Filling out the Draft Card
Draft mechanics Supplemental draft
Please Read the Following Critical Message before you fill out your card!
To help maintain parity, the computer will automatically draft for owners who do not submit a draft card. Automated drafting may occur in any of the three draft events (also known as 'iterations'). The computer will temporarily assign a contract type 'D', which reverts to a standard type if you don't drop them or sign them during the transactions season. While this can benefit an owner who forgets to send in a card, it also means that s/he may end up with unwanted personnel.
To be sure you maintain complete control over all draftees and their contracts, you must send a draft card for each and every draft event. If you do not want any more players, then you must send a blank draft card to tell the computer you are finished drafting. How does the computer decide who to draft? First, an analysis is performed on your needs. Second, the computer builds a draft card, not knowing who it will be able to get. It tries for higher-priced players because it wants to improve the team, but it never puts supplemental players on the card. Third, the computer evaluates the new draftees and signs them as needed. It is possible to miss a draft completely and end up with a successful draft that keeps your franchise viable.
Player Selection and Draft Card Features
Adding Players ...
Once you've selected all the players you want from a particular pool, click the return arrow to return to go back to the draft card. You'll notice the players you selected now appear on the draft card and/or tag list. Choose another pool and repeat the steps above until you have all the players you want to get on your draft card and tag list. Players on your tag list can be moved onto the card simply by clicking them. Now you're ready to make some final decisions to get the card just the way you want it.
Customizing the Card ...
About Contingencies
Contingencies are are always of the "draft x only if I don't get y" type. In the figure above, a contingency has been applied to Wally Judnich, as indicated by the '>' in front of his name. If Roy Sievers is drafted, then Wally Judnich will be ignored. But if Sievers is already drafted and Judnich is still available, Judnich will be drafted.
Contingencies are useful in a variety of circumstances, but particularly when dealing with positions where you might need to acquire several players, e.g., starting pitchers, relief pitchers, and outfielders. They also may prove helpful if you have several picks high in the draft. Let's say you need 2 outfielders and so you put 3 or 4 high-priced ones on your card. You might not want to pay two huge salaries, so you'd create contingencies to avoid getting saddled by players you can't afford.
To remove a contingency, simply click the contingency symbol again.
About Bidding
This feature is useful only in a bid-type draft (the final of the 3 draft iterations) and can otherwise be ignored. In a bid-type draft, the computer will assign any contested players to the owner who bids the highest. Acceptable bids range from 1 unit to 50% of the player's value. If two or more owners bid the same amount, the tie will be broken by drafting order (advantage to lower seed).
The Limits Card
The blue limits card above is a companion to the draft card that tells the drafting program when to stop drafting from certain pools. It can also be used to set a maximum number of spendable units (from your supplemental account). Let's imagine that you need a first baseman and you want to make this position a priority. So you put your top three first base choices at the very top of the card. Since there are four rounds to the draft iteration, if you do not set any limits at first base then it's possible you could end up with more than one first basemen. If this is what you wanted, that's fine. But in so doing it would be possible to waste other important picks, so you'd most likely want to set your first base limit to one.
You'll have to think through all the implications of how to order your draft selections to maximize the value you get. What you do depends greatly on where you are in the draft, what personnel other owners need, your experience in the Nostalgia drafting system, your personnel strategy for building a team and so on. Simply stated, the limits card allows you to fine-tune your strategy and make the best of the draft. You should always review it carefully before sending your draft card, because limits are constantly in flux during the drafting season.
To set a drafting limit, click the left/right arrows just to the left of the limit column and observe the effect it has in the far right column headed "Draft Max." This column is the important one! It tells the drafting program when to stop drafting for each of the player pools.
In the lower area of the card you'll see a display which shows the supplemental units you're willing to spend in the next iteration of the draft. You can change this number by clicking the round menu button in the upper left hand corner of the screen. If you have no units in your supplemental account, then this feature is irrelevant. If you do have units in that account, consider the following scenario to understand at least one way the unit limit might help:
So, you set your unit limit at the MPV value of the higher-priced supplemental pitcher, which then allows you pick up one but not both of those supplemental pitchers. Of course, it's possible to get neither depending on the competition. As with the player limits, you can probably imagine other creative ways to utilize the units limit, too.
Strategy Suggestions
Guidelines for Rosters: Following are some guidelines that owners should consider when filling out their roster. The first set of guidelines are necessary to have a functioning team. The second set of guidelines provide some cushion to allow for injuries and manager flexibility (pinch-hitters, defensive substitutions, rested bullpen and starters, etc.). Remember that the waiver wire can be used mid-season to "shore-up" any holes you may have in your opening day roster.
Necessary
Recommended
Drafting Advice
For each drafting iteration owners are advised to list, in order of preference and with financial considerations taken into account, 32 eligible players of their choosing from the featured player pools. Because these selections need to survive four rounds of 24 selections per round, owners are advised to consider the likely choices of other owners. If a particular owner's selections have all been eliminated by the end of the third round, the owner will not be assigned a player for the fourth round. For this reason, owners are advised to make their selections carefully. (Although it is advised, owners do not need to include 32 selections for any drafting iteration.)
Owners are also advised to not put too many players of the same position designation on any one drafting form. Once a player with that position designation is selected for an owner's team, all other players with that designation will be removed from the form (see test two above).
In order to save money (units) and field a competitive team, you must carefully make your drafting form selections. The program is designed to help owners avoid making serious financial blunders.
Draft odds/ends players carefully. Because the program does not automatically eliminate other odds/ends players from the drafting form once one is assigned to an owner's team, there is a potential for getting "duplicates" (two or more players which fulfill the same function for a team). To avoid this, owners should spread out their odds/ends selections across the three drafting iterations. Once feedback is given regarding the outcome of the first iteration, more definitive selections can be made for successive drafting iterations. Finally, owners should not feel obligated to have every supporting position on their roster filled by opening day. The waiver wire is an excellent way of filling in roster holes after the season has started.