General Sports Water Cooler

How does that work? Is there a group stage?

We could try to implement a pod system: judges first rank all teams 1 through x, and then split the composites into four pods. Random draw from each pod for a pool. Judges then evaluate pools.

The hole being that the judges would essentially evaluate teams en masse twice, which might be redundant.

It's super hard to create a strategy before you know when you're picking. I mean you can have some ideas in place, but I feel like a lot depends on who your first couple picks are. Then you can build a strategy around that.

I will be a judge if needed. Lazy wanted in but I think he has been away from the board. He should be reserved a spot.

Ok...let's decide on what we want to do for the draft. We'll decide on the draft first, and then decide on how we want to set up the teams for judging - either doing a knockout, the groups of 5, whatever.

Please indicate which idea you want to do. Majority rules.

1) Do some variation of what we've been doing the last couple of years. Snake draft, one player per club/country. If we do this idea, I think it'd be great to throw in some sort of wrinkle to change things up from the past couple of years.

2) This idea came from gsterp, and it's done annually on the bigsoccer boards. Basically, there is no draft order in the traditional sense. Each round will feature a different pool of players based on a qualifying description. For example, "someone with over 100 international caps." Each person will then submit a pick to me via PM. If you're the only one who chooses the player, then you successfully draft that player. If multiple people try to draft the same player, that player will be ineligible until a significantly later round. If you choose a player who doesn't meet the qualifier, then you would still "fail" the round, but that player would continue to be eligible for later rounds.

Those failing to get their player will then have to submit a second choice with the same criteria and process being applied (note that those players successfully drafted will not be revealed yet). If they fail again, a third and final submission will be made. If anyone has failed on all three chances, then the successful drafters and myself can nominate other players who meet the criteria who will then be randomly allocated to the people who failed (ie the Sheep). These players should generally be among the weaker players who fulfil the initial criteria.

A total of 16 players will be drafted, and each team must submit a reasonable formation (including a GK). Managers will explain their strategy/tactics/likely subs, and will be judged according to whichever format we decide.

If we choose option 2, the club/country rule won't apply.

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We may want to have an alternate on hand in case a drafter goes AWOL/gets banned. Just sayin

I PM'ed lazy. We'll see if he responds.

My idea is to have a random draw for pools. We could also do it by draft starting position, but I like the random aspect of it.

Judges would then evaluate each group as though they were playing a group stage of a major tournament and select a group winner and runner up. The remaining 8 teams would play a knockout tournament. Winners in the knockout round are chosen by a vote involving the judges and the managers of any eliminated teams.

Thoughts?

Great idea... and I don't want something horrid like the 16th pick again, lol!

I think the groups have to randomly be drawn. You might want to do that before the draft too, because then we could have drafters building their teams with a focus on an opponent if they wanted, rather than in general.

And that is where I find myself haha