Rule 5 draft is broken

[Daniel_09]

Originally Posted by FantasyDrafter

But here is the problem - release players and then immediately re-sign them (within 1 year anyway)?

I’m going to log in to the latest sim and see if I can tell if that is what happened. All I had done previously was check their amount of time as a professional.

it is possible that some bug does this, CPU has to release a player to be able to add scouting discoveries and once released another player I rehire the player because he has some talent in terms of ratings.

I am not saying it is the right thing to do, it is possible that the CPU does this to solve the issue of adding scouting discoveries, which in the version of the game before the patches were almost all 70/80 potential.

[FantasyDrafter]

Here are the two youngest rule 5 eligible in 2040. Both were released by their original team, picked up by new team. Pretty sure that doesn’t match the exception criteria?

[Daniel_09]

Originally Posted by FantasyDrafter

Here are the two youngest rule 5 eligible in 2040. Both were released by their original team, picked up by new team. Pretty sure that doesn’t match the exception criteria?

Look at Elvis Luciano, by the way Foolish Baseball made a video of him a few days ago.

18 years old was selected in the rule 5 draft.

because of his 2nd contract was eligible in 2018.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPKE05C9zkc

[FantasyDrafter]

Originally Posted by Daniel_09

Look at Elvis Luciano, by the way Foolish Baseball made a video of him a few days ago.

18 years old was selected in the rule 5 draft.

because of his 2nd contract was eligible in 2018.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPKE05C9zkc

He is the same as Chen - first contract was “voided due to a medical issue” then re-signed to the same team within a year of it being voided.

[FantasyDrafter]

Why at 18 with less than five years of pro experience he is eligible for the draft comes down to a loophole. His first contract with the Diamondbacks was voided due to health reasons that Atkins declined to elaborate on. When he signed a second contract with the Diamondbacks within the same year of the voided one, he became Rule 5 eligible, per an MLB rule that has since been changed.

From The Athletic. No idea if that was actually changed as they claim but this explains what happened in that case again. That isn’t what is happening in OOTP.

https://theathletic.com/713150/2018/...o-from-royals/

[Carplos]

I am absolutely not 100% confident in interpreting the rules, but I can't find anything about a player changing teams (which wouldn't even necessarily be a second contract if they were traded) and then being eligible earlier than normal.

But I also vaguely remember Lukas or Matt (maybe) explaining how the rule works in OOTP and it's not 100% how it works in MLB. Could be wrong on that, though.

[FantasyDrafter]

Originally Posted by Carplos

I am absolutely not 100% confident in interpreting the rules, but I can't find anything about a player changing teams (which wouldn't even necessarily be a second contract if they were traded) and then being eligible earlier than normal.

But I also vaguely remember Lukas or Matt (maybe) explaining how the rule works in OOTP and it's not 100% how it works in MLB. Could be wrong on that, though.

It is possible it has worked like this for years, but the AI minor league management logic was better at hiding it. Based on some searches I am guessing that is the case because it looks like others have seen it in previous seasons based on some Reddit topics that everyone just responds to with Chen and Luciano and they move on.

Again - if it is happening this blatantly where lots of teenagers are in the draft who should not be rule 5 eligible, then it is happening with older guys too, it just is not that obvious.

If all they did was have the age based rules which are very simple (since we can’t even void a contract for medical reasons) it would work properly

[progen]

I'm at the Rule V draft in my save, and I have two 17-year-olds, twenty eight 18 year-olds , and 31 nineteen-year-olds. I stopped counting after that.

Guess I never noticed this before as I'm generally looking at my scout's ratings and of course they're not close to being on the radar.

[Carplos]

Did you check if any of them had changed teams or were released then signed by another team?

Might be that OOTP has a misinterpretation of the rules due to a couple exceptions that happened.

(Or somewhere there's another rule we can't find on the internet.)

[Matt Arnold]

We have a simplified rule to mimic the whole "2nd contract" issue mentioned. When players are released and then sign again later we have them eligible.

But there shouldn't be that many, I would expect. Trying to understand whether this is a specific setup, or what connects them, obviously is something to think about.

Alternately, maybe it's not a problem. As mentioned teams rarely will want to force an 18 year old to stay on the roster the whole season. It may just be if we create more young players you just might have this noticed more.

[Carplos]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

We have a simplified rule to mimic the whole "2nd contract" issue mentioned. When players are released and then sign again later we have them eligible.

But there shouldn't be that many, I would expect. Trying to understand whether this is a specific setup, or what connects them, obviously is something to think about.

Alternately, maybe it's not a problem. As mentioned teams rarely will want to force an 18 year old to stay on the roster the whole season. It may just be if we create more young players you just might have this noticed more.

Thought you had mentioned something about a simplified rule.

But since the rule seems to actually be it's only if they resign with the same team within a year, wouldn't a simplification of the rule make more sense to exclude it and stick to the 4/5 year time frame?

I mean, I agree that most of the 18/19 year olds that would become eligible probably aren't going to sniff a roster, so maybe it's not a big deal, but I guess it depends on how the AI is handling it long term.

[locuspc]

Yeah I have noticed this too. None of the teenagers were in any danger of actually being drafted, but it does clutter up the rule 5 draft pool a bit. Probably the reason this has become a problem is that in this year's version players are being more aggressively moved out of the International Complex, leading to them washing out of rookie ball and being cut when still quite young. Then, a few of them get interest from other teams, and they become rule 5 eligible.

