OK, so I have an idea. Truth of the matter is I get tons of ideas but most of them get buried in a folder on my desktop called “Yeah Right.” The thing about this one is it was supposed to be a joke but a couple of guys think it actually has legs. Not just a couple of guys – a couple of guys in the fantasy industry that are pretty tuned into the landscape.

It came about at the Fantasy Sports Trade Association football draft last month. As Lawr detailed, we had the first pick. The order was drawn about 15 minutes previous to when we were on the clock so we didn’t have a lot of time to talk about who we wanted. We quickly decided we didn’t want Peyton Manning, Calvin Johnson or Jimmy Graham, which left a running back. There are four ball-carriers that can be a defensible top choice: Matt Forte, Jamaal Charles, Adrian Peterson and LeSean McCoy. Who we took and why along with the relative merits of each aren’t important; they’ll be plenty of time to talk about that. What is important is what I off-handedly uttered to my co-manager with my tongue firmly implanted in my cheek.

"Geez, I sort of wish we could pick a quarter share of each."

I told the story to a couple of guys at the FSTA conference, not to pitch the idea but rather to demonstrate how close the call is and how all of the four are viable options. They both said forget that, the idea was genius. Well, they may not have said genius but I need practice spelling the word properly and this was a good time to use it. Suffice it to say they both pushed me to seriously consider the notion. One, Fantasy Sport Network’s Nando DiFino threatened to pick up the ball and run with it if I fumbled. See what I did there?

The concept is a draft (most logically football but it could work for baseball) where you could pick partial shares of the player and the scoring would be adjusted to account for the percentage you own. So if quarter shares were allowed, Lawr and I could have actually done what I jokingly suggested and picked up a 25 percent share of Forte, Charles, Peterson and McCoy.

Obviously there's a ton of details that would need to be hammered out, not the least of which is a person goofy enough to organize and administer such a monster since there isn’t a commissioner service equipped to handle the format. The person would have to be pretty adept with spreadsheets and know enough people to recruit league members.

OK, I’ll do it.

At this point, the only rule that is set-in-stone is you can draft partial shares of players and those shares are available until 100 percent of the player is chosen. Past that, everything is on the table. I have some ideas (some rather obvious, some a bit more creative) but if the idea has legs, we can take it to the Mastersball forum and discuss the rules.

So, what do you think? Does the ability to pick 25 percent of Matt Forte, 25 percent of Calvin Johnson, 25 percent of Jimmy Graham and 25 percent of Payton Manning with the top pick pique your interest?

I’ll tell you what. Post a note in the comments or drop me a line and if we have ample feedback, we’ll take it to the message board so I can move this one into the “About Damned Time" folder. If we can come up with some rules, I’ll set it up and run the league from the site.

Deal?{jcomments on}