13 Spots Left: $200 Guillotine Live: Jan. 10 8 pm ET

[Greg Ambrosius]

We are always looking at new ways to entice our players to compete in fantasy baseball leagues. What started as a unique 15-Team national contest in the NFBC Main Event in 2004 has evolved to include Auctions, Draft Champions, Cutline, Online Championship, private high-dollar leagues and more.

Now we're adding one more very, very unique contest that hasn't been tried before in baseball. This one is called:

The NFBC GUILLOTINE LEAGUES.

This is something that we unveiled in football and it became an instant hit. We held drafts during the off-season with $200 and $400 per team price points and sold out a dozen leagues. SportsHub Games Network also offered lower-priced Guillotine leagues and sold out dozens of leagues at the $30 and $50 price points. The NFFC then continued with the Guillotine concept during the regular season and sold out two leagues every week at $100 per team from Weeks 1 through 8.

Take a second to digest the format before making an opinion because it's very unique and slightly different from football. But I think you'll like it.

We are going to offer these as 4-hour drafts to start out and will offer nightly drafts in March. We will likely start out with a $200 price point, but if there's demand for a $400 price point we will offer that. Then during the MLB regular season we'll also offer Guillotine leagues at likely $100 per team.

Okay, here's the concept:
NFBC Guillotine Leagues
Cost: Private leagues at $200 per team (can add $400 price point)
Teams: 15 Teams Per League
Players Per Team: 34
Prizes: Pay Top 3: ($200 league) = 1st Place $1,400; 2nd Place - $700; 3rd Place - $400 (double prizes for $400 entry)

These are private leagues with only league prizes.

Okay, so here's the basic concept: Every two weeks the lowest scoring team in the league is ELIMINATED from the competition. That's right, after the first scoring period the lowest scoring team in the league is eliminated and ALL OF THEIR PLAYERS GO BACK INTO THE FREE AGENT POOL.

That team was chopped in the Guillotine!!

That's right, all 34 players from that lowest scoring team in the first scoring period will be placed back into the league's free agent pool and only 14 teams will remain in the competition. The league scores reset to zero to start the new scoring period as each period is its own contest. In scoring period 2, the lowest scoring team just for that period will be eliminated and ALL OF THEIR PLAYERS GO BACK INTO THE FREE AGENT POOL. That will leave us with 13 teams and this continues through the end of August until only four teams are left. Every period is a new scoring period, so total points are NOT accumulated in this contest. Each scoring period one team will be chopped in the guillotine.

Now, this sounds like a lot of work, even though FAAB is every other week, because 34 pretty good players are being added to the FAAB pool. Trying to balance how to spend that $1,000 of FAAB wisely will be your toughest task. But the best thing about this format is that you never have to set a starting lineup as we'll use optimal scoring for the Guillotine league, using Cutline scoring. So yes, you do have FAAB work about every two weeks, but then you just sit back and watch your team score at will and stay out of last place for that scoring period. It's as easy as that.

The four remaining teams after the Sept. 6th scoring period will compete over a two week period for the prize money. The Championship Round starts from scratch and totals points between those four teams over the last two weeks. In the $200 league, First Place earns $1,400, Second Place earns $700 and Third Place earns $400. Just double the prizes for the $400 leagues: $2,800, $1,400, $800.

Here's the scoring periods as some weeks have three sets of scores due to the short start week of Opening Day and the All-Star break:

The Guillotine regular season will consist of 11 scoring Periods with one team being ELIMINATED each period for having the lowest score. Period 1 and Period 8 will consist of three scoring weeks, while every other Period will consist of two full weeks. Scores for each week will be added together to determine the final Period standings. Four teams will survive and advance to the Championship Round, which consists of two weeks with the Top 3 teams earning prize money. Here’s the scoring periods:

