Edit: two new leagues created based on the discussion below:
http://www.profsl.com/smf/index.php?board=3318
http://www.profsl.com/smf/index.php?board=3307

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We're bigger than ever, we're more active than ever, we're having fun... how about another cycling league? ProFSL has a million baseball/basketball/hockey/football leagues, yet only one soccer league (by yours truly) and only one cycling league. I could set up another forum and another spreadsheet rather quickly, I think.


Proposed roster format: something very original, so that there is no overlap with this one. Ideas that come to mind, separately or in combination:
League A. national teams, where we first get a number of riders from our nation (with a combined 2015 score cap)
League B. national teams, where we first bid money on the nation we want, but later get a 50% discount when bidding on riders from our own country
League C. realistic balanced teams where everybody has 1 GT contender, 1 top sprinter, 1 young sprinter, 1 time trialist, 1 geezer, 1 injury survivor, 1 wasted talent, 1 surprise transfer... (would start by agreeing and announcing who the X GT contenders etc. are, X being the total number of participants)
League Z. something completely cuckoo, say... one rider per team born each year? (16 riders per team: 1995+, 1978-, plus the 14 in between)


Proposed calendar & scoring: either something original and wacky OR the exact same as here so that there is zero added in-season maintenance.


Proposed Start: December 15, when the dust settles over auctions here, yet there is enough time before TDU, and we're bored waiting for Xmas.


May the brainstorming begin

League E. The more I think about the INTERnational league though...

OK- so let's imagine a system whereby we have a squad of (let's say) twenty riders. We can only have one rider of any given nationality (and no, Froome doesn't count as Kenyan). No duplicate riders between teams.

So - how to decide who gets to pick who? Blind auction. Let's say we all have a budget of 10 million Space Credits. We all have to bid on rights for twenty nations. Once all the bids are in for each nation, a draft is set up for each country bid upon, with the highest bidder given first pick and so on. In the unlikely event of tied bids (you can bid to individual creds, and I think stipulating that none of your own bids can be of equal value would also reduce the possibility of e.g. loads of one credit bids).

So a two-stage game - first the blind nation auction, then multiple drafts.

It leads to some interesting tactical choices, especially regarding nations that have one or two outstanding talents but little strength in depth, versus the traditional cycling powers (so how much more would you bid on, say, Slovakia, over the Netherlands?).

I'm on a long train journey and there's not much to look at out the window...

Re. Season ruined in one day in lowball - that's one of the reasons I'd limit it to WT only - most breakaway winning randomers are from PCT or lower (especially in .HC or WT races). I take your point about cheering on failure - I was thinking more about my unerring ability to curse riders; doing this might curse my picks with success!

Re. Blind auction - honestly I find these things fascinating as a dilettante game theorist. But for a practical reason too - it would make the draft order rank a lot easier to figure out.

Re. Blind auction - honestly I find these things fascinating as a dilettante game theorist. But for a practical reason too - it would make the draft order rank a lot easier to figure out.

I fear it would come out brutally unfair, thus ending your season within seconds. Imagine you place the majority of your money on Slovakia and Poland, yet finish juuust second and third respectively. Suddenly you're stuck with Velits, Paterski, and the 17th pick in all other countries.

I like the idea of C to be honest, Abit NFL draft like in a way