Under the old PtP injury system it was extremely unlikely that a team could suffer multiple concurrent injuries. Now that we have a much more realistic injury system it can be extremely difficult for teams to weather a bad run of injuries with a 35-man roster. If we just raise the overall roster limit that will have a side effect of allowing teams to use those roster slots to retain more players. Uncarded players won't count against the roster limit during the season, so teams who carry them can still have a full complement of backups on their inactive list. Uncarded players will count against your limit in the off-season, so keeping them will still cost you a roster spot/usable draft pick just as before.

Since the bookkeeping on this will be a massive pain for the Registrar, if this is passed Chris and I will have to enhance the web tools that the Registrar uses to manage the rosters.

changes:

During the regular season, players who are unable to play for an entire week will not count against the 35-man roster limit.

A player “unable to play” is defined as one who is either

1. injured and/or suspended for every day of the upcoming week
2. uncarded

Teams must be within the the 35-man limit by the end of the November release period, and must stay within the 35-man limit until the transaction period immediately preceding the commencement of play in week 1.

Same as 2013-1a, except that uncarded players will always count against the 35-man roster limit

When MLB teams have a bunch of injuries in a game they can call guys up from the minors immediately, whereas in the IBL we have to wait until the end of the week. This means that if you're unlucky and lose a couple of players you can be forced to play somebody out of position for the rest of the series. This is particularly problematic at catcher. This change will allow you to make a roster change during a series if you cannot field a legal roster. This change will also reward teams who use their inactive roster to maintain injury coverage, as opposed to packing it full of usage guys and picking people up off the free agent pile when they need a backup.

changes:

A team may (but is not required to) replace a player injured during a series by activating another player from their inactive roster, so long as that transaction allows the team to fulfill legal roster requirements. Teams may not sign free agents in this situation, only players on the inactive roster at the start of the series are eligible replacements. These transactions must be reported with the GRS for the series, along with note indicating that it occurred during the series. Players deactivated in this manner must remain inactive for the next two weeks, just as if they were deactivated after the conclusion of the series.

We alternate injury processing but do pitcher rest in parallel, which can result in some funky scenarios (e.g. RP gets hurt in home series, serves injury in road series while also forced to rest in home series). Synching these up would increase the chances that a pitcher's injury and rest requirements overlap. For shorter injuries and DTD I think it also makes it more likely the injuries get served properly.

changes in (2.1.7, Injuries and Suspensions):

Injuries and suspensions will be assessed from:

1. The remainder of the home or road series.
2. The series of same location (home/road) the following week
3. The series of the alternate location the following week
4. Continuing the pattern for subsequent weeks

Everybody hates PA limits during the regular season, and with split regression they aren't really that necessary. However, we can't just eliminate them without dealing with our playoff restrictions. This set of rule changes will make the regular season easier to deal with and will prevent abuse of small sample size guys in the playoffs. If you want to platoon in the playoffs you'll need guys with >50 PA just like before. It also raises the bar for pitchers so that you've got to have 100 AB+BB vs at least one side as a starting pitcher in MLB in order to start a playoff game, and in general limits the really small sample size guys to pitching in the 6th inning or later.

If this is passed I'll put PA info on the cards so it will be easy to determine post-season eligibility.

changes:

1. eliminate section 3.2.6 (PA Limitations), other areas where regular season PA limits are referenced
2. modify 3.3.4 (Playoff Eligibility, Limitations, and Restrictions) thusly:

rules for position players:

• A batter with less than 100 total AB+BB is not eligible for the post-season.
• A batter with less than 150 total AB+BB may only enter the game from inning 6 onward, unless he is the only available defensive replacement for an injured player.
• A batter may only start a game in the post-season if they had at least 50 AB+BB vs the hand of the starting pitcher, unless there are no other players available which would allow a legal starting lineup.
• A batter may only pinch-hit in the post-season if they had at least 50 AB+BB vs the hand of the current pitcher, unless he is the only available defensive replacement for an injured batter.
• A batter with less than 50 AB+BB vs the hand of the current pitcher may only enter the game as a pinch-runner or defensive replacement from inning 6 onward, unless he is the only available defensive replacement for an injured player.

rules for pitchers:

• A pitcher with less than 100 total AB+BB against all batters is not eligible for the post-season.
• A pitcher with less than 150 total AB+BB against all batters may only enter the game from inning 6 onward, unless no other pitchers are available.
• A pitcher must have recorded at least 150 total AB+BB against all batters as a starting pitcher in order to be eligible to start a post-season game or enter the game in a situation where a pitcher would be required to be rated as a starter.
• A pitcher not rated as a starter but with at least 150 total AB+BB against all batters may enter the game from inning 5 onward, or anytime prior to inning 5 when the current pitcher has allowed 3 runs or is fatigued.

