League Records Updated
The keeper deadline has passed and now it finally feels like football season. No more sitting around and wavering over whether you should keep Player A or Player B. There’s no turning back now, and it’s time to focus all our attention on the 2011 JFL Draft.
In a way, today’s keeper deadline marked the official start of the 2011 season, so I’d like to take the next couple paragraphs to welcome everyone back.
I say it every year, but I like to reiterate how happy I am to be moving into our sixth season in the JFL. All I ever wanted in college was to start a fantasy league with friends but it never got off the ground. I couldn’t find the dedicated players the, but now, with 12 members, we are strong and steady heading into Year 6.
And I have to thank all of you for sticking around with the JFL and dedicating yourselves to taking care of your team week in and week out. I never have to bug anyone to set their lineups because everyone is active and having fun.
A special thanks goes out to the nine teams entering their sixth year in the JFL. Houserville and the Sunday Slackers each enter their fourth season, while Jawz Attack enters his second.
The trophy I purchased is an 18-year trophy, so I hope to have all of you along for the ride.
Now that I got all the mushy stuff out of the way, let’s talk football.
We have a strong keeper class this season, and several teams had some tough decisions, while others made trades. With three preseason trades, I believe we set a League record. (Speaking of which, all the League records are updated an available in the link above.)
Ray Rice went from the Jammers to the Slackers in a McNabb-like, divisional trade. LeSean McCoy went from the Organ Thieves to the Generals in another divisional trade, and DeSean Jackson went from the Super Bowl Champion News Team to Jawz Attack.
All three teams receiving players won just four games last season and they’re hoping that these keepers will help them get over the top.
Other interesting stats from the keepers:
The World of Noise is keeping TE Dallas Clark for the second time in his fantasy career because outside of WR Andre Johnson, he just doesn’t have anyone who is keeper worthy.
His two QBs from last season were Chad Henne and David Garrard, and both are on hot seats and certainly not worthy of keeping. And at running back, his once dominant duo of Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams have been sent packing by Miami, joining in time shares elsewhere. So, it’s easy to see why the Noise chose to go with Clark for the 2011 season.
My tip. Find a real QB in this year’s draft, and try to do it before you draft Jason Avant.
One thing is certain for the Noise. He won’t draft David Akers this season.
But you’ll hear more about Noise’s drafting strategy — or lack thereof — in the 2011 JFL Draft Preview, which I’ll post sometime next week.
If you wish to prepare for the draft, click on the PLAYERS tab above, and within the free-agent page is a link that reads, “NON-KEEPERS.” Click that and you’ll see every player who will be available in the draft. I’m not going in and dropping players that owners didn’t drop because this new “NON-KEEPER” function on the free-agent page saves me the trouble.
We have possibly 10 of 12 owners coming right now. Graybill is on the fence, but we’re hoping he’ll be able to make it.
No matter what, here’s how the draft is going to work.
We’ll start at about 7 p.m. I will have a dummy draft room set up for the big screen which will allow us to all see what is going on live. I will be hitting pause on the main draft every now and then to keep things from going too quickly because we’ll technically have two drafts going on.
I’m setting up a podium to announce picks, too, to liven the atmosphere here at the draft. So for the two or three online drafters, it will be a little bit slower than usual, but I don’t expect it to be that bad. Things should start to cruise after 10, 12 rounds.
I’ll need a laptop count and who will need a laptop. I have one extra that will be available for anyone who doesn’t have one, but if you do have a laptop, please bring it.
The same rule that I enacted two years ago applies for 2011. If any of your keepers go down before the draft with an injury that will keep them out of regular-season game, you can switch that player out for a player that was on your roster prior to the keeper deadline.
New Roster Rules
As requested by a few, I decided to expand the maximums on two positions, RB and WR. What I did was I made it possible for each potential starter to have one backup.
There is a potential to start 3 RBs a week, so I moved the maximum from 5 to 6.
There is a potential to start 4 WRs a week, so I moved the maximum from 6 to 8.
The same follows with the other positions 1 TE, 2 maximum; 1 K, 2 maximum, 1 DEF, 2 maximum. All three of those haven't changed from the start of the League.
The only exception is QB where we start 1 but I'm giving everyone the option to have 3 if they want. I believe if you want a starter, a backup and a potential rookie/future star on your roster, you should have room for that.
All together, if you do the math, that 23 possible players, but we still only have 17 roster spots, so you have to make your decision where you want to use your extra roster spots.
The way the 17-man roster is set up is that you can have 1 QB, 2 RB, 1 RB/WR, 2 WR, 1 WR/TE, 1 K, 1 DEF (9 players) and 8 backups, which is enough to have a backup QB, RB, RB, WR, WR, K, DEF, and an extra. So nothing has changed there. This just allows you to add WRs or RBs when you kicker or defense's BYE has passed, if you so wish. It's all in the strategy. If you have any questions, let me know, or read the message board thread started by Nikish (News Team) on the right.
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