2008 Rule Change Proposals

Vote Yes or No on the following 22 proposals. Please email a list indicating the proposal # (1-22) and your vote (Yes or No) and the year to adopt (when asked for it). Ballots are due by Midnight CT on Tuesday, November 4.

Shorten regular season to 6 months: Instead of the current 8 month regular season with 18 or 21 games per month from March to October, the regular season shall be played as 27 games per month for 6 months from April to September. The season trade deadline would still be near the start of August, with 2 months (54 games) remaining in the season. The league secretary would be responsible for coming up with the exact schedule format. This could possibly allow for a later draft, and allow for the playoffs to start in October and thus coincide with the MLB playoffs.

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of going to a 6 month regular season schedule. A No vote is a vote to keep the current 8 month schedule.

B. Vote for either 2009 or 2010 as the year for this proposal to take effect. Even if you vote No, include a vote for the year in case the proposal passes. If the proposal passes but there is a tie for the year, then the proposal will be adopted in 2010.

See also related proposals 2 and 3. If any two or all three proposals 1, 2, and 3 pass, then the one getting the most “Yes” votes will be the winner. If there is a tie then we will hold a run-off election to see which one is adopted.

Shorten regular season to 7 months: Instead of the current 8 month regular season with 18 or 21 games per month from March to October, the regular season shall be played in 7 months from March to September. There would be 18 games in the first month and 24 games per month in other 6 months. The season trade deadline would still be near the start of August, with 2 months (48 games) remaining in the season. The league secretary would be responsible for coming up with the exact schedule format. This allows for the playoffs to start in October and thus coincide with the MLB playoffs.

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of going to a 7 month regular season schedule as outlined above. A No vote is a vote to keep the current 8 month schedule.

See also related proposals 1 and 3. If any two or all three proposals 1, 2, and 3 pass, then the one getting the most “Yes” votes will be the winner. If there is a tie then we will hold a run-off election to see which one is adopted.

Shorten regular season to 7 months but offset it by 2 weeks: Instead of the current 8 month regular season with 18 or 21 games per month from March to October, the regular season shall be 7 months long but played from March 15 to October 15. This would mean that rosters and rotations would be submitted towards the end of a calendar month (the 24th), and then lineups for that bracket would be submitted by the 9th of the next calendar month. There would be 18 games in the first bracket and 24 games per bracket in the remaining 6. The season trade deadline would be mid-August, with 2 brackets (48 games) remaining in the season. The league secretary would be responsible for coming up with the exact schedule format. This could possibly allow for a later draft, and allow for the playoffs to start before the end of October before the MLB World Series was over, and thus give a little more leeway prior to the Holidays.

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of going to a 7 month regular season schedule from March 15 to October 15 as outlined above. A No vote is a vote to keep the current 8 month schedule.

See also related proposals 1 and 2. If any two or all three proposals 1, 2, and 3 pass, then the one getting the most “Yes” votes will be the winner. If they both pass in but tie for the most “Yes” votes then we will hold a run-off election to see which one is adopted.

Move the taxi draft ahead of the regular draft starting in 2010. The determination of taxi draft picks would be the same as it is now, but those picks would all come at the start of the draft, before the regular roster phase. As proposed, there would be no limit on the players that could be taken during the taxi draft.

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of moving the taxi draft to the front, ahead of the regular draft, starting in 2010. A No vote keeps the current system, where the taxi draft comes at the end of the regular draft.

See also related proposal 5. If both 4 and 5 pass, then the one getting the most “Yes” votes will be the winner. If they both pass in but tie for the most “Yes” votes then we will hold a run-off election to see which one is adopted.

Move the taxi draft ahead of the regular draft starting in 2010 but restrict selections to uncarded or ineligible players. The determination of taxi draft picks would be the same as it is now, but those picks would all come at the start of the draft, before the regular roster phase. There would be an additional restriction, however, that only uncarded or ineligible players (currently those with less than 20 IP or less than 50 AB) could be selected (should those minimum requirements for eligibility be changed, that would affect this rule accordingly). This would prevent a team with several open taxi slots from taking the best cards out there just to prevent them from falling through to the regular draft phase.

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of moving the taxi draft to the front, ahead of the regular draft, starting in 2010, with the restriction that only uncarded or ineligible players may be selected. A No vote keeps the current system, where the taxi draft comes at the end of the regular draft and there is no restriction on taxi draft selections.

See also related proposal 4. If both 4 and 5 pass, then the one getting the most “Yes” votes will be the winner. If there is a tie then we will hold a run-off election to see which one is adopted.

