Salary Arbitration

[mmarra82]

Looked through the manual, did not find an answer to help clarify something for myself...

I am currently in the off-season, and I understand the salary arbitration process for those who are arbitration elgible, however, I do not follow the bottom section of this page for players that are free agent eligible players that can be offered arbitration.

Does this mean that if I offer the player arbitration he could accept a one year offer from the arbitrator and I am required to pay him the awarded amount for one year?

If he declines the offer, does that entitle me to compensation?

What is the likelihood they accept the arbitrator's decision? If I am a team that has little room in their budget, is this a route I should avoid?

Thanks.

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by mmarra82

Looked through the manual, did not find an answer to help clarify something for myself...

I am currently in the off-season, and I understand the salary arbitration process for those who are arbitration elgible, however, I do not follow the bottom section of this page for players that are free agent eligible players that can be offered arbitration.

Does this mean that if I offer the player arbitration he could accept a one year offer from the arbitrator and I am required to pay him the awarded amount for one year?

If he declines the offer, does that entitle me to compensation?

What is the likelihood they accept the arbitrator's decision? If I am a team that has little room in their budget, is this a route I should avoid?

Thanks.

The bottom of the arbitration page is actually the qualifying offer process from real life. So you're not making an offer and then going to an arbitrator to decide the amount of the contract. If the player accepts (which it seems they always do in OOTP), then that player will be paid the average of the top 125 (I think) salaries in the game, which is typically in the $14M range.

So be very careful with who you choose to offer that to.

[mmarra82]

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

The bottom of the arbitration page is actually the qualifying offer process from real life. So you're not making an offer and then going to an arbitrator to decide the amount of the contract. If the player accepts (which it seems they always do in OOTP), then that player will be paid the average of the top 125 (I think) salaries in the game, which is typically in the $14M range.

So be very careful with who you choose to offer that to.

Not what I wanted to hear...wanted to make the offer and hear that generally he doesn't accept.

[TribeFanInNC]

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

So be very careful with who you choose to offer that to.

Quoted For Truth. The intention for the bottom portion is that you only offer these "qualifying offers" to true superstars. Basically, unless they will make >$14M on the free agent market, the player will accept this qualifying offer. And you will be stuck paying them $14M.

(I know, the game calls it arbitration, but it really isn't as pointed out above)

[BIG17EASY]

I've lightly beaten the drum to have that process either removed from the arbitration screen and given its own separate page, or to have it clearly labeled as qualifying offers. The OP's question pops up somewhat regularly, so it's clearly confusing to some, especially people who are new to the game.

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by mmarra82

Not what I wanted to hear...wanted to make the offer and hear that generally he doesn't accept.

I've rarely offered them, but judging from other threads that pop up on this topic, even players who stand to get multi-year deals for equal or more money per year have been accepting the offers.

If you accidentally offered someone who's not worthy because you were confused by the process, you can always go into commish mode and edit the amount of the contract, then release him so you don't get a huge hit to your payroll.

[JCarter93]

Yeah about half a dozen guys in my online league got burned by this process last week. Some of them thought they were just offering an arbitration deal, not a 13 mil qualifying offer. It's labeled "arbitration", which is very confusing; if it said "make qualifying offer (13 million)" or something like that, then maybe it wouldn't be as much of a problem.

Thing is, almost all of the players took the qualifying offer, even a few that could have made as much as 18 million on the FA market. In the online leagues, this process is next to useless because *nobody* is going to pay an FA salary in excess of 13 million (usually much higher) and lose a draft pick on top of that just to sign one player.

[chazzycat]

The answers to your first two questions is yes. The term in baseball is a "qualifying offer". The third question, I don't know.

In general, I think it's better to plan ahead to avoid arbitration. For good young players, I'll try to sign extensions through the arbitration years before it gets to that point. For eligible veterans I'll try to trade them at the beginning of their walk year or at the trading deadline.

