FOF 7 - Thoughts on contracts, free agency, salary cap, and related issues

[QuikSand]

Since the "main" thread seems to be spraying all over the place trying to cover whether the random-number-guy named "Arian Foster" is putting up reasonable statistics, or whether the color scheme in one screen segment or another is well executed...I thought it might be useful to start a separate thread for observations about specific segments of the game that appear to have been changed.

So - my goal here is to host a more focused discussion about player salaries, contracts, negotiations, free agency, salary cap, and all those things.

[QuikSand]

I am really just sitting down, but in my first offseason - I see one potentially huge change. Decent-looking young RFA players are asking for real money to sign, and they want multiple year deals. I am very used to a very large share RFA players being willing to accept a one year minsal offer right off the bat in early free agency.

If it's gotten meaningfully tougher to re-up with guys you just inked on one-year rookie deals, then this could have a big effect on the value of lower round draft picks (making them worth more, as that becomes a more cost-effective way to lock up a young player for a few years).

[QuikSand]

That's interesting... I'm playing an NFL-based setup in the 2014 free agency stages. Just ran stage FA 1:2, and it looks like only three or four other contracts got offered other than my batch. Very different... I wonder if th new FA process is less frontloaded (at lest in single player) then it has been before... perhaps player demands start higher and drop more rapidly as FA stages progress than in previous versions (which I think would be a really good change).

[DaddyTorgo]

Why are contracts limited to 5 years though?

I mean I know in the NFL stuff gets renegotiated before that point anyway, so it's largely just used for cap-circumventing, and I guess the decision to cap them at 5 was to prevent that for MP leagues, but it still kinda rubs me the wrong way as someone who only plays SP.

Any SP guys notice/are bothered by this?

[Ben E Lou]

I am really just sitting down, but in my first offseason - I see one potentially huge change. Decent-looking young RFA players are asking for real money to sign, and they want multiple year deals. I am very used to a very large share RFA players being willing to accept a one year minsal offer right off the bat in early free agency.

If it's gotten meaningfully tougher to re-up with guys you just inked on one-year rookie deals, then this could have a big effect on the value of lower round draft picks (making them worth more, as that becomes a more cost-effective way to lock up a young player for a few years).Yes, I'm seeing this combined with the minsal+trivial-bonus-for-for-years draftees referenced here (http://www.operationsports.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=87946) making a big difference. It seems that RFAs who get any level of meaningful playing time want a little money now.

That's interesting... I'm playing an NFL-based setup in the 2014 free agency stages. Just ran stage FA 1:2, and it looks like only three or four other contracts got offered other than my batch. Very different... I wonder if th new FA process is less frontloaded (at lest in single player) then it has been before... perhaps player demands start higher and drop more rapidly as FA stages progress than in previous versions (which I think would be a really good change).It appears that they are closely adhering to the "Wants To Sign In Stage x" stuff and that AI teams therefore only make offers in stage x-1. (It may be that they never sign early in SP. I'm not certain of that. I've seen guys sign late, but not early.)

[QuikSand]

Looks like marginal, low-end veterans will now only accept a 2yr minsal deal, rather than 3yrs in the previous version.

[QuikSand]

Nice little addition -- I made an offer to a player, decided I wanted to do better, and could just enter in another contract offer right away. No "you have already offered a contract..." message even within that stage.

[Ben E Lou]

Nice little addition -- I made an offer to a player, decided I wanted to do better, and could just enter in another contract offer right away. No "you have already offered a contract..." message even within that stage.That's nice. I haven't seen that yet.

[Noop]

Why are contracts limited to 5 years though?

I mean I know in the NFL stuff gets renegotiated before that point anyway, so it's largely just used for cap-circumventing, and I guess the decision to cap them at 5 was to prevent that for MP leagues, but it still kinda rubs me the wrong way as someone who only plays SP.

Any SP guys notice/are bothered by this?

I am bothered because it makes it hard to spread the money over the years. Its minor but it is a little frustrating.

[Grim.Reaper]

I know in the past it seemed people recommended changing the salary range default option when you setup a new game....with this new version, is that still recommended? If so, any recommended settings for that? Might be too early too know, but thought I would ask.

[Ben E Lou]

I know in the past it seemed people recommended changing the salary range default option when you setup a new game....with this new version, is that still recommended? If so, any recommended settings for that? Might be too early too know, but thought I would ask.I think it's too early to tell. I recommended changing it in the past to make it easier for the AI to manage their rosters. My observation so far is that the AI does a *much* better job of roster management now. Unless I see something different down the line, I'm probably going to just leave well enough alone on this one.

[QuikSand]

Hmm, too soon to say if this is really a "thing" -- but on a particular guy who had indicated interest in signing in stage 5, I put in early offer. No AI teams did, and the guy sat there. No shock, that seems to be how the game wants it to work now.

Anyway, when stage 5 did come, my guy got another offer -- and it was exactly $100,000 more than my sitting offer. And mine was not just the asking price, it was a calculated deal seeking to lock the player up (he's a perfect fit).

I am not used to seeing AI bids look "smart" in any way. This one did. I really, really hope this is how the game works now in single player. It might help explain why Ben got beat out on a few of his target players as well... if the AI is deliberately engaging in bidding wars, rather than just setting a value once based on bars/experience and offering it.

Good sign, could be a really big move forward for the SP game.

[QuikSand]

So, just for the record, here's how it played out with my one case:

-Player indicated desire to sign in stage 5

-Player demands were something like $6m over 4 years, with first year salary low as usual

-In stage 2, I put in a flat offer 4yrs, $7.2m

-In stage 5, Denver puts in 4yrs, $7.3m

-In stage 6, I bump up to 4yrs, $7.8m, and that gets him to sign with us

[henry296]

Why are contracts limited to 5 years though?

I mean I know in the NFL stuff gets renegotiated before that point anyway, so it's largely just used for cap-circumventing, and I guess the decision to cap them at 5 was to prevent that for MP leagues, but it still kinda rubs me the wrong way as someone who only plays SP.

Any SP guys notice/are bothered by this?

The new CBA limits bonus to be spread out over just five years even if the contract is longer.

Salary Cap 101: Proration, Amortization, Cap Hits, Dead Money And More - Blogging The Boys (http://www.bloggingtheboys.com/2013/2/23/4017138/salary-cap-101-proration-amortization-cap-hits-dead-money-and-more)

[QuikSand]

Tiny aside: I can't tell if the contract market for long snappers makes any sense at all. We all have to have one, they all seem to demand/make minsal, but there's a huge swath of abilities.

(I really wish I could just choose to "make do" with a C/TE who has some skill there)

[Ben E Lou]

Hmm, too soon to say if this is really a "thing" -- but on a particular guy who had indicated interest in signing in stage 5, I put in early offer. No AI teams did, and the guy sat there. No shock, that seems to be how the game wants it to work now.

Anyway, when stage 5 did come, my guy got another offer -- and it was exactly $100,000 more than my sitting offer. And mine was not just the asking price, it was a calculated deal seeking to lock the player up (he's a perfect fit).

I am not used to seeing AI bids look "smart" in any way. This one did. I really, really hope this is how the game works now in single player. It might help explain why Ben got beat out on a few of his target players as well... if the AI is deliberately engaging in bidding wars, rather than just setting a value once based on bars/experience and offering it.

Good sign, could be a really big move forward for the SP game.Now THAT is interesting, especially because I do believe that their demands decrease over time, so if you're offering him at FA1:2 and the AI isn't jumping in until FA1:5, the offer in former versions would have been based upon the lower FA1:5 asking price...

[QuikSand]

Hmm, I have a very mediocre-looking young LB -- a gu I signed as a riffraff UDFA for minsal, and then re-signed for year 2 at minsal. Now he's rated 23/25, and is "Demanding Trade." I'm used to seeing this only apply to serious players - I don't see him as a serious creeper guy who might be legitimately upset about playing time. Intriguing.

[QuikSand]

Hmm, it doesn't look like any team used its franchise tag in my year two (2015 offseason, default NFL start).

