For those that do live auction drafting (1 Viewer)

[Anonymous Internet User]

Hey,

I'm thinking of moving my local league to auction format. We've talked about it in the past and everyone for the most part wants to try it out. We'll probably rent the porch out at the local pub and bring a whiteboard to help organize things, but I can't picture having anything but printouts with us to help keep organized. My question, however, leans more towards myself - since I'm commish, I'll probably be stuck as the auctioneer.

Since I need to draft a team myself, how do I go about placing my own bids? Is there some way where the owners can self-manage the bidding so that I can have time to make considerations as we go? I can't imagine being on the ball the whole time if I were distracted taking bids on players the whole night. (or at least part of the night).

Do you do rotations of auctioneer among the owners?

Any tips you have are appreciated =)

 

[radballs]

As auctioneer, just up anyone's bid whenever you want to. Just clearly speak as you would during you're other auctioneer duties. Shouldn't be any kind of a conflict. Although, I would say don't let the bidding get all the way down to 1 ... 2..... 2 and a half .... okay I'll increase the bid on LJ from 68 to 69. Slow rolling your bids will probably piss off your league mates. Just don't do that and should be good.

 

[Dudley Dawson]

My league uses an electronic timer. 5-10 seconds if I remember correctly. When the bidding slows down, we start the timer and reset it as needed. After most of the larger bidding wars settle down we just do it ourselves as there usually aren't many last second raises.

 

[stugnut]

1. Don't run the auction youself. Find a friend who likes football and tell him that he gets free drinks and eats if he acts as auctioneer. Have all the owners kick in a few bucks to cover that.

2. Get the draft board from Football Guys.

3. Keep track of the draft and owners money with Draft Dominator. I use it to help with my own draft as well as keeping track of the entire draft.

 

[Saints-Man]

If you can find someone outside of the league to be the auctioneer, this is best.

However, I was commish & auctioneer and it seemed to work well.

I didn't have an automatic timer, but I just sensed when things slowed down. I would announce "going once", pause, "going twice", pause "gone". The key is to key the same pace throughout the auction. The other owners seemed to adjust to whatever pace I set.

As far the bidding, I would always recognize the bidder. Tom for 1, Steve for 3, etc. So, when I wanted to bid, I would just say "I bid 5", or whatever. I find if you keep a deliberate pace it works quite well. I didn't feel I was at a disadvantage and I actually thought it was an advantage, because I could start to guage better when people were bluffing. This does require you to be a little more organized.

I had another owner keep track of the auction via the Draft Dominator. All I did was log the bids, and he did the rest, so you will need help.

Good luck...I love the auction style!!!

 

[kaso]

We do a live auction, with no auctioneer.

League fees go towards getting a draft board, which we modify to have a column for each team. That way everybody can see who has gone, who is left, and which teams have selected which players.

As for the auction. we sit around the table in final season rankings (worst to first). Worst gets to throw out the first name and in clockwise order the next person can stand up and up the bid or say pass. Bidding continues in a clockwise format until there is only one owner left standing. That owner wins the player up for auction for whatever his last price said was.

Keeps it clean and organized.

 

[radballs]

We do a live auction, with no auctioneer.

League fees go towards getting a draft board, which we modify to have a column for each team. That way everybody can see who has gone, who is left, and which teams have selected which players.

As for the auction. we sit around the table in final season rankings (worst to first). Worst gets to throw out the first name and in clockwise order the next person can stand up and up the bid or say pass. Bidding continues in a clockwise format until there is only one owner left standing. That owner wins the player up for auction for whatever his last price said was.

Keeps it clean and organized.

I really would dislike this kind of auction. It defeats the whole purpose in a way. If you're right behind the person who is bidding on someone, it could cost you way more to get him as it has to go all the way around the table versus outright bidding. But, to each his own.

 

[nittanylion]

Draftkit.com has draft board specifically designed for auction leages. No great technological breakthrough, just a column to the right of the players name on each position color coded sticker where you can continue the subtraction down the column as players are acquired by each team. These boards are relatively cheap, especially when the cost is spread across the League. I'd definately recommend getting the largest one feasible, so everyone can see what's going on without squinting or having to get up for a closer look...

