#SLOE: People's Basketball Sim League

So it's that usual time once every few months Louie(LoCo) teases a comeback and once again we're left with the burning question of tax relief. For the newer-ish members, Louie a few real life years ago ran up a hilarious tax bill (over 500 points) that has been left unpaid as of today. Tax bills follow the GM, not the team, so the condition was if Louie ever wanted back he would still have to pay his bill.

The last time Louie ever even submitted something for a sim was back in December 2018 which was season 35. We are now entering season 45, a full 10 seasons of Louie being gone. How long is too long for consequences? 10 seasons of not playing a game seems like punishment enough for a league that's built around having fun. At the same time we don't want to create a rule that allows a strategy to be to quit for long periods and come back fully tax forgiven.

Couple of notes I have picked up on that's been discussed:

* There should be consequences for your actions.
* It shouldn't take you more than a real life year to be able to pay off your total tax if you're fully active.
* Should time away count towards some type of relief?
* If time away should count does that open the league of having GMs leaving and having too many open teams? What's the advantage of being an active GM besides keeping your team?

Is there a good middle ground here that we aren't thinking of?


One thing to note is this isn't a discussion for just Louie's potential relief as this has been an issue before and can still be one. I also know Louie ran up the bill for laughs. I don't think he went inactive because the tax bill restrictions didn't allow him to have fun, he was already losing interest before. We know he has a "watch the world burn did it for the laughs" mentality which would be great to have again. I also fully expect him to run up the bill immediately when he's allowed to for this very reason. Think of the potential for that meme thread.

No one should ever take my suggestions seriously and this isn't well thought out, but I'm sitting here with nothing to do so here's an idea or 2:

If tax hell has crippled them for a set amount of time, you could obviously just knock off a chunk of the debt as long as the GM has been working towards paying it off. Sort of like a student loan forgiveness program.

In a case like the one that sparked this, maybe you do something such as eliminating (or easing) the tax restrictions for one off-season to allow that GM to get their team together as best as they can so they are in a better position to try earning points to pay off their debt. So, allow them to work RFA, offer free agents more than the min, etc. Even if you don't want to give them full reign, perhaps at least giving them up to a MLE salary to offer. Then after that first off-season, you put the restrictions back up and let them work through it.

I dunno, just spitballing.

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A hard cap would solve a lot of tax issues (if it's even possible in the system)...

The two measures I'd immediately suggest (I did in the chat):

After a certain amount of seasons in the tax (7-10 seems reasonable...after all, many debts fall off your credit report after 7 years, right?):

1. Teams regain the ability to bid more than the min, but are hard capped to not go in the tax. The game does NOT support this, so there would be policing involved (which really sucks for me). To enforce this, the team would not be able to make any bids that would risk putting them over the hard cap. (The game does this automatically except with bird rights/early bird players/vet mins).
2. Teams cannot use points for training or trades until their bill is paid off in full.
3. Teams WOULD regain the ability to retain RFAs.

I likethe points G-Man made above and think that they could all be things that can be worked towards in an eventual rule.

I also thought of some additonal ways to monitor people who would fall into this type of situtaion. If someone were to fall into this category, they would not have the ability to freely enter in anything they wish regarding bids or trades. They would either have to submit everything to the Commissoner for approval, or we could extend the use of stewardships, but maybe callthem advocates instead, to teams who fall in this tax relief program (to not burden the commissoner more so than what he already does.)

The advocate would go through the same selection process that stewards go through every year, and must not also be outstanding in any of thier own tax bills. Once an advocate is chosen, they will overlook all financial decisions by the GM in the relief program (UFA/RFA, trades, player training, etc.) So, for example, during RFA the GM would message the advocate the amounts they are bidding, the advocate would check the numbers to GM's finances and approve or deny the offers prior to this occuring. Once approved, it could also be approved by the Commissoner if we wish, the GM would be able to input the bids.

In order to maintain that the appropriate checks are being done, there could be a seperate tab in the forum in the area where points are posted dedicated to the GM's relief program. The GM would input when appropriate that they have notified the advocate of a move, andthe advocate would then notify when the move is approved (this could be done post move for trades).

Additonally, the advocate can things suhc as audits on the GMs points, reccomending to put points towards bills when they noitce a certain amount has been accumulated, among other things. The pro of the advocate doing this would be the same as being a steward and receive point compensation for it.

