| Rules | Draft | Bible | Finance | Owners | ESPN Site |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Kobe Who League
The Kobe Who League is a Rotisserie league inspired by and copied from Bill Simmon’s description of the “greatest fantasy league ever”. Do yourself a favor and read it now!
Unique to this fantasy format is a salary cap that each team must manage. To draft a good team you’ll need to know the player’s stats and their actual NBA salaries. Your challenge is to draft a good team and stay under the cap. Go over the cap and your team will incur taxes and penalties.
The Basics
- The league is hosted at ESPN.com.
- There will be a maximum of 12 teams.
- Teams have an 11 man roster (10 active, 1 bench) and are limited to 82 games per active roster spot.
- Each team’s salary is equal to the actual NBA salaries of it’s 11 players (10 active, 1 bench).
- Teams compete rotisserie style in 8 categories: Points, Field Goal %, Free Throw %, Three Points Made, Assists, Steals, Blocks, and Rebounds.
- There is a yearly draft and, if new teams join in the offseason, an expansion draft that precedes it.
- Between seasons each team may designate 3 players (‘keepers’) they want to keep who are then unavailable to draft. (Up to one keeper may be lost during an expansion draft).
- There is a “Soft cap” of $105 million (which can be exceeded for a tax) and a “Luxury (hard) cap” of $115 million (that if exceeded incurs penalties and must be fixed immediately).
- The annual league fee is $50. However, if a team ever exceeds the soft cap there is an additional luxury tax of $100.
- All fees get paid into the prize pool (there are no administrative fees for the site or for management positions).
- The winning team gets 60% of prize pool, 2nd place 30%, 3rd place 10%. If there are fewer than 8 teams it’s winner take all.
Standard Draft
Each season has a Standard Draft that takes place before the start of the NBA season. In the event NBA games have been played before the draft is complete points for games already played will be assigned retroactively for all players selected (or however ESPN calculates).
Prior to the draft each team may designate up to 3 keepers for the new season who will be kept on their roster and not available in the draft. Teams with (or without) keepers will draft normally starting in the first round but will cease drafting once they have 11 players on their roster. Other than keepers (and players acquired through the expansion draft) all players in the ESPN player universe are available to be drafted.
Teams take turns drafting players using a “snake” draft according to a draft order which is the inverse of the prior seasons record of finish (worst team picks first). The exception is that to discourage tanking the worst teams will use a lottery to determine their position as follows:
- 5 or fewer teams = no lottery
- 6–8 teams = 2 lottery teams
- 9–12 teams = 3 lottery teams
- more than 12 teams = 4 lottery teams
To further encourage tanking to be eligibile for the lottery a team must have a minimum number of 740 games played as determined by the ESPN site. The league commissioner may grant exceptions to the 740 game requirement if a team had exceptional injuries during the season.
Draft order for the very first year of the league will be determined by a drawing of inaugural team owners.
Reminder: as the draft progresses team managers are responsible for tracking their total team salaries and ensuring they remain within their desired budget.
Once the draft is completed all players not on a team roster become Free Agents.
Expansion Draft
In the event that any new teams are added in the offseason (either as an expansion team or as replacement for a prior team that left) there will be an expansion draft as follows:
Prior to the expansion draft each team from the prior season can designate one player on their prior season’s roster as protected.
A random draft order will be determined for the new teams.
Each new team will draft one player from the universe of available players which is all players except for the players designated as protected.
Once a team loses a player to the expansion draft the rest of their roster becomes unavailable to the expansion draft.
Once each expansion team has drafted one player a standard draft will be conducted as described above. The draft order will be the standard draft order described above followed by the inverse of the new team order established in the expansion draft (so that the expansion order snakes along with returning teams).
As in the Standard Draft each pick in the Expansion Draft has up to 24 hours to make their pick. If a pick is not made within the allotted time the next team is free to make their pick. If the clock expires on the last pick before it is made that expansion pick is forfeit and the team must use the Standard Draft to complete their roster.
Salaries and the Cap
Remember: team managers are responsible for their team’s salary. If the caps are ever exceeded taxes and penalties will be assessed.
Salary Bible
Player Salaries are based on actual NBA salaries as best they can be determined which is not always easy since salary information is often withheld by teams.
For this reason the League Manager will maintain a Salary Bible that will act as the definitive answer on player salaries.
The salary bible will be compiled from the following online sources with the highest priority source taking precedence.
If a player’s salary isn’t listed at any of the above sites or there is a major discrepancy between sources, then the League Manager will make a ruling on what the salary will be for the season in question.
When a player is first added to any team’s roster for a given year (declared as a keeper, drafted, or picked up off waivers) that player’s current salary in the salary bible shall stay the same all season unless that player’s NBA salary is changed by the team or NBA.
