FOF 2004 - salary cap spirals out of control
 

Maybe I'm just to eager to load up on FAs - but I always gotta cap guys out and make some trades and release a few guys to keep a solid team together

Has anyone had success with a low to moderate cap number? - it just seems like everyone's contract just snowballs too big and after a few years I gotta make the painful decisions

Can you really keep a good team together or do you just have to blow it up every few years?

Yo Phoenix man, take it easy on the backloaded contracts, and you'll have an easier time.

what do you do - just cut off the last couple years, say, if a player is requesting a five year deal?

seems like when I do this they reject the offers

Is there like a percentage of their asking price that is a good rule of thumb to begin negotiations with?

you can never keep a totaly stocked team, you will have to let some go. just like in real life. but if your good you can keep most and let others go, just replace them in the draft

you need to know when to let guys walk away and replace them through the draft

yeah what bullet said

Isn't that what makes the game fun?

Loses some of the fun when you let a guy walk because he wants 80 million over 4 years and he ends up signing with another team for league minimum.

BINGO!!! - That's the kind of stuff I'm talking about brother!!!

What I generally do with free agents is try to stick to deals that are of two different types:

(1) Contracts that are fairly flat -- not ones with tiny affordable salaries for a year or two, followed by big money later. Sure, you can afford fewer guys this way if you pay for them up front in part, but then you don't have to purge as the contracts blow up -- it's a trade off.

(2) Contracts that are designed to be offloaded -- I'll backload when I believe my need at a position is short term. If that's true, I don't mind paying a quality player a signing bonus and a couple cheap years, and then take a cap hit when I trade or release him once he starts to get expensive. The ideal situation for this is when he's filling a position that you expect to fill with a developing young players -- squeeze a couple seasons from your veteran, then spin him off when the slot is covered.

What I have realized too sometimes is when to offer an extension. I have been able to keep several QBs for most of their career on my team by offering them extensions a year after that have a bad year or a year after they were injured for most of it. Those types of seasons usually makes their demands go down.