2018 Free Agency Tweaks

[Goodell]

A little more frustration expressed than usual this year in free agency. Some of that might be dozens of new players who haven't experienced this before or might make "rookie" mistakes that cause frustration for others, and some of it might lead to a couple of adjustments we could make to improve things overall. We're always working toward improvement.

I wanted to start a discussion about free agency while it's fresh in our minds. I'm open to different thoughts, but in reality I really like the overall principles driving our open market free agency and realistically probably not as interested in a complete overhaul as much as small adjustments. Every couple of years we adjust certain aspects of free agency from bid requirements or contract limits to changing what information is made public about bids and when. If you have an idea about a couple small changes that would improve things, let me know. If you have bigger thoughts about changing everything, that would be interesting too (if not as probable).

I'm in a lot of sim leagues (mostly baseball) and I really do greatly prefer the open market approach we setup here compared to some of the other free agency methods I've experienced in other places that were more like guesswork and being lucky in my opinion more than legitimate market-driven fair competition.

I'd also say if some of the frustration is over just losing bids or not wanting to pay as much as someone else for a good player, we're not changing rules for hissy fits over not winning fair competitions where everyone knows the rules and everyone has the same opportunities and cap restrictions. It's a game that intends to reward winners with the best strategies in a difficult game, not coddle sore losers. And overspending dramatically in free agency isn't always the best way to win overall, and sometimes is the worst way where you pile up mistake deals that cripple your team's salary cap going forward. This is a salary cap management game played over multiple seasons. Overspending arguably is the worst way to managing your cap and build a long-term winner.

The advise I'd have regarding free agency is to operate self-control and know what free agency is. Don't get desperate to let other team's mistakes force you into bad decisions too. Win by making good decisions. Both here and in the NFL there are always going to be players who get overpaid in market competition situations of high demand and low supply. There are always going to be teams like Jacksonville or Washington in years past who overpay in free agency and made a lot of mistakes while writing large checks for players other teams didn't offer extensions to keep. There are always situations like unproven backup QBs who hit the lottery that turn out to be awful signings in hindsight. You can either be the team making big mistakes or a team that finds other ways. If your reasonable bids for a needed QB got out-bid and turned into way over priced bidding wars, you can throw a fit about it or just shift focus to other avenues (like putting bids on different players on the market or put out some trade offers). If you hate free agency and know you aren't going to win bids, don't just gripe but put some strategy in place to plan on that and capitalize on other teams overspending to get you 4 high compensatory draft picks to build around the draft instead. Or capitalize on teams that spent themselves into bad situations that need to trade desperately. Don't just be a baby about losing bids, there are many ways to build a team and drafting/trading is arguably the advised path long-term. Or just get better at the game if you want to win in free agency. Lots of teams have done brilliant jobs at structuring creative deals to their advantage or targeting promising but under the radar 2nd level players first and getting good bargains while everyone else was too busy fighting over the same higher demand players in frustration. Not everyone puts out all their bids in the first minute of free agency to see all of them immediately out-bid in a whirlwind of frustration. There are other approaches and other strategies of being patient and seeing how the markets shape out for different players/positions to end up on top after the first day.

If you have some ideas feel free to discuss them here as free agency plays out and we can imagine the impact of changes while we're in the middle of it, and possibly institute a couple of tweaks next season. Thanks!

[Nathan S.]

I think the system is perfect.

People need to stop bitching and take it for what it is. If Team A outbids Team B by the minimum bump bid possible, they are being smart. Why would you want to pay more than you potentially have to - get over it people. If Team A bids on Player C 10 minutes before they expire, tough luck. People have more than 5 targets and after day one start to shirt their focus towards new people and get new bids back to use. Why would I let your team get a deal on a player I want because the 24 hours ends soon, that's stupid. If Team A wants to bid with a 30 million SB on a player who doesn't need it, that's their choice and they're stuck with him. Don't whine about not keeping your players because there are LTCs, tags, and the ability to pay what YOU value someone at. They may value the player more and as a result, pay more.

Get over it or quit.

[Fish]

So why limit the number of bids at all? Why such a short window for negotiations?

Speaking for the baseball sims, limiting the bids is because it is or was manual. I've seen a lot of different setups, but generally the goal was to move towards open/free market and automation which you have here, so why limit the bids or the timeframe a player is open for bidding?

I already posted this, but the only thing that stands out to me is how low some of the signings are and how that can really tip the scales. Throw in the off-season was a little slow to get started and I wonder if all 32 teams were active on day 1. Honestly when Pro-Bowl caliber players are signing for $500k or $1-$2m, I think there is a bit of a problem.

[Fish]

One thing we've discussed in leagues I've been in is adding a random element to how long a FA negotiation window is open. I don't play Madden anymore, but when I did play it seemed you could not always count on a FA to remain available.

You don't seem to factor a HTD in, but I do think some FAs place value on not having to move their families.

[Nathan S.]

One thing we've discussed in leagues I've been in is adding a random element to how long a FA negotiation window is open. I don't play Madden anymore, but when I did play it seemed you could not always count on a FA to remain available.

You don't seem to factor a HTD in, but I do think some FAs place value on not having to move their families.

Think the 24 hours works, however, a solution to your first post would be something along the lines of 10 bids on 5 players over 24 hours. So you raise # of bids, but lock them in on number of players they are available.

Really think unlimited bids would drive players prices through the roof. Steals are good, rewards GMs who find them. If you're mad a Pro Bowl player is 1 million, should have bid on them.

[robroach]

Let me start by saying I love this game. It is awesome and I appreciate all the hard work that goes into it. I also appreciate the changes we've made to free agency over the last couple of seasons. I fee it has made the game more realistic.

I still think we need to have 2 waves of free agency:

Wave 1
You must sign a player to at least a 3 year contract
Signing bonus must be at least 2 million per season
This would last anywhere from 5 days to 2 weeks
No NFL free agent signs a 1 year 450k non guaranteed contract on the first day of free agency

Wave 2
Just like we have it now

I would also propose that we can't do an opening bid on our own players until a specified time. We had the chance to LTC them and we declined, so to think they would sign for 450k on the first day of free agency is unrealistic.


I think some form of these changes would make things a lot more realistic and bring about a whole lot more strategy.

[Fish]

Unlimited bids would eliminate the steals we see now, but do you really think it would drive prices above realistic levels?

[jerrydlux]

what if we had two tiers of free agency? week 1 (or however long) is for B or higher rated players and after that is everyone else? I am also not a fan of the unlimited bids for your own FAs. I dont know how to make it work in the favor of the "home town team" but if a team has a ton of FAs they can just go in and outbid everyone else all day. I know we need to be selective with the 5 picks we have and teams having many top rated free agents doesnt happen often but just to guard against potential future issues as well

[robroach]

No. Wave 1 would be money related. If you like a C+ and want to give him B money in Wave 1 to beat everyone to the punch then so be it. Like I said, it brings about more strategy.

[Fish]

I've done the tiered thing and wasn't a huge fan, but some really liked it. I prefer being able to balance my plan A with plans B-D or whatever.

EDIT: If you were going to split it up, I agree more with robroach's plan. If you want to wait and hope you can steal a player, rather that be as the market nears end and has set those conditions by all 32 teams passing for a week or two.