Salary Arbitration

[Mennogreg]

To note right off the bat, I'm not too familiar with how real life MLB arbitration works in regards to how player agent and team arrive at their numbers.

I have a player named Bill Foster, a pitcher with a 78/80 Overall ability. However, his past two seasons have been injury plagued, missing over 1/3 season last year and more than 3/4 this year. Foster's card attached below.



Recently I received an update on his arbitration status, and i was surprised to see he's expected to get under a hair of $10 million. Needless to say its thrown a wrench into my offseason plans. Looking at his (lack) of getting on the field, and his relatively mediocre results in pitching, I'm wondering how he's being rewarded with a large figure. Does the game just look at his overall rating, and base it from that?

[McGuiser]

If I am reading my own experience correctly, a player's injury history has no bearing on what he wants or what an arbitrator might assign. Nor does poor performance, if it does not lower the player's ratings.

A player in his early 30s seems to expect a seniority bonus, even when the skills have lessened.

You probably know that the laptop version of this game assigns some players a greed gene, and iOOTP probably does, too (there is no screen to confirm this, given memory limits). Arbitrators do not seem eager in iOOTP to chasten the greedy, so maybe you should.

I have overcome an initial reluctance to let highly rated arbitration-eligible players go. I cannot think of any time when I came to regret this.

[joncarlos]

Yes, based on my experience, it seems to be largely based on ratings, and not on their on-field performance.