have i found a new loophole?

yajeflow · 06-11-2009, 05:30 AM

my league uses a board that determines the budgets for each team. most of our teams are poorly managed, financially-speaking. we use budgets of around $2.5 million, or so.

let's say that i do not want to use my budgetary surplus. let's say that i buy just a couple of players and have $500K leftover.

now, i could take 'orders' from other teams for players, sign them, then trade them. it would get players on THEIR teams, and as soon as i clear their salary off my books once again, free up the original $500K for me to continually do this until every team has had their fill.

why would i? because for every deal i consummate, i could reap yet another prospect. i could theoretically do this for all teams until their rosters are all set.

am i wrong here? or is this an ingenius circumvention of the bylaws? there is an english saying that goes like this:
"it just ain't cricket"

i think that this applies. it just ain't baseball. at any given time, only about 4 of our 12 teams ever have money to bid upon free agents so far. the other 8 are all out of whack, yet they still want more players and more titles. i know that this would be accepted by those teams, as i would've gladly paid the piper when my team was 2 million in the hole.

struggles_mightily · 06-11-2009, 10:14 AM

You'd have to give up a pick, of course (presuming that the player involved was a Type A or B free agent and had been offered arbitration by his former club). So it'd be up to you to decide whether the value of the prospect you were receiving would be greater than a player you could potentially take in the amateur draft at a particular point.

In reality, doesn't MLB have a hard upper limit on the amount of Type A free agents that one club can sign in a year?

Those two rules together might prevent this from being a viable strategy, as you reap larger rewards the more times you do this in one offseason (since the picks you have to surrender are of less and less value with each free agent signing, but the calibre of prospect received presumably remains constant).

EDIT: All in all, I think that this probably is an effective strategy in most cases -- particularly if there are Type C (or whatever? "unranked"?) free agents available that a team in your league covets but can't afford. If signing a Type A or B player, then it's still a good strategy as long as the value of the prospect you get back exceeds the value of the pick you lose (or the total value of all the prospects you get back exceeds the total value of all the picks you surrender, if making multiple deals). I do think that "moral"/ethical question are, as you imply, quite important in explaining why baseball doesn't witness "sign and trade" moves.

kq76 · 06-11-2009, 05:08 PM

Have you found a new loophole? No, not really. It just sounds like your league might not have some rules in place that others do to prevent this sort of thing.

First, of all, I forget the exact date, but you can't just sign FAs and turn around and trade them. You have to wait half of the season [EDIT: June 15th] before you can. And by that time while some teams might be more desperate, there won't be quite as many teams interested so unless you've got a player a team really wants you just might be stuck with him and what might be a bloated contract, years and salary-wise. Then figure in that the player might have gotten injured, played badly or taken ratings hits in that time and who knows if you'll ever be able to get rid of him.

Secondly, it sounds like you're probably not using a cap. Now while MLB doesn't use one, in OOTP you can and if you set it low enough then even the best teams can't get too far away. And if the best teams aren't buying then a number of your most likely trade partners aren't buying (the worst teams are generally, but certainly not always, managed by people who don't trade and are otherwise active) which also lowers what a buyer has to pay as there's less competition for the player.

Thirdly, in OOTP GMs might not care so much if they're losing money year after year, but that's certainly not realistic. In OOTP you do somewhat get punished for being fiscally irresponsible though in that the more money you lose the less likely you'll be able to reel in FAs, extend contracts, etc. Now of course you could trade for them like you are (and you could institute a rule similar to the June 15th one if you want), but it's a lot more expensive to trade for a FA than to just sign one because you're not only paying what is probably an over-sized contract, but you're giving up players and picks as well which will eventually hurt the organization. A GM does that enough and sooner or later they'll get fed up with not being to do anything financially and they'll just quit the league.

Lastly, if your budgets are only 2.5M, I wonder how the salary structure and other financial settings were set up. There could be something with it that's creating issues as well. Maybe not, but if your league doesn't have a June 15th rule then I'm thinking there's a good chance they overlooked a number of problematic things, especially if it is in its infancy and hasn't yet instituted rules to prevent things it doesn't like.

yajeflow · 06-12-2009, 06:49 AM

thank you, guys.

although i have worked in baseball for 12 years, i had never heard of the june 15 rule. go figure. that solves my issue right there.

as far as our teams losing money, this has already come up. i instituted a cash balance low limit of -$10,000,000. we had a team try out a plan i came up with whereby a team would not care at all about contract values. they would acquire way above and beyond contracts from teams wanting to get out from under them for prospects.

most of the time the acquired players were in the final year of their contracts, and the team would receive some potential free agent compensation. the team would obviously have zero money for free agents or extensions. no matter. more teams would be willing to dump off contracts the next season. draft picks merely served as a tool for acquiring these excellent (and expensive) players.

the team could theorhetically do this forever, since there are always dumping teams and draft picks. the team that did this has the most wins in our league's history, and four 2nd-place finishes in four seasons. they are getting off it now, as they would like to see if they can rebuild the team the old-fashioned way now. but it worked, and could work forever without a cash balance minimum. the team has a $3.6 million hole to dig itself out of.

as far as our $2.5 average payroll and budgets, it works well with the other settings we have. i think i basically used a straight % of the major league figures the game came with. we just want our salary structure to be lower and mean something. we have never had a million dollar player, and we won't unless the guy is young and the best ever, i imagine. RF log pilo did sign for $775K, but no one has topped it.

