Financial Settings Questions

JerryShoe · 01-07-2024, 09:42 PM

Ever since my Strat-O-Matic card days, I've kept financials. It's been very unrealistic in that players earn their salaries solely on performance (or lack thereof) and experience while teams earn by wins, place in the standings and how deep they go into the playoffs. That is, no arbitration or TV contracts. I've done the same in my OOTP projects, but I'd like to try to have the game take care of things. It looks like if do the reserve clause thing that salaries would be close to what I used to so, since you can set a baseline for the different levels of player (superstar down to poor). As for the team money picture, having no revenue sharing and visiting team gets 0% of gate seems to be in line for what I do (so that a good team reaps all of its rewards), but what other settings can I use to ensure good teams profit more than bad teams? Thanks.

Pelican · 01-08-2024, 11:42 AM

Not sure what your goal is, but if it is "good team reaps all of its rewards", I'm not sure the OOTP engine can accommodate that. It is, after all, intended to mimic the MLB model, and past practices. And MLB does not directly reward good teams, and actually penalizes them, in the amateur draft.

My goal with financials, for example, is to force teams to spend a minimum number on total salary. Looking at you, Pirates, Royals, Rays (Montreal Mounties, in my sim), Reds. A spending floor seems to promote overall team parity better than a salary cap or luxury tax.

Settings of no revenue sharing and no sharing of gate receipts will virtually insure that "the rich get richer" and the bad teams get worse. If that is what you want, you'll likely achieve it. Some romanticize baseball in the Depression Era by a focus on the great Yankee teams. I tend to focus more on awful teams like the Phillies and Athletics and Browns, and of course on the Negro Leagues. I prefer parity and competitive balance. YMMV and OOTP can help you achieve either goal.

JerryShoe · 01-08-2024, 07:21 PM

It's not a matter of the rich getting richer, more a matter of fiscal responsibility. If you have a team of highly paid superstars, you need a good record to deserve keeping them. As an example, in my last project I brought the 1962 Mets to a pennant in 1968 so the goal (postseason by '69) was reached, but if I hadn't won around 88 games and finished at least third, I would have had to shed salary and stars, and the worse the year the more would need to be done. In early June I was looking at an 82-80/fifth place year which would have meant a bloodbath in the payroll section. A better example might be when I took over the 1965 Yankees, high payroll with players no longer worthy of it and with a house rule of no disposing of players who stayed with the team historically (so I had to keep Whitey Ford who was paid for 1950-64, 216-84, 2.73, 135 ERA+, but pitched 20-22/116 ERA+). The only forced parity I want is that the big market teams don't have a financial advantage over their little brothers.
I do have a salary question now, though, in how does it work. When I did the Mets replay, Ernie Banks would have a top salary as a star, but as his performance slacked off, he took incremental cuts but would never reach down to the level of scrub. Does OOTP treat its former stars the same way?

01-07-2024, 09:42 PM	#1
JerryShoe Minors (Double A) Join Date: Aug 2021 Posts: 122	Financial Settings Questions Ever since my Strat-O-Matic card days, I've kept financials. It's been very unrealistic in that players earn their salaries solely on performance (or lack thereof) and experience while teams earn by wins, place in the standings and how deep they go into the playoffs. That is, no arbitration or TV contracts. I've done the same in my OOTP projects, but I'd like to try to have the game take care of things. It looks like if do the reserve clause thing that salaries would be close to what I used to so, since you can set a baseline for the different levels of player (superstar down to poor). As for the team money picture, having no revenue sharing and visiting team gets 0% of gate seems to be in line for what I do (so that a good team reaps all of its rewards), but what other settings can I use to ensure good teams profit more than bad teams? Thanks.

01-08-2024, 11:42 AM	#2
Pelican Hall Of Famer Join Date: Mar 2021 Location: Wilmington, Delaware Posts: 2,885	Not sure what your goal is, but if it is "good team reaps all of its rewards", I'm not sure the OOTP engine can accommodate that. It is, after all, intended to mimic the MLB model, and past practices. And MLB does not directly reward good teams, and actually penalizes them, in the amateur draft. My goal with financials, for example, is to force teams to spend a minimum number on total salary. Looking at you, Pirates, Royals, Rays (Montreal Mounties, in my sim), Reds. A spending floor seems to promote overall team parity better than a salary cap or luxury tax. Settings of no revenue sharing and no sharing of gate receipts will virtually insure that "the rich get richer" and the bad teams get worse. If that is what you want, you'll likely achieve it. Some romanticize baseball in the Depression Era by a focus on the great Yankee teams. I tend to focus more on awful teams like the Phillies and Athletics and Browns, and of course on the Negro Leagues. I prefer parity and competitive balance. YMMV and OOTP can help you achieve either goal. __________________ Pelican OOTP 2020-? ”Hard to believe, Harry.”

01-08-2024, 07:21 PM	#3
JerryShoe Minors (Double A) Join Date: Aug 2021 Posts: 122	It's not a matter of the rich getting richer, more a matter of fiscal responsibility. If you have a team of highly paid superstars, you need a good record to deserve keeping them. As an example, in my last project I brought the 1962 Mets to a pennant in 1968 so the goal (postseason by '69) was reached, but if I hadn't won around 88 games and finished at least third, I would have had to shed salary and stars, and the worse the year the more would need to be done. In early June I was looking at an 82-80/fifth place year which would have meant a bloodbath in the payroll section. A better example might be when I took over the 1965 Yankees, high payroll with players no longer worthy of it and with a house rule of no disposing of players who stayed with the team historically (so I had to keep Whitey Ford who was paid for 1950-64, 216-84, 2.73, 135 ERA+, but pitched 20-22/116 ERA+). The only forced parity I want is that the big market teams don't have a financial advantage over their little brothers. I do have a salary question now, though, in how does it work. When I did the Mets replay, Ernie Banks would have a top salary as a star, but as his performance slacked off, he took incremental cuts but would never reach down to the level of scrub. Does OOTP treat its former stars the same way?