Somehow I read &quot;Dew&quot; for the author and I was like, whoa.<br /><br />1.&nbsp; Former captains who did not play last season have a placement record determined by an average of their [b]total[/b] captaining (regular season) record, not just the most recent season.<br /><br />2.&nbsp; You say the returning captains are already placed and then the [i]old captains[/i] come and the returning captains &quot;get shuffled around for what they&#039;ve accomplished.&quot;&nbsp; But the math doesn&#039;t work that way.<br /><br />First, returning caps preserve their order--the worst-performing teams still pick spots before the best-performing teams, no matter what--so &quot;shuffled&quot; is an odd verb in this case.&nbsp; They get spread out.<br /><br />Second, it does not matter which numbers happen first.&nbsp; If you mix returning captains...<br /><br />A .215<br />B .367<br />C .551<br />D .890<br /><br />...with old captains...<br /><br />E .284<br />F .507<br /><br />...you get the same order whether you add the second list to the first or the first list to the second:<br /><br />A .215<br />E .284<br />B .367<br />F .507<br />C .551<br />D .890<br /><br />Third, any alternative to this has to insert non-returning captains somewhere, and therefore has to push them around somehow.&nbsp; We could put them at the front and push all returning captains back, or put them at the back and push all returning captains forward.&nbsp; The system we chose attempts to preserve the virtues of not clumping, aiming for the middle, and respecting team divisions when placing captains.<br /><br />3.&nbsp; Have we tiered captains?&nbsp; Of course, I have made the argument that using a team&#039;s past season record is a form of ranking captains (&quot;unfairly&quot;&lt;--sarcasm).&nbsp; So in the sense that we have always ranked captains, yes, we did it again.<br /><br />The ranking that upsets people, though, is [i]subjective[/i] ranking, and there is nothing subjective about this system.&nbsp; It is purely determined by numbers and chance.&nbsp; Once we set it in place, it runs itself.&nbsp; And at the time we decided on it, we did not know who the captains or the free agents would be.<br /><br />4.&nbsp; Round 0.<br /><br />We need to distinguish between being a good system (i.e., one that [i]can[/i] be useful) and a system that just didn&#039;t happen to be useful this season because nobody took advantage of it.&nbsp; The system is new and unfamiliar to captains, and I think they were reluctant to fully use it.&nbsp; <br /><br />According to my list, the grade A meat stops at about 8-ish, and the grade B meat stops around 18-ish (with two prime cuts sitting on top).&nbsp; That said, I might&#039;ve gone for a lower pick myself to land both categories.&nbsp; I wasn&#039;t surprised when you and Strangle took 1 and 2.&nbsp; If Strangle and Stallion can get Nosturi, that is a solid team; if Strangle and Whiteboy can get Noob, that is a solid team.&nbsp; However, I was surprised when Tai and DG took 3 and 4 and, in particular, I think Tai and DG are two captains who could have benefited from choosing a lower pick, and I&#039;m hinting at a prediction right now.<br /><br />There might also be psychological factors at work like the blind assumption that a higher pick is better.&nbsp; Or, since the attitude is that better captains should pick earlier and worse captains should pick later, maybe every captain thinks of himself as great...<br /><br />The point of this system is that captains get to choose their fate, and in the proper order.&nbsp; This way we get to hold them even more accountable for their performance.&nbsp; And when a slew of early-pick captains fail it, we can all point to Round 0 and say, you chose... poorly.&nbsp; Do better next time.&nbsp; (*Dew uses steal idea.)<br /><br />That is my vision anyway.