Designate any drafted player as being sent to the taxi squad. Instead of the players taken at the end of the draft automatically going to the taxi squad, allow managers to designate which of their drafted players are used to fill the open slots on their taxi squad. This designation must be made immediately upon the selection of a player, and prior to the next draft pick being announced. For example, if a team has 2 open slots on their 5-man taxi squad, such that they have 17 draft picks total, then immediately following any of those selections the player taken can be declared as going to the taxi squad. If no such declarations are made, then the last two selections made by a team are for the taxi squad. If a team starts out with 5-men on their taxi squad, such that they have no open taxi slots, then they cannot make such a designation and all draft selections go to their regular roster.

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of allowing managers to designate which of their draft selections go to the taxi squad. A No vote means that players for the taxi squad will only be selected during the taxi portion of the draft and not during the regular portion.

See also related proposals 4 and 5. Should either 4 or 5 pass, then this rule would be obsolete. This rule would only be adopted if it passes and 4 and 5 fail.

Change to a 1-day draft on the Sunday of President’s Day weekend. The draft would start at 12 noon CT that Sunday with a 7 hour window set aside to end around 7PM. Draft would be via net meeting and skype from as many locations as necessary. There would be 60 seconds per pick, assuming approximately 330 picks, with four twenty minute breaks. The breaks would come at the ends of rounds 3, 7, 11, and 15 (prior to the start of the taxi draft). In addition each manager would be allowed a total of two 30 second extensions for when they wanted to take longer on a particular pick.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 1-day draft on the Sunday of President’s Day Weekend. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.

See the other related proposals. If more than one of them passes, then the one getting the most “Yes” votes will be the winner. If there is a tie between the ones that pass with the most Yes votes, then we will hold a run-off election to see which one is adopted. The proposal that passes would immediately apply for the 2009 draft.

Change to a 1-day draft on the day before Super Bowl Sunday. The draft format would be the same as above, except that the draft date would be the day before the Super Bowl each year.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 1-day draft on the day before Super Bowl Sunday. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.

Change to a 1-day draft on the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl. The draft format would be the same as proposal 7, except that the draft date would be the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl each year.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 1-day draft on Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.

Change to a 1-day draft on the Saturday of the weekend after the Super Bowl. The draft format would be the same as proposal 7, except that the draft date would be the Saturday of the weekend after the Super Bowl each year.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 1-day draft on Saturday of the weekend after the Super Bowl. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.

Change to a 2-week draft starting on the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl and ending on the Sunday of the weekend after the Super Bowl. There would be two 2.5 hour windows set aside for the draft. The first 2.5 hour window on the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl would be for the first 6 rounds. There would be 60 seconds per pick plus two 15 minute breaks after rounds 2 and 4. The exact start time each year is negotiable among the members but unless a majority agrees to a different start time then the start will be at 12 noon. No draft picks could be made prior to this start. After the first session concludes, over the next 2 weeks picks can be posted on the discussion board, with a maximum of 12 hours per pick. There will then be another 2.5 hour session to conclude the draft on the Sunday of the weekend after the Super Bowl. The start of that session is also negotiable but will be 12 noon if no other start time can be agreed upon. There will be 15 minute breaks at the conclusion of every third round the round on which the session started.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 2-week Draft starting on the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl and ending on the Sunday of the weekend after the Super Bowl. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.

Change to a 2-week draft starting on the first Saturday in February and ending on the Sunday that is 15 days later (i.e. the Sunday that is the day after the third Saturday in February). The format would be the same as proposal 11 above, the only thing different would be the start and end dates.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 2-week draft starting on the first Saturday in February and ending 15 days later on the third Sunday in February. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.

Add minimum AB requirement for position players to start playoff games. Currently position players who are eligible in the regular season (50 or more AB) are fully eligible for the playoffs. The proposal is to raise the eligibility to start playoff games to 100 AB or more. Position players with 50 to 99 AB could still be carried on the playoff roster and come into games as replacements (pinch hit/pinch run/defense), but could not start a game. This limitation would be in addition to the 10% usage for position players during the playoffs. The 10% usage would still apply to all players.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of adopting a 100 AB minimum in order for a position player to start playoff games. A No vote keeps the current system where any eligible position player with 50 or more AB may start a playoff game. If this proposal passes it would not take effect until the 2010 season.

