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COUCH COACH FANTASY DRAFT USER'S MANUAL Prepared by Len Shepard May 9, 1991 Table of Contents Page Introduction..................................... 2 Compatibility.................................. 2 Contents......................................... 2 Ways to play Couch Coach Fantasy Draft........... 3 Installation..................................... 3 Operation of the Software........................ 4 How to enter, make selections, and exit........ 4 How to move around inside the system........... 4 Changing Player Data............................. 4 Drafting Fantasy Teams........................... 5 Choice of Leagues.............................. 5 Naming Each Draft.............................. 5 Draft order.................................... 5 The Drafting Screen............................ 5 The Drafting Process........................... 5 Adding Free Agents............................. 6 Review Options................................. 6 Second Thoughts................................ 6 Potato League Sports picks and logic........... 6 HELP! Help screen available while drafting..... 7 Generate Reports................................. 8 System Utilities................................. 8 List File Directory............................ 8 Examine Contents of a file (preview report).... 8 Box Outline Color Modification................. 8 Appendix A - Errors and Corrective Action........ 9 (1) INTRODUCTION Couch Coach Fantasy Draft, or FSD, as we will refer to it in this manual, is a system of computer programs designed to act as your drafting opponent (or opponents) in a simulation of an actual fantasy league draft. A fantasy league is a group of friends who act as owners, general managers, and coaches of fictitious teams comprised of real players. Scoring in a fantasy league is based on the performance of real players in actual contests, with the total score of a fantasy team equal to the sum of the scores of the "starting" players on that team. FSD was designed primarily for practice with a free fantasy draft (as opposed to an auction-type draft), which is common to many baseball leagues. If you are about to participate in a "player auction" draft, FSD is still very useful, since it contains statistics and information about the players which will give you an idea as to how we value the players. For baseball, it also allows you to generate a "Bid List", which is a listing of all players, some statistics from the previous year, and OUR Bid Price which is changeable by YOU. This "Bid List" can be invaluable as a reference during your actual fantasy league draft. Some of the terms used in this manual are: Drafting Pool - Group of fictitious teams composed of real players where real player scores are accumulated to get fictitious team scores. Fantasy Team - Fictitious team comprised of real players from a variety of real teams. Round - Period in which each owner gets a draft choice. The total number of rounds equals the number of players on each roster. Owner - Owns the fantasy team and is responsible for drafting his/her roster of players, picking starters, etc. Starters - Those real players whose scores count for the fantasy team in any given period of play. Free Agent - A real player NOT contained in the master player file. FSD free agents are not necessarily real free agents. Compatibility. FSD is compatible with 100% IBM-PC compatibles and compatible printers and monitors, including monochrome, color, and EGA/VGA. CONTENTS The Distribution diskette contains: MASTER .??? - the master player file for the current season FSD .EXE - the main banner program F?D* .EXE - program modules sportnam.TEM - a file with the names of the current real teams COLORS .SDP - a file with default colors for screen boxes FSD* .HLP - help files called by the program modules SAMPLE .* - sample files for you to review and test Neither version of FSD is copy protected! Sharing of the Shareware version is encouraged! Sharing of the enhanced version among your drafting group is specifically allowed in the license agreement. (2) WAYS TO PLAY COUCH COACH FANTASY DRAFT FSD gives you the capability of playing several ways: 1) CONTEST MODE, which pits you directly against Potato League Sports (PLS) in a 1-on-1 draft. 2) You against a friend. In this case, FSD acts as Master of Ceremonies for the draft and Record Keeper for later on. 3) You against a friend each picking against PLS. In this manner, FSD picks against each of you, and you compare your results against each other throughout the year. PLS can fill in as many spots as you want (up to 16 total). 4) Your group of up to 16 people. Here again, FSD acts as Master of Ceremonies and Record Keeper. 