Pick trades

Draft picks trade like players. This page explains the rules. For the trade screen itself, see Trades. To read these rules in the game, open the How pick trades work panel. It is on the Trades screen, in the draft room and on Outlook. The panel shows the numbers for your league.

What can trade

• Picks trade up to four drafts ahead. The panel lists the first and last season in range.
• First-round and second-round picks both move.

Protect a first-round pick

A team can protect its own first-round pick. A protection means: if the pick lands in the top few picks, the team keeps it.

1. On Trades, find the pick in the Draft picks list. Picks are grouped by season.
2. Select Protect beside the pick. An editor opens.
3. In the Top field, set the protected range for season 1. The range runs from top-1 up to a limit. A value of 0 means unprotected.
4. Select Add a season to extend the protection to a second and a third season. Select Remove to drop a season.
5. Select Add to deal. The pick joins the offer with its protection attached.

A protection covers one to three straight seasons, from top-1 up to top-20. Only the last season can be unprotected. If the pick lands inside the protection, the team keeps it and the debt rolls to the next season on the terms.

When the last season is protected and the pick still lands inside it, the team's second-round pick from that draft goes instead. That second-round pick is set aside the day the two teams agree the protection. It cannot be traded.

The lottery settles every protected pick for its draft before anyone is on the clock.

The Stepien rule

A team has to own a first-round pick in at least one of any two straight drafts. If a deal would break this, the league refuses it. Keep one of those firsts, or take a first back.

• A first the team owes under a protection does not count.
• A protected pick that the team is owed does not count either.
• Two protected firsts in a row need another first to sit beside them.

Other refusals

• A pick tied to a protection that another team is owed cannot move on its own. Send a different pick.
• A pick outside the four-draft window is refused. Choose a season inside it.

Lottery odds

The panel also has a table of Seed and Top pick. It gives each lottery seed's chance, as a percentage, of winning the top pick.