Instead of starting with a clean slate each year, some leagues allow
each team to retain players from the previous season. These types of
leagues fall into two main categories – Keeper Leagues and Dynasty
Leagues.
Keeper Leagues
Keeper
Leagues generally allow owners to retain a set number of players from
their previous year’s roster. The number will vary from league to
league, with the average being two or three. In most instances, one
must sacrifice a draft pick in order to keep a player. The round of the
draft pick lost is usually determined by where the player was slotted
the previous year. For example, using a system in which the keeper
slides up three rounds each year, the cost of keeping a player taken in
the eighth round in 2005 would be a fifth-round pick in 2006, and the
cost of keeping a player taken in the fourth round in 2005 would be a
first-round pick in 2006. In this type of system, players taken in the
first three rounds would always be available in the next year’s draft.
The
sliding system described above makes it fairly simple when evaluating
keepers – it boils down to a comparison between the type of player you
could get with the pick that you may sacrifice vs. the player that you
are thinking of retaining. For instance, you would keep WR Andre
Johnson if the cost was an eighth-round pick, and you would not if
you had to give up a first-round pick.
Most
Keeper Leagues allow you to retain only a few players each season. In
that case, it doesn’t make sense to load up with a lot of bench-riding
rookies with potential if you are unlikely to be able to hold on to them
for at least a few seasons. It is wise, however, to emphasize youth and
potential when everything else is equal in Keeper League drafts,
especially in the last few rounds. For example, you would respectfully
favor promising rookies such as RB Joseph Addai (Ind) and TE
Vernon Davis (SF) over RB Fred Taylor (Jac) and TE Marcus
Pollard (Det), two aging veterans with little long-term upside.
Dynasty Leagues
Dynasty Leagues work more like the NFL. There is usually no limit
placed on how many players may be retained from season to season.
However, there often is a salary cap or length-of-contract limit (in
terms of years). The available talent pool is replenished by rookies
and by the players released due to the salary cap or players with
expired contracts. As it is in the NFL, the draft order in Dynasty
Leagues is usually determined by how the teams finished the previous
year (worst picks first).
In
most Dynasty Leagues, your draft choices will be limited to incoming
rookies and suspect veterans who are coming off of a down year for one
reason or another. In this type of system, it is much more difficult to
turn around a bad team, and it is very important to use long-term
thinking when drafting, emphasizing younger players with potential over
moderately performing veterans.
