2024 Idea: Should We Offer Slow Drafts For Primetime & OCs?

[Greg Ambrosius]

As most people in the NFFC know, we have never offered slow drafts for the NFFC Primetime, NFFC Classic or NFFC Rotowire Online Championship.

The reason was simple: We felt each of those contests deserved the same tough decision making for every single draft. Making a pick with 60 seconds on every single one of your drafts with $250,000 on the line seemed like the fairest formula for me, Tom and everyone here at the NFFC. And mainly, we felt it was the fairest format for the players.

But we also learned that we're a dinosaur in this thinking. We are the only national fantasy football game operator who thinks this way. All of the other national contests in the fantasy football space offer slow drafts, even as long as 8 hours!!! Okay, THAT WE WON'T DO!!!

But it's worth a discussion today to decide whether slow drafts are acceptable in the NFFC for the NFFC Primetime and the Rotowire Online Championship, especially. We limited the NFFC Primetime to only 21 days of drafting last year and we sold out 90 leagues during that short timeframe. I'm not saying we need more time for more leagues, but by offering these a wee-bit earlier in August and by adding a slow draft format it could give more people more time to get some drafts in and compete for both of those $250,000 grand prizes.

And we're blaming new hire Geoff Stein for this idea!!! He said it was popular where he worked before and that players like the different formats. It made Tom and I think about our standing on this subject. If we would do this, we'd offer 4-Hour, 2-Hour and 1-Hour drafts for those two formats and maybe even a 4-Hour one for the NFFC Classic.

Anyway, I'm interested in the feedback. Personally, I like how we've done it, but I also know the market is changing and I/we need to change with it. One prominent NFFC player told me in Las Vegas that he played with our competition because we didn't offer these slow drafts earlier in the season. Others said the same thing to me.

I'm now open-minded and willing to hear from all of you. We'll include this in an NFFC newsletter tomorrow and I hope people either email us back or post here. I honestly don't know what the sentiment is from our community, but if the feedback is positive for the idea we will implement it. We have some start times in mind for both formats and can discuss those once we hear from our players. Again, everyone else is doing it, and although that's not the reason for making a change, I don't think anyone is playing in the NFFC because we DON'T offer slow drafts.

Thanks all and look for the 2024 NFFC site to be rolled over next week. Enjoy.

[nails]

I say why not
U can start drafts much sooner doing that

I would use it for championships more likely than not but I don’t think there is an advantage doing this

Change is not bad

[calsuer]

I would agree- sounds like a good idea.
Would Silver Bullet be included?

[Greg Ambrosius]

I would agree- sounds like a good idea.
Would Silver Bullet be included?

No on the Silver Bullet Cal. We will offer 21 or 22 different draft dates and times for that contest and just don't feel it's necessary. Thanks for the feedback.

I think adding a 4-Hour and a 2-Hour Classic option makes sense. Not everyone can fit the Classic into their busy schedules in Las Vegas or Online, so let's give that one an option since basically those are private leagues with all of the prize money going to the league winners. We'll try that in '24 and if we can add another league or two that would be great. If not, it was worth a try.

[Sideline Sage]

I don't like the idea of slow drafts and starting earlier. With a short time frame and everone under same time constraints, I think it makes for a more even contest to try and win an overall prize.

But then again, I'm a dinosaur too.

[Greg Ambrosius]

I don't like the idea of slow drafts and starting earlier. With a short time frame and everone under same time constraints, I think it makes for a more even contest to try and win an overall prize.

But then again, I'm a dinosaur too.

I'm a dinosaur too Roger, so we tend to stick together. That's how we live so long!!!

Let's break this down one contest at a time and just talk about the Rotowire Online Championship for now. Let's leave out the idea of a Primetime slow draft for now. Just the OC:

* So we always start these Online Championship nightly drafts the Sunday of the NFL Draft in April, or at least we have been doing that recently. So let's say we do 4-Hour, 2-Hour and 1-Hour Online Championship drafts from that point when nightly drafts are available through no later than mid-August. Just for the OC right now, mind you. Would there be an objection to that?

I'm not just asking Roger, but everyone. People who draft that early are making their decisions based on the data they have at that time. Again, I like every draft at 1-minute per pick, but we're the ONLY GAME OPERATOR doing that. Geoff showed me the numbers from another contest and the percentage of slow drafts vs. all drafts was around 18 percent. That was a higher number than I expected and it's hard to deny that some folks want to compete that way.

So again, just concerning the Online Championship, if we offered these the same time we offer the nightly drafts and cut them off in mid-August so they didn't drag too close to Week 1, would that work? Just talking OC here. Thanks for any and all input.

[shark]

If it grows the overall contest pool by adding that as an option…why not. Perhaps just make it an option April-July.

[eliasond]

I would be fine with having a slow draft option for the OC. I'll have to think about it for the Primetime.

Greg, could you clarify your percentage comment -- are slow drafts 18% of the total number, or are live drafts 18% of the total? You said 18% seemed high to you, but if it is the former, that number seems low to me.

[Greg Ambrosius]

I would be fine with having a slow draft option for the OC. I'll have to think about it for the Primetime.

Greg, could you clarify your percentage comment -- are slow drafts 18% of the total number, or are live drafts 18% of the total? You said 18% seemed high to you, but if it is the former, that number seems low to me.

Another contest in our space that runs slow drafts for their Online Championship had 18% of leagues coming from the slow draft format. And the majority of those were in an 8-hour time frame!!! We are NOT doing 8 hours ever again in the NFFC or NFBC.

Last year we had 399 leagues. 18% of that is 72 leagues. If we could add 72 leagues to this contest it would be amazing. I never thought that many people would want to do slow drafts for a $350 national championship, so it piqued my interest.

There's very little news or changes to player values from the NFL Draft until training camps open in late July, so for the first time I'm seeing less of a downside to do this in the OCs. We also are still thinking about the Primetime and definitely wouldn't do those before the Hall of Fame game if we decide to do them at all. But if we want to grow participation in the OCs, the slow draft format has some merits.

Hope that clarifies things.

[Sandman62]

I'm warming up to this idea for OCs. As others have said though, not a fan for higher price points like main events. Prefer we all draft with the same 90-min news window for those.

Maybe consider cutting them off though when training camps open in mid-July - to avoid the clock stalling that can occur when people wait for each day's practices to end to make sure someone they're about to draft didn't get hurt, cut, demoted, etc.