[Ben E Lou]

Hmm, it doesn't look like any team used its franchise tag in my year two (2015 offseason, default NFL start).I don't know if this is why, but my observation is that the AI tends to give contract extensions to guys it wants to keep, so maybe there are fewer candidates? (Only three guys got the tag in the current 2016 offseason in my league.)

[Solecismic]

When I was putting in the new AI, I noticed the same thing, and it persists throughout a career. I now see 1-2 Franchises a year.

There are three issues involved:

1. The NFL does franchising before the game will do its renegotiations. So teams don't think they can afford the players they want to franchise. Moving the renegotiations away from the free agency period might make sense, but I think would make for a less sequential game. The timing works better otherwise.

2. Franchising is fundamentally a hostile process. Players don't like to be franchised in FOF, but you don't take anything more than a hit to how the player feels about your team. Maybe that hit could be increased, and expressed at the time of the franchising. Hostility is largely absent from FOF.

3. There's no mechanism for determining players who don't want a "reasonable" renegotiation. If you're willing to pay what the player wants, you can re-sign the player. So the AI knows it can have the franchise player for less of a cap hit in most cases. Franchising has a much lower value-add in FOF than it does in the NFL. In the NFL, players almost never refuse a cap-out. But they often do refuse contract extensions - even reasonable ones. I haven't tried to put that into FOF except in a very limited sense.

[Ben E Lou]

With the lower-bonus, higher-salary profile of offers in FOF7, the cap out option seems to be more problematic. However, at least some players will accept partial cap outs. I think it makes sense from a game perspective, but could give an additional advantage to more savvy owners in MP, since I suspect that many owners don't really understand how the cap out works, and therefore wouldn't be able to construct a partial cap out offer without assistance.

[beorn]

Could someone please define "cap-out"?

[Ben E Lou]

Could someone please define "cap-out"?Here's the Help File entry:
The Cap Out button allows you to quickly renegotiate a contract to make more cap room available.


The Cap Out button is available only for players on your team who have two or more years remaining on their contract. It simply reduces a player's salary for the current season to the league minimum, giving him the rest of that salary in the form of a bonus. Since bonuses are counted against the cap over the life of a contract, this saves you cap room during the current season. Players like it because they get most of this year's salary immediately, without risk. Players close to the minimum salary for their experience can't be capped out.

[beorn]

Thanks!

[Olsson]

I love how the AI targets UDFA's in this version :-)

[Ben E Lou]

I love how the AI targets UDFA's in this version :-)
Yeah. No longer can we just assume that we'll get the ones we want for minsal.


Has anyone seen a FA sign *before* their "desired stage?" I haven't yet. I'm wondering if that piece is now hard-coded.

[DaddyTorgo]

The new CBA limits bonus to be spread out over just five years even if the contract is longer.

Salary Cap 101: Proration, Amortization, Cap Hits, Dead Money And More - Blogging The Boys (http://www.bloggingtheboys.com/2013/2/23/4017138/salary-cap-101-proration-amortization-cap-hits-dead-money-and-more)

Well that's very interesting.

[Suicane75]

I have no idea where to put this with all these threads but I'll post it here. When I let the staff automatically sign players to fill the roster, they do a lot of cutting of guys. A lot of my later round picks who should be the most valuable as roster filler, are getting cut in their 1st or 2nd seasons. Even vets are getting cut when I have a good amount of cap space left and only a few OUT injuries so I don't think that's the issue.

The caveat to this is that I don't look nearly as deep under the hood as some of you guys so this is just anecdotal but I'm wondering if anyone else is noticing this?

[Suicane75]

I see what's happening now. In the pre season my staff is signing as many guys as they can to get close to 60, regardless of injury. So that 7 Million dollars in cap space I had went away pretty quick, which in turn causes havoc when they need to sign a guy during the season. Havoc may be a strong word, but still.

Has this always been the case?

[Suicane75]

Ok, it says when you click yes to the "Staff automatically signs players to fill the roster" button that it will only sign first year players to allow you to field 46 active players for a game. That's untrue because it's signing veterans and releasing rookies & veterans.

It's not a deal breaker but it's very frustrating.

[Ben E Lou]

Yes, I'm seeing this combined with the minsal+trivial-bonus-for-for-years draftees referenced here (http://www.operationsports.com/fofc/showthread.php?t=87946) making a big difference. It seems that RFAs who get any level of meaningful playing time want a little money now.OK. I have a good illustration of this from my Raider dynasty. I picked up an undrafted rookie WR and signed him to a one-year deal. He made the team as our primary punt returner and got a little work in at WR5. In his rookie season, he was in on 242 ST plays and 59 pass plays. His salary request is now:

B: 160K
1: 520K (cap cost 600K)
2: 660K (cap cost 740K)

My fifth round draft choice is going to cost me $570K this year and $670K next year. The fourth rounder is at $630/$730. Third rounder: $680/$800.

My strategy takeaways from this so far are:

1. Sign all undrafted guys for 2 years.
2. Unless there's a guy who looks like he might start one day available, don't be shy about using later-round picks on specialists I'm used to picking up as undrafted rookies, because...
3. An undrafted rookie who plays is going to cost roughly 4th round money or better by his 3rd season, maybe his 2nd in MP if the market ends up forcing one-year, $1M type deals for decent-looking ones as it often does.

Very interested to see how this is going to play out in MP.

[Ben E Lou]

One thing I'm noticing about this version for SP: I can no longer reliably say "I'll fill that slot in FA." The AI seems to be doing a better job of holding on to its starters. Position-by-position, at FA1:2 in 2017, here's the top of the class:

QB: 39/39
RB: 64/64, then four guys rated 50/50
FB: 56/56, 51/51
TE: 52/52, year 12
WR: 62/62, 60/60..drops to 46/46 after these guys. Both want north of $10M.
C: 57/57, 52/52, 52/52
G: 60/60 (yr 12), 51/51
T: 45/45
DE: 83/83, 65/65, 55/55
DT: 64/64, 51/51
ILB: 50/50
OLB: 56/56, 55/55, 53/53
CB: 46/46
S: 55/55, 53/53

It seems like a pretty good balance of having *some* talent available but the AI teams largely keeping their talent. What's also interesting to note is that I'm running close to the cap, so it doesn't appear to be a case of the AI being able to keep its players because salaries are too low. Either the AI is doing a solid job, or so far I suck at cap management in the new game.

[Grim.Reaper]

Is it normal for a lot of teams to have room under the cap in $20-$35 million range? I have 10 ten teams that are in this range, with one of the team's having $35 million remaining.

Seems like a lot, but maybe that is real life.

[Ben E Lou]

Is it normal for a lot of teams to have room under the cap in $20-$35 million range? I have 10 ten teams that are in this range, with one of the team's having $35 million remaining.

Seems like a lot, but maybe that is real life.At what stage? Offseason? Regular season? I'm at the end of FA1, right before the draft, with a $134M cap, and right now the AI teams range from one being over the cap to one with $25.98M in cap room:

