Star players signing Minor League deals

Dutch Alexander · 10-31-2022, 09:56 AM

During testing of my fictional pro/reg league I noticed some odd behaviour by quality players from the top league who become Free Agents and then sign Minor League deals with teams from the lower league early in the offseason. Below an example of such a player. During this test I used high scouting accuracy and AI eval of 65/20/10/5. The player in the example wins the player of the year award at age 23 when he is 2 RBI shy of the triple crown. He then becomes a free agent and signs a three year deal with another team, becoming one of the highest paid players in the league. His $172,000 salary would be fifth highest for the upcoming season. Now during this time he has a large dropoff in performance (in that sense not the greatest example but other testfiles have already been deleted) but his ratings remain high and he is entering his age 27 season. From the players point of view he should be looking for a long term deal with a team from the top league. Or at least, considering the dropoff, a one year deal to prove himself.

Signing a Minor League deal with a team from the lower league within a month of the offseason makes no sense. Team budgets in this league are about 1/3 of the top league and reputation of this league is very low compared to the top league. In this same test another player batted .400 at a young age and a couple years later wins another batting title. He then becomes a Free Agent entering his age 27 season and two days into the offseason signs a Minor League deal with a team from the lower league. He then has 3 very poor years in the lower leage before returning to the top leage at age 30 and promptly wins another batting title his first year back.

I don't understand this behaviour. Not even below average players should consider Minor League deals until very late in the offseason. Has anybody else observed this behaviour, might there be something in my settings causing this or is it related to the pro/reg setup? I guess I could simply disable FA from the highest league from signing with another league the first couple of months of the offseason but that should not be nescesary.

BIG17EASY · 10-31-2022, 12:00 PM

Two quick thoughts ...

Do the teams in your top level have money to spend on free agents?

Is the league prestige (or whatever the setting is called) set up correctly so that free agents don't think your lower levels are on par or better than the top league?

Dutch Alexander · 10-31-2022, 07:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

Two quick thoughts ...

Do the teams in your top level have money to spend on free agents

Financial system in OOTP is difficult to understand. My league is a low level low finance league with financial imbalance to give each team an identity so to speak. See attached overview of opening day payrolls and budget for both leagues. In the long run the system is stable. No team goes in debt too much and no team starts stockpiling money. At the start of the offseason there are always some low budget teams that have no money for free agent, but most teams do. With league minimum salary at $7,500 each team should have enough money to sign players. High profile FA should still find teams and certainly not sign Minor League deals with lower league teams. If I increase revenue in the league then the top teams start stockpiling money and refuse to spend the extra cash and the payrolls of all the teams move closer to each other, disturbing the imbalance.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

Is the league prestige (or whatever the setting is called) set up correctly so that free agents don't think your lower levels are on par or better than the top league?

Reputation of the top league is maxed out at ten and the bottom league is at 3, so no FA should want to play in the bottom league.

BIG17EASY · 11-01-2022, 09:04 AM

I'm not sure what the issue could be, then. Was that free agent a one-off? In other words, have all the other top free agents signed appropriate contracts in the top league?

Pelican · 11-01-2022, 09:04 AM

I understand what you are trying to accomplish with your financial structure. It certainly will mirror the real world imbalance of MLB and professional soccer (meaning Euro football). Will you have an amateur draft, compensation for signing free agents, a soft or hard salary cap, or luxury tax? Without some guardrails, it is going to be virtually impossible for the poor teams to complete with teams spending many times as much each year. “Moneyball” can only take you so far.

My own preference - we each play our own way - is to even out the starting financials as much as possible, to prevent wealthy teams from simply dominating. Then some teams invest in free agents, others in their farm system, I like to lock in young stars to long-term contracts before I have to (before arbitration). Within the constraints of a financial system, there are still many different ways to spend the money. Just a thought.

Dutch Alexander · 11-01-2022, 12:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

I'm not sure what the issue could be, then. Was that free agent a one-off? In other words, have all the other top free agents signed appropriate contracts in the top league?

It's not a one off but also not super common. Most FA get appropriate deals. It happens every now and again. Shouldn't really happen. Going from earning $172,000 to a Minor League deal in an inferior league is a bit extreme. And FA should pretty much never sign a Minor League deal until it is late in the offseason.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pelican

I understand what you are trying to accomplish with your financial structure. It certainly will mirror the real world imbalance of MLB and professional soccer (meaning Euro football). Will you have an amateur draft, compensation for signing free agents, a soft or hard salary cap, or luxury tax? Without some guardrails, it is going to be virtually impossible for the poor teams to complete with teams spending many times as much each year. “Moneyball” can only take you so far.

None of the above. Most players enter the world as scouting finds and end up in the International Complex which functions as a domestic youth academy in my league. I tried to use luxury tax to keep the financials in check and this worked very well. Unfortunately luxury tax does not work when promotion/relegation is used. This is a long time bug.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pelican

My own preference - we each play our own way - is to even out the starting financials as much as possible, to prevent wealthy teams from simply dominating. Then some teams invest in free agents, others in their farm system, I like to lock in young stars to long-term contracts before I have to (before arbitration). Within the constraints of a financial system, there are still many different ways to spend the money. Just a thought.

