Another good point, Freeman. As long as we all know in advance, there's no unfair advantage to anyone. There's also some additional strategy that may go into the auction regards timing. Early players are most likely to be slotted in 'active' spots while late acquisitions are most likely bench spots. Remember, we cannot control where a player gets slotted during the auction.

What happened two years ago is that I assumed (yes, I know) that pre-auction game stats would not count. That assumption was advertised to the league and turned out to be wrong. I had to go back and manually insert the auction results while ensuring that players from that early game were put in bench slots. Ugh...

Maybe your solution is best if ESPN has the same policy on early games.

Fantasy considerations aside, that seems really dumb to me. If you want to introduce baseball to Australia or something, fair enough, but there have got to be better ways to do it than that. Seems pretty unfair to the Dodgers and D-Backs to have their spring training disrupted like that while everyone else goes about their business.

Anyway... I'm fine with either having or not having the stats. I think the most important thing is avoiding you having to do manual re-entry. Mostly because you shouldn't have to do all that work, but also because it broke the transaction history. If it's possible, I'd say contact ESPN and ask them whether there's a way to run the auction after those games that doesn't result in a mess (they're usually reasonably responsive, right?). If so, auction later and don't count those games so that we're as close as we can be to the regular season. If not, auction before them and count them.

Suggestion & query sent into ESPN. We may not know what they will / will not do until the rollover (late January / early February) but if it's in the works, maybe they could tell us know.

We'll probably have to assume, however, that the set-up won't change (the stats will count). If that's the case we either auction prior to Australia or let the chips fall where they may in a later auction.

I got nothing from ESPN except 'thank you for your suggestion, now go away..."

Assuming we don't get an answer on this until the ESPN turnover (2013 went live on February 5th), here's where I'm currently at on the issue:

The date needs to be locked in before February - it should be in your calendars so that you don't schedule anything stupid that would conflict with the auction. No weddings, vacations, funerals, etc....

We are to draft as close to opening day as possible and I don't view the Australia games as the opening day that counts - traditional opening day is on Monday, March 31st. That puts the auction, per our constitution, on Saturday, March 29th.

If we can choose to not count Australia stats, then they will not be counted.

If we must use the stats then we use them - stats count for players slotted into active slots and do not count for those in bench slots.

I will not be doing a manual fix - it's too time consuming and, as pointed out by Todd, screws up the data.

I'll let you know when the decision goes final - in the meantime, I'm willing to hear input.

We can always settle on the date without knowing whether or not we're using those stats. In February, we can try to settle that question, but we can set the date now.

That's the intent. I plan on locking in Saturday, March 29th. I'll give it a few weeks to see if anyone else has some ideas not thought of yet.

By the way, Mike, I think you discussed last year moving the keeper date to a week before the draft date (instead of two weeks). I think that is a great idea (nothing to do with the fact that I have a gazillion rookies )!

I think you're right, Freeman, so I put it on the confirmed amendment list. Of course the trade off is that you have less time to prepare for the auction with certainty of the player pool.

That extra week last year enabled me to draft guys like Uggla, Konerko, Dunn....

The auction will be Saturday, March 29th @ 9 p.m. EST.

Regarding the Australia games: If given the option, we will NOT use the stats.

This is how I'm feeling on the voting right now, and why. Feel free to try to change my mind (or change yours).

1. Eliminate divisions.

No. We haven't run the experiment long enough to really get a feel for it. Ideally I'd like to go at least 5 years, but I understand that's a really long time. Still, certainly 2 seems like a minimum requirement.

2. Set minimum AB's. Note: Actual limits TBD along with a potential change in our IP limit (currently 10).

No. I actually want to vote Yes, so let me clarify. We should have a PA minimum, not an AB minimum, first of all. Second, it should be low, and I'm not willing to vote for it without some amount of assurance it would be. I'd rather risk that, on occasion, a team accepts a 2-3 loss in the hitting stats, than implement something with a significant impact on anything else.

With 12 active lineup spots, an average of 1 PA/day, or 7/week, would give 12*7 = 104 PAs. So I think a minimum of 100 would work nicely. Pitching-wise, I have no problem with a team eschewing starters for relievers, and would say that at most the minimum should be 2-3 IP/day, so I could go as high as 20 IP.

3. Institute the FAAB system. Each team would be given a budget for waived players. Players are awarded to the highest bidder in a blind auction. The budget is separate from any other limits in place (auction budget & acquisition limit). This will only replace the previous waiver system and will not affect how free-agents are acquired (those passing through waivers or players never owned).

