I have veteran talent with bad contracts. Unless the projected ratings are way better then current, I have a feeling that I have no farm system at all. I also think I could keep this team, spend about 130 million in player payroll and contend this season. However, my goal is not to win one championship - it is to build a consistent long term winner. Which means I am scrapping this team.

Quote: Originally posted by hatt11 on 4/15/2007In Moonlight Graham I took a team that won the WS in S1 and underachieved a bit in S2 and now I'm taking em right back to the WS. WORSHIP ME!!

No 7hatt117 allowed in this thread.

I did take over a poorly run franchise in Pioneer and am turning it around nicely.

STEP 1 (C) - EVALUATING YOUR PLAYERS - ARBITRATION/FREE AGENTS

The final thing I will do before beginning to think about the first day of the season (budget day) is to develop a plan for my players that are currently arbitration eligible or free agents to be. I obviously need to know how much I want to spend on these guys before I set my budget.

When looking at arb eligible guys, I look not only at what their arbitration demand is, but I also will hit that "Negotiate Long Term" link and see how much they want per year in a long term deal. If the guy is worth keeping at all (as opposed to simply releasing), I will sign him long term ONLY if his long term per season demand is less than his current arb demand. Otherwise, he goes to arbitration.

When looking at free-agents-to-be, I will also hit that "Negotiate Long Term" button. This is not to see what their demand is (that you can see from the free agency screen), but to find out without having to wait for the email from my team owner whether the guy is a Type A or B free agent. You can find this information in the note section.

Having obtained all of this information, I evaluate who I will arbitrate, who I will sign long term, and who I will simply not resign/release.

With this team, there are no arb eligible players, so that step is skipped. This just goes to show one of my team's major weaknesses - no youth.

As far as free agents, there are a handful. 3 major league position players, ages 31, 31, and 34. Contract demands range from 2.7 to 5.6 million. There is a DH with a nice bat (DH because he is a catcher with a pitch calling in the 20s) and a fielder with 74/60 L/R splits and a good eye. The fielder is a Type B free agent. I simply hope that someone signs the fielder and move on - I don't want to spend money on players over 30, my team is alrady doing way too much of that.

I also check minor league free agent position players and find 3 of them. Two are non-major league prospects with contract demands over 3 million. No need to look at them any further. The third is a catcher who probably will never make the bigs, but has solid defense/pitch calling. He is only 24, and his demands is listed as 54K, meaning he just wants a minor league contract. I like to have 2 active and 1 inactive catcher at each minor league level so I make a note to sign this guy because odds are the prior owner does not have as many catchers in his system as I would like.

On the pitching side, there are 3 major league free agents, all with solid stuff. The best of the 3 is a 30 year old reliever that could be a closer on almost any team. He is only looking for 4.4 million. But, the best part, he is a Type A free agent. Odds are I will get 2 draft picks which I really need. There is also a decent reliever who is Type B - another bonus. Naturally, I am not going to sign any of the 3 - they are all over 30 and want multimillion dollar deals.

Checking minor league pitchers, I find two guys that want multimillion dollar deals. Each of them have a 10 in the durability column. I don't look any further, although one could possibly be converted into a reliever. He wants 6.8 million though, so he won't be doing it for my team.

At this point, it is time to begin figuring out what I want to do for a budget. We still have 7 spots to fill in the league so I will have some time. Once I figure out my budget, I may sat evaluating my minor leagues at least to figure out who down there may have current ratings good enough to help me try to fill out a major league roster for the next year or two while I build a farm system.

Up next -- Figuring out the Budget

Just wondering what draftpick do you have for the amateur draft? 1 i hope?
if you are also going to let go of these three guys and possibly get about 4 out of the first 35ish picks how much money do you think youll need to put aside for the prospect payroll. Alot, i assume.

I have the #2 overall pick (EDIT: #1 actually. Oops.). I want as much prospect payroll as I can, but I think it is going to end up being pretty low, with the hope to move salary through trades and then transfer budget into it to get enough room to pay my draft picks. And I think I am gong to stay away from the international market entirely. I will have my budget analysis done by tomorrow.

Actually, I intend to spend as little as possible on internationals for two reasons.

The first is simply that with 99 million in player payroll already committed, I am going to only have between 80 and 85 million available for all other categories. I am going to therefore have to cut corners somewhere, and skipping internationals is a good start.

The second is that I no longer believe in spending a ton on internationals unless I simply have a pile of extra cash with nothing else to spend it on. Here is my analysis: To land 1-2 great internationals, I would have to spend 14 million on international scouting and 20 million on prospect payroll -- and even then I would be lucky to get more than 1 great international because he would probably cost me 12-15 million and I would need the rest of my prospect payroll for the draft. In the alternative, I can skip internationals and only spend 6 million (the minimum there for me this season) on scouting and keep my prospect payroll down to only 8 million or so for the draft (even less if I go very conservative). in this second scenario, I have saved 20 million dollars (8 from scouting, 12 from prospect payroll). I use between 4 and 8 million of that 20 to make certain my high school and college scouting are maxed out. I am ahead of the game about 15 million dollars and odds are I will land an extra major league prospect or two in the draft that I would have otherwise missed.