Team Cap Room Cntr Draft Picks Big Need 2nd Need 3rd Need
New Jersey $25,980,000 42 $2,600,000 Start QB Start DT Start S
Atlanta $24,990,000 44 $6,040,000 Start QB Start S Start G
Cleveland $24,190,000 43 $7,920,000 Start QB Start DT Start S
Chicago $24,110,000 34 $5,910,000 Start TE Start T Start DE
St. Louis $22,530,000 36 $5,060,000 Start RB Start ILB Start G
Seattle $22,040,000 37 $4,850,000 Start S Start DT Start DE
San Diego $21,030,000 43 $5,240,000 Start DT Start QB Start DE
Dallas $19,840,000 32 $9,790,000 Start S Start ILB Start QB
New Orleans $19,760,000 31 $8,100,000 Start T Start QB Start DT
Philadelphia $19,520,000 38 $7,220,000 Start DT Start QB Resrv ILB
Cincinnati $19,380,000 34 $10,360,000 Start ILB Start OLB Resrv OLB
Baltimore $18,120,000 36 $8,910,000 Start T Start DT Start ILB
Buffalo $18,020,000 41 $5,030,000 Start RB Start T Start S
New York $16,900,000 34 $6,590,000 Start T Start S Start G
San Francisco $16,710,000 38 $5,580,000 Start CB Start DT Resrv CB
Detroit $16,520,000 34 $4,950,000 Start CB Start ILB Start T
Jacksonville $16,170,000 40 $8,580,000 Start CB Start ILB Start S
New England $16,100,000 36 $7,420,000 Start OLB Start CB Start ILB
Arizona $16,040,000 39 $6,210,000 Start QB Start DT Start S
Pittsburgh $15,070,000 39 $5,110,000 Start G Start T Start DT
Houston $14,760,000 37 $5,290,000 Start WR Start QB Start S
Denver $14,490,000 36 $4,980,000 Start ILB Start CB Start QB
Carolina $14,380,000 40 $2,110,000 Start RB Resrv G Start G
Washington $14,110,000 36 $4,890,000 Start DT Start QB Start C
Indianapolis $13,940,000 36 $4,670,000 Start ILB Start DT Start G
Tennessee $13,870,000 37 $5,190,000 Start T Start QB Start ILB
**Oakland $13,850,000 46 $5,330,000 Start DT Start S Start RB
Tampa Bay $13,570,000 30 $4,730,000 Start ILB Start DE Start T
Minnesota $12,540,000 40 $5,450,000 Start ILB Start QB Start WR
Miami $10,730,000 41 $4,800,000 Start DE Start ILB Start WR
Kansas City $6,880,000 31 $4,770,000 Start QB Start ILB Resrv OLB
Green Bay $0 28 $4,050,000 Start DT Start ILB Start FB

[QuikSand]

Another quick point - we need to avoid basing too much on how the game handles the built-in contracts from an NFL start career (or any artificial startup). The contracts it kicks off with might set things up to be unrealistic for a few years before becoming a true "FOF" market-driven situation.

I think we need to be 4-5 years deep to have much sense of what FOF is going to look like with contracts, etc.

[Grim.Reaper]

At what stage? Offseason? Regular season? I'm at the end of FA1, right before the draft, with a $134M cap, and right now the AI teams range from one being over the cap to one with $25.98M in cap room:

Team Cap Room Cntr Draft Picks Big Need 2nd Need 3rd Need
New Jersey $25,980,000 42 $2,600,000 Start QB Start DT Start S
Atlanta $24,990,000 44 $6,040,000 Start QB Start S Start G
Cleveland $24,190,000 43 $7,920,000 Start QB Start DT Start S
Chicago $24,110,000 34 $5,910,000 Start TE Start T Start DE
St. Louis $22,530,000 36 $5,060,000 Start RB Start ILB Start G
Seattle $22,040,000 37 $4,850,000 Start S Start DT Start DE
San Diego $21,030,000 43 $5,240,000 Start DT Start QB Start DE
Dallas $19,840,000 32 $9,790,000 Start S Start ILB Start QB
New Orleans $19,760,000 31 $8,100,000 Start T Start QB Start DT
Philadelphia $19,520,000 38 $7,220,000 Start DT Start QB Resrv ILB
Cincinnati $19,380,000 34 $10,360,000 Start ILB Start OLB Resrv OLB
Baltimore $18,120,000 36 $8,910,000 Start T Start DT Start ILB
Buffalo $18,020,000 41 $5,030,000 Start RB Start T Start S
New York $16,900,000 34 $6,590,000 Start T Start S Start G
San Francisco $16,710,000 38 $5,580,000 Start CB Start DT Resrv CB
Detroit $16,520,000 34 $4,950,000 Start CB Start ILB Start T
Jacksonville $16,170,000 40 $8,580,000 Start CB Start ILB Start S
New England $16,100,000 36 $7,420,000 Start OLB Start CB Start ILB
Arizona $16,040,000 39 $6,210,000 Start QB Start DT Start S
Pittsburgh $15,070,000 39 $5,110,000 Start G Start T Start DT
Houston $14,760,000 37 $5,290,000 Start WR Start QB Start S
Denver $14,490,000 36 $4,980,000 Start ILB Start CB Start QB
Carolina $14,380,000 40 $2,110,000 Start RB Resrv G Start G
Washington $14,110,000 36 $4,890,000 Start DT Start QB Start C
Indianapolis $13,940,000 36 $4,670,000 Start ILB Start DT Start G
Tennessee $13,870,000 37 $5,190,000 Start T Start QB Start ILB
**Oakland $13,850,000 46 $5,330,000 Start DT Start S Start RB
Tampa Bay $13,570,000 30 $4,730,000 Start ILB Start DE Start T
Minnesota $12,540,000 40 $5,450,000 Start ILB Start QB Start WR
Miami $10,730,000 41 $4,800,000 Start DE Start ILB Start WR
Kansas City $6,880,000 31 $4,770,000 Start QB Start ILB Resrv OLB
Green Bay $0 28 $4,050,000 Start DT Start ILB Start FB


When I saw the remaining cap, it was at the start of the season (week 1 preseason) after all off season activities were complete. I wish I would have taken a snapshot of the report you had above to show it, but I completely forgot that report existed (I brought up each team separate).

[Ben E Lou]

Another quick point - we need to avoid basing too much on how the game handles the built-in contracts from an NFL start career (or any artificial startup). The contracts it kicks off with might set things up to be unrealistic for a few years before becoming a true "FOF" market-driven situation.

I think we need to be 4-5 years deep to have much sense of what FOF is going to look like with contracts, etc.Very true and actually maybe a little longer than 4-5 years due to residual effects of those original contracts. My career is in year 5. I'm thinking maybe around year 6-7 I'd expect to see things look pretty much exactly they'll look for the rest of the career.

[Grim.Reaper]

I ran a few more seasons and it did get better so that likely was the issue.

On a related note, how many players can be under contract on a given team? I have teams that range from 51 to 61 and this is in the regular season. I would think most teams would have the same number to maximize the rosters, but maybe I am wrong. The teams that are at the low end of 51 have no cap room. Just can't imagine an NFL team not fully taken up all the roster spots available to them, even if it means releasing high price players. At the start of the pre-season, I even had 1 team have only 48 players, barely enough to field the team for the game.

[Grim.Reaper]

I ran a few more seasons and it did get better so that likely was the issue.

On a related note, how many players can be under contract on a given team? I have teams that range from 51 to 61 and this is in the regular season. I would think most teams would have the same number to maximize the rosters, but maybe I am wrong. The teams that are at the low end of 51 have no cap room. Just can't imagine an NFL team not fully taken up all the roster spots available to them, even if it means releasing high price players. At the start of the pre-season, I even had 1 team have only 48 players, barely enough to field the team for the game.

I screwed that up.....I see the range is from 51-54.....did not execute the first week of the season. I guess I would still think that minimally all teams would have 53 players but maybe that is not the case.

[korme]

Check out his transaction history with the Texans.

[Dynasty23]

Check out his transaction history with the Texans.

I think that whole transaction history should be looked at. He seems to get cut at the beginning of FA every year despite signing a four year deal the previous year. Certainly, situations like that might happen here and there in the NFL (Ed Reed comes to mind), but four years in a row for the same player? (and when he's evidently still a productive player).

[Ben E Lou]

Moved the Guzowski discussion into this thread before deciding whether I want to send it to Jim. On one hand, I'd agree that his transaction history looks goofy. But on the other, if the AI determines that he's worth the money in year 1 but not worth the money in year two and it makes for a more competitive AI, I'm all for that. Thoughts?

[korme]

The biggest problem is that Houston cut him out of a 9M/4yr contract only to sign him later to a much larger one.

[DukeRulesMAB]

Yeah, one can come up with a scenario where the repeated cuts after signing 4-year deals makes sense. I can't come up with any scenario where Houston has him on an existing low deal, cuts him, then 7 stages later signs him to a monster deal.

