Everything stated in this rant is a personal opinion of the three writers wanting to contribute. Although the majority of the things stated in this article will be things we agree with each other on, we all have different viewpoints as to what is occurring within the DSFL, making it flawed. If you would like to comment on the topic please try to keep it civil as we do not want to have this thread locked, thank you!
Rindiee:
As much as I like the idea of expansion and giving everyone the chance to play. The DSFL is not the answer, or not at its current state. Although I am not in the same position as some of the writers in this thread, I can feel their pain as I have gone through similar things such as this. The NSFL is only in S3 with 8 teams. What is the need for expansion into a developmental league with only 6 teams? Sometimes it is found difficult to field a full NSFL team of actives, how is it fair these GM’s are expected to field a full team of new players and inactives? Even if a DSFL GM gets a great active center piece what is to stop the team that drafted them in the NSFL draft to call them up? Absolutely nothing, take Pierno as an example. Am I saying the DSFL will never work in this simulation? Of course not, but I personally do have a better idea as to how we go about a developmental league in the current state of our beloved sim. If we are wanting to take the simulation to a new level of realism, while not having teams left in the dust we should create the NCAA as the entry league. I have seen other simulations throughout many different sports complete their sims this way successfully. In terms of originality like I said, of course it has been done before, but I believe many would appreciate if the DSFL was replaced with the NCAA and we had managers in place who knew what they were getting into, beforehand. Players would have to stay for a minimum of 3 seasons (2 if we want to take a slight bit of realism out) these players get to choose where they want to commit after player creation is completed successfully. The GM’s or “coaches” in place get to choose the school they’d like to run for the year (make them choose from a Power 5 so there isn’t as much biased?) One school is too stacked while another is lacking recruits? Each school will have a maximum amount of “scholarships” they can give varying in price. In turn, that player's “scholarship” will be their “salary” for the year. The NSFL draft will have all eligible NCAA players entered who wish to pursue the draft opposed to staying an extra year. Opposed to saying how I would put together this league I want to stress the point as to why I find it necessary. By having the NCAA we create that much more realism in the league, coaches & teams won’t be left in the dust by call-ups and the league (NCAA) can be there to teach them everything they need to know about the league. Not that the DSFL is lacking in this, but it is hard knowing that you can wake up each day with one less active player on your roster. No one wants to be volunteering their time to manage a bunch of bots. Overall, can my system be tweaked? Of course, and I have no problem hearing others opinions if this is something that could actually be put into consideration. Another thing I know will be brought up: “Well not all players can make their NSFL team they deserve somewhere to start.” My answer is as simple as this, deserve your spot like the person ahead of you, lucky for you it doesn’t take actual skill rather just being active and being dedicated. People in the real NFL are back-ups, if we are wanting to create realism then the NSFL can have backups too. With that being said, maybe new variables are put into place: Knock down the realism a bit, if the player was around before the NSFL let them go to the NCAA, if they wish. At the same time, the DSFL could be adapted to fit my “plan”, but out of all honesty that is the easier, less work way out of it. By making it the NCAA, you have more leniency as to how the league can work, the teams management work isn’t going unnoticed and they WON'T have to coach bots, what a concept! There are many ways to make my system flexible, if you’re not a fan of signing day and realism isn’t the BIGGEST issue, you have a NCAA draft. Opposed to scholarships you have contracts, now players won’t choose where they get to go, but they don’t get to choose where to go in the DSFL or NSFL draft either way. By implementing a draft in the NCAA, you can still have it so players must stay for at least 2 years before they decide to declare.
124715:
They took my Quarterback.
The future of my franchise. The leader of the offense. The face of the team. The second overall pick. The locker room wizard. The graphics guru. The hardest worker on my team.
“Nicholas pierno called up by yeti”
AAAaaaanndd… it’s gone. Not just my hopes of contending for the Relicum Trophy (what the hell is a Relicum, by the way? Why is it even named that? Magnus or Magnum would’ve been infinitely better than Relicum.), but my hopes of letting Jordan Weal and Jaquan Young shine in the offense, boosting their self-confidence and draft stock, and working together to create a great team environment. I suppose it doesn’t matter, though, as both are being called up anyways, leaving me with an active Kicker and a semi-active QB. Why couldn’t we have had it just like the NFL? Players enter the NCAA, play 1-4 years, and then go into the NFL. There’s no affiliation, calling up or sending down, and nobody gets the foundation of their team pulled out from under them. The way that this works now, it’s impossible to get a team going when players stay only one year.