So the choice is simple: save 15 million dollars and get 2-3 extra decent prospects or spend 15 million and get 1 superstar. Obviously, if I have the room available to max out college and high school and still go after the international superstar, I will do that. Otherwise, let others spend 15+ million for one great player - I will take my extra draft pick prospects and begin building a solid and deep farm system that can turn my team into a dynasty instead of a one and done.

STEP 2 -- BUDGET

Setting your budget for the season is probably the most important offseason event. If you don't budget correctly, you can end up with excessive injuries (if training or medical are too low), no progression of your minor leaguers (if coaching is too low), or not enough money to land that player you need (if budget is too low).

With the Cincinnati Venus Flytraps, money is incredibly tight. I start the season with 99.2M committed to player payroll already and that is before any free agents have been signed. I also noticed that my minor leagues are pretty barren of players and odds are I will need to sign 10 or more minor leaguers just to fill my rosters. I have the extra problem of about half a dozen minor leaguers starting the season on the disabled list, in all likelihood due to the prior owner not budgeting properly for training and medical.

Because I do not intend to go after any high priced free agents, and I intend to move as much salary as I can via trades, I decide to spend no more than 105 million on player payroll. This gives me only a small cushion for minor league free agents and promotions, but if I am lucky I can free some more cap space during the season. I would normally likely more cap room for waiver wire claims on a rebuild project, but the money just isn't there for it.

Next, I look at scouting. 14 million for advanced scouting. I always spend this amount with all my teams. I also invest 14 in both high school and college scouting -- I have the #2 overall draft pick and need as much in these categories as I can get. Internationals will go as low as I can set it, to 6. See the prior post for my reasoning there.

48 million spent in non-payroll already. I need to cut a few more corners. Training and Medical are up next. Because I don't expect to contend this season, I am willing to drop Medical down to 8 million (I normally like 11 or 12). Training, on the other hand, helps keep veterans from declining. With all the age on my problem, I need more money here. I would normally go with 14 million here with a veteran team, but due to my budget problems, I set it at 11.

67 million down and still coaches and prospect payroll to set. I would like at least 13 million for coaches but that would leave me with no money at all for prospects if I set my player payroll at 105. I need to trim a few more corners to get some prospect payroll money. I therefore cut coaches down to 10 and hope I can find some guys from lower levels to promote up to the major league jobs and get them at lower salaries. I also cut my player budget down to 102 (only 3 million cushion now!) and set prospect payroll at 6.

Now the big question is how I can go so cheap on prospect payroll. I agree that it is a gamble. However, I will set my entire draft to Very Conservative to help keep the dollars down. Also, as I hopefully unload my veterans, I should free up some player payroll. What I don't need to sign free agents and make promotion to set my rosters, I figure I can transfer to prospect payroll if I need it. It is still a huge gamble, especially with the risk of not having enough money for my #2 overall draft pick, but it is my only chance to keep the categories that cannot be modified through transfers where I need them to be.


Up next -- Evaluating the minors. We only have a few spots to fill in Addicted Users so budget day should be Wednesday or Thursday. The day after that I will get to see my projected ratings and fully assess my farm system.

BREAKING NEWS - TEAM OPTIONS

I just received an email and discovered that team options were available on two of my players for this season. While I hate to throw away that 25% of their salaries, the players are:

"P. Carter, SP, 36, 9.6M (final season of contract). Here is a serious waste of money. The guy has good STA/DUR, control, and L/r splits, although his 4 pitches are not very strong. He is serviceable and if I cannot move him due to his ridiculous contract and age, at least he can eat innings for me this season. Perhaps if I pay most if his contract I will be able to pick up a prospect for him. At least I don't have to move a prospect to get rid of him -- he will thankfully be gone next season."


and

"L. Kennedy, Long relief, 37, 3.1M (final year of contract). 87 control, 42/61 splits, and 4 pitches rated 50 or higher. Noone will want to trade for a 37 year old, so I am going to simply have to eat his contract this season and use him as one of my 4 long relievers."


I immediately declined the option on Kennedy. I look at it more as saving 75% of his salary then throwing the rest away. Carter is a tougher call. He is still decent and may have value for a contender. But anyone that knows anything about this game wont want to waster 9+ million on him. I was hoping to get a decent prospect if I could move him, but the chance to save over 7 million dollars right now can't be passed up. This will definitely clear the money I need just to assemble and fill my rosters this season, and maybe I can even consider a Budget transfer to get myself more coaching money -- I did not like going with only 10 million there. Both options are declined and almost 10 million dollars is added to my player budget room. Good start and I haven.t even made one trade yet.

Today is resign free agents day. I had one minor league free agent catcher that wanted a minor league salary who I resigned to fill a roster spot in the minors. The rest I have all let go.

In addition, the next 2 days are rehire coaches days. The coaching on my team was AWFUL last season. I found 4 minor league coaches that wanted to be rehired whose ratings were not total trash, so I rehired them -- anything to make hiring coaches easier. However. every major league coach and the majority of the minors will have to be filled during regular coach hiring. With only a 10 million payroll, this may be tough. Luckily, I have the money I saved yesterday by declining options available and I should therefore be able to transfer 4 or 5 million more into coaching if I need it.

Tonight and tomorrow I will do a full evaluation of my minor leagues - a quick look shows me I have 2-3 decent position player prospects, but almost no pitching at all. With no arb eligibles for tomorrow, I have plenty of time to work on that while also trying to start making trades.

Just wanted to let you know youre doing a great job here. Good luck with this crappy team.