Salary cap calculation help

[Chuzwazza]

My apologies as I'm sure this was addressed somewhere before, but I need some clarification on exact cap calculations....

Is it like last year, just a flat rate based on top 21 OV, or is it strictly based on total accumulated pro salary. meaning teams carrying 22 players are going to be hit harder than those carrying 20 and choosing to risk their players on waivers to keep cap figures down? if its the 2nd one, does that mean teams can be over the cap at points during the season as long as their total payments in that season don;t exceed the cap?

thanks

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[Ohio Jones]

Any answer from the admins on this? I know various options were being debated, but am unaware of a conclusion being reached...

 

[Chuzwazza]

Might be something we need to sort pretty quick. I know the admin guys have lots of things on their plate, but its unusual to start a season without even a firm system of how were going to work out a cap. It needs to sorted ASAP or else were going to be getting GM's pleading ignorance at the deadline regarding trades etc. and its not going to be fair to either punish them, or hurt the ones not bending the rules a little by not punishing them. either way I can see it being a problem in the not too distant future.

I'm not overly fussed either way, but in order to structure my team effectively this year and next year, it would be nice to know as soon as humanly possible. even if we take a vote on here and close it off in a week? give the league a chance to voice its opinion?

 

[The old geezer]

I try to stay out of the admin business but given a decision is still outstanding I thought I'd chime in given I had contributed a 'little' on the existing cap calc methodology.

If I understand correctly the issue is that the new OV includes things such as morale that cause it to fluctuate (correct me if there's more to it) and I know that's signifcant especially when it comes down to the who the 21st should be. For those of you that don't recall, in the event there are multiple players tied for the 21st position the highest salary player is used and if OV's are changing that could be dangerous for teams right near the ceiling.

If that is the only issue, and I'm likely over simplifying here, why not simply take the straight average up to the experience column?

I know OV generally has some weightings involved so different ratings don't have the same impact but frankly some of those were stupid like in the old FHL Sim 'ST' had a really heavy weighting so 4th line goons always had inflated OV ratings.

I did also considered simply excluding some less relevant stats like ST (is just a function of a guys size not ability) or DU, DI, etc. but I'll leave it to others to decide what ratings should be included in an average.

I did a quick check, and with only the rare exception things came out pretty much as expected. Given when the salary cap checks are run the files are always being converted to Excel simply adding in an average has no material impact on the work effort involved in administering the process.

Anyway, that's my two cents.

 

[Canuck09]

Since STHS has a salary cap monitor built into it why not turn it on and use it? I can't say I've ever seen the actual Sim settings but it must have a range that can be used for the cap, set the floor at $0 since we don't have a floor for some reason and the cap at the appropriate amount.

If I read some of the updates right I think the new version has new ways of handling the cap anyways so this could just be a 1 year stop gap until we switch.

 

[MatthewFlames]

Since STHS has a salary cap monitor built into it why not turn it on and use it? I can't say I've ever seen the actual Sim settings but it must have a range that can be used for the cap, set the floor at $0 since we don't have a floor for some reason and the cap at the appropriate amount.

If I read some of the updates right I think the new version has new ways of handling the cap anyways so this could just be a 1 year stop gap until we switch.

The main problem with turning on the cap in the sim is that GM's don't manage their teams enough. When a team goes over the cap I can't sim. The sim just freezes until the roster over the cap is fixed. At times where certain GM's take weeks to fix lines when players are injured - can you imagine every second day where we have to wait for some GM to respond and fix his roster? And I know I certainly don't want the added responsibility.