[Suicane75]

Welp, just had my starting RB, in the 3rd year of a big 4 year contract get released in week 16 with no corresponding cap saving move. Completely kills this career for me.

[bigmike75]

Teams will have a franchise qb, sign a backup to a huge deal and take a qb in the first round. Just kind of the way this game is. This just isn't a viable SP product. Think I'm probably done with FOF, don't play MP. That said, was a fun franchise.

[TheFoosballWizard]

Hmm, I have a very mediocre-looking young LB -- a gu I signed as a riffraff UDFA for minsal, and then re-signed for year 2 at minsal. Now he's rated 23/25, and is "Demanding Trade." I'm used to seeing this only apply to serious players - I don't see him as a serious creeper guy who might be legitimately upset about playing time. Intriguing.

In OSFL I had a less than 20 rated longtime position leader who never played more than 85 or so plays a year (at most) get angry enough that he was demanding a trade. He also wasn't a major creeper. It's not something I saw happen a lot in the old version, but it did seem to happen sometimes.

http://i.imgur.com/0HEkWO8.png

[Carman Bulldog]

Really loving the "Veteran Holdout" feature in this version and it's much improved from past years.

Last year, I signed Graham Harrell (35/35) to a 2 year, $1.6 million dollar deal. He threw for 4234 yards and 29 TD's. This year, he is holding out asking for $37 million over three years.

Two seasons ago, I signed Kendall Hunter (52/52) to a 3 year, $4.5 million deal. His first season, he ran for just under 1000 yards in 13 games. He held out but returned in Week 3 of the exhibition season. Last year, he ran for just over 1000 yards in a full season. Sure enough, holding out again.

[scorp]

you still see 40ish rated players asking for much more to resign in their last year of a deal than it takes to resign them once they become FAs.
Several want much much more until they become FAs. ( actually no way would you sign them until they became FA $ on a couple )

[Ben E Lou]

you still see 40ish rated players asking for much more to resign in their last year of a deal than it takes to resign them once they become FAs.
Several want much much more until they become FAs. ( actually no way would you sign them until they became FA $ on a couple )Yup. That's a good thing imho.

Speaking of that, I'm seeing something now in my dynasty thread now that the team has gotten good that I like: the cap is forcing me to make intentional decisions to let some "solid starter, but getting older" guys walk into free agency because I don't want to take the risk of extending them. My 10th-year starting LT, rated 50/50 by my scout is in the final year of his contract and wanting a 3-year deal. It comes down to me not being willing to risk the bonus money that he wants. I like that dynamic very much, both for SP and MP. The other fun intersection with a new game dynamic is that I have a 2nd-year 27/50 LT. He was +3 in his rookie TC. In the old game I would have had complete confidence that he was heading into at least the upper 50s just from that one camp. With this one, it's not a sure thing, thus making my decision to let the aging starter walk a more difficult one.

[Ben E Lou]

Ah...just realized something else that's passes both the "realism" test and the "does it make for more interesting gameplay decisions" test with flying colors. You can "cap out" renegotiation requests as well.

For example, my RB is requesting:

B: 7.99M
1: 5.78M
2: 7.86M
3: 8.69M
4: 9.79M
5: 11.32M

With his existing bonus cap hit of 1.74M, that contract would make for a cap cost of $9.11M this year. I can't afford that this season. However, if I shift as much of the year 1 amount into the bonus as is possible, it spreads the cap hit over the length of the contract, costing me less this year but more in future seasons. If I go all the way on it, I can lower the year 1 salary to the minimum of $760K and put $13.01M in bonus, saving me $4M in cap room this year, but costing an additional $1M in cap room in the following four seasons. It's good for the player and a meaningful decision for me.

[QuikSand]

....hmmmm...can you reverse that too?

[Ben E Lou]

....hmmmm...can you reverse that too?You mean go low/no bonus? I'll bet you'd have to increase year 1 to cover it all, which would make it not doable for me most of the time. I can't try it on this team since I'm so close to the cap, but theoretically, the player above wants 13.77M this year, so the contract would look like:

50K
13.72M
13.72M
13.72M
13.72M
13.72M

That ends up being much more of a cap hit in exchange for "bonus insurance."

[Ben E Lou]

Bah. Now you've got me curious. Opening another career...

[Ben E Lou]

It's somewhat doable, but it costs so much more, the only reason I could think of wanting to do it would be for really old players. I'll be curious to see how this plays out in MP, but for me in SP so far, I'm not really able to afford it.

I think finding if there's a "moneyball" approach to roster-building is going to be important for MP success...

[QuikSand]

Okay, what I was worried about was a too-simple algorithm that might let something that fits a simple formula become an angle-shooting opportunity. You don't want a guy like me figuring out that I can take bonus money, and put it dollar for dollar into year one salary, and the game is hard-wired to accept the offer. (cf. FOF 2007 algorithm for partial capouts in multi-player)

[Ben E Lou]

So....it is possible for one franchise tag to trigger "past injustices" now.

1. Drafted guy in the first round.
2. Four good seasons, no holdout.
3. Franchised him in offseason 5.
4. Went to extend him in FA1:1--BOOM! Past injustices.

So, yeah. No holdout. Loyalty was 41 pre-tag, dropped to 20 when I gave him the tag.

[Julio Riddols]

So....it is possible for one franchise tag to trigger "past injustices" now.

1. Drafted guy in the first round.
2. Four good seasons, no holdout.
3. Franchised him in offseason 5.
4. Went to extend him in FA1:1--BOOM! Past injustices.

So, yeah. No holdout. Loyalty was 41 pre-tag, dropped to 20 when I gave him the tag.

I like it. I guess we better pay attention to loyalty and its other ignored friends this go around. Maybe intelligence/play to win/leadership etc all mean a lot more now, which would be nice if true.

[Ben E Lou]

No idea if loyalty played into that scenario, but just wanted to record it to add to our knowledge base for the future.

I just realized that this is the first time I've actually used the Franchise Tag in the release version, so I have no idea how frequent this may be, either.

[TRO]

Since I was at Tag stage in my current test career, I decided to experiment by tagging every free agent I had one by one.

Here are the results.
Pos Name Exp Role Rating Playing Time? PreLoyalty PostLoyalty Reneg?
QB Anderson 11 Backup 26 No 19 0 Y
G Boothe 10 LG 38 No 65 50 Y
DE Bryant 8 LDE 49 No 8 0 Y
G Greco 8 RG 46 No 18 0 Y
SS Godfrey 8 SS 49 No 19 0 Y
G Vasquez 7 Backup 24 No 22 0 Y
WR Thomas 7 Backup 51 No 51 27 Y
WR Harvin 7 SE 53 No 7 0 Y
RB McCoy 7 RB 70 No 42 6 Y
CB Haden 6 LCB 72 No 18 0 Y
DT Carter 5 Backup 26 No 14 0 Y


I wasn't able to replicate the 1 Tag = Injustice in my quick test as everybody agreed to reneg request.

I did confirm that there is not a consistent drop in loyalty. Range of -15 to -36 in this test.

None of these players had any issues with playing time, so that wasn't a potential factor.

[Julio Riddols]

Since I was at Tag stage in my current test career, I decided to experiment by tagging every free agent I had one by one.

Here are the results.
Pos Name Exp Role Rating Playing Time? PreLoyalty PostLoyalty Reneg?
QB Anderson 11 Backup 26 No 19 0 Y
G Boothe 10 LG 38 No 65 50 Y
DE Bryant 8 LDE 49 No 8 0 Y
G Greco 8 RG 46 No 18 0 Y
SS Godfrey 8 SS 49 No 19 0 Y
G Vasquez 7 Backup 24 No 22 0 Y
WR Thomas 7 Backup 51 No 51 27 Y
WR Harvin 7 SE 53 No 7 0 Y
RB McCoy 7 RB 70 No 42 6 Y
CB Haden 6 LCB 72 No 18 0 Y
DT Carter 5 Backup 26 No 14 0 Y


I wasn't able to replicate the 1 Tag = Injustice in my quick test as everybody agreed to reneg request.

