Determining Keeper League Draft Order

[DusterDave]

So I am apart of a first year keeper league and yesterday the discussion came up as to how next season's draft order will be determined and it got me thinking, which is the best and fairest way?

I am the commissioner of the mostly Dobber participant league, PQMC and here is the format I have used so far....

Standard draft order (not serpentine)
12 teams
Top 6 teams qualify for playoffs, bottom 6 do not.
The bottom 6 teams go into a consolation bracket to earn the first overall selection.
The winner of the consolation bracket gets next season's 1st overall pick, the runner-up gets the 2nd overall pick, 3rd gets the 3rd pick etc.
The actual playoffs works backwards where the champion would select 12th, the runner-up would select 11th etc.

For me, I thought this was the fairest way to determine the draft order and it avoids tanking which is very important in my opinion.

So in yesterday's discussion I suggested my format and it wasn't received well. Someone said that this format is flawed because the bottom feeding teams are usually too weak to even compete in the consolation bracket and because of this it is nearly impossible to gain any ground on the other teams as they all continue to get stronger. This got me thinking, maybe this guy is right. If you continue to be a bottom feeder for several consecutive years, the fun of fantasy may wear off and the manager could bail and there is nothing worse than replacing managers often in fantasy.

Someone else suggested to let teams tank if they want but I can never get on board with that. The happy medium for me is one of two options. Either have a random lottery for teams that missed the playoffs and each team has equal odds of winning the 1st selection or have a weighted lottery based on final season rankings. The second option of course promotes tanking but not outright as awarding the worst team the first pick.

So after all that, my question to you is, how do you determine your draft order in your keeper leagues and which in your opinion is the best option/format?

[DJ Rection]

In one of my league, we base our lottery on the NHL lottery. Teams are associated with the NHL team that finished at the corresponding rank. No teams can move forward more than 2 ranks.

[SuperMario]

We bought a Walmart bingo cage and do a weighted lottery live on Facebook. Guys love it.

[2014olympicgold]

We use the "Consolation Bracket" as our way to give the highest percentage in a draft lottery.

So teams placing 1-6 or whatever go into the playoffs.
Teams 7-12 go into the "Consolation Bracket". The winner of this gets the highest odds at winning the draft lottery.

So team #8 could win it, and 8 gets highest odds, then the team that came 2nd in that bracket and so on. It helps with the tanking a ton because teams want to trade away players, but still have a decent team to win the 1st overall pick. The only issue we've had is a team who's battling for that 6th/7th borderline spot might tank. Out of 4 yrs doing this, only 1 yr we've had it where the final week actually mattered where someone tried to tank.

[DusterDave]

Anyone else? Looking for as many opinions/suggestions as possible.

[duducks]

Personally I hate any sort of weighted lotto rewarding last place finishes, and Im sure I would equally hate the consolation bracket deciding. My league had a weighted lotto at one time, but switched to equal odds for all non-playoff teams, followed by reverse playoff standings for playoff teams. Much better now.

[lucafen4]

So I am apart of a first year keeper league and yesterday the discussion came up as to how next season's draft order will be determined and it got me thinking, which is the best and fairest way?

I am the commissioner of the mostly Dobber participant league, PQMC and here is the format I have used so far....

Standard draft order (not serpentine)
12 teams
Top 6 teams qualify for playoffs, bottom 6 do not.
The bottom 6 teams go into a consolation bracket to earn the first overall selection.
The winner of the consolation bracket gets next season's 1st overall pick, the runner-up gets the 2nd overall pick, 3rd gets the 3rd pick etc.
The actual playoffs works backwards where the champion would select 12th, the runner-up would select 11th etc.

For me, I thought this was the fairest way to determine the draft order and it avoids tanking which is very important in my opinion.

So in yesterday's discussion I suggested my format and it wasn't received well. Someone said that this format is flawed because the bottom feeding teams are usually too weak to even compete in the consolation bracket and because of this it is nearly impossible to gain any ground on the other teams as they all continue to get stronger. This got me thinking, maybe this guy is right. If you continue to be a bottom feeder for several consecutive years, the fun of fantasy may wear off and the manager could bail and there is nothing worse than replacing managers often in fantasy.

Someone else suggested to let teams tank if they want but I can never get on board with that. The happy medium for me is one of two options. Either have a random lottery for teams that missed the playoffs and each team has equal odds of winning the 1st selection or have a weighted lottery based on final season rankings. The second option of course promotes tanking but not outright as awarding the worst team the first pick.

