Never mind. We've always had the option to keep cut players. I'll go back and correct my previous post about releasing players.

Me too.

I'm accepting that trade.

I was curious to see what you and wazu would do about that. I'm kind of tempted to do it just to get a good backup, but I'm not sure I want to give up whatever next year's pick is, too.

Even with the painful 35 percent discount I'm seriously considering trading down with my #1 pick. My key question is whether I take a good and safe OT that I will likely need next year, or a somewhat more risky DT that I'm desperate for this year.

I'm still struggling a little with this whole free agent thing. It seems a little unfair for us to never lose a free agent, but it could also be a pain to monitor it for the lower tier players. Any ideas? I'd like for us to fight the free agent battle along with the NFL Chiefs.

At a minimum, I'm thinking that we shouldn't get compensatory picks starting next year if we don't lose free agents. This year we should get them because we all lost Brandon Carr, but if for example Albert walks and we keep him, we shouldn't get compensated for it.

I don't really know what to do about free agents. I don't particularly want to monitor all of my "foreign" players for whether they leave through free agency or get cut/traded from their teams. As for Chiefs free agents, I could go either way. I agree that we shouldn't get both the free agent and the compensatory pick.

I, too, am accepting the trade.

*Runs over to the corner of the room and pukes his guts out.*

I'm good with this. Really, we are starting to get deep enough into this game that drafts will mean everything. If get so good at drafting that people look at our teams and think it's impossible salary-cap wise, then we can adjust.

And I think the honor system holds true. There are only 3 of us. We can look back and see who we drafted. If I passed on Baldwin, but he blows up, I won't claim to have him on my roster. There's no point. I just want to have some fun with this and see it continue to evolve.

Okay, that settles it. We'll take compensatory picks this year, and henceforth we will not lose free agents other than Chiefs. We'll review it as we go to see if that gives us an unfair advantage or not.

If I can keep Albert and Winston, that'll help me a ton.

You, me, patteau, and the real Chiefs as well. Can't fathom why this new regime thinks it's a good idea to cast off two very good tackles and create a new problem where one didn't already exist.

I can only shake my head. And they cut Winston. I don't get it. However, since he hasn't signed with anyone yet perhaps we can assume that there's a problem that we don't know about.

Edit: I guess we all lose Glenn Dorsey this year, too. Have we had anyone else walk? Oh, yeah. Brady Quinn. Anyone else?

Dorsey hurts me because he and Toribio are my only true tackles. Alex Carrington plays there a little, but he's not really a tackle. If Da'Quan Bowers ever comes back and justifies my first-round pick I'd like to go with a 4-3, but it's hard to do that when you have no defensive tackles. I think I may be stocking up on DTs in this draft.

Hmm, I just had an idea that I think could be fun.

On our trade up and trade down scenarios, we introduced the "tax" (15 percent on trade up, 35 percent on trade down) because we know where the players were drafted. The tax offsets the perfect knowledge.

But what if we trade up or down BEFORE the draft? If that's the case, I think it would be reasonable to get full value.

What do you think about changing the tradeup/trade down rules to this?

1. If you trade up or down before the draft, you can trade at full value. However, this is irreversible. Once you make the call to do it, you can't go back and switch. You can make as many of these trades as you like as long as they only involve draft picks.

2. You can still trade up or down after the draft, in which case the rules in the thread header still apply.

If we really wanted to be pure, we would eliminate the second option and only go with the first. I could do that, though I think it's fun to do the tradeup/trade down thing.

That's fine with me.

I'm good with the new trade rule.

(Banging gavel.) Okay, new trade rule is in.

Hmm. I've been looking at draft points under the new rule. So if I trade with, say, Philadelphia at the #4 pick before the draft I would get every pick in their draft. Every one of them, and I'd still be giving up points. I realize that we have an oddity this year in having the #1 pick, but does that seem reasonable?

I haven't thought about how we would value future picks and probably wouldn't remember that I have one anyway, so I'm thinking I'll just stick with this year's picks.

I think I would make that trade prior to the draft, but want to confirm that it's a reasonable thing. Or is a pre-draft trade at face value too generous? We're assuming that we could make the trade in real life, and that may not always be the case.