I did confirm that there is not a consistent drop in loyalty. Range of -15 to -36 in this test.

None of these players had any issues with playing time, so that wasn't a potential factor.

It did the same last version, so I wonder if the threshold for holdouts has just been changed some or is determined differently.

[Ben E Lou]

Heh. So maybe just plain ol' bad luck then.

[TRO]

Only 2 of the players tested were stars, the rest were scrubs or replacement level. So still plenty of room for varience.

[Ben E Lou]

Another quick point - we need to avoid basing too much on how the game handles the built-in contracts from an NFL start career (or any artificial startup). The contracts it kicks off with might set things up to be unrealistic for a few years before becoming a true "FOF" market-driven situation.

I think we need to be 4-5 years deep to have much sense of what FOF is going to look like with contracts, etc.I'm now in the 2021 offseason. I'm not one to get bogged down in the minutiae of some of the stuff I've seen in this thread about some AI team signing too many QBs or drafting the same position three out of four years or whatever else people are concerned about. The big picture I'm seeing in 2021, with all the initial contract silliness removed, is as follows:

At the beginning of FA1, here's the top of the FA class:
http://www.fof-ihof.com/upload/Ben%20E%20Lou/free_agency.png

And here's the league-wide cap situation:
http://www.fof-ihof.com/upload/Ben%20E%20Lou/cap_situation.png

I see a free agency class with some top-tier talent at non-marquee positions and a fair bit of mid-level talent spread across many positions. That tells me that the AI teams are keeping most of their talent. That's what I'd like to see there.

I see nearly all AI teams with ample cap space to compete in FA, fill their rosters without losing draft picks, and hold on to their stars. That's what I like to see there.

Seeing the above two things, the obvious concern would be that it might be too easy for the human to build a monster team and keep it together. So far I've enjoyed only modest success--four playoff appearances in seven seasons, no titles, and a 1-4 record in postseason games. And part of the reason I'm writing this now is that I'm procrastinating in trying to decide if I need to trade my starting QB away because of his cap cost--this after already having outright cut two starters this offseason and having allowed two others to become free agents. And for only one of the five players mentioned do I have a replacement waiting in the wings who even looks like he might be starter potential.

Yeah, that's what I like to see there.



I'm sure I'll learn some tricks of the trade and get better at this game, but for now, it's extremely promising as a challenging and engaging SP experience, especially now that I'm far enough along that I'm probably starting to see how the AI will hold up long-term.

[QuikSand]

A few quick notes from my own "play all out" solo career (I'm into 2023 now):

-The level of free agents who will ask for a click or two above minsal is gong to change the game a lot, at least for GMs like me who really have feasted on that band of players -- investing in cohesion and chemistry is going to be a lot more difficult, if the cap is a real consideration

-(any following that segue...) The cap looks like it's a real consideration in this game by default --- for savvy owners, this was not the case in FOF 2007 or its predecessors, where just making smart roster decisions could keep a quality team well out of cap trouble without much sacrifice.

-This is not a new thing, but I think while we have the developer engaged in making game tweaks, now is the time to launch an effort to help resolve the system used to evaluate contracts of varying components (bonus/early salary/late salary) and duration. If the FA system is going to be this big a deal in both SP and presumably MP, then this is worth Jim polishing it up a good deal. Now's the time.

[Ben E Lou]

-This is not a new thing, but I think while we have the developer engaged in making game tweaks, now is the time to launch an effort to help resolve the system used to evaluate contracts of varying components (bonus/early salary/late salary) and duration. If the FA system is going to be this big a deal in both SP and presumably MP, then this is worth Jim polishing it up a good deal. Now's the time.Might it be a good idea to run a test MP league, zipping through the seasons and drafts and just concentrating on Free Agency, sooner rather than later? (As in, maybe I ought to set this up today...)

[QuikSand]

I'm game to invest some time/effort, but I'm not sure what we'd gain from deeply refining how the game works right now.

I'm personally convinced that the current system is too simple and too easy to defeat in SP. I want to recommend or urge changes.

I don't really need a mountain of new evidence to support the argument. My current SP roster, chock full of quality 10th year veteran players who (frex) chose my 1yr $9m B$0m offer to another team's 4yr $30m B$15m offer is plenty of testament and easily reproducible.

I think a set of fairly simple recommendations is the order of the day. Add more value to total guaranteed money, not exclusively dollars per year. Base contracts on a "peak year" concept and evaluate them with that in mind. Add some variability, whether indicated in game as a preference, or hidden as a wild card, to make the outcome more variable across different contracts of similar objective merit. Add a factor of whether the contract is above or below an expected value. Blend that stuff (or most of it) together, and this part of the game can improve dramatically.

[AlexB]

It appears that they are closely adhering to the "Wants To Sign In Stage x" stuff and that AI teams therefore only make offers in stage x-1. (It may be that they never sign early in SP. I'm not certain of that. I've seen guys sign late, but not early.)

Very much not true! Just seen my entire first FA period blown apart by targets signing early!

[QuikSand]

Very much not true! Just seen my entire first FA period blown apart by targets signing early!

I'd like more details here... I have yet to see this. Lots of guys don't express a timing presence, but among those who do, I don't see anyone jumping the gun in my game, at all.

[AlexB]

Quik - a pattern has quickly appeared on further inspection!

Jonathan Dwyer was preference week 7, resigned with Pittsburgh week 3
Golden Tate preference week 8, resigned with Seattle week 3
Perry Riley preference week 10, resigned with Washington week 3
Alterraun Verner preference week 7, resigned with Tennessee week 3

In each case the players resigned with their original teams, and had no offers from other teams, including me as I was waiting until the week before.

Looks like there is a risk of resigning in week 3 if no offer is made

[Ben E Lou]

I'm game to invest some time/effort, but I'm not sure what we'd gain from deeply refining how the game works right now.

I'm personally convinced that the current system is too simple and too easy to defeat in SP. I want to recommend or urge changes.

I don't really need a mountain of new evidence to support the argument. My current SP roster, chock full of quality 10th year veteran players who (frex) chose my 1yr $9m B$0m offer to another team's 4yr $30m B$15m offer is plenty of testament and easily reproducible.

I think a set of fairly simple recommendations is the order of the day. Add more value to total guaranteed money, not exclusively dollars per year. Base contracts on a "peak year" concept and evaluate them with that in mind. Add some variability, whether indicated in game as a preference, or hidden as a wild card, to make the outcome more variable across different contracts of similar objective merit. Add a factor of whether the contract is above or below an expected value. Blend that stuff (or most of it) together, and this part of the game can improve dramatically.Sounds like you should post in the bug/issue thread with the specific things that you've been able to do that seem to be imbalanced/off-kilter. Maybe they can get a look for the first patch.

[AlexB]

Quik - a pattern has quickly appeared on further inspection!

Jonathan Dwyer was preference week 7, resigned with Pittsburgh week 3
Golden Tate preference week 8, resigned with Seattle week 3
Perry Riley preference week 10, resigned with Washington week 3
Alterraun Verner preference week 7, resigned with Tennessee week 3

In each case the players resigned with their original teams, and had no offers from other teams, including me as I was waiting until the week before.

Looks like there is a risk of resigning in week 3 if no offer is made

I reran the FA from the save I made after a QB bug to test how they'd react with an offer from me - bid for all the players I wanted at the start this time.

All four of the above turned down significantly more money from me to resign with their teams at FA3 again. Of the four, there was probably only one where I thought it was odd (others had wants winner, high loyalty, etc)

[MizzouRah]

I reran the FA from the save I made after a QB bug to test how they'd react with an offer from me - bid for all the players I wanted at the start this time.

All four of the above turned down significantly more money from me to resign with their teams at FA3 again. Of the four, there was probably only one where I thought it was odd (others had wants winner, high loyalty, etc)

Is Jerry Jones your owner?

[QuikSand]

All four of the above turned down significantly more money from me to resign with their teams at FA3 again.

