Frequently Asked Questions Page 2

There are several steps: 1. Create an account if you haven't already, by going to the Sign In page and clicking to create a new account. 2. Head over to the lobby and just click "join" on any leagues that interest you. You aren't obligated to pay for these leagues at this time. 3. Deposit money into your account using one of several methods from your Account Page. 4. Return to the lobby when you are ready and pay for the league.

You don't have to pay for your leagues right away, but don't wait too long! If you do, you risk losing out. It's first-come-first-served. For example, if the league holds 12 teams, the then first 12 to pay for their team get to play.

Once the league receives enough paid owners to fill it, it is automatically locked and your draft order is assigned. The league will no longer appear in the lobby but will be available on your Leagues page.

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DataForce software is divided into two groups of pages, or hubs. Anytime you're connected to the site, you're in one of these two hubs. The Administration hub is used to maintain your account, buy leagues, and learn about DataForce, while the Team Manager hub is used to manage your teams and view league pages after leagues are formed.

You can switch between the two hubs at any time by clicking Administration or Team Manager at the top right of the page. As you do, you'll see the menubar buttons change.

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They're just tips. Don't click on them! Hover over them for a moment until the tip message appears. Practice on this one if you like:

You'll also occasionally find book images scattered around, which you can click to go directly to the referenced section of the rulebook.

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The Live Stats display allows you to watch your fantasy games in real time, as you and your opponent accumulate fantasy points. There are two modes of display for live stats:

1. All my teams: This shows all your teams at once, in all your leagues, but shows only the game you are in for each league.
2. League display: This shows all games in one particular league.

If you own multiple fantasy teams, your display will default to "all my teams" so you can watch them all at once. To switch modes and view each game in one particular league, locate the drop-down at the top of the page. It should say "All my DataForce teams (click to see each league). Just click open that drop-down and choose the league you want to display.

Note that Tin Baby leagues don't automatically show in the "all my teams" mode. This is because some owners purchase dozens of tin baby leagues, and displaying them all at once could slow your data feed (and our server load) too much, so to view Tin Baby results in real time, you must switch to "league display" mode.

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Yes. Look for the little symbol scattered throughout the website. You can download rosters, free agent lists, waiver lists and more.

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Head over to Draft->MyDraftList on the Team Manager hub. Move players around as much as you want, and then save your work. You will now be able to see your player ranking on draft and auction nomination pages.

You have only one overall custom ranking, not one per league. This means that all your leagues share the same ranking, whether they are single-year or keeper leagues. If you make a change to your rankings, that change will be immediately reflected in all of the drafts you are currently participating in.

If you happen to miss a pick, then it's nice to have a custom ranking in place. The computer will select your player based on your rankings rather than from our Average Draft Position (ADP) list. However, if you decide you don't want a custom ranking (maybe you prepared it quite a while ago, and it's gotten a bit stale), just click the button on that page to REVERT TO ADP. This drops your rankings, and autopicks will revert to using ADP.

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You drop a player on the same page you add a player. Go to FreeAgents->Add/DropPlayers.

You don't need to add anybody to drop somebody. Just move the player you want to drop from My Team to Drop These Players and click the PERFORM ADDS/DROPS button.

IMPORTANT NOTE: When the Wednesday blind bidding deadline is approaching, you may not be allowed to drop players. It will be temporarily disabled, because every team owner should have an equal opportunity to bid on players that you drop, and dropping them too close to the deadline would be unfair. You'll have to wait until waivers run (at 10pm ET) before you can drop somebody.

But what if you need to drop a player now because you want to bid on other players? You don't really need to. Just add him to the top of your Players I'm Willing To Waive box on the Waivers->PlaceBids page. It's important to list him first, so that he will be the first player dropped. The waivers process will just keep dropping players from this box until it has made enough room on your roster for the players you win with your bids.

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This is a common question after just purchasing a team, so let's assume you have little or no experience with DataForce software. The first thing to understand is that DataForce does not create a league for play until it fills. While the league is still in the lobby, you cannot change your team name. It has to wait until the league is filled.

That said, here are the steps to take, from the very beginning, once the league fills:

1. Go first to www.dataforceff.com and log in if you haven't yet.
2. Look for the button at the top right that says Team Manager. Click that.
3. Once you switch from the Admin hub to the Team Manager hub, locate your new team by its league name, and click it.
4. Now follow the drop-down under the Owner button to the Setup page. There you can change your team name, upload or build a team logo, and set preferences for team management.

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Many pages, like the draft page, waivers page, and free agency page, allow searching by player name. Simply use that box to search by team name as well. For example, if you want to find Arizona players, just type ARI in the search box.

Hint: Don't forget to clear your search by clicking the CLEAR button when finished!

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You can reply directly to an email message (whether sent through the trade system or the messaging system) only if the sending owner is willing to make his or her email address public. This setting is near the bottom of the Owner->Setup page. Email conversations are more convenient than using our messaging system, but please understand when owners prefer to keep private information private.

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This is because DataForce software renders pages dynamically to boost the usability and speed of display. We believe the trade-off is worth it. You are not really changing pages when you move from one tab to another on the same hub; you're simply displaying different data on the same page.

