FOOTBALL SIMULATION LEAGUE RULES
FanGM mixes weekly fantasy results and supporting cast grades to impacted those performances in simulated football games. It's a step beyond fantasy football and as realistic as you can get! Learn more about the rules in the various sections below.
Jump to salary cap, draft, trading, grades, simulator and tips.
General Summary
FanGM ran its first season in 2007, and every year since we're always working on improving league play with feedback from all our game players.
If the NFL does it, we try to do it here also. Our goal is to make this league as realistic as possible, as if you were hired to run your favorite NFL team as general manager. Full 55-man rosters, practice squads, 7 round college drafts, franchise tags, restricted free agents, signing bonuses, salary cap hits and more. The only times we bring in rules that aren't part of the actual NFL is to help create a more realistic situations where there aren't real players with free will or real money and consequences.
We are a GM-based, roster-building game. Like a real GM you don't call plays on the field, but your job is to build the best roster possible within your salary cap. All teams must operate within the NFL's salary cap equally, and those who can fit the most talent within their cap usually do the best.
How well your team does on any given Sunday depends largely on both the quality of your supporting cast grades (offensive line and defense) plus skill-position real NFL game performances. To win, usually you want to try to get a quality QB with some offensive weapons plus building up the best graded line and defense you can. Just like the best and most complete NFL teams. All within the salary cap. But teams have won in a variety of ways here over the years from elite QBs with historic seasons carrying mediocre teams to journeyman backup QBs winning low scoring games with an elite defense.
We have our own custom programmed game simulator that generates results each week on a play-by-play basis factoring in both grades and NFL box scores. All of our transactions are automated through forms on the website for immediate roster transaction processing.
Most leagues are FREE to play. Our top free league (AFFL) requires experienced-only players who have proven themselves in other leagues. We have also recently started some paid leagues.
For more information on the various leagues, check team openings in the top menu.
GMs can be removed from their teams at the discretion of the Commish for bad behavior toward other players or the game (collusion, intentionally wrecking franchise, etc.), inactivity (if they haven't logged in for over 2 months and/or miss critical events) or if they fail to pay in paid leagues. GMs will be given private message and email warnings prior to removal, and they may join again in the future if things change.
Pay attention to the announcements on the league forum, clicking "View new posts" near the top to stay updated on the latest news.
Salary Cap, Player Contracts, Transactions and Free Agency
Every year our salary cap is the same as the NFL. In 2020, that was $198,200,000. Our teams have to fit all of their players and any salary cap hits within that limit. All teams must equally pay a 55-player active roster, so if any team has less than 55 players they are charged a minimum rookie salary for any empty spot. That prevents teams from unfairly only giving huge contracts to 22 starters and having no depth unrealistically. All teams have to pay 55 active players and stay within the salary cap. If a team happens to go over the cap, they have 48 hours to correct the salary cap violation. League tools are setup to help police salary cap violations. For example, teams over their roster or cap limits are unable to place any further bids in free agency until the situation is resolved.
Like the NFL off-season, free agency is the first big event of a new league year. That's where teams bid on players without contracts on the open market. We have two periods of free agency, and once its turn on in the off-season it doesn't turn off until the end of the regular season. If a player is without a contract, they're always available on the market any time, 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Peak free agency kicks things with the most activity. After 2 weeks, we transition into regular free agency for the rest of the season with some subtle changes such as less notification of active bids on the market to keep teams from cherry-picking other GMs doing their research for them.
Before peak free agency starts, teams can try to keep some of their best pending free agents from hitting the open market by placing a franchise/transition tag or signing them to a contract extension just like in the NFL. We use the NFL's published price tags on franchise and transition tag players (based upon averages of top NFL player salaries at each position). For franchise tags, you can use an exclusive tag that allows you to sign them to an extension at tag prices, or let the tagged player test the market where you can then match any offer or get 2 first round draft picks if you don't. Transition tags just allow you to match any offer. If you wish to trade a player you've tagged, you need to choose to have them sign their 1-year tender so they are under contract as an active player to trade.
