OSFM Contract Edits

[24]

Wouldn't turning budgets off in Franchise mode fix this problem?

[sink4ever]

Quote: Originally Posted by WaitTilNextYear

So, basically there are 3 approaches... 1. Do nothing 2. Edit the contract years for accuracy, but leave the dollars alone (most contracts are already correct for years). 3. Edit the contracts to be fully accurate for years and dollars, but use 30-team control and make sure that no blue chip players are languishing in free agency at the end of a full season. This way you can have your contracts and prevent great players from retiring early. It takes extra work to make this solution work, but it will work for people like me who spend too much time on upkeep/realism of a franchise.

So for option 3, it's not a problem with 30 team control? In other words, it's not a case where the total dollars required to sign all these players is more than the total dollars available.

[adamj2281]

Quote: Originally Posted by WaitTilNextYear

With the shiny new tool of being able to edit contracts, I decided to check it out. I took a SCEA roster and edited contracts so that all players making 1 million per season or more had accurate contracts. Then I simmed to 2020 to see what would happen. I have team payroll (in millions) and team record info for each year below. Records marked with * means that team went to the WS that year. The Nats 5-peated as WS champs (lol) and are marked with a * each year. AL 2015 2015 2016 2016 2017 2017 2018 2018 2019 2019 2020 BAL 157.5 88-74 141.75 76-86 127.57 74-88 114.82 82-80 113.13 69-93 101.82 BOS 225 94-68* 202.9 89-73 183.23 89-73 179.73 93-69 179.27 81-81 170.28 NYY 237.5 79-83 213.75 82-80 192.58 69-93 173.32 67-95 160.1 75-87 169.17 TB 113.5 79-83 103.08 82-80 104.17 88-74 113.05 91-71 117.03 91-71 121.16 TOR 160 76-86 144 75-87 129.6 83-79 131.61 81-81 127.7 93-69 146.42 CWS 166.5 82-81 149.85 83-79* 143.71 76-86 129.75 67-95 116.78 67-95 111 CLE 136 78-84 122.4 75-87 110.16 85-77 111.21 72-90 100.09 84-78 106.96 DET 204.5 83-80 188.46 87-75 195.68 86-76 201.04 83-79 190.2 71-91 177.7 KC 147.5 83-79 132.75 80-82 119.47 84-78 116.26 77-85 105.65 78-84 105.31 MIN 146.5 72-90 131.85 67-95 118.67 77-85 106.8 89-73 116.14 89-73 118.69 LAA 205 82-80 184.5 85-77 166.05 91-71* 172.63 99-63* 180.5 96-66 175.39 OAK 121 78-84 108.9 83-79 107.25 73-89 98.02 80-82 100.31 71-91 93.73 SEA 159 80-82 143.1 78-84 134.85 87-75 144.19 78-84 135.22 84-78 141.56 TEX 190 78-84 171 80-82 153.9 74-88 138.51 69-93 124.66 68-94 119.88 HOU 103.5 75-87 98.23 80-82 103.16 73-89 99.46 76-86 99.42 89-73* 114.33 NL 2015 2015 2016 2016 2017 2017 2018 2018 2019 2019 2020 ATL 142.5 83-79 128.75 84-78 115.43 76-86 104.11 82-80 104.52 86-76 114.73 MIA 141.5 80-82 127.35 80-82 115.44 77-85 1101.9 82-80 111.5 80-82 112.4 WAS 201 102-60* 203.86 98-64* 205.99 95-67* 207.3 95-67* 203.94 85-77* 195.75 NYM 140 75-87 126 79-83 117.23 86-76 125.14 69-93 112.62 77-85 112.61 PHI 167.5 68-94 150.75 71-91 135.67 62-100 122.11 72-90 114.99 80-82 123.66 CHC 154 92-70 141.48 91-71 144.18 87-75 149.24 86-76 140.81 85-77 139.74 CIN 164 77-85 147.6 75-87 132.84 83-80 138.47 84-79 138.78 82-80 139.92 MIL 137 85-77 132.3 87-76 134.89 82-80 133.11 79-83 126.83 68-94 115.6 PIT 127 94-68 125.08 72-90 112.58 77-85 106.33 77-85 102.17 82-80 108.41 STL 164.5 91-71 158.2 79-83 146.04 80-82 145.6 90-72 157.58 91-71 162 ARI 113.5 66-96 102.15 69-93 93.77 69-93 92.59 85-78 106.48 67-95 95.83 COL 134 70-92 120.6 74-88 108.91 84-79 117.57 75-87 108.89 78-84 111.48 LAD 268 96-66 241.2 94-68 225.07 103-59 230.07 92-70 212.52 100-62 219.68 SD 145 75-87 130.5 88-75 126.27 79-83 117.56 81-81 114.44 82-80 117.02 SF 214 75-87 192.6 88-74 173.34 77-85 156.01 78-84 144.22 81-81 146.5 VERDICT: The payrolls seem to rubberband downward from 2015-2020. It seems they are not supposed to go as high as this test made them start out. This isn't incredibly problematic, but I did notice teams simply not having enough cash to sign important guys. After 2015, it wasn't a big deal with Mike Napoli going unsigned. But then guys like Carlos Gomez and Jered Weaver (2017), Bumgarner/Darvish/Sale/Brantley/Encarnacion/Cain (2018), Goldschmidt/Machado/Grienke (2019), and Starlin Castro (2020) all went unsigned in the offseason and were forced to retire early. In one case, the Indians did not have enough cash to sign a 3B coach, so I got an annoying pop up message every single day of the offseason reminding me that the contract offer couldn't go through. That only happened in that one instance though. So, basically there are 3 approaches... 1. Do nothing 2. Edit the contract years for accuracy, but leave the dollars alone (most contracts are already correct for years). 3. Edit the contracts to be fully accurate for years and dollars, but use 30-team control and make sure that no blue chip players are languishing in free agency at the end of a full season. This way you can have your contracts and prevent great players from retiring early. It takes extra work to make this solution work, but it will work for people like me who spend too much time on upkeep/realism of a franchise.