 

[Chuzwazza]

I figure if thats the case that we just go off pro player payments for the season....if a team carries 20 or 22 thats up to them. If they want to risk waiving someone to cut 300K or so off the cap payments then thats their call. No need to judge OV then etc. just more work. If we bring in a rule to stop teams from cheating and carrying guys in the minors that might go against the cap then in addition to having to clear waivers, make a rule that anybody earning over a certain amount (say $2million) moved to the minors instantly causes a 50% of his yearly salary hit on the teams bank balance. essentially that prevents teams from trying to circumvent the cap and makes players like that essentially 1 way contracts anyway.

as for seasons cap calculations, it could then just be read off the financials page, and anybody over could get penalised etc. like previous seasons

 

[The old geezer]

Until seeing Matt's comments on the Sim process being held up if the cap calc functionality was turned on I had actually been expecting/hoping that was what was going to happen for next year. I say next year since teams (self included) had not prepared for that as I think teams will need to have reserved some cap room for injuries that the top 21 OV methodolgy isn't impacted by.

In regards to Josh's proposal that could cause new issues. First it would be administrativly challenging to record the 50% of salary for guys waived. Second some teams have already got bigger salary guys buried in the minors that wouldn't count (unless called up) that would be counted in the Top 21 process and so they would in effect give them more cap space. This might also drive a more undesired trend to moving more guys to the minors to avoid the cap.

In many ways the top 21 OV rule dealt with the aforementioned challenges since you couldn't hide guys on the farm team but also teams that had a string of bad luck with injuries didn't find themselves in cap trouble on top of everything else.

Again I think the current process works we just have to substitute an average skill rating instead of OV that excludes, at a minimum, MO and PO ratings so the average doesn't fluctuate during the season.

 

[Ville Isopaa]

The main problem with turning on the cap in the sim is that GM's don't manage their teams enough. When a team goes over the cap I can't sim. The sim just freezes until the roster over the cap is fixed. At times where certain GM's take weeks to fix lines when players are injured - can you imagine every second day where we have to wait for some GM to respond and fix his roster? And I know I certainly don't want the added responsibility.

Is it possible to turn it on with a higher cap than we now have? If the cap is set at say 10m over our cap, no team should ever reach it and the sim shouldn't freeze. The cap hit for the teams would still be counted by the sim and we would manually only have to keep track that no team goes over our own cap at any time.

 

[Dr.Sens(e)]

I actually like Josh's idea of a 50% penalty for every waiver move down to the minors - perhaps for any player with a salary >$1M. I know there is an adminstrative requirement here, but I don't think we'd see a ton of these moves given the cost of it and given the player would like show up on waivers (perhaps that's the qualifier for the penalty).

And Matt K, do you really think the hard cap tool would freeze things up that much? I don't think there are that many teams THAT close to the cap and this actually solves the problem of teams bringing players up and down that puts them over the cap for brief periods of time and slipping over the cap without admin noticing - obviously we can't expect anyone to monitor this and if we do it as in past (periodic measurements) teams can just drop a few players at the time of the most measurements. The cap is hardly a "hard cap" if this is the case.

The one problem we will continue to face is the reality of players going and coming back to Europe. When they return, their salaries are reinstated (based on what they left), but their ratings take a major hit. As such, holding the player in the minors for a year is the only option. I know that's what I'm stuck doing with Emery right now, because his rating is basically unusable.

 

[HFNHL Commish]

Josh's idea is an interesting one, but installing a penalty sort of establishes the presumption that all waiver moves are carried out with ill intentions, and I don't think that's a fair judgment to apply uniformly.

For now, my inclination is to stick with the Top 21 OV system. While OV may not be quite as good a gauge in STHS as it was in FHL (I think that can be attributed to more stat categories), I still think it's reasonable. Furthermore, while MO certainly can play games with OV, it's only a minor factor, and MO tends to fluctuate in the same direction for players on the same team.

Look at it this way - if a player ranks 11th on his team in OV, are MO fluctuations likely to drastically change that standing? No. Really, it's a question of what's going to happen with the bottom-ranked guys on the roster, and in most cases, those players are earning pretty uniform, bottom-rung salaries.

Will there be a few outliers? Sure. But if the STHS Cap Monitor doesn't fit our needs, then I say we go with what we've got.