Teams get up to 2 long-term contract extensions (LTC) per season. We do that to replicate an NFL team placing a priority on keeping a few of their players willing to sign an extension, but others testing the market for offers. LTC options are based upon the average of top 10 similarly graded players at their position (with the top and bottom salary extremes thrown out) and have various multiple year options. The longer the deal, the higher the signing bonus required. LTCs take effect immediately, overwriting the current deal and they do not have any partial season discount if signed mid-season. All LTCs come with a 1-year no-trade clause, as no player would sign an extension with a team that didn't intend to keep them. Depending upon salaries for different positions, some LTCs will be better deals than others, just like some players and their agents will be easier to sign an extension than others in reality. We will adjust the LTC formula, if needed, over the years to ensure fair contract price options are generated. LTCs cannot be discounts. The player will only agree to an extension that pays him a higher annual salary ahead.
If a pending free agent has 3 years experience or less, they are restricted free agents (RFA). Teams can match any offer to a RFA, and may receive a draft pick if they don't match depending upon the player's tender. Teams can place 1st round, 2nd or original round tenders on RFAs at various prices matching the NFL tender amounts each year. An original round tender is based upon the player's real NFL draft round (not sim league draft round). You'll have to give up a draft pick in that season's upcoming draft pick if you successfully sign a RFA, unless they had an original round tender and were an undrafted free agent in the NFL in reality.
All players without contracts who aren't restricted and weren't tagged become unrestricted free agents (UFA). Any team can sign UFAs and they cannot be matched. There are some realistic maximum limits and minimum requirements for eligible bids in the system. A players is signed once they go 24 hours without any counter-offers. There are no do-overs with bids, so please bid carefully.
All teams have 5 bids per 24 hours in free agency plus unlimited bidding on their own UFAs. Once you make a bid and only have 4 left, 24 hours later you'll get that bid back. Unlimited bidding applies to UFAs who were on your roster when their contract expired. You have built-in advantages to sign them back, so long as you're willing to pay competitive market prices. In the NFL, players often are also likely to resign with their familiar teams/coaches/systems unless another team is willing to pay much more.
A player's contract in our league can consist of the following elements:
• ANNUAL SALARY: This is generally unguaranteed and the player earns this in the form of weekly game checks. If you cut or trade a player in the off-season their entire annual salary for this year and any future seasons goes off your salary cap. If you cut/trade a player during the middle of the season, you will only be charged a partial amount for percentage of games played (if cut at mid-season, half the salary remains on salary cap). The only exception is that veterans players (4+ years of experience) have their full annual salary guaranteed if they make a team's roster for week 1 before being cut during the season. If a free agent is signed off the market during the season, their current season annual salary is prorated.
• SIGNING BONUS: This is guaranteed money. There is absolutely no way to get out of this. The signing team will pay this 100% entirely. No way to transfer a signing bonus to another team or get rid of it. One way or another it will be paid by signing team. While the player gets the money technically when signed, for salary cap finance purposes it is spread out over the length of the contract while they remain on the roster. For example, a 10M signing bonus on a 5-year deal turns into an additional 2M per year added to the player's cap value. If that player was cut after one year, they would have 8M of that signing bonus remaining (after 2M accounted for last season), so that translates to an 8M cap hit. The team would have to pay that cap hit in full or can split it up over 2 years (if after June 1st or one of your team's two exceptions prior to June 1st). Be very careful signing players to large signing bonuses — it is usually a bad idea unless you know exactly what you're doing.
• ROSTER BONUS: Roster bonuses are more rare than signing bonuses, and act similar to salary except that they are paid on June 1st by the team whose roster they are on at that time. After June 1st, you cannot get rid of the roster bonus off the cap you already paid on 6/1. If you cut or trade the player after that, the roster bonus paid will remain against your cap.
For salary cap purposes in a single season, a player's cap value is:
SALARY + SIGNING BONUS/YR + ROSTER BONUS.
If a player signed a 5-year deal with 10M signing bonus and 1M salary, they would count 3M against the cap that season (10/5 = 2M SB/yr + 1M salary = 3M).
There is a 1-year no trade clause for new contracts involving players with 85+ grades or signed contracts with 10M+ signing bonuses. It would be unrealistic for a star player to sign a huge contract of their own free will to a team that didn't want him and was planning to trade him away shortly after. As our sim players don't have free will, this element helps simulate realistic signing decisions. It also eliminates unrealistic big signings by bad teams with no intention of keeping the player (but lots of cap space to eat dead money cap hits) from trading them shortly after signing a big deal.