The difference in budgets might seem extreme but it's a 12 team league in which the top 4 make the playoffs. It's a short 88 game season and baseball being baseball small teams still have a decent chance to make the playoffs every few years. Also budget is partly tied down to market size and this tends to chance over time. So sometimes smaller teams become larger and vice versa. I personally don't like parity as all teams become the same and it starts to feel a bit too random for me. I prefer to have some powerhouse teams that regularly make the playoff and normally are not in danger to relegate. A bit like the European Soccer leagues where you have big clubs and smaller clubs. Baseball as a sport is still volatile enough that surprises happen especially with a short season and playoffs.

It is a bit tricky to get the financials right. If the budget of the small teams is too low then sometimes they don't have enough revenue to cover the minimum costs and end up in a downward spiral of declining market size and fan interest and having no money for free agents. Ussually in this case the owner will add money but sometimes they loose too much and their negative balance grows. However if I increase the league wide revenue then the rich teams start earning more than they spend and end up with high positive balances with continue to grow, which I don't like. Also in this case the imbalance in payrolls between the teams becomes smaller, defeating the original intent. Revenue sharing would be perfect to prevent this from happening but this doesn't work with pro/reg. Instead I have set the gate share to 50% (excluding season tickets) and this works somewhat similar to luxury tax. In practice this seems to work quite well.
I also lowered the minimum wage from $10,000 to $7,500 so that the minimum expense teams have is lower. For the rest it is trial and error to find the excact sweetspot were the financials remain stable long term without interference.

Pelican · 11-02-2022, 10:51 PM

Lots of merit in what you say. I can tout my “parity” approach, but at least in the short term more money for bad small market teams does not turn things around. I tried with the 2021 Orioles, signing a bunch of pricey free agents, and they lost 100 games. IRL the 2022 Orioles surprised everyone by being competitive - to your point - with a small budget (great farm system).

I have no experience with promotion/relegation, but it makes total sense, when you have dominant franchises like the Yanks and Mets and Braves and Dodgers, and pathetic ones like the Pirates and Royals and formerly the Orioles. Teams like Tampa Bay and Oakland in the moneyball years are captivating exceptions to the general rule.

The 50% gate share is a genius move that simply accomplishes at least as much as complicated revenue sharing or caps or luxury taxes. I intent to use, if not 50%, maybe 75/25 or two-thirds and one-third. I think the default is 10% for the visitor?

Dutch Alexander · 11-03-2022, 03:30 AM

The 50% gate share seems to work well. Top teams will lose up to $200,000 in gate revenue annually and small teams gain more than $100,000. With payrolls ranging from $500,000 to just over $2,000,000 this is significant change. In the past I saw rich teams stockpiling money. After 50 years some teams had millions in their balance. It seems that after a certain point AI teams will not spend any more money. I also saw poor teams get into negative spirals were they kept losing money and their balance was more than minus $1,000,000. One thing I did to prevent the negative balance was to lower minimum salary from $10,000 to $7,500. This means that the minimum ammount teams have to spend on their payroll is reduced by up to $100,000. (25 x $2,500 = $62,500, plus lower arbitration costs) This is significant when the lowest payrolls are between $400,000 and $500,000. Than add about $100,000 in extra revenue from gate shares and poor teams no longer go into death spirals. Teams still get in financial trouble where they have negative balances but they now have the option to lower their payroll to improve the balance. Also in these cases the team owner will add money annually so that the situation is kept in check.

I don't mind some teams getting into a bit of trouble as long as it does not get out of control. Makes sense that some small teams have financial difficulty in a small league. It simply means they will be bad as they cannot sign quality players and are in danger of relegation. In such a case if they do relegate then they will still not have money in the lower league and might be bad for some years before their finances are back up. This also presents an interesting challenge for the player. If you take control of a team with a negative balance you will have $0 to spend on free agents and you have to survive signing so-so and has been players to minor league deals for a few seasons while fighting relegation and trying to cut costs to get the balance back to green.

I like to have a forget-about-it financial system where the system remains stable longterm without interference and without any team stockpiling too much or losing too much. This is a fine balance and right now it seems to work quite well. Still more testing to be done however. All my tests were with pro/reg disabled so the system wasn't tested exactly as it will run later.

