Lineup Error Messages

Plymouth · Post by **Plymouth** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 2:05 am

Gordie, What part of "you need to have a legal line-up" is it that you don't understand? A legal line-up is 2 catchers active regardless if they are on or off the DL. I don't meet with my team by the water cooler because I don't have team of advisors since I like to make my own decisions but everyone needs to work within their abilities. Keep up the comments because they are good for the morale of the NFBC.

Gordon Gekko · Post by **Gordon Gekko** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 2:17 am

Originally posted by Plymouth:

Gordie, What part of "you need to have a legal line-up" is it that you don't understand? A legal line-up is 2 catchers active regardless if they are on or off the DL. I don't meet with my team by the water cooler because I don't have team of advisors since I like to make my own decisions but everyone needs to work within their abilities. Keep up the comments because they are good for the morale of the NFBC. Still haven't answered it. Keep trying...

A team (not necessarily mine) can drop a catcher for another catcher, and then forget to activate him. What happens in that case?

J.F.K. · Post by **J.F.K.** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 3:14 am

glad I took the time to read this thread ....

after assuming that it had nothing to do with me or my team, I quickly realized that when Greg spoke of the '5 teams who had a DL player active', I was one of them. I know this isn't really the issue (because I DID have '23' players active), but since it was briefly mentioned, and has since been mentioned as far as 'strategy purposes' are concerned, I'd just like to say that I did do it intentionally, had Robb Nen active. I had two pitchers on my bench who I did not want to start that week (Tomko and Rueter at Houston).

As far as the catcher thing goes (the strategy that Gordon spoke of), I don't think there's anything at all wrong with it (having DL'ed catchers active). Now, actually having them on your BENCH (thus having less than the required '23' active spots) is another story. The SS issue from the NY team opened a can of worms, but IMHO that owner should not be penalized. The deciding factor for me, in having that opinion, is that the system did allow his roster to be finalized that way.

Even though we should all take the time to thoroughly read and interpret the rules, in the end roster decisions and discrepencies are really at the mercy of 'what the system allows'. If you play in any other on-line leagues, invalid rosters never get the point of 'an issue' because they are simply not allowed by each on-line system. I do not fault the NY team for having Nomar benched, because the system allowed it. not his fault ... just my opinion.

Going forward, it is good that this issue will be discussed openly on these boards and it will also be noted in the newsletter, but until the online system corrects itself from allowing such moves, I don't think that anyone should penalized with '0s'. There is really no way to determine if errors such as these are 'intentional' or 'accidental'. If it is indeed the later reason and an owner was unaware of the problem, (maybe they don't read these boards or even the newsletter

...) it would certainly seem rather harsh to penalize them for entire week.

If the system corrects itsself to not allow inactive rosters (less than 23 active players) then the point is moot.

If you have a big lead in RBI, RUNs, and HRs toward the end of the season and your catchers suck, it would be great strategy to pick up two DL'ed catchers off the waiver wire and play them for the remainder of the year. Nothing wrong (IMO) with this at all.

Plymouth · Post by **Plymouth** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 4:17 am

Gordie, It is not possible to set a line-up without two catchers active as far as I can tell, I can't be any clearer then that.

Gordon Gekko · Post by **Gordon Gekko** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 4:50 am

Originally posted by Plymouth:

Gordie, It is not possible to set a line-up without two catchers active as far as I can tell, I can't be any clearer then that.

I'm not talking about setting a line-up.

My question is: What happens if an owner drops his only two catchers this FA period and picks up 2 pitchers? Will his line-up of only 21 players be allowed to accumulate points? Or what if a team drops 1 catcher and picks up a new one via FA, BUT the owner forgets to "activate" the newly acquired cather, thus leaving him with an active line-up consisting of only 22 players?

I just re-stated what I initially posted. I take it back, some owners really need to get a clue before posting. Read my posts and understand what i'm asking before opening your mouth.

Plymouth · Post by **Plymouth** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:07 am

As usual Gordie you missed the point entirely. I think we should move on to another subject.

J.F.K. · Post by **J.F.K.** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:18 am

interesting question Gordon

FWIW, I just went an did two FA pickup bids on pitchers and dropped my two catchers ... it did allow this. Now, would it actually allow the transaction to happen? lol. I don't think I want to test that

... if someone was able to do this though ... 'Houston, we have a problem'.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:38 am

Gordon, it has been said before that you cannot enter a legal lineup without the required number of players at each of the required positions. So your lineup would not be legal with 0 catchers in it and in that case you wouldn't get stats for that week. STATS sends a message to each owner that they do not have a legal lineup if less than 23 starters are entered or if they are missing a player at a required position. We are warning each owner and it's up to them to make the change.

