Accelerating Staff Hiring

[QuikSand]

Accelerating Staff Hiring

CAVEAT: This item came up in some informal discussion about how to “speed up” some of the less interesting phases of a MP FOF league. As many league seek to combine preseason weeks, compromise on mid-week stages, and the like – I think pretty much every league still slogs through three days worth of “staff hiring” which amounts to a nearly complete waste of everyone’s time as it is basically absent any meaningful strategy or intrigue. My goal here is to speculate about a way to accelerate this process, hopefully without losing too much of its practical effect. If that goal isn’t one you share, then this discussion likely isn’t for you.


My working assumption: Each team can offer a maximum amount to a staff member at a given position, which is (I believe) directly related to the team’s profitability from the prior season. Right now, in MP leagues, when you seek to hire a staffer, you find the guy you want, and make him your maximum offer, as the flow-through of these dollars to other in-game purposes is essentially nil. If you are not a profitable team, you essentially end up settling for the staffers that the more profitable teams don’t pursue.

If this is essentially how the staff hiring process works now, then my proposal captures the essentials of this sorting… and theoretically can do it all in one stage. Get on with the more interesting part of the offseason – that’s the goal here.


The idea:
Hold a one-day DRAFT for staff positions

Framework:
-teams with staff vacancies get assigned draft slots to fill them
-draft is in descending order of team profit from prior year
-each team gets assigned a fixed time window to make its pick(s)

After the draft has been run (in one day, real time) teams submit an export including a maximum offer to the staffer they drafted. That will be the only offer submitted for that staffer, so presumably that team will get him.

Any team not participating in the draft may submit a file to make an offer on any staffer not selected in the staff draft. if they get their target guy, fine. If they don’t, they retain their current staffer, all managed in-game.

The commissioner processes all staff hiring (Stages 1-3 all in one sweep) and reports the outcome, and moves on to the next stage, the beginning of the FA process.




Candidly, I think leaving teams with staffers under contract is the way to make this simplest, but it also binds their hands a bit. It may be desirable to let those teams participate in the staff draft as well – maybe by narrowing the time window for each team’s selections. Even if all teams get a draft time slot…32 teams x 15 minutes = 8 hour period. In a league that sims in the morning time, that means the entire draft can easily be done by evening time that same day – and every team can easily submit its stage file as soon as it has made its staff draft selections.

[stevew]

Sounds like a great idea....I hate the stage soooo much. I would suggest one addendum, perhaps giving each team the right of first refusal on its head coach. Or enabling a team to "promote" one of its expired assistants to the head coach position. But I do think you're on the right track, the idea sounds painfully easy to enable, and nobody's done anything like it yet.

[QuikSand]

Sounds like a great idea....I hate the stage soooo much. I would suggest one addendum, perhaps giving each team the right of first refusal on its head coach. Or enabling a team to "promote" one of its expired assistants to the head coach position. But I do think you're on the right track, the idea sounds painfully easy to enable, and nobody's done anything like it yet.

I like that idea, and it would only help to make the actual draft shorter as some teams would just lock up their current guy and not need to draft.

[Ben E Lou]

I like the concept in general. Heck, I'd support just about any reasonable solution to the boredom that is staff hiring. I do have two questions:

1. Does a team with two vacancies get to make two picks at one time?
2. Would we want to order it by HC, then OC, then DC? I ask that question because it seems that not doing it that way might create a situation where a profitable team hires a guy to be a coodinator who would have made more moeny as a Head Coach in the open bidding system.

[QuikSand]

I like it simple, so I would prefer that team 1 gets to lock up anyone they want, and so forth. Yes, you lose some nuance there, from time to time, but my chief interest is to make this a one-day deal.

[Ben E Lou]

Quote:
<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" width="100%"> <tbody><tr> <td class="alt2" style="border: 1px inset ;"> Originally Posted by QuikSand http://www.operationsports.com/fofc/images/styles/yellow/buttons//viewpost.gif (http://www.operationsports.com/fofc/showthread.php?p=1646438#post1646438)
I like it simple, so I would prefer that team 1 gets to lock up anyone they want, and so forth. Yes, you lose some nuance there, from time to time, but my chief interest is to make this a one-day deal.
</td> </tr> </tbody></table>
I agree with you on that. I'd just hate to be accused of "not stopping to clarify the rule because we were in just such a bullheaded rush to do something without fully considering the ramifications that we just didn't give a damn."

