Ideas to Reduce Player Movement

[Lordofbrewtown]

Hi, I have a 72 team league I play in commissioner mode in which I want to have trading, but would ideally like to have less/minimal player movement. 22 Man rosters with an 18 man reserve roster. AI GM's/managers control all teams.

I currently have the AI trading set to 'Almost Never'; but am noticing this offseason that halfway through the offseason, teams are averaging 5 trades per team, and player movement/turnover seems to be extremely high. At that pace, there would be 8-12 offseason trades per team, turning over > 30% of the 40 man roster before free agency and releases. Makes me cringe at what 'average' or 'frequent' AI trade setting would do.

An ideas on how to tweak settings to reduce player movement? Does the AI trading setting even matter? Outside of trades, are there other settings that would help? Side/unrelated issue: I'm noticing that @ 50% of the best/highest rated free agents remain unsigned each year (with crazy demands and not enough budget available). I assume I need to tweak the financial settings, but that seems incredibly high for 'default' settings.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by Lordofbrewtown

Does the AI trading setting even matter?

You might have discovered it doesn't. Suggest you test it.

[LansdowneSt]

Real life baseball owner’s for a hundred years: “The Reserve Clause”.

[David Watts]

Turn off 3D.....ducks

[Lordofbrewtown]

Originally Posted by LansdowneSt

Real life baseball owner’s for a hundred years: “The Reserve Clause”.

I did consider that; but, I do want the free agency - I kind of feel like if I'm going to use the reserve clause, why bother with using financials.

My big concern is the trading. Was not that frequent when using OOTP22 offseason, and was definitely low(er) in OOTP23 regular season. I noticed it spike using OOTP23 in my most recent offseason, imported to newer versions, and am still seeing the issue.

[Lordofbrewtown]

Originally Posted by David Watts

Turn off 3D.....ducks

If that is a serious suggestion, I'm certainly willing to try

[ZepTepi]

Originally Posted by Lordofbrewtown

Hi, I have a 72 team league I play in commissioner mode in which I want to have trading, but would ideally like to have less/minimal player movement. 22 Man rosters with an 18 man reserve roster. AI GM's/managers control all teams.

I currently have the AI trading set to 'Almost Never'; but am noticing this offseason that halfway through the offseason, teams are averaging 5 trades per team, and player movement/turnover seems to be extremely high. At that pace, there would be 8-12 offseason trades per team, turning over > 30% of the 40 man roster before free agency and releases. Makes me cringe at what 'average' or 'frequent' AI trade setting would do.

An ideas on how to tweak settings to reduce player movement? Does the AI trading setting even matter? Outside of trades, are there other settings that would help? Side/unrelated issue: I'm noticing that @ 50% of the best/highest rated free agents remain unsigned each year (with crazy demands and not enough budget available). I assume I need to tweak the financial settings, but that seems incredibly high for 'default' settings.

I had honestly not paid much attention to trades in my save other than recognizing there were more than I would like. Other aspects of the game were my focus. Once I read your post I did the math and found that over 10 seasons there were an avg of 47.4 trades per calendar year. That's with a AI Trading Frequency setting of Normal. I changed it to Low at the end of the last year so am very curious as to how many there are going to be. One other thing I found interesting was that I assumed that the more teams in a given a league the more overall trades but in the 4th year of the 10 year period I looked at I expanded the league from 16 to 20 teams but while I did have an increase in trades of 21 from the last year at 16 teams and the first with 20 teams, the avg # before and after the expansion were within 1.3 trades.



2031 - 59

2032 - 50

2033 - 36

Expanded league to 20 teams

2034 - 57

2035 - 52

2036 - 54

2037 - 44

2038 - 37

2039 - 38

2040 - 47

Avg # of trades: 47.4

Pre-expansion avg of 48.3
Post-expansion avg of 47

I tried to find the stats of what the # of trades in the MLB has been in recent years but could not find that info though I'm sure someone has it somewhere.

[Lordofbrewtown]

Just ran a small test. Setup items that might affect results: 72 team fictional league, 102 game schedule (May-August regular season), August 1 Trading deadline, 22 man roseter and 17 man reserve roster; no salary cap, 50% revenue sharing across the board. Ran for first 7 years of league (up to opening day of Year 8).