I play as the Giants so I'll give an example: Sergio Romo. He's a really good closer (4.5 stars) but 32 years old and eligible for arbitration/free agency after 2014 and demanding a 4 year deal. I played out the first season a few times and took different routes with him:
1) sign him to an extension and avoid arb. This route secured my short term bullpen but after a couple years he started aging and overall it was a bad contract.
2) play out the season and extend him the qualifying offer. He was demanding a 4 year contract at the time, so was very surprised to see him accept the QO (1 year 11 million). This kind of backfired as I was hoping for the draft pick.
3) trade him at the beginning of the 2014 season. I got Trevor Rosenthal in return, a closer with 4.5 start potential but much younger and under cheap team control for 4 years.

In this instance, #3 was by far the best choice. Obviously I would hesitate to draw any conclusions from a sample size of 1. But unless there is some kind of reliable way to determine whether they will accept the QO or not, addressing the situation before you get to that point seems less risky IMO.

[jdono927]

One way to figure out if they will accept the QO is to go to the offer contract extension page and see what they are demanding, and if it is more than the QO amount for your league, than you should be ok to offer it to them. This is not 100% guarantee that they deny it, but usually they should.

[Winnipeg59]

The OP's post has been answered, but just to add a voice to this discussion (to hopefully see it changed in the future) it would be nice if the term was changed to "Qualifying Offer" in that lower section instead of "Offer Arbitration."

If you qualify a seemingly decent player that the game suggests is asking for much less than the qualifying offer that's entirely your fault if the player takes you up on it.

What is sometimes tough is when the player is in the "ballpark" of what the offer would be and the only choice is signing them to multiple years at the ballpark number or qualifying them if you do want them to stay for one more season.

And the real difficulty, in my opinion, is when a player refuses to negotiate all season and says he "wants to test free agency." You would think it's a good idea to qualify them (at any price IF you feel another team might sign them in the off-season) just for the draft pick, because they aren't coming back anyway. Right?

Not so, in many cases! And some do actually decline, but not many!

The amount of the 1-year offer is, as I recall, identified in the small print in that section on the arb page but it would be nice if it was more clearly spelled out as this comes up often (in the forum and online leagues when the arb period opens).

[RchW]

Originally Posted by Winnipeg59

The OP's post has been answered, but just to add a voice to this discussion (to hopefully see it changed in the future) it would be nice if the term was changed to "Qualifying Offer" in that lower section instead of "Offer Arbitration."

If you qualify a seemingly decent player that the game suggests is asking for much less than the qualifying offer that's entirely your fault if the player takes you up on it.

What is sometimes tough is when the player is in the "ballpark" of what the offer would be and the only choice is signing them to multiple years at the ballpark number or qualifying them if you do want them to stay for one more season.


And the real difficulty, in my opinion, is when a player refuses to negotiate all season and says he "wants to test free agency." You would think it's a good idea to qualify them (at any price IF you feel another team might sign them in the off-season) just for the draft pick, because they aren't coming back anyway. Right?

Not so, in many cases! And some do actually decline, but not many!

The amount of the 1-year offer is, as I recall, identified in the small print in that section on the arb page but it would be nice if it was more clearly spelled out as this comes up often (in the forum and online leagues when the arb period opens).

The issue has been reported in beta.

[RchW]

Originally Posted by jdono927

One way to figure out if they will accept the QO is to go to the offer contract extension page and see what they are demanding, and if it is more than the QO amount for your league, than you should be ok to offer it to them. This is not 100% guarantee that they deny it, but usually they should.

I'd be careful with that one. Had a pitcher looking for $22M got him down to $19.2M so thought a $16M QO was a sure turndown. Au contraire mon ami, he took the damn offer and my offseason was not at all fun.

The issue as I have reported it is that in real life no qualifying offer has been accepted. To me that means it should run at 99% for sure no acceptance in OOTP. Players should be highly motivated to become FA. Related to that, AI teams make too many QO to too many players who have no business getting that much $$. Bottom line is that several areas have to be tweaked.

[moneyball]

I've only offered the QO to players who want ~$20M/yr and all of them have declined. Perhaps I've just been lucky or no one wants to play for my team!

Typically this situation happens when I trade for a one year rental superstar in the off season before their final year. (like the Cards with Heyward this year) I extend the QO for these players since I can't afford to extend them.

