who knows

• teams are allowed to keep as many players as their draft picks accommodate

• free agents are kept in the 10th round. A free agent is any player picked up for free without having to bid on.

• waiver pickups are kept in the 5th round

• teams are able to keep players in higher rounds. For example, a 7th round keeper is eligible to be kept in the 6th round, however once that player is kept as a 6th he becomes a 6th henceforth (this rule is mute after 2025 draft)

• You can trade during the off-season in order to finalize your keeper list
• The player you keep will retain the round that he was picked in
  • Example: Bob drafts Alvin Kamara as a rookie in the 12th round.  Two years later, Alvin is now valued at a first round pick. Steve can let Alvin go for anyone to draft or he can keep Alvin and it would only cost him his 12th round pick.
  • Steve can spend his 12th round pick every year in order to keep Alvin.
• If you have two picks in the same round, you can choose which pick to use to keep a player.
  • For example, you have round 4 pick 2 and round 4 pick 10.  You can use round 4 pick 10 to keep a player and draft with the higher round 4 pick 2.
• During the off-season, it’s smart to swap picks with other players.
  • For example, Steve has round 1 pick 3 and he’s using it to keep David Johnson.  Paul has round 2 pick 2 and he’s using it to keep Travis Kelce.  Steve has round 2 pick 12 and Paul has round 1 pick 10.  Steve and Paul can swap their first and second round picks.  They both can still keep their players (DJ and Kelce) but now they can pick at a higher order.
• If your players go down in value, obviously you probably don’t want to keep them as you could draft them later and at a lower pick.
• The Angel Exemption allows an owner to convert a waiver pickup (one exemption per year) into a free agent. BUT said owner has to sacrifice one of their vet offensive keepers to do so (8 down to 7). After the one year the player is locked in as a 10th and further exemptions aren’t required.
• If you have any questions on how to play keepers, feel free to ask Trey Richards, Steve Ranieri or Steve Kim.

After a trade every team in the league has 12 hours to beat the original offer. If a new offer is accepted the original two trade partners have an additional 12 hours to beat the 1up