Variations on a free agent draft

oriole^ · 06-03-2014, 10:52 AM

Is it possible for teams to pass a draft pick in either an initial or free agent draft?

I'm looking for the opportunity to keep some teams as is and draft the others...

GMLoophole · 06-03-2014, 12:45 PM

I asked this question about the FA draft the other day, and was told that teams make all their picks in the draft (unlike the Rule 5 draft where most teams pass).

Maybe you could make a dummy league and move the teams you want to reorganize over there, dump all the players and run an FA draft and then move the teams back to the correct league? Kind of cumbersome but maybe that will solve your problem.

oriole^ · 06-05-2014, 06:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GMLoophole

Maybe you could make a dummy league and move the teams you want to reorganize over there, dump all the players and run an FA draft and then move the teams back to the correct league? Kind of cumbersome but maybe that will solve your problem.

This is indeed a good idea, but it's causing more problems - namely, the minor leagues.

I've gotten as far as the following: I've created a new Fictional Major League, released all the fictional players to free agency, and then eliminated all the Free Agents (so no fictional players). Then, I chose the real ML teams I wished to eliminate, moved them to the Fic, renamed or relocated them how I wished, released their players, and prepared to do the complete redraft. Then I noticed that no minor leaguers came along for the ride.

Now I have some options...none of which I know will work.

A. Take the FML teams, move them back to the ML, and cross my fingers that the Team ID is what's being read when determining minor league affiliations. In other words, I change, say, the Houston Astros into the Jacksonville Sharks...then when I put the Sharks in the real American League, they end up having an unchanged Oklahoma City Redhawks team as their AAA affiliate, etc. Boring.

B. Start from scratch...except this time when I make the FML, I also make a full selection of minor leagues for them. Then import every team in each moved ML team's farm system as well, to the proper FML level. Then do a full every-level draft, then move everyone back over... (This sounds like it might work...it also sounds like it would take weeks!)

C. Move the FML teams back to the ML, and scoot around the affiliations somehow. In other words, the new Jacksonville team might be given Seattle's AAA franchise, Boston's AA, and so on. Can't find any way to change minor league affiliates in an existing league, though.

D. Do some combination of the above. The current, actual idea is to just do the major and AAA levels, and "attach" the lower minors once the FML teams come back.

Again, what I am guessing (and really kind of hoping for at this point) is that the minor league affiliations are based entirely on the Team IDs. So if I turn the Astros into the Sharks, and then relocate the Oklahoma City AAA affiliate to Timbuktu, and rename the AA team to something weird and put them in Iceland...it won't make any difference to the game - they'll still just be major team - AAA - AA, as long as they keep the same team ID numbers. If that is the case, I know what to do.

Questdog · 06-05-2014, 06:36 PM

What I do when I want some teams to not make draft picks is I first create some fictional scrub players (as many as needed). I make them 16-17 year old Filipinos so I can find them easy later. Then when a team I don't want to pick has their turn, I manually pick one of these scrubs for them. After the draft, I go and delete these scrub players.

Just make sure you do not manually make the final pick of the whole draft or the game will crash.

oriole^ · 06-06-2014, 10:50 AM

Hmmm...the separate dummy league is actually a pretty good idea for my purposes, though, because it allows me to keep those players separate from the actual free agents that are available in the majors.

Is there a way to bulk-create players like that, though, if I did wish to go that route? Say, "Give me 80 random players who are from Uganda and throw left?"

Questdog · 06-06-2014, 01:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oriole^

Hmmm...the separate dummy league is actually a pretty good idea for my purposes, though, because it allows me to keep those players separate from the actual free agents that are available in the majors.

Is there a way to bulk-create players like that, though, if I did wish to go that route? Say, "Give me 80 random players who are from Uganda and throw left?"

Yes, but you cannot pick all characteristics...handedness is one you can't pick by bulk....

oriole^ · 07-01-2014, 10:06 PM

I posted this to the Facebook page while the forums were down, but now that they're back again, I'll try my luck with it here.

