Free Agency in Random Debut Leagues
I would love it if the development team would take a look at the issue I'm about to describe and see if it's a bug. It's been driving me nuts for some time and I've started using the Reserve Clause in all my leagues as a result.
When I play random debut, I'm seeing way too many players fail to sign prior to the start of the season. The unsigned range from the very bad to the very good. I've seen a 28 year old Pete Rose remain unsigned. a 30 year old Joe Mauer. Great relief pitchers are often among those that fail to sign. I've seen Rollie Fingers, Dennis Eckersly and Aroldis Chapman all fail to sign. Thing is, if this was a one and done deal, it would be a storyline for your league. But, once it happens, more often than not the player will repeat the process year after year. The reason it repeats is, the player will eventually sign, usually before the end of April, but he will only sign a one year deal.
What I see happening in every random league I play is, the free agent announcement day will arrive. Players announce their free agency. Players start signing and continue to sign up until December 31st. Then January 1st arrives and free agents quit signing contracts. From January 1st to Opening day, no free agents sign deals. If a free agent isn't signed by December 31st in a random league, he is going to remain a free agent when the season begins. I don't even think trades get made in random leagues from January 1st till opening day.
Now, I've played a straight historical league and when I did so, teams signed free agents and made trades during the whole off season including January 1st thru Opening Day. It's just random debut leagues I see this happen in.
When you create a Random League the creation date is always January 1st. When you create a historical league, the creation date is very close to opening day, if not the day before(I don't know the exact date). When you create a Random league and it starts on January 1st, I'm wondering if something isn't programmed into the game to ensure teams don't immediately start making tons of trades before the inaugural season even begins. Is there something programmed to ensure this? If so, is it maybe failing to shut itself off for season 2 and beyond? I grasping at fish in a basket here, but something has to be causing this. Transactions occur from January 1st to Opening Day in historical leagues. They don't occur in Random Leagues.
I would love it if a member of the development team could look into this. It's easy to test, as all you have to do is set up a random league using free agency and let it fly. I would love it if it's user error on my part, as that would mean I could fix it myself once someone points out what I'm doing wrong. Thanks David.
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