Top Dawg Fantasy Football, created in 1997, is a head-to-head, performance-scoring league. It consists of an even number of teams divided into two conferences, the American Conference and the National Conference.

Contents

The draft shall be held on a Saturday after 6:00 pm as close as possible to the first day of NFL action, given the varying schedules of the coaches. League fees are due before the commencement of the draft. Draft order is determined by the previous year’s playoff results:

1. Toilet Bowl winner
2. Toilet Bowl loser
3. Toilet Bowl consolation winner
4. Toilet Bowl consolation loser
5. Wild Card consolation winner*
6. Wild Card consolation loser*
7. Super Bowl consolation winner
8. Super Bowl consolation loser
9. Super Bowl loser
10. Super Bowl winner

*These spots are not used in 8 Team leagues

Coaches new to the league will pick last. If there is more than one new coach, their positions at the end of the draft will be determined randomly, unless the new coaches work out by mutual agreement which pick goes to which coach. If a team has left the league, its draft spot is vacated and coaches below that spot will move up.

Coaches may trade draft picks with other coaches as long as each coach has the designated number of picks.

Players will be picked in serpentine fashion: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10 on odd rounds, 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 on even rounds. The number of rounds, and thus players per team, will be decided prior to the draft, but can be no less than 16, or more than 18.

2. Keepers

You may keep one player that was on your final roster the previous season. To do this you would forfeit your 1st round pick. If a owner elects to keep a player, that decision must be made by no later then August 1st of that season. You MUST email both the commissioner (Mike Coon Sr.) and the Top Dawg site administrator (Michael O'Brien) by no later then 23:59 hours on August 1st. Keepers will be posted on the Top Dawg website and emailed throughout the league. Failure to do so means you can not keep any players and you will draft as normal in the 1st round. In the event that your “kept” player is considered out for the season prior to the draft you will be allowed to drop him and pick last in the first round.

In addition the First and Second rounds will have the same draft order, then the serpentine order would be in effect starting the end of round two and the start of round 3. If we had the same draft order for the 2010 draft this is how it would look

* Round 1 picks are subject to being lost: If you keep a player that player takes that slot.

All subsequent rounds are serpentine. Rounds 2,4,6,8... all have the same order (first to last), and 3,5,7,9....same order (last to first).

Coaches may carry any mixture of positions on their rosters. Rosters may never exceed the maximum established number.

In case of injuries (i.e., a player is listed as OUT on the official NFL injury report, or is on the official NFL DL) or cases where a player is no longer active (i.e., suspended, fired, in jail, etc.), leaving a coach with no active player to satisfy lineup requirements, the coach must do one of the following. The coach must work through these options in order, only moving to the next option if the current option is not possible.

1. Fill the position through free agency, or
2. Designate a substitute. The substitute must be on the same team and of the same position as one of the inactive players, and must not be on the roster of another coach. Such designation must be made prior to 12:00 midnight Wednesday in order to prevent the designated substitute from being picked up in free agency; after that time, the coach may designate a substitute on a first-come, first-served basis regarding other coaches’ free agency choices. The substitute is only on the roster for the week he is designated.

No trades are allowed after the games of Week 11.

Coaches are not required to have all lineup positions represented on their rosters.

Lineups for each game will consist of 2 options:

1. Pro-Set: 1 quarterback, 2 running backs, 3 wide receivers, 1 kicker, 1 defensive team.
2. Run-and-Shoot: 1 quarterback, 1 running back, 4 wide receivers, 1 kicker, 1defensive team.

As there is no tight end position, tight ends are determined to be wide receivers for all league purposes.

If the NFL week starts on Saturday, a coach may make one lineup change prior to Sunday kickoff except for players who have already played. In the case of Thursday games, a coach may make unlimited lineup changes prior to the next Sunday kickoff, as long as the players involved did not play on Thursday.

10 Teams: A thirteen-game schedule is played, with each team playing each team in its conference twice, and each team in the other conference once.

The league administrator will assemble a schedule well in advance of the season. He will do so by creating a schedule with teams represented by number, then matching each team with a number randomly.

There will be two playoff brackets, the Super Bowl bracket, and the Toilet Bowl bracket. The number one and two seeds in the Super Bowl bracket will always be the Conference Champions. All seeds will be determined by won-lost record, with the following tiebreakers:

1. Head-to-head record
2. Conference record
3. Total points, head-to-head games
4. Total points, all games
5. Coin flip

There will be a three-point home-field-advantage bonus award to the top seeded team in each game except the Super Bowl.

In cases where more than two teams may have the same won-lost record, the combined won-lost record each team had against the other tied teams will be used to eliminate all but two teams. If there is still a tie between more than two teams after comparing mutual won-lost records, the top two teams will be determined by average total points scored per game in games between the involved teams. Then the normal tiebreakers will be used for the top two. If there are still more than two teams with the same won-lost record that have to be seeded, the above process will be repeated.

 Two normal four-seed tournament for each bracket starting in week 15. Seeds are: 4 at 1, 3 at 2. In week 16, winners play each other, and losers play each other.

10 Teams

Super Bowl Bracket: Top six teams compete. Week 14: Conference champions draw a bye. 5 is at 4, 6 is at 3. Week 15: Lowest winning seed of Week 14 plays at 1, highest winning seed of Week 14 plays at 2. Losers of week 14 games play Wild Card Consolation game, then are done for the year. Week 16: Winners of Week 15 play Super Bowl, losers of Week 15 play Super Bowl Consolation.

Toilet Bowl Bracket: Bottom four teams compete. Week 14: 4 at 1, 3 at 2. Week 15: Winners play for Toilet Bowl, losers play Toilet Bowl Consolation.

Ties in playoff games will be resolved by using decimal values for points scored by each player rather than the normal system of rounding down. If the teams are still tied, the winner will be determined by comparing the scores of the top-scoring substitute on each team. If there is still a tie, the next-top scoring substitutes are compared. If after comparing all substitutes, there is still a tie, the result will be determined by a coin flip.

Coaches may trade players with other coaches. Free agent bidding points may not be a part of any trade. There are no restrictions on trades as long as roster maximums are not exceeded. No trades are allowed after the games of Week 11. Coaches may not trade for players who were once on their rosters.

Points scored for each game will be determined by the performance of the eight players designated in the starting lineup, according to the following system (all numbers are rounded down):

Each player is charged a $30 league fee, $25 of which goes to awards and $5 of which goes to defray the cost of the software necessary for the administrator to maintain statistics and the web site. The previous year’s Super Bowl winner is responsible for engraving the Super Bowl trophy with the current year’s winner.

There shall be two league officers:

1. Commissioner

   The commissioner shall be responsible for setting the date of the draft, resolving disputes not covered in these rules, inscribing and distributing trophies, and any other league duties that may arise that are not reserved to the administrator.

    

2. Administrator

League officers may be changed by majority vote of the coaches.

League rules may be changed or amended by a majority of the league’s coaches. League rule changes may be made at any time, except while a season is in progress. Any coach may propose a rule change.

A league All-Star Game will be held on Week 17 of the NFL season. This game will be played for fun only: no awards of any kind are associated with it. Each Conference Champion will appoint a standard Pro-Set lineup, being sure that each conference team is represented by no more than two players. In the all-star spirit, each coach should, when feasible, appoint stand-out players to each position, taking into account that certain playoff teams may rest their star players in Week 17. To qualify for an All-Star team, a player must have started at least seven games for a fantasy team, or have scored 120 or more points in starts for a fantasy team.