Okay, long explanation: my league has seven new teams that I created by disbanding seven old existing teams. The way I did it was: created a new league (with minors), deleted all the players and teams in that new league so it was empty, moved the seven teams (and their minors affiliates) from the Majors over to the new league structure, released all the players to free agency, and held a free agent draft. Then once populated I moved the teams back over to the ML and the appropriate minors. A lot of work, but it got me the results I wanted.

Except now I have found that there are some fictional created players from the dummy league I created which somehow made it into the draft. So now I have to get rid of them.

My first idea was when I noticed that the created players had ML experience (years) listed, but no stats. So I went into the ML tab, close to list all players...and then discovered there's no way to list last season's stats for a list of players. (A HUGE oversight, btw.) That would at least take out the fake *major* leaguers, if not the minor leaguers.

So, three questions: 1. Is there any way to separate created players from actual ones?
2. Barring that, how do I list major league years experience AND last season's stats, or career stats, in order to quickly find out the impostors?
3. Once I find them, how do I delete them?

Questdog · 07-02-2014, 12:07 AM

The players came from being free agents in the league you created. You probably deleted all the players on the teams and forgot about the free agents.

I have done this before and the way to get rid of them is to sort the free agents by career games played at "All Levels". Any player that cones through the draft of your league will have stats from the HS/college included even if they have never played a professional game. The newly created players in your fake league will have no career stats at all. So, then you can mass delete all players with no career games played. Just make sure you are looking at batting stats and not pitching stats.

On the page with the list of all the free agents are 6 drop down menus with little inverted chevrons next to them. In the first menu choose some thing that shows batting stats. In the one that says "Scope", choose 'All Levels'. In the one that says 'Split' choose 'Career'.

Anyone with 0 games played in the list should be a player you want to delete.

oriole^ · 07-03-2014, 07:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Questdog

The players came from being free agents in the league you created. You probably deleted all the players on the teams and forgot about the free agents.

Questdog: I think you may have it right. The problem of course is that there is a single pool of free agents; it appears that when you create a new league, it just adds a bunch of fictional players to the free agent pool. Hmmm, that's rather an annoyance; there's no way to disable this feature?

oriole^ · 07-17-2014, 01:37 PM

Well, I've reviewed this and it might be worse than I figured. It appears that once I ran the draft, all the spots on the associated minor league teams which didn't get filled were populated with fictional players. So aside from being a few fictional free agents, there are an awful lot of amazing 17-20 year olds sitting in the A league and rookie league affiliates of all the new teams.

Now I finally found the option with which I can ensure the game creates only, say, 39 year old Latvians as fictional players. So I can restart, enable that option or something like it, and easily pick out the fictional players.

Couple more questions on that, though: do I only have access to that option at the start of the league? If I do that, am I doomed to having only 39 year old Latvians entering my league from that moment onward, or can I get back into it and change it later?

Questdog · 07-17-2014, 02:21 PM

You can set the age limits and Nationality parameters of the fictional players that enter your universe. It is on the "Players" tab of League set-up.

oriole^ · 07-18-2014, 05:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Questdog

You can set the age limits and Nationality parameters of the fictional players that enter your universe. It is on the "Players" tab of League set-up.

Yes...but once the league is set up in that fashion, can it be changed later?

Questdog · 07-18-2014, 06:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oriole^

Yes...but once the league is set up in that fashion, can it be changed later?

Yes.

06-03-2014, 10:52 AM	#1
oriole^ Minors (Double A) Join Date: Nov 2013 Posts: 123	Variations on a free agent draft Is it possible for teams to pass a draft pick in either an initial or free agent draft? I'm looking for the opportunity to keep some teams as is and draft the others...

06-03-2014, 12:45 PM	#2
GMLoophole All Star Reserve Join Date: Jun 2010 Posts: 863	I asked this question about the FA draft the other day, and was told that teams make all their picks in the draft (unlike the Rule 5 draft where most teams pass). Maybe you could make a dummy league and move the teams you want to reorganize over there, dump all the players and run an FA draft and then move the teams back to the correct league? Kind of cumbersome but maybe that will solve your problem.

