That gives me another two weeks to get this thing buttoned up and ready for launch. It is a process just turning it over from one year to the next, because of the addition of new players, subtraction of old players who are out of the league and haven’t had any NFL stats in the past three years. Updating our supporting player database for all the vital information for the players. Compiling the stats from the past three years to include in the Compiler. Not to mention we have different versions for Excel 2007 and newer, and Excel prior to 2007 (2008 for Mac).

I always like to add something new as well. Last year, things were really new, because it marked the first time the Cheatsheet Compiler and Draft Buddy were in a single file. Sorry baseball fans, that didn’t happen for baseball this past season. For football though, it was great.

Unfortunately, we had to lose some features from the prior two-file system to help ensure the single file would work properly and not be overloaded with data and features that could compromise performance. I’d like to try to add back some of those features this year. One is the countdown timer, which a number of people missed last season. The issue with that went beyond the one-file, two-file change as it was yet another alternate version of Excel causing problems – 32-bit or 64-bit for Windows. The countdown timer didn’t work in 64-bit Excel. I’m still investigating how to fix that.

I’d also like to add some new stats this year, if possible. Tackles for loss is one that is becoming more popular for leagues that use individual defensive players. I won’t be able to do anything with respect to valuing the players, but at a minimum I think I’m going to change the “Exp” column on the DL, LB and DB tabs to more detail about each player’s position – defensive tackle or defensive end; cornerback or safety.

Overall there won’t be as much new stuff as the big change last year (don’t think I could dream up that big a change again), but there is still plenty to look forward to because fantasy football drafting season is almost here! If you want to review some of my early drafting calls, check out the mock draft I’m participating in as @FantasyThrowdwn.

Work this past month included getting my Stanley Cup Playoffs Pool and the annual NFL Draft Contest up and running, updating the NFL Draft Tracker over at FF Today, plus planning for the second year of Fantasy Throwdown.

And… of course, planning and development of the fantasy football version of the Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy. Or are we calling it just “Draft Buddy” this year? Maybe, maybe. All will be revealed in due time. I love that I’m already receiving some emails from people about the football version.

There isn’t much else to say. Yes, I know people want the old countdown timer back in the CC/DB this year, so I am trying to make that happen. It is going to be a busy month of May getting ready for another great season of fantasy football. Keep checking in for semi-periodic updates, but know when the football CC/DB is ready, we will let past customers know by email. Now back to the grind.

I got onto my @FantasyThrowdwn Twitter account last week and before I knew it, I was in two different fantasy football mock drafts. One organized by buddy Jim Day (a.k.a. @FantasyTaz), and the other by Jeff Ratcliffe (@JeffRatcliffe) from Pro Football Focus.

Both leagues have similar format: start 1 QB, 2 RB, 2 WR, 1 TE, 1 RB/WR/TE Flex with PPR scoring. The difference is Jim’s mocks have a team defense position, and Jeff’s is an individual defensive player draft, start 2 DL, 3 LB, 2 DB, 1 DL/LB/DB Flex. The IDP scoring is pretty significant too, with 1.5 points per tackle, 6 per sack, 6 per turnover, plus points for tackles for loss.

The Cheatsheet Compiler & Draft Buddy for fantasy football is not updated for 2012 yet. It is normally available in June when the projections are done. I don’t even have the 2011 stats organized yet for the new CC/DB. However, I am keen to track these drafts with the CC/DB, even if I’m using the 2011 version. So that is just what I’ve been doing.

Well, truth be told, I started using it right away for the first mock, but not for the IDP draft. Until today, with over seven rounds drafted, I wanted to see how the rosters were shaping up to help me decide what positions I should be targeting to help get the best value in the draft. So, time to set up the CC/DB and input seven rounds of picks.

I know that sounds like it would take a long time, but it doesn’t have to, and I can prove it with the video below. Consider this the first CC/DB fantasy football video for 2012, as I show the steps involved setting it up, and how to get the team owners and existing picks into the file quickly without selecting every individual player. Hopefully you find it helpful, and happy mock drafting!

I haven’t received a full projection update from Rick, and truthfully, I’m not sure if he was planning to do one since the season is now underway. Generally, we don’t update projections after the season starts. This season is a little different than in the past with the opening series in Japan. (Hooray, I drafted Dustin Ackley last week!) If Rick has time to come through for us and send an update, then I’ll put it up and post when it is ready. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or Google+ for update notices. In the meantime, hit Update Projections in your copy of the Compiler to get the latest ADP and depth charts.

Fortunately ezcollectibles had an extra family member kicking around to make up the 14th team, and everyone else showed good patience sticking it out for the new start time and later night than planned.

