Killing the Message Board (And a Comish Request to Onwers)

I've decided to attempt an upgrade to the ATB draft experience. This is for two reasons

1) My place of employment has been cracking down on internet abuse. I can't spend a lot of time helping to administer the draft this year. This is a scary proposition for me, since one unknowing owner error could result in a busted team. While owner errors have always been 'buyer beware, tough luck' it can still ruin the enjoyment of a season and in the past I liked to handhold as much as possible to avoid this.

2) We all know the draft is a bear. It is extremely challenging to follow and keep up to date on.

Introducing Google Docs to save the day. I have created a spreadsheet in Google Docs that allows multiple owners to log in at the same time, edit at the same time, and chat at the same time.

Most importantly, it contains the list of players an owner can choose from, and every owner selection will remove that player from "the board" completely.

Here's how it works:

1) Selecting your player. Use the CTRL-F function to bring up a player search window. After typing in the player you want, choose "find".


2) This will take you to the player you're looking for. To draft him, simply type in (or select via drop down window) your team Name, Round of the pick, and the year of the player. That's it!

There is validation in the spreadsheet that forces you too choose a valid team name, a valid round (#1-30) and a valid year (no 18th century revolutionary war players Sean).

It also has a drop down window if you would rather not type:


3) The doc will auto populate your pick in another tab that contains the draft time slots and results.


4) It will also populate a team specific tab


Below is the link. Please take a moment to try this out and make sure it works for you. I try not to ask much from owners, but this is critical to draft day. If there are issues with this new idea, we need to flush them out right away.

Google Docs Draft Room