Offseason Day 2

[PitchingWinsGames]

All Eligible FAs have filed. Arbitration is over.

We'll be starting the contraction draft tomorrow and the structure will require a little bit of imagination.

There are 14 players on Arlington's active roster and 18 on Vancouver's. Those guys will be going in the first round. If you don't want to make your pick, PM or post in the draft when your pick is up that you want to be passed.

As it stands, I will just be trading the players from that team to yours for a dollar. So, these guys will be placed on your active roster. Now, 20 remaining teams and 32 picks will mean not everyone gets 2 picks, but such is life.

Once the ML phase is over, we'll go to the MiLB phase. Vancouver has 16 players that are more than 1 star in potential and Arlington has something like 17. So, there's 33 picks, e.g. another 2 rounds. After the four collective rounds, I will outright delete the Arlington and Vancouver franchises.

After that, we'll begin the FA period, and that process is still being worked on to improve last year's.

[PitchingWinsGames]

Ok, there was an issue with the financials where, in Sandro's case, he couldn't make an offer to FAs. Quick look says Sandro's at 74.4M and the cap is obviously 75M. So, AFTER the draft, I'll increase the salary cap to 85M ... but remember you MUST be under the cap by Spring Training, or you'll forfeit a 3rd round pick. If you stay over in subsequent sims, the forfeiture will increase to a second or even first round pick.

[Mainge]

Imma piss people off.

[FishFanInPA]

so the cap is 85 Mil now or 75?

[PitchingWinsGames]

so the cap is 85 Mil now or 75?

The cap will TEMPORARILY be 85M until Spring Training, this will allow for some Free Agency wiggle room. Once Spring Training hits, the cap goes back down to 75M.

[FishFanInPA]

so then why raise it at all? If Sandro can't fit anyone new, then oh well.

[PitchingWinsGames]

It stimulates player movement, Fip. Players will have to be traded to get under the cap, releasing them doesn't magically remove the cap hit.

[FishFanInPA]

Meh, a cap is there for a reason obviously.

[PitchingWinsGames]

Meh, a cap is there for a reason obviously.

It's true enough, but Im fairly certain other sports leagues allow for salary cap wiggle room and "you must be below it by date X" so we're doing the same.

[Mainge]

In all professional salary cap leagues, you're allowed to go over before certain deadlines.
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It's true enough, but Im fairly certain other sports leagues allow for salary cap wiggle room and "you must be below it by date X" so we're doing the same.

Exactly. Fip is a hater.

[PitchingWinsGames]

Also, in addition to that, Im considering eliminating contract incentives in the league. A) They serve no real purpose, inasmuch as Im quite certain no award winners had contracts that stipulated that... and B) People have begun to exploit them, in that offers last year included MVP/AB bonuses that were crazy for players that were never going to meet them...

What happens is ... Ross Gload hits the FA market, everyone offers him the same kinds of 1 year/1M contracts and then it becomes a bidding war of money that'll never matter. "Yeah, I'll offer my bench guy 6M for getting 600ABs and another 20M for winning the MVP". Now, granted, it hasn't gone that far yet... but that's the example I'll use.

Additionally and probably most importantly is the slick "Last year option" trick. Now some of you may not know this, but that's why Im killing it now.

There's basically a method in which you can offer Ross Gload that same 1M contract as everyone else, but tack on a team option of X amount on the back end. So let's say you make it 10M... you just offered Gload 2/11M... nobody's going to offer that... and that 10M contract will never happen as you just have to not pick up the option to make it happen.

Long story short... offer your contracts, nix the incentives and keep the options reasonable. If I find a violation that seems to harm the competitive balance of the league, I will handle it accordingly.

[pdub858]

I have to say that I do not like the fact that even for a little bit of time that the cap will be increased. I am well under the cap already looking to make a big FA push. Now anyone can go into FA and just use a 10M bonus to there liking. After that is over they can just make some moves to get back under but by that time FA will be over and damages have been done.

[PitchingWinsGames]

If you have more money, then you'll have more money. I don't see the problem, necessarily.

Not to mention, there are really only a couple of "impact" FAs and... really, they're not going to make the difference between a team making the playoffs or not, imo. They will be solid contributors though.

[pdub858]

Now that I have seen the FA pool I guess it doesn't really matter lol.
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If anyone needs to dump salary, hit me up, Im your man.

[Mainge]

I've got 5m to offer and a lot of room to take on salary. Get at me.