If you have a save game at that point, then more data would be helpful here, I think. The current team gets an edge even without really high loyalty, so that's in play -- but money usually talks.

So... what do you mean in terms of "significantly more money" in specific? How much bonus, especially? If you have details of your offer, versus the details of the offer they accept yours for - that could really help determine if there's a new problem at work, or if this is just a matter of more clearly understanding what players value in a contract (basically bonus per year as the main element...then early salary...and eventually late salary).

[AlexB]

I've not got the save at that point any longer, but through notes & the transaction log I can work out rough details:

The way I structured my offers was to increase the first year cap cost by one more than next $100k (i.e. if they asked for $1.52m in the first year, I increased the bonus until the first year cost was $1.7m, a $2.25m became $2.4m through bonus increase only)

So over a three year contract, I offered generally an extra $330k - $670k depending on the initial request, four years an extra $440-800k bonus.

Plus I also rounded up the final salary years to the nearest $100k in cap cost, which would have added an extra $30k-$270k on a three year contract. In each of the three cases below there no other teams in for the players other than me & their original team

Dwyer - PIT
Loyalty 33
Wants winner 90
PIT went 8-8 previous year, MIA went 11-5 and lost WC game; after two games following season MIA power rating 63 (5th) PIT 53 (23rd)

My offer was $5.92m over three years, with a $1.7m first year salary + bonus
He accepted $2.93m over two years, with a $600k total bonus, 1st year salary + bonus is $1.38m.
I would have added at least $330k to my bonus offer in this instance


Tate- SEA
Loyalty 15
Wants winner 85
SEA went 9-7 previous year, progressed through the WC game but lost in the divisional round
MIA went 11-5 and lost WC game
After two games following season MIA power rating 63 (5th) SEA 65 (4th)

My offer was $9.92m over three years, with a $2.7m first year salary + bonus
He accepted $7.75m over three years, with a $2.4m total bonus, 1st year salary + bonus is $2.25m.
I would have added at least $330k to my bonus offer in this instance


Riley- WAS
Loyalty 79
Wants winner 75
(WAS went 6-10 previous year, MIA went 11-5 and lost WC game; after two games following season MIA power rating 63 (5th) WAS 57 (17th))

My offer was $6.42m over three years, with a $1.8m first year salary + bonus
He accepted $4.6m over three years, with a $1.15m total bonus, 1st year salary + bonus $1.33m.
I would have added at least $330k to my bonus offer in this instance


In the rerun FA, Verner wasn't on the Grey Sheet, so didn't specify a preferred stage (whether they are on the Grey Sheet seems to be the factor as to whether they state a preference or not)

Of the three contract examples above I would have thought on balance Dwyer would have signed my offer, but you could argue he preferred the two year deal

Without the exact bonus offers I made this is incomplete data, but looking at the similar structured deals that were accepted, it looks like the total bonus I offered would likely have been about the same as those signed by the players I lost, but 1st year salary would have been higher.

I'm not sure there is a problem as such tbh, was originally commenting that players do sign before their stated preferred stage.

To further this point, in the rerun FA, I signed five players who specified a preference: two were before their preferred stage, two were bang on, and one was afterwards. So of the eight players that I went in for & who specified a stage, the totals were five signed before their stated preference.

[QuikSand]

Hmm, too soon to say if this is really a "thing" -- but on a particular guy who had indicated interest in signing in stage 5, I put in early offer. No AI teams did, and the guy sat there. No shock, that seems to be how the game wants it to work now.

Anyway, when stage 5 did come, my guy got another offer -- and it was exactly $100,000 more than my sitting offer. And mine was not just the asking price, it was a calculated deal seeking to lock the player up (he's a perfect fit).

I am not used to seeing AI bids look "smart" in any way. This one did. I really, really hope this is how the game works now in single player. It might help explain why Ben got beat out on a few of his target players as well... if the AI is deliberately engaging in bidding wars, rather than just setting a value once based on bars/experience and offering it.

Good sign, could be a really big move forward for the SP game.

I am ready to declare this a mirage -- I haven't seen it happen again, and now I presume that I have the facts here modestly wrong.

I am once again very comfortable knowing just what offer it will take to land nearly all free agent players ... just looking at their requested contract, and assessing my degree of interest, I am putting in 1yr bonus-heavy deals, 1yr bonus-free deals, and multi-year deals of varying kinds... and I'm landing nearly every player I pursue (this in a mature SP career where I'm playing "all out"). I put in 15 offers in the early stages of free agency, and I'll land at least 13 of them, and usually every single guy.

It really would be nice to see some of these FA situations be more dynamic. Right now we can generally see hos things will go... guy asking for $4m/yr and we know that any bidders will come in somewhere inside a window right around that value. If I'm inclined to storm in and beat the 4yr/$17m/half-bonus offer that I know in advance is basically going to be the best offer, it's fairly easy exercise to drop in my offer and know that the AI teams will be oblivious (they will just drop in their 4/16 and 4/17 offers even while my 4/22 is sitting right there).

In MP, we can expect this to be a bit dynamic, we'll get actual bidding wars. I don't know from a programming perspective how tough this would be, but how cool would it be for single player AI teams to say "ok, we really want that guy, let's up the offer 10% to beat out the Chicago offer" as the stages progress? Do want.

[QuikSand]

So, with the emerging sense that a "decent payer who's seeing the field" is going to cost a couple notches more in this game, here's a thought. Might it emerge as a legitimate strategy to basically engage in "crop rotation" with a squad of players, in order to keep them cheap?

Maybe I maintain a corral of cheap reserve caliber guys at DB (hint: I always do), but in this version I might go out of my way to make sure that when A is a year away from needing a new contract, I de-activate him for the year so his re-nag or re-up will be more cap-friendly. If I have a decent stable of fairly replaceable guys, this might become a viable strategy.

(I think it's unlikely we'll get so clear a sense of what triggers a real contract request versus a minsal one that this is a longshot... but right now I'm trying to think of angle-shooting as I play through this game. I have had a few gusy get hurt or otherwise sit out a season, and they are much more affordable the following year... it could turn into an angle.

[aston217]

For what it's worth, in 2k7 it always seemed to me that guys who only had say, 7 starts didn't show up next offseason expecting bigshot money. That might be the threshold, but it's a pretty good one that will allow you to get your 'crop rotation' guys a lot of meaningful time without triggering the excessive demands.

[Garethw87]

Quick question...

I was at 61 roster players. and then simmed the next week and it auto released a player for me to get back to 60 roster. The player wasn't that good so I dont mind but is this how it is handled? there is no like reserve roster to send the player too it seems. Also I guess even if you inactive a player they stay on your 60 man roster still?

Sorry for the questions they might seem obvious but I'm not 100% on some of the rules yet,

thanks

[Mike Lowe]

Can anyone answer, for a MP league:

My team was originally at 80 players. I have done a mix of cuts (roster down to 60) and contract offers (another 19 pending), but am not sure if the game is going to reject all of them because the team currently sits at 60. I did not use the "cut x if y is signed" as I wasn't sure it was necessary.

I'm not playing a game or anything, but I the MP league was going to advance just to get some FA's signed before the preseason kicks off.

[dzilla77]

So, with the emerging sense that a "decent payer who's seeing the field" is going to cost a couple notches more in this game, here's a thought. Might it emerge as a legitimate strategy to basically engage in "crop rotation" with a squad of players, in order to keep them cheap?

Maybe I maintain a corral of cheap reserve caliber guys at DB (hint: I always do), but in this version I might go out of my way to make sure that when A is a year away from needing a new contract, I de-activate him for the year so his re-nag or re-up will be more cap-friendly. If I have a decent stable of fairly replaceable guys, this might become a viable strategy.

(I think it's unlikely we'll get so clear a sense of what triggers a real contract request versus a minsal one that this is a longshot... but right now I'm trying to think of angle-shooting as I play through this game. I have had a few gusy get hurt or otherwise sit out a season, and they are much more affordable the following year... it could turn into an angle.

