Constitution

League Introduction

1. The Strat-O-Matic Basketball Association (SBA) is an internet-based league that uses the Strat-O-Matic computer game and the previous year's National Basketball Association (NBA) statistics to run a full 82 game basketball season and playoffs (along with an annual rookie draft, trading, off-season activity, etc.).
2. The SBA consists of 29 teams, each owned and run by a different coach (when possible).  This league was created to model the NBA, so any changes in the league will be assumed to be adopted by the league. This includes rule changes as well and any expansion to more teams.
3. Each team in the SBA owns 12 NBA players for the duration of the season, unless they trade or release them to free agency.  Decisions to retain or release a player are based upon his age, minutes played, health and playing status and upward potential.
4. Games will be played by the Visiting Team Coach.  At this point, Strat-O-Matic Basketball does not support internet play.
5. The SBA places a strong emphasis on matching real NBA performances so minutes played are carefully monitored and managed throughout the season.   Teams that use players beyond their seasonal minutes limits are penalized during the season and playoffs.
6. League participation and communication is strongly urged.
7. This is probably the most important rule/theme of the league!  FUN, RESPECT, and INTEGRITY are the key ingredients for this league.  Bad mouthing other members for their ideas, causing disruption to its members, continued lateness or disregard for the league procedures will not be tolerated.

Costs and Requirements

1. There is no fee for membership in the SBA.
2. The SBA uses the computer game that currently provides the best combination of statistical accuracy, playability, and enjoyment (with statistical accuracy being by far the greater consideration). Strat-O-Matic Computer Basketball is the chosen game for the SBA, so you must purchase a copy of Strat-O-Matic Computer Basketball, along with the current season player diskette to participate in this league.
3. You need to make a commitment to stay in the league for a long while, as it will greatly hurt the league if you bail out of the league after one year or after your dynasty falls apart and you have to start rebuilding. Having long-term committed managers also helps our continuity and allows us to form good friendships thru years of emails, trading, and playing.

SBA Web Sites

1. The SBA has a web site at http://members.cavtel.net/stangd/sba

2. The SBA web site is where current roster moves, league records, and various other important information for the SBA is kept.

3. The league also makes extensive use of an internet based message board at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SBAhoops as a gathering place for day-to-day league activities and interaction. 

About the Commissioner

1. The SBA currently has one Commissioner, Doug Stang. Doug is responsible for managing league activities, handling monthly file processing and providing direction for the league.

2. The Commissioner also maintains the league database and web site.

3. The Commissioner is also in a unique position in that he is also an owner.  It goes without saying that the Commissioner will not abuse or take advantage of his stature to gain an unfair advantage in the league.

League Setup

1. The SBA consists of 29 teams, with the goal being that each team is owned by a separate general manager.  However, in order to keep all teams actively managed the SBA does allow owners to manage a second team with limitations (see Caretaker Owners).
2. The SBA league structure and team names will mirror exactly that of the NBA, namely the league will employ the NBA league structure with two conferences (Eastern and Western), each containing two divisions (Atlantic, Central, Mid West, and Pacific). 
3. In the event of expansion, realignment or downsizing in the NBA, the league structure will change to match the NBA.

Files

1. All files will reside in the SOMBK directory, and will follow the naming convention of yyyyyyS (for example the 2001-02 SBA files will be named 200102S.*)
2. Each year, upon receiving the new player diskette from Strat-O-Matic, the commissioner will create a new SBA league and place all players that appear on the current roster disk onto their proper SBA teams.  The SBA league files will be identified with the letter "S".
3. At the beginning and end of each monthly interval, the commissioner will post to the Yahoo! group and to the website, up-to-date Strat-O-Matic league files.
4. To load the new SBA League files, unzip the league file into your C:\SOMBK\LEAGUES directory. The computer game should not be running when doing this.
5. All managers are required to have a copy of Winzip at their disposal.  All league files will be sent in zipped format.

Regular Season

See Appendix 1 - Procedures section below for details on submitting Game Plans and Game Results.

1. The regular season begins on November 1st, at which time everyone is expected to have the latest version of the game.
2. The regular season is 82 games and is patterned exactly after the NBA schedule.  The season is broken into monthly intervals.  The schedule for the monthly intervals is as follows:

   1st of month	League file is issued for the new month.
   6th of month	Game Plans (aka Coach Files) are due. As soon as game files are submitted, opponents can begin using them for their games.  Teams will be notified of which games they can autoplay against teams that do not have owners.
   22nd of month	Game Results are due for ROAD games.  New League file is issued.  Begin accepting waiver pickups for the next month.
   27th of month	Game Results are due for any HOME games that an opponent has not played.
   27th of month	Autoplay any unplayed games, process game files, and make roster changes for any burnouts or trades.  Also deadline for submittal of waiver pickups.
   1st of next month	Process any free agent claims/releases and issue League File.
   * All deadlines are at 10pm EST

3. Each interval is one month and consists of all the games on the schedule played for that month.  Intervals around Christmas and the New Year will be slightly modified for the holidays.
4. Each owner is required to submit game plans for his team's home games for that month.  Any home games for which an owner does not submit a game plan are subject to be played by his opponent or autoplayed by the commissioner.
5. Each owner is required to play at least his team's road games and then send in the statistics files for those series before the end of the current monthly interval.
6. Additionally, owners may have to play all games (home and road) against teams that have no active owners.  Lineups are set by the computer for vacant teams.   Additionally, home games for which an owner has submitted a game plan but the opponent has not played it by the monthly deadline may be played by the owner.
7. Any games NOT played by the monthly deadline are autoplayed by the commissioner.

