Interested in a salary cap league, like the original FBUK?

Anyone that played Fantasy Baseball UK in 2019 or before will be aware that before it broke, the original game used a salary cap system:

• Each MLB player was assigned a salary value based on previous performance
• Rather than a draft, managers built their roster within a team salary budget cap (the same for each team – $12m)
• Within the league, the same MLB player could be held by multiple different fantasy teams/managers
• As the season went on, player salary values were regularly recalculated based on performance (and at a ratio appropriate to the $12m team budget)
• Revaluation wouldn’t affect a player’s salary if they were already on your roster but if you added a player during the season it would be based on their current salary value at the time.

So as you dropped and added players through the season you would need to be mindful of your overall team budget cap. Similar to how fantasy football (soccer) in the UK tends to work.

Well, I might have found a solution 💡 to reintroduce the old FBUK format using the Fantrax online fantasy baseball platform, which offers a salary cap league as one of its formats. I am in the process of testing it out now, but it looks like it offers exactly what the old FBUK format did but with the advantages of being a professional fantasy platform with a modern interface, technical support and seemingly very customisable league settings from the commissioner’s point of view.

The hitch is that to use the salary cap format requires paying for a Premium League package at $100 USD (about £75) per league per season, but seems to cater for up to 200 teams per league. So there would probably need to be an entry fee for managers to help cover costs but with enough fantasy teams the per-team cost would be relatively low. For example, if there were at least 15 teams, the cost would be similar to the £5 per team rate of the old FBUK game that was charged for buying additional teams.

The intention would be to still run the free Yahoo draft-based games as currently and offer a Fantrax league for those that want to return to the salary cap format and don’t mind paying a small entry fee to do so.

Nothing is decided yet but I thought I would let you know. To help with planning, it would be useful to get a sense of the numbers that might participate, so please do indicate your interest via the topic poll and in the comments below.

(If it goes ahead there will be more info and a proper registration process nearer the start of the 2022 season.)

Thanks,
Tim

• This topic was modified 2 years, 12 months ago by FBUK. Reason: Closed topic poll

[gregor @gregor]

Hi Tim

I think that sounds like a good idea. While I’ve enjoyed the Yahoo! games over the past couple of years, I miss the old salary capped format. A few quid to enter sounds OK to me.

Thanks for the time & effort you’ve put in to keeping the game running!

Derek (Ted&Yaz&Manny&Me)

[Redbaron 07 @redbaron-07]

Hi Tim

Yep, I’d be up for playing the old format as well as playing in the 2 games in the Yahoo format too.

Rene’ (Secret Agents)

[Jonathan @jonathan]

Yes, I’m up for it too!

The current Yahoo format is great and I love the interface, but getting the initial draft right or lucky has a disproportionately big effect on your season in my view. An early draft pick getting an injury early on (Steven Strasburg, Mike Trout) can leave you struggling…. But maybe that’s part of the fun?🤨

[dodotop @dodotop]

I’d likely be in as well.

[Jane W @jane-w]

I really missed the old game and it was the only Fantasy game I’d ever played so it’s take me a while to get the hang of the Yahoo games.  I’ve played in this Points Only game and another Yahoo Public Rotisserie League that last two seasons and I’m not sure I’d want to play the old salary cap game as well now.  I enjoy being able to change players on a daily basis and find the Yahoo platform easy to use. I’m surprised the Forum hasn’t been used much this year – I used to enjoy the daily banter and having somewhere to have a good moan when things weren’t going well 😩  Thanks for all your efforts, Tim, and for keeping Fantasy Baseball UK going.  If you decide to go back to just playing the salary cap game instead of Yahoo I would probably join.  I certainly don’t mind a financial contribution and have always felt we should pay to play to compensate those running it.

[Allan @dynamite]

Count me in.

[Gareth Jones @garethrhysjones]

It seems I’m just adding the same kind of sentiment… Despite slowly getting the hang of the yahoo leagues, I do miss the old league.  I’m up for it, and happy to contribute.

[Baz The Bald @baz_the_bald]

Not for me, I’m afraid. It’s just too unrealistic when everybody has the same players.

 

[Baz The Bald @baz_the_bald]

I would say that injuries were far more damaging under the old system because you could only replace players once a week or even less in the limited trade league if you’d already used up your monthly allowance. I remember many occurrences when I signed a player on the Sunday and he was injured that day.

[FBUKCommissionerTopic Author @fbuk]

Baz The Bald wrote:

I would say that injuries were far more damaging under the old system because you could only replace players once a week.

Fantrax is very customisable so I think it could be set to allow daily transactions if we wanted (or maybe people liked the challenge of the once-a-week transaction deadline?)