Last season I set up a wiki page for people to upload their MIS. This proposal will require that the official mechanism for exchanging MIS will be uploads to the wiki. It changes the MIS deadline to Thursday, after which the home managers can use whatever is present on the wiki at their own discretion.

changes (not sure where exactly, probably multiple edits required):

1. at minimum, every team must upload a generic MIS to the wiki before the start of the season
2. MIS should be updated on the wiki each week by 5pm Pacific Time on Thursday (email is optional, but encouraged)
3. after the Thursday deadline the home manager is empowered to use whatever MIS is present on the wiki, the away manager forfeits the right to protest any outcomes which were a direct result of using the outdated MIS
4. the Commissioner must be informed when the home manager is forced to use an outdated MIS, so that IP penalties can be applied and any prior results that the league officers possess can be forwarded along

IP Penalties

• -1 for failing to upload a MIS by the start of week 1
• -1 for each subsequent week that a team fails to have a MIS available on the wiki
• -1 if an owner fails to update their MIS by the Thursday deadline and the home team is forced to use an outdated MIS

Fairly straightforward, MIS games will be required to have been played on IRC with channel logging unless an exception is granted in advance by the away owner. Not sure exactly where this would go in the Constitution.

It seems like late results/boxes/etc. are an epidemic. My proposal here is to add 4 additional real-time off weeks to the IBL calendar which would coincide with OFF days on the schedule. It would probably look something like this:

1/2/3/4 OFF 5/6/7/8/9 OFF 10/11/12/13/14 OFF(ASB) 15/16/17/18/19 OFF 20/21/22/23/24 OFF 25/26/27

In conjunction this would come with the following changes to IP penalties for late results:

changes to 5.2.2 & 5.2.3 (IP Penalties):

• -1 to the home team for failing to report results or ask for a FTF extension by the Monday deadline
• -1 to both teams after asking for a FTF extension and failing to report results within 48 hours of the Monday deadline
• -1 to the home team for every week of outstanding results at the conclusion of a real-time off week
• -1 to the home team for every week of outstanding box scores at the conclusion of a real-time off week

So the bottom line here is that if you're playing the games via MIS the results need to be in on Monday or you're going to get dinged. If you're trying to play FTF and running into scheduling problems the home team can request a FTF extension by Monday. This will buy you another 48 hours, but also puts both teams on the hook for IP penalties. In addition, if you're late on anything at the conclusion of a real-time off week you get dinged for more points.

If this is passed I intend on working with Chris to automate the IP enforcement mechanisms. There will be no leniency. If you look at the old penalties they were actually much harsher (if actually applied) and we're adding additional off-weeks to get stuff done. Furthermore, the IP system is designed in such a way that everybody can afford to lose a few points, it just gets progressively more painful if you're perpetually late.

Another incentive to get your stuff in.

changes (add to section 4.2):

• A team which has outstanding home results/boxscores from anytime prior to the current week may not trade.

It can be difficult for the Registrar to determine FA signing priority due to missing/late results, this change makes it so that we use the previous week's standings rather than the current standings.

changes section 4.3:

• from “the team with the lower winning percentage will have the rights to the free agent”
• to “the team with the lower winning percentage as of the previous week will have the rights to the free agent”

Currently if you demote a player after week 22 the two-week restriction prevents them from being activated when rosters expand. This rule change would allow all players to be activated when rosters expand.

changes section 3.2.2:

• from “A player placed on the inactive roster must remain there for two weeks.”
• to “A player placed on the inactive roster must remain there for two weeks. This restriction does not apply once the active roster limit expands to 35 in week 24.”

There always seems to be a lot of confusion about how much rest is required for a guy who pitched in relief prior to a start. This just simplifies things, if a pitcher is to start a game he has to have rested the number of days required on the SP rest chart.

changes section 3.7.2:

• to “In order for a pitcher to start a game he must have rested the required days listed on the STARTERS' rest chart, regardless of whether his previous appearance was as a starter or reliever.”

also requires edits to 3.7.3 for consistency

I was reviewing the way that the Constitution handles Incentive Points and it looks like the parts dealing with ownership probation (and double-secret probation! – had to be done) didn't survive the last overhaul of the IP system. At this point the word “probation” only shows up once in passing, but the term isn't defined and there's nothing listed under section 5.3 (Consequences). So, as things are written now there's just the gradual penalty component (if you have X IP you can only retain X players after the season) and ownership removal (drop to 0 IP), but with the probation component missing there's nothing in-between.

changes in section 5.2 & 5.3:

• all members begin each season with 35 IP (this is the de-facto rule anyway)
• a member is placed on probation once their IP total reaches 25
• a member remains on probation until completing an IBL season with more than 25 IP
• if a member on probation takes on a co-owner, their IP total is immediately reset to 35 but team will still be subject to the consequences of probation for the remainder of the season
• the Commissioner is empowered (but not required) to appoint a caretaker for any team being run by a member on probation
• the Commissioner is empowered to remove any member whose IP total is under 10 (replaces forced removal at 0)

• consequences of probation are:

1. all IP penalties are doubled for a member on probation
2. free agent claims by members on probation are processed after claims by members who are in good standing