One of the more exclusive features to The League is the Franchise Tag option that every team owner has. In The League, every Owner/Coach can keep/carry over up to four players to next seasons roster (2 Offensive & 2 Defensive players). There are no penalties assessed using the standard keepers format of two offensive players & two defensive players, meaning you don’t lose future draft picks. You are not punished by picking later in the draft or anything like that and you’re only doing yourself a disservice by not establishing your keepers. Using the standard keepers format, you could keep the same said four players year after year if you wanted without penalty.
Franchise Tags are a way for an Owner/Coach to keep core players dependent on if they are more heavily offensively or defensively stack. In the case that you would want to keep three offensive players instead of the standard two, or vice versa (three defensive players instead of the standard two), you would have to exercise your team’s Franchise Tag option to do so. But there IS a catch. Whoever you use your Franchise Tag option on for the next season, after that next season YOU HAVE TO RETURN THEM TO THE DRAFT POOL TO BE DRAFTED AGAIN. So let’s look at this even further shall we…
So let’s say you want to establish your teams keepers as the following; Tom Brady-QB, Arian Foster-RB, Patrick Willis-LB, and Larry Fitzgerald-WR. I can only choose as many as two offensive players. So if I want to keep a third player on the offensive side of the football I WILL HAVE to use my team’s Franchise Tag option. In this example, you will need to Franchise Tag either Tom Brady-QB, Arian Foster-RB or Larry Fitzgerald-WR. I’ll Franchise Tag Larry Fitzgerald-WR. By doing this, I can now choose to carry over three offensive players and only one defensive player to my team’s roster next season. But AFTER the following season ends, Larry Fitzgerald-WR will have to be added back to the draft pool. Once the Franchise Tag option is used on a player, that player MUST BE RETURNED after the following season. So year two, your team’s keepers have been established by the example above. But year three, whoever you Franchise Tagged for year two will have to be returned to the draft pool come year three.
Deciding on how your team will use their Franchise Tag option is completely up to you and keep in mind that you do not have to use your teams Franchise Tag option if you don’t want to. The Franchise Tag option is put in place to not water down the fantasy draft by having big name players available year in and year out. With even bigger name players returning to the draft periodically. You can view last season’s Keeper’s Report here for Origins & C/O 2013 league members. For The League – 2014’s Finest, every NFL player is still available.
Note: You can decide not to use your team’s Franchise Tag option if you only want to use the standard keepers format of two offensive players and two defensive players. A Second Note: A Franchise Tagged player being return to the draft pool CAN be redrafted by the team he was Franchised Tagged by. A Third Note: In any instance, you can only carry over a total of four players to your team’s roster the following year.