Note: If this passes, the system will have to be tested once ESPN opens up for the 2014 season. If it does not work as we expect and wish it to, we will default to our original waiver rules. I am not hopeful given how ESPN sets up the system for football.

Yes. The fact that it's contingent on a satisfactory implementation makes this an easy call for me. If it does what we want (FAAB where things would be contested, easy-as-always FA otherwise), great. If not, forget it.

4. Replace the Saves category with Saves/Holds (2015). It is still a single category but now adds Holds. Due to contracts on closers already in place, this would not take effect until the 2015 season. Current keepers contracted through 2015 (I think only the Duckling's Perkins fits this description) would have that year optioned.

Yes. The closer market is one of the odder things about fantasy baseball, and one of the places I think game-y strategy most significantly trumps baseball knowledge and player evaluation. While I actually think that's a good thing for me personally, I think it takes away from what fantasy baseball is supposed to be about. Having a way to spread our reliever contributions would make more relievers more valuable, but also make the supply greater, so that we don't have teams that punt a category out of necessity (rather than by design).

5. Move the keeper deadline to one week before the auction. It is currently two.

No. I could easily persuaded otherwise, as for the most part I DGAF. But you have all offseason to evaluate your keepers, and much less time to evaluate other people's choices, so it seems odd to skew that balance even further. Yeah, it's a bit more time for things to go catastrophically wrong in spring training or whatever, but that can happen any time, and we're all playing with that same risk.

Some background on the PA/IP minimums:

*In 2010-2011, no one had fewer than 200 PAs in a week.
*In 2012, the Sauce had 3 weeks in the 100s
*In 2013, the Teabaggers and Sauce each had one week in the 100s. The Sluggers dropped below 200 permanently from week 7 on, including one week at 19 and one at 92.

*In 2010, the Teabaggers had two weeks in the 10s
*In 2011-2012, no one had fewer than 20 IP in a week
*In 2013, the Sauce had two weeks in the 10s. The Sluggers had 8 weeks in the 10s and one at 20 exactly.
*In general, it's fairly rare for teams not to clear 30 IP in a week.

As I see it, aside from the Sluggers, there's almost no attempts by any owner to go for extreme quality over quantity strategies, and the Sluggers weren't really doing that anyway, so much as just rostering a lot of minor leaguers. If the goal is just to address that one week where the Sluggers had a few hitters OPS 1200 or so and then benched everyone, I think we can accomplish it by going with minimums of 100 PAs and 20 IP (or lower, even; 50/10 would probably do it) without having any impact on normal owner behavior. That leaves some space for an owner to try something weird or have bad things happen without additional punishment for not hitting minimums, and should be enough to make leveraging a few extreme performances basically impossible.

Regarding AB's vs. PA's: This would be a manual check and AB's are easy to find. I don't see any stat columns for PA's. Given the purpose is to ensure that there are no extreme scenarios (by design or by virtue of rostering minor leaguers), I don't think it makes much practical difference. The limit will be set pretty low.

1. Eliminate divisions

No. Even though I was the most impacted by this (or so I feel) I think ditching them would be premature. I'm curious if we are considering reallocating these in any way or not.

2. Set minimum AB's.

Yes. I agree this should really be a PA minimum, and I think we are all in agreement it should be relatively low, but I can't support what was done a few times last year, catching lightning in a bottle for a couple of days and tanking the rest. It doesn't fit with the spirit of the competition. It also will help prevent (to some degree) people burning roster spots when they decide they're out of it to capture all of the next crop of rookies.

3. FAAB

I will abstain on this. I think it sounds interesting on its face but my brain isn't prepared to deal with the mathematical logistics of it. I'm okay with what others decide.

4. Saves\Holds

Yes. This dramatically deepens the market tremendously and will help with competition. It also makes the "closer by committee" idea less painful for an owner to consider, as the other relievers will still get holds.

5. Move the keeper deadline to one week before the auction.

No. I also mostly don't care, but as someone who didn't make the playoffs, it was pretty frustrating to spend so long holding on to players just so others couldn't pick them up for the minimum and keep them. I don't feel like it benefits anyone to move it up.

Regarding AB's vs. PA's: This would be a manual check and AB's are easy to find. I don't see any stat columns for PA's. Given the purpose is to ensure that there are no extreme scenarios (by design or by virtue of rostering minor leaguers), I don't think it makes much practical difference. The limit will be set pretty low.

When I do OBP calculations for the stats, I use the proxy of AB+BB, and BB are displayed with AB in the matchup stats.

If it needs to be manual, I would suggest that the rule be something to the effect of the opposing owner 'challenging' their opponent for failing to meet the minimum, which would be the only time you'd actually check.