1) The Retro Beer League (RBL) shall be played in the winter months each year, starting in late September/early October and ending in early to mid-March. We shall play a 162 game schedule with 2 series per week, of varying (3 or 4 game) length

2) The RBL shall begin with the 1996 player cards for the teams in the player pool, and each winter shall advance to the next season’s cards

3) The player pool shall consist of the following 16 teams:

Atlanta Braves

Baltimore Orioles

Boston Red Sox

Cleveland Indians

Kansas City Royals

Milwaukee Brewers

Montreal Expos (Washington Nationals)

New York Mets

New York Yankees

Oakland Athletics

Philadelphia Phillies

San Francisco Giants

Seattle Mariners

St Louis Cardinals

Texas Rangers

Toronto Blue Jays

4) The first year draft shall be a snake draft with a randomly selected draft order, 30 rounds. Only carded players may be selected from the player pool teams. Draft picks in the first year and subsequent years may not be traded.

5) 2 weeks prior to the draft each off season, each team shall declare a list of 12 keepers (this was changed starting with the 2001 season; before that it was 10 keepers) for the upcoming season. The keepers shall have no restrictions, except that only one uncarded keeper may be selected. If a team chooses to pick an uncarded keeper, they shall play the upcoming season with only 34 carded players.  The 12 keepers need not be players on the player pool roster (in other words, if a player moves outside of the player pool between player card years, he may still be kept but if he is cut he will not be draft eligible)

6) Drafts subsequent to the first year draft shall consist of 23 rounds (12 keepers plus 23 round draft = 35 man roster), linear draft format. The draft pool will consist of new players entering the player pool plus players released from RBL teams that are still in the player pool.  The order for each round shall be determined by reverse order of standings the previous season. If there is a tie the following tiebreakers shall apply:

1. i) Head to head record (better record picks higher)
2. ii) Record vs division (better record picks higher)
3. iii) Coin flip (winner picks higher)

The draft will be conducted in a linear (ie non-snake) fashion; in other words, the draft order will remain the same for each round.

In order to speed up the later rounds of the draft, the final four rounds of the draft (ie picks 20-23) will be completed with paired picks. In other words, if Team A picks first in each round, once we get to round 19 they will pick twice in a row (ie they will make their 20th and 21st picks at the same time). Then Team B will make their 20th/21st picks, etc. When it gets back to Team A, they will finish their draft by making their 22nd and 23rd picks.

The draft will be conducted via the Slack app. The time limits between picks as well as the period when the clock stops will be announced by the Commish (typically 3 hours between picks except between midnight – 8 am EST). If an owner knows he will be away from Slack during a time when his pick can reasonably be expected to come up, it is his responsibility to send a list of players to another owner (or the Commish).  Once an owner has picks outstanding (ie he has had his pick skipped over due to his time limit having elapsed), their picks will be skipped until they catch up on all outstanding picks.

7) Classic stadiums are permitted; each owner can select whatever stadium they chose, but they must play in their chosen stadium for at least two seasons before being allowed to move. Different versions of the same stadium that another owner is using is prohibited, but owners can select a stadium from the same team as another owner is using (for example, Qualcomm and Petco stadiums for San Diego)

8) Trading is allowed during the following time periods:

1. i) For the week prior to the keeper deadline each season;
2. ii) Immediately following the draft until the trade deadline, which will be based on the DLB games played and not a fixed real life calendar date. The trade deadline shall be at 112 games played; in other words, both teams must have 112 games played or less for any trade to be legal
3. iii) Further to the above, there shall be no trades in the RBL offseason

9) Alignment and playoff structure – There shall be two x 6 team leagues, both leagues using the DH. Three teams shall make the playoffs for each league. The division winner (ie the top team in each league) gets a bye for the first round of the playoffs. The 2nd and 3rd place teams are considered wild card teams and will play a best of 3 playoff series, with the winner playing the division winner.  The division winner shall get home field advantage in the League Championship Series, and the team with the better W-L record shall get home field advantage in the World Series (in case of tie, the same tiebreakers shall be used as for draft position above). Note that a division winner will always get home field advantage over a wild card team in the World Series.

• The 3 game wildcard series occurs Sept 30 – Oct 2 with no days off.
• The 7 game league championship series starts Oct 4 (1 day off after the end of game 3 of the wildcard round; this date doesn’t change even if the round requires only 2 games).
• The 7 game world series starts Oct 14 (1 day off after the end of game 7 of the LCS round; this date doesn’t change even if the round requires fewer games).

10) For the playoffs, the RBL shall use the DLB default value of 20 games for season length for each 7 game playoff round for calculating limitations. This means that % players shall be allowed to be on the roster for their % rating x 20 games. AB, IP and Spot start limited players will have their limitations multiplied by 20/162 for determining their allowed use for each round.

For the 3 game wildcard round, the Dynasty default shall be used for internal series length for calculating limitations.

11) All rules adjustments must be approved by 2/3 of the league ownership (8/12 owners)