If a team loses more UFAs during peak free agency than they sign from other rosters, they may be eligible for compensatory picks in next year's draft. If a team loses a highly-graded UFA but also signs a player similarly graded, those cancel each other out for compensatory pick consideration. Only the highest graded top 32 unbalanced UFA losses will get a compensatory pick ranging from the end of the 3rd round (from the highest graded losses) to the 7th round. 4 compensatory picks are the max per team.
Before you sign a player, do your research on their current situation. Some players have the same names, so double-check the name, position and college along with any news about the player before acquiring. We honor real retirements, real injuries and real NFL suspensions. If a player retires, the team still owes the signing bonus left against the cap (split over 2 years), as all signing bonuses are guaranteed and have to be accounted for 100% by signing team.
If a player with 3 years experience or less is cut, other teams in the league can put in a waiver claim to pick up the player at the existing contract. 48 hours after being waived, all team claims will be reviewed and the player will be awarded to the team with the highest claim position. In the off-season and before week 4, that is based upon last year's record (original draft position). After week 4, waiver position is based upon the existing season records. Worst team gets first chance at claiming the player. If nobody claims them, the player becomes a free agent. The waiver order does not reset with successful claims. The worst teams always has first crack at waived players. In some cases a paid league in their first season may not have previous sim seasons to determine waiver order, so other measurements are used such as reverse initial draft order until week 4 then sim records can be used going forward.
Teams can also restructure existing contracts to create salary cap space (2 per team in the off-season with an additional restructure added during the regular season when it is harder to create cap room). Restructuring a deal cuts the current season salary in half, defers that payment until the last year of the deal, and gives the player some extra signing bonus incentive to agree to that. Doing so may create a balloon payment in the final season of a deal that would force the player to be cut earlier for salary cap purposes later.
Brand new deals signed in the current season cannot be restructured or LTC extended. The player in those cases just signed the deal this season and it cannot be re-written until a future off-season.
The amount of money under the cap at the end of the season can be carried over to next year, similar to the NFL. Since we are working with fake money and more extreme situations, we cap the amount of cap carry over to 10M per season. If a team ended the year 50M under the cap, they could only carry over 10M to next year. If a team was 2M under the cap, they'd carry over 2M.
College Draft
After free agency, our next big off-season event is the college draft. It is held after the NFL draft, and we run ours just like the NFL. It is a 7 round draft of eligible players in the NFL's draft class that season. Draft order is determined by the same rules as the NFL draft order going off last season sim team results.
Our draft goes across multiple days. Day 1 is round 1 with 15 minutes between pick windows. Rounds 2-3 are day 2 with 10 minute windows, rounds 4-5 are day 3, and we finish up with rounds 6-7 on day 4.
Teams can trade this year and next year draft picks, and can trade all the way up to their pick deadline. Before the draft teams will know exactly what the deadlines are for their and all draft picks. Picks are made using the online roster management tools that include a way to rank players before the draft.
If you are online when your team is on the clock for your pick, you can manually make your selection of available players. If you are not online by your pick deadline, you will get the highest remaining player in your draft queue player ranking. If you do not rank players or don't have any left in your list, you will get the highest remaining player from the NFL's draft order. If you end up getting a player you didn't want, most of the time they have value as highest available NFL draft selection for trading.
Players from the draft pool that go unselected become undrafted free agents (UDFA) the day after the draft. Similar to the NFL, we put some limits on UDFA signings with limits on individual salaries and a cap on overall UDFA signing bonuses. Teams can only spend up to 100K on all their UDFA signing bonuses. Once they reach that, they can still sign UDFAs but cannot off them signing bonuses (so other teams might out-bid them).
If there are players selected in a later NFL supplemental draft which happens some seasons in reality (but not every year), we will also hold our own supplemental draft with eligible players. Teams send in which future pick they would give up for a supplemental draft player, and the highest pick wins then gives up that pick to gain that player. These usually involve lower round picks and players that weren't initially eligible for the regular draft but the NFL makes available in a following supplemental draft.
