Quote:
Originally Posted by Assos
I am in my second season of my fictional league, this is my very first fictional league (I am hooked), and after my drafts the last two years, I have a teaming minor leagues of 18 to 23 year olds. My team is starting to get old, all of my starters are 30+ sans my left fielder who is 22.
How long on average will I start to develop passable replacement players? I have a 37 year old second baseman with a year left on his contract who I do not wish to resign.
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you can never polish a turd and have a good result. so, if you can't get top-tier potential draft picks, you can't have high expectations. and, sometimes they just don't develop even when you draft a high-potential prospect.
hopefully, you have a steady stream of talent developing at various ages and well-timed to personell decisions like your predicament at 2B. a few years ago(or more) you should have looked into investing some upper round draft picks in 2-3 second basemen. also, keep an eye out for free agents and look into trading the aging guy in his last couple years of the contract. even if you only get a couple middling prospects, it's better than nothing when the contract expires.
this stuff is all a jigsaw puzzle. you don't want to have to replace 6 players in 1 year or even 6 over 2 years. so, avoid it with smart decisions on contract lengths -> make use of the salaries report, it is a good visual for this. sometimes paying a million or 2 extra for a couple less years is a good thing. sometimes you need a 2 year FA stopgap because your three 2b you drafted a few years ago were all duds, but a younger one is rising quickly. it's okay to overpay short-term, but let those 7-10yr 30mill/yr guys go, or at least only keep X amount of them based on what your budget allows. try getting them to 5-6 years.
Use good FA pickups to compliment your development of players. you need both streams of talent for a good team. if you minor leagues have good infielders but not much in way of OF, guess what you start keeping an eye out for in the FA market.... again, even if it is a year or two before you dump a player, just trade him for junk if you have to. compare those players to potential free agents in ensuing years.