Player Eligibility

1. Each year around September, a new player diskette becomes available from Strat-O-Matic that has all of the NBA players and their statistics/ratings for the real NBA season that was played in the previous year.
2. Any player who appears on the diskette is deemed eligible to play in the current SBA season.
3. If a player that is owned by a team does not appear on the diskette, then he is still owned by the team (see Team Rosters) that had him, but he can only retain him as his "13th man" and not on his active 12 man player roster.

Off-Season Draft

1. Each year, between the playoffs and the start of the next season, the league will conduct a rookie/free agent draft. 
2. Before the draft begins, each team may protect up to nine players who total no more than 18,000 minutes (for the current NBA season). Those players released go into the pool of players eligible for the draft.  NBA rookies and any unsigned players from the previous year are also included in this draft.  NOTE: Any designated 13th man COUNTS against your nine players/18,000 minutes limits (see Team Rosters for more details).
3. Draft order will consist of a modified weighted lottery system similar to the NBA.  For the first round ONLY, a lottery system is used to determine the first three picks of the draft amongst the non-playoff teams.   Picks 4-13, which is the remainder of the non-playoff teams are determined based on record.  Picks 14-29, consist of the playoff teams, and are determined based on how teams finished in the playoffs.  For subsequent rounds, draft order is based on seasonal record and record in the playoffs.  (see Appendix 2 - Determining Draft Order).
4. Each team has 24 hours in which to make their selection. In other words, the first team to draft has 24 hours to make their pick, the next team then has 24 hours from when the last team teamed picked to make their selection.  The draft continues in this fashion until all teams have completed their rosters. 
5. A team that does NOT select in their 24 hour window is skipped and subsequent teams can continue making their picks.  The skipped team can make their pick at anytime up until the end of the current round.  If a team does not make their pick by the end of the round the Commissioner will autopick for them.
6. For teams that are not currently owned, the Commissioner will make autopicks for them.  The Commissioner will rank order available players by TENDEX and select the highest rated player where the team has the greatest need.  For skipped teams that do no draft, the Commissioner will simply autopick the player with the highest TENDEX rating.
7. Players eligible to be drafted will be published on the league web site.  If for some reason a team makes an invalid selection (eg. an already drafted player or an ineligible player), owners are welcome to point this out to the offending owner but the next teams to draft are NOT obligated to wait for the offending owner to remake his pick and can draft immediately.  Given that eligible players and draft selections are openly published for all, the onus is on the individual owner's to make valid selections.

Team Rosters

1. Rosters are limited to a maximum of 12 players.  There is no roster minimum but teams must retain enough players to field a viable team and cover required minutes at each position.
2. Teams may also designate a player as there "13th man".  The so-called 13th-man is a roster spot on a team designated for a player that has no more then 400 NBA minutes played last year. This player remains inactive for the entire season and may not be traded, waived or made active.
3. A listing of each team’s roster is kept at the SBA web site.
4. Only the SBA Commissioner is allowed to make any changes (i.e. trades, player releases, free-agent pick ups) to the Strat-O-Matic SBA roster files.

Player Usage

1. Players will be limited to their Actual NBA Minutes played plus a bonus of 10%. For example a player that had 1000 minutes played in the NBA would be eligible to be used for 1100 (1000 + .10*1000) minutes in the SBA. 
2. In addition, 'Crap' players, ie. those players NOT drafted during the off-season draft AND who pass the filtering criterion are awarded an additional 600 minutes to their Actual NBA Minutes plus a bonus of 10%. See Appendix 3 - Designating Crap Players for details on filtering criterion.  Revised 6.24.03
3. Players that go over their seasonal limit of minutes are deemed burnouts and are made  ineligible for the rest of the regular season (see Burnouts).
4. There is no limit to the number of games a player can play in a season, minutes played for the season is the only limit.
5. Players are only allowed to play up to their maximum per game minutes allowed as defined by Strat-o-matic or minutes per game in the NBA.  In the Playoffs, Minute per game limits are raised for 6 and 12 minute rest players.  Here is the breakdown:

   Rest (according to Strat-o-matic cards)	Rest (according to MPG in NBA)	Regular Season-Minutes per game	Playoffs-Minutes per game
   2	>= 39.5 mpg	46	46
   6	< 39.5 & >=33.5	42	46
   12	< 33.5 & >=27.5	36	42
   18	< 27.5	30	30

6. Players can only play a position that they are rated to play as shown on the MINUTES GRID.  For example, 1997-98 Joe Smith has minutes of 0-0-14-15-1 (pg-sg-sf-pf-c).  He is rated to play SF, PF, and C.
7. Players can not be positioned inside (or outside) if they are not rated there.  The computer game enforces this rule.
8. For the playoffs, players are awarded a bonus of 125% of their regular season minutes.  Burnouts on the other hand are allowed only 75% of their minutes in the playoffs.  Minutes allowed per playoff series are normalized to the number of games in the series.  Additionally 6 and 12 minute rest players get increased MPG bonuses. (see The Playoffs).
   

