What does it mean when a contract has an expiration year and then (minimum)?

[Slammer]

I get free agent and arbitration, but what does this mean? New to the game and couldn't find an answer in the forums. Thanks for your help!

[Brad K]

I think you're looking at a pre arbitration player who will get an automatic one year renewal at minimum unless you release him.

[Slammer]

Originally Posted by Brad K

I think you're looking at a pre arbitration player who will get an automatic one year renewal at minimum unless you release him.

On the contract page of a player it says signed through 2023 (minimum). Some players will say signed through 2023 (automatic) renewal. So the minimum players will Just get auto signed until they reach arbitration? What are the automatic players then?

[Brad K]

I looked at my current save and found several players who had year (minimum) on their profile page. On the team salary page they all had auto listed for at least next year. Sounds to me like it's a situation of the game using inconsistent terminology.

[kq76]

Ahh! You might want to take a look at the Salaries Report (Front Office tab > Salaries). At the bottom it explains (maybe not perfectly) that these players only make 16.5% of their salary while in the minors, which is, of course, peanuts. They're usually prospects that haven't played in the majors yet. And in real life, baseball organizations will often delay bringing up their prospects to the majors, even if they're ready, simply to get another year of cheap salary. You may, or may not, wish to do the same.

[Slammer]

Here's an example of one of these players. There are also some that show year (automatic), so not sure what the difference is.

https://imgur.com/a/6uNveGY

[MathBandit]

Do you have an example of a player showing (automatic) on that page? I don't think I've seen that before.

[Slammer]

Here's an example, it's (auto renew) not (automatic), my mistake.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by kq76

Ahh! You might want to take a look at the Salaries Report (Front Office tab > Salaries). At the bottom it explains (maybe not perfectly) that these players only make 16.5% of their salary while in the minors, which is, of course, peanuts. They're usually prospects that haven't played in the majors yet. And in real life, baseball organizations will often delay bringing up their prospects to the majors, even if they're ready, simply to get another year of cheap salary. You may, or may not, wish to do the same.

A prospect who hasn't played in the majors won't have an MLB salary unless he insisted on one as part of his initial signing. And if he did that it's likely not to be a MLB minimum salary.

[kq76]

Originally Posted by Brad K

A prospect who hasn't played in the majors won't have an MLB salary unless he insisted on one as part of his initial signing. And if he did that it's likely not to be a MLB minimum salary.

Note what is in the red boxes. Now maybe mine is different because I'm playing in 1986, using reserve rosters (no minors), and playing an independent league, and who knows what else, but most of those players with those "$85k(*)" contracts have (minimum) by their signed through year on their player pages like the OP has. Not all (the AI signed Caraballo and Hicks), but most and the ones that do were also draft picks.

I also just now looked at an OOTP23 MLB lg in 2023 and those rosters also have plenty of these players with asterisks and at least one, Joey Murray, was a Toronoto draft pick, hadn't played a game in the majors, and doesn't have any other txn history.

Now I haven't matched the exact salaries and expenses of my team into a spreadsheet according to when they've been on the active roster or not (some the AI has brought up from time to time then I've sent back down and I've made trades), but it looks like, for my game at least, that the salaries of the players who are normally on my active roster are going towards "Player Payroll" along with 16% of these other players' salaries.

And I just did another test. I compared the Blue Jays 2023 reports (with that OOTP23 MLB lg) before Opening Day and the Projected Player Expenses don't match exactly, but if I calculate those asterisked players salaries at only 16.5% that total (172.777) is closer to the Projected Expenses (173.557) than it is with either their full value included (175.7) or those values not included at all (172.2).

I then simmed 2 days (they didn't play the first day and their expenses didn't change) and YTD Expenses went to 1.073482. I then checked all the players who played that 1 game and divided their salaries by both 162 and 182 (I wasn't sure if they pay by the game or day, but it looks like it must be by the game as it's much closer) for all 3 of the above (* included at full value, only 16.5% of * included, and none of * included). The #s still didn't add up exactly (3 players were signed from before OD to G1 with only 1 playing, but I caught them and factored them in), but again, the closest was with 16.5% of the * for 1.072987 as opposed to 1.101851 for all and 1.067283 for none. Now obviously it's not counting all, but I checked it just in case. And the actual YTD expenses (again, 1.073482) is a bit higher than the with 16.5% # and even higher than the # without. So, while I can't be sure that it is including the 16.5%, I'd say it's more likely than not. I also thought it might be going to Misc Expenses, but it's not as they remained at 0 after game 1.

You can check my work here.

Not that I really care (it would be nice if OOTP's math was clearer), but I was curious how these contracts were being expensed.

[MathBandit]

Originally Posted by Slammer

Here's an example, it's (auto renew) not (automatic), my mistake.

I don't see anything.

[Slammer]

Originally Posted by MathBandit

I don't see anything.

Sorry, here

[MathBandit]

Ah. The one on auto-renew is in the 'Minimum Salary' range (first 3ish years) but for whatever reason isn't making the minimum salary - so saying 'Minimum' would be misleading.

So it seems like players who are not arb-eligible and on minimum salary show up (correctly) as "Minimum", and players who are not arb-eligible but not on minimum salary show up (also correctly) as "Auto-Renew" - since they are not eligible for a raise but will instead be renewed at their current salary.