06-05-2014, 06:36 PM	#4
Questdog Hall Of Famer Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: In a dark, damp cave where I'm training slugs to run the bases...... Posts: 16,142	What I do when I want some teams to not make draft picks is I first create some fictional scrub players (as many as needed). I make them 16-17 year old Filipinos so I can find them easy later. Then when a team I don't want to pick has their turn, I manually pick one of these scrubs for them. After the draft, I go and delete these scrub players. Just make sure you do not manually make the final pick of the whole draft or the game will crash.

06-06-2014, 10:50 AM	#5
oriole^ Minors (Double A) Join Date: Nov 2013 Posts: 123	Hmmm...the separate dummy league is actually a pretty good idea for my purposes, though, because it allows me to keep those players separate from the actual free agents that are available in the majors. Is there a way to bulk-create players like that, though, if I did wish to go that route? Say, "Give me 80 random players who are from Uganda and throw left?"

07-01-2014, 10:06 PM	#7
oriole^ Minors (Double A) Join Date: Nov 2013 Posts: 123	I posted this to the Facebook page while the forums were down, but now that they're back again, I'll try my luck with it here. Okay, long explanation: my league has seven new teams that I created by disbanding seven old existing teams. The way I did it was: created a new league (with minors), deleted all the players and teams in that new league so it was empty, moved the seven teams (and their minors affiliates) from the Majors over to the new league structure, released all the players to free agency, and held a free agent draft. Then once populated I moved the teams back over to the ML and the appropriate minors. A lot of work, but it got me the results I wanted. Except now I have found that there are some fictional created players from the dummy league I created which somehow made it into the draft. So now I have to get rid of them. My first idea was when I noticed that the created players had ML experience (years) listed, but no stats. So I went into the ML tab, close to list all players...and then discovered there's no way to list last season's stats for a list of players. (A HUGE oversight, btw.) That would at least take out the fake major leaguers, if not the minor leaguers. So, three questions: 1. Is there any way to separate created players from actual ones? 2. Barring that, how do I list major league years experience AND last season's stats, or career stats, in order to quickly find out the impostors? 3. Once I find them, how do I delete them?

07-02-2014, 12:07 AM	#8
Questdog Hall Of Famer Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: In a dark, damp cave where I'm training slugs to run the bases...... Posts: 16,142	The players came from being free agents in the league you created. You probably deleted all the players on the teams and forgot about the free agents. I have done this before and the way to get rid of them is to sort the free agents by career games played at "All Levels". Any player that cones through the draft of your league will have stats from the HS/college included even if they have never played a professional game. The newly created players in your fake league will have no career stats at all. So, then you can mass delete all players with no career games played. Just make sure you are looking at batting stats and not pitching stats. On the page with the list of all the free agents are 6 drop down menus with little inverted chevrons next to them. In the first menu choose some thing that shows batting stats. In the one that says "Scope", choose 'All Levels'. In the one that says 'Split' choose 'Career'. Anyone with 0 games played in the list should be a player you want to delete.

07-17-2014, 01:37 PM	#10
oriole^ Minors (Double A) Join Date: Nov 2013 Posts: 123	Well, I've reviewed this and it might be worse than I figured. It appears that once I ran the draft, all the spots on the associated minor league teams which didn't get filled were populated with fictional players. So aside from being a few fictional free agents, there are an awful lot of amazing 17-20 year olds sitting in the A league and rookie league affiliates of all the new teams. Now I finally found the option with which I can ensure the game creates only, say, 39 year old Latvians as fictional players. So I can restart, enable that option or something like it, and easily pick out the fictional players. Couple more questions on that, though: do I only have access to that option at the start of the league? If I do that, am I doomed to having only 39 year old Latvians entering my league from that moment onward, or can I get back into it and change it later?

07-17-2014, 02:21 PM	#11
Questdog Hall Of Famer Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: In a dark, damp cave where I'm training slugs to run the bases...... Posts: 16,142	You can set the age limits and Nationality parameters of the fictional players that enter your universe. It is on the "Players" tab of League set-up.