5) Your group of up to 16 people, with the computer filling in as many vacant spots as you desire. INSTALLATION Backing Up Your Diskettes. As with most software, the first thing you should do is make a backup copy of the diskettes (or diskette) that contain the software. This is always a good practice, as it is time consuming to get a replacement diskette. Registering Your Copy. Second, please fill out the registration form (if available) and send it in. Prior to any communication with us, you will need to have registered your software. Please answer all the questions as completely and accurately as possible. If you are registered, it is easier for special upgrades to be offered to you. Installing On A Floppy Disk System (either 3-1/2" or 5-1/4"). After you make your backup copy, place the backup in your disk drive. Initiate the software by typing "FSD". The system should respond with the opening banner. If it does not, you will need to consult the corrective action section (Appendix A). Installing On A Hard Disk System: Even if you are putting the system on a hard disk, it is still a good idea to make a backup copy (or copies). After making the backup, copy all the files from the diskette onto your hard disk. Put all the files in the SAME directory or sub-directory. Initiate the software by typing "FSD". The system should respond with the opening banner. If it does not, you will need to consult the corrective action section (Appendix A). If you are using a floppy diskette (of either size), please make sure that the diskette is always in the proper drive when running the software. It is always YOUR responsibility to make sure you have enough disk space to run a draft. Each draft may take up about 12K of space. (3) OPERATION OF THE SOFTWARE How To Enter, Make Selections, and Exit FSD. To enter FSD, type "FSD" at the system prompt. Your system will respond with a 'banner' screen that shows the version date and copyright info. Making A Selection With FSD. Use the arrow keys or type the first character of your intended selection to move the pointer to that selection and then press the space bar. How To Move Around Once You Have Entered FSD. All of the boxes in FSD have similar construction and rules for moving between and inside them. Once you know how to move around and make selections within the software, making changes is a snap. How to move around is described in the most common help screen (press F1). Exiting Any Module and Leaving FSD. Pressing the ESCape key anywhere will either 'back up' within a module or exit the current module and return to the main menu. TO EXIT FSD, PRESS THE ESCAPE KEY WHILE AT THE MAIN MENU. CHANGING PLAYER DATA This module allows you to edit data for all players supplied in the master data file. Possible changes include changing a player's real team designation, making players inactive (and re-activating them), changing a player's position, and changing the "Bid Price" associated with a player. You may select players by their position or by their real team. After highlighting a player by pressing the space bar while the arrow is in front of his name, you may do the following: Change The Real Team Designation Of A Player. Type R for real team. The real team selection box is located beneath the position selection box. Move the pointer to the correct new team, then select the team by pressing the space bar. Change The BID PRICE Of A Player (baseball only): Included with the Master List of players is a "bid price" for each individual player. This Bid Price is important as a guide during your actual fantasy league draft. Although a Bid Price is already assigned to each player, this value can be changed to reflect the price that YOU feel each individual player is worth, as it relates to a typical fantasy league "auction" draft. You can print out a list of players and the price YOU WOULD PAY for those players. Change The Position Of A Player. The positions of all players are set by PLS prior to each season. A player's position CAN be changed, and from that point on the player will show up, and be available to be drafted, at that new position. However, WHENEVER YOU SELECT THE CONTEST MODE OF DRAFTING, FSD will automatically use the original positions for all players. Change A Player's Active Status. When the player is active, Typing I will inactivate that player. If a player is inactive, '-NA' will appear in that player's name (for Not Available). The whole name shows for healthy players, unless they started as inactive when the master data file was last read. When the player is inactive, typing "A" will activate that player. (4) DRAFTING FANTASY TEAMS This is the main module of FSD. You have numerous choices regarding the parameters of each draft (except in the shareware version). If you elect to take the standard you-vs-computer (CONTEST MODE) option, then you won't have to make further setup choices. If you don't choose this mode, you will be asked to specify the drafting order, how many owners will participate in the draft, how many of them will be filled by you (and/or your friends, along with how many spots the computer will draft in), and what the roster requirements for each position are. Choice Of Leagues. With certain sports, you have the opportunity to select which league, conference, or division that you want to confine your selections to. For example, with baseball you may choose the American League, National League, or include players from Both Leagues. Naming Each Draft. You may draft as often as you like with FSD, and there are numerous ways to set up a draft, as noted earlier in the section on "Ways to play FSD". Each time you begin a new draft, you may call the new draft by a new name. You are allowed up to 8 characters and the result must be a legal DOS filename (consult your DOS manual). Do NOT use punctuation marks or spaces! Draft Order. This software supports forward or switchback order for drafting. Forward order always has the first team draft first in each round. In the contest mode, Forward order is used. Switchback order, which is the most common for pools, starts even numbered rounds with the last team from the prior round