#SLOE: People's Basketball Sim League

No doubt now the we have to put a hard cap on the salaries.

With severe penalties.

This needs to be discussed further before we can put it to vote (specifically where is the ceiling set, etc)

I think we do need some form of a hard cap. Question is how high/low and how much higher than the soft cap.

Why do you feel we need a cap ceiling? The luxury tax already guarantees that teams that massively exceed the cap like the Hawks are not sustainable... I will have to break the team up after a year or two and get back under the cap.

The adjusted point system (with much lower rewards for things like MVP) means teams won't be able to bank monstrous amounts of points, either (see: Golden state Kemps). If you "save up points" for a couple seasons (as I did) you can make a 2 or 3 season run, and then the luxury tax forces you back down. I think that works exactly as it was intended, so a cap ceiling is kind of redundant.

WigNosy wrote:Why do you feel we need a cap ceiling? The luxury tax already guarantees that teams that massively exceed the cap like the Hawks are not sustainable... I will have to break the team up after a year or two and get back under the cap.

The adjusted point system (with much lower rewards for things like MVP) means teams won't be able to bank monstrous amounts of points, either (see: Golden state Kemps). If you "save up points" for a couple seasons (as I did) you can make a 2 or 3 season run, and then the luxury tax forces you back down. I think that works exactly as it was intended, so a cap ceiling is kind of redundant.

FWIW, I agree

Yeah I don't know why a hard cap is being discussed now. I think the system in place works perfectly. The luxury tax is harsh and now with your new points system it will be even harder to pay luxury tax AND train players. I think some teams still have a nice amount of points DUE to the old system and not spending them. But I think a hard cap would be a huge mistake. The league has ran with a soft cap for a long time including the PR league. I think in about two seasons everything well even out with the new points system and paying the tax well become something pretty difficult to do and teams will have to monitor it closer than ever before.

Now a cap floor on the other hand. I think a cap floor could totally be discussed.

DarthVegito wrote:
Now a cap floor on the other hand. I think a cap floor could totally be discussed.

Absolutely agree with this point

PaulyP wrote:

DarthVegito wrote:
Now a cap floor on the other hand. I think a cap floor could totally be discussed.

Absolutely agree with this point

I thought I was in favor of a floor at first, then I looked harder at it. There are some potential pitfalls here:

1. Generally, teams that aren't going to make the salary floor don't make it due to owner inactivity during Free Agency - this is enough of a penalty as it is, as it can set the team back significantly for years.

2. Teams below a potential salary floor are generally devoid of talent, meaning they won't garner the all-league selections, regular season win streaks, etc. to pay off a large floor tax bill.

3. Currently, teams always sign in-season FA's to minimum deals. If you inherit a roster like the Sonics in-season, how are you going to pick up enough salary to get to the floor without bad trades? If you just let teams sign FA's for whatever, teams will pick up a FA or two right at the deadline for however large a contract they need get them over the floor, so the floor rule becomes meaningless anyway. This forces us to re-visit the way we do in-season pickups (unintended consequence, with a lot more thought and work, and for what?).

For sake of argument, suppose the cap floor was set at 80% of the salary cap, with teams are penalized for being under the salary floor in the same way they are penalized for being over the salary cap (i.e., for every 1.5% by which you are UNDER, you pay escalating penalties; luxury tax thread: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=513 ).

If this had been in place this year, since the cap this year was $37,424,761, the floor would have been $29,939,809; five teams would have been under that floor.

Five teams this season would have been under that cap floor:
Sonics (Salary: $15,036,710; this is 40.2% of cap or 39.8% under the floor - 57 point penalty)
Pistons (Salary: $21,968,930; this is 58.7% of cap or 21.3% under the floor - 27 point penalty)
Clippers (Salary: $25,889,292; this 69.2% of cap or 10.8% under the floor - 13 point penalty)
Magic (Salary: $27,937,134; this is 74.6% of cap or 5.4% under the floor - 8 point penalty)
Cavaliers (Salary: $29,315,464; this is 78.3% of cap or 1.7% under the floor - 4 point penalty)

TL;DR: A cap floor probably just has the effect of kicking bad teams while they're down.

Additional fun fact: This season, the league as a whole is $11 million under the salary cap. This is the second HIGHEST total salary relative to the cap the league has ever had. Everybody is cheap, apparently. For reference:
1999: $32.5 million under
1998: $45.7 million under
1997: $36.8 million under
1996: $1.4 million OVER - the only time we've ever been over
1995: $17.0 million under
1994: $35.6 million under
1993: $32.0 million under
1992: $30.9 million under
1991: $78.2 million under
1990: $52.8 million under

WigNosy wrote:

PaulyP wrote:

DarthVegito wrote:
Now a cap floor on the other hand. I think a cap floor could totally be discussed.

Absolutely agree with this point

I thought I was in favor of a floor at first, then I looked harder at it. There are some potential pitfalls here:

1. Generally, teams that aren't going to make the salary floor don't make it due to owner inactivity during Free Agency - this is enough of a penalty as it is, as it can set the team back significantly for years.

