Restricted Tag discussion

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

It's hard to know w/ any certainty how much impact it will have on league activity w/out actually seeing it happen. But I would expect a more flexible RFA tag to have much greater potential to reduce league activity than a more flexible franchise tag.

With the RFA tag, GMs can definitely go for the max contract length everytime. But w/ the franchise tag, contract length is determined by the real life deal, which is usually less than our max and is often less than what we may want for this league.

For instance, I'd love for Stephen Drew to get a good long term deal for my franchise tag, if I tag him, but at this point, that's really up in the air. And there was no chance I would've benefited at all by franchise tagging him early in the past. But an early RFA tag on him would probably have either netted me a nice 7-year deal or let him go to some other GM's unmatched, crazy $$$, 7-year deal before.

OTOH, since we are likely to shorten the max to 5 years, maybe that will be less of an issue going forward.

Still, perhaps, we should just be happy to have the extra bit of flexibility for the franchise tag and keep the RFA tag the same as before so we don't create some unintended bad side effects. Certainly, there's not much reason to think a more flexible RFA tag is actually good for the long term health of the league.

[Former Reds GM (Patrick)]

hmm... i see what you mean.

Well, I think it's a good thing but if everyone else thinks that it will have a strong negative result in league activity we can skip it. I'm for it because it gives us more tools to act like real GMs. Most people will use the tags for expiring contracts. It seems like most teams have plenty of FAs they want to retain. It probably would only come up once or twice an off-season.

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

You may be right in practice, but it's often hard to predict what most GMs will actually do ;D -- and GMs also come and go.

Also, while I usually like to have these leagues simulate real life, we should also be very aware that there actually are *NOT* that much league activity in real life (besides the fact that we will never come *that* close anyway since there are no player representation here, only team representation by us GMs).

For instance, in another (dynasty-like, points) league I run, we might've come a little too close to real life in some respects for league activity to ever be all that high there (much like in real life). In the end, this is really just a game, so we should try to make the game good however we can, including keeping things nice and simple. There's really something to be said for the KISS rule of thumb, ie. keep it simple, stupid. ;D

So like some wise sage might say, "Be careful what you wish for..." ;D

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

BTW, it's definitely not that I don't like the idea at all. I'm just trying to see whether it makes good sense for us to add this to the league. ;D

[Former Rockies GM (Peter)]

We could probably achieve the same effect by removing the 'use it or lose it" aspect of the Tags and being able to save a tag for use in subsequent years. Either way works for me.

[Former Reds GM (Patrick)]

Oct 11, 2009 4:39:37 GMT -5 Former Rockies GM (Peter) said:

We could probably achieve the same effect by removing the 'use it or lose it" aspect of the Tags and being able to save a tag for use in subsequent years. Either way works for me.

Yeah, that would have the same effect. Either works for me as well.

[Former Nationals GM (Alan)]

Oct 11, 2009 4:39:37 GMT -5 Former Rockies GM (Peter) said:

We could probably achieve the same effect by removing the 'use it or lose it" aspect of the Tags and being able to save a tag for use in subsequent years. Either way works for me.

The roll over idea might work well, but then would we have to put a limit on how many tags you can stockpile?

I say this because outside of one or two guys, I will have my basic team in tact for about 3 to 4 years baring any trades or FA signings.

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

Not crazy about the rolling over idea as that may be even worse for league activity (and Graham's point about one team potentially being able to hold onto too many good-to-top talents more easily than ideal, which would be bad for the overall health of the league).

Remember, we need to consider the good of the league as a whole, not just whether something's a cool idea or not.

Honestly, I think the use-it-or-lose-it approach works better than making it easier to use the tag since *THAT* actually helps generate more league activity as unused tags can always be traded.

So along those lines, how 'bout this instead? Make tags become tradeable one year ahead of time so that teams can actual swap tags in a trade between the current/upcoming offseason and the next one? IOW, make it so that you can trade away/for a 2011 preseason tag at this point -- that way, teams can effectively swap a 2010 tag for 2011 tag (or trade something else for that 2011 tag). If we allow that, that should probably provide just enough flexibility w/out any noticeable reduction to league activity since that adds one more potential for trades to happen.