Trading
Trade can be done between two teams from the start of the league year up until the trade deadline. Our trade deadline happens around the official NFL trade deadline, but is always on the following Sunday morning before we lock our depth charts for the new NFL week. Trades must be completed using the online roster management tools.
Trades can involve draft picks from year or next and/or active roster players. Some players have one season no-trade clauses including players signed to LTCs this season and free agents with elite grades or signed to 10M+ signing bonuses. These top players recently signed to big deals would not do so with organizations that intended to trade them away shortly after unrealistically.
League trades are posted on the league homepage as they happen. If other GMs notice a massively unfair deal, they can contact the commish. We will also be adding trade flagging and review mechanisms. For the most part, though, you can build your team as you wish without league interference in your game strategy. Most leagues are just fun and free. Paid leagues may have stricter trade reviews in some cases.
You cannot make conditional trades, under-the-table agreements beyond the trade tool terms or participate in collusion to the detriment of league play. In the NFL you will sometimes see a conditional draft pick traded (that only is exchanged if the player makes the roster or reaches some performance levels), but we cannot keep track or honor those types of agreements, and GMs sometimes will change so no conditional trades.
Trades must generally stand on their own merits, but with some exceptions such as: exchanging compensation draft pick between involved teams during free agency before the commish gets around to doing that, offering a draft pick during free agency as incentive for a team to not match a contract (essentially trading a pick for that player), or an additional element of a recent trade that was accidentally clicked or judged as not a fair enough deal and requires additional exchange or reversal.
Player Grades
UPDATE: We may be adjusting our grading a little for the 2021 season and beyond, using Madden grades as the floor and boosting a player's grade slightly if they are graded higher in other popular grading services. Read more.
We use Madden player rankings because they are an objective, third-party resource that is frequently updated and publicly available to all from their website. Other grading options have been discussed over the years, so that is subject to change but currently that is the basis of our grading.
Our grades are updated weekly during the regular season along with any Madden grade updates, so don't rely totally upon what a player's grade is at any given moment as it probably will change depending upon their future performances.
For the purposes of our depth chart and game simulator, we translate Madden grades into our own custom grade scale. Grades above 88 on Madden are given a little more separation from lower rated players in that calculation. A top 99 Madden score translates to a 9.0 here and A+ player ranking. 98 is 8.8, 97 is 8.6 with .2 difference in our scale for every Madden increment. Once below 88, you go from 6.8 for 88 then 6.7 for 87, 6.6 for 86... 5.0 for 70, etc. with .1 difference for every Madden increment for non-elite grade players.
Those grades are primarily used in calculating an area strength grade for different position groups on your team. You can see that in the team depth chart. For receivers, it uses 2 WRs + 2 WR/TE + backup. The 4 starting-level players (whether 2WR/2TE or 3WR/1TE or 4 WRs) count twice as much as the receiver backup grade toward the receiver area average. It just uses the highest grades for this calculation of starting players for the highest average. For offensive line, it's 5 starters + backup + FB/TE if help grade. You need a starting center, but otherwise some positional flexibility as tackles can fill in guard spot too but guards don't play tackle. Again the starting 5 OL count twice as much toward the positional average than the backup or FB or blocking TE. TEs can only count toward one area. TEs who catch a lot of passes are labeled TEWRs and only count toward the receiving grades, while regular TEs are blockers that just count toward OL grade if their grade is higher than the average otherwise. Defensive front 7 is 2 DE, DT/NT, 3 LB, DT/LB (3-4 or 4-3) + DL/LB backup, with the starting front 7 counting twice as much as the backup. Secondary is four CB/S starters + backup with the same twice as much value on starting grades.
These area strength grades drive a lot of the game simulator results, as it compares your offensive line against your sim opponent's defensive front seven grade. QBs will do better than their real game if their sim OL and WR grades are better than the opposing defense grades.
If a player retires in the NFL their grade is turned to zero. If a player has a Madden grade to start the season but ends up getting cut in reality and never returns to the NFL, we lower the grades for players who are out of the league by 25% after week 4 as Madden won't be updating them any more until they are back in the league.