All in all, it was a very fun auction draft. I like my team overall, but I made some mis-steps I wish I could take back. That is a typical outcome from an auction, since they are rather unpredictable. What looks like a good deal on a player one minute turns out to be a gross overpayment, when similarly ranked players end up going for bargain basement prices later.

As mentioned, it is a 14-team league with only 20 roster spots, so not a particularly deep league. The format is head-to-head with 5X5 roto scoring. We had $260 to spend at the auction. My post-auction roster is on the right, and ranges from a high dollar amount paid for Justin Upton at $48, while there were a handful of $1 and $2 players, including Kendrys Morales and Grant Balfour.

It seemed like a good idea to use this recent experience to create another YouTube video to discuss auctions in general, and also some specific tips using Draft Buddy for an auction. The video below includes discussion on using your cheatsheet as a guide to bid on players rather than using the dollar values as if they are set in stone. This particularly applies to high value players to ensure you don’t get shutout getting your share of studs on your roster. Depth is great, but an entire team of average players will usually provide just average results.

Also, it is important to appropriately value your roster spots. You may be able to bid on anyone in an auction, but you can’t buy everyone, not only because of the money but also because of limited space on your roster. I use my acquisition of Bryce Harper as an example of me not judging my remaining roster spots correctly.

Finally, some tips specific to Draft Buddy during an auction draft, including how to quickly find players that are still undrafted and can best help you in specific roto categories. The video is a tad long for my liking at 12 minutes, but I think you’ll find some valuable stuff in there if you have an auction coming up.

I absolutely know there are a ton of sharp fantasy baseball players in the NFBC, so I agree the NFBC ADP is good data. I guess which you prefer could depend on who you are playing against. Do the owners in your league draft more like your average Joe MDC member, or your average Joe NFBC player?

Always one to give you guys choices, I created an HTML page with ADP from the NFBC that you can import into your copy of the Compiler, in case you’d rather use that instead of the default MDC ADP. The only thing you need to know, is how to change it. And that is why I created another video, to show how it is done.

Amongst the projection changes we added new starting second baseman for the Philadelphia Phillies, Freddy Galvis, to our database, reduced projections for Domonic Brown and Bryce Harper with their assignment to the minors, reduced Chase Utley, Ryan Howard and Stephen Drew due to injury recovery concerns, added Humberto Quintero as the starting catcher for the Kansas City Royals, and upgraded Grant Balfour as the new closer for the Oakland Athletics. Plus a handful of other changes.

All-in-all, a pretty healthy update. Remember, if you already have Draft Buddy set up for your league, and you want to get the newly updated cheatsheets in Buddy from the Compiler, follow these steps:

1. Update projections in the Compiler. Compile Cheatsheets will run automatically after the update.
2. Open Draft Buddy. If you already have any keepers, draft picks, custom draft order, draft pick trades, etc. in Buddy, then uncheck the Clear Keepers and Draft Picks option on the setup tab.
3. Click the Setup Draft Buddy button.

Last thing, we are still looking for one more for a $50 league drafting on Monday night. Contact me if interested. Good luck in your fantasy baseball drafts this weekend!

On the downside, I couldn’t figure out what the loud clacking sound is that occurs in the background on occasion, until I finally realized it was when I was hitting the keyboard. I’m not sure why that is so loud, but I’ll see what I can do to prevent it going forward.

As for the video production, I have two new ones today. One is on re-ranking players in Draft Buddy. This can be useful if you’ve already got your cheatsheets from the Compiler, into Buddy after running the Draft Buddy Setup, and you want to move a handful of players up or down your cheatsheets.

You can move players by editing their projections in the Compiler (yellow section on the hitters or pitchers tab), but if you are at a stage you don’t want to get into the detail of projections, try a simple re-rank in Buddy. If news breaks that a player will miss some time with injury, maybe he is the only guy worthy of a change, knocking him down a few spots. This video is ideal for that.

The second video is more of an Excel tutorial than specific to the CC/DB. Have you noticed those annoying green triangles in your copy of the Compiler, or Draft Buddy? Those are a Microsoft Excel feature called error checking. Excel is referencing various error checking rules to identify formulas which potentially have an error. Not that they have an error, just that Excel is telling the user it thinks the formula might have an error.

All in all, the error checking rules are too strict by default and finding all kinds of potential errors, creating lots of green triangles messing up the look of the Compiler and Draft Buddy. What we want to do is turn off a bunch of these error checking rules, to get rid of the triangles. The next video shows how to do that in older versions of Excel, and newer versions since Excel 2007.