I agree with Carplos that if you don't want to bother with the actual rule, just counting time as a pro likely gets closer to reality than making players rule 5 eligible the moment they sign with a new team.

[FantasyDrafter]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

We have a simplified rule to mimic the whole "2nd contract" issue mentioned. When players are released and then sign again later we have them eligible.

But there shouldn't be that many, I would expect. Trying to understand whether this is a specific setup, or what connects them, obviously is something to think about.

Alternately, maybe it's not a problem. As mentioned teams rarely will want to force an 18 year old to stay on the roster the whole season. It may just be if we create more young players you just might have this noticed more.

1. I appreciate the honest answer. It is much better than when I got “this has never been seen in 1000s of simulations, send me your league files, must be a setting, maybe we will eventually look at it.” A simple “we know, you just haven’t noticed before” would have been much more productive!

2. As was just said in the post before mine, what you guys did it appears is react to two outlier situations to cover that, rather than ignore the outliers and cover 99.999999% of Rule 5 situations. Not a development choice I would make but at least it is a choice. Rather than simplifying, I would say it overly complicated things, especially since we can’t void contracts for medical reasons.

3. I will make the assumption that the newly condensed player stars / ratings along with odd AI organization management is how this became more easily identifiable. I had an off-season where the highest potential Rule 5 player on my team (3 stars I believe) was 18 years old which lead me down this rabbit hole. I also had taught myself to change to one of the minor leagues to make my player comparisons so I could see bigger differentiations between guys who are rated the same at the MLB level (2.5 or lower). My best player to protect was 18, and that should not happen.

Thanks again for responding and I respectfully ask that you guys cover the 99.999999%.

[Le Grande Orange]

From the 2021 edition of the Major League Rules:

Major League Rule 5


(c) PLAYERS SUBJECT TO SELECTION. All players on the Minor
League Reserve Lists of Major League and Minor League Clubs, except
players on the Voluntarily Retired, Disqualified or Ineligible Lists, shall be
subject to selection by other Major League Clubs at the Rule 5 Selection
Meeting in accordance with the following:

.....(1) A player without previous Major or Minor League service who
signs with a Major League or Minor League Club shall be subject to
selection based on the following:

..........(A) if 18 years of age or under on the June 5 immediately
.....preceding the player’s signing, the player shall be subject to
.....selection at the fifth Rule 5 Selection Meeting that follows the
.....signing date of the player’s first Major or Minor League contract,
.....unless Rule 5(c)(1)(C) applies;

..........(B) if 19 years of age or over on the June 5 immediately
.....preceding the player’s signing, the player shall be subject to
.....selection at the fourth Selection Meeting that follows the signing
.....date of the player’s first Major or Minor League contract, unless
.....Rule 5(c)(1)(C) applies;

..........(C) if the signing date of a player’s first Major or Minor
.....League contract is between:

...............(i) the conclusion of the championship season for the
..........Major or Minor League Club to which the player is assigned
..........on such contract and

...............(ii) the next Rule 5 Selection Meeting, then the player
..........shall be deemed to have signed after the next Rule 5 Selection
..........Meeting, for purposes of this Rule 5(c)(1).

.....(2) A player who is re-signed by a Club within one year from the
date the Club released the player shall be subject to draft at the Rule 5
Selection Meeting following the date of the latest contract with that
Club.

.....(3) A player who has been subject to draft at a Rule 5 Selection
Meeting shall be subject to draft at any subsequent Rule 5 Selection
Meeting if the player is on a Minor League Reserve List (filed pursuant
to Rule 1 (Reserve Lists)) at the time of the Rule 5 Selection Meeting.

.....(4) A player:

..........(A) whose contract has been assigned outright by a Major
.....League Club to a Minor League Club,

..........(B) who has been signed as a free agent to a Minor League
.....Uniform Player Contract for services in the following year and is
.....otherwise subject to selection pursuant to Rule 5(c)(1) or
.....Rule 5(c)(2), or

..........(C) who has been released unconditionally from a Minor
.....League roster and is otherwise subject to selection pursuant to
.....Rule 5(c)(1) or Rule 5(c)(2), shall be subject to selection at any
.....subsequent Rule 5 Selection Meeting if the player is on a Minor
.....League Reserve List (filed pursuant to Rule 1 (Reserve Lists)) at
.....the time of the Rule 5 Selection Meeting.

.....(5) A Major League Club may designate any player on one of its
Minor League Reserve Lists to be subject to selection who otherwise
would not be selectable under this Rule 5.

You can find a copy of the 2021 MLR at the MLBPA's website. (The site said the 2022 rules were coming soon, but were never posted. It now says the 2023 rules are coming soon. I am skeptical.)

[texasmame]

Stopped using it years ago when a team opted to keep a lower tier guy they picked and put a player from their current team on waivers instead.

The waived player was just entering his prime. It was Lou Gehrig.

*off*

[thenewchuckd]

Originally Posted by md40022

Just as the rules are very clear and well defined on where bugs should be reported.

You da police?

I like the way this is going. The forum has never been so interesting for me. I paid my money and the game is broken so at least I can get some entertainment.

[CubsFan1967]

All the players on the 2024 roster seem to have 2 extra years of service time, so American players that are 20 show 4 years of service instead of the much more usual 2.