Qualifying Offer/Compensation Pick Strategy

[bsloan14]

Looking for advice on whether or not I should offer my pending ageing free agent players the 1 yr /15M qualifying offer or just let them walk? (I don't really want them back next year but would also like to cash in on a compensation draft pick if i can)....

I have a 2.5/2.5 RF who is 33 (soon to be 34) years old coming off an injury plagued season but has had a productive career...he is seeking $13M per year for 2 years so I fear he may accept the 1 year qualifying offer at $15M...thoughts??

Any insight on how often players actually accept the qualifying offer? Does anyone have a specific strategy on how they handle?

Thanks in advance!

[endgame]

If you really don't want them back it's unlikely anybody else wants them and offering the 15 million qualifier will probably cost you $15 million.

[veggie1975]

Currently I am in my 5th (2021) season in OOTP 18 and in the previous 4 off seasons I have only offered 2 qualifying offers, both players wanted more than 15 million (one was looking for 30 and one for 20). So the 30 million got picked up quickly by another team the 20 (Mike Zunino) sat there a long time, the a week before spring training started I signed him for 3 year 8.75 million. But so far I have been definitely afraid if they are looking for less than that 15 million to give them a qualifying offer and they end up taking it.

[NoOne]

2x13.5 is 27 mill... he will likely decline it. a bit more knowledge about typical FA and that type of player -- expected salary *most years type stuff. for example, in my leagues a power hitter will get more than his initial demands quite often.. so, i'd view that 2year demand as the low-end with a fair amount of confidence... that's why i perceive that as a likely safe QO for a draft pick.

now i have no idea on specifics, but term and salary will be the biggest key... in general if they can make more i'll offer for the draft pick, excluding a reliever with a long, cheap contract... i'm less sure on those guys... if it's 6-8+ mill guy stick to total salary as a good guesstimate, but 3-4m = ~15m may be another matter. bet at some ratio they will take the big bucks for one year. it will be some quantifiable and repeatable qualification like that.

in my experience i get more value for trading this type of player vs a supplemental draft pick. i definitely wiegh multiple options before this point.

[NoOne]

Originally Posted by veggie1975

Currently I am in my 5th (2021) season in OOTP 18 and in the previous 4 off seasons I have only offered 2 qualifying offers, both players wanted more than 15 million (one was looking for 30 and one for 20). So the 30 million got picked up quickly by another team the 20 (Mike Zunino) sat there a long time, the a week before spring training started I signed him for 3 year 8.75 million. But so far I have been definitely afraid if they are looking for less than that 15 million to give them a qualifying offer and they end up taking it.

here's the thing with that line of thought:

the future isn't imprtant relative to the current decision in this context. if the player thinks they are worth that much based on their demand, that's all you can go by at that time. the market has not corrected him, yet. It is unknown information for them too, so all that matters is their perception of themselves. if they are old or recent scouting reports showing a downward trend, defintiely something to consider too. at the least you can try signing them cheaper in FA -- which some situations will allow to happen, but if they demand enough money,that's going to be the key.

you can find a point where the AI makes the decisions based on amount of money -- definitely the main rail. then things like personality and such have their typical effect to create some rational variations.