agrudez wrote:Don't you then have an "unfair advantage" in the EBA when someone has a former player that gets poached?
I don't understand. An EBA team is going to get a player either way, the only question is from which team.
I don't think the prospect of losing an unprotected Rule 5 guy is a deterrent for a poaching team. That addition wasn't about punishing the MBBA team (few will even notice the player gone, I'd suspect), but rather helping ease the blow to the EBA team.
The proposal would not be stiff enough to keep anyone from poaching a name player. It isn't meant to. What it does is keep a team (like us now, but it will be someone else later, maybe) from losing a Rule 5 eligible player merely because we got out-bidded. I have no real emotional commitment to this situation overall, and I'm fine personally as we move forward. The Nine probably won't feel like mine fully until I have a season or two under my belt. So this gives me a very small window to work in.
The Rule 7 is a brand new twist, and its current incarnation leaves the top team open to both losing the pick, and losing a Rule 5 eligible player from their organization who might have a little value. I don't see how that's a positive. Rule 7 as I suggest it gives the #1 team in the list a pretty fair idea that they are going to have some advantage to having the #1 spot, even if it's just being able to grab a back-up someplace.
The intent of the Rule 6 was two-fold: 1) Spice up FA and 2) Give bottom teams a leg up on acquiring extra talent (note: "leg up" does not mean "get handed"). I know you're new and don't have this background, but I'm pretty sure Baca was only the 2nd "high profile" guy poached from a team (the other being a closer that ended up getting PAID). Sometimes the secondary and tertiary guys get poached (like Talboom), but most of the times the top picks are easy to retain for the drafting team. It's just that, in the extremely rare case (as I said before, I'd estimate this is only the 3rd TRULY elite guy in the Rule 6) that an elite guy is in the Rule 6 the rules tend to lend themselves towards piracy.
I'd pose this question, though... doesn't this accomplish intent #1 of spicing up FA?
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_e_smile.gif)
I don't see how my suggested change would stop the spice. After all, as you said, losing two rule 5 guys would almost certainly not deter a team from poaching a name player. All my suggestion does is make sure that the #1 drafting team doesn't get hurt (beyond the 10 PP) due to being over-bid, which we definitely do as the Rule 7 draft is written today.