Look for the Go Back link at the upper left of your page (upper right on the mobile version). That's the easiest way to return to the page you just left.

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You may have received a temporary ban on your communication. If you threaten other users, or abuse them in any way, or use excessively offensive language, such that an abuse report is lodged against you, we will suspend your ability to communicate with others. This includes messaging, chat, trade commentary, and more.

You can learn more at Report Abuse.

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If you really want to play, pay as soon as you join, especially if you are the one who requested the league. You can always move your money out of the league to join another if you change your mind before it fills.

There are two reasons you should pay quickly: (1) Paid teams draw other members like flies, and if a league sits too long without getting paid members, it grows stale in the lobby and no one else will join. (2) We periodically cull the lobby of leagues which don't have any paid members to make room for more popular league formats. If you just join and don't pay, your league may be removed.

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Sometimes a league doesn't draw enough paid entrants by the scheduled draft date. It's usually not a problem.

If it's an email draft or email auction, we simply leave it in the lobby and run the league when it does fill.

Live drafts and live auctions are a little more frustrating. First, it should be mentioned that when a league gets "in the red" (the number of paid entrants is half or more) it's almost guaranteed to fill on time, especially for less-expensive leagues. This is because we can usually find volunteers to take the last few spots at a discounted price, or we can boost the prize fund to draw more participants.

But if it just can't fill, we'll make the decision at some point to delay the league. Usually, we push it back one week, leaving it on the same day of week and time of day. That gives everyone time to reschedule and leave the league if they can't make the new draft time, and it gives plenty of time to find more participants.

As the NFL season approaches, it becomes no longer possible to push back the draft, and we must attempt to combine like leagues, or cancel the drafts. Of course, all money is refunded if we can't make it happen.

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It sits in a secure prize fund at Fidelity.com, overseen by the watchful eye of an auditing attorney firm, and then it comes back to you as prizes. Almost all of it. We boast the highest percentage return in the industry, and after we add Bonus Money on top of the other prizes, it's not even close!

We insist on complete transparency of the prize fund, so you know where your money is at all times. You can view the prize trust fund here.

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Bonus money is awarded by DataForce as low-end prizes (such as to Toilet Bowl winners) and for sign-up and referral incentives. It can be used during the purchase of leagues to decrease your cost. That is, up to $12 dollars of your league cost ($6 for a Tin Baby) will automatically come from any bonus money you have available. Bonus money cannot be withdrawn from your account.

Bonus Money expires and will be removed from your account if you do not play in a league for two years in a row.

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If your league hasn't yet filled and locked, it can still be seen in the Lobby. Just click the Leave button on the league, and your money will be refunded to your account. You may then withdraw money from your account at any time by visiting your Account page.

When your league is fully paid by all owners, it becomes locked. Draft positions are assigned; owners can begin trading draft spots; message boards are available. At this time, the league generally becomes unrefundable. However, if you find that you will be unable to participate, let us know. We will list your team for sale and if someone else buys it, you'll be refunded. You can discount the price if you like to give it a better chance of selling.

After the draft or auction begins, refunds are generally no longer available.

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First, if this is a new-year league and it league hasn't filled, then it hasn't yet locked. You can simply drop your team from the lobby or from your My Leagues page. But let's assume the league is filled and lock.

If you wish to continue to league, do you best to prepare a custom draft list. You can do this on the Draft->MyDraftList page. Or, you can simply let the computer make your picks based on Average Draft Position.

If you really would like out of the league, we might be able to help. The sooner you tell us you need out, the better. We'll list your team for sale and if someone else buys it, you'll be refunded. You can discount the price if you like to give it a better chance of selling.

Contact us at [email protected] if you would like to do this.

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Various states have various fees, taxes, and regulatory requirements that form additional costs. All Fantasy Football sites pay these fees now, if they are operating legally, but rather than increase the cost of buying into leagues to cover the additional costs, we have chosen a more fair method: we calculate the anticipated cost at the beginning of each year, and spread that costs between owners, especially those in the states requiring fees. For example, if your state requires a 10% tax, we will charge you 10% additional on the taxable portion of your entry fee (that portion which is not returned to the league in prizes).

You can learn more here.

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Live drafts, and especially live auctions, require additional commissioner time and additional bandwidth. Unlike most fantasy sites, we attend every live event from beginning to end to make sure it runs smoothly.

Another reason for the cost is that live events sometimes require last-minute fillers. We then offer a bonus-money prize boost to entice customers, and we occasionally offer volunteers (called "fillers") a discounted price to join the league at the last minute. The live draft fee we charge gives us the flexibility to make these last-minute offers, helping each draft fill.

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If your state passes laws that make fantasy football illegal, or the fees become too prohibitive, we will no longer be able to offer games in your state. DataForce is not responsible for changing laws in your state that may prevent us from offering licensed games. If you have purchased teams in multi-year leagues and must discontinue play because of changing licensing restrictions, your deposit remains non-refundable. Your teams will be sold for you at auction in the off-season alongside all other orphans, and the sale price deposited into your account.

