Benchwarmer News

2/2/10

• Batman League Draft Central
  • Phase Two, Part Two results posted.
  • Phase Two, Part Three draft submissions are due Thursday Feb 11 - see your team page for access to the draft list.
• Four Star League Draft Central
  • This page will be a link to the draft results coming up later this month
  • You'll also find links to past drafts to give you a feel for how things work
  • The league is now full.  Your draft list deadline date is Tuesday night, Feb 9 at midnight Pacific.

2/1/10

• Did you take over an Orphan team for 2010?  Now that the Redistribution Draft is over, what next?  It's likely you're in a league now with very experienced players.  In many cases, your best first move may be nothing (but that's not always true - some of you have significant holes to fill).  In order to assist with some of the tricky parts of the game, the roster, cash balances, and what the heck are these contract-thingeys? - check out a series of entries in the Benchwarmer Baseball Blog: Orphan School (people drafting brand new teams might find it useful too).
• Redistribution Draft Complete - Rosters and cash balances now updated.  Redistribution Draft Index
• Free agency and trades now open.  Weekly transaction deadlines are Friday nights, midnight Pacific.

1/31/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Experts League
• Experts League:
  • Welcome to a new expert - Adam Ronis from Newsday (and other outlets) - who completes the Print Division for 2010 by taking over Rock Ridge.
  • Thought we had the remaining three slots filled, but I can't get confirmations, and one guy backed out.  We still have openings in the Airwaves Division (looking for connections with Radio/TV, including Internet radio) and the Web Division.  If you know of anyone, please let me know or if you know them personally, talk them up on the idea.
  • Recently Read from our Experts:
    • The Roundtable "scours" for 2010 Sleepers
    • Rotobuzz is going through position tiers for your 2010 drafts.
    • Brad Berreman links to his stories about overvalued and sleeper 1B, and OF Rankings.

1/30/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Redbirds League and Longball League
• 2010 Payment:
  • New Leagues and Owners: Owners joining for the first time in 2010 must pay before joining a league.  See the Payment Summary to handle that.
  • Returning Leagues:  Payment is not due until Opening Day, visit your Payment Summary when you're ready to take care of it.

1/29/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Deuces Wild League and Bleed Dodger Blue League
• Get a team for FREE - Be a Benchwarmer Blogger - share your thoughts, strategies, results, etc.  Email for details, but see Dave Regan's Dinks and Dunks and Jacob Vass with Save the Dome as potential models.

1/28/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Golden Throat League and Reality Bites

1/27/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Beer League and Hall of Fame League

1/26/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Chevy Chase League and Triple Crown League

1/24/10

• I'm not yet sure how/why/when this will be used, but BWB is now on Twitter...I finally catch up a little bit with 2009:
• And a personal Twitter take on things: find me at jonswansonMN
• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Commissioners League, Shadowball, and Blue and Gray

1/23/10

• Redistribution Draft - Results Posted: Three of a Kind & Beatleball
• I forgot - thankfully I automated most of the Redistribution Draft process last season...so it's a lot quicker to do this than it used to be.  But expect to see about 2-3 leagues posted per day for the next week.  In the meantime, enjoy the NFL Playoffs.

1/22/10

• Redistribution Draft - K Street results posted
• Waiting for the draft results?  New to the game?  You can work with a sample score and change your roster/batting order to get a feel for how to set up your team's roster later this spring.

1/16/10

• 2010 Rule Changes
• Returning Leagues: Redistribution Draft picks are due Monday night, Jan 18, midnight Pacific.
  • Access the form to draft players from your team roster.
  • The draft is optional, but is your best chance to rebuild your team this winter.
  • See last season's draft results

1/13/10

• There's a new filter on the player selection lists that was suggested: "Major Leaguers with salary <= 250" - what this allows you to do is find players who can be stashed on your minor league roster but are still able to be plugged into your lineup when needed.  Keep in mind that at this time of year, all players on the 40-man roster have designation of "major league" and as they are sent down in Spring Training, the designation will change back to minor league.  So, this may be more useful later on.
• There have been a few other suggestions (such as not showing any free agents or injured players) and we'll look at adding those soon.

1/12/10

• By original design (and maybe that will change next year) there is no "change your lineup" link on your roster during the Redistribution Draft phase.  But you can find a link to do that on the transactions page so that you can better analyze your current roster.

1/8/10

• Batman League Draft Central - Phase One Complete

1/3/10

• New Feature - If you are drafting more than one team, you now have the ability to copy the draft list from one team to another.  This option is available only as long as there are entries for a team in its startup draft list.  Once the Phase One draft is processed for a league, those entries are cleared.  The option will appear at the bottom of the draft page for your team.
• Four Star League - 7 of the 16 league slots are filled.  Your draft lists will be due about a week after the league is full.  Create your draft list now, so that we're not waiting on you at the deadline.  Visit your league's draft central.

12/31/09

• Returning Leagues:
  • Roster cuts have been processed.  See Transactions for details of who was dropped in your league.
  • Redistribution Draft is Now Open

12/29/09

• Welcome Back - Jacob Vass resumes blogging at Save the Dome.  Check out his BWB-specific writing on top prospects and closers (among other things) in the Benchwarmer world.
• Returning Leagues: Roster carryover choices are closed.  For those of you who missed the deadline, contact me via email on Tuesday or Wednesday.  The current plan is to post the cuts on Thursday afternoon/evening.  In the meantime, you can look at last year's Redistribution Drafts for some idea on what to expect in the next phase.  Redistribution Draft lists will be due Sunday, Jan 17.

12/28/09

• Two very common website problems at this time of year and one that happens often...and what to do about them:
  • "I can't find my team -- why do I always go to the New Fairfield Neanderthals roster when I click 'Roster'?" -- New Fairfield is the default team page for guests to BWB (League A1, Team 01).  This means you're not logged in.  The "remember me" feature typically expires in 30 days, but if you've cleared out browser cookies that will do it too.
  • "Why does my team say 'Bonus New Team' - how do I get to my team roster?" -- It's likely you won a bonus team based on your finish in 2009.  If your "remember me" setting has expired (see above), when you log in you might by default go to the bonus team.  Click "Switch Leagues" in the upper left corner of every page - or "Leagues" in the navigation bar at the top of the screen and you'll see all your teams.
  • "The 'Switch Leagues' link is gone, how do I change to one of my other teams?" -- The browser cookie that remembers you have multiple teams also expires...and I believe there are a few site pages that somehow clear it out (sorry...I keep looking for them).  Two ways to fix that...click the "Leagues" link in the navigation bar at the top of the screen and then pick one of your leagues/teams - or log out and log on again.  The link will return.

See the News Archive for older headlines.