2019 Off-Season Update

[Goodell]

I have added to our potential openings some new at-risk teams that haven't checked in yet this year and haven't visited the site in 2019. They have all been contacted, but if they do not show up before free agency (starts 4/13), their team may be transferred to new GM.

If you are interested in another team, this might be a year in which we can accommodate that. We prefer to give new openings to new GMs without a team, but we'll probably run short on those for the possible openings ahead.

GMs may have contacted me before over the years in various ways, but with those messages scattered I think we need a new centralized list of people interested in a new team today. So here's what you can do if you'd like to be considered for a new team opening:

Send an email to commish@fangm.com.
- Include your top 3 preferences for either open or at-risk teams from our openings page: http://www.fangm.com/openings.php
- If your interest is in an AFFL team, include a short paragraph about your worthiness (activity, quality performance in other leagues, etc.).

Thanks!

[Goodell]

A reminder that free agency will begin one week from today:

Saturday, April 13th at noon EST.

[Goodell]

A reminder that free agency will begin one week from today:

Saturday, April 13th at noon EST.

For those new to the leagues or forgot how things go, here are a couple reminders. New GMs can also refer to previously sent welcoming messages with details on league activities.

Teams get UNLIMITED bidding toward their own UFAs on the market, and 5 bids per 24 hours to put toward other players. After 24 hours, a used bid becomes available again. There's nothing more frustrating than putting in your 5 bids immediately first thing only to see them all countered and no longer leading bids by mid morning with no other bids until the next day. Some have different strategies probably, but sometimes it can be effective to space your bids out a bit after seeing how the market is going, what players are in crazy demand, and being the team that gets out of the first day on top instead of the team that had an all their early bids countered. But to each their own. Different strategies is part of the fun!

New this year from off-season rules discussions are:
- 1-year no trade clauses for players with 85+ grades at time of signing or signed to a contract with 10M+ signing bonus.
- You cannot enter a 1-year contract on the first day of free agency. We'll make 1-year bids available on Sunday. That will hopefully help some of the veteran minimum steals not slip through as much this year.

A UFA is signed when he goes without a counter bid for 24 hours. Restricted free agents (RFA) or tagged players are signed to offersheets after 24 hours without a counter bid, but their home team has a chance to match or receive compensation in some cases. Always read the bid page completely, especially in cases of RFA or tagged players that have certain conditions and compensation required for bidding that is listed on their page. Often in those cases you may have to give up a draft pick if you sign a restricted/tagged player. If a player has an original round tender, check their actual NFL draft round for the required compensation (not sim draft round).

Once turned on, free agency will never be turned off until the end of the regular season in January. It's always available to shop players throughout the off-season and regular season. During peak free agency starting tomorrow you'll be able to see what players have bids and rough signing time deadlines before they'll sign, as we do that in peak free agency to try to ensure players get their fair market price. Some things change after peak free agency is over when free agency becomes much more secretive for the rest of the season to reward teams that do their research on training camp gems instead of just cherry-picking other team bids.

Depending upon your situation, you may want to pay close attention to the UFA gain/loss chart on the front of the league homepages (and on your team roster page) once free agency starts. That determines which lost UFAs get compensatory picks in the 2020 draft or not. Only teams with more UFA losses listed than gains are even eligible for picks, and only the top 32 UFA losses whose team didn't have a similarly graded UFA gain to balance that out will get picks. Street free agents without teams, RFAs, and tagged players DO NOT factor into compensatory picks -- only UFAs from other teams with unlimited bidding rights. So it helps you with compensatory picks in next year's draft to let some of your UFAs sign with other teams (despite your unlimited bidding rights) and sign street free agents without home team unlimited bidding affiliations.

There are no do-overs in free agency. Especially if you are giving a player GUARANTEED signing bonus money, make sure you do your research. Check their rotoworld page and do a google news search. There's no hurry, take your time and enter wisely. Make sure you're bidding on the right player and not someone with the same name. We honor real NFL retirements, suspensions, injuries, etc. Grades listed are grades from last year, and madden grades can sometimes change significantly from year to year plus grades are updated weekly throughout the season with performance. Be smart with your money, and careful with guaranteed signing bonuses especially as there is no way out of those at all. You're going to pay 100% of that one way or another and cannot transfer signing bonuses to anyone else.

