Auction Nominations & Bidding

An auction moves through the same cycle for every open roster spot: nominate a player, reveal the nomination, accept bids, sell the player, and rotate to the next team. The phone controller shows the action available to each owner while the TV and draft board keep the room synchronized.

Complete Auction Draft Setup before using this guide.

In this guide

• Follow the live auction cycle
• Nominate a player
• Place bids in your league's selected mode
• Understand the bid clock
• Complete a sale and rotate nominations
• Use commissioner controls
• Recover from a connection problem

Follow the live auction cycle

After the commissioner starts the draft and the intro finishes, DRAFTNIGHT opens the first 30-second nomination turn. The first team in the configured team order nominates first.

Each cycle has four visible phases:

1. Nomination: the active team chooses an available player and starting bid.
2. Reveal: the player is presented to the room before bidding opens.
3. Bidding: eligible teams compete while the bid clock counts down.
4. Sold: the winner and purchase price are revealed before the next nomination begins.

The nomination order continues in a loop and automatically skips teams whose rosters are full.

Nominate a player

When your team is up, the controller opens Nominate a player. Search or filter the available players, select one, and enter a whole-dollar starting bid from $1 through your team's displayed maximum. Select Nominate to confirm.

The starting bid is binding: the nominating team immediately becomes the high bidder at that amount. Make sure you are willing to roster the player at that price before confirming.

If the 30-second nomination clock expires, DRAFTNIGHT automatically nominates the best available player by the room's ranking order with a $1 starting bid for the active team. The commissioner can pause the draft before expiration if the owner needs help.

Place bids in your league's selected mode

During bidding, the controller shows the current price, highest bidder, your remaining budget, your maximum possible affordable bid, and your filled roster spots.

In Proxy bidding mode:

• Quick Bid buttons submit a maximum that is $1, $5, or $10 above the visible price.
• Set Max Bid lets you enter any valid whole-dollar maximum.
• Your maximum is private. Other teams see the current price and leader, not your ceiling.

DRAFTNIGHT uses proxy bidding. It raises the visible price only as much as needed to keep or take the lead, using $1 increments.

For example, if the price is $10 and you set a $20 maximum, the visible price may remain near $11. If another team then sets a $15 maximum, DRAFTNIGHT automatically keeps you in the lead at $16. If another team exceeds $20, that team takes the lead at the lowest price needed to beat your maximum.

The leading team may raise its private maximum, but it must enter at least $1 more than its existing maximum. Raising that ceiling does not raise the visible price by itself.

In Direct bidding mode, every submitted whole-dollar amount becomes the visible, binding price immediately. If the current price is $2 and you bid $15, your team leads at $15 and will pay $15 if no one bids higher. There is no hidden maximum or automatic counterbid. The current leader cannot bid against itself and must wait for another team to take the lead before responding.

In either mode, bids cannot exceed the controller's displayed Max Bid. DRAFTNIGHT still reserves $1 for every roster spot the team would need to fill after the current purchase.

Understand the bid clock

The configured bid clock begins after the nomination reveal. When a bid changes the visible price or leader during the final 10 seconds, the clock resets to 10 seconds—or to the configured bid-clock length when that setting is shorter than 10 seconds. Every accepted Direct-mode bid changes the public price and receives this protection.

Updating the current leader's private maximum without changing the visible price does not reset the clock.

When the clock reaches zero, DRAFTNIGHT automatically sells the player to the highest bidder. Bids are rejected after expiration, while the draft is paused, when a roster is full, or when the submitted amount is higher than the team's protected Max Bid.

Complete a sale and rotate nominations

After a sale, DRAFTNIGHT:

• Adds the player to the winning team's roster.
• Deducts the final visible purchase price from that team's budget.
• Shows the winner and purchase price across the connected screens.
• Advances to the next eligible team after the sale reveal.
• Opens a fresh 30-second nomination clock.

The auction completes automatically when every team reaches its roster target. Completed results include each purchased player and auction amount.

Use commissioner controls

The assigned commissioner has auction-specific controls on the phone controller:

• Pause freezes the current nomination or bid clock; Resume continues with the saved time.
• Force Sale immediately sells the active player to the current high bidder during bidding.
• Undo Sale removes the latest auction purchase, refunds its price, makes the player available again, and restores the team that made that nomination with a fresh 30-second nomination turn.

Announce a pause, force sale, or undo before using it. After an undo, confirm the restored budget, player availability, nominating team, and timer on the controller and TV before continuing.

Auction rooms do not support live pick or player trading. Owners should make roster changes outside the live auction if their league rules require them.

Recover from a connection problem

If a phone disconnects, reopen the same controller URL or join again with the same room code and reclaim the team if prompted. If the TV disconnects, reopen the same TV URL. The live snapshot should restore the auction phase, timer, current nomination, budgets, rosters, and completed sales.

Do not create a replacement room while the original room is still active. Ask the commissioner to pause if the room needs time to reconnect. See Hosting & Joining a Draft and Troubleshooting & FAQs for more recovery steps.