New Free Agent bidding...

[Particleman]

It seems as though the price that players ask for drops a lot and I mean a lot more as time goes on with the latest update. I've seen players that originally asked for 70 pts go for 1. This is too much of a steal if you ask me. I was unable to stay at my computer all day this weekend, so I missed out on some of the bargain hunting, and to my surprise, All Star players were signed for 1-5 pts. I have no problem with people getting players cheap, if no one else bids on them. But these prices are insanely low. And at least make the length of the deals they ask for shorter and make it so they don't accept anything other than a short contract if they are given this miniscual amount of pts. So that those of us that missed out on it this time can sign him the next time he becomes a free agent, like the next season or two. Most of the time when players accept less money than they are worth in real life, they only sign short term deals to prove that they can perform. But in this case, all star players were signed to 7 year deals for 1-5 pts!

[kyles1483]

Yeah, this new drop in asking prices makes it really easy to sign ten good players to deals worth 1 pt for the rest of the contract. It makes it really easy. I think it may be better if some (not all) of the unsigned players take one pt to finish the current season and raise their asking price considerably over the next two years of the contract...
say player a is an all star caliber first baseman that didnt get signed and player b is a 22 year old speedy shortstop with a lot of potential.
player a should ask for a few pts to finish the season in progress. anything after that should go something like:
yr 1 asks 3pts basically 25% of original asking salary
yr 2 12pts 75%
yr 3 16pts 100%
yr 4 17pts
yr 5 17pts
yr 6 16pts
of course this depends on age and potential and stuff.

then player b:
yr 1 asks 1pt
yr 2 1pt
yr 3 1pt
yr 4 3pts
yr 5 7pts
yr 6 13pts
player b being a young player should not ask for more than 1 pt for the time he is planning to spend in the minors. but since he is projected to be a good player, he should cost some money to keep for a long time. I think the current situation for players like player b is good, but players like player a need to ask for more money.
My four cents,
Kyle

[Slugger222]

If I had my druthers, I'd rather see them keep the players signing at realistic levels, rather than let them dip to "sign at any cost" deals.

This way, those who are forced to miss out on the draft at least have a chance to get some of those players.

[takaplan]

ya, it really takes the realism out of the league. because of the 70 pt. players signing for 1 pt, i've seen bidding wars go on for an hour over 1 pt players. it isnt fair if you cant sit at your computer all day every day.

tom

[Particleman]

I know, the way it is now, almost any team, even those with tiny budgets can rebuild to at least half decent if they're just able to be around during free agent bidding, this seems to be the case in all the leagues now except the private ones (in the public league I am still playing I feel like such an idiot for resigning my players, to think I could have had them for 1-5 pts).

I also agree that it seems unrealistic to see so many all star 70 pt players sign to such tiny paying long term contracts.

[Phlint]

on the other hand, i've seen one point free agents get bid up to 80 points because of draft wars. actually i think this is a fair way for even the small markets to compete. in the leagues with active gm's, only a few players sneak by at below market value. in the other leagues, i guess it's one benefit of being active.

[Particleman]

Not true, even in the private leagues, where almost everyone is active, most of the players go for below market value now. As it stands now there is almost nothing to lose in letting your players go free agent. In some public leagues, prior to the changes, I saw the occasional overbidding, but I haven't seen that happen in a while.

[Schaefling]

I agree that free agents are signing too cheap now. Personally I really liked the system where free agents gradually asked less all the way to March and then on April 1 went beck to asking full price for their services. Under this system I witnessed some great bidding wars in March and sometimes in February. I even saw some players acquiring free agents from November to January either because they just had to have these players or because they wanted to prevent a bidding war in February and March on a player they really wanted.

Under the new system almost everybody waits until March and even then there is much less competitive bidding because everyone knows you can pick up good players for next to nothing on April 1. Under the old system I sometimes was forced to bite the bullet and sign a player on April 1 for more money than I wanted because I lost a crucial bidding war. That almost never happens now making BBMO less of a game because of it.

[Particleman]

I think what should happen is that the opening bid of 1 should be eliminated on certain players. The minimum bid on all players should be what their final asking price in the last round of free agent bidding is going to be (but that final asking price should be higher than the absurdly low 1 pt for everyone it is now). This would alieviate the problem of people complaining about free agents not signing when they left their computer even though their MAX bid was higher than what their final asking price was, but it never got bid up. This is a much more practical solution than everyone dropping their asking price to 1 pt like what seems to be happening now. Plus I think it would lead to more players signing at market value and more bidding wars.

[takaplan]

i know, ive actually used the strategy of letting a player go, and then resigning him as a free agent for a lot less. I had a young closer, Kenny Araiza in NABL, who wanted something like 12 points for 7 years. I let him go, and signed him for 1 point as a free agent. I think this should be a top priority, as it is dreadfully unrealistic.

Tom

[James Grove]

FYI -

We have made some modifications to free agency to prevent the release-and-resign-cheap bug.

It used to be that if a player was released at the very end of free agent bidding, they immediately asked for a rock-bottom price.

Now the players lower their prices the longer they are on the free agent list, NOT the later it is in the bidding process.

So if you release a player, no matter when it is in free agency, he should start off with a reasonable-to-high asking price, which will come down over time.

Please let us know if you are not seeing this happen.

Thanks,
James Grove