SCORESHEET FANTASY HOCKEY: CONTINUING LEAGUE RULES
Each year, you will keep 9 players from your team. The remaining rounds of the draft will go in REVERSE order of the final standings in EVERY round. Regardless of win-loss record, the league's playoff winner will pick last, and the division winners will pick second and third to last. Also, you must use all of your protected spots; you can not protect only 7 players and get the first 2 picks in the draft. (However, you CAN trade protected spots - more on that below.)
Among tied teams, we use the team number as a tie-breaker, alternating each year between higher and lower numbers winning the tie-breaker. In the 2018-19 season, the tie-breaker for tied teams will be such that the lower (smaller) numbered team gets to pick first in the first round of the second stage, and then it will alternate each round thereafter. For example, if Team 6 and Team 12 are tied with the worst record in the league, then in Round 10 (the first round of 'real drafting' after the 9 protected rounds), Team 6 gets to pick first, and Team 12 picks second, and then in Round 11, Team 12 picks first, and Team 6 picks second, and so on.
For your 9 keepers, you can choose whatever mix of positions you want - there are no limits on the number of players you can keep at each position. Also, there is no Roster Balancing in Round 10.
You can trade draft picks, and you can also trade protected spots. But draft picks and protected spots can be, at most, one year in the future when you trade them. For example, once your league has drafted Round 18 in 2016, you can trade for a 2017 Round 18 pick. But in 2016, you can not trade for year 2018 picks, and can not trade for 2017 picks until that round of the draft has been held in 2016. Also, if you trade away one of your protected spots, it simply means you get to protect only 8 players, and the team to which you traded the protected spot gets to protect 10 players. Note: you can NOT make trades for players to be named later (they are too difficult to review for fairness.) And finally, you can NOT 'rent' players. Deals such as: "I'll give you Ovechkin for the rest of the season, and then you give him back, plus a draft pick" are definitely NOT allowed!
Picks 1 through 9 are protected spots - the first round of 'real drafting' is the first round of the second stage, which is Round 10. If you trade for the first pick of the second stage it will show up on the rosters as a Round 10 pick, not as a Round 1 pick!