Disclaimer: This was just an idea I had while at lunch that I thought out while typing.

garbageman wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 11:15 am The two measures I'd immediately suggest (I did in the chat):

After a certain amount of seasons in the tax (7-10 seems reasonable...after all, many debts fall off your credit report after 7 years, right?):

1. Teams regain the ability to bid more than the min, but are hard capped to not go in the tax. The game does NOT support this, so there would be policing involved (which really sucks for me). To enforce this, the team would not be able to make any bids that would risk putting them over the hard cap. (The game does this automatically except with bird rights/early bird players/vet mins).
2. Teams cannot use points for training or trades until their bill is paid off in full.
3. Teams WOULD regain the ability to retain RFAs.

I'm not sure how worried people would be about "gaming the system" to go all in and take a few months off, but this is a really good idea in my opinion. I think having a step system might be a good idea based on how many seasons you take off (maybe define a "season" as the draft ending/rfa moratorium: ex. GM quits right after the playoffs of 2033 and comes back right after RFA in 2040. That's 8 drafts (2033-2040) so 8 years off.)

1 season off: 20 points or 10% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
2 seasons off: 40 points or 20% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
3 seasons off: 60 points or 30% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
4 seasons off: 100 points or 50% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
5 seasons off: 125 points or 65% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
6 seasons off: 150 points or 80% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
7+ seasons off: 140 points or 75% off your tax bill, whichever is higher; you receive your rights back to sign above the MIN, retain RFA's, etc., but you can't train or trade points or use the MLE until you have paid off your tax bill. Also, if you go into the tax, you are back under the normal tax rules and can't get out of it until you have paid off both outstanding tax bills.

Thought process: If you take a couple seasons off, you can get a few points off your bill to make it more manageable, but you still suffer the consequences of accruing a huge bill. Once you get to 4+ seasons off, all of the contracts you'd have signed to get into the tax have likely fallen off so we can give more relief. Once you get to 7+ seasons, that means you've likely taken at least a full year off under which circumstances you still have a good bit of restrictions until you've paid off the remaining bit of your tax bill, but you can at least do *something* to build a real team.

Bowtothebill23 wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 12:34 pm

garbageman wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 11:15 am The two measures I'd immediately suggest (I did in the chat):

After a certain amount of seasons in the tax (7-10 seems reasonable...after all, many debts fall off your credit report after 7 years, right?):

1. Teams regain the ability to bid more than the min, but are hard capped to not go in the tax. The game does NOT support this, so there would be policing involved (which really sucks for me). To enforce this, the team would not be able to make any bids that would risk putting them over the hard cap. (The game does this automatically except with bird rights/early bird players/vet mins).
2. Teams cannot use points for training or trades until their bill is paid off in full.
3. Teams WOULD regain the ability to retain RFAs.

I'm not sure how worried people would be about "gaming the system" to go all in and take a few months off, but this is a really good idea in my opinion. I think having a step system might be a good idea based on how many seasons you take off (maybe define a "season" as the draft ending/rfa moratorium: ex. GM quits right after the playoffs of 2033 and comes back right after RFA in 2040. That's 8 drafts (2033-2040) so 8 years off.)

1 season off: 20 points or 10% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
2 seasons off: 40 points or 20% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
3 seasons off: 60 points or 30% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
4 seasons off: 100 points or 50% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
5 seasons off: 125 points or 65% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
6 seasons off: 150 points or 80% off your tax bill, whichever is higher
7+ seasons off: 140 points or 75% off your tax bill, whichever is higher; you receive your rights back to sign above the MIN, retain RFA's, etc., but you can't train or trade points or use the MLE until you have paid off your tax bill. Also, if you go into the tax, you are back under the normal tax rules and can't get out of it until you have paid off both outstanding tax bills.

Thought process: If you take a couple seasons off, you can get a few points off your bill to make it more manageable, but you still suffer the consequences of accruing a huge bill. Once you get to 4+ seasons off, all of the contracts you'd have signed to get into the tax have likely fallen off so we can give more relief. Once you get to 7+ seasons, that means you've likely taken at least a full year off under which circumstances you still have a good bit of restrictions until you've paid off the remaining bit of your tax bill, but you can at least do *something* to build a real team.

I don't want anyone to take seasons off. It's such a pain in the ass to have stewarded teams, and not good for the league to have to be constantly finding people. I think they should have to be actively GMing for those seasons to count towards restoring GM abilities.

garbageman wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 1:50 pm I don't want anyone to take seasons off. It's such a pain in the ass to have stewarded teams, and not good for the league to have to be constantly finding people. I think they should have to be actively GMing for those seasons to count towards restoring GM abilities.

I agree with this because creating a strategy to have GMs quit is a bad idea. Instead of a passive solution of letting GMs be forgiven of their tax by quitting, maybe we can reward them for staying?

