Salary Cap Bug after Training Camp

[OldGiants]

I signed the maximum number of FA's I could prior to training camp. this left me with $220,000 available going into the 2001 training camp. After training camp, I was $1,340,000 _over_ my cap limit.

So I began cutting FA's. To my consternation, each player cut put me even further _over_ the cap, and by more than the rookie minimum salary. That is, I cut a player with a $230,000 salary (the cut a player dialogue correctly said I'd save that amount) but now I was #1,600,000 _over_ the cap. Instead of cutting my overage by $230,000, the program _increased_ it by $260,000.

Each succeeding $230,000 players I cut, The cap gets worse by $260,000.

But when I release a $3.5 million veteran, the cap overage is properly credited with a 3.5 million deduction. bizarre.

Why is this happening?

[OldGiants]

Further investigation leads me to believe there are errors in the starting salaries of many players:

Denver, for example.

Look at the lowest paid players. Jason Moore is listed as a cap cost of 180,000 on the roster screen. If you bring up his player screen, there is the 180,000 again. Now click on his "release" button. It will say you can save 350,000. Now hit the "negotiate" button. It will say his salary is 350,000 and suggest he is willing to take a "cut" to 280,000. If you press "accept", thinking you will save 70,000 this year, in fact you have given him an increase in pay from 180,000 to 280,000 and your cap room went down 100,000.

Desmond Clark, Anderson, Speight and other low paid players all have variations on this oddity.

Why is this happening? Is this a mistake, or is there a rule in the salary cap that low-paid (and they are both Rookies and 2nd year players) count as a specific amount lower than actual pay? the first round pick, O'Neal, does not have this problem.

[ez]

i've seen a similar thing happen when trading these players. their salaries on the trade-roster and the individual player screens match, and are presumably correct, but when you add these guys to a trade, their "cap effect" is different than their "known" salary...

[This message has been edited by ez (edited 11-26-2000).]

[sjshaw]

This is the exact bug that I have encountered. If you sign the rookies to 1-year contracts, I think the bug does not occur.

[GiantFan]

After doing some cursory investigations I agree that the problem seems to be with the starting salaries for *min-salary* contracts. These are what I beleive to be the correct minimum salaries for 2000: Rookies - $170K, 2yr - $180K, 3yr - $250K, 4yr - $350K, 5+yr - $440K.

These figures seem to be consistant with what is listed in the initial roster screens and on the player data screen. However in the contract negotiations screen the listed salary for "This Season" (2000) is the minimum salary for the NEXT year of service (ie: a 3rd yr player who's min. sal. should be $250K is listed as having a salary of $350K which is the min salary of a 4th yr player.) This occurs in any player who is signed to a minimum salary - regardless of the bonus involved. I checked this with the computer controlled teams - and it appears to be happening there as well. I don't as yet know if this problem is corrected after the 2000 season as all minimum salaries change - I'll have to keep an eye on that.

Needless to say, if this trend continues, this problem has serious implications in 2001 and beyond because it greatly increases the amount of salary $ being payed out on younger players thus decreasing the amount of available cap room. Could this be a reason that so many people are complaining that they are strapped for cash in their second season?

[OldGiants]

Yes, anyone signing a bunch of FAs to take to camp and hope one or become studs will take big hits to the cap when they release all the guys.

[ez]

Originally posted by OldGiants:
Yes, anyone signing a bunch of FAs to take to camp and hope one or become studs will take big hits to the cap when they release all the guys.

so this is a feature?

[QuikSand]

I'm a heavy dipper into the URFA pool every season, and have never seen anything like this.

Sorry if this was implied within the above, but is this problem something that happens only when one plays with the "NFL players" who are assigned initial contract values by the game? (That would explain why I never see it)

[dacman]

I think its the 7-yr minimum deals bug. If I don't sign them to 7-yr minimum deals, I never see it -- if I do -- ouch!