Beardmamba wrote:
Ok, thank you.
So this means I'll have to wait till offseason to offer new contracts to my players or sign free agents?
You'll want to resign all your 70+ players that have one year remaining. They are all young players still on bloated draft pick contracts so your resign contracts will cost less and give you a little cap room.
Do not use the renegotiation manager. It is broken. You'll want to manually offer them a contract by clicking their name and then clicking contract.
You'll want to lower everything all the way except years which is irrelevant so put that to 6. Submit the offer and it will give you an error message with the players bonus requirement. Currently this is the only number that matters to the player in resigning negotiations. You'll want to put in a bit higher than what he requested. It will lower after you put in the number and click off. You'll want to reenter the slightly higher amount then move the slider on the bonus percentage down but not to zero and let go, then move it back up to 75% and let go. This will show a refreshed number that should be closer to his request. You'll continue to do this until you reach slightly higher (5k-50k) than his request at 75%. Practice will help you better judge how much to offer to get the desired refresh number quicker. Once you have the slightly higher than his request you can hit submit. He'll accept it during the next spin.
This gives you the cheapest contract as it uses minimal salary and is spaced over 6 seasons. It comes with a few drawbacks though that make this kind of contract not always the best. Bonus money is always paid out. In the event of trading or that player retires the bonus money is added to the cap penalty for that and possibly the next season. The current season will receive the current seasons bonus money taken away as cap penalty while all future other seasons will be added to next seasons cap penalty all at once. This can be disastrous and cripple a team for several seasons. For this reason you need to pay attention to who you are offering your contracts to and for how much.
Backups who aren't very good but have ideal skills at certain spots may warrant resigning if you aren't planning on cutting them any time soon. Often these players can be had for very cheap prices that can make any salary cap hit if you later change your mind manageable. So its always good to poke around your key backups or positions you may face a shortage at and see how much they are asking for.
Sometimes you'll be in a situation where you want to offer a shorter contract. This makes it more expensive but some players are worth the cost. You'll use this in the event of players coming up on retirement age or possibly a backup you don't foresee needing long but definitely need now like an emergency starter you want to replace within a few seasons. Remember you'll have to pay any extra should the player retire or you get rid of him so its good to have his contract to where you are only paying his normal price at most for those seasons or even better his contract ends when he retires.
You'll likely only have a few short contracts because they are typically very expensive for the player and can get you into salary cap trouble that way. You'll have to determine who is worth it and who isn't.
Players typically retire at different points in their careers. Typically CB, WR, RB, TE, FB, LB all run a retirement risk starting season 8 with very very rare retirements in year 7 (has caused some very heated backlash when it happens). OL typically can be counted on to last until season 9/10. DL will usually last until season 11/12. P, K, and QB last the longest rarely retiring before season 13. There are outliers but when it comes to contracts these are the targets you want to have in mind and not go too far beyond them or risk cap penalties. I've had CBs play until season 17, but its not something you should ever count on happening.
This should give you a groundwork of resigning your players and managing your cap with resigning.
Signing free agents is a different beast. Salary holds weight rather than just bonuses though the devs keep quiet on exactly how much weight. Bonus money is still worth much more than salary money though. In free agency the player doesn't really have a choice though. He goes to the highest bidder. This can be a great way to manage the cap with players that no one needs but you can use and giving them minimum contracts long term with the minimum signing bonus. So when it comes to free agency, you'll just have to guess how much people are going to offer them and keep a limit for how much you are willing to offer them. Though there is also a maximum contract limit. Free agency is also where many vets will end up, you can sign these players focused on salary and giving them minimum bonuses, making it a painless retirement.
There is no exclusive free agent period any player you don't resign goes directly to bidding by everyone so make plans accordingly.
Also in regards to salary cap in the offseason you'll note you won't have all your money to spend. This is because draft picks have set price tags so the team holds out that money for the draft picks. The salary cap also ticks up slightly each season though so will wages.
There are many different strategies to how to manage your cap. You'll have to find what you are most comfortable with. Some teams pay big for top talent players while having minimum wage backups that aren't very good. Others try to field a full roster building primarily through the draft, trading, and cheap contracts. This usually results in teams that have great depth and injury resilience but they miss out on many of the very best players. Either way has pros and cons and there are various strategies in between. I've seen some who heavily trade and almost never have draft picks. Others who focus heavily on FA. And there are some who stockpile picks. And those who use a combination of all three. All of them are viable strategies.
Thats what makes this game great. Find your strategy and build your best team. Hopefully this helps answers all your cap related questions. Also coaches have their own cap, they don't affect your team salary cap.
