Banthas Nearly Ruin Draft

It’s common knowledge that Bestine Banthas owner Ryan Lindsay doesn’t know what he’s doing. Usually it doesn’t wreak havoc on the rest of the league, because he enters most drafts with one inconsequential pick, like 4.06.

Such was the case in 2017 as well, until he made a bold move, trading TY Hilton for draft pick 1.08.

Moments later, he announced that he would be unable to attend the draft.

Commissioner Hammond, who is nothing if not helpful, reminded Ryan that he could fill out a draft list on the website so that he could get his guy. Seemed simple enough.

Fast forward to the draft, and all hell has broken loose. Somehow Joe Mixon falls to the Colliders at number 5, and then when Bestine’s pick comes up the computer nabs TE OJ Howard, leaving WR Corey Davis to fall to the Colliders at 9. NINE!

Moments after the picks were made, Lindsay called bullshit via text, and sent an image of his draft board. Davis was the 5th guy on his board; Howard the 15th. The computer screwed it up. MFL had this to say:

Thanks fro (sic) touching base, and I apologize for any confusion. the “My Draft List” option tries to fill a starting lineup first, so he had a WR (Coleman) as #5 on his list, but he already had more WR’s on his roster than are specified in the lineup requirement (2-4 WR’s). Therefore, the system chose the first TE on the list in order to fill the lineup requirements (1-3 TE’s).

For future reference, he can control how the system picks players from the “My Draft List” by combining it with the “My Draft Preferences” screen to tell the system which position(s) to select in each round. This page goes into more detail about how it all works, in case that helps:

http://www63.myfantasyleague.com/2017/support?L=40486&FAQ=671

The “Additional notes” section at the bottom of that page explains how it applies the position requirements for the starting lineup before filling the entire roster.

The situation was a mess. It wasn’t fair to Ryan, but also wasn’t fair to the people who drafted after him. If Davis hadn’t been there, the Colliders would have taken Kamara, who went 10th to the Chitons.

After many emails back and forth, bruised egos and hurt feelings, a solution was reached, thanks in part to the magnanimity of Tom Rothfus. The Colliders gave up Davis and took the guy they would have taken in Kamara. The Chitons accepted a compensatory pick in next year’s draft (1.04) to make the whole thing go away.

OJ Howard was released and becomes a coveted free agent, who is still RFA-eligible to the highest bidder. It’s possible that he’ll command an even greater salary than the $11 he was scheduled to make.

Despite the Davis fiasco, and some problems on Enright’s end, the draft went more smoothly than usual. The commissioner only had to undo one draft pick, and the audio seemed to work. Still, one longs for the day when a 30 minute draft can be completed without errors.

© 2017, Josh Hammond. All rights reserved.