[Dutch]

I was thinking about ways to fix FOF's in-game staff hiring and came up with each team receiving "X ammount of interviews" for HC, OC, DC, and Scouts that they would be given at the very beginning of the season....and they could hire anytime they wanted up until training camp.

The interviews would presumably give a "bonus" to hire, but the ultimate consideration was to remove the staff hiring stages completely.

But we could implement your idea ourselves! So that's a pretty great idea.

[QuikSand]

I agree with you on that. I'd just hate to be accused of "not stopping to clarify the rule because we were in just such a bullheaded rush to do something without fully considering the ramifications that we just didn't give a damn."

Yeah, I would really hate to be accused of that.

[Landshark44]

is there any evidence to support that it it even matters who your coaches are?

[MalcPow]

is there any evidence to support that it it even matters who your coaches are?

While I wouldn't call it conclusive, I offer at least some semi-reasonable data on the topic here: http://www.thefobl.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25602. Just some food for thought.

[gstelmack]

One side note: can the commish make offers to staff for teams? If so you don't even need submissions from GMs and take that risk away.

Another alternative for web-based leagues is to use this idea to turn this into something more interesting. Since no one will actually be "bidding", you could do a much more robust interview, etc stage with a customized set of rules on a web site, and then enter the results into FOF at the end using the only-one-team-bids rule. If we came up with a far more robust method for handling offers, re-signing staff, etc, you could implement it on the site and feed the results in.

[Ben E Lou]

One side note: can the commish make offers to staff for teams? If so you don't even need submissions from GMs and take that risk away.I'm not certain, but I believe that he can't (at least now from commish mode). I *know* he can't make contract offers for players or even see renegotiation demands. The documentation of the 6.1 change was limited to game plans and depth charts only, and I don't think anything else slipped in there.

[MalcPow]

For what it's worth, I like the idea of speeding things up. I wonder if this doesn't cause more trouble than it's worth though. Sure, you don't have the total dead time for three days, but you've got a draft that people need to participate in, and then you need every single person who participated in the draft to put an export in for the coaches they drafted (because the commish can't handle the bids themselves without loading the game up as each team and exporting).

It seems to me like Staff Hiring is still a two day affair with this format, and more dependent on active participation. Why not just run it through the game but combine stages 2-3 into one export? You get the same speed without the administration headaches, and you get basically the same end results you're getting now (I think all but a handful of slots are filled by the 3rd round). Thoughts? Just seems that if speed is the concern, this is just as fast and simpler.

[QuikSand]

wow, long response just disappeared into cyberspace... *sigh*

[QuikSand]

Another unspoken (so far) benefit of this system is that *nobody* would ever have to end up getting stuck with an unwanted staff member, which can definitely happen in the current 3-stage system if you lose out on the staffer you were targeting, (Probably a greater risk of this if you compressed stages 2 and 3 into one stage, also)

[danimal]

How would you account for the fact that coaches and coordinators appear to be willing to stay with their current team for less money than other teams offer?

Also, I've seen instances where staff members don't always take the highest offer (not sure why). Recently in the vNFL, for example, I signed Jack Forbes as my OC for $3.74mm, 5 yrs. The Giants were offering him the HC position for $5.98mm, 3 yrs. Maybe coaches look at the total contract amount instead of the annual amount?

[MalcPow]

Yeah, I just ran a couple seasons to the staff stage. It looks like there are 8-10 hires that take place in stage 3 in a typical single player staff hiring run. I have no sense for whether there'd be more or less in an mp league, but a condensing of the last two stages would mean those slots would be filled by the game. Personally, that seems acceptable to me, as it basically means you get one stage to go after your top choice and then you have to seriously consider signability in the second or face the prospect of a game-selected guy (which frankly isn't usually much different from what's left to "choose" at that point anyway).

