Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

[PlanetCharisma]

My biggest gripe with the game is that good players always go unsigned (or get signed at the very end). What are some ways to combat this? 36-team league? Adjusting the salary cap (I don't want to turn it off)? Any other suggestions?

[disturbingcreation]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

Contract sliders. Once the high dollar players are signed for proper amounts, crank the min and max rating sliders in the contract slider settings.

[jk31]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

30 team control unfortunately...

[mustardnmayo]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

In 2K23 adding 4 expansion teams worked well consistently for future seasons. Free agency would consist of 73-74 & lower rated players.

Trying to do the same in 25, not sure how different it'll be with CPU signing some 2nd rounders & longer guaranteed rookie contracts.

[Dorkington]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

Easy answer is "contract sliders"

But there's also things like progression, injury, and draft quality sliders at play too.

Personally when I start a new myEras play, my base is to do the following, and then adjust as needed:

* Min Rating 50
* Max Rating 75
* Salary Curve 0
* Reduce the other contract sliders a bit to taste
* Progression 25-35
* Regression 65-75
* Draft Quality 25


If that doesn't help, you can increase Max all the way up to 100, Min up to whatever, and increase the cap at the start of setup.

[jeb4056]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

Like others have mentioned, use the contract sliders. I usually keep it at 50 for the first half of free agency, then bump it up to 75 for 3 days, then bump it up to 100 for the lasts 3 days and never have any good players left in free agency.

[amioran]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

There's a very good video by 2K with the PopBoy with contract sliders settings to resolve just this issue. Here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aaD488750M

[dwayne12345]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

In addition to what others have stated teams go after free agents by position need. So if a team has cap space but isn't making any offers, what I do is temporarily adjust the positions of players on their roster. Make it so they have 1 or 0 players at the position you want them to sign a free agent at.
Simulate a free agency day and they will have made an offer to someone at that position. You can then move their players back to their proper position after the offer is made.
Or 30 team ctrl for specific periods.


You can also up the CPU Re-Signing aggressiveness. This will make it so teams aren't letting bird right players go as often.

[schnaidt1]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

The issue is the default roster is already inflated with high overalls regardless of contract value. Way too many players want to much money simply because the overalls are way too high.

Even if you

1. Spread out the ratings overalls (2k17 had the best base roster, 17 players rated 90-99 and 63 rated from 80-89)

2. Adjust the contract sliders

3. Adjust the draft class quality

This doesn't address the problem because the CPU doesn't understand roster or cap management. They will sign every single draft pick, teams that have 4 or 5 picks sign them all, even 2nd rounders. They now have to create roster space and will waive guys that will lead to dead cap and guys in FA that shouldn't be there.

CPU will also pull their qualifying offers from players in FA to sign a different player and will not sign players they have bird rights for.

This is the biggest issue plaguing the off season. 2k doesn't test anything.

Pop boy just increases the salary cap and lowers the amount of money players should want to "fix" this. But that's not a fix.

The only true thing you can do right now is run 30 team control from the draft class signing through moratorium to make sure the CPU doesn't sign every single draft pick, picks up the qualifying offers they should, and don't rescind bird rights to players they shouldn't.

[Real2KInsider]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

The only true thing you can do right now is run 30 team control from the draft class signing through moratorium to make sure the CPU doesn't sign every single draft pick, picks up the qualifying offers they should, and don't rescind bird rights to players they shouldn't.

Does the CPU sign 2nd rounders to standard contracts, or Two-Ways? My gut tells me that's something they haven't been able to account for.

And to be clear, the NBA itself is struggling with roster management, given how many starter level players now have to settle for minimum contracts.

[Real2KInsider]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

2024 Draft
TWs: Mitchell (38), Simpson (42), Ingram (48), Newton (49), Freeman (50), Post (52), Spencer (53), Watson (54), McCullar (56), Chomche (57), Hukporti (58)
11 players signed Two-Ways.
Every player in the 50s except Ajinca (Europe), and Bronny (an obvious exception).

2023 Draft
TWs: Bailey (41), Jackson (45), Lundy (46), Miller (48), Bates (49), Johnson (50), Wilson (51), Clark (53), Slawson (54), Wong (55)
10 players signed Two-Ways
Camara (52), Biberovic (56/Stash), Trayce (57), Livingston (58) were the only 50s who didn't.
Camara/Trayce were justified and overperformed their draft position.
Livingston was also an exception ala Bronny (i.e. don't pick my client bc he has a standard promise)

They need to implement an OVR-based threshold where 2nd rounders under X only get Two-Ways.

[sirdez]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

Does the CPU sign 2nd rounders to standard contracts, or Two-Ways? My gut tells me that's something they haven't been able to account for.

And to be clear, the NBA itself is struggling with roster management, given how many starter level players now have to settle for minimum contracts.

The CPU doesn't actually sign any of its second rounders, you have to manually do it for them. It's been an issue for several years now, unless they have now fixed it for 25

Teams with multiple first rounders can be problematic, as the CPU obviously doesn't trade picks tactically or with consideration for roster spots.. OKC basically broke that part of the game.

[Real2KInsider]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

The CPU doesn't actually sign any of its second rounders, you have to manually do it for them. It's been an issue for several years now, unless they have now fixed it for 25

Teams with multiple first rounders can be problematic, as the CPU obviously doesn't trade picks tactically or with consideration for roster spots.. OKC basically broke that part of the game.

I have long said that the game was designed in the 90s (a very basic era).

Now that every last dollar is being micro-managed IRL there's no way for the AI to come close to replicating that. The vast majority of the playerbase are 12-year olds who wouldn't appreciate that level of complexity anyway.

[Sheitan]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

We fixed the unsigned FA issue within the CoY MyNBA project, if you need more details please go to our roster page, or follow the process below :

### Fixing the unsigned FA issue :

3 days before the end of the FA please load the following MyNBA sliders :

File : CoY end of FA
ID : Sheytanlefaux

Revert to the original MyNBA sliders before the beginning of new season :

File : coy MyNBA v2
ID : Sheytanlefaux

[jtex23]

Re: Best strategies to not have good free agents go unsigned?

Idk if anyone has done this testing yet besides me, but I think a big part of the issue is the existing contracts are structured to THE ACTUAL CAP and, regardless of how you set the "salary cap inflation rate" slider, the 2025-26 cap goes from 140 to 150 (it's supposed to go up 10% each year according to multiple reporting, through the end of this CBA, which would put it at 154M) and then 26-27 only goes up FOUR MILLION to 154.5. So of course these teams are cash-strapped as hell.



I know sometimes sliders wind up changing something different from what they say. I haven't done any testing for that... but I think this could really help our cause.