Your other question is a good one. If someone picks up a free agent catcher and thus cuts one of his starting catchers in the process, he would need to activate that new catcher between Sunday night and Monday at 1 p.m. EST to have the required players at each position. All FAAB picks are automatically entered onto your lineup right now as inactive and it is up to each owner to activate that new player. However, I have asked STATS to look into the possibility of automatically activating that player if it is as simple as a catcher for a catcher and you have no other catchers on your 29-man roster. I will let you know if that's possible, but right now it is up to each individual owner to make sure they have 23 starting players in their lineup.

We monitor every lineup each Monday and hopefully nobody will make this error. If they do, I'm sure we'll hear about it.

viper · Post by **viper** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 10:53 am

Ok, what is the penalty is you ignore the message that STATs gives you and just have your lineup with 22 starters or(better scenario) forget to active that player required to give you a valid lineup? Heck, you could drop a starting OF and just plain forget to activate your new pickup until it is 5 minutes AFTER the deadline. Merely saying it can't happen is all wrong. It can happen by accident or other reasons. Is there a penalty that will be imposed? Clearly it was not impossed for a week 1 boo-boo and I have no problem with that.

The person who said that the subject should just be dropped is wrong. It can easily and finally be resolved if and when Greg states the penalty and UPDATES THE RULES accordingly. It just hasn't happened yet so the issue is still a live issue and in discussion. If it can happen, it will happen. STATS can't stop it because new free agents go directly to the bench, as well they should. Teams should be responsible for having a valid lineup and there should be penalities if they can't count to 6 (the number of bench players allowed).

Gordon Gekko · Post by **Gordon Gekko** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 10:56 am

Originally posted by J.F.K.:

interesting question Gordon Gekko and colleagues are second to none. Thanks for noticing.

Gordon Gekko · Post by **Gordon Gekko** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 10:58 am

Viper,

I'm in agreement with a lot of what you say. Keep up the good work.

Gordon Gekko · Post by **Gordon Gekko** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 11:07 am

Originally posted by Greg Ambrosius:

Your other question is a good one. If someone picks up a free agent catcher and thus cuts one of his starting catchers in the process, he would need to activate that new catcher between Sunday night and Monday at 1 p.m. EST to have the required players at each position. Okay, so we established that if the above situation occurred (not having the required players at each position), the owner would get a zero for all of his players for the entire week. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Taking that further and including what Viper has been saying for days...what exactly happened with the owner who allegedly had Nomar on his bench for the first week of the season, and only had 22 starters? Is that what happened? Did he get zeros for all of his players? Did he get a mulligan?

Thanks for answering the tough questions.

Dyv · Post by **Dyv** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 5:14 pm

Originally posted by Gordon Gekko:

quote:Originally posted by Greg Ambrosius:

Your other question is a good one. If someone picks up a free agent catcher and thus cuts one of his starting catchers in the process, he would need to activate that new catcher between Sunday night and Monday at 1 p.m. EST to have the required players at each position. Okay, so we established that if the above situation occurred (not having the required players at each position), the owner would get a zero for all of his players for the entire week. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Taking that further and including what Viper has been saying for days...what exactly happened with the owner who allegedly had Nomar on his bench for the first week of the season, and only had 22 starters? Is that what happened? Did he get zeros for all of his players? Did he get a mulligan?

Thanks for answering the tough questions. [/QUOTE]Just a thought, couldn't we resolve this by stating that anyone who doesn't have a valid lineup gets their lineup auto-clipped down to 6 bench spots by dropping the most recent addition to their bench and then they go forward with scoring for the 22 or 21 or 20 players they really have activated? I think losing all stats for all players is incredibly harsh for what could be a technology problem or a family health issue, a death in the family, an accident, etc. If I got hit by some idiot on the road at 7pm EST on Sunday evening and got checked into a hospital until the next afternoon and I could possibly get a zero for the week? Wow, that just 'don't seem right' to me.

How about the 'excess' player for over the 6 man bench is dropped - and the players correctly in the active roster can generate stats. Is that penalty enough or do we need blood and/or 5 layers of security to make sure our rosters are perfectly accurate even in the event of unforseen circumstances.

I don't intend for it to ever happen to me, but it sure would seem unfair if something crazy happened and a manager effectively threw away his money for something out of his/her control.

Dave

viper · Post by **viper** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 5:38 pm

Good questions await good answers. I admit that we are looking at the unlikely but stuff happens.

J.F.K. · Post by **J.F.K.** » Wed Apr 14, 2004 7:44 pm

agree with Dyv

Greg, the question still seems to stand:

'what if you add a pitcher through FAgency and drop one of your two catchers? The system (right now anyway) allows this move to be conditionally made. Obviously, if the FA bid went through successfully, then the problem of 'less than 23 active' would become a non-fixable reality'

Can't tell for sure if this is a problem or not (someone would actually have to test it to be sure).

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 9:17 am

Viper, I haven't been ignoring your questions, just trying to solve them before answering. You bring up good points that our initial rules did not cover this point fully and thus I have updated the rules and STATS is posting them this afternoon to cover some of the ambiguities.