Management is impressively bad, too. I am frequently notified about waiver claims that should’ve been processed a day ago, or my signing goes through hours after the depth chart deadline. It’s obvious that the NSFL is the primary league and concern of the HO, but they should really try to think about the D league as well. The call-up and send-down systems are nothing short of terrible, and they just aren’t well thought out. In my opinion, player advancement should be uni-directional (ie, from DSFL to NSFL but not back) or there should be designated call-up and send-down times: for example, at the beginning of the season, after the first week of sims, before the playoffs start, and after the NSFL draft. This makes it easier for the DSFL GMs, but there’s still a lot of turnover.
I still struggle to understand why the Head Office couldn’t have gone with the infinitely similar system that the EFL and the NFL use, slightly modified. Prospects enter a pool as they create, and are signed by college teams (or DSFL teams, in our case) on National Signing Day. They play as long as they want, or as long as it takes them to hit the TPE cap, and then declare for the draft to play on a pro team. Not only does this give the DSFL teams some semblance of stability, but it also makes it far more realistic, and easier for DSFL and NSFL GMs alike, to control their roster. I’d only propose one thing: instead of Nat’l Signing Day, I’d have the same waiver/draft system we employ in the NSFL. All new creates are placed on waivers (side note: why do waivers only last 24 hours? That means that some players, like none other than Paul DiMirio, never get claimed, despite joining far into the season. What’s the damage?) and play out the remainder of the season on that team. At the conclusion of the season, they are entered into the draft and fall on a DSFL team. After playing the desired length of time in the DSFL, they get drafted by an NSFL team.
I simply don’t understand the low level of organization and high level of complexity of the DSFL.
To12143:
The DSFL has started horribly. As a GM, I feel constantly out of the loop, and I feel like stuff isn’t made known until the last possible second. Organization, scheduling, and communication has been pretty bad between the head office, the NSFL GMs, and DSFL GMs. There are a few problems within that cause the system to fail, such as the call up/send down system, the draft, the waiver system, and the free agency system. The system was implemented horribly, and way too early in my eyes, as there was no need for a developmental system at this stage of the league. It feels like something that was done early in an attempt to have the system ready for when it is actually needed, as right now there is no need for it.
First off, I have to make note of the call up and send down system. It was obviously made to emulate the systems in place in the MLB and NHL, but the difference here is that there are not nearly enough people to make that system work. Add to the fact that the teams probably won’t send someone back down after calling them up, as the only people who get called up are actives who have outgrown the DSFL, and it just makes for a system doomed to fail in the current state of the league. There is no reason for people to want to stay in the DSFL at this stage of the league either, and so this causes a massive disconnect between the NSFL and DSFL. The system in place does not work for either league at this stage of the league’s history, and it will be doomed to fail if nothing is changed.
The draft was horrible as well, and part of it has to do with the previous system that was mentioned. There was no cutoff point for teams to finalize draft send downs, and instead they could send down and call up at any point prior to the draft. It became hard to keep track of send downs when they were changing up to an hour before the draft, and as a GM it was hard to keep track of players to target as the list of players would change, and possibly the people we want. This caused havoc in the draft room as we found out about players being available during the draft, as the notification of new send downs didn’t happen until we were already picking players, and had we known about certain players the draft would have gone a bit differently. The draft itself was also organized horribly as the person running the draft did not know to keep going after the 10th round, causing a bunch of players to be available after that would have been targeted. Now this is of no fault to the guy running the draft, as he was not aware until after the draft had ended, instead this falls on the others who knew how the draft was going to run, and neglected to tell him when they knew they would not be able to make the draft. This caused havoc on the waiver system and the free agency system as well.
Speaking of the waiver system and free agency system it was so horribly mismanaged. The first problem was having to use a waiver spot on people who were not drafted, and were not on any NSFL teams. This caused multiple people to claim these free agents who had nothing otherwise, and I know I lost 2 people I was claiming because I had to wait for the claims to go through. Having to claim a guy who is sent down, ok I get that, having to claim a guy who is not on any team was really dumb. It was overall a really bad system that was fixed, but a bit too late as most free agents were taken by the time the system was fixed.
Finally, the organization, scheduling, and communication was horrible. Call ups and send downs were not alerted, as multiple times the list changed without being told. People were available and never told of, and the list was not fixed as people were sent down, or called up before the draft. Communication has gotten better however, and know that we have a more concrete schedule with the season going on now it has been a bit easier to keep track of. Organization has gotten better as well, although it was still pretty bad and could have been fixed, I don’t know if this is a product of Noble leaving, but organization has gotten better as a whole.