10-31-2022, 09:56 AM	#1
Dutch Alexander All Star Reserve Join Date: Apr 2012 Location: Amsterdam Posts: 712	Star players signing Minor League deals During testing of my fictional pro/reg league I noticed some odd behaviour by quality players from the top league who become Free Agents and then sign Minor League deals with teams from the lower league early in the offseason. Below an example of such a player. During this test I used high scouting accuracy and AI eval of 65/20/10/5. The player in the example wins the player of the year award at age 23 when he is 2 RBI shy of the triple crown. He then becomes a free agent and signs a three year deal with another team, becoming one of the highest paid players in the league. His $172,000 salary would be fifth highest for the upcoming season. Now during this time he has a large dropoff in performance (in that sense not the greatest example but other testfiles have already been deleted) but his ratings remain high and he is entering his age 27 season. From the players point of view he should be looking for a long term deal with a team from the top league. Or at least, considering the dropoff, a one year deal to prove himself. Signing a Minor League deal with a team from the lower league within a month of the offseason makes no sense. Team budgets in this league are about 1/3 of the top league and reputation of this league is very low compared to the top league. In this same test another player batted .400 at a young age and a couple years later wins another batting title. He then becomes a Free Agent entering his age 27 season and two days into the offseason signs a Minor League deal with a team from the lower league. He then has 3 very poor years in the lower leage before returning to the top leage at age 30 and promptly wins another batting title his first year back. I don't understand this behaviour. Not even below average players should consider Minor League deals until very late in the offseason. Has anybody else observed this behaviour, might there be something in my settings causing this or is it related to the pro/reg setup? I guess I could simply disable FA from the highest league from signing with another league the first couple of months of the offseason but that should not be nescesary. Attached Images

11-01-2022, 09:04 AM	#5
Pelican Hall Of Famer Join Date: Mar 2021 Location: Wilmington, Delaware Posts: 2,915	I understand what you are trying to accomplish with your financial structure. It certainly will mirror the real world imbalance of MLB and professional soccer (meaning Euro football). Will you have an amateur draft, compensation for signing free agents, a soft or hard salary cap, or luxury tax? Without some guardrails, it is going to be virtually impossible for the poor teams to complete with teams spending many times as much each year. “Moneyball” can only take you so far. My own preference - we each play our own way - is to even out the starting financials as much as possible, to prevent wealthy teams from simply dominating. Then some teams invest in free agents, others in their farm system, I like to lock in young stars to long-term contracts before I have to (before arbitration). Within the constraints of a financial system, there are still many different ways to spend the money. Just a thought. __________________ Pelican OOTP 2020-? ”Hard to believe, Harry.”

11-02-2022, 10:51 PM	#7
Pelican Hall Of Famer Join Date: Mar 2021 Location: Wilmington, Delaware Posts: 2,915	Lots of merit in what you say. I can tout my “parity” approach, but at least in the short term more money for bad small market teams does not turn things around. I tried with the 2021 Orioles, signing a bunch of pricey free agents, and they lost 100 games. IRL the 2022 Orioles surprised everyone by being competitive - to your point - with a small budget (great farm system). I have no experience with promotion/relegation, but it makes total sense, when you have dominant franchises like the Yanks and Mets and Braves and Dodgers, and pathetic ones like the Pirates and Royals and formerly the Orioles. Teams like Tampa Bay and Oakland in the moneyball years are captivating exceptions to the general rule. The 50% gate share is a genius move that simply accomplishes at least as much as complicated revenue sharing or caps or luxury taxes. I intent to use, if not 50%, maybe 75/25 or two-thirds and one-third. I think the default is 10% for the visitor? __________________ Pelican OOTP 2020-? ”Hard to believe, Harry.”

10-31-2022, 12:00 PM	#2
BIG17EASY Hall Of Famer Join Date: Jun 2006 Posts: 3,291	Two quick thoughts ... Do the teams in your top level have money to spend on free agents? Is the league prestige (or whatever the setting is called) set up correctly so that free agents don't think your lower levels are on par or better than the top league?

11-03-2022, 03:30 AM	#8
Dutch Alexander All Star Reserve Join Date: Apr 2012 Location: Amsterdam Posts: 712	The 50% gate share seems to work well. Top teams will lose up to $200,000 in gate revenue annually and small teams gain more than $100,000. With payrolls ranging from $500,000 to just over $2,000,000 this is significant change. In the past I saw rich teams stockpiling money. After 50 years some teams had millions in their balance. It seems that after a certain point AI teams will not spend any more money. I also saw poor teams get into negative spirals were they kept losing money and their balance was more than minus $1,000,000. One thing I did to prevent the negative balance was to lower minimum salary from $10,000 to $7,500. This means that the minimum ammount teams have to spend on their payroll is reduced by up to $100,000. (25 x $2,500 = $62,500, plus lower arbitration costs) This is significant when the lowest payrolls are between $400,000 and $500,000. Than add about $100,000 in extra revenue from gate shares and poor teams no longer go into death spirals. Teams still get in financial trouble where they have negative balances but they now have the option to lower their payroll to improve the balance. Also in these cases the team owner will add money annually so that the situation is kept in check. I don't mind some teams getting into a bit of trouble as long as it does not get out of control. Makes sense that some small teams have financial difficulty in a small league. It simply means they will be bad as they cannot sign quality players and are in danger of relegation. In such a case if they do relegate then they will still not have money in the lower league and might be bad for some years before their finances are back up. This also presents an interesting challenge for the player. If you take control of a team with a negative balance you will have $0 to spend on free agents and you have to survive signing so-so and has been players to minor league deals for a few seasons while fighting relegation and trying to cut costs to get the balance back to green. I like to have a forget-about-it financial system where the system remains stable longterm without interference and without any team stockpiling too much or losing too much. This is a fine balance and right now it seems to work quite well. Still more testing to be done however. All my tests were with pro/reg disabled so the system wasn't tested exactly as it will run later.