Cash is King

[MisterTidster]

I’m a simmer. Wondering how many others have picked up on the value of cash in this game for keeping a team going. Seems I’m always trading away marginal 2 and 2.5 star (overall and potential) players for cash. If you get a large group of prospects together, you always seem to need it to keep your team together. With extra cash, you can front load free agent contracts and extensions for the seasons you get that extra cash so you have more financial flexibility later in the contract (plus front loaded contracts are easier to dump if you need). Trading for cash also means you can take on an extra contract or two to get butts in seats and more wins for a rebuild.

[ThePretender]

No, cash is not king. You can front load contracts regardless of having high or low amounts of cash. Trading cash for prospects means you're doing something wrong. You should never be trading prospects for cash. You can keep a team together even if you get a group of prospects coming up at the same time.

I think there's a flaw in your strategy if you need to acquire cash to keep your team together.

[TheMaus2]

be smart. if a player on an expiring contract wants a buttload of cash unload him for some nice assets. if you're playing with draft pick compensation on game the system by trading for stars with expiring contracts so hopefully you can catch extra 1st rounders. there are ways to be efficent.

[MisterTidster]

There are more ways to be efficient than trying to get prospects and picks when you can’t afford contracts. Picks sometimes don’t work out and even when they do, they’re not always going to be a fit for your team. My strategy doesn’t fit traditional baseball wisdom, but it has worked very well for me in game. You can get guys that are exceptional on your roster, pay what it takes to keep them... do that while keeping your player development well funded and you can trade the solid starters that you develop behind them for cash to pay for their contracts. If you run the front loading in cycles, you have only one or two years of extreme payrolls to fund. Purge what you don’t need (guys 24+ with two plus stars that will never have a shot to start) for cash. Once the front loads come back to a more reasonable level, you have a handful of years to reload the farm for the next wave.

[ThePretender]

You can create a sustainable cycle without needing to trade for cash. That's the whole point. I'm paying a top 5 sp in the league 50-60m a year and I don't need to trade for cash and I have a positive cash situation. I haven't had to rebuild since I took over the team 15+ years ago and I've made the playoffs nearly every year.

You're obviously not as efficient as you think you are if you need to trade for cash to do all that. You can do everything you're saying, and run a positive budget where you're making cash, and don't need to sell off prospects to keep your elite players and continue your window without needing to sell prospects for cash.

[MisterTidster]

I’m talking about sustaining a “90’s Indians” sort of roster with an all-star at every position. I pay for 5 star infielders that have elite defense without sacrificing offense (generally high speed/high OBP guys). I also pay for a high power/high speed//high contact/solid defensive player... one that will routinely compete for MVP. Finally an elite defensive CF with high contact/high OBP. I fill the rest out with great power hitters. Pitching a 5 star starter, rest of the starters 3’s that are mostly ground ballers. 4-5’s throughout the bullpen. To sustain a roster like this is extremely pricey. You can sustain a solid roster without trading for cash I know... Im saying you can sustain an elite roster by being efficient with players development and trading for cash.

[ThePretender]

You can still do that without trading for cash. And it's actually not as expensive as you suggest to do it. If you do it properly, you trade guys at their peak value, and you should either have players in your farm ready to fill that position, or the prospects to acquire a younger version of the player you had. That way you can keep your payroll down and not lose any production.

We're talking about a consistent 100-110 win team, over a 20-30 year period (if not more) right? If you're trading prospects for cash, then you're not being very efficient. That's my whole point. Even 110+ wins, you still shouldn't be trading cash for that.

[wallewalls]

i always trade my AAAA players for cash in the offseason just so i have more money to spend in the draft and IFA during the season. i never trade quality players/prospects for cash though

[MisterTidster]

I’m not saying you have to trade for cash to succeed. I’m saying if you’re very efficient at developing prospects, you can develop more than what you need without needing to trade for additional prospects to reload. You can cherry pick the best, bundle the next tier in trades to bring in the best ML ready or near ready prospects from other teams, and still have enough trade bait left to bring in cash to make your payroll even larger so you can take on a couple extra large contracts.

I’m not saying my way is better than yours, although I’ve found my way has a lot of advantages that I like. One of the great things about this game is that there are multiple other viable strategies and it’s fun to experiment with a variety of them. I was curious to find out if others came on the same strategy and found that at least one did.

[ThePretender]

Except you posted a thread titled "cash is King" and asked people for their opinion. My opinion is that cash is most definitely not as valuable as you're suggesting. You shouldn't need to trade for cash to take on contract dumps and to sign your players and be able to compete. That's my opinion. That if you're relying on trading prospects for cash, then there's something wrong with your team building strategy.

[Dyzalot]

I mostly agree with the replies. I've traded for cash a few times in the past but it is something I rarely do. I tend to look to trade guys in their early thirties for younger guys who are MLB ready. I try to draft well, at least for the first 5 rounds. I tend to sign free agent relievers after preseason starts, when their asking money has been drastically reduced. I tend to trade "AAAA" guys who are out of options for "AAAA" guys who still have options to remain fairly deep without spending money. I play with injury settings on "high" so this is important. And I rarely sign free agents who are 30+ to contracts of more than 4 years.

[NoOne]

revenue is everything -- it is your "potential" as a GM. your ceiling is how many good players you can afford.

obviously, that's simplified. lots of tricks to the trade involving good financial management and timely trading.

ignore everything else that goes into 'winning'. if you have 20M more money to spend you can make a better team right?

now, you just need to devise and plan best practices of using that money in the most efficient ways possible to squeeze the most wins as possible out of your team.

if you have less money but better practices, you will outproduce larger budgets -- to some extent... it's possible the difference is just too great in some contexts too. however, take your same practices and get a larger budget and you 100% win more than before unless mildly ******ed, lol.

budget is the ceiling for anyone -- so it is "king" in that respect.

like thepretender said, trading for it is probably not the best option available. maybe it can be abused? if you trade to enough teams and the AI doesn't protect against raiding cash, they will not be able to perform normal offseason functions etc... buying worse players etc. if you can make your competition poor, it may very well be a viable strategy, although more of a loophole in video game logic than anything else.