[old fat bald guy]

I think the most important thing to understand is how the arbitration and free-agency systems work. In general, players are going to be on minimum salary until they have three years of major-league service (or a little less), and they can't be free agents until they have six. This might change during your save game depending on your league evolution settings.

So don't pay a lot for players who don't have the service time to demand a lot, unless they're signing on for years beyond that six-year threshold.

I try to build around guys who have good ratings for durability and are willing to sign long-term deals that sacrifice potential salary for security. You'll have to pay them even if they're hurt, so I bet heavily on guys who are deemed less likely to be hurt.

Another key thing to understand in OOTP is the "budget for free agents"/"budget for extensions" thing. This baffled me when I first started playing. Think of it as "this year's budget"/"next year's budget." And ... in OOTP, next year's budget includes the arbitration estimate for all players who are eligible for arbitration, as well as various other contracts that you can choose to terminate. If you see a $5 million arbitration estimate for a player you don't really want, you can expect to free up $5 million for next year when you decline to offer arbitration.

A trap I've fallen into is trading for a player whose contract expires after the current season, so I think I'm only spending "budget for free agents" and not touching "budget for extensions," but he's already signed an extension with his previous team and I'm stuck with that. You have to dig into the "contract" tab on his profile to check that.

There is a hell of a lot involved, really, and I understand why some people find it overwhelming.