I think this will be balanced out by the playing time expectations. You deactivate the guy but he thinks he should be on the field, he might not sign with you.

[BowTieSports]

I think this will be balanced out by the playing time expectations. You deactivate the guy but he thinks he should be on the field, he might not sign with you.

+1

Or at least that's the way I'd hope the game would deal with it --- guy gets angry at playing time/demands trade because he's not getting on the field.

Plus if you have injuries set to 200 (or higher) you might not have the healthy bodies at a position to keep a healthy potential contributor off the field.

[QuikSand]

For what it's worth, in 2k7 it always seemed to me that guys who only had say, 7 starts didn't show up next offseason expecting bigshot money. That might be the threshold, but it's a pretty good one that will allow you to get your 'crop rotation' guys a lot of meaningful time without triggering the excessive demands.

There is definitely a major coding change with guys like that between FOF 2007 and FOF 7. In the newer game, it's much much tougher to keep marginal players like that on board without paying up well above minsal. That's my entire point -- we angle-shooters may end up looking for new twists to deal with the new realities of contract expectations.

[QuikSand]

Quick question...

I was at 61 roster players. and then simmed the next week and it auto released a player for me to get back to 60 roster. The player wasn't that good so I dont mind but is this how it is handled? there is no like reserve roster to send the player too it seems. Also I guess even if you inactive a player they stay on your 60 man roster still?

Sorry for the questions they might seem obvious but I'm not 100% on some of the rules yet,

thanks

First - it sounds like you have a setting issue (in Game Options...Single Player Options) at work. If you want to manage every roster addition/subtraction, then make sure your setting of "Staff automatically signs players to fill roster" to NO. It's not clear from that label, but setting that to YES gives the AI total authority to get your roster into shape. most of us want to manage things better than that.

Overall, an NFL roster includes two relevant limits: total players, and active players. During the offseason, no limits in place (unless you play in a league that mandates them, which is common). During the preseason games, it's 60 total, 46 active. During the regular season, it's 53 and 46. (Note: injured players put onto injured reserve do not count against either list... but contract holdouts count on both lists, even if they are not playing)

Hope that helps.

[QuikSand]

I think this will be balanced out by the playing time expectations. You deactivate the guy but he thinks he should be on the field, he might not sign with you.

I have limited experience with FOF 7 (as do we all) but I don't think this is an issue with players at this level... they need to elevate to "angry" to resist contracts, and one season on the bench for a 38/38 guy who might otherwise just be CB4 isn't going to get even close to that - maybe disgruntled at most.

In real life, maybe - but in FOF, I don't think there's a strong backstop of that sort.

[Garethw87]

First - it sounds like you have a setting issue (in Game Options...Single Player Options) at work. If you want to manage every roster addition/subtraction, then make sure your setting of "Staff automatically signs players to fill roster" to NO. It's not clear from that label, but setting that to YES gives the AI total authority to get your roster into shape. most of us want to manage things better than that.

Overall, an NFL roster includes two relevant limits: total players, and active players. During the offseason, no limits in place (unless you play in a league that mandates them, which is common). During the preseason games, it's 60 total, 46 active. During the regular season, it's 53 and 46. (Note: injured players put onto injured reserve do not count against either list... but contract holdouts count on both lists, even if they are not playing)

Hope that helps.

Hey Quiksand, thanks for the reply and the explanation. Could I ask one more question then...

During start up it asks if I want to play with Chemistry and Personalities or something like that? Is it best to play with this ON or OFF? I couldn't decide so left it off but would it be more interesting to use it on? Thanks

[QuikSand]

You're asking a very biased guy - I like the chemistry system a lot more than most. I think it's basically a personal choice there - it's one more wrinkle, potentially helpful and interesting, but it adds a little more "work" to the game. So, your call.

[Garethw87]

You're asking a very biased guy - I like the chemistry system a lot more than most. I think it's basically a personal choice there - it's one more wrinkle, potentially helpful and interesting, but it adds a little more "work" to the game. So, your call.

Thanks again! I'm just about to load a new game up (and stop the staff releasing people this time!) So I'll try it.

[NawlinsFan]

I have to agree with QS. I really enjoy the added complexity of having to deal with the chemistry and personalities. It takes the immersion to another level by having to worry about the locker room as well as the play on the field.

[Garethw87]

I have to agree with QS. I really enjoy the added complexity of having to deal with the chemistry and personalities. It takes the immersion to another level by having to worry about the locker room as well as the play on the field.

Loaded it up. Finally got the coaches names too. I was wondering up the hell is Wayne Snodgrass last time :lol:

[Mike Lowe]

How does this whole "If player accepts deal, all others will be withdrawn" stuff work?

I see there are options that will be indicated with a * or #, but I've never seen them.

[Karim]

I'm finding contract re-negotiations to be too easy. I just had a Joe Flacco situation with my 79-rated, 25 year old QB. He was heading into unrestricted free agency after winning the SuperBowl MVP, although he had never won any other awards. I franchised him which resulted in his loyalty dropping to 1. His salary prior to this was $14.7 million. Looking at the other top rated QBs in the league, they were all around $20-24 million with the highest being $27 million. When renegotiating with him, this was his request:

Year 1 - $18,700,000
Year 2 - $20,450,000
Year 3 - $22,670,000

So really the increase this upcoming season is only $4 million so I immediately said yes.

My high-rated players are re-negotiating very cap friendly deals and they don't all have good loyalty ratings. Is this the by-product of coming off a SuperBowl win?

The tougher issues to deal with I find are the fringe/backup/younger players who want a pay day but regular starters seem to be more than reasonable in renegotiations.

[QuikSand]

My overall view on contracts in FOF 7, so far, is that things haven't changed too widely. This biggest visible change is in the marginal players who now demand a solid delta above minimum salary.

I think this is a potentially harmful change to the fabric of the game, unless it's calmed down a bit. Especially in single player. I like what it does to the relative value of draft picks (which was a major flaw before) but now I think there's going to be a really steep "cliff effect" affecting way too many players.

We're going to see an awful lot of players who really aren't worthy of the "real" contract they want, but who won't even listen to a more reasonable contract. So, they sit unclaimed all the way through free agency, and then end up getting parceled out to the teams who have too few players at the pivot point that happens behind the scenes.

FOF veterans have seen this for a long time, selectively. A veteran QB who demands an $8m/yr contract in free agency, won't even listen to anything much less, and the we see he and 5 other quality guys end up signing with Arizona all at once for 1yr, minsal. It stinks for league texture, but it's a way to get the rosters filled, and since it's not all over the place, we mostly just look past it.

But if instead of 5-10-15 players who end up like this... what if it's 50-100-150? Not game-changing star players...but just fairly useful roster fillers? I think we will see a pretty empowered backlash to having way too much of this problem. It will lay bare the inner workings of the game too much as every single player GM will have players like this that he cannot afford to sign, and who then land with a division rival for peanuts.

Sorry to sound alarmist... but I have been trying to focus more on contracts and the marketplace than anything else in this game, and I think it's a real worry.


If I had my druthers, I think I'd try to have player demands decline more significantly as the FA process carries onward. These guys demanding $2.5m and not even listening to 2.0 or 1.5 ought to start getting more flexible -- one one year deals only -- as the market is rendering its verdict that they aren't going to get their demand. Whether the best time for that to happen is in stages 8-12 of early FA or in the after-draft FA stages, I'm not certain... but I think a market-based solution is better than the current "band aid" of auto-filling short rosters behind the AI curtain.

[TRO]

If I had my druthers, I think I'd try to have player demands decline more significantly as the FA process carries onward. These guys demanding $2.5m and not even listening to 2.0 or 1.5 ought to start getting more flexible -- one one year deals only -- as the market is rendering its verdict that they aren't going to get their demand. Whether the best time for that to happen is in stages 8-12 of early FA or in the after-draft FA stages, I'm not certain... but I think a market-based solution is better than the current "band aid" of auto-filling short rosters behind the AI curtain.

Agreed. It isn't as big of an issue in single player, but it will be in multiplayer.