2. Teams below a potential salary floor are generally devoid of talent, meaning they won't garner the all-league selections, regular season win streaks, etc. to pay off a large floor tax bill.

3. Currently, teams always sign in-season FA's to minimum deals. If you inherit a roster like the Sonics in-season, how are you going to pick up enough salary to get to the floor without bad trades? This forces us to re-visit the way we do in-season pickups (unintended consequence).

For sake of argument, suppose the cap floor was set at 80% of the salary cap, with teams are penalized for being under the salary floor in the same way they are penalized for being over the salary cap (i.e., for every 1.5% by which you are UNDER, you pay escalating penalties; luxury tax thread: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=513 ).

If this had been in place this year, since the cap this year was $37,424,761, the floor would have been $29,939,809; five teams would have been under that floor.

Five teams this season would have been under that cap floor:
Sonics (Salary: $15,036,710; this is 40.2% of cap or 39.8% under the floor - 57 point penalty)
Pistons (Salary: $21,968,930; this is 58.7% of cap or 21.3% under the floor - 27 point penalty)
Clippers (Salary: $25,889,292; this 69.2% of cap or 10.8% under the floor - 13 point penalty)
Magic (Salary: $27,937,134; this is 74.6% of cap or 5.4% under the floor - 8 point penalty)
Cavaliers (Salary: $29,315,464; this is 78.3% of cap or 1.7% under the floor - 4 point penalty)

TL;DR: A cap floor probably just has the effect of kicking bad teams while they're down.

Additional fun fact: This season, the league as a whole is $11 million under the salary cap. This is the second HIGHEST total salary relative to the cap the league has ever had. Everybody is cheap, apparently. For reference:
1999: $32.5 million under
1998: $45.7 million under
1997: $36.8 million under
1996: $1.4 million OVER - the only time we've ever been over
1995: $17.0 million under
1994: $35.6 million under
1993: $32.0 million under
1992: $30.9 million under
1991: $78.2 million under
1990: $52.8 million under

I don't think anyone said huge tax penalties, I just think it needs to be discussed much more than a cap ceiling should be. Obviously a situation like mine and my Sonics would have been excused from any floor penalties. But I think the problem is teams actively(or inactively) trying to lose. We all agree that not playing your best players during the season is inexcusable. As is purposely inputting a gameplan you know is bad(sabotaging your team). These things are all agreed to be no-nos.

It always bothered me that the worst teams in the league had 15+mil in cap and would sit FA out. I think that is the same thing as the above sabotages. It also guarantees that the best teams automatically get even better players in FA. Even in my rebuild year with the Mavs, I had less than 2 mil in cap. And you can't give me the argument that you can't force teams into bad contracts. That isn't what I'm saying. Offer all 1-year deals, offer deals to players that can be traded in 60 days. That will not hurt the future of any team. I know this won't be popular to teams who tank more than they win.

So basically all I'm proposing is that teams with assloads(the term "assloads" will need further definition) of cap be forced to make legit("legit" would need definition as well) bids in FA. I don't know what the "penalties" should be. Doesn't mean those teams will win players in FA but as long as they have tried is what matters.

Discussion though would be great.

I think the OP was done Tongue-in-cheek. No need to vote on that.

DarthVegito wrote:So basically all I'm proposing is that teams with assloads(the term "assloads" will need further definition) of cap be forced to make legit("legit" would need definition as well) bids in FA. I don't know what the "penalties" should be. Doesn't mean those teams will win players in FA but as long as they have tried is what matters.

Discussion though would be great.

Looking at the list of the five teams that would have been under the floor, I think it's safe to say at least three of them (Sonics, Pistons, Cavaliers) were under due to owners not paying much attention during free agency and not getting bids in.

If it helps, the way we've approached "lack of FA activity" in the IJBL for years (including before we switched to FBB) was "if your team doesn't submit anything, the computer's Recommended bids are used." If you don't want to bid (say, you want to save for Day 2) you still need to send a PM, but you just put "no bids" in the body of your PM (to show you are consciously opting out). This has generally worked pretty well. This may not be the perfect solution here, but it's worth mentioning as a possible way to help.

I don't mind that tbh


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WigNosy wrote:

DarthVegito wrote:So basically all I'm proposing is that teams with assloads(the term "assloads" will need further definition) of cap be forced to make legit("legit" would need definition as well) bids in FA. I don't know what the "penalties" should be. Doesn't mean those teams will win players in FA but as long as they have tried is what matters.

Discussion though would be great.

Looking at the list of the five teams that would have been under the floor, I think it's safe to say at least three of them (Sonics, Pistons, Cavaliers) were under due to owners not paying much attention during free agency and not getting bids in.

If it helps, the way we've approached "lack of FA activity" in the IJBL for years (including before we switched to FBB) was "if your team doesn't submit anything, the computer's Recommended bids are used." If you don't want to bid (say, you want to save for Day 2) you still need to send a PM, but you just put "no bids" in the body of your PM (to show you are consciously opting out). This has generally worked pretty well. This may not be the perfect solution here, but it's worth mentioning as a possible way to help.

That helps activity but how does it address a floor if all you have to do is send in a "no bid" PM?