Niners Nation FanPosts as we head towards the draft

With free agency kicking off in a couple days, and the NFL Draft 7+ weeks away, I wanted to address some site issues that have arisen and likely will continue in the coming weeks.

We always want to encourage discussion, whether it be comments, FanPosts, or FanShots.  A year ago tomorrow I put together a post called "Niners Nation 101: FanPosts and FanShots."  In that post I discussed the differences between FanPosts and FanShots.  I recommend reading it over, but basically FanShots are for quick takes, links and videos, while FanPosts are for extended discussions on a particular topic.

I bring it up now because we've made some slight changes in the way we're using FanPosts for certain subjects.  As you may or may not have noticed, we have several "Official NN FanPosts" for everything from mock drafts to free agency-related transactions to the combine (now completed).  The reason we have these kinds of posts is to keep the discussion on a given topic relatively organized.  If we have ten different FanPosts talking about the combine, it makes it extremely difficult to follow the discussion.

This has been particularly pertinent for mock drafts.  We've got the continually updated mock draft thread for people to post their mocks, whether it be a look at one pick or an entire seven round mock.  We strongly encourage you to provide your mock draft as a comment in that thread.  Doing that allows people to compare your mock to the various other ones people are posting and provide critiques accordingly.

So when would a mock draft be suitable as its own FanPost?  Here are two examples.  One by nocal81 and one by trickeysob.  The two threads provide some kinds of mock drafts, but on top of that they provide info about current 49ers, free agents, needs, and in the case of trickeysob, a 53-man roster projection.  Now, each one of these things individually would not make for the best FanPost at this point.  However, combining them all together provides depth that FanPosts should really contain.  Whether you agree with the predictions is besides the point.  In fact, it might be better for you to disagree so we can get some lively discussion.

So, if you're just going to post a mock draft (even with some explanations), please go to the mock draft thread.  However, if you're going to put together a mock draft, along with a look at free agency, along with a projection of the 53-man roster (as an example), then we're talking about a potentially quality FanPost.  Obviously the substantive and technical quality of your FanPost depend on the details, but if you include enough depth, you're on your way to a quality post.

Again, I'm not here to discourage discussion in any form.  Rather, I just want to keep things organized so people can follow the flow and logic of various discussions without having to hop between five different threads.

If you have any questions, concerns, or suggestions about this (or anything on the site), feel free to leave a comment or email me at ninersnation@gmail.com.