Please split pay evenly between myself, To12143 and 124715
GRADED
Rindiee:
As much as I like the idea of expansion and giving everyone the chance to play. The DSFL is not the answer, or not at its current state. Although I am not in the same position as some of the writers in this thread, I can feel their pain as I have gone through similar things such as this. The NSFL is only in S3 with 8 teams. What is the need for expansion into a developmental league with only 6 teams? Sometimes it is found difficult to field a full NSFL team of actives, how is it fair these GM’s are expected to field a full team of new players and inactives? Even if a DSFL GM gets a great active center piece what is to stop the team that drafted them in the NSFL draft to call them up? Absolutely nothing, take Pierno as an example. Am I saying the DSFL will never work in this simulation? Of course not, but I personally do have a better idea as to how we go about a developmental league in the current state of our beloved sim. If we are wanting to take the simulation to a new level of realism, while not having teams left in the dust we should create the NCAA as the entry league. I have seen other simulations throughout many different sports complete their sims this way successfully. In terms of originality like I said, of course it has been done before, but I believe many would appreciate if the DSFL was replaced with the NCAA and we had managers in place who knew what they were getting into, beforehand. Players would have to stay for a minimum of 3 seasons (2 if we want to take a slight bit of realism out) these players get to choose where they want to commit after player creation is completed successfully. The GM’s or “coaches” in place get to choose the school they’d like to run for the year (make them choose from a Power 5 so there isn’t as much biased?) One school is too stacked while another is lacking recruits? Each school will have a maximum amount of “scholarships” they can give varying in price. In turn, that player's “scholarship” will be their “salary” for the year. The NSFL draft will have all eligible NCAA players entered who wish to pursue the draft opposed to staying an extra year. Opposed to saying how I would put together this league I want to stress the point as to why I find it necessary. By having the NCAA we create that much more realism in the league, coaches & teams won’t be left in the dust by call-ups and the league (NCAA) can be there to teach them everything they need to know about the league. Not that the DSFL is lacking in this, but it is hard knowing that you can wake up each day with one less active player on your roster. No one wants to be volunteering their time to manage a bunch of bots. Overall, can my system be tweaked? Of course, and I have no problem hearing others opinions if this is something that could actually be put into consideration. Another thing I know will be brought up: “Well not all players can make their NSFL team they deserve somewhere to start.” My answer is as simple as this, deserve your spot like the person ahead of you, lucky for you it doesn’t take actual skill rather just being active and being dedicated. People in the real NFL are back-ups, if we are wanting to create realism then the NSFL can have backups too. With that being said, maybe new variables are put into place: Knock down the realism a bit, if the player was around before the NSFL let them go to the NCAA, if they wish. At the same time, the DSFL could be adapted to fit my “plan”, but out of all honesty that is the easier, less work way out of it. By making it the NCAA, you have more leniency as to how the league can work, the teams management work isn’t going unnoticed and they WON'T have to coach bots, what a concept! There are many ways to make my system flexible, if you’re not a fan of signing day and realism isn’t the BIGGEST issue, you have a NCAA draft. Opposed to scholarships you have contracts, now players won’t choose where they get to go, but they don’t get to choose where to go in the DSFL or NSFL draft either way. By implementing a draft in the NCAA, you can still have it so players must stay for at least 2 years before they decide to declare.
124715:
They took my Quarterback.
The future of my franchise. The leader of the offense. The face of the team. The second overall pick. The locker room wizard. The graphics guru. The hardest worker on my team.
“Nicholas pierno called up by yeti”
AAAaaaanndd… it’s gone. Not just my hopes of contending for the Relicum Trophy (what the hell is a Relicum, by the way? Why is it even named that? Magnus or Magnum would’ve been infinitely better than Relicum.), but my hopes of letting Jordan Weal and Jaquan Young shine in the offense, boosting their self-confidence and draft stock, and working together to create a great team environment. I suppose it doesn’t matter, though, as both are being called up anyways, leaving me with an active Kicker and a semi-active QB. Why couldn’t we have had it just like the NFL? Players enter the NCAA, play 1-4 years, and then go into the NFL. There’s no affiliation, calling up or sending down, and nobody gets the foundation of their team pulled out from under them. The way that this works now, it’s impossible to get a team going when players stay only one year.