On another idea. There isn't an easy way to condense the Franchise/Summer stage that comes immediately after the staff stages is there? I know we all post who we're franchising and sending to Europe in case something goes wrong, but is that something a willing commish could put through just clicking through the teams? Or would it require a lot of reopening the game, etc? If it's something a commish could do in five or ten minutes, maybe that's a stage we can skip entirely. People would just post what they want as usual during the staff stages and the commish could put things in after running the end of staff hiring and reveal the draft class/start FA. Meh, just throwing stuff out there.

[stevew]

Just some thoughts, hopefully a few ideas that someone can make a lot better.

I think the key to the process may be to make each coach's/staff contract work on a year to year basis. All new hires should be signed to a one year contract only. Until you get to that point, it will be very hard to run a freewheeling coaching stage, but it should resolve itself in 2-3 years.


At the end of the regular season in MP, a comprehensive coach/scout master list is pulled. All the ratings, etc. Hopefully easy to access info on a web page. The next week or so will be the MP playoffs. This is time for the other (bored?) owners to fill their coaching staffs, giving them something to do.

"Day 1"
Each team, at that point, makes a decision on their scout/HC. And also their coordinators. If they wish to retain them, the scout and head coaches are considered "signed". The assistants are considered "signed", but are available to another team if they chose them as the head coach. No lateral movement will be permitted, and no coach may be demoted.

At this point you may also chose promote your coordinator if you wish to only fire your head coach, but your coordinator must be in the last year of his contract(this works a lot better when coaches are always on one year deals). If a team "fires" their coachs or scout, that staff becomes fair game to bid on, regardless of the remainder of their contract.

Bidding on fired coaches may be a problem, since it could realistically take all 3 days for a team to sign a replacement. Generally, as a safety net, these coaches may be considered "out of the league" for the next season. This will resolve when all coaches are on one year deals.


At some point, there is some pre-ordered "pecking order" determined....whether it be profitability, owner participation, whatever. This order will be posted and easy for league members to find.

Then something like....
"Day 2"

Each team is able to offer contracts to up to 3 scouts. The bids are then resolved via the pecking order. If you bid on a scout that nobody else bids on, then you get him. If there are multiple bids on a scouts, they are resolved.

Any team with a head coaching vacancy may then submit 3 canidates. These are resolved the same way as scouts.

"Day 3"
Repeat day 2, but with 6 names. Should fill all the vacancies.

"day 4"

Teams then choose coordinators, if your coordinator hasn't moved up and you wish to retain them, they are considered "signed"

Each team submits a preference list of 3 names for each coordinator vacancy

In the even that a coach is offered an offensive and defensive job, he goes to the team w/ the top preference #, for the job.
"Day 5"

Each team submits a preference list of 6 coordinators for each vacancy....should eliminate the rest of the vacancies.

Meanwhile the rest of the league has watched the Aztecs win the WooF Bowl.

Obviously this would be tedious, but I'm fairly certain the programming wizards could ease the process up, and proceed.


In the event your choice of coach/staff retires, you're SOL, although you may submit a contigincy plan(ie you can pick a newly created coach).

On the first day of the offseason when files are processed, each team submits the offers they should, and stadium renovation plans. Plus they denote on the forum their summer league/franchise players. The commish processes everything, manually enters the franchise/summer league selections.

Day 2, draft class is revealed, FA begins.


Who knows, maybe this way we can actually learn a few coaches names from time to time.
*edit*
Day 2-5 of our coaching staff period could easily be done via a forum draft as well, making the process way easier. Hell that's a shit ton easier than submitting names.

This will really only work once all coaches are on year to year deals.

[Solecismic]

The idea:
Hold a one-day DRAFT for staff positions

Framework:
-teams with staff vacancies get assigned draft slots to fill them
-draft is in descending order of team profit from prior year


I love this idea. It's simple to understand and get behind logistically, and yet it ties together some very important game concepts. Thanks.

[wade moore]

I love this idea. It's simple to understand and get behind logistically, and yet it ties together some very important game concepts. Thanks.