First of all, our rules state that you must start 23 players each week at the required positions. However, we do not state what happens if you don't follow that rule. Our rules did state that the NFBC has the right to fill out your starting lineup if you don't submit one before Week 1. So within our rules, we could have activated the New York team's only shortstop (Nomar Garciaparra) to give him 23 starters. And Gordon, for the record, that team did accumulate stats from his 22 starters (23 if you count an inactive Nomar) in Week One.

Secondly, nowhere in our rules do we state a team will get zeroes for the week under any circumstance. So I should watch what I say here before implementing such a rule. As of now, there is no rule stating zeroes for a team if they fail to submit a legal lineup.

Every NFBC team had 23 starters in Week 1 (except the New York example that you cite with Nomar Garciaparra as his benched shortstop) and every team had 23 starters in Week 2. What I am trying to accomplish with STATS is to program this in a way that every team can only make changes to its starting lineup if it finishes those changes with 23 starting players. If that doesn't happen, then the old starting lineup stays in place. That would be one safeguard to make sure every team starts 23 players every week because the computer won't allow a move that leaves a team with less than 23 active players.

The second safeguard would be to have the computer activate any FAAB pickup that replaces an active player at the same position. Again, if you are cutting a starting catcher and picking up a catcher via FAAB, the computer would make sure that you replace him with your FAAB pickup and retain your 23-man active roster. So right now we continue to look at ways to safeguard the process through the lineup setup before Week 3 since everyone has legal lineups and everyone is required to start 23 players each week according to the rules. If the system works that way, no one will be able to start 22 players even if they wanted to.

[ April 15, 2004, 03:20 PM: Message edited by: Greg Ambrosius ]

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 9:43 am

I just talked with Jim at STATS and he said there will be a program in place this week that activates a FAAB pickup if you cut a player from your starting lineup at the same position. If you have a bench player at the same position, you obviously can move that player into your starting lineup by Monday at 1 p.m. EST in place of the FAAB pickup, but at the very least you'll always have a legal lineup. STATS already implemented a setup last week that will not allow you to have a starting lineup with less than 23 starters in it, meaning no one can purposefully set an invalid lineup. Again, if anyone tries to start a lineup with one catcher, for instance, the starting lineup will revert back to the previous week's lineup automatically. Hopefully this situation has been covered and cleared up.

nnoy · Post by **nnoy** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 11:20 am

Great to hear some progress has been made on this issue. I hope the situation NEVER occurs where a team can be assessed zero’s. Clearly this provides an opportunity for collusion down the stretch. Obviously if a team is out of it and say their buddy in 3 RBI’s and 2 R’s behind them, all they have to do is submit an invalid line-up, and voila: the team is passed.

If zero’s are ever assessed I would hope that the stats still count for the purposes of comparisons against the other teams and the offending team has their standing adjusted to reflect the zero’s, but their totals are still used to assign roto-points to the other teams.

viper · Post by **viper** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 12:26 pm

I really like the idea that any team with an illegal lineup will have their lineup reverted to the prior week. Just made sure to handle the situation where they dropped a player from the prior week's lineup to pick another player up. Always need to stay one step ahead of the hoard.

Greg Ambrosius · Post by **Greg Ambrosius** » Thu Apr 15, 2004 4:27 pm

Viper, I will give you credit on this one. You were definitely one step ahead of the hoard, which included me. Again, I appreciate the input everyone is giving and I'll just keep updating the rules and tweaking the programming as we go along. In this case, we handled a potential problem through the web site before there was any conflict (if you throw out one idle Nomar Garciaparra on one team, that is). So I was lucky, thanks to you. And I'll give credit to STATS, who created the programming to solve this even before I asked for it .

Again, I've been accused of not foreseeing all of these potential problems in the original rules and I apologize for that. But we'll continue to adjust the rules and the web site as we move ahead and make sure that the potential problems are written in stone before they happen.

Plymouth · Post by **Plymouth** » Fri Apr 16, 2004 1:35 am

I think you are doing well Greg, remember, even the constitution gets a new amendment now and then. Keep up the good work. The NFBC parallels life in many ways including the fact that life would be much better for everyone if some folks would spend at least 1/2 the time looking for positive things that they do looking for ways to beat the system and getting out of work.

viper · Post by **viper** » Fri Apr 16, 2004 10:48 am

In spite of what may seem like complaints from me, all I want is a set of rules the anticipate problems. Greg is doing a great joke once problems occur. His goal is fairness and I personally think he has been doing a bang-up job. Paraphrasing PT Barnum, you can't please all the people all the time. The 300 team, 2005 version of the NFBC will have a set of rules, tested by time and incorporating the resolutions of problems presented on these boards. Keep up the good work.

And now for my latest problem, do you think you can resolve the Alternative Minimum Tax problem? Working for a CPA/Tax lawyer who does over 600 personal returns annually, this is indeed a concern raised a lot by his clients.