CBS Sportsline (1 Viewer)

[bulldog_guy]

Our league has used the CBS Sportline for over 10 years.

For whatever reason, about 3 (out of 12) owners cannot make the draft date this year and they will have to use the customized player ranking and draft robot.

As commissioner, I thought I would check out the robot this year and get myself used to it before anyone else has questions. I used it last year and don't seem to remember having this much trouble with it.

Here are the problems I am having:

1. Once I save a customized player ranking, how do I delete the ranking I created? I may want to do this so that I can start over.

2. I am not clear how my rankings get used in the draft room. Is it automatic? Do I have to chose it? I thought it would automatically have chosen my customized ranking until the response I got from CBS to question 1.

3. When I asked question 1 to CBS, the response I got back was "You can choose which rank list you want in the draft room. ". Didn't answer my question at all and now confused me enough to ask question 2.

CBS does not have a help phone number (they used to). They do not send e-mails (they used to). All responses are on their site and not truly interactive.

Am I being dense? If so, could someone help answer my questions a little clearer that CBS could do?

Thanks to those that try.

 

[the rover]

How do I rank players?

Located on the center column of your league home page, you will find a box labeled "Draft Prep." Typically, this box will be located towards the middle of the page underneath the "At A Glance" Scoreboard and the "Player News."

Rank Players will be the top option in the Draft Prep box. Click on the link and you will be routed to the Rank Players page. There will be a drop box allowing you a choice to view your initial rankings by Projected Rankings (based on League Scoring System) or by Draft Averages.

Beneath this drop box, you will find the options to Rank Players by Position or Rank Players in a Single List. The new rank list has two features, which helps in customizing your rank list. First, I suggest that you rank your players using the by position rank list. Then the system will adjust the single rank list based on your positional rankings. Then, you can go into the single rank list and fine tune your rankings. The new system is a little more in depth, but will result in a more customizable list.

You can rank the players by clicking on the player name with your mouse and drag him up or down the list to suit your preference. After you have prioritized your list, you can save the changes by creating a file name in the "List Name" field. Click on "Save Changes." This will allow you to import your draft rankings to any other football leagues under your user ID. Whenever you access the Rank Players page, your Custom Rank list will be available in the drop box as "Custom Rank (file name)."

The Draft Robot will select the best player available according to your prioritized draft list. Provided that you concentrate your position of preference at the top of your list, your chances to draft a quality player at this position will be drastically improved.

Be aware that the Draft Robot will fill out the active spots on the roster first and then the remaining reserve spots.

 

[the rover]

this thing really seems to suck now. used to be able to tell it what position you wanted each round--now you can't. it also fills out all spots first, guaranteeing that you pick a kicker or defense too early.

 

[Philo]

Rover--what you've posted is what's on the site. But there's no way to actually select your list for the robot to use. Try it... change the list to reflect you own rankings, then go into the draft room... you're never asked what list to load as your own. It'll just bring up the default CBS rankings.

It also says elsewhere: "In a Live Draft, you'll have an area called the Draft Queue to list players you're considering with your next pick. If the time limit expires before you make a pick, the top player listed in your Draft Queue will be taken for you. If there are no players in your Draft Queue, the top player available on your Rank List will be taken. Thus the importance of making sure your preferred players are at the top of your Rank Lists. It is also useful because the players will appear in the draft room according to your rankings. It makes our draft room that much easier for you to use."

But...

I posted this yesterday in another thread. If you go to the "pre-rank your players" page, you can select what list of players you'd like to start with... the default CBS ranks, by ADP, and the end result of any mock drafts you've done on their site. Also selectable are any previous rankings you've saved by name.

I sent a message via the webpage to support over the weekend and was supposed to receive a response next business day, so far, nothing.

Nowhere are you given the option of which of these lists for the robot to use.

Nowhere are you given the option of which you'd like to load into the draft room.

When you load the draft room, after it's loaded and running there are two columns on the right of the player box... MyRnk and Rank. "Rank" is the default CBS ranking for your league. "MyRnk" is what is supposed to be your customized rankings, but there is no way to tell them to load a specific list as "MyRnk".

Now, here's the thing, if you exit the room, and edit one of your customized, "All Players as a Single List" rankings (not "players by position" as far as I can tell), and then save it with the name "MyRnk" without the quotes, that list will then appear as the column "MyRnk" in the draft room.

HOWEVER, when the room loads, the players are sorted by "Rank" (CBS defaults), not "MyRnk", and you have to click the "MyRnk" column to get them to sort. If you exit the draft room, and enter again, they'll be sorted by "Rank" again. So it appears that to have them sorted by "MyRnk", you have to leave the room up and running.

But I have no idea if the automated robot will actually go by this list, though. Sorting the list is done in the Java applet, I have no idea whether or not the automated robot is receiving that info to make it's selections.

Right now I'm going to try a mock draft and see if I can get auto-pilot to use MyRnk.

 

[Philo]

Well, no dice.

Tried a mock draft, but the "save your list with the name MyRnk" trick doesn't work. The MyRnk column in the mock draft was the same as the CBS defaults. My rankings didn't transfer. It appears that only works with my main league's draft room.

Also, I ran a simple experiment. I loaded the draft room, then disconnected my DSL. I was able to rerank and move players in the draft room no problem. So, like I feared, it's entirely contained within the Java applet... moving players around doesn't send any of that info to the auto-pilot.

Only if the room is up, and running, and manually set to auto-pilot, during the actual draft, and then sorted by MyRnk, is there even a chance that the CBS servers will look up what you have as your next player on your list.

But I can't test this without being in my actual draft, so no dice on that.

 

[Tar Heel]

I had the same problem with the auto draft for baseball this season on CBS.

CBS did not use anyone's pre-rankings. They eliminated the pick which round you want each position taken feature as well.

I, and the rest of the league, e-mailed them back and forth. They admitted not using the pre-rankings and stated that the pick your round feature was "unfair" and thus eliminated.

Of course, both of these facts ran counter to what was on the website.

We never got anywhere with them. Nice to see that they listened to us and fixed it for football.

Their customer service has always been a joke.

 

[the rover]

Well, no dice.Tried a mock draft, but the "save your list with the name MyRnk" trick doesn't work. The MyRnk column in the mock draft was the same as the CBS defaults. My rankings didn't transfer. It appears that only works with my main league's draft room.Also, I ran a simple experiment. I loaded the draft room, then disconnected my DSL. I was able to rerank and move players in the draft room no problem. So, like I feared, it's entirely contained within the Java applet... moving players around doesn't send any of that info to the auto-pilot.Only if the room is up, and running, and manually set to auto-pilot, during the actual draft, and then sorted by MyRnk, is there even a chance that the CBS servers will look up what you have as your next player on your list. But I can't test this without being in my actual draft, so no dice on that.

Ok, now I get it. I can't get my rankings to work with the mock draft either.I just ranked players, saved them with my ranking, and went to the draft room (our draft is this Saturday, so I have the draft room available). Turned on autopilot and they're ranked in the order I ranked them. Then I made sure the autopilot was off three times.

 

[bulldog_guy]

Thank you Rover and everyone else.

I am not surprised to see that I am not the only one with difficulties.

I will continue my back and forth with the CBS Sportline "help desk".

If I find out more information, I will gladly share with the FG community.