One possibility for you if this happens is to locate a friend or relative in a legal state and transfer your teams to them. You can then operate as a co-owner, having found a legal contestant to pay entry fees and receive prizes.

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Yes, we'll try to accomodate you, but you must request this before the league fills! Otherwise, your position in each division is totally random, like your draft position.

We cannot allow division changes once all the participants have been revealed, and we certainly cannot allow division changes once the draft begins, or everyone would ask to be in the division they perceive to be the weakest.

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DataForce used to allow swapping draft spots in no-trading leagues before the draft bagins. We never considered this to be teams trading anything (the teams remain unchanged), but rather, two owners literally swapping teams, and it appeared harmless.

But we've received complaints that it just looks too much like a trade; that it changes draft strategy for other teams who may have prepared against particular opponents; that it opens up the possibility of cross-league trading, which is the very sort of collusion that people who join No Trading leagues are hoping to avoid; and that changing ownership of teams can change how many times you play each owner, which may matter to some people. In other words, the "luck of the draw" has been violated in minor ways.

So this practice is no longer encouraged. But if you and another league member wish to swap teams with plenty of time before the draft that we can poll other members to see if there is any objection (acceptance must be unanimous), we don't mind accomodating.

Note that in trading leagues, an easy way to swap draft positions is simply to trade all your picks for all of your trade partner's picks.

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This is allowed. But trading between family or household members is iffy, and such relationships must be disclosed, so that other team owners in the league have a chance to voice objections. If you think some funny business is going on between friends or family, please let us know! See the rulebook for more information.

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We guarantee it placing it in a holding fund under the watchful auditing eye of an attorney firm. As soon as a league fills, we immediately deposit all your prize money in a holding fund at Fidelity.com. You can view this prize trust fund here.

From your My Leagues page, you will find a button for each league that will link you directly to the Fidelity repository detailing the amount of prize money reserved for your league.

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You can if it's a multi-year league, like a dynasty. You can have any league name up to 12 characters (DataForce requires short names so that they fit easily on buttons). Your league name can be changed in one of two ways:

1. Request an official league vote by contacting us at [email protected] before the end of the preseason. We will enable a league-wide vote using the Owner->LeagueNameVote page. Owners will be able to nominate league names up until the season starts, and will then have through the end of the first week of the season to vote on the nominations. We will then select the winner and make the change.
2. You may also request name changes at any time during the year by taking your own informal poll within the league. Then just let us know what the owners agreed upon. If we are satisfied that all owners had input into the decision, we'll go ahead and change the league name.

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Beginning at the start of week 13, any player you drop from your roster (except kickers and defenses, and except for players in dynasty or legacy leagues) will be permanently removed from play that year. It does not matter whether you drop the player through free agency or waivers. The reason for this is two-fold:

1. As teams begin to recognize they are unlikely to make the playoffs, there may be a temptation to drop good players so that friends in the league can pick them up and play them. This sort of collusion is not allowed.
2. Disgruntled owners sometimes try to ruin a league by dropping all their players, or they may enjoy the feeding frenzy on waivers that results. This obviously has a negative impact on the league.

Different fantasy sites use different methods of combating these tactics:

• Some sites prepare an "undroppable" list: a selection of players who are deemed too valuable to allow them on free agency. While effective, we find this to be too subjective a solution, and it leads often to arguments with owners about who must be retained and who can be dropped.
• Some sites simply stop allowing free agency after a certain point in the season. We don't like this method at all!
• Others do what we do: take skill players (some sites take all players) out of play who are dropped after a certain point in the season.

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When we started operating in 2015, we began with only a few leagues on our own software, running in beta mode, and hosted all the rest on MyFantasyLeague (MFL). We plan to continue hosting leagues in both places, since MFL does have its cult following. So you can join a league on either site with us as commissioner.

Here's where it gets complicated. DataForce software allows uploading any MFL league to our own site. You can see your MFL leagues on DataForce Fantasy Football (DFF) if you like, simply by choosing MyTeams->RefreshFromMFL. That syncs DFF with MFL so they are the same. But remember, any player changes you attempt on the DFF site will have no effect if the league is hosted on MFL.

But we do have a great Live Stats feed to let you watch your games during the year. You can combine all your leagues on one page and watch them all at once! When you open the Live Stats feed on our software, it automatically syncs all of your MFL leagues so that you can watch them on DFF.

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Check the Host column in the lobby for new leagues, and the same column in your My Leagues page for leagues you have joined. Be careful to join only those leagues that are hosted on the site you prefer.

You'll also see MyFantasyLeagues clearly marked on the Team Manager hub.

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Well, of course we like our software the best! We think we offer a great draft experience and live stats feed, too. We focus on simple, easy-to-use software and navigation, we think it's less buggy, and heck, we think it's prettier, too. We don't have all the bells and whistles of the MyFantasyLeague site, but we have our niche.

On the other hand, MyFantasyLeague boasts a Developer's Program, so 3rd-party applications have sprung up that you can use to enhance your experience. We can't tell you much about them, but such tools do exist.

