XFL Hosts 1982 Retro Draft - Interesting Concept
Posted: Fri May 01, 2020 9:19 am
I am in the Xperts Fantasy League (XFL), along with 14 other industry writers/personalities, which is the industry's premiere Keeper League. It was started by Ron Shandler at the Arizona Fall League Symposium and is about 14 years old now. It's a fun league as you can keep 15 players from year to year along with their salary bumped up by $5 or $3 each year.
We have our early draft in November and then a supplemental draft in March before Opening Day. This year we agreed that holding the supplemental draft of 17 minor-leaguers/free agents didn't make sense since we didn't know when Opening Day would be. It made sense to hold it closer to the new Opening Day, and if baseball is cancelled altogether, to not hold it at all this year.
But Ron and several of our other antsy owners needed a draft fix, so they decided to create a retro league and to hold a 12-round draft knowing the finished stats from that season. They chose 1982 and 12 owners held an online/Zoom draft with Dean Peterson representing our NFBC team. I was knee deep in trying to preserve our NFBC leagues to concentrate on 1982, but I'm glad Dean (my old STATS buddy) represented us.
Ron writes about the draft and the first round on ESPN.com today, and it's very interesting:
https://www.espn.com/fantasy/baseball/s ... many-bases
This retro draft has my mind racing about the possibilities during this down time. The beauty of a retro draft is that the standings are completed as soon as the draft is completed, so there's instant gratification. You also likely can see how you are faring during the draft with the right software, so you have a chance to correct your mistakes in real-time. It's an interesting concept: Kind of like taking a test with several other people and everyone has the answers. Even though you know all of the final stats, you still would have to build the best, most balanced roster to win it all.
Imagine if we held a 15-team 2019 NFBC draft today with all participants knowing the final stats of each player. Would you find that interesting to try and compete against other owners to build the perfect 23-man roster? Could you do multiple drafts and build rosters differently to win the league titles? I think it really is interesting and if 2020 doesn't return it may be our only game for the time being!!
Anyway, we have enough old-time veterans who may have some thoughts on this concept. I'm not sure we could even do something like this easily, but it's obviously doable if needed. Just something to consider. Thoughts?
Retro drafts. Interesting.
We have our early draft in November and then a supplemental draft in March before Opening Day. This year we agreed that holding the supplemental draft of 17 minor-leaguers/free agents didn't make sense since we didn't know when Opening Day would be. It made sense to hold it closer to the new Opening Day, and if baseball is cancelled altogether, to not hold it at all this year.
But Ron and several of our other antsy owners needed a draft fix, so they decided to create a retro league and to hold a 12-round draft knowing the finished stats from that season. They chose 1982 and 12 owners held an online/Zoom draft with Dean Peterson representing our NFBC team. I was knee deep in trying to preserve our NFBC leagues to concentrate on 1982, but I'm glad Dean (my old STATS buddy) represented us.
Ron writes about the draft and the first round on ESPN.com today, and it's very interesting:
https://www.espn.com/fantasy/baseball/s ... many-bases
This retro draft has my mind racing about the possibilities during this down time. The beauty of a retro draft is that the standings are completed as soon as the draft is completed, so there's instant gratification. You also likely can see how you are faring during the draft with the right software, so you have a chance to correct your mistakes in real-time. It's an interesting concept: Kind of like taking a test with several other people and everyone has the answers. Even though you know all of the final stats, you still would have to build the best, most balanced roster to win it all.
Imagine if we held a 15-team 2019 NFBC draft today with all participants knowing the final stats of each player. Would you find that interesting to try and compete against other owners to build the perfect 23-man roster? Could you do multiple drafts and build rosters differently to win the league titles? I think it really is interesting and if 2020 doesn't return it may be our only game for the time being!!
Anyway, we have enough old-time veterans who may have some thoughts on this concept. I'm not sure we could even do something like this easily, but it's obviously doable if needed. Just something to consider. Thoughts?
Retro drafts. Interesting.