It's a good idea probably to save yourself about $2M+ under the cap for in-season transactions as it's more difficult to clear cap space during the season when injuries happen. I'll also be adding estimated draft pick values, but in the meantime you can research a player drafted in that slot last year and look at their contract. Don't over spend in free agency or you won't be able to afford your draft picks.

We also carry over some unused cap space from year to year to a max of 10M. So if you're 10M under the cap at the end of this season, you'll get that 10M next year. If your 50M under the cap, you still only get 10M carried over.

If you are unsure about something, please send me a PM. Better to ask than make a mistake that can't be undone. Thanks and happy hunting!

[Goodell]

Free agency is underway! I have also added the estimated draft pick costs on the team rosters so you can keep those monies in mind compared to your available salary cap budget left to spend.

[Goodell]

The NFL draft is coming up soon (April 25-27). I've turned on our draft tools, if you click on the draft link in the top menu. You'll be able to start ranking your preferred college players in your queue. That's important for if you aren't online during your assigned draft pick window, you'll get the top available player from your personal rankings. If you don't have players in your queue, you'll get the top undrafted player from the actual NFL draft order.

You can also mark on your draft picks if you are looking to move up or down, which can help facilitate trade partners.

I'll likely post a poll regarding preferred draft dates, but the system should be ready to roll here soon.

[Goodell]

Our college draft will start Saturday, April 27th. 1st round on day 1 and then 2 rounds per day for the following three days. I will update time windows for specific draft picks soon.

With free agency seeming to wind down a little (at least for me), we'll set the deadline for peak free agency ending to be: Friday, April 26th at 11:59pm ET.

Any bids for tagged or RFA players must be entered by then. Unlimited bidding for your own players will also end at that time with all team associations dropped for unsigned UFAs.

[Goodell]

Our college draft will start Saturday, April 27th. 1st round on day 1 and then 2 rounds per day for the following three days. I will update time windows for specific draft picks soon.

With free agency seeming to wind down a little (at least for me), we'll set the deadline for peak free agency ending to be: Friday, April 26th at 11:59pm ET.

Any bids for tagged or RFA players must be entered by then. Unlimited bidding for your own players will also end at that time with all team associations dropped for unsigned UFAs.

I have updated the draft order to include specific time windows now for each draft pick. You have to be online by the time listed of the pick (you go on the clock at least 10 minutes before -- or 15 minutes in the first round) or have players in your draft queue to get a player selection of your choosing. If you don't have a player in the draft queue and don't make a pick online by that time listed, you'll get the highest available player based upon the real NFL draft order.

[Goodell]

Our college draft will start Saturday, April 27th. 1st round on day 1 and then 2 rounds per day for the following three days. I will update time windows for specific draft picks soon.

With free agency seeming to wind down a little (at least for me), we'll set the deadline for peak free agency ending to be: Friday, April 26th at 11:59pm ET.

Any bids for tagged or RFA players must be entered by then. Unlimited bidding for your own players will also end at that time with all team associations dropped for unsigned UFAs.

As mentioned, we'll adjust free agency tonight when we pass the deadline for unlimited bids, tagged and RFAs. Such players without bids return to their teams under that 1-year amount.

Our college draft starts tomorrow at 3pm ET as announced last week. I'll likely turn the draft on earlier in the morning (won't be setting any alarm clocks, though) so the teams at the top can get their picks in early, but nobody has to pick until their pick window time expires. Load up your draft queues or you'll automatically just get the highest available player from NFL draft order.

[Goodell]

It's draft day! The draft has been turned on so any teams at the top can enter their #1 overall picks at any time. No teams have to pick prior to their pick window time expiring. Draft officially begins at 3pm ET. We do round 1 today, then 2 rounds per day for the next couple of days. Keep an eye on your assigned pick windows for your times. Just be here prior to that time to enter your pick manually when on the clock. Also make sure to have some players ranked in your draft queue so you'll get someone you like even if you miss your pick window. Let me know if any questions or problems. Happy drafting!

[Goodell]

As we're in the final day of the college draft, keep in mind that any eligible draftees who are not selected will become undrafted free agents available to sign. I will release them into free agency tomorrow morning.

Wednesday, May 1st at 9 AM ET

Also remember that teams have a 100K budget for signing bonuses to undrafted free agents (UDFA) so that's part of the strategy after the draft if you're going to go all in on one targeted UDFA or spread it around in smaller amounts to more prospects to increase your odds of one of them panning out.