Our suggestion: If you are new to both DFF and MFL, play on our site. You're going to get more individual attention there, since we don't assume you know your way around either the software or the games. If you find DFF too restrictive or you're just used to MyFantasyLeague, stick with what you're used to.

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Pretty much, yes. The biggest difference is in how email auctions operate. We therefore have two sets of rules: One for DFF email auctions, and one for MFL. There are also a few rules in our rulebook that MFL doesn't enforce, so members in an MFL league are a little more self-monitoring. When you recognize a rule is being broken, you bring it to our attention and we set it right. Again, we expect you to be more experienced at Fantasy Football if you choose to play on MFL.

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Frustrating, I know. This happens when an owner trades for players or picks that fill his team before he uses all his draft slots. When it get to his turn, the draft halts and he can't pick. If you see this happen, or if it happens to you, there are three solutions:

1. Contact us at [email protected]. We can skip his turn.
2. Regular snake drafts on MFL will typically allow dropping a player so that a pick can be made. Of course, the owner may not want to drop anyone.
3. Trade the pick to someone else, preferably a team that doesn't have enough picks to fill his team.

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All teams are locked after the season ends, and new-year teams are not yet set up by MyFantasyLeague until a couple days after the Superbowl. We roll the old leagues into new ones as soon as we can after that.

You can make trades with other teams, using the prior-year league, but you won't be able to move players around in your lineup or Injured Reserve until the new-year leagues are ready.

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Please understand that when we evaluate a trade, we are working to prevent collusion. It is not our job to prevent foolish trades. A trade may be imbalanced and still be fair. For example, if an owner actively shops a player and accepts the best offer he or she can find, that is not collusion. Every owner had an equal opportunity to acquire the player.

That said, sometimes a trade offer is so imbalanced that even if no collusion is detected, allowing the trade is detrimental to the league. When this happens, especially if the trade was offered in error, we will step in and prevent the trade at our discretion.

The commissioner may also overturn a trade that is clearly accepted in error, or if there is a clear misunderstanding. If you claim that you misunderstood an offer, be prepared to back up your claim with the email conversation between you and your trade partner that led to your acceptance.

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DataForce is committed to keeping Fantasy Football a game of skill. Our owners expect better play to be rewarded. While there will always be a large amount of luck involved in this hobby, our rule selections are based on finding a proper compromise between upholding traditional fantasy football rules and diminishing the luck factor. To this end, we insist on blind bidding to give every team equal opportunity at waiver picks, we decrease the impact of kickers (no field goal is worth more than three points) while increasing the impact of defensive points allowed, and we make sure the top-scoring teams are rewarded with playoff berths.

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Our draft timer runs every 10-15 minutes to make autopicks. That means each player has a grace period of between zero and fifteen minutes before the computer will draft a player for them. If you note that the autopick is delayed more then 15 minutes, please let us know...our engine may need attention!

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You acquired this player through trade, and the trade has not yet been approved by the commissioner. Such players must remain on your team until the trade is no longer pending. Most trades are approved quickly, but controversial trades may take longer, as the commissioner researches to make sure no collusion is happening.

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A free agent is, um, free. Pick him up anytime you like and put him on your team. But a player on waivers costs bidder dollars, and you start the season with $500 for just this purpose. You can only acquire him at a blind bidding auction, which is held every Wednesday at 9pm Central Time, during both the preseason and the regular season.

There are several ways that a player can get put on waivers:

• When he is dropped from a team, he goes on waivers.
• When his game starts, whether Thursday, Saturday, Sunday or Monday, he goes on waivers.
• During the preseason, there are free agents. All the undrafted players go on waivers.

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When their games start, free agents go on waivers. A player is always either (1) On somebody's team, (2) a free agent, or (3) on waivers. Can't find the player you're looking for? Try out the Owner->PlayerSearch function.

Note that there are no free agents in the preseason. If you want to pick up that stud who just proved his worth in a preseason game, you have to bid on him in the next Wednesday auction.

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First, check the League->Players page to learn his status. If he's not there, then we may not have him in our database yet. Contact us, and we'll contact our stats provider, and get it resolved if we can.

Sometimes you may find that a player has status "Permanently Locked." This means he has been dropped from a team in week 13 or later, and therefore goes out of play. You won't be able to pick him up this year.

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These two hints may make life easier for you:

• ON DATAFORCE SOFTWARE: Each time a player drop is performed, the person on the top of the drop list is dropped. Therefore, to make sure you are dropping the right player for each pickup, any time you use the "drop only for this player" option, be sure to move that drop to the top of your list!
• ON MYFANTASYLEAGUE SOFTWARE: We have enabled conditional bidding, so to pick up multiple players you must enter multiple bid groups. The single most important thing to understand on MyFantasyLeague is that you will only receive one player per bid group. You can read more about conditional bidding below.

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Are you playing on DataForce software? Then you can't use conditional bids. Frankly, conditional bidding systems can be a nightmare for commissioners, and the more powerful (complicated) they are, the more time we commissioners spend trying to explain what happened to your bids. You can indicate that you're willing to drop a player only when you acquire a certain other player, but that's the extent of conditional bidding. We like it simple.

