D|League COVID-19 Plan
IR Rules and Shortened Season Contingencies
While it appears the NFL is full steam ahead for the 2020 season, there’s still plenty of concern and doubt about what the season might end up looking like. Here’s my best attempt at a plan for the various scenarios.
2020 Season IR Spots
Effective immediately, the IR will be increasing to 3 spots. This increase will only be in effect for the 2020 season. Yahoo has created a COVID designation for players that contract the virus and this designation is IR eligible. There is no differentiation between players that are out due to normal injury or due to COVID and there will be no rules preventing D|L teams from using all three spots for regular injuries.
Note: players that opted out of the season are unfortunately not eligible for IR under the current Yahoo IR rules and I don’t anticipate Yahoo changing that at all. D|League will not be extending any extra roster spots or custom player “holding” for those players (like we do for practice squad players).
Shortened Season Contingencies — Payouts and Champion
Pretty sure the NFL would rather make teams trot out dudes signed an hour before game time than lose the money of canceling games, but just in case…
2020 D|League Champion
First things first, if the season is canceled at any point, even if it’s right before Week 16, the 2020 season will have no League Champion.
Weekly Payouts
All miscellaneous payouts during the season (rival week, weekly high score) will, of course, be awarded as normal.
Seeded Payouts: 14–15 Weeks Completed
If we are able to complete an entire fantasy regular season but the season ends in the middle of the fantasy playoffs, payouts will be as follows to the teams currently seeded:
1st: $300
2nd: $150
3rd: $70
If any top three seeds are eliminated in Weeks 14–15 and the season is canceled, the highest-seeded teams left will receive the payouts in the order above.
Standings Payouts: 9–13 Weeks Completed
If we are able to complete 9–13 weeks of fantasy football (but no fantasy playoffs), payouts will be as follows to the teams placed in the standings:
1st: $250
2nd: $125
3rd: $50
Standings Payouts: 1–8 Weeks Completed
If only 1–8 weeks of fantasy football were completed, no payouts will be given based on standings.
Remaining League Dues: All Scenarios
Anything not paid out to league members will be kept by the Commissioner.
…
Just kidding!! Sort of — anything not paid out to league members will be held by the Commissioner and go towards our 2021 Rookie Draft Weekend so that we can go extra big!
This is what my other league is doing and I think it’s a great idea. If anyone disagrees, we can of course discuss returning dues to you guys instead.
Shortened Season Contingencies — Draft Order
Consolation Pick Prize
First things first, like the League Champion, unless we are able to complete a full season, no Chumpion will be crowned and there will be no Pick 1.15 in 2020.
13+ Weeks Completed
If we can make it to the fantasy playoffs, the season will be fully “validated” for draft ordering. Draft order will be in reverse order for all non playoff teams as usual. For playoff teams, draft order will be in reverse order based on however far the playoffs was able to be completed.
9–13 Weeks Completed
If we only complete 9–13 weeks, the season will be partially “validated” for draft ordering. This means we will use the current standings as part of the Draft Bucket Lottery System. More details below.
1–8 Weeks Completed
If only 1–8 weeks are completed, the season will be voided for draft ordering. This means we will not use any of the current standings as part of the Draft Bucket Lottery System. More details below.
Draft Bucket Lottery System
Alright, so what is the draft bucket lottery system?? In the event of a shortened season, I will be using two seasons of D|League history to assign teams into different tiers or, “draft buckets”. Teams will then be drawn from those buckets to figure out 2021 draft order.
The buckets are based off of our playoff structure: Playoff Team, Consolation Bracket Team, Bunghole Bracket Team. However, I will be using two seasons of history that will cause further tier separation (Playoff Team twice, Playoff then Consolation Team, Bunghole Team twice, etc.)
Is this too complicated? Maybe! But I saw this idea on Twitter and it felt like the best method of accounting for team strength while keeping the randomness of a fantasy season too.
Here’s a hypothetical scenario:
In this scenario, Teams C and E would be randomly chosen for Picks 1 and 2, D and K for Pick 2 and 3, and so forth.
Is it perfect? Of course not. Could teams still end up with picks that don’t necessarily correlate to how “strong” or “weak” their teams are? Of course. But that happens every year. After a lot of thinking and researching, this is the best I could come up with.
Wrap-Up
Again, my assumption is that the NFL will do everything possible to play a full season, even at the expense of player health (unfortunately). But this should cover any shortened season scenarios. Any questions, let me know!
