ABA RULES AND REGULATIONS (In effect for Season Three) ROSTERS Teams maintain a 26-man active roster with a six-man farm club. Note: If you end up a player shy because of a 2-for-1 trade, you may pick up a free agent to reach the 32-player mark. If you are making such an addition after the beginning of the summer development league season, that player is eligible for your carryover roster ONLY if you use him in the starting lineup, rotation, or active bullpen. Beginning with Season Four, such additions will count against your three-man rebuilding drop/add limit. (See "Drop/Adds" section.) If you end up with an extra player because of such a trade, you must let someone go to stay at 32. Eligibility: To be eligible for the ABA, a hitter must have had 30 ABs in the previous summer development (major) league season; to start or platoon, he must have had 200 ABs. Starting pitchers must have had 30 IPs; relievers, 15 IPs. (If a player misses the previous summer development campaign but comes back the following season, the team that previously owned him has first rights to his services. But to reclaim him, that team must use its first-round draft pick. If it has traded its pick, it cannot reclaim him. If that returning player is not reclaimed by his old team, he joins the regular free-agent pool. The "missing" player must be on the carry-over 20-man roster, but does not take up space on the 32- man roster used during his absent season.) Drop/Adds: After the completion of the draft and up until the beginning of the summer development league, ABA teams may perform drop/adds whenever they wish. Once the summer development league starts, some restrictions kick in: Any player you pick up as a drop/add must be used in your starting lineup, rotation, or active bullpen, and must have enough IPs or ABs to qualify. Any pitcher with a grade below 3 is ineligible. This is to prevent contenders from stockpiling for future seasons on the cheap. These rebuilding-oriented drop/adds are limited. Each team is entitled to only three total, and only two may be starting pitchers. Dragon Clause: When trades create vacancies and you execute a rebuilding-oriented pickup to fill the spot, SUCH ACQUISTIONS *DO* COUNT AGAINST YOUR THREE-PERSON TOTAL, per previous sentence. Drop/adds may not be executed after the trading deadline, which is on Day 120. If, in the future, the ABA deviates from the January-June schedule, the czar may impose a different drop/add deadline to prevent the aforementioned stockpiling. In those cases, the drop/add deadline should come in mid-May. PITCHING ROTATIONS ABA teams must use 5-man rotations. In the event of disruptions caused by trades or injuries, GMs may juggle their rotations, but a pitcher's position may not move up by more than one slot each time through the rotation. GMs may *not* juggle their rotations on a one-time basis for a big series or other strategic advantage. Four-man rotations are allowed (but not required) after Day 130 and in the playoffs, and the Czar will edit pitchers' fatigue statuses to make that possible. Teams may use three-man rotations in the finals if their pitchers can handle it. The Czar, however, will not edit their fatigue statuses to accommodate a three-man rotation in the finals. INJURIES If you lose a player for five days or more due to injury, you may call a player up from your farm club. When the injured player comes off the d.l., you must send someone back down to the farm to keep the active roster at 26. Hardships caused by a rash of injuries at one position can be dealt with by drop/adds. THERE WILL BE NO INJURY PICKUPS. EMERGENCIES: In extreme and rare cases, such as two catchers ending up on the d.l. at the same time once the trading-drop/add deadline is past, you may do an emergency drop/add to keep your active roster adequately stocked. The Czar will decide whether a true emergency exists. (For example, having two starting pitchers on the d.l. will not constitute an emergency; a reliever may make a spot start.) PLAYERS OBTAINED AS EMERGENCY DROP/ADDS automatically become free-agents after the injury time is served. INJURIES do carry over to the playoffs. For purposes of determining the timing, the regular season always ends on a Sunday (in ABA time), with the playoffs beginning the following Tuesday. The second round of the playoffs begins the next Tuesday. The finals begin a week from that next Saturday. Real time and ABA time will not coincide! Thus, a player injured for three days on the final regular season Sunday would miss the first two games of the opening round playoff series. DRAFT ABA teams drop down to 20-man carry-over rosters at the conclusion of each ABA regular season. A 12-round draft begins the day after the conclusion of the summer development league season, usually around October 1. When their turns come up, GMs should make their pick within a day. If they are unable, they should inform the czar and make arrangements for someone to pick for them. Additional rounds of drop/add drafting may continue if owners are interested. Otherwise, owners may proceed with drop/adds on a first-come, first-served basis. In the event of ties (i.e., two teams drop/add for the same player on the same day), the team with the higher drafting position will get the player(s). If, because of trades or other reasons, teams fill their 32-man roster before the others, they continue drafting on a drop/add basis. Conversely, teams that are a player(s) shy may continue with additional rounds when others are finished. In the later rounds, when teams are building their farm clubs, the czar may declare double-speed drafting. That is, teams pick two guys at a time to speed things along. EXPANSION: The procedures outlined above may be changed to accommodate expansion. TRADING Teams may trade at any time except for the period between Day 130 and the end of the ABA regular season. The Czar must receive official notice from both parties for the trade to take effect. The rosters section above explains how teams will deal with roster irregularities caused by 2-for-1 trades and the like. Draft picks may be traded. DIVISIONS AND SCHEDULE The ABA has two seven-team divisions. Each team plays everyone in their division 13 times and everyone in the opposite division 12 times for a 162-game schedule. The basic schedule will be made by the automatic schedule-maker that comes with the League Manager software. The czar may make slight changes in the schedule to accommodate head-to-head series and games between owners. No live managing is allowed unless both teams are being managed by their GMs or designates. PLAYOFFS: The two first-place teams are automatically the Nos. 1 and 2 seeds for the playoffs. Of the remaining teams, the four with the best records receive at-large playoff berths. Those four will meet in the first round in best-of-five series, with the top two seeds receiving byes. No. 3 will play No. 6, and No. 4 will play No. 5. The higher seed will have the home field advantage. The two winners will join the top two seeds in the semifinals in best-of-seven series. No. 1 will play No. 4 and No. 2 will play No. 3. The two surviving teams will play a best-of-seven series for the ABA crown. AWARDS Three awards will be bestowed by Jason Stark-Ravingmad at the conclusion of each season. Executive of the Year: This is awarded to the GM who used the most players. It's about quantity, not quality. Die Young Award: This goes to the GM whose team had the highest ERA. Ruben Sierra Award: This goes to the biggest underachiever in the league; that is, the player with the biggest gap between his ABA performance and his performance in the previous summer development league season. The Czar will accept nominations for this coveted prize. Willie Adams Award: This goes to the biggest over-achiever in the league; that is, the player who most dramatically exceeds his summer development league production. The Czar will accept nominations for this coveted prize.