Normal Trading: Offseason: Avg 104.5 (1.5/team); Median 100 (1.4/team), Max 129; In Season Avg 51.7 (0.7/team), Median 52.5 (0.7/team)

Almost None: Offseason: Avg 57.9 trades (0.8/team), Median 58.0 (0.8/team), max 75. In-season: avg 7.2 (0.1/team), Median 6.5 (0.1/team).

Of Note: 95% of the 'in-season' trades occurred in July (within 1 month of the trade deadline). The trade setting seems to have a much larger effect on in-season trading than during the off-season. Also, the trading trend was down/stabalized at lower numbers in years 5-7 with 'normal trading' than years 1-4. Somewhat similar with 'Almost None': Year 2 had the max number, years 1 & 2 30-40% higher.

My league that was experiencing the higher number was in Year 2. It has almost none and is blowing away may sample simulation. One item that may be affecting this: as commissioner, I am taking control and extending/signing 1-3 player per team.

I am thinking that is causing more trades: The AI seems go ahead an sign other/more free agents, and then make trades to get back to budget, as opposed to limiting new signings if cash strapped. I'm hopeful my large spike of 3 per team is related to the "inaugural" league effect I'm noticing in the test results, where the first 1-3 years have more trades, and Year 2 seems to spike (in my admittedly small sample size).

I would love a new feature that allowed the Commissioner to Approve/Reject all trades.

[uruguru]

Originally Posted by Lordofbrewtown

I did consider that; but, I do want the free agency - I kind of feel like if I'm going to use the reserve clause, why bother with using financials.

The Reserve clause in OOTP is not like the Reserve clause in real life. In OOTP, player contracts are not completely under the owner's control... the amounts are determined by the player's overall rating.

So even with the Reserve clause on in OOTP, you still have to balance budgets and may have a financial need to trade away expensive contracts.

The Rule V draft and minor league free agency will ensure that MLB-quality players don't get trapped in farm systems.

[Pelican]

One thing I have noticed in recent sims is a large number of trades at the deadline (July 1 is what I use). Yes, IRL MLB there is an increase, particularly in "rentals" of guys with expiring contracts about to become free agents. But IRL there are typically more deals at the end of Spring Training, as teams cut active rosters, and need spots on the forty-man roster. I wonder if the new feature for trade windows or intervals at the deadline has increased the number of deals? It shouldn't affect the AI.

As Commissioner I monitor deals, and have been forced to void some that appeared too one-sided. And I usually play with trading set at Low or Very Low. I don't want no trades, or only IRL trades, because I like randomness and play with development on. But when 1961 Ernie Banks and Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays get traded, enough!

[uruguru]

One thing you can do is turn off the trading deadline day feature. Not only does that increase activity, but it seems to slightly lower the difficulty so that the players get offered better deals than they would otherwise.

Another thing I have tried is dynamically adjusting the difficulty. In the off-season, I set it to "Very Low" because there always seems to be a massive unrealistic spike when the off-season starts. Then I bump it to "High" for the Winter Meetings. After the meetings, I keep it at "Low".

A month before the trading deadline, I set it to "Normal". At that point, the game's internal logic automatically ramps up the volume as the deadline approaches.

I have no idea if this makes anything more accurate, but I enjoy playing with the knobs a bit.

[Lordofbrewtown]

Originally Posted by Pelican

As Commissioner I monitor deals, and have been forced to void some that appeared too one-sided. !

How do you void the trades? I am playing as commissioner (usually do) - and I've never noticed a setting that allows for that?

[liberty-ca]

Originally Posted by Lordofbrewtown

How do you void the trades? I am playing as commissioner (usually do) - and I've never noticed a setting that allows for that?

There is no setting for that, you just edit guys back to teams they belong before.

[Pelican]

Originally Posted by Lordofbrewtown

How do you void the trades? I am playing as commissioner (usually do) - and I've never noticed a setting that allows for that?

I simply place the players involved back on their original teams. Then I check the box to bar AI roster control for each team. (To prevent the AI from going ahead and making the trade again.) Of course, one problem with no AI control is no roster moves for those teams in the event of injuries. Meaning you have to kind of babysit those teams.