and proceeds back to the first team (Round 1=1-2-3-4, Round 2=4-3-2-1, Round 3=1-2-3-4....). The Drafting Screen. At each owners turn, the top left hand of the screen shows the position requirements for that owner, including filled and total to be filled at each position. The large boxes in the middle are used for the display of players, either by position or by real team. The lower left box is reserved for displaying last season's statistics for a selected player. The Drafting Process. When it is your turn to select a player, you may find & select that player by position (highlight the proper position initials in the upper left corner box, and a list of those players will appear on screen), or by real team (using the F2 key). You may also pick up a free agent by using the F3 key. If you pick up a free agent, you will be expected to enter his name, select the appropriate position, and select the proper real team for that player. When there are more than 60 players at a position, a message will be presented at the bottom of the screen stating how to see more players (using the PgUp and PgDn keys). After you highlight a player as the one you want to draft, the player's statistics for last season are presented for your review in the lower left corner box. You may then either press Y (or ENTER) to confirm this player as your draft selection, or ESCape to reconsider and possibly choose another player. BY PRESSING Y (or ENTER) YOU ARE SELECTING THIS PLAYER, AND CANNOT CHANGE THIS PICK! (5) ADDING FREE AGENTS. Pressing the F3 key, while in the DRAFTING module, will add a free agent by asking three things: 1) The player's name (last name first - i.e. Smith John); 2) the position of the player (by highlighting the proper position initials in the upper left corner box); and 3) the real team of the player (by highlighting the appropriate real team in the lower left corner box). Once you have added a free agent, you will not have to enter that person as a free agent in a separate draft since his name will be added to the Master Player File. You may add a maximum of 50 free agents. IMPORTANT NOTES: 1) Any free agents added will not be presented in alphabetical order in subsequent drafts (unless their name really falls at the end of the list!), so remember to search the whole list for players that you have added before. 2) If you lose the Master Player File, or copy it from the original disk after adding free agents, all those additions will be lost and you will need to enter them again. Why Aren't All Players Included In The Master Player File? There are several reasons. First, disk space was a consideration. Second, the more players in the file, the longer it will take to read them all in (and reading them in takes place each time a new module is entered). Third, we wanted the information to fit under a minimum memory capacity, so that many computers could run FSD. Having less players also rewards those people who seek out and find the best "free agents". Review Options. Pressing F4 or F5 will let you review any prior picks. F4 will review the picks by round, while F5 will list selections by position. Second Thoughts. When FSD asks you to confirm your pick, you may "back up" by using the ESCape key. You may not, however, go back and change a player selected in an earlier round (just as you could not in a live draft). Your only recourse is to start a new draft! Potato League Sports Picks And Logic. Although a fairly sophisticated picking strategy has been used to pick players for the upcoming season, you may feel that some of the picks are odd, or questionable at best. To some extent, this reflects experience with many actual drafts - everyone has their own surprise picks, including Potato League Sports! You may be surprised at how well our "surprise" picks do - so might we (embarrassingly so). You might also keep in mind that, for distribution purposes, the selections are made at least two to four months prior to the season, when actual opening day rosters are not complete. (6) HELP! Here is the help screen presented when you press F1 while in the DRAFTING module: COUCH COACH FANTASY DRAFT - HELP To move within boxes that contain selection arrows, use the following keys: KEY FUNCTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- arrows Moves the selection arrow in the desired direction. Will move within the specified bounds of the box or across single line boxes. Esc Gets you out of the box immediately (escape!). space bar Selects or de-selects the choice being pointed at. The choice will be highlighted if selected, or lowlighted if de-selected. A-Z,0-9 Entering the first character of your choice moves directly to the next choice that starts with the character you entered. PgUp/PgDn Displays more players in the category - PgUp shows prior (alphabetic) players while PgDn shows later players. Function Keys ( F1 calls this screen ) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- F2 Show remaining players by real team F7 Show/Omit Real Team in Display F3 Pick up a free agent F8 Show/Omit Stat Totals in Display F4 Review prior selections by round F9 Turn Drafter's Aid On/Off F5 Review prior selections by position (F9 not active in CONTEST mode) F6 Review Scoring Rules F10 Turn Browse Stats Mode On/Off ___________________________________ Here is the normal help screen presented when you are NOT in the DRAFTING module. COUCH COACH FANTASY DRAFT - HELP When asked for information, with