 

[Chuzwazza]

SO when are we going to take the top 21 OV salaries? 20/40/60 game marks sound good to me.....any thoughts?

 

[Chuzwazza]

bump? whats happening here?

 

[Ohio Jones]

bump? whats happening here?

Double bump. Come on guys, call the ball. (Er, puck).

 

[Canuck09]

Yeah it seems like this is a pretty big deal and should be dealt with sooner rather than later.

Also something that perhaps should be handled...player ages. It doesn't appear as any of my team has been updated and as it was pointed out before it will have a large impact on RFA/UFA status. Especially concerning is that contracts are already being extended, hopefully this is checked on as each player is signed.

 

[Dryden]

As the only person to get nailed for being over the cap this is pretty irritating

 

[HFNHLOilers]

Ya i did notice that when i was looking into my contract extentions my players ages were off by atleast a year or two

 

[The old geezer]

Geez where is our Admin team on these important decisions and more importantly some action. "When I was on the Admin team ..."

If you haven't guessed I'm just razzing a bit. It's fun being on the outside throwing stones at 'management' now

 

[Dempsey]

The new version of STHS is a major upgrade but the switch to the new version can only be done in the off-season.

One of the new features of the new version 2.0 is that is has actual player ages with birthdays, so players age on their actual birthdays rather than the current system.

Perhaps we upgrade to version 2.0 this off-season, which will automatically update all player ages to their actual birthdays when the upgrade is done. If we do it before the FA season, it would take care of the age problems.

 

[Canuck09]

The new version of STHS is a major upgrade but the switch to the new version can only be done in the off-season.

One of the new features of the new version 2.0 is that is has actual player ages with birthdays, so players age on their actual birthdays rather than the current system.

Perhaps we upgrade to version 2.0 this off-season, which will automatically update all player ages to their actual birthdays when the upgrade is done. If we do it before the FA season, it would take care of the age problems.

This could work out just fine as long as GMs and agents are checking players ages when doing negotiations during the season.

 

[MatthewFlames]

Geez where is our Admin team on these important decisions and more importantly some action. "When I was on the Admin team ..."

If you haven't guessed I'm just razzing a bit. It's fun being on the outside throwing stones at 'management' now

*Ducks*.....

 

[MatthewFlames]

One of the new features of the new version 2.0 is that is has actual player ages with birthdays, so players age on their actual birthdays rather than the current system.

Perhaps we upgrade to version 2.0 this off-season, which will automatically update all player ages to their actual birthdays when the upgrade is done. If we do it before the FA season, it would take care of the age problems.

This is a great suggestion. At the moment I am faced with a player by player review of every players age -- Thanks to the GM's who checked their rosters and others. I still have it on my list of ToDo's to fix that.

What we may do is as we get towards the season end is start up V2.0 and that way people can see the exact status of the free agents. Actually, we may be able to do that pretty much right now. That will save me a very time consuming step.

 

[Dempsey]

This is a great suggestion. At the moment I am faced with a player by player review of every players age -- Thanks to the GM's who checked their rosters and others. I still have it on my list of ToDo's to fix that.

What we may do is as we get towards the season end is start up V2.0 and that way people can see the exact status of the free agents. Actually, we may be able to do that pretty much right now. That will save me a very time consuming step.

Just note that if you want to have both versions working at the same time you'd have to purchase a second license for version 2.0 at full price, where as if you upgrade your license in the offseason to go from version 1.x to 2.0 you get a discount.

 

[MatthewFlames]

Just note that if you want to have both versions working at the same time you'd have to purchase a second license for version 2.0 at full price, where as if you upgrade your license in the offseason to go from version 1.x to 2.0 you get a discount.

Yeah I saw that and that's probably not a problem if we need to do it that way.

 

[HFNHL Commish]

There goes Drew in his glass house.

We stick with Top 21 OV. At this point, it only seems to make sense to have two measuring points - call it Game 40 and Game 60?