Are you playing on MyFantasyLeague software? Then we have enabled conditional bidding. We assume customers who prefer MyFantasyLeague are experienced and willing to learn more complex functionality.

This means you can say "I want waiver selection A or B, but not both." If waiver selection A gets processed, B does not. Therefore, waiver selections are grouped, and you will receive only one player per group. To learn more about conditional bidding and how to enter waiver selections on MyFantasyLeague, see MFL's operating instructions here.

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Live game stats are unofficial, as are the emails you receive the evening after games. Until you receive the final game results email on Monday night, after the last game of the week and that day's audit has completed, you should not consider the results to be final.

We often receive emails from customers asking "can you tell me for sure that I won this game?" No, we can't guarantee anything until about an hour after Monday night's game. That's when our final audit for the week will be complete. Up until that point, the NFL may make corrections or our stats provider may make corrections or our audit of the stats may result in corrections. These corrections are rare and usually minor, but can result in changing fantasy results.

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When your player is officially placed on season-ending IR, you may move him to an IR spot on your roster for multi-year leagues. Please do not ask us to let you put players on IR before they are officially designated as such! We will not set a precedent of allowing this. We simply do not have the manpower to field dozens of email requests, do research, and then manually update the status across a hundred leagues each time a player gets hurt. We must draw a clean line and allow player movement to IR only when the player is officially designated as on IR in the NFL.

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If he's doing it on purpose just to slow down the draft, yes, we'll do something about it. Nobody appreciates that. Otherwise, we usually give the owner the benefit of the doubt and take the approach that only if there are two timeouts in a row, or three overall, will we put the team on autopick.

We typically do not change a team's autopick setting during MyFantasyLeague drafts, because team owners there do not have the capability to remove the setting when they check back in again.

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We will not change a player from one flex position to another, such as from TE to RB or WR to TE. If a player begins the year at one position, he will remain at that position all year, with very few exceptions.

Our software is designed to allow a player into only one position, rather than qualifying for multiple positions, and it causes havoc to change that position mid-year. We must, for example, manually move that player from the starting lineup to the bench in every league before making the change. Then we must pacify all the owners who drafted or picked him up to play the other position. Finally, we must live with the fallout of owners who don't pay attention to the change, and don't reset their lineups.

We will change a player's position from QB or PK to another position, or from another position to QB or PK, if he becomes permanently designated as such in the NFL. That is the only change we'll make, and then only after careful consideration.

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The answer, almost always, is no. You want to make sure your opponents have to earn their wins, not get freebies from somebody who doesn't care anymore if they win or lose, but there's usually not much we can do about it. For one thing, we are prevented by law from assisting any team owner by making decisions for them. For another, once we start changing lineups, we start getting complaints of favoritism: "Hey, you changed my opponent's lineup and he beat me, but last week you let him play somebody on a Bye against somebody else!" It's a slippery slope.

Nor will we contact an owner directly asking him or her to set a better lineup. We do what we can, with our Tuesday night "helpful roster moves" process--which also reminds users of players in their lineup who are on bye or out for the week--but we cannot treat some owners differently than others.

That said, if you can demonstrate that an owner is purposefully trying to lose, we will take action! That is a violation of our fair-play rules.

It doesn't count if he or she simply ignores her team or forgets to set a lineup. Lots of owners simply quit playing for one reason or another, and we can't do anything about it. You must show that the owner took steps to try to lose. This usually means checking the Owner->PlayerMoves page to show that he purposefully hurt his lineup.

Finally, it is certainly within YOUR rights to contact any owner and advise/request/beg that they try to win their game.

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You can draft any NFL player you want. If you don't see him, just contact us. We'll make sure he's a legitimate player, and then hold your spot for him until he shows up on the player lists.

It's very rare that a player will be missing from the email draft list, but the live draft page is a little more conservative about which players are on the available player list. That's because the larger the list, the slower the software runs for you. But the rule remains: If you want to draft someone but don't see him, just let us know in the chat box when your turn comes.

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No, except in one unique circumstance.

MyFantasyLeague will let you do it, but it usually doesn't help your cause in a snake draft. You will not free up any draft spots by dropping players; you'll only wind up short a few players when you finish the draft.

However, if your league is running on MyFantasyLeague and because of trades you have acquired a full team, and it is now your turn to pick, you may drop a player and make a pick. If you choose not to drop a player or trade your pick, please contact us so that we can skip you pick and speed the draft, rather than waiting for it to time out.

Some sites let you drop selected keepers during a keeper/dynasty draft in order to draft different players. DataForce does not allow this, except for the above circumstance on MyFantasyLeague.com.

Dropping players in an email auction is strictly against the rules. Sometimes a team bids on players and drops them just to prevent another team from having them. This is against the spirit of DataForce's fair-play rules, because you aren't supposed to make any kind of roster moves that are not to better your own team. Roster moves made merely to block another team are considered improper. Therefore, if you happen to notice this practice in your auction, please let us know and we will restore the dropped player(s) to their teams.

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Yes, and no. It uses up the draft picks at the end of the draft, not the ones you care about at the front of the draft.