Game Simulator
Our custom-programmed game simulator pulls in stats from NFL games and player grades to generate a football game result built one play at a time. Your sim coach will call plays based upon both game situations (we're down 10 late in the 4th, we better throw) as well as your skill position player's box scores to try to work toward their stats. If you had a great RB real game update and your QB had low passes in their NFL game, your sim coach's play calling will lean more toward the run stats it's trying to generate unless game conditions force a change to throwing more. If you instead had a great QB NFL game update and none of your sim RBs had much carries in reality, it will probably throw more in neutral situations unless your team gets a big lead and tries to run out more clock.
Because we sim games one play at a time, the NFL box score doesn't always end up looking like the sim game -- by design. The goal isn't to get the exact same results as the real NFL game, the goal is to fairly simulate what would happen in this different reality with different players on different teams. For example, if you have 3 RBs who each had 25 carries for 100 yards in real life (on separate NFL teams), they can't each possibly get 25 carries each in the same game in the same backfield. There's only one ball for one player at a time, and only so many plays. The sim will put more emphasis on your starting RB generally, but if you're backup had a better game in reality, he'll steal more of the carries. Game circumstances might also mean that you ran the ball a lot less or more than your starters may have in reality.
Touchdowns matter a lot in fantasy football. Not as much here, but they still have an impact. They become automatic scores close to the endzone. If your QB threw for a TD in reality, he has an automatic TD pass ready to go if your offense gets into the redzone on the next pass play. Once he throws that TD, though, he won't have an automatic TD pass left the next time you're in the red zone. One of your WRs may make a huge play and score anyway, but it's less likely without an unused QB TD left.
Same with RBs, as you get close to the goal line, if they've got a TD in their NFL game update, they'll hit paydirt on their next carry. If they don't have a TD left in their update, it's more likely they get stopped short of scoring. If a RB has a 4.0 average in his NFL game, but his offensive line grades are better than his opposing defense front seven grades, his adjusted average for the game simulator may get boosted up to 4.5 per carry. If he has a poor OL going up against a great defensive front seven, his average could drop down to 3 yards per carry (we can the grade impact at 1 yard/carry). The same RB that has 20 carries for 80 yards in reality (4.0 ave) could range from an expected low of 60 yards (3 yds/carry) or as much as 100 yards (5 yds/carry) if they got their 20 carries in the sim game, depending upon grade adjustments.
The QB stats drive most of the passing game results. Whether a pass is complete or incomplete depends upon their adjusted completion percentage. We take their NFL game percentage and adjust it based upon the strength of their receivers and offensive line versus the opposing defense grades. The max improvement/decrease a QB can have is 15%. Doesn't sound like a lot, but it can take a strong 65% passing game and make it a mediocre 50% one, or vice versa. So building up strong grades are important. A maximum grade advantage adds another TD to the QB update, while a maximum grade disadvantage adds another interception. Great game stats can overcome grades too, though, with automatic TDs in the red zone plus a QB's passing yardage and yards per completion having a lot to do with the length of completions in the simulator. Receiver averages also play into that some (althought the QB yards are bigger drivers), as can big plays that pop up from a receiver stats from reality.
On the defensive side, beyond the grade we do also upload real game sacks by your defensive players into the system that can help trigger sim sacks.
Kickers, punters and returners also get their real stats loaded each game for determining special teams play. For kickers their total FG percentage, short misses and long makes impact the sim most. Punt results are determined by punting average, balls inside the 20 and blocks. Returners have their KR and PR averages loaded as well as any touchdown returns.
If you look at a game simulator results under game scores, below the play-by-play generated action is a crunching the numbers section comparing grades that impacted the sim. For running game adjustments, it compares OL vs F7. For the passing game adjustments to QB, it is OL+WR vs F7+SEC.
Real injuries impact our games just like real games. We upload NFL official injury lists and adjust our grades for health. If a player is fully healthy, they get 100% of their grade. Questionable is 85% and doubtful is 75% of their grade. If a player is marked as out, their grade isn't factored in. We don't individually monitor hundreds of players on the field each week, but just go off the injury list and box score for skill position players. If a QB/RB is injured before halftime of their NFL game and doesn't return, they are marked for in-game injury. Depth becomes critically important in surviving the marathon of a season that usually sees many players go down hurt. Your 4th RB might be your top starter left come the end of the season. Your line could be decimated with injuries where one of your starters has to be a journeyman signed off the street if you don't have quality backups.