Period 1 – March 26-April 12 (3 scoring weeks)
Period 2 – April 13-April 26 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 3 – April 27-May 10 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 4 – May 11-May 24 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 5 – May 25-June 7 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 6 – June 8-June 21 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 7 – June 22-July 5 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 8 – July 6-July 26 (3 scoring weeks)
Period 9 – July 27-Aug. 9 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 10 – Aug. 10-Aug. 23 (2 scoring weeks)
Period 11 – Aug. 24 -Sept. 6 (2 scoring weeks)
Championship Round – Sept. 7-Sept. 20 (2 scoring weeks)

NFBC Cutline scoring will be used for this contest and Starting Lineup is the same as other NFBC contests. It includes:

Starting lineups will consist of:

* 2 Catchers
* 1 First Baseman
* 1 Second Baseman
* 1 Shortstop
* 1 Third Baseman
* 5 Outfielders
* 1 Corner Infielder
* 1 Middle Infielder
* 1 Utility Player
* 9 Pitchers

Scoring Categories include:
For Hitters

Home Run: 6 points
Stolen Base: 5 points
Hit: 4 points
Run: 2 points
RBI: 2 points
At-bat: -1 point
For Pitchers

Win: 6 points
Save: 8 points
Inning Pitched: 3 points
Strikeout: 1 point
Hit or Walk Allowed: -1 point
Earned Run Allowed: -2 points

We know this is adding another FAAB league for folks, but we found out in football that this FAAB league was so interesting that it added a new element to FAAB. Some players actually went for the full $1,000 FAAB in football in Week 3, leaving that team with no FAAB money the rest of the way. I don't think it went well for those owners, but it's an interesting twist to the game.

We also know that your drafting schedules will be very tight in February and March, so we'll offer 4-Hour Guillotine drafts that will start once they fill. That has been added to Registration already and we'll add draft dates for February and March later. We realize that someone will be eliminated after only one scoring period, so we didn't put the entry fee too high. But we also realize there's a lot of in-season work with these leagues, so we didn't want to put the entry fee too low. We'll start out at $200 per team and again if there's interest in $400 leagues let us know. We filled two of those in football, so you never know. Plus this should be a ton of fun.

We made the rosters 34 players deep because it is an optimal scoring league and because you don't have FAAB every week, so plan for a little longer draft night if you do the nightly drafts. We just felt like the 4 extra spots would provide more strategy in drafting and create more fun in FAAB each period. It's a battle of survival in the Guillotine leagues, so keep trying to improve your team while knowing that if you want to win the league title you'll need some FAAB right up to the end.

We are VERY excited about this format and enjoyed the response in football. Again, look for Guillotine leagues during the season as we'll have 14-team drafts two weeks into the second, 13 team drafts two weeks after that and so on until we get to 8-team drafts. We won't go any lower than that and league prizes will change with each new format. Should be fun.

Here's the link to the Contest and again we look forward to your feedback:

https://nfc.shgn.com/gametypes/baseball/103
https://nfc.shgn.com/rules/461

Here's the current signup list:

NFBC $200 Guillotine 4-Hour League
15 Teams, 34 Rounds, Pay Top 3
Lowest Scoring Team Gets Cut Each Scoring Period:
1. Eric Gailing

NFBC $200 Guillotine 2-Hour League
15 Teams, 34 Rounds, Pay Top 3
Lowest Scoring Team Gets Cut Each Scoring Period:
1. Jeffrey Rubenstein
2. Jon Stadtmueller
3. Kelly Withrow
4. Ryan Erickson

[Thurman15]

Sounds really interesting Greg. I would love to try it out......except.....I could not possibly have the patience for 4 hour picks. Now if MTM was to run one, I would join for sure. But the idea is neat and strategy would be fun and very important. I think it may well be a success, but I'll be waiting for the fast ones. Thanks for providing another fun concept.

Al (Thurman15)

[Greg Ambrosius]

Sounds really interesting Greg. I would love to try it out......except.....I could not possibly have the patience for 4 hour picks. Now if MTM was to run one, I would join for sure. But the idea is neat and strategy would be fun and very important. I think it may well be a success, but I'll be waiting for the fast ones. Thanks for providing another fun concept.

