http://www.baseballhq.com/members/forums/showthread.php?t=40313&highlight=expansion+draft
All 3 keeper leagues in which I've played have faced the challenge of expansion, and of replacing owners who have dropped from the league. All 3 leagues "bump" salaries by $5 each season. Here are the various things that have been used/proposed:
1. After old owners freeze 3 players, new/expansion owners get to pick 3 players total from the old teams, with each old team losing at most 1 player. Then old owners freeze up to 2 more. Then new owners pick 2 more, again with no old team losing more than 1 player. etc (our limit on keepers is 15). This is being discarded this year because old owners complained they were losing too many of their better keepers.
2. After old owners do all freezes, new owners have a draft from non-returning teams and returning teams unfrozen guys. First 4 players they take they get with no $5 bump. Rest they take they get the $5 bump.
3. New owners can choose a non-returning team, or, if they prefer or no non-returning teams are available, they get a $5 "discount" on each of the first four players that they buy in the auction, where their winning bid amount is at least $15. So if they have the high bid of $30 for a guy, they get him at a salary of $25 (and only $25 is deducted from their auction budget).
Personally, I think the last one is the best, since it's simple, gives the new guys some "keeper value", and has no impact on the old owners. You might choose to change to more or less than 4 discounted guys - depends on what you expect the "average keeper value" to be in your league. With a small league and large expansion, like yours will be this year, I think you should give them more than $20 in "discount", since it's very likely that the old teams will have a lot more than that in keeper value from their 5 keepers.
1. After old owners freeze 3 players, new/expansion owners get to pick 3 players total from the old teams, with each old team losing at most 1 player. Then old owners freeze up to 2 more. Then new owners pick 2 more, again with no old team losing more than 1 player. etc (our limit on keepers is 15). This is being discarded this year because old owners complained they were losing too many of their better keepers.
2. After old owners do all freezes, new owners have a draft from non-returning teams and returning teams unfrozen guys. First 4 players they take they get with no $5 bump. Rest they take they get the $5 bump.
3. New owners can choose a non-returning team, or, if they prefer or no non-returning teams are available, they get a $5 "discount" on each of the first four players that they buy in the auction, where their winning bid amount is at least $15. So if they have the high bid of $30 for a guy, they get him at a salary of $25 (and only $25 is deducted from their auction budget).
Personally, I think the last one is the best, since it's simple, gives the new guys some "keeper value", and has no impact on the old owners. You might choose to change to more or less than 4 discounted guys - depends on what you expect the "average keeper value" to be in your league. With a small league and large expansion, like yours will be this year, I think you should give them more than $20 in "discount", since it's very likely that the old teams will have a lot more than that in keeper value from their 5 keepers.
Originally Posted by alleyoop  1. After old owners freeze 3 players, new/expansion owners get to pick 3 players total from the old teams, with each old team losing at most 1 player. Then old owners freeze up to 2 more. Then new owners pick 2 more, again with no old team losing more than 1 player. etc (our limit on keepers is 15). This is being discarded this year because old owners complained they were losing too many of their better keepers. |
Maybe the old owners would support something that protects their competitive advantage over the new teams, but with the new teams not paying the entry fee for the first year? I say that not facetiously, I can see the guys in my league going along with that plan if it meant that they got to keep more of their keepers.
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In our 13 team NL 4x4 we've had two expansion drafts over the past 24 seasons (yes, we started in 1983). We allow 15 keepers, but for expansion purposes each owner was allowed to protect 8. Once they lost a player they could pull back another player off their list. Maximum number of lost players allowed per team was two.
I personally felt that the protect list should have been five in order to allow the new team to compete immediately, but most other owners believed that an expansion team should "pay its dues" for the first year.