Burnouts

A Burnout is a player that has gone over his SBA minutes for the season (NBA minutes for the season * 110%).  In order to maintain fairness and reality in the SBA, minute restrictions must be carefully adhered to.  Once a player goes over his minute allotment in the season he is deemed a burnout and is removed from his team's roster and is ineligible to play in any more games for that season. 

Burnouts also incur deep penalties for the playoffs so its very important that owner's watch their minute usage carefully during the season.  Burnouts, even though not on the computer game roster, are still on the team's paper roster and can be waived or traded just like any other player.

As disincentive to burning out players excessively, a new rule has been instituted. For every 100 minutes that a team overuses or burns out its players (total of ALL team's burned out players), that team loses 1 position in next years draft. Revised 6.24.03
 

Trades

1. Teams can trade their currently owned players or upcoming year draft picks.
2. Teams may trade at any time except during the final two months of the season, during the playoffs and for a short time following the league championship.
3. Teams may only trade draft picks for the upcoming off-season draft.   Teams may NOT trade draft picks beyond next year.
4. Teams may NOT trade the player designated their 13th man.
5. "Loaning" of players or "players to be named later" are not allowed.
6. Teams may trade any number of players and/or draft picks in a single trade, so long as no team ever exceeds the roster maximums.
7. All trades must consist of the following steps...

   • Two managers agree on the terms of a trade.
   • One or both owners involved must email the terms of the trade to the Yahoo! list. The name of the teams, the players, and the draft picks involved must be clearly listed for both teams by each manager.   Both owners must confirm the trade.
   • Upon receiving the trade proposal from both managers involved, the commissioner checks to see if the terms of the trade violate any league rules. If they do not, then the trade is considered to be approved. When a trade is approved, it is only listed in the SBA web page. The actual SBA rosters in Strat-O-Matic are not altered until the trade is made official at the beginning of the next interval. The commissioner then sends an email to the Yahoo! list telling them that the trade has been approved.
   • At the beginning the next interval, the commissioner makes all trades that were approved during the previous interval to be official.  When a trade is made official, the commissioner actually makes the trades in the team rosters in Strat-O-Matic. After making any possible trades official, the commissioner will then send the up-to-date Strat-O-Matic SBA rosters out to all managers (with the rosters now altered by any possible trades that were approved during the previous interval).

8. Any trade can be protested either by at least two owners or the commissioner.  If a trade is protested, then a committee of three league owners, who have been previously determined, will vote whether to uphold or reject the trade.  A majority vote of the trade committee (at least two out of three votes) is required to uphold or reject the trade.  If a protested trade involves any member of the trade committee, then the Commissioner will vote in their place.  Overturned trades will only happen in extreme circumstances, when it is obvious that one manager involved in the trade is attempting to harm the league in some manner, and will not happen because an owner(s) think that one team made a poor trade.

Waiver Wire/Free Agents

1. A Free Agent is any player not currently on a team roster and still possessing minutes.
2. Starting in the second monthly interval, December, at the beginning of each month before the new league disk comes out, teams will have the opportunity to select free agents from the waiver wire.  All free agent signings and trades will be processed and included in the new league disk for the upcoming month's games.
3. Priority for waiver selections will be based on the total minutes left on a team before the start of the month. The less minutes you have left the higher your pick. If two team's have the exact number of minutes left then the tie breaker is W-L record.  Minutes are recalculated as each player is added to the team roster, so a team that wants to pick up multiple players may move down the list as they accumulate more minutes with each player.
4. Teams send their selections to the Commissioner, they may want to send more then 1 player in case they don't get their top choice. The Commissioner will send their picks to somebody else.  Teams must also indicate who they wish to drop in case a player is picked up.  The rule is simple to pick somebody up you need to drop somebody, whether they are burned out or not.
5. Each team is allowed up to 6 free agent picks for the year. Teams can make as many picks as they want in a given month.
6. Free agency ends after the March session.
7. For ownerless teams that need players due to attrition thru burnouts, the Commissioner will select the player with the most minutes at the position that is needed most.
8. Free Agents picked from the waiver wire in this fashion can only be retained for the current year.  Once the season ends they are released into the off-season pool of free agents.  Released players of course are no longer a team's property.
9. Burned out players released to free agency are removed permanently from the free agent pool.
    

Appendix 1 - Procedures

5. Subsequent rounds are based strictly on regular season record and record in the playoffs, in worst to first order.

Appendix 3 - Designating Crap Players 

2) Assists per 48 min < 9.0

3) Rebounds per 48 min  < 16.0

4) 3Metric48 < 5.5 (see below)
6) FTA per 48 min < 7.9
7) if rated, ScoEff < .500

where,
3Metric = 5*3PM - 3PA
ScoEff = PTS / (2*FGA + .88 FTA)