An idea I had was to allow tax offenders with greater than x amount of a point bill to receive double awarded points. No missed DCs? Instead of 5 you get 10. League article worth 3 points you get 6. League responsibilities could be worth double points and we need them.

NOLa. wrote:

garbageman wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 1:50 pm I don't want anyone to take seasons off. It's such a pain in the ass to have stewarded teams, and not good for the league to have to be constantly finding people. I think they should have to be actively GMing for those seasons to count towards restoring GM abilities.

I agree with this because creating a strategy to have GMs quit is a bad idea. Instead of a passive solution of letting GMs be forgiven of their tax by quitting, maybe we can reward them for staying?

An idea I had was to allow tax offenders with greater than x amount of a point bill to receive double awarded points. No missed DCs? Instead of 5 you get 10. League article worth 3 points you get 6. League responsibilities could be worth double points and we need them.

Wouldn’t this just be an award for absurd prolonged spending though?


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AngryBanana wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 2:50 pm

NOLa. wrote:

garbageman wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 1:50 pm I don't want anyone to take seasons off. It's such a pain in the ass to have stewarded teams, and not good for the league to have to be constantly finding people. I think they should have to be actively GMing for those seasons to count towards restoring GM abilities.

I agree with this because creating a strategy to have GMs quit is a bad idea. Instead of a passive solution of letting GMs be forgiven of their tax by quitting, maybe we can reward them for staying?

An idea I had was to allow tax offenders with greater than x amount of a point bill to receive double awarded points. No missed DCs? Instead of 5 you get 10. League article worth 3 points you get 6. League responsibilities could be worth double points and we need them.

Wouldn’t this just be an award for absurd prolonged spending though?


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Yeah it can definitely be seen as that, but I always love the idea of rewarding people for being active in the league like with articles, memes, DC participation, responsibilities, etc. It only helps the league. Back in the day the point system rewarded strong teams and participation points were weak and we recognized that we shouldn't reward GMs based on luck of having a strong player but should be rewarded in their participation.

What's the negative, a GM who went all in and made the league more active? Right now the other option is a slow decay and loss of interest with higher potential to leave. Darth actually paid it off by being active but it grinded him so much he quit (among other reasons).

NOLa. wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 3:02 pm

AngryBanana wrote: Thu May 21, 2020 2:50 pm

NOLa. wrote:
I agree with this because creating a strategy to have GMs quit is a bad idea. Instead of a passive solution of letting GMs be forgiven of their tax by quitting, maybe we can reward them for staying?

An idea I had was to allow tax offenders with greater than x amount of a point bill to receive double awarded points. No missed DCs? Instead of 5 you get 10. League article worth 3 points you get 6. League responsibilities could be worth double points and we need them.

Wouldn’t this just be an award for absurd prolonged spending though?


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Yeah it can definitely be seen as that, but I always love the idea of rewarding people for being active in the league like with articles, memes, DC participation, responsibilities, etc. It only helps the league. Back in the day the point system rewarded strong teams and participation points were weak and we recognized that we shouldn't reward GMs based on luck of having a strong player but should be rewarded in their participation.

What's the negative, a GM who went all in and made the league more active? Right now the other option is a slow decay and loss of interest with higher potential to leave. Darth actually paid it off by being active but it grinded him so much he quit (among other reasons).

It took Darth fewer seasons to pay off the tax when he finally did decide to start earning whatever points he could than there were seasons before that where he complained about the tax and advocated forgiveness.

I think that putting together rosters that look great on his roster page but weren't performing up to expectations by day 60 ground him a lot more.

In any case, there are ample opportunities for points. Between media points (25), pressers (5), participation (5), voting on league propositions (3), all of the regular season points, auxiliary points like Sim Vegas and awards, volunteer responsibilities, and the capacity to gain points in trades, an active GM who doesn't spend points on training/trades can pull in 60 points per season easily (Louie/Luis gained about 60 points on one draft day alone through trading).

I think that we have plenty of opportunity for points as it is, but if we're increasing points that a tax team can earn, I think we should increase points for everyone (maybe have 25 media points be separate from the 15 meme points?). But...I'm not sure we should increase points for everyone. I don't want to make larger tax bills easier to pay off for everyone because I think the ratio now is pretty good in terms of dissuading most GMs from going too crazy. I think it stands to reason that no team has ever been in tax jail won the championship the season before going to tax jail (though Wave came close, he was able to pay his bill before last season and could've easily sold off before not winning last season and being a little short of payback this season).

I also think points as a whole are at a good level because of how we're able to use training to make average player quality better than it ever was. If we start adding more points for everyone to make the tax more manageable, I almost certainly would want to raise training costs, and I don't want to do that.