Live Draft Lobby!
The Live Draft Lobby gives you the option to draft your team immediately without having to go through the process of joining a league via the League Directory and waiting for the draft date to come around. Instant draft satisfaction! The whole process is pretty simple but you should know some important things which are all listed below. Please read through it all so you know what to expect and will have the upper hand on your fellow league members. Good luck!
Join a Live Draft Lobby
The lobby is where it all starts. Once you're there click on a room name which has the status of "Waiting" with the league settings you'd like to play (draft time, league size, scoring type and single or keeper season). Note: The listed league names (all MLB team names -- aka "Red Sox Room") are for vanity purposes only and will change to generic league names which you can customize by league vote after the draft is complete.
After entering the waiting room you will only see the "Join Room" button if you meet a few specific conditions:
You must own at least one undrafted Fantasy Baseball team. You must have a team that is NOT already joined in a league. You must have a team available with the same "Season" setting (Single or Keeper) as the room you're trying to join.
If all is good select which team you want to enter in the pulldown and click the "Join Room" button.
Waiting for the draft to start
After you successfully join a room, your team name and info will appear on the page in bold. The current time is displayed in the upper left on the page and the start time below it. In order for the draft to turnover into drafting mode all the "Open Slots" must be filled by the listed start time. Recruit members to join via the message board or simply wait hoping the room will fill itself by the time (the page automatically reloads itself every 30 seconds). If the room does NOT fill by the listed start time the league will automatically disband and (unfortunately) you'll need to find another room to join. If the room does completely fill then you're in business for the actual draft to begin.
Starting the live draft
If your room is full at the listed start time the waiting room page will automatically reload itself to the "Launch Draft" page just as it would if you joined a league via the regular, League Directory way and your draft was starting. On this page a java area will appear on the bottom of the page. Click on the "Load" button to launch the java applet. You can also access the Lite version draft (see below) on the Launch Draft page (Note: It will open a new browser window).
Java Draft
After clicking on the "Load Draft" button the java draft applet will launch -- converting your team into drafting mode, determining the draft order and loading all the players and default draft lists for each team.
After the java applet fully loads the draft will start approximately 10 minutes after the league converts to draft mode and first pick can be made with 90 seconds remaining. You have 90 seconds to make each pick and the draft last for 20 grueling rounds. Pick some winners! A system message will appear when the draft is complete. If you want to continue chatting through the java applet you can do so for about 45 minutes by clicking the "Ok" button. To close the applet simply click the X in the upper-right corner of the applet.
Lite version draft
They might appear completely different but really the Lite and Java draft work in much the same way. Both allow you to select your players and view others teams and we encourage using BOTH during your live drafts. The Lite draft is available from "Launch Draft " page and will open a new window when clicked.
After the draft
After the draft is complete the system needs a few minutes to convert your team from drafting to season mode. After it converts your freshly-drafted team will be accessible in regular HTML mode from the Fantasy Baseball frontpage. Time to scout your first week's matchups and opponent and/or start thinking about some trades! That's it, you're done. Good luck with the season.