If a player’s salary is not yet in the Salary Bible when the player is added to a roster, then the League Manager will consult the usual sources for salary information and add the players salary to the bible. Team managers beware: you should know the salary of your players BEFORE adding them to your roster; consult the bible and if the salary is not listed, consult the sources listed above. If you go over the cap you will be penalized.
Team salaries are the total salaries of the 11 players on a teams roster.
Determining the Caps
The Soft Cap and Hard Cap are adjusted each year by the same percentage that the NBA uses to adjust the salary cap.
Exceeding the Soft Cap
The Soft Cap for 2017/18 is $105 million and it is each teams responsibility to stay at or under this cap if they do not want to pay the luxury tax.
If the soft cap is ever exceeded (whether intentional or not), the team that exceeds the cap must pay the luxury tax of $100.. The luxury tax is in addition to the annual fee
Once a team exceeds the Soft Cap their total salary can fluctuate up to (but not exceed) the Luxury Cap without incurring additional fees or penalties.
The Luxury Tax can only be charged once per season per team.
Exceeding the Luxury Cap
The Luxury Cap for 2017/18 is $115 million. If the luxury cap is ever exceeded the team that exceeds the Luxury Cap must take immediate action:
- The team incurs a fine of $50, and
- The team must get under the Luxury Cap through an immediate drop.
The same penalties apply every time the Luxury Cap is exceeded and there is no limit to how many times a team may be penalized for exceeding the Luxury Cap.
If a team has traded any of their picks these picks are not theirs to lose; they can only forfeit picks still in their possession. Forfeited picks will always be the next best pick still in their possession (if a team somehow exceeded the luxury cap during a draft they would forfeit the next pick - if any remaining - in that same draft).
Roster changes
Rosters can be updated daily and are locked 5 minutes before first game on the day in question or as implemented by the ESPN site.
Owners can add and drop free agents and waiver picks freely without approval of the LM. Remember, each team is responsible for staying under the soft and luxury caps and failure to do so will result in additional fees and/or penalties.
All trades are subject to approval of the LM only to ensure they are legal from a salary perspective. This is to verify that the salary cap rules are respected on the trade prior to the trade being completed and possibly affecting scoring.
Free Agents & Auctions
Undrafted players and players dropped during the season become Free Agents.
To add a Free Agent to your team you must place a bid for the player in one of the Daily Auctions and win the player when the auction closes. To win the bid:
- You can bid any amount for a Free Agent from $0 to your remaining amount.
- If you bid $0 and nobody else bids, you win.
- If you bid the highest for a player, you win.
- If teams are tied for the highest bid the team lowest in the standings at the start of the week wins.
The Daily Auction will close to bids and process at 3:00pm PST everyday. This end time allows teams to add players won at auction to their active rosters on the same day the auction closes (the earliest games usually start at 4pm PST).
Each team will start the season with $400 auction dollars. Once you run out of money you can still bid $0 for players but you will only win if nobody else wants that player.
REMEMBER: Teams are responsible for knowing the salary of the players they bid on and for staying under the cap. If the player’s salary isn’t in the Bible you can ask the LM for a ruling prior to the pickup. Alternatively a team may add a player with unknown salary to their roster and wait for a salary ruling from the LM (this technique can even be used for unsigned free agents). Once the player’s salary is determined the team must drop the player within the next 24 hours or prior to the next weekly roster lock, whichever comes first, or keep the player at their confirmed salary. If the player is dropped there are no cap implications (even if the players salary would have caused the team to exceed the cap). If the player is kept then their salary is added to team salary as usual. Any free-agent pickups and auction dollars used to add the player are forfeit whether a player is dropped or kept.
Transactions
Each team is limited to 40 free agent pickups in a season. Even if you have auction dollars left you won’t be able to add Free Agents after your 40th pickup.
Trades
Any trade that keeps all teams salaries legal (under or equal to luxury tax) are legal.
In addition, teams may include draft picks as further trade inducements as long as all salaries are legal (draft picks have no salary value for this calculation). For instance you could trade Kevin Durant for LeBron and a future third-round pick.
When a draft pick is traded it may only be for the upcoming (next) or currently in process draft and the order of the draft pick must be specified (e.g. my 1st pick).
Trades are allowed from the start of the draft through the trade deadline on or about the middle of March.
Rule changes and clarifications
The League Manager has sole discretion to change rules subject to the following:
Rules will only be changed after the season ends and prior to the next years draft (or expansion draft) with two exceptions:
All teams unanimously agree that a rule should be changed. This can be any rule for any reason as long as all teams agree.
To address a situation that isn’t covered by the existing rules.
FAQ
- Does a waiver pickup have a set salary? Yes. ALL players use the salary from the salary bible. Always. No exceptions.
- Is this the one [league] with the sticks or hoops? Hoops!