Change in playoff usage for position players. Currently the rules provide for 10% usage for position players during a playoff series, but the player has to be pulled immediately when they run out of AB and PA, which means that managers need to keep track of usage during a game and there is a lot of potential for error leading to a player going over their limit.

This proposal is to reduce the percentage to 7% but eliminate the requirement that a player be immediately pulled from the game in progress when they run out. This should make bookkeeping much easier for the managers, because they only need to check the usage report prior to each game. If a player has 1 AB or 1 PA of playoff usage remaining, then they are available to play the entire game, and do not have to be pulled after that first AB or PA.

The 7% limit means that a player would still need only about 350 AB in MLB to go an entire 7 game series. Just for comparison purposes, if you assume that a player will average 4 AB per game, and then need just 1 more AB to go another full game, then the approximate number of starts that you can expect a batter to make is given in the chart below. (Keep in mind this chart is only for comparison, your mileage may vary).

MLB Season AB	Playoff Series AB with 10% Usage	Playoff Series AB with 7% Usage	Approximate Number of Starts With 7% Usage
50	5	4	1
75	8	5	2
125	13	9	3
180	18	13	4
240	24	17	5
300	30	21	6
350	35	25	7

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of reducing the percentage for playoff series usage to 7% but eliminating the requirement that a player be immediately pulled from the game in progress when they run out. A No vote keeps the current 10% limit with the requirement that a player be pulled immediately when they run out (and thus necessitating that managers continue to keep track during games). If this proposal passes it would not take effect until the 2010 season. Note that there is no conflict between this and the previous proposal 13. If both of them pass, then both of them will be adopted.

Rule change procedure: There is currently very little written in the rules to specify the procedure for changing the rules. This proposal is to tighten that loophole a little by requiring that proposals be better vetted before voting on them. Any rule change proposal can be suggested by any manager, but that proposal must then be officially nominated for consideration either by a member of the executive committee or by the league secretary and then seconded by another member of the executive committee or league secretary. In other words, out of the 5 managers that comprise the executive committee plus league secretary, a proposal must be supported by 2 of them in order to make it to the managers at large for a vote. The proposal must be nominated and seconded by July 15 in order to be placed on the ballot that year.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of requiring that rule change proposals be better vetted with a July 15 cutoff date. A No vote will keep the current system and its ambiguities. If passed, this will immediately take effect for the 2009 season.

Allow for conditional trades within limits: Currently the rules technically do not allow for conditional trades, but many managers still post trades ahead of time that do not take effect until a later date. To better accommodate the ability to post trades ahead of time and have them be officially binding, it is proposed that the following 3 conditions be allowed to be specified on trades:

Post-season
Post-protect
Post-draft

A post-season trade could be announced prior to the season trade deadline for the current season, but it would not take place until after the season trade deadline (and thus after the season is over) but before protect lists are submitted.

A post-protect trade could be announced prior to protect lists being submitted, but would not take effect until after protect lists are published. Thus any players involved in such a trade would be required to be protected by the originating team, not the destination team.

A post-draft trade could be announced prior to or during the draft, but does not take place until after the draft. Any players or picks involved in a post-draft trade are not counted against the 35 (player + pick) limit of the destination team as determined prior to the draft on January 9, and any players taken with the picks involved in a post-draft trade are not restricted from being traded back to the original team or any other team.

Once announced and confirmed by all parties involved, such a conditional trade is as iron-clad as a non-conditional trade and cannot be revoked, whereas with the current system if a condition is violated the conditional trade itself is rendered null and void instead because it is not enforceable.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of allowing any one of these 3 conditions to be placed on announced trades. A No vote will keep the current system which technically forbids any conditional trades. If this proposal passes it takes effect immediately.

Move up protect-list deadline but allow a grace period: The current deadline for protect lists is December 24, and many people wait until the last minute. There is no prescribed punishment for being late, however. This proposal will move the protect list and taxi transaction deadline up to December 22nd, but then there would be a 2-day grace period after that in which a manager could correct any mistakes brought to their attention (such as not listing the correct number of players, for example). The protect lists and taxi transactions become final at midnight CT on December 24.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of moving up the 20-man protect list and taxi transaction deadline to December 22nd but with a 2-day grace period after that. A No vote will keep the current system whereby 20-man protect lists and taxi transactions are due December 24.