Management is impressively bad, too. I am frequently notified about waiver claims that should’ve been processed a day ago, or my signing goes through hours after the depth chart deadline. It’s obvious that the NSFL is the primary league and concern of the HO, but they should really try to think about the D league as well. The call-up and send-down systems are nothing short of terrible, and they just aren’t well thought out. In my opinion, player advancement should be uni-directional (ie, from DSFL to NSFL but not back) or there should be designated call-up and send-down times: for example, at the beginning of the season, after the first week of sims, before the playoffs start, and after the NSFL draft. This makes it easier for the DSFL GMs, but there’s still a lot of turnover.
I still struggle to understand why the Head Office couldn’t have gone with the infinitely similar system that the EFL and the NFL use, slightly modified. Prospects enter a pool as they create, and are signed by college teams (or DSFL teams, in our case) on National Signing Day. They play as long as they want, or as long as it takes them to hit the TPE cap, and then declare for the draft to play on a pro team. Not only does this give the DSFL teams some semblance of stability, but it also makes it far more realistic, and easier for DSFL and NSFL GMs alike, to control their roster. I’d only propose one thing: instead of Nat’l Signing Day, I’d have the same waiver/draft system we employ in the NSFL. All new creates are placed on waivers (side note: why do waivers only last 24 hours? That means that some players, like none other than Paul DiMirio, never get claimed, despite joining far into the season. What’s the damage?) and play out the remainder of the season on that team. At the conclusion of the season, they are entered into the draft and fall on a DSFL team. After playing the desired length of time in the DSFL, they get drafted by an NSFL team.
I simply don’t understand the low level of organization and high level of complexity of the DSFL.
To12143:
The DSFL has started horribly. As a GM, I feel constantly out of the loop, and I feel like stuff isn’t made known until the last possible second. Organization, scheduling, and communication has been pretty bad between the head office, the NSFL GMs, and DSFL GMs. There are a few problems within that cause the system to fail, such as the call up/send down system, the draft, the waiver system, and the free agency system. The system was implemented horribly, and way too early in my eyes, as there was no need for a developmental system at this stage of the league. It feels like something that was done early in an attempt to have the system ready for when it is actually needed, as right now there is no need for it.
First off, I have to make note of the call up and send down system. It was obviously made to emulate the systems in place in the MLB and NHL, but the difference here is that there are not nearly enough people to make that system work. Add to the fact that the teams probably won’t send someone back down after calling them up, as the only people who get called up are actives who have outgrown the DSFL, and it just makes for a system doomed to fail in the current state of the league. There is no reason for people to want to stay in the DSFL at this stage of the league either, and so this causes a massive disconnect between the NSFL and DSFL. The system in place does not work for either league at this stage of the league’s history, and it will be doomed to fail if nothing is changed.
The draft was horrible as well, and part of it has to do with the previous system that was mentioned. There was no cutoff point for teams to finalize draft send downs, and instead they could send down and call up at any point prior to the draft. It became hard to keep track of send downs when they were changing up to an hour before the draft, and as a GM it was hard to keep track of players to target as the list of players would change, and possibly the people we want. This caused havoc in the draft room as we found out about players being available during the draft, as the notification of new send downs didn’t happen until we were already picking players, and had we known about certain players the draft would have gone a bit differently. The draft itself was also organized horribly as the person running the draft did not know to keep going after the 10th round, causing a bunch of players to be available after that would have been targeted. Now this is of no fault to the guy running the draft, as he was not aware until after the draft had ended, instead this falls on the others who knew how the draft was going to run, and neglected to tell him when they knew they would not be able to make the draft. This caused havoc on the waiver system and the free agency system as well.
Speaking of the waiver system and free agency system it was so horribly mismanaged. The first problem was having to use a waiver spot on people who were not drafted, and were not on any NSFL teams. This caused multiple people to claim these free agents who had nothing otherwise, and I know I lost 2 people I was claiming because I had to wait for the claims to go through. Having to claim a guy who is sent down, ok I get that, having to claim a guy who is not on any team was really dumb. It was overall a really bad system that was fixed, but a bit too late as most free agents were taken by the time the system was fixed.
Finally, the organization, scheduling, and communication was horrible. Call ups and send downs were not alerted, as multiple times the list changed without being told. People were available and never told of, and the list was not fixed as people were sent down, or called up before the draft. Communication has gotten better however, and know that we have a more concrete schedule with the season going on now it has been a bit easier to keep track of. Organization has gotten better as well, although it was still pretty bad and could have been fixed, I don’t know if this is a product of Noble leaving, but organization has gotten better as a whole.
Please split pay evenly between myself, To12143 and 124715
GRADED