The player in question was a 27 year old SS that recently completed his 6th year of MLB service. As a former farm hand of mine, I felt like I kind of got taken on the original trade where I dealt him and I was interested in bringing him back into the fold.
Player Report for #26 José Ramírez
Original FA demands were I believe 8 @18m, which is pretty extreme although understandable. I wish there was a way to just limit the amount of years that guys could demand in a league setting, I see very few human GMs offering a guy 8 years.
I decided to offer the guy a contract like this, I can't remember the exact splits but I think it was something like 6m/17m/17m/17m(6m guaranteed). So I'm offering him like 46m guaranteed over 3 years, which is way below what he wants, and he more or less laughs at it(justifiably).
At the next stage of FA, approx around the league meetings, I offer him 5@14m, with the last year partially guaranteed. He of course still laughs at it. These likely were the only 2 multiyear deals this player received, however.
So it advances into February, when guys who have dreams often get realistic. He's asking for 6.5m/1year, I parlay that into a 3 year deal for 23.5m and he signs it, taking way less than half of the money of either of my previous offers.
wtf is wrong with this game, why wouldn't the player just say something like, "I don't plan on signing this offer at the moment, but if you're willing to keep it active I may consider it at a later date". The human GM could then withdraw the offer if he wanted to. This is a pretty large AI issue and should be looked at for subsequent versions of the game.