League Rules

Expectations of Owners
-Because there is a slow draft after each season, it is important that owners be active. There is nothing worse in PC than an "absentee" owner.
-10 days of inactivity without notification may result in removal from the league
-Notify commissioner if there is going to be an extended leave of absence of over a week, especially during the offseason.
-Keep all conversations clean.
-Don't be rude to fellow owners
-Try to improve your team (no tanking)
-Have Fun
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Draft-A-Champ is a real stats, real progression, no contract league that will begin with the 1921 season (to avoid the fall out of the Black Sox scandal).

After each completed season:
Rookies will be imported to the draft room from both MLB and NNL each year based on real life stats to be selected in a rookie "slow" draft.
Rookies will need to have a minimum of 40AB or 15IP to be imported.
The slow draft will be 2 rounds, and will be a snake draft.
Only rookies with 4 or more upcoming years of service will be eligible for the 2 round "slow" draft. All rookies with less than 4 years will become eligible for the supplemental draft and free agency.
Unlike many drafts we see in PC, the draft order each season will be RANDOMIZED regardless of prior seasons record. This is to mitigate our own obvious knowledge of who the best players are OR more accurately, will be.
After all, IRL sometimes the worst team ends up with a dud even though they draft first and the best team ends up with a superstar even though they draft much later. However, since it is snake draft if you get the pick of the litter, you also get last pick.
So you may be lucky enough to start with the 1921 Yankees and Babe Ruth, but you are gonna have to get lucky to pair him again with Lou Gehrig.
Keep track of your players future year statistics, recognize the positions you need to fill each year to address a weakness and maintain your dynasty.
Do you draft a player who starts his career a bit slow but ends it with some big seasons? Or the player who had a dominant but short career? It's all up to you.
Players who are not drafted here will become free agents and are eligible for the supplemental draft and then waiver. More on this in the Supplemental Draft and Free Agency sections below.

Major League roster will initially be set at 24 players.
Minor league will be set at 5 players to start and may increase to 10 in 1930 based on player availability.
A larger minor league will allow for space to demote a player who has an "up and down" career so you don't have as much risk of having to drop him when he stinks.

Players remain with the team that they join as rookies (or that they began the league with in 1921) until they are traded or dropped.
Players will retire when they retired in real life.

In a situation where a player makes no appearances, then has a year or more "retired" (i.e. not enough "real" stats to qualify for this league), and returns in a future season based on real stats with another team, the player will fall back into free agency. In order to keep from losing a player in this situation, teams need to give the player at least one appearance so that there will be a record of this on his player card. If a team fails to do this, they can send a message to the commissioner regarding the player BEFORE player progression removes the player from their roster.

SUPPLEMENTAL DRAFT AND FREE AGENCY- As stated above, any rookies imported to the draft room who are not drafted will become free agents.
Eventually if the Free Agent list grows too big, older players may be "retired" early.
Supplemental Draft will follow the slow draft and be 2 rounds. You must have room on your roster to draft. Only players pre ranked will be drafted.This draft WILL be based on prior seasons final standings (WS winner drafts last).
There will be a waiver system for all remaining free agents.
Waivers will open after the first game of a season.
1 waiver claim allowed after each game.
Waiver order for first 5 games will be based on last seasons standings. After game 5, on current season standings.

Players may be dropped at any time EXCEPT from the time period of the end of the World Series to the end of the 2 round slow draft.

Schedule each season will be based on the real life MLB schedule. There will be a 3 day All star break after day 90.

4 man pitching rotations will be used until 1980, then it will be 5 man rotations.

Owners may request pitcher conversions.
Until relief pitching becomes a more normal part of a baseball teams make-up, you may request up to 4 pitchers listed as SP to convert to RP. This will be done each and every season, but choose wisely, once the season starts this cannot be undone. Stamina will be set to 40. Pitcher conversion rules will eventually change to be based on SP/RP appearances and stamina once more modern pitching staff makeup occurs.

This league will be slightly more liberal than most for position player changes.
Owners may request two position player changes per season. The player must either have played at least 10% of their season appearances at the position desired, or have played 25% of their career games at that position in order to convert.
(Appearances section of Baseball Reference is used to make this determination).

Injuries will be set to a maximum of 15 days for all players. This may be increased to 25 in the future if the FA pool goes enough.

Trading is unlimited from after the rookie draft until the trade deadline after day 120. Unreasonable trades may be reversed by the commissioner.
Free Agency will close at the end of the regular season and reopen after Game 1 of the next season.

Slump buster is limited to 5 days.
On fire is based on WAR since this is a real stats league.

Team Details - you may change your ballpark boost or disadvantage each season. Please do not change your ballpark name. Please do not change your team name or logo.

Sims will be run every 4 hours. Owners will be able to run Sims.

As seasons progress, expansion MAY happen, teams will change names and leagues, and playoff formats will follow real MLB playoff formats.
*(with this being a real progression league, expansion can be problematic. When we get to 1960, discussion will occur within the league ownership about expansion).

MVP and Cy Young will be awarded for each league.

If division leaders are tied:
1 game playoff home team better run differential. 1 day off granted.
3 or more teams tied, winner determined strictly by run differential.

7 game World Series in 2-3-2 format, team with best record has home field adv. If reg season record is the same, team with best run diff has home field. 3 days off granted before WS.
There will be 1 day off granted for "travel days" during each series when teams switch home and away.

Rules last updated 09/18/2025
Dodger1973

League Settings

Year Range of Stats	1928 - 2025
Roster Size (Majors)	24
Roster Size (Minors)	5
Keepers	(29 keepers)
Change Stats Allowed
Free Agency	(waivers)
Drops
No-Drop List
Player Fatigue
Batter Injuries	(15 games max)
Pitcher Injuries	(15 games max)
Use Pitcher's HR Allowed Stats
Allows Max Surprise Bunts
Min Batters Pitcher Must Face	0
Slump Buster	(5 days)
On Fire	Uses WAR
User Sims	(every 4 hours)