Al (Thurman15)

Yeah, I agree Al that the nightly drafts at 1 minute per pick will be the most popular format. That being said, if anyone wants to compete in a "fast" draft before those nightly drafts begin just let me know and I'll set one up. We can list it as a 2-hour draft and help facilitate the speediness of it through 34 rounds. Should be easy enough for us to do. Thanks.

[Greg Ambrosius]

We're eager to start these debut NFBC Guillotine Leagues and will set up some nightly drafts in January shortly. We'll gladly host these at 1 minute per pick in the next few weeks if those are better than the 4-Hour and 2-Hour drafts. Look for those shortly.

Until then: 13 Spots Left in the next 2-Hour Guillotine:

NFBC $200 Guillotine 4-Hour League
15 Teams, 34 Rounds, Pay Top 3
Lowest Scoring Team Gets Cut Each Scoring Period:
1.

NFBC $200 Guillotine 2-Hour League
15 Teams, 34 Rounds, Pay Top 3
Lowest Scoring Team Gets Cut Each Scoring Period:
1. Jeffrey Rubenstein
2. Jon Stadtmueller
3. Eric Gailing

[Roy's Outlaws]

Greg , the championship week is 3 weeks. Sept 7-27. ???

[Greg Ambrosius]

Greg , the championship week is 3 weeks. Sept 7-27. ???

No, that is wrong. I corrected above to Sept. 7-20. The final is just two weeks and ends a week before the end of the MLB season. Thanks for the catch.

[Greg Ambrosius]

Okay, we've heard from a bunch of folks who are interested in the Guillotine concept, but would rather hold the entire draft in one sitting. And the earlier the better before all of the nightly Online Championship and Cutline drafts begin.

Consider it done.

We've picked Friday nights in January as the night to host these Guillotine 1-minute per pick drafts. If someone wants a different day of the week, let us know. But right now we have them scheduled for the next three Friday nights at 8 pm ET, starting on January 10th. These are 15-team, 34-round drafts that should get done in less than 3 hours. Then the fun begins during the regular season when you're trying to stay out of last place for a two-week time period and navigate what will surely be a very interesting FAAB market.

Check out the rules above and let's get this rolling. First nightly Guillotine draft is next Friday at 8 pm ET. Who's in?

NFBC Guillotine League Express
Friday, Jan. 10th, 8 pm ET
1 Minute Per Pick, 34 Rounds
1. Jeffrey Rubenstein
2. Alan Holmes

https://nfc.shgn.com/rules/461
https://nfc.shgn.com/signup/baseball?for=0;461

[Thurman15]

Now you're talking Greg. An all in one night draft. Sit down and roll through the first Guillotine . One night full draft. I'm in !! Friday January 10. Thanks for doing a fast one.

[Deadheadz]

Okay, so here's the basic concept: Every two weeks the lowest scoring team in the league is ELIMINATED from the competition. That's right, after the first scoring period the lowest scoring team in the league is eliminated and ALL OF THEIR PLAYERS GO BACK INTO THE FREE AGENT POOL.

That team was chopped in the Guillotine!!

That's right, all 34 players from that lowest scoring team in the first scoring period will be placed back into the league's free agent pool and only 14 teams will remain in the competition. The league scores reset to zero to start the new scoring period as each period is its own contest. In scoring period 2, the lowest scoring team just for that period will be eliminated and ALL OF THEIR PLAYERS GO BACK INTO THE FREE AGENT POOL. That will leave us with 13 teams and this continues through the end of August until only four teams are left. Every period is a new scoring period, so total points are NOT accumulated in this contest. Each scoring period one team will be chopped in the guillotine.

It would be good if this info was reflected in the official rules.
It doesn’t specifically say players from the eliminated team(s) are eligible to be free agent pickups in FAAB.
It seems obvious but we don’t want people complaining they didn’t know later on. Murphy’s Law, you know.