[moneyball]

Originally Posted by RchW

I'd be careful with that one. Had a pitcher looking for $22M got him down to $19.2M so thought a $16M QO was a sure turndown. Au contraire mon ami, he took the damn offer and my offseason was not at all fun.

The issue as I have reported it is that in real life no qualifying offer has been accepted. To me that means it should run at 99% for sure no acceptance in OOTP. Players should be highly motivated to become FA. Related to that, AI teams make too many QO to too many players who have no business getting that much $$. Bottom line is that several areas have to be tweaked.

I agree that in your situation there is no way the AI should have accepted the offer. But I don't think it should be programmed for 99% declines because people would abuse it for the comp picks. The programming just should be tweaked so players who want more than the offer should not accept it.

[RchW]

Originally Posted by moneyball

I've only offered the QO to players who want ~$20M/yr and all of them have declined. Perhaps I've just been lucky or no one wants to play for my team!

Typically this situation happens when I trade for a one year rental superstar in the off season before their final year. (like the Cards with Heyward this year) I extend the QO for these players since I can't afford to extend them.

Maybe so but the QO/FA module is not realistic. Not one pending FA has taken a QO in three offseasons IRL. Players in game obviously don't value FA like RL players do. AI teams offer QO to players in the $10M range which would never happen IRL. This has a cascading effect on team budgets and FA competition.

[moneyball]

Originally Posted by RchW

Maybe so but the QO/FA module is not realistic. Not one pending FA has taken a QO in three offseasons IRL. Players in game obviously don't value FA like RL players do. AI teams offer QO to players in the $10M range which would never happen IRL. This has a cascading effect on team budgets and FA competition.

And I agree with that sentiment.

AI teams should only offer QO to players that "should" decline it (want a contract over the QO amount or want a multi year deal with an AAV "close" to it - like Cuddyer this year).

Players should decline QO for the same circumstances that the teams offer it (want a contract over the QO amount or want a multi year deal with an AAV "close" to it).

In effect this would prevent players from accepting AI team offers, AI teams would only offer it to players that would decline it, and it would keep human teams honest so that if they do offer it to scrub FA's, the scrubs would accept it and burn them. And it would mirror real life!

[TribeFanInNC]

Originally Posted by RchW

Maybe so but the QO/FA module is not realistic. Not one pending FA has taken a QO in three offseasons IRL. Players in game obviously don't value FA like RL players do. AI teams offer QO to players in the $10M range which would never happen IRL. This has a cascading effect on team budgets and FA competition.

I agree it isn't realistic. But I don't think it is the game's fault it isn't realistic. The game probably works about how it should, although maybe with some tweaks on the threshold for acceptance.

I think the realism problem is that OOTP GMs don't behave like MLB GMs. OOTP GMs tend to overvalue picks. OOTP GMs have a tendency to let guys sit on the market until March, when they can sign them for cheaper and for 1 year (at least in an online league scenario). MLB GMs would just negotiate a contract rather than offer a QO. MLB GMs probably have a REALLY good idea on whether a guy would accept a QO or not, probably even having interactions with the agent to know what the player would accept. They probably even have verbal understandings to not accept the QO if a player is definitely going to FA. No MLB GM would ever get caught with its pants down with a player accepting an unexpected $15M contract. OOTP GMs don't really have that advantage.

If there is a problem with the game (IMO), it's probably that the game underestimates the desire of a player for a multi-year contract.

[jdono927]

Originally Posted by RchW

I'd be careful with that one. Had a pitcher looking for $22M got him down to $19.2M so thought a $16M QO was a sure turndown. Au contraire mon ami, he took the damn offer and my offseason was not at all fun.

The issue as I have reported it is that in real life no qualifying offer has been accepted. To me that means it should run at 99% for sure no acceptance in OOTP. Players should be highly motivated to become FA. Related to that, AI teams make too many QO to too many players who have no business getting that much $$. Bottom line is that several areas have to be tweaked.

I've had the same thing happen, thats why I said its not 100% reliable sometimes they accept it. I also agree they should make the players less likely to accept them.