For example, if you're in a 20-player league, and you keep five players, those five players will get slotted into your picks for rounds 16 through 20. You'll still get to pick normally for rounds one through fifteen, after which your roster will be full.

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Technically, no. Go ahead and spend as much money as you want on keepers, even if it means you don't retain enough money for the auction. Only in the initial-year auction are you required to keep back $1 for every empty roster spot.

You are not required to carry a full roster after the initial first-year draft, so you are not required to complete your roster in the annual rookie/freeagent draft. Do be aware, however, that the software will not let you bid more than $1 per player if the amount of money you have available is less than or equal to the number of open roster spots on your team. You have to keep more than $1 per roster spot if you wish to do any bidding in the auction.

In contract leagues, your auction money is $200 but your salary cap is higher, at $240. Therefore, after the auction ends you can bid on waivers to fill out your team if you like.

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In DataForce leagues, you are required to select the players you want to keep three days before the draft, even in Dynasty and Legacy leagues. You will not be able to drop players during the draft to make room for more players. This is true whether your league is hosted on the DataForce platform or the MyFantasyLeague platform.

Therefore, it behooves you to look ahead at your available draft picks, and figure out how many picks you want to use, before selecting keepers. On DataForce, this can be learned on the Draft->Results page. On MyFantasyLeague, it's at Reports->League->DraftResults.

We recommend you make room for all picks through at least round three. So, perhaps by examining the first three rounds, you discover that you have four picks in those first three rounds (perhaps you traded for an extra pick sometime in the last year or two). Then you'll want to drop enough players to make room for four new players.

Now suppose in this example that your lineup allows 22 active players. You can't protect anyone on I.R. during the draft, so by the time the draft finishes, you'll have exactly 22 players. So, using this example, if you want to draft at least four, you'll have to keep 18 or fewer.

Hint: Don't select your keepers simply by dropping the ones you don't want from your team. That leaves the commissioner guessing about whether you've really made your final selections. Better, instead, to use the Owner->SelectKeepers option (Draft/Auction->SelectKeepers on MyFantasyLeague).

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The number of players you can retain from year to year. In a keeper league, you get to keep only 5 players for the next year. In a dynasty league, you can keep as many as you wish. Dynasty leagues have a couple more roster spots than keepers, too.

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Apples and oranges. In a salary cap league, salaries perpetually climb from year to year until the players eventually price themselves out of a job. So the owners eventually have to drop them and they go back on the auction with the rookies in the offseason, and the cycle starts over. A salary cap league is an exercise in forming the best team you can under the constraints of a rigid cap.

On the other hand, in a contract league the salaries don't climb. In the off-season, you decide which of your players to put on contract, and then you decide how long the contract should be. They remain on your team for that salary until the contract expires. Contract leagues are an exercise is evaluating a player's future value, and buying and selling contracts to construct a team of underpriced talent.

One major difference between the two is that when you bid on players on waivers, your bid sets the salary in the Salary Cap league. If you bid $26 for a player, his salary becomes $26. If you pick up a player from free agency, his salary becomes just $1. But in contract leagues, a person's salary only changes once per year, at the annual auction. Players who do not get drafted have a base salary of $4 for the season. No matter what you pay during the waiver process for a player, his salary remains the same.

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A "deposit" is paid up front when you buy into a brand new multi-year league. It's usually the cost of the entry fee. This deposit is not returned until the league folds, at which time it goes to the current owner of the team. A deposit may be used in full or in part by DataForce to help pay for the entry fee of an orphan sale, to decrease the orphan sale cost, in a case where an orphan team cannot otherwise sell.

A "prepayment" is an advance payment on next year's entry fee. It can be paid at any time during the year, or not at all. This fee is charged in order to enable future-year pick trading. It is required for certain states, while for other states DataForce will enable future-year trading on an agreement that you will auto-renew at the end of the year if you have traded away draft capital.

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The deposit system is what keeps multi-year leagues intact from year to year. It provides an incentive for owners to return, and it provides a basis of value for selling unwanted teams so that other owners will be enticed to pay for them.

Think of the deposit as the cost you pay to buy a new team. It now belongs to you. If you sell the team at auction on a later date, you pocket the sale price.

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It's your deposit money. Deposits are there to add value to teams, helping the league fill in future years if some of the owners leave. However, even if you leave the league, you do not automatically forfeit the deposit! If you leave, DataForce will auction your team to the highest bidder, and the money received will be passed to you ... whether it is higher or lower than your original deposit!

In this way, the deposit on each team is maintained from year to year. If the league is ever disbanded, or DataForce ceases to provide commissioner services, all team deposits are returned to the current owners.

Once in a great while, DataForce dips into the deposit to be able to drastically reduce the price of an orphan that just won't sell. For example, we may pull $50 from the deposit to decrease the orphan price $50 on the marketplace. But this is rare; we really prefer keeping the deposit intact, as this helps keep the league alive, so we're willing to first take a reasonable loss on orphan sales.

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Head over to your Keepers->RenewTeams page (on the Administration hub) and, instead of clicking PAY to renew your team, click LEAVE. This will ask you for a listing price, optionally letting you put the team up for sale on the marketplace.