I used your roster I believe, or someone's with full contracts/years and simmed into the future a few years and had the same issues. I'm thinking another viable solution is to only edit the contracts that are off by a factor of 2 or 3 per team to make those outliers and harder to trade, etc. That way I think you are keeping a nice balance between reality and not breaking the economics of the game.

[WaitTilNextYear]

Quote: Originally Posted by 24

Wouldn't turning budgets off in Franchise mode fix this problem?

I'm not sure that's a legitimate fix for people wanting to play realistically. Without budgetary restrictions, the contracts are fairly meaningless. But, technically you're correct because having no budget will mean players shouldn't go unsigned. I haven't tested it out since I need budgets with my contracts.

Quote: Originally Posted by sink4ever

So for option 3, it's not a problem with 30 team control? In other words, it's not a case where the total dollars required to sign all these players is more than the total dollars available.

It is a case like you describe. Teams run out of money and can't sign all the guys they'd like (the "max" contract players). But, with 30-team control you'd be able to create budget space by releasing/trading players. So, you could get around the league-wide recession that way and create budget room yourself.

Quote: Originally Posted by adamj2281

I used your roster I believe, or someone's with full contracts/years and simmed into the future a few years and had the same issues. I'm thinking another viable solution is to only edit the contracts that are off by a factor of 2 or 3 per team to make those outliers and harder to trade, etc. That way I think you are keeping a nice balance between reality and not breaking the economics of the game.

Yeah, there are more than 3 fixes. Different ones might make sense depending on how you like to play. For me personally, accurate contracts are a must and I am willing to invest extra 30-team control time to manage it.

[sink4ever]

Quote: Originally Posted by WaitTilNextYear

It is a case like you describe. Teams run out of money and can't sign all the guys they'd like (the "max" contract players). But, with 30-team control you'd be able to create budget space by releasing/trading players. So, you could get around the league-wide recession that way and create budget room yourself.

Okay, so there's enough money league wide to sign all the players, it just needs to be properly "allocated" in a way to certain teams. I use 30 team control anyway, so this sounds rather doable. Thanks for doing this research.

[WaitTilNextYear]

Quote: Originally Posted by sink4ever

Okay, so there's enough money league wide to sign all the players, it just needs to be properly "allocated" in a way to certain teams. I use 30 team control anyway, so this sounds rather doable. Thanks for doing this research.

Hey no problem, hope it helps. I do want to add a disclaimer that I only went to 2020, so the long-term picture could change with more guys making "max" money (which is $30MM per year). The problem does appear solvable using 30-team control if you are willing to slash payroll in the offseason so that a handful of cpu teams can sign that handful of star players I mentioned in post 1 and keep them from retiring. I do know for sure that all teams maintained 90-man rosters through 2020 with no problems.

I will try to post more data on my sims to give people an idea of how over/underbudget teams are and how well they're allocating their cash toward high dollar players (I.e. does a single team have 3 $20MM per season shortstops?) and so forth.

[johntait1]

I was wondering on if making player contracts proportional to the in game budget would work? What I mean is real life player salary*in game team budget/real life team budget. That way all the teams would still have a budget that adds up to the in game one, but the players would have a contract value that is proportional to real life, so players who are on team friendly contracts would still have them(relatively) in game and teams would still try to get rid of "bad" contracts(relative to the other values of contracts in the game).

[WaitTilNextYear]

Quote: Originally Posted by johntait1

I was wondering on if making player contracts proportional to the in game budget would work? What I mean is real life player salary*in game team budget/real life team budget. That way all the teams would still have a budget that adds up to the in game one, but the players would have a contract value that is proportional to real life, so players who are on team friendly contracts would still have them(relatively) in game and teams would still try to get rid of "bad" contracts(relative to the other values of contracts in the game).

That might work, but you'd have to have someone willing to take that on and do the math so that everything is scaled properly. I am not going to do that because I am satisfied with option 3 that I described in post 16 for my eventual franchise. I'd rather have the accurate contracts and just deal with the ramifications of it.