06-11-2009, 05:30 AM	#1
yajeflow Minors (Double A) Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: newport beach Posts: 199	have i found a new loophole? my league uses a board that determines the budgets for each team. most of our teams are poorly managed, financially-speaking. we use budgets of around $2.5 million, or so. let's say that i do not want to use my budgetary surplus. let's say that i buy just a couple of players and have $500K leftover. now, i could take 'orders' from other teams for players, sign them, then trade them. it would get players on THEIR teams, and as soon as i clear their salary off my books once again, free up the original $500K for me to continually do this until every team has had their fill. why would i? because for every deal i consummate, i could reap yet another prospect. i could theoretically do this for all teams until their rosters are all set. am i wrong here? or is this an ingenius circumvention of the bylaws? there is an english saying that goes like this: "it just ain't cricket" i think that this applies. it just ain't baseball. at any given time, only about 4 of our 12 teams ever have money to bid upon free agents so far. the other 8 are all out of whack, yet they still want more players and more titles. i know that this would be accepted by those teams, as i would've gladly paid the piper when my team was 2 million in the hole.

06-11-2009, 10:14 AM	#2
struggles_mightily Minors (Triple A) Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 292	You'd have to give up a pick, of course (presuming that the player involved was a Type A or B free agent and had been offered arbitration by his former club). So it'd be up to you to decide whether the value of the prospect you were receiving would be greater than a player you could potentially take in the amateur draft at a particular point. In reality, doesn't MLB have a hard upper limit on the amount of Type A free agents that one club can sign in a year? Those two rules together might prevent this from being a viable strategy, as you reap larger rewards the more times you do this in one offseason (since the picks you have to surrender are of less and less value with each free agent signing, but the calibre of prospect received presumably remains constant). EDIT: All in all, I think that this probably is an effective strategy in most cases -- particularly if there are Type C (or whatever? "unranked"?) free agents available that a team in your league covets but can't afford. If signing a Type A or B player, then it's still a good strategy as long as the value of the prospect you get back exceeds the value of the pick you lose (or the total value of all the prospects you get back exceeds the total value of all the picks you surrender, if making multiple deals). I do think that "moral"/ethical question are, as you imply, quite important in explaining why baseball doesn't witness "sign and trade" moves. Last edited by struggles_mightily; 06-11-2009 at 10:47 AM.

06-11-2009, 05:08 PM	#3
kq76 Global Moderator Join Date: Nov 2002 Posts: 11,799	Have you found a new loophole? No, not really. It just sounds like your league might not have some rules in place that others do to prevent this sort of thing. First, of all, I forget the exact date, but you can't just sign FAs and turn around and trade them. You have to wait half of the season [EDIT: June 15th] before you can. And by that time while some teams might be more desperate, there won't be quite as many teams interested so unless you've got a player a team really wants you just might be stuck with him and what might be a bloated contract, years and salary-wise. Then figure in that the player might have gotten injured, played badly or taken ratings hits in that time and who knows if you'll ever be able to get rid of him. Secondly, it sounds like you're probably not using a cap. Now while MLB doesn't use one, in OOTP you can and if you set it low enough then even the best teams can't get too far away. And if the best teams aren't buying then a number of your most likely trade partners aren't buying (the worst teams are generally, but certainly not always, managed by people who don't trade and are otherwise active) which also lowers what a buyer has to pay as there's less competition for the player. Thirdly, in OOTP GMs might not care so much if they're losing money year after year, but that's certainly not realistic. In OOTP you do somewhat get punished for being fiscally irresponsible though in that the more money you lose the less likely you'll be able to reel in FAs, extend contracts, etc. Now of course you could trade for them like you are (and you could institute a rule similar to the June 15th one if you want), but it's a lot more expensive to trade for a FA than to just sign one because you're not only paying what is probably an over-sized contract, but you're giving up players and picks as well which will eventually hurt the organization. A GM does that enough and sooner or later they'll get fed up with not being to do anything financially and they'll just quit the league. Lastly, if your budgets are only 2.5M, I wonder how the salary structure and other financial settings were set up. There could be something with it that's creating issues as well. Maybe not, but if your league doesn't have a June 15th rule then I'm thinking there's a good chance they overlooked a number of problematic things, especially if it is in its infancy and hasn't yet instituted rules to prevent things it doesn't like. __________________ My OOTP Wishlist \| My FAQ List OOTP Wiki \| Your Recommended Team Nicknames, By City (A Crowdsourced Project)

06-12-2009, 06:49 AM	#4
yajeflow Minors (Double A) Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: newport beach Posts: 199	thank you, guys. although i have worked in baseball for 12 years, i had never heard of the june 15 rule. go figure. that solves my issue right there. as far as our teams losing money, this has already come up. i instituted a cash balance low limit of -$10,000,000. we had a team try out a plan i came up with whereby a team would not care at all about contract values. they would acquire way above and beyond contracts from teams wanting to get out from under them for prospects. most of the time the acquired players were in the final year of their contracts, and the team would receive some potential free agent compensation. the team would obviously have zero money for free agents or extensions. no matter. more teams would be willing to dump off contracts the next season. draft picks merely served as a tool for acquiring these excellent (and expensive) players. the team could theorhetically do this forever, since there are always dumping teams and draft picks. the team that did this has the most wins in our league's history, and four 2nd-place finishes in four seasons. they are getting off it now, as they would like to see if they can rebuild the team the old-fashioned way now. but it worked, and could work forever without a cash balance minimum. the team has a $3.6 million hole to dig itself out of. as far as our $2.5 average payroll and budgets, it works well with the other settings we have. i think i basically used a straight % of the major league figures the game came with. we just want our salary structure to be lower and mean something. we have never had a million dollar player, and we won't unless the guy is young and the best ever, i imagine. RF log pilo did sign for $775K, but no one has topped it.