If you don't set a price, your team will languish unsold until the renewal due date, sometime in May, when it goes up for auction. Either way, you get any proceeds from the sale.

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If you have dropped a team, and it hasn't sold on the marketplace by the deadline, we go through three phases to try to get you the best price possible:

1. We hold a blind bidding auction first, and sell to the highest bidder.
2. If no bids are received, or if bidders can't follow through on the purchase, we set a price and hold a buy-it-now sale on the Orphan Marketplace.
3. If we still can get no takers, the team is given away for $1 ... or even less! Yes, sometimes we decrease the price to less than zero, and DataForce (not the seller!) then takes a loss on the sale. (The buyer still has to pay the current-year entry fee to play.)

The process can take up to three weeks.

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Well, I guess it's possible! If you buy a league for $40, and then it brings $60 in the auction the following year, you pocket a cool $20. But you have to pay the entry fee each year you own the league.

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In theory, the average team in a $50 league is worth $50. That's because that is the value of the deposit beneath the team; when the league eventually folds, that is how much money comes back to you. But who wants to buy someone else's average team for the same price that they could draft their own? You draft better than average, right?

So the average orphan price is closer to half of the team's inherent value. Better teams are worth the entire deposit ($50, $100, or whatever the league costs) and celler-dwellers can be had for $1 because the commissioner is anxious to keep the league going. Remember, DataForce doesn't make money selling orphans! The money paid at auction goes to the prior owner of the team. We'll get him or her the best price we can at auction, but we're also motivated to keep the league alive.

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This is a league that migrated to DataForce from another Fantasy Football commissioner service. There are two things you absolutely need to know about grandfathered leagues:

1. The rules may differ from regular DataForce leagues, particularly in scoring. Check the bylaws carefully. On the MyFantasyLeague site, these can be found at Reports->Rules->League Bylaws.
2. The teams do not--or at least did not originally--have deposits beneath them. We do not charge owners new deposits when the league migrates from another company. If you bid on one of these teams in their first year on DataForce, the amount of your bid actually becomes the team deposit. You win the team at auction for $20? Then the deposit on the team becomes $20, and you'll get that money back when the league eventually folds.

Other than these two difference, grandfathered leagues operate exactly like any other multi-year league.

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Of course, if everyone wants to! Just get a few owners request a live draft (we like to see three), and we'll put up a league vote page for you, where all owners can specify the dates and times they are available ... or indicate that they don't really want to draft live after all. We aim to please, but we won't change the draft without agreement, nor will we schedule a live draft at a time that isn't satisfactory to everyone.

Other than these two difference, grandfathered leagues operate exactly like any other multi-year league.

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Absolutely not! It is a clear violation of our fair-play rules to purposefully set less than your optimal lineup, and is cause for suspension.

More importantly, it won't help one bit to lose! The only thing that matters in determining next year's draft picks--except for the teams which make the quarterfinals in the playoffs, since these four teams earn the last four draft spots--is your Potential Points calculation. The sum of your potential points through week 14 determines your draft position for the first 8 draft spots next year.

Potential points is a bestball calculation that determines how well your team could have done, had you played the best lineup. Additionally, you are awarded penalty points if you form a team that scores no points at a position. See the rulebook under Potential Points to learn more.

You can, of course, roster players whom you think will play but play badly, but this is a strategy that often backfires, as well as crippling your team for the Toilet Bowl.

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DataForce software is largely browser agnostic, which means we frankly don't care what type of computer or mobile device you have, nor do we care what browser you use. Our software uses industry standard tools that should work for everyone. However, there are a few things that can cause havoc:

• If the site looks garbled and unprofessional, and doesn't respond to anything you do, you may have javascript disabled. This is a no-no, since virtually all new websites rely on javascript nowadays, so get it turned back on.
• If you can't seem to stay logged in, or the website keeps returning to the login page, the most likely cause is that you have disabled cookies. DataForce relies on cookies for navigation and team management. You must enable cookies if they've been turned off.
• If you're using a mobile device, you may have trouble with drag-and-drop and with tooltips. Certain mouse functions just aren't the same on mobile devices. Click on player names and follow instructions rather than attempting drag-and-drop, and make a note to read the tooltips later. Sorry, best we can do.
• If you can't seem to get a password reset by email to work, it's possible that your username has somehow acquired a special character that is throwing off the URL you're being provided. After you've tried two or three resets, just drop us an email and we'll give you a new password by hand, correcting your account name as well if necessary.
• If pages load slowly (usually pages that contain a lot of player names), there are two likely causes: (1) Your internet connection is slow to receive large amounts of data, or your computer is short of available memory. Yes, your own compuer matters: Much of the processing on your page is local, meaning that the server ships you the content in abbreviated form, and javascript on your computer enhances the content once received. Because player databases are large, the only solution to this problem is faster connections and computers.

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The most common reason for this is usually easily remedied. The emails are most likely going to your spam folder, or your email program is filtering them by content. Check your spam folder and filtering, white-listing [email protected] if necessary, before doing anything else.