I think Quik's idea is a great way for a league to speed up the process and get around where the staff hiring stands now.

I think this is a TERRIBLE idea for implementing in the game engine.

[MalcPow]

I think Quik's idea is a great way for a league to speed up the process and get around where the staff hiring stands now.

I think this is a TERRIBLE idea for implementing in the game engine.

Yep.

[Ben E Lou]

I assume the "realism" argument is why the two of you are opposed to the idea. But from where I'm sittin', all I've seen in every text sim I've played are staff hiring systems that *suck* for MP because by nature they have to drag on. To be "realistic," they end up being based on some combination of finances and/or prestige. The team with the most money and/or highest prestige gets the guy they want, and then it trickles down from there. I don't have a problem with abstracting that system into a draft in which the end result would be essentially the same thing, but it wouldn't take so freakin' long like all of the coach/staff hiring systems in text sims that I know of do.

[MalcPow]

I just think a draft is both unrealistic and a clunky way to do it. Why not simply make it a more complex "blind auction" that resolves itself in one stage. I assign, from a pool limited and determined by whatever (prestige, finances), the number of "recruiting points" I want to candidates I am interested in and a maximum contract (also limited by whatever) for the positions I am trying to fill. Teams and coaches are matched under the hood based on the mix of preferences. One export, one stage, the game adjudicates things for me without the work of administering a draft or the total suspension of quasi-realism.

[MalcPow]

Dola, but obviously that's just a quicker fix solution based on something similar to what we have. A real improvement would be a system where we weren't simply offering the max contract, either because that had some significant impact on our other resources or because it would make it nearly impossible to fire the coach without a significant impact to resources down the line. The seemingly arbitrary nature of most of the staff aspects of the game are the real issue here. If there were interesting things happening strategically, a three stage staff cycle wouldn't be a problem.

[gstelmack]

Why doesn't staff hiring overlap other stages? Heck, we haven't even done the Super Bowl and only one NFL team has a vacancy for next season. You could cut all 3 staff hiring stages and still have a robust system with personalities, systems the coaches run, and the like within the framework of the existing game stages.

[MalcPow]

Why doesn't staff hiring overlap other stages? Heck, we haven't even done the Super Bowl and only one NFL team has a vacancy for next season. You could cut all 3 staff hiring stages and still have a robust system with personalities, systems the coaches run, and the like within the framework of the existing game stages.

That'd definitely be an improvement as well. Something else to consider would be some fog of war regarding a new coach's ratings. It's all well and good that I know that X veteran coach's teams have had excellent offenses, but how well is this hotshot college coach's offense going to translate to the pros? It would be more interesting to have some "blue bars" so to speak, to model the very real decision making process where teams are deciding between guys like Schottenheimer (a known quantity) and Jason Garrett (a young guy who could be the next big thing). I think Quik has suggested similar things before.

[Ben E Lou]

Dola, but obviously that's just a quicker fix solution based on something similar to what we have. A real improvement would be a system where we weren't simply offering the max contract, either because that had some significant impact on our other resources or because it would make it nearly impossible to fire the coach without a significant impact to resources down the line. The seemingly arbitrary nature of most of the staff aspects of the game are the real issue here. If there were interesting things happening strategically, a three stage staff cycle wouldn't be a problem.

Bingo. Another informal discussion has brought up another thought for the future of FOF: what's the point of even having a financial system (apart from the cap) for a pro football sim? How would your strategies in FOF change one bit if the following were just eliminated?

ticket pricing
stadium upgrades
attendanceAll three of these are based heavily on one thing, the one thing that all of us (except maybe one former IHOF owner) play for first and foremost: winning games. I'd love to see some of the suggestion in this thread implemented, but also give every MP team an equal amount of money to spend per available position. You want to spend heavily on your offensive coordinator? Go for it, but other aspects will suffer. You're willing to take a chance by going cheap with one of the QuikSand/MalcPow "fog of war" young offensive coordinators? Great! You can then spend a little more on your head coach and defensive coordinator. You've got a head coach under contract for three more years but want to get a new one? You're gonna have to buy out his contract, which means less to spend on a replacement. This sort of thing would make it much more strategic, and little/nothing would be lost in eliminating the "fluff" items I mentioned above. Really, what NFL team has "Poor" stadium turf that causes more injuries???

