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FREE AGENCY (FA):
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- In the offseason, all players not under contract become free agents.
- Free Agents will be bid upon using a league message board.
Group 5 Free Agency:
- Free Agents will be grouped together in sets of 5, in order of their Yahoo! O-Rankings
- Once the first 5 FA's are off the table, the next best set of 5 are up for bids, and so on.
*THE STRATEGY* - this allows GM's to bid high on the star players,
without risk of missing out on a second-tier player in the process.
- Bidding on Free Agents:
- FA Bids include the contract AMOUNT and contract LENGTH
- TOTAL contract is then obviously (AMOUNT x LENGTH)
Duration:
- Contract LENGTH is from 1 - 4 years
Exception:
- Any contract SECURED at $2 million or lower can only be a 1 year deal,
- So if you want a multi-year deal, you have to offer at least 3 million per season.
(avoids youngsters being locked in for 1 or 2 mill longterm)
Abusing prestige:
- Any non-loyalty Free Agent can NOT be traded until group 5 Free Agency is over.
(counter-acts a loophole in the prestige points rule)
(FA's re-signing with their old teams can be signed and traded at any time)
- Securing a free agent - what is a "BETTER BID"?:
- Players have 4 criteria in deciding which team to sign with - they are, IN THIS ORDER:
I. TOTAL CONTRACT
II. LOYALTY
III. PRESTIGE OF TEAM in the PAST 3 SEASONS
IV. Team's standing last season
I. So, players will sign with any team offering a higher contract than all others.
* also: if two contracts have the same value, but different years, the FA will prefer the shorter contract
i.e. if a player is offered 3 million for 4 years by one team, and 4 million for 3 years by another,
he will prefer the 3 year bid.... he'd rather make the same money in shorter time
II. But, the team that last held the player under contract is said to hold the player's LOYALTY.
- A team that holds the player's loyalty only has to MATCH THE HIGHEST OFFER, not beat it.
- Basically, in NBA terms, everyone's a restricted free agent
III. But, If two or more teams offer the same amount, and the team with loyalty CAN'T/WON'T match
the amount, the player will sign with the team that has the most "Prestige Points" in the past 3 seasons (Prestige Points are explained in the League Dynamics section of the rules).
(We use only the past 3 seasons to keep Prestige current and changing)
IV. And if the two bidding teams have the same number of prestige points in the past 3 seasons,
then the FA will sign with the team that finished higher in the standings in the previous season.
- The salary cap is a "hard" cap. You can not go over the cap to sign Free Agents.
- If you only have $5 million in cap room, the highest bid you can make is $5 million.
-You can offer bids to multiple players at the same time,
but you must have enough CAP ROOM to sign all those bids.
- FA Bids can NOT be withdrawn.
- A team SECURES a player when TWO FULL DAYS pass without the player receiving a better bid.
- Any free agents still unsigned when free agency ends, can only be signed to minimum contracts.