...as far as an auctioneer goes, consider trying this: I have tried, and failed, for the past 2 years to get some of my 'old timers' to relent and accept auction drafting over the traditional serpentine format. It's more due to their stubbornness than my lack of innovative effort, however. Right from the start, I knew there would be objections in regards to who was going to be the auctioneer. To eliminate this from being an issue, I went to the Yellow Pages, and found a # of auction houses around my area. I visited a few, and found a couple of 'professionals' who were football fans, had actually heard of/played FF, and were really into the idea...they were more than happy to volunteer their services, in return for picking up their food and beverage tab at the bar where we hold our draft every year...I can't think of a better auctioneer than one who does it for a living, and what a way to set folks' minds at ease who are on the fence.

Unfortunately, I have the draft board, I have the auctioneer, yet I'm still saddled with people, who, for no really good reason, still refuse to consider the option. June 1, the battle resumes. This time, I'm holding a mock auction that they can sit in on, where they'll be paired up with experienced auction drafters from another League I'm in. Maybe they'll finally see the light...

 

[kaso]

We do a live auction, with no auctioneer.

League fees go towards getting a draft board, which we modify to have a column for each team.  That way everybody can see who has gone, who is left, and which teams have selected which players.

As for the auction. we sit around the table in final season rankings (worst to first).  Worst gets to throw out the first name and in clockwise order the next person can stand up and up the bid or say pass.  Bidding continues in a clockwise format until there is only one owner left standing.  That owner wins the player up for auction for whatever his last price said was.

Keeps it clean and organized.

I really would dislike this kind of auction. It defeats the whole purpose in a way. If you're right behind the person who is bidding on someone, it could cost you way more to get him as it has to go all the way around the table versus outright bidding. But, to each his own.

It really doesn't play a factor in my eyes. Only the interested owners will bid on a player, so although the order of how the bids come in may change, the final amount would likely be the same. With the limited amount of money each team has, combined with the roster size (18 players) and number of teams (14), you can't really risk bidding on a player to just bump up his price.

 

[roadkill1292]

We do a live auction, with no auctioneer.

League fees go towards getting a draft board, which we modify to have a column for each team. That way everybody can see who has gone, who is left, and which teams have selected which players.

As for the auction. we sit around the table in final season rankings (worst to first). Worst gets to throw out the first name and in clockwise order the next person can stand up and up the bid or say pass. Bidding continues in a clockwise format until there is only one owner left standing. That owner wins the player up for auction for whatever his last price said was.

Keeps it clean and organized.

I really would dislike this kind of auction. It defeats the whole purpose in a way. If you're right behind the person who is bidding on someone, it could cost you way more to get him as it has to go all the way around the table versus outright bidding. But, to each his own.

It really doesn't play a factor in my eyes. Only the interested owners will bid on a player, so although the order of how the bids come in may change, the final amount would likely be the same. With the limited amount of money each team has, combined with the roster size (18 players) and number of teams (14), you can't really risk bidding on a player to just bump up his price.

My league is also a "poker" style auction and I can pretty safely say, having done open auctions as well, that this method works very well. Whether you're bidding in order or just calling them out, there is no appreciable difference in ultimate player values.As an aside, I am heartened by the increasing number of posts I'm seeing where leagues are trying auctions for the first time.

 

[BigRed]

If you can find someone outside of the league to be the auctioneer, this is best.

However, I was commish & auctioneer and it seemed to work well.

I didn't have an automatic timer, but I just sensed when things slowed down. I would announce "going once", pause, "going twice", pause "gone". The key is to key the same pace throughout the auction. The other owners seemed to adjust to whatever pace I set.

As far the bidding, I would always recognize the bidder. Tom for 1, Steve for 3, etc. So, when I wanted to bid, I would just say "I bid 5", or whatever. I find if you keep a deliberate pace it works quite well. I didn't feel I was at a disadvantage and I actually thought it was an advantage, because I could start to guage better when people were bluffing. This does require you to be a little more organized.

I had another owner keep track of the auction via the Draft Dominator. All I did was log the bids, and he did the rest, so you will need help.

Good luck...I love the auction style!!!

Nice recap and agree. I was "forced" to take over auctioneer when an owner's wife got too hammered and it was kind of a pain but not a big deal. Good point on the pace of saying going once, twice etc. And we had someone bidding on the phone so I said loudly "Team X bids $20" (etc) when there was a brief break in the shouting of bids.