So after all that, my question to you is, how do you determine your draft order in your keeper leagues and which in your opinion is the best option/format?

i've done the playoffs for last pick for the past 4 years in a pool. it's been really well received - it does prevent full on tanking. Although some teams have tanked to get into the consolation bracket in order to be a really strong team - aiming for the #1 pick -- there's the counter to that.

but with the lotto. One thing to safeguard against weak teams always getting screwed out of top picks (see NHL - where #31 can only drop so far) Last place in Reg season was only ever able to drop to #2 pick. dahlin/svech -- matthews/laine -- hughes/kappo/couzins -- That team's not getting entirely screwed.

This year, we adopted the suggestion that everyone battles for EVERY draft position. So I've created like six consolation brackets. so semi-final losers will actually battle for picks 9&10 in the final matchup of the year. It was done to keep everyone engaged for the entire playoffs. Otherwise only 4 teams (finals & consolation finals) of 12 are involved in the final two weeks of the NHL season. With this sytem - it is entirely possible the worst team, picks 4th instead of 2nd as we have done in the past

- - - Updated - - -

We bought a Walmart bingo cage and do a weighted lottery live on Facebook. Guys love it.

I think the love is the location... It's so cozy and inviting.

[Dennis]

The dynasty league in my signature started awarding draft picks by a consolation bracket type competition but this was changed for the second season presumably for the same reasons the consolation bracket was opposed in your league (I took over the team after the first season and wasn't around for any discussions.) We switched over to a lottery between the bottom four teams. Each team has an equal chance at the 1st overall pick, after that the remaining 3 have an equal chance in a second lottery for the 2nd overall pick. The remaining order is determined by the teams place in the standings.

I prefer the competition for the 1st overall pick myself, mainly because I abhor tanking, you know, because it's cheating, but the 4 person lottery is a decent compromise. The team that finished 4th last won the pick and the team that placed last had to settle for 3rd overall in the last draft.

[Kofax]

I agree with the criticism of your proposed method. It's easy enough for a strong team to have a slightly off year resulting in them just missing the playoffs but rolling the consolation meaning you are just making a strong team stronger. I have a hard time seeing a bottom team being able to meaningfully rebuild in that format.

My counter to that would be that the winner of the consolation gets to move up 2 spots and the runner up moves up 1 spot. Keeps things a little more even and gives some meaning to the consolation bracket but does not entirely discourage tanking.

Alternatively, go with the lottery odds thing people have suggested above. You want to be able to make sure you are giving your weaker teams the best chance to get stronger, while at the same time discouraging tanking. It's a trade off and you're not going to find a foolproof method. You will have outliers no matter what where strong teams end up winning regardless.

[Kabonov]

We bought a Walmart bingo cage and do a weighted lottery live on Facebook. Guys love it.

We did this too. (Tanking is allowed, but frowned upon)
So what we do 1st round is lottery with the balls. (12 Team League, and you can only draft prospects/players that are already drafted by NHL teams only)

12th place get 12 balls, 11th get 11 balls, 10th gets 10 balls etc.

Doing this makes it a 2way battle ever year. Battle for the Cup and the battle for the basement. Which allows crappy teams to improve a bit or at least rebuild.

However, we also have a fantasy Dollar system to auction for Free Agents and the payout goes Highest to the Cup Winner and No dollars to the 11th, 12th places to curb tanking but it still happens.

Not the best system but it works for us. No matter which way you go there will always be someone that disagrees so…

[Rockies & Hockeys]

I want the lower teams to have the biggest advantages and chances to improve from year to year, so I just do the draft in reverse order of standings. That being said, I do straight points and not Head to Head, which I assume tankers would be more annoying for.

Also, I added a rule this year that you're never allowed more than 5 guys on your bench on any night, as that happened last year where I guy took tanking to a whole new level. If that rule is broken, I'd ding them with a draft pick penalty.

[FantasyKing]

whoever wins the consolation bracket gets first pick. Most fair so you don't have guys tanking out the rest of the season

[MZac]

We have a 16 team league and keep it pretty simple. Bottom 5 go into a lottery format and can shift around with the last place team with the best odds.

8 teams make the playoffs and there is no consolation prize.

We also reset the waiver order in favor of the last place team every year. We try to do everything possible to keep the league as balanced as possible.

The other thing worth mentioning is we only did a snake draft for year 1. Every other year is a standard draft so in a 16 team league with only 2 keepers that's a pretty big deal.

Ironically we've had the same person (me) draft 16th each of the first 3 seasons so it hasn't necessarily worked. In three years it's been the same 5 or 6 teams near the top.

[stevegamer]

We actually just use reverse order of standings, and have for the 20+ years the league has been going.