take your desired percentages to face each one and insert them into the formula. Chances are you will have to pick a percentage for one side, then back calculate what percentage you can play them vs the other side: (%age of time vs LHP)*0.327 + (%age of time vs RHP)*0.673 is less than 100%*(Total PA/490) The above equation can also be expressed as: %age of time vs LHP = (100%*(Total PA/490) - (%age of time vs RHP)*0.673)/0.327 or %age of time vs RHP = (100%*(Total PA/490) - (%age of time vs LHP)*0.327)/0.673 For example, revisiting Player A has 45 PA vs lefties, 255 PA vs righties and 300 PA overall. From the previous example, the maximum percentage he can start vs LHP is: 100%*(45*2)/160 = 100%*(90/160) = 100%*0.5 = 56% of the time vs LHP To play him as much as he's allowed vs LHP and using the rest of his PA vs RHP would yield %age of time vs RHP = (100%*(300/490) - (56%)*0.327)/0.673 %age of time vs RHP = (61.22% - 18.31%)/0.673 = 63.76% = 64% So playing Player A as much as possible vs LHP and the rest vs RHP would allow him to play 56% of the time vs LHP and 64% of the time vs RHP. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * NOTICE ON PLAYING TIME REQUIREMENTS: If you cannot meet the minimum playing time for all spots in the playoffs, the commisioner will assign the worst starter available in the free agent pool to play in that spot. Therefore, it is in your best interests to make sure you meet playoff playing time minimums. PART 4 -- AFTER THE SEASON (POST-SEASON) 14. Everyone gets $25. Players are worth according to how long its been since they've been drafted. 15. The # of $$ a player is worth goes by the following criteria: 1 year after they are drafted - $1 2 years after they were drafted - $2 3 years after they were drafted - $3 Every year after that - player gets a $0.20 raise, so that means that: 4 years after they were drafted - $3.2 5 years after they were drafted - $3.4 6 years after they were drafted - $3.6 and so on. The only way that a person's keeper price can change is if they are released into the free agent pool at the end of the year to be drafted. Once a player is drafted, they revert to the criteria in #2 above. (IE-Say I keep Maddux for 5 years. By this time, he will be taking up $3.4 in my keeper list. If I release him, and someone else drafts him, he will be worth $1 after the first year with his new team). Trading away players does not affect dollar values of players involved. It only transfers their values to another team. Any fractional salaries left over when summing up player salaries is rounded DOWN. So if you keep 4 $3.2 players, that counts as 4 players X $3.2 = $12.8 ==> $12. If you kept 5 $3.2 players, then that counts as 5 players x $3.2 == $16. 16. You can keep up to 5 players who earn $3 or more. These are called $3 keeper slots. Each team gets 5 $3 keeper slots a year. $3 keeper slots may be traded from one team to another, just like players, draft picks or salary. 17. You can trade up to 2 of your $3 keeper slots and/or up to $6 in total salary. A $3 keeper slot is *NOT* the same as $3 in salary cap space. Trading for a $3 keeper slot only grants you the right to keep an additional $3 player (IE-6 $3 players instead of 5). If you are keeping 5 $3 players and $25 in total salary, and want to trade for a $3 player while keeping your existing keepers, then you would have to trade for a $3 keeper slot *and* $3 in salary cap space. 18. Only players who were on keeper lists the year before or who were drafted the year before may be kept. There is a league salary list on the web site which lists all players who are elligible to be kept. 19. You may switch to any ballpark that isn't taken in the off-season. For those who have ballparks that are no longer in use, they have first dibs on the "new" ballpark. (Such as with Old Commisky-New Commisky). 20. During the off-season you may trade salary cap money and $3 keeper slots for the coming year or following year (IE-right before the 1995 draft you can trade $$ from the 1995 or 1996 season). PART 5 -- THE DRAFT 21. The order is dependent upon 3 "classes" of teams: Those with 95 or more losses, those teams with less than 95 losses but didn't make the playoffs, and playoff teams. Teams with more than 95 losses will be sorted by order of losses, with the team having the most losses getting the #1 pick. After the 95+ loss teams have gotten their place at the top of the draft list, the other non-playoff teams will come next. In this case, teams are sorted by *wins*. Thus, the team with the best record while not making the playoffs will get the next highest draft pick. In a year where no teams get 95 or more losses, the non-playoff team with the most wins would wind up with the #1 overall pick. After all non-playoff teams have their place at the top of the draft order, the playoff teams will be placed according to losses. Thus, the team with the best record in the league will have the last pick of each round. In the case where teams are tied in regular season record, the tie breaker system used for the playoffs will be used. 21a.In situations where 3 or more teams end up tied in the regular season, RunMargin will be used to determine the tie-breaker for the draft order. NEW For the "95 loss club", a more negative run margin will get priority for FOR tied teams. For non-playoff teams that are not part of the 95 loss club, '95 a more positive run margin will get priority for tied teams. For playoff teams a more negative run margin will get priority for tied teams. If only 2 teams are tied, then standard playoff tie-breakers are used (which is team-vs-team performance followed by RunMargin). 22. The draft order is non-snaking. 23. Draft picks are a tradable commodity. When trading draft picks, you are limited to trading a maximum of 5 of your own draft picks per season (no matter how many picks you get in return). You can only trade picks for the current or next year. The beginning of the game year is defined as the day immediately after the world series. You may also not trade any picks lower than the 10th round. 24. There is no limit to the amount of IP, at bats, starts, or any other criteria other than the amount of salary or $3 keeper limits that you have available. PART 6 -- OTHER RULES 25. This is probably the most important rule: Obey the spirit of the game as well as the rules. I reserve the right to stop something in progress if it is detrimental to the league's integrity. I do reserve the right to change the rules, but I try not to leave people up the creek without a paddle. 26. When a person is a new owner of a team, I reserve the right to allow the person to reverse the deal if I feel they made the deal under false assumptions or similar "newbieness". As soon as I feel they're up to speed (probably a couple weeks) then they're on their own. :) It is in the original owners' best interests to make sure the new owners understand the quirks & workings of the league when making deals. 27. No collusion between owners. (IE-two or more owners whose sole goal is to pool the resources of several teams to get a juggernaut). 28. Avoid making trades that essentially "rents" a player for the year. You are not allowed to trade a player to another team, with the specification that you get the same player back at some future point. You can trade for a player you traded during the season, but it must be an independent and completely separate deal from the first one. 29. If a trade looks obviously lop-sided, I reserve the right to void the deal, particularly if it looks like it's trying to get around the collusion or "rent-a-player" rules. 30. Trades only become valid after *BOTH* parties tell me of their trade. If a trade causes a team to go over the 33 man limit or under the 25 man minimum the team owner in question must either cut players or sign players to meet the limits. 31. All trade items (players, draft picks, salary, keeper slots) must switch teams immediately upon confirmation of both parties. No delays in trade components will be allowed. 32. Some rules stated above appear twice. I just like repeating myself. :) There also may be some inconsistent rules, which happens when I forget to modify the right places. If all else fails, ask. 33. When making changes to your managerial profile, please list only the changes, and do not upload the whole thing. The less work I have to do, the more accurate I will be in making your changes for you. :) 34. Most importantly, this league is for fun. I don't charge anything for it. I am willing to listen to suggestions, and if I like them enough I'd probably implement them. Also remember that on occasion I will be late with the results, etc, and the sometimes the mail will get lost along the way. Good luck to everyone, and may the the best team win! If you have any comments, suggestions, modifications or clarifications on these rules please feel free to e-mail me.