Auction Draft Salary Cap Error (1 Viewer)

[Loomba]

Okay,

At my main league's auction yesterday, we used a big board to track players and remaining salary cap. A simple math error early in the auction resulted in one team having an extra $10 million to spend. The salary cap is $100 million. The error was detected last night when I was entering the players and salaries.

The error was, to some extent, threefold. Firstly, the "league" erred as the person working the board made a simple error. The team in question also erred by not keeping track of his cap and relying on the big board. All other teams present also missed the error too.

What to do?

1. A purist would say the auction was busted due to the trickle down effect it would have had, since the team in question would not have acquired or bid on certain other players. Re-doing the auction is not a practical option, however.

2. I initially thought that the error should be shared (due to most teams relying on the big board) by requiring the team to drop $5 million and then writing down the other $5 million across the rest of his team on a pro rata basis.

3. I now think that the team in question should drop the full $10 million overage as it was effectively given an option on $10 million in extra player(s). Being able to pick and choose to drop today is an advantage even if he has to drop $10 million in salary. The drop player(s) would go into the free agent auction pool.

Does anyone else see another better option or have otherwise dealt with this situation before?

TIA

 

[CalBear]

3. I now think that the team in question should drop the full $10 million overage as it was effectively given an option on $10 million in extra player(s). Being able to pick and choose to drop today is an advantage even if he has to drop $10 million in salary. The drop player(s) would go into the free agent auction pool.Does anyone else see another better option or have otherwise dealt with this situation before?TIA

I think the team has to drop below the $100 million cap; as you note, that's less of a hardship than it would have been to have to stay under the cap in the first place. There's no perfect solution at this point; I think that's the most equitable.

 

[Thrasymachus]

I really don't envy your situation as a commish this would be one of the worst things to happen.

What I would 'probably' do in your situation is what I would call the 'Bank Errors in your Favor' Solution. That is do nothing:

Rule #1 The Big Board is always right.

Rule #2 If the Big Board is wrong see rule #1

We have a rule in our league that after the first game for the next week start all games from the previous week are locked. there is no going back to change things EVEN IF THE SCORING WAS COMPLETELY WRONG. If there was an error and you didn't catch it that is just too bad once the game starts. I would assume a similar stance. once the draft is over the draft is over. If you missed an error you should have caught it at the draft, maybe that will teach your owners to rely so heavily on the Big Board in the future.

That's just my $.02

 

[Velcro]

Well, I've never had this happen before, but my opinion would be the 3rd one you listed. I think the team has to drop $10MM in payroll. Further, you might consider making it the last 10MM that was added since those should have never made it onto his team.

Another thought - while you may need to play the political game and get input and build concensus from other teams, I think you need to be the decision maker and make the decision you feel is best as commissioner. Offering the decision to a vote is a bad idea.

 

[Loomba]

Thanks for the feedback. Keep it coming.

I think we are leaning towards letting him make drops or trades this week to get under the cap and ensuring everyone is aware of the situation so they can try to work a trade with that owner.

There will be no vote on this.

Calbears, I like that you used the word "equitable". Fellow legal beagle?

 

[inca911]

Each individual team owner is responsible to manage his team, including accurate management of the cap. The system you have developed attempts to help the owner meet this requirement, but only the owner is accountable. He should have to get under the cap via drops/trades/etc.

 

[MrPack]

Next year use the Draft Dominator. Works great.

Oh and get rid of the $100 Million and go to a normal number like $100, $200 or $300.

 

[CalBear]

Next year use the Draft Dominator. Works great.

Draft Dominator doesn't solve the problem; it just changes it from a mathematical problem to a data entry one. We used DD and a projector to display max bid amounts in our auction this year, and had several data entry errors that we caught during the auction. It's definitely a good idea, however you're doing your auction, to take a few breaks to recalculate and verify where you are in terms of salary. Especially once people are starting to get knocked out of auctions because they're at their max bid.

 

[Thrasymachus]

Oh and get rid of the $100 Million and go to a normal number like $100, $200 or $300.

 

[Mordraken]

I've had this happen a few times too... What we did is this:

1) Owner can trade with other teams to get himself under $100

2) If they can't work out a trade, they must drop players to get their salary UNDER $90 (the extra $10 is a penalty). They can then make waiver claims to fill their roster (noting that the players they droped would have to go through waivers & could be picked up by other teams first).

Then again, my league has specific provisions for teams that go over the cap in the auction....