We go off the NFL schedule and sim our games after all NFL games have been played for that week so that we have all the game data — usually on Wednesdays, depending upon the schedule of the commish. You cannot make changes to your depth chart after knowing the results of their NFL game, so depth charts are locked prior to NFL games for players involved. They are unlocked again once we sim our version of that week. You also cannot trade players during that locked time, as their performance for the upcoming sim week would already be known and artificially changing their value.
When you have a player on your team that has a bye week in reality that your team doesn't, you still get to use that player in your sim game. Since they don't have real NFL game stats that bye week for them, you get to use an averaged game for them based upon their season so far.
For the playoffs, we replicate the NFL playoff structure. We use the same tie-breakers as the NFL, as well as same draft order determinations. Most of your players will use their averaged NFL games from the season as their game update in the playoffs, except if they have a strong actual NFL playoff game that same round as the sim playoffs in which you would get the real playoff update. So if a player carries his team to the Super Bowl in reality with excellent playoff games, your sim playoff team gets that advantage also. Injuries from the playoffs also count too. Because successful team players are at higher injury risk during the playoffs (and not sitting at home on the sofa with no risk as part of a real life losing team), they get that additional advantage of pulling in strong playoff game updates. It also makes the playoffs more unpredictable and rewards sim teams having players who excel the most when championships are on the line.
Tips and Suggestions
There is not just one way to do things. Over a dozen years and multiple leagues, we've had a variety of different champions built in different ways. Some NFL teams have won with historic defenses while others rode offensive MVPs to titles. It can happen many ways. Those who are the most successful over time tend to have a good plan and see it through.
It is best to leave yourself a couple million under the cap going into the regular season, so you have funds available to make mid-season moves. It is much more difficult to create cap space during the season when veteran salaries become guaranteed and players start earning paychecks.
If you need to create salary cap space in the off-season, the best way is to restructure a contract or make cap-friendly cuts/trades. The best players to move and create the most cap space are players with large current season (unguaranteed) salaries and small/no signing bonus left. If they have a signing bonus left, you can split it over 2 years to save some cap space this season.
To create cap space during a season, you'd have to restructure a contract or trade/cut young players (less than 4 years experience) with large annual salaries and lower signing bonuses left as veterans have their salaries guaranteed if on the team from week 1.
Don't get over-emotional in free agency. Every year teams get into bidding wars and way over-pay for a player they just can't do without. Don't be a GM that can't get out of a bidding war before it turns into a big mistake. If someone out-bids you with an outrageous offer, let them make that mistake and don't take that on yourself. If you're new to free agency especially, avoid large signing bonuses. There is no way to get out of signing bonus money, while deals with large salaries with no signing bonuses have no cap hit impact. If you end up losing a prized UFA because of other teams over-paying, gladly take the compensatory pick. Just make sure you're eligible for that by not signing more UFAs than you lose, and don't make a replacement UFA signing at a similar grade as your loss if you want a pick. If you game is getting compensatory picks, focus on players that don't factor in such as street free agents (with no team association or unlimited bidding), RFAs and tagged players with matching rights.
If you end up with a player who is making way too much salary and their LTC quotes are too high for the cap, there are a couple of options. You can let the player hit free agency and rely upon your unlimited bidding advantage to pay the market price (hopefuly lower than the LTC quoted you would have been stuck with otherwise). You can also use the transition tag on them to see what their price is on the market and match the offer if you wish. If the player isn't a pending free agent but you need to get out from their salary but desperately want to keep them, you could cut them and try to re-sign at a lower price on the market at any time. It's a way of renegotiating their deal — the player will stay for you at a lower price bid unless someone tells their agent they are willing to pay more.
New players taking over a team will sometimes have their inexperience taken advantage of by more experienced GMs. Ways to best deal with that include:
• Getting multiple offers to pick from instead of relying upon a conversation with just one GM who doesn't have your interests in mind.
• Post a trade block message from your team roster to let every team know who you're shopping to attract more offers.
• You can always contact Goodell if you get into salary cap trouble, have questions about something or even just to ask advise. Especially for new GMs, as we want all GMs to get off to great starts.
If you have any questions, you can always contact Commish Goodell on the message board forum.