Free Agent Bidding

[mrchip4]

I am becoming disillusioned with the whole free-agency process in the game. It sucks. Here is my humble opinion.

Players who have one or two years of major league experience are demanding huge contracts that have no basis on their track record. I had a player with one year of experience who hit .330 and 25 HR demand 95 points over seven years. It seems that pitchers are demanding alot more these days too. Which would be fine if the free market had any bearing on the game. It does not seem to.

For instance a player is demanding 125 points per year. None of the 30 teams wants to pay him that. The highest bid is 75 points per year. Would said player sit out the season if no one came higher than this? Not in real life. He would sign with the highest bidder for his services. In Baseball Mogul he would sit out the year. In fact in one league I'm in almost two thirds of the free agents went unsigned. Thus no one has them on their teams and the talent level of the league is suffering. We have to wait until they come down in their demands because noone wants to pay them that many points that is why they are unsigned in the first place.

Also in the process, if player X is seeking 25 points per year I bid 25 points per year. The bid however starts at 1 point per. If noone else bids on player X the bids remains at 1 point and at the end of the signing period he remains unsigned. Not because I wouldn't meet his demands but because the game wouldn't up my bid. The same happens if I offer 17 points and it goes that high. He may or may not sign with me. Why?

I think that the free agent process needs to be overhauled. You should be able to enter an opening bid and a maximum bid.

[Frost]

chip that's happened to me b4, so if i want to bid the 25 or whatever points instead of the 1 point, i just put the bid in a second time and it always works for me.

[James Grove]

Hi, Chip -

Yes, Frost is correct.

If nobody else has bid on a player, the first bid will always be for 1 point for X years (where X is 1 to 7 years).

If you want to immediately jump this price up to 12 points (for example), then you can place a second bid for 12 points for X years. This causes the asking price to jump up.


If another user has already bid on the player, your first bid (assuming it is higher than the current max bid) will be 1 point higher than the max bid.

Then, if you want, you can place a second bid to jump the bid price up even higher.

I hope this helps.

-James

[James Grove]

Don't forget that the prices players demand go down throughout the free agent season. And in fact, if the players are not signed by April 1, their asking prices continue to drop throughout the season.

So the guy who wants 60 points on November 1 may be down to just 30 points by March 1.


Also, don't forget that players want different salaries for different contracts.

In your example - the guy with 1 year experience who hit .330 with 25 homers. He sounds like a candidate for Rookie of the Year, if you ask me!

So this guy is thinking that he is going to be an All-Star in 3 or 4 years, at which point he'll be REALLY valuable.

Consequently, if you want to sign him to a 1 or 2 year deal, he might ask just 20 points.

But if you want to lock him up long term (7 years, as you said) then he is going to want to be sure he is getting paid what he will be worth by then, when he will be at the peak of his career. So he will need 95 points per year.

And for comparison's sake, if you did sign the young player to a 2 year deal for 20 points per year, when that deal expires then he's going to want some REALLY big dough. He'd probably want 120 points for a 1 or 2 year deal at that point.

So don't forget to try bidding on contracts of different lengths, and see how that changes the asking price. (I usually place a bid for 1 point at 1 year, then another bid of 1 point for 7 years, and see how they compare.)

-James

[lancelot55]

One big problem that I notice is that their are a lot of good players that go unsigned, because they are asking way to much. They end up unsigned and wasted. No want to pay more seventy points for a player, especially some of the veterans that don't deserve it.

Another point is this, if a player goes unsigned throughout the offseason, why does he ask for more on April 1 than on March 1. It is not realistic, because I am sure he would want to be on team and make something.

[Frost]

yeah i agree with that. the way it's set up now, IRL it would be like Giambi became a FA and started out asking for 30 million per year but waited and settled at 18 million per year. it doesnt' really happen that way. i've seen players ask for 120 points long term in some leagues.

[kenargot]

I know this is happening in EBL too... Owners are finding out that they can drop almost all of their high contracts and resign them for less during the free agent season. We have a "Ton" of FA's this year that you could build a whole team in one year.

[faulk28]

the team has the rights to a player based on major league service...so a player is going to be cheap for the first four years of service...then they go to arbitration...that being said i'm not sure we would want to go that route because gm's would keep there young players in the minors and keep them longer...but i do think that the asking price is extremely high on some free agents


***also the game doesn't seem to rate by performance, it rates by scouting...that's how you get guys that have never played in the majors wanting some good amount of $***