Require that protect lists be submitted as number-ordered lists: To enable the handing of mistakes on protect lists, all official 20-man protect lists shall be submitted as an ordered list from #1 at the top to #20 at the bottom. If no numbers are given then the bottom of the list (or the last player listed if not in a list format) will be assumed to be #20. If there is a mistake made on a protect list submission and that mistake is not corrected within the grace period (should the previous proposal 17 pass), then players will be dropped starting from the bottom of the list and going up until sufficient players have been dropped to accommodate a correct 20-man list. For example, if a team forgets to protect a player involved in a post-protect trade, then the player at #20 on their list is automatically dropped in favor of protecting the player involved in the trade.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of requiring that 20-man protect lists to be submitted as numbers lists. A No vote will keep the current system which really has no provisions for correcting mistakes on protect lists. If this proposal passes it takes effect immediately for the upcoming 2009 protect lists.

Enhance the minimum IP remaining requirements for starting pitchers. Currently the chart for determining how many starts a pitcher can make based on the IP they have remaining only takes into account the “6 IP Max for start” player setting:

In order to Start this many games:	At least this many IP must remain: (Without 6 IP Max setting)	At least this many IP must remain: (With 6 IP Max setting)
1	1	1
2	8	7
3	15	13
4	22	19
5	29	25
6	36	31

This seems to lead to some mild abuse and extension of starters who are not set to 6 IP Max (and set to “Slow Hook” instead, for instance). The start chart should take into account the “7 IP Max for start” player setting as well. We should replace the chart shown above with the enhanced one below instead:

In order to Start this many games:	At least this many IP must remain: (No maximum set)	At least this many IP must remain: (With 7 IP Max)	At least this many IP must remain: (With 6 IP Max)
1	3	2	1
2	9	8	7
3	17	15	13
4	25	22	19
5	33	29	25
6	40	36	31

A. Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of adopting the new chart with the “7 IP Max” column. A No vote means that we will continue using the current chart at top.

Designate mid-month standby relievers for call-up. Because reliever usage is so much harder to control than starting pitcher and hitter usage (which can be controlled through the rotations and lineups), we should allow each manager to designate up to two of the relievers in their minors as being on standby. The manager could designate one reliever for LH standby duty, and one for RH standby duty. Should the computer game use up a reliever in the majors during the month, then depending on the hand of the used-up reliever, the appropriate standby reliever would be called up in place of the other reliever when he is sent down at the end of a series. This would only apply to a pitcher with a relief rating being used up, not a starting pitcher with only a starter rating, and the standby reliever would only take the spot vacated on the major league roster, not replace the used up reliever in the manager settings such as setup or closer. This could help defend against a bullpen being short handed due to a reliever being burned up faster than expected. Only two relievers per month can be designated as being on standby. Note that it is the hand of the first used-up reliever that determines which standby reliever is called up. You could designate a RH reliever as being the LH standby, and if a LH reliever was used up, he would be the first one recalled. If a second reliever is used up, then the other standby reliever is recalled regardless of the throwing side. If more than 2 relievers are used up in a month, though, then you play short-handed as a penalty for not managing your usage better.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of allowing two standby relievers to be designated and called-up if necessary during the month. A No vote means that we will continue to use the current system, and when any reliever gets used up during the month you effectively lose that roster spot when they are sent to the minors. If passed this would take effect for 2009.

Division Alignment changes when new mangers join the league: Currently the rules only allow for division alignment changes when all managers involved agree to the move and a majority of non-involved managers approve. Should a manager vacancy open up, though, then a veteran manager should have the option to switch divisions with that team without the new manager having to agree. That is, a veteran manager should only have to get approval from the majority of the other veteran managers to move to that division, and the new manager will be assigned to whatever division is left over. Should more than one veteran manager want to move to that division, the selection will go in draft order.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of allowing veteran managers to switch divisions with a team with a new manager by only getting approval from a majority of the other veteran managers. A No vote will keep the current system whereby the new manager would also have to agree to the move.

Change to a 2-week draft beginning online on the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl with a 1-day finish 15 days after the start (i.e. finishing on the Sunday of the weekend after the Super Bowl). The draft would start on-line at 8AM CT on the Saturday of the weekend before the Super Bowl. There would be no posting of picks before this hard start. Draft will go on on-line for 14 days. Any picks that remain shall be completed in a single in-person/net meeting/conference call on the Sunday of the weekend after the Super Bowl (i.e. the 15th day). The start and end time of the final Sunday session will be determined by consensus so as to allow 2 minutes per pick.

Vote Yes or No on this proposal. A Yes vote is in favor of a 2-week on-line draft ending with a final 1-day finish on the Sunday of the weekend after the Super Bowl. A No vote is for keeping the current draft system.