[wade moore]

Why doesn't staff hiring overlap other stages? Heck, we haven't even done the Super Bowl and only one NFL team has a vacancy for next season.

To me *this* is the "quick-fix" game engine answer. If we're looking for some sort of quik-fix in the engine, just overlap the stages. I think we can all (even Jim) agree that a massive overhaul in future versions would be nice, but if we're considering a quick-fix this seems like the answer.

Now granted, this may be WAY more complicated than we realize in the code - so that would negate my statement if so.

[Anthony]

who is the former IHOF who doesn't play to win games?


i don't think the staff hiring stage needs to be shortened. it needs to be fleshed out and have more strategy/decision making introduced.

i'd like to be able to have to "buy-out" a staff's contract if i want to make a change. as it is now you can unceremoniously just replace a guy with an existing contract with someone new. if i want to offer a good coach a 4 year deal, then replace him with a great coach 1 year into that deal then there should be some consequences.

maybe implement "play for winner" and "loyalty" ratings for the coaches.

also, perhaps have coaches who like to resign/retire often, like the Parcells/Petrino types, guys who drift in and out of the league. it shouldn't be just the owner who gets to terminate a contract. we should get an email like "Coach Smith has retired to become a sports commentator. The remainder of his contract has been credited back into the team's purse." something like that.

[RedKingGold]

The remainder of his contract has been credited back into the team's purse." something like that.

What game are you playing where team's have purses?

[Anthony]

Front Office Fashion.

[Dutch]

maybe implement "play for winner" and "loyalty" ratings for the coaches.

Slow down, let's get those things implemented for the players first.

[ace1914]

Couldn't you just set aside one hour conduct sims every 15 minutes and BAMMM..staff hiring is done. Like an online draft but quicker.

[gstelmack]

Couldn't you just set aside one hour conduct sims every 15 minutes and BAMMM..staff hiring is done. Like an online draft but quicker.

Getting 32 owners together during the same hour, especially in a leauge scattered around half the globe (we have a lot of Europeans in WOOF), is pretty much impossible.

[RedHawk00]

Interesting thread, not that I play MP yet or anything, but just now do I learn I can replace a coach under contract with a better one available... in highly profitable years in SP, I can buy other scouts or coaches. That is good stuff, if everyone was under contract I would just skip the stages. That is a good one for the 1 million tiny secret things to know about FOF thread.

[Cotton]

In stage 3, there are sometimes good coaches that got bumped by teams that replaced them by better coaches in stages 1 and 2. I always check the results of stage 2 to see if that's the case and have found some better options - but only during seasons when I have a full staff and can afford to sit back and watch.

I'm generally against speeding up aspect of the game just because it's 'boring'. If it's inconsequencial - like some of the later early FA stages, that's another thing, but staff hiring is definitely not inconsequencial. I'm not a big fan of it and would love to see some of the ideas for recoding the next version of the game considered. The overlapping idea is fantastic, I think, for example. But until then, there are some interesting aspects and bidding strategies to it for players and leagues that make it so.

There's a lot of suggestions for fleshing it out and making it more detailed, but if people think hiring staff is boring, maybe it would go from a slight delay and annoyance to my attention deficit and requirements for instant gratification to an even more excruciating ordeal - if not handled correctly.

If some people think it's boring, I just don't think that's a reason to race through it.

[Vinatieri for Prez]

I don't find the 3-stage staff hiring to be long enough to be boring. Seems like a lot of work for shortening up something that's already short.

As to potential changes, I've mentioned it before. Coaches need to be fleshed with more ratings, attributes, and systems just like players (including a cohesion factor with the players and affinities with other coaches), and be available and bid on during the normal FA stages for players, with the same or very same amount of money available to each team. Coordinators and position coaches should be added, with much more responsibility than you see now.