a (Y/N), the first choice (Y, in this case) is the "default" response. The default is taken if any key is pressed but the non-default (N, in this case) response or the ESCape key. To move within boxes that contain selection arrows, use the following keys: KEY FUNCTION ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- arrows Moves the selection arrow in the desired direction. Will move within the specified bounds of the box or across single line boxes. Esc Backs up to the last prompt or out of the current module (escape!). space Selects the choice that the selection arrow is pointing at. The choice will be highlighted if selected. A-Z,0-9 Entering the first character of your choice moves directly to the next choice that starts with the character you entered. PgUp/PgDn Displays more players in the category - PgUp shows prior (alphabetic) players while PgDn shows later players. If any function keys are active, they are shown at the bottom of your screen. (7) GENERATE REPORTS Some reports will be similar regardless of the sport, others will differ. Here are the reports for the Football, Basketball, and Baseball versions. Scores of Players by Fantasy Team. This report provides a roster for each fantasy team with last year's total scores and the total by team. You may ask for totals by position. Rank Players by Position by Stat Category. There are numerous different options for sorting and printing this report: 1) Total Points for each position. Ranks players by position in descending order of total points. 2) Individual statistical categories. Rankings may be based on ANY category below): FOOTBALL FOOTBALL FOOTBALL -------- -------- -------- position QB,RB, and WR Kickers Defensive/Special Teams by Rushing yards Extra Points Td & Safeties scored Receiving yards Field Goals < 30 yds. Sacks Passing yards Field Goals 30-39 yds. Interceptions & fumbles TD's scored Field Goals >= 40 yds. Blocked punts & kicks returned for TD's BASEBALL BASEBALL BASKETBALL -------- -------- ---------- position Hitters Pitchers Guards, Forwards, Centers by Average ERA Points scored Hits Strikeouts Rebounds Runs Wins Assists RBI's Saves Stolen Bases Generate Bid Price List. (BASEBALL ONLY) This report gives you a printout of players, ranked on the Bid Price of each player. Some statistics, along with each player's point total from the prior season, will also be listed on the printout. SYSTEM UTILITIES The following utilities are offered: List File Directory Examine Contents of a File Box Outline Color Modification LIST FILE DIRECTORY allows you to examine the files in your current directory, sub-directory, or diskette. You will be asked whether you want to look at all files or pick a specific subset of files. Use the normal DOS wildcards to specify which subset of files to search for. EXAMINE CONTENTS of a FILE allows you to look at any individual file on the screen. The screen will pause after each 22 lines printed, and you can also stop it from scrolling by pressing the space bar. If you press the Escape key, the utilities menu will return. We recommend that you examine files prior to printing them whenever possible. BOX OUTLINE COLOR MODIFICATION allows you to change the colors of the outlines of the boxes that appear on the screens. Choose the colors by number and press Escape when you are finished. (8) APPENDIX A - Errors And Corrective Action Here it is! The section that is supposed to tell you what went wrong and how to correct it. Well, let's hope this helps. There are three types of common errors: 1) Errors caught by FSD and reported, such as "out of disk space" and "drive unavailable" and "file doesn't exist". REMEDY: Most of these errors are caused by the user (YOU!). Check to make sure you have enough disk space prior to starting a draft, make sure the door on your disk drive is closed, etc. Normally, these errors are minor in nature, and can be easily resolved. 2) Errors caught by our friendly compiler, but not by FSD. These result in "Error number XX at line YYYY". REMEDY: Although FSD was extensively tested, with no instance of this reported, PLS can't guarantee this won't occur. If it happens, please note the message and feel free to call us (if it isn't obvious what the remedy to the problem is). 3) Errors not caught by the compiler or FSD. There are two types here: a) Calculations made by FSD. if you think FSD has calculated something wrong, please check your work and then, if still convinced, let PLS know! b) System hangs / disk media errors / other unknown REMEDY: In the event of any "hangs" or "stoppages", check your printer, making sure it is on and on-line. In the event of disk media errors, make another copy of the original diskette and try using it. You may also encounter problems if you use "memory-resident" software, If you suspect this might be a problem, re-boot your machine WITHOUT loading any memory-resident software (i.e. renaming your AUTOEXEC.BAT file and re-booting until you are finished with FSD, then renaming it back to AUTOEXEC.BAT). Whatever the reason for consulting this section, if you can't find the remedy, do NOT get frustrated - call for help. We are always happy to help in any way we can! Lastly, we have over a thousand people using our software, and you can rest assured that it does work or can be made to work if you have the right hardware setup. POTATO LEAGUE SPORTS 748 Whaler's Way E-202 Fort Collins, CO 80525 (800) 537-9228 - orders (303) 229-9606 (9)