If that wasn't the problem, the second most common problem is that you've been blocked on our end. When we receive a spam report, either from you directly or from your email provider, it blocks all further output to you. Multiple bounces may also result in a block placed on your email. We have to remove the block to restore communication, so just drop us an email and we'll fix it.

The third most likely is that your setup has changed, so you're not getting emails for the functions you expect. Visit your Owner->Setup page to review your setting.

If you're having problems receiving emails from MyFantasyLeague, the solutions are similar. We can't unblock an email address (MyFantasyLeague has to do that for you) but we can sometimes tell if you've been blocked. Let us help if we can.

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There is a provision for this. Lineup changes can be submitted to us by email, so long as they are timestamped before the games begin. Please see the rulebook..

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Unfortunately, there's nothing we can do. At all. Please always double-check your lineups, verifying that you saved them, especially if you're on MyFantasyLeague where it's easy to make a mistake.

Missed lineups in week 1 will be set by the commissioner based on best-play pre-game projections. Missed lineups on any other week of the season will remain the same as the prior week.

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We will definitely help you make your picks! But please contact us before your pick expires. Or, at worst, immediately afterward, before any other teams make their picks. Slow drafts give you plenty of time to make your choice without a mad rush at the very end, and the rules are clear that when time expires the computer will pick for you, so please don't ask us to change your pick simply because you didn't make it in time.

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Tell us immediately. We are sympathetic to operator error and will correct honest mistakes if reported immediately.

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Again, tell us immediately. This happens a lot more than you might think. Again, we are sympathetic to operator error, and we are sympathetic to misunderstood rules. If you simply changed your mind, or if your player's injury turned out to be more serious than you thought, we'll do nothing more than offer consoling words.

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This is one I wish we heard more often! Please bring any problems or confusing operations to our attention! If something isn't working properly, and we determine that a malfunction occurred, we'll bend over backwards to make things right ... and then we'll fix the software.

However, with that said, we must insist that problems be reported immediately, and that you remain responsible for double-checking the results of actions such as setting line-ups, offering trades and placing waiver bids.

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Our job is to send the email to the address you provide. It's not our job to make sure it's delivered to you, or that it avoids your spam folder. We cannot be responsible for missed emails or for your spam settings.

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We're going to get several of these comments every year. Statistically speaking, this will happen to several of our customers each season. Several dozen of our customers will receive bottom-3 picks in their first two drafts. It sucks when it happens to you, but it has to happen to somebody.

Unfortunately, if this does happen to you there is absolutely nothing we can do about it. We use a standard linear congruential algorithm (PHP's shuffle, for those in the know), which is more than sufficient. The integrity of a completely random pick assignment is a staple of any Fantasy Football site, and we will never change the assigned picks for any reason.

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Rats. But yes, the post office is definitely slower than it was in past years, so patience is advised.

Our rule of thumb is give the mail two weeks from the day you receive your email from us saying your withdrawal has been processed (this is usually the same day you request a withdrawal). If you live in Canada, figure on a few days more. If you live overseas, give it at least three weeks.

After this time, please contact us. We are able to place a stop-payment on the original check, and issue a new one, or let you choose a different means of withdrawal. We'll let you know what new check number is valid, and what old number has been invalidated.

If the canceled check arrives at a later date, we request that you void it, snap a picture, and share with us so we can file it. Sometimes the canceled check is accidentally deposited, instead. Be careful not to do this! Not only will your deposit be debited back by your bank, but your bank will probably charge you a fee as well!

What if someone steals your check? This hasn't happened yet for any of our thousands of checks, but it's a concern, and you're not on your own. State law generally states that we or you are not responsible, so we get our money back from our bank if someone forges your signature to cash your check, and we can then write you a new check, though of course the process does take time. There is federal protection as well in the United States against theft. We recommend you research this on your own for your state and country before deciding on a method of withdrawal.

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Let's first be clear about something: it's not cheating if he or she hasn't broken any rules. We have a hard time taking seriously any claims of cheating that aren't clearly against the posted rules, and we are extremely unlikely to change any rules mid-draft or mid-year.

That said, sometimes an owner does break the spirit of fair play while staying within the rules, and we have to make a judgment call. Let us know if you think something isn't fair, so we can discuss it. We want everyone to have fun, and we will try to reason with reasonable people. It helps a lot if you're reasonable too.

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Oh, boy, do we hear this a lot. Most of the time you're right. These email auctions on MFL are notoriously hard to manage. But you are not tattling when you bring these things to our attention. You are helping us keep things under control, and believe me, we appreciate it. Babysitting is a hard job.

In the case of excessive nominations, we may warn the offending owner and ask him to temporarily not submit new nominations, or we may be able cancel the nomination if it's early in the auction. Repeat offenders, whether the excessive nominations are by accident or not, will have nomination privileges temporarily suspended.

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Goodbye.

We take our role as commissioner seriously. We cannot under any circumstance ever give the impression that we are influenced by threats or coercion. If your communication can in any way be perceived as a threat or as coercion, by us or by any owners in your league, we must disregard it in its entirety.

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