[Ben E Lou]

I'd like to see this actually play out a bit in MP before a change is requested. I don't think it'll be that big of a deal, simply because I expect most sheeple to overpay their backups to stick around. I don't think we're going to see that many in FA.

[gstelmack]

If I had my druthers, I think I'd try to have player demands decline more significantly as the FA process carries onward. These guys demanding $2.5m and not even listening to 2.0 or 1.5 ought to start getting more flexible -- one one year deals only -- as the market is rendering its verdict that they aren't going to get their demand. Whether the best time for that to happen is in stages 8-12 of early FA or in the after-draft FA stages, I'm not certain... but I think a market-based solution is better than the current "band aid" of auto-filling short rosters behind the AI curtain.

FWIW, I do know that demands decrease as FA progresses. I've watched players who were asking a bit more than I wanted slowly decrease their demands each week, until they finally were willing to listen to the offer that was too low to even consider at FA 1.

I'm not sure if it decreases enough or fast enough (probably needs to be some sort of curve so they don't decrease much in demands until near the end of FA, or possibly until late FA), but the basic framework is already there.

[QuikSand]

FWIW, I do know that demands decrease as FA progresses. I've watched players who were asking a bit more than I wanted slowly decrease their demands each week, until they finally were willing to listen to the offer that was too low to even consider at FA 1.

I'm not sure if it decreases enough or fast enough (probably needs to be some sort of curve so they don't decrease much in demands until near the end of FA, or possibly until late FA), but the basic framework is already there.

Definitely already in place, I just think it's too marginal. A guy who starts out asking for $2.8 million a year probably ends up at FA 1:12 down to around $2.3 million or so. So, the game already does this.

What I disagree with is the cliff that remains. Too many players are just going to sit there demanding that $2.3m, will not even listen to an offer of, say, $1.5m, and then will get assimilated into the minsal roundup.

[Ben E Lou]

Definitely already in place, I just think it's too marginal. A guy who starts out asking for $2.8 million a year probably ends up at FA 1:12 down to around $2.3 million or so. So, the game already does this.

What I disagree with is the cliff that remains. Too many players are just going to sit there demanding that $2.3m, will not even listen to an offer of, say, $1.5m, and then will get assimilated into the minsal roundup.Oh, and I left this part out: I've done a bit of testing post-release on this and can confirm that it works quite different for MP. Pretty sure in your example that they'll easily take $1.5M--just not minsal.

[QuikSand]

Glad to hear - that's a step in the right direction, at least.

[QuikSand]

Here's a curious case. This sort of player has long been my bread and butter in FOF...decent enough to play, not good enough to really require any serious cap space. Look around at my MP teams over time, you'd see guys like this as my TE2/TE3 all over the place.

Here's his status at the end of his 3rd year, in graphics:

http://www.sevenshuffles.com/QuikSand/weird_te_demands.png

Now, if he weren't a major injury risk (as it appears he is), I would be thrilled to re-up with him for minsal or so, lock him up for another year or two, and hope to slot him as my TE2 on this roster. He's got a little skill, and he's a strong affinity for us (duh). So, I want to re-sign him.

Now, I know in FOF 7, guys who have seen the field ask for some real cash. So, this guy might have been a minsal player in FOF 2007, but I expect that he'll want something like...oh, $2 million? (In my league, minsal for his age is about $1.1m) I'm not wild about signing him for $2m... but again, he's the sort of player that I really like to have around, so maybe I'd swing that. or maybe (actually more likely) I'll just wait to see what he has in mind in the next offseason, when he will still be an RFA. Anyway, I check out his demands...

http://www.sevenshuffles.com/QuikSand/te_contract_reneg_request.png

Ummm...this guy thinks he's an $7 million a year player. After going undrafted, then not re-signed as a RFA, and racking up a total of 15 catches across 3 years. Seven million bucks, twenty-eight all told.

So, I wonder what this is telling me?

-Okay, I likely need to set aside the injury for this year - I expect FOF still bases its impressions on the last full year completed, so that would be his 2036 season, where he played in 10 games. Not that a 10-game backup who then got hurt merits big money, but for the moment I need to set aside the complete year of he had in 2037. Fine.

-Maybe this is a tipoff that this guy is a "creeper" or whatever the FOF 7 equivalent is? The group scout happens to be the same guy in his first and third years, and that guy has him gaining 9 points in his final evaluation acros those two years. (Though that's basically just gaining back what he seemingly lost in his rookie offseason... which doesn't seem terribly impressive to me)

-Something else I'm missing? (Seems awfully likely, even if both of the above are partial answers to this)

-And yes, of course I'm going to defer on re-signing the guy, and I'll wait to see what he wants as an RFA next season (I'll post here). I expect it will be peanuts... but *something* in this game triggered the "ask for real money" routine in FOF for this guy, and I'm now itchy to figure that out.

[zbuckley]

must have hired Jay-Z's firm

[QuikSand]

Here's a curious case. This sort of player has long been my bread and butter in FOF...decent enough to play, not good enough to really require any serious cap space. Look around at my MP teams over time, you'd see guys like this as my TE2/TE3 all over the place.

Here's his status at the end of his 3rd year, in graphics:

http://www.sevenshuffles.com/QuikSand/weird_te_demands.png

Now, if he weren't a major injury risk (as it appears he is), I would be thrilled to re-up with him for minsal or so, lock him up for another year or two, and hope to slot him as my TE2 on this roster. He's got a little skill, and he's a strong affinity for us (duh). So, I want to re-sign him.

Now, I know in FOF 7, guys who have seen the field ask for some real cash. So, this guy might have been a minsal player in FOF 2007, but I expect that he'll want something like...oh, $2 million? (In my league, minsal for his age is about $1.1m) I'm not wild about signing him for $2m... but again, he's the sort of player that I really like to have around, so maybe I'd swing that. or maybe (actually more likely) I'll just wait to see what he has in mind in the next offseason, when he will still be an RFA. Anyway, I check out his demands...

http://www.sevenshuffles.com/QuikSand/te_contract_reneg_request.png

Ummm...this guy thinks he's an $7 million a year player. After going undrafted, then not re-signed as a RFA, and racking up a total of 15 catches across 3 years. Seven million bucks, twenty-eight all told.

So, I wonder what this is telling me?

-Okay, I likely need to set aside the injury for this year - I expect FOF still bases its impressions on the last full year completed, so that would be his 2036 season, where he played in 10 games. Not that a 10-game backup who then got hurt merits big money, but for the moment I need to set aside the complete year of he had in 2037. Fine.

-Maybe this is a tipoff that this guy is a "creeper" or whatever the FOF 7 equivalent is? The group scout happens to be the same guy in his first and third years, and that guy has him gaining 9 points in his final evaluation acros those two years. (Though that's basically just gaining back what he seemingly lost in his rookie offseason... which doesn't seem terribly impressive to me)

-Something else I'm missing? (Seems awfully likely, even if both of the above are partial answers to this)

-And yes, of course I'm going to defer on re-signing the guy, and I'll wait to see what he wants as an RFA next season (I'll post here). I expect it will be peanuts... but *something* in this game triggered the "ask for real money" routine in FOF for this guy, and I'm now itchy to figure that out.

..and in the following offseason, he is back to minsal (looking for a two year deal, and I believe I will get to re-up with him for nothing).

[zbuckley]

..and in the following offseason, he is back to minsal (looking for a two year deal, and I believe I will get to re-up with him for nothing).

I've never tested the current version but I know # of games started can significantly bump a players salary demands. As Ben has said it should be interesting to see how it plays out in MP. I wonder if teams will still be able to sign above 40 backs ups for next to nothing deals.

[Olsson]

No way a guy like this would become a free agent in real life. A Franchise QB in his prime.Franchising him would mean 11 million. The guy they have to go with now is a 34/41 9th year QB. Surely they should have trimmed the team elsewhere.

Let's see how much money he will get. He's requesting 156 million over 5 years.

http://i1206.photobucket.com/albums/bb447/Muggert/fof/glover.jpg