Never saw this before!

[Wheeler Dealer]

My GM didn't invite ANYONE to camp.

The new arrivals were the three FAs I hired during bidding and the 10 draftees I selected! I started camp with only 48 players, after I signed my draft class!

I think it was a cap problem. I had set aside $12M to sign draftees and have about $3M left over for an in season extension where the player's price rated to go up. The rest either rated to extend for about the same amount or I wasn't planning to extend them.

I don't normally worry about the cost of the camp FA's. The cap during camp is based on the most costly 53 players on the roster. Adding a $290K rookie doesn't cost anything if the lowest paid player in the 53 already makes $290K. Adding $900K vets cost a bit more but it's usually temporary and can be "borrowed" from the reserve for extensions.

Two things went wrong;

1) My #1 pick cost me $1M more than planned.

2) I had only 38 players on my roster AFTER I added the three free agents during pre-draft bidding. This meant the first 15 players added at full price instead of the difference between that player and a less costly player.

I think the my GM was allowing for the possibility that all of my draft picks might receive maximum cost contracts. I never pay more than minimum, sometimes with extra bonuses or incentives to hurry the process along.

I finally got my roster up to 56 by hiring all the undrafted rookies available.

I thought this would let me hire more rookies as the other teams cut them since they wouldn't add anything to the cap but the program apparently checks first to see if I have enough cap room to cover the new FA, not how much impact the new FA will have on my cap!

I even resorted to panning for gold among the other teams' rejects. Once I gave up on a rookie I could drop him and pick up a rookie some other team had cut. I did find an 80/88 DE this way. He'll be a starter once I negotiate a real contract with him.

After much wiggling and squirming I entered the season with $40K cap room!

Did I mention that I just took over the Green Bay Franchise in 2015. Their finances were a mess!

[jesrockz]

Doesn't entering the season with only 40K in cap room left mean that you won't be able to extend ANY contracts during the season? That's what it always does to me and that really sucks.

[Wheeler Dealer]

Quote: Originally Posted by jesrockz

Doesn't entering the season with only 40K in cap room left mean that you won't be able to extend ANY contracts during the season? That's what it always does to me and that really sucks.

I don't know for sure. I have several contracts that I expect to extend at lower cap figures. For example, I have a FB I picked up out of the FA Pool for $1M. I am sure that one will be extended for less. I have an 80 ovl WR making $4.8M. If he doesn't negotiate a lower contract, I'll cut him if I need the space.

The big one is Aaron Kampman at $10.5M in the last year of his contract. If he doesn't negotiate a lower number I'll need to trade him.

It should let you negotiate down but it may not let you start a negotiation unless you can meet the new contract demand with current cap room. That would be disappointing.

I may not find out for sure this year, I already traded my QB and cleared up $1.2M. I have other overpaid players on the trading block.

I'll let you know.

[DassTheBoss]

Usually, the game won't let you negotiate a contract if you don't have enough money to afford the most expensive option of the contract. So for big name guys, you should have $10M plus to try to enter into talks, even if you won't pay as much.

[Wheeler Dealer]

I had a LT making about $2M that had a minimum demand of about $4.5M (I found out later) and I could not enter negotiations with my $1.2M cap room.

It did let me enter negotiations with Aaron Kampman (He was costing my cap $10.1M). He wanted minimum $29.7 for 3 years including a bonus. I suppose I was allowed to start negotiations since his minimum was less than his current cap hit plus my cap room.

It seemed to me that all the players whose minimum demand was less than their current cap hit were allowed to negotiate new contracts.