Keeper League Advice Needed

[latenight71]

I am in a 12 team Yahoo keeper league (8x8) that has had a tremendous amount of churn over the years (we've lost an average of 3 owners per year).

Our keeper rules are simple (may be too simple)
Teams may keep 6 players per season and for each player kept you lose your draft pick based on the players current value. We use Yahoo's ranking to determine what round a player would be kept in (So if your player is ranked 24 you lose a 2nd round pick). If you have 2 players valued in the top 12 you would lose your first and second pick.

We have no max contract or anything stopping teams from collecting the top picks over the years so we have a team starting out with Pujols and Cabrera and others who will wind up with Sandoval or David Wright as their #1 pick (and best player).

Any recommendations? Is the simple answer to only allow players to be kept for a certain amount of years? Am I just being bitter?

[bigmck]

If you want to make your league work well, there has to be a limit on the number of years a player can be kept. If you don't players like Albert Pujols will be kept every year and no one will have a shot at him. I suggest three years. This way it helps the teams on the bottom to get good players once in a while and help them to climb to the top.

[jefferey13]

We have a 3 year limit on players and one guy can be kept for 4, which works, but I don't think this is the very best way though. I think an auction with set increases in costs over the previous year is the way to go.

I also don't like the system you have where they are taken in their current ranking. This takes away all incentive to try to find those up and comers and get them in late picks, because if they do work out you have to pay a lot the following year instead of being rewarded for researching and drafting new players.

[lane_anasazi2]

Teams may keep 6 players per season and for each player kept you lose your draft pick based on the players current value. We use Yahoo's ranking to determine what round a player would be kept in

That kind of defeats the point of keeper leagues, doesn't it? Let's say you took a flier with Hosmer last year in the 16th round. In most keepers, that's what he'd cost you this year, maybe with a penalty of a couple rounds, and maybe a larger penalty the more years you kept him. In your league, Hosmer would now cost you a, what, 5th round pick or something. Why bother? If you're keeping guys based directly on their current value that's almost the same as a redraft.

In the end, though, it's the managers who make the league. No matter what rules you impliment, you'll never have a good league with bad/surly/whiny/indifferent managers.