[Former Reds GM (Patrick)]

For some reason, I already thought we could trade tags one year in advance. At the very least, I think we should be able to trade tags a year ahead. I'd still like to see more flexibility in use of RFA tags as well.

At this point, it seems like we've all said what we need to say. Let's put it to a vote...

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

Oct 12, 2009 16:45:34 GMT -5 Former Reds GM (Patrick) said:

For some reason, I already thought we could trade tags one year in advance. At the very least, I think we should be able to trade tags a year ahead.

Originally, there was no limit stipulated -- and I even made a deal for an RFA tag a year ahead of time. But the rest of the LO didn't think it was a good idea to allow anything beyond the upcoming preseason as there was concern that a GM might deal away some future tags and then skip town leaving the next GM w/ less to work w/. So the rule was revised to only allow trades that involve the next upcoming preseason, not beyond that.

And I do understand the concern and would go for allowing the extra year ahead.

I'd still like to see more flexibility in use of RFA tags as well.

At this point, it seems like we've all said what we need to say. Let's put it to a vote...

Well, you haven't offered any particularly good counter-arguments to the concerns already raised though, so other than the fact you like some more flexibility (and actually, most people, including myself, probably would), I don't see why the LO shouldn't simply keep status quo on this matter for the long term health of the league.

It's not like there are any other GMs clamoring for the proposed change anyway.

A poll is really not the best way to decide what's best for the league all by itself -- this should not merely be a popularity contest settled by anonymous voting. A poll should probably be a last step after a fair amount of solid feedback/discussion has been given in favor of change.

If we make a change based solely on a poll here, what's gonna happen if/when such a change causes real problems down the line for the league?

I guess we can do a poll to see if there's much interest in furthering this debate and/or exploring other options for a bit more flexibility. But a poll to actually decide on the matter doesn't seem warranted at this time.

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

Let's be clear what are the concerns being raised:

1. A change (to allow earlier or later use of the RFA tag) could easily negatively impact overall league activity (much more so than allowing franchise tag to be used earlier) because GMs can *always* choose to sign RFAs for the max number of years (whereas franchised players get whatever real life deal, which is usually shorter). Also, greater flexibility in the actual use of a tag generally means less likelihood for tags to be traded thus leading to less trade activity.

2. Gives a dominant team greater likelihood to stay dominant for many years while weaker teams will have less opp to improve via the regular FA market (and whatever other reduced league activity). Remember, if a hardly proven youngster gets RFA tagged alongside a bunch of proven, quality veterans, that youngster will likely get overlooked in our silent-bid RFA process -- and unlike real life, the youngster cannot reject a max-contract-length 500K/year deal.

3. Since there's nothing wrong w/ staying status quo on this particular matter, we need to be careful about fixing something that's not really broken. Remember, the KISS principle is a good one in general unless one can present a strong argument to add more complexity to the rules/system. Also, remember the wise saying to "be careful what you wish for..."


Finally, remember that by simply allowing the flexbility to trade for a tag one year ahead of time, you will already have the opp to try to postpone use of a tag via the trade route. Sure, you're not guaranteed to be able to postpone its use (at least w/out possibly costing you something extra), but in that case, success or not would've been determined via the trade market, which would help minimize the potential problems listed above.

[Former Reds GM (Patrick)]

Basically my only counter-argument would be that I'd be willing to sacrifice a little league activity (i can't imagine that having one maybe two protected players RFA'd a year would greatly effect league activity) for more realistic and increased flexibility use of the tags. At this point, it's a matter of preference. I don't think there's much of an argument that would discredit either side.

I was only proposing a poll to allow the league office to gauge where people stand on this after this long and drawn out discussion, which would allow the LO to make the decision while at least concretely knowing the GMs' position on the matter.

I think everyone knows where I stand at this point. I'm not going to quit or something if the rule isn't changed. As long as we can trade tags one season in advance, I'm happy. Just seems like a minor but helpful change to the use of RFA tags.

[Former Reds GM (Patrick)]

i made that last post at the same time you did.

i see where you're coming from. im happy as long as we can trade tags.

[BK Dodgers GM (Man)]

Fair enough. I'll put up a poll to gauge interest in the matter.

[Former Reds GM (Patrick)]

Clearly it's a non-issue for most. The more I think about it, the more I see where you're coming from. With tradeable tags, it allows some measure of flexibility with the tags while creating more league activity.