Post by Sarawak on Oct 23, 2015 16:32:41 GMT
Coaching Free Agency Roundtable
Here is it your Coaching FART
We surveyed the contestants on 7 questions related to the upcoming coaching free agency. For each question participants are rewarded between 1 and 3 points. Note that the bonuses are lessoned because we had less contestants. This roundtable you can get bonus points in the following ways:
Highest total score: 100 PP
2nd Highest total score: 75 PP
3rd highest total score: 50 PP
Best Answer of the Roundtable: 50 PP
1. So the league has switched from the old system of a $5 million a year softcap (where teams lost space above the salary cap for being over) to a hardcap of $6 million a year for staff. What are your thoughts on this change?
Cairo: I voted for the new system and the raise to 6 million. Not sure I love it but I think it is easier to manage from a commish perspective then tracking hardcap, but I am guessing the penalties for going over it are going to have to be pretty harsh after this first season which is a test run. Examples would be go over, lose your head coach no matter what or go over more than once lose a first round pick. This may seem really draconian, but realistic if the only deterrent is losing the guy you signed then you have raised his price tag for the whole league, knowing you would lose him and that type of strategery is neither cheeky nor fun.
Minnesota: I'm split on it. While I voted to keep the old system I see the cons of it and the pros for the new one. I like that the new system will be easier to explain to new GMs. I like that it will make it easier to track cap. What I'll miss is that strategy involved of investing heavily in coaching if you knew you were going to be losing for a while. Some people felt like it was a burden and if that is the case then it's good that we changed.
Moscow: I like the change overall as makes it much simpler to keep track of long term as coaches contracts rise. It shouldn’t affect Free Agency anymore. Also, gives you a little more flexibility to play with when coaches ask for absurd amounts of money. It sort of dumbs down the game for those GMs who couldn’t handle it and takes another aspect of strategy out. If the idea was to close the gap between bottom tier and top tier GM’s then this did it
Vancouver: I think it’s a good change – I always felt the 5mil was on the lowside, especially with decent scouts having a minimum salary of 2+mil. I also think separating out the 2 caps for coaches and FA makes it a more even playing field because it eliminates significant inflation in coaches which was directly related to teams overpaying because they had to spend their “all in 80mil cap” and felt coaches were the best investment. I think now teams have to budget and make smart offers since they only have a max allotment of $6mil, so spending $5mil on a HC is just ludicrous.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 1
Moscow: 2
Vancouver: 3
Moderator Thoughts: Everybody has solid points but Vancouver nails this particular one. Teams are going to make really bad decisions year one and cost the league talent.
2. Follow up question what teams do you think are most likely to go over the hardcap and how hard are you going to laugh?
Cairo: The team’s that invest really heavily (4+ Million in one spot) It is going to be tough if you tie up a ton of your cap in a scout or head coach. Say between the two you end up with 5.5 million invested. You still have to grab 3 assistants with 500K. Based on Legends I am going to say Spurs, he always invests heavily in a scout and I think that will make it hard to put together an actual staff with 6 million
Minnesota: Cairo - that guy's a buffoon. Man I wish Beijing made it into the committee. Can we vote Cairo out? He's clueless.
Moscow: I would imagine quite a few GM’s go over the hardcap this off-season in attempts to sign someone big to their roster. Since there is no penalty for going over, I won’t laugh but may actually applaud for someone taking a shot. If you miss on a ton of people then overpaying in an area isn’t a bad option.
Vancouver: Washington. I’m not sure he can even count to 6, so trying to manage a budget will be extremely difficult. I won’t even laugh because it’s not nice to make fun of special people and their disabilities.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 2
Vancouver: 1
Moderator Thoughts: Minnesota is right that Cairo guy is a buffoon, best answer of the RT right there. He will probably get replaced shortly on the committee! I don’t really agree with Moscow’s assessment I think GM’s are screwing themselves and the league by pushing the hardcap for guys. Washington is such a predictable response.
3. What do you look for in a head coach, an assistant coach and a scout?
Cairo: I really look for a guy that value the skills I want. I want a great defensive and shooting coach who is really solid in one of the other two areas. I don’t go for the good but not great in all areas HC, because I think you can always find a specialist of an assistant coach on the cheap. Assistant coaches I try to fill in the gaps again with a focus on Shooting and Defense, because those areas form the basis of how I want my team to play. As far as a scout, I like to get a guy who is solid in both current and future, but don’t ever chase the elite scouts as I think they are very expensive and I would rather focus on my coaching staff.
Minnesota: I want breadth of talent in a Head Coach. Since their attributes double for your team it's good to have them have talent in all skills rather than super high in just a couple. Assistants will balance out the talents of the Head Coach and the other Assistants. No need to have 4 guys who excel in Inside. I like current scouts the most because they give you the best reading on a player's athletics as well as their current abilities.
Moscow: I’d like my head coach to be effective in at least 2 primary areas and 2 secondary areas to give me a good base then I normally target 2+1 assistants to make sure my team has depth. For a scout it is simple, I don’t care because the league scout is better. I won a title not opening the game except to test trades and very few would doubt my ability to decipher talent. The Secret Is Out.
Vancouver: In my head coach, I look for a jack of all trades with an emphasis on defense. I want them to be average or above in all 5 areas (ins,sht,hnd,prd,psd) because I try to get assistant coaches that are elite at 2 skills and average in a 3rd. It helps create a good balance and a staff that typically has 4 stars with at least a 5 star mixed in somewhere. In terms of scouts, they are so overpriced that I just try to find a good bargain, where they are elite on 1 side and mediocre on the other. I’ll lean towards the worse guy wanting $60k versus the elite guy wanting $2.2mil.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 2
Vancouver: 2
Moderator Thoughts: Good work by everybody. I won’t go as far as Moscow and encourage the use of the league scout, but he is correct in that scouts tend to be overvalued. Minnesota wins this round by a sliver and two points each to the others.
4. How do you plan on dividing up your money in coaching free agency?
Cairo: Biggest money to a HC, landing one of day 1 would be huge for us. Then I will spend the majority of my remaining budget on assistants and just kind of pick up a scout as I can. I also am pretty seriously considering punting on everything but a head coach and gambling on their being considerably less competition for guys next off season. I say this because I think the majority of GMs are going to go nuts getting guys to sign this year and be at or close to the 6 million hard cap. That is good for now, but as contracts start expiring there are going to be a ton of overpaid coaches that nobody is going to be able to keep with it now being a hardcap. So I would say that a little restraint could serve teams well.
Minnesota: I don't know percentages but the bulk of it will go to the Head Coach because Training Camps are so important. I don't want to lose an asset that way. This time around I will probably invest more in Assistants too. I think it will be pretty important to have a good staff.
Moscow: It’ll likely be something along the lines of 3.5 mill head coach with 2 1 mill assistants and a value assistant with the bare minimum going to the scout but I haven’t looked in the game to make offers yet.
Vancouver: Without divulging too much information into my madness, I will be spending around 30-40% on a HC depending on who accepts, 50-60% on AC and roughly 5-10% on a scout. With EVERY team needing coaches, it’s literally anyones guess as to what bids are in the realm of winning or are not even in the equation. It is definitely going to be interesting to see what goes down today.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 3
Vancouver: 3
Moderator Thoughts: 3s for everybody. Very similar thinking, not as much diversity in answers with this question. Who wrote such a bad question?!?
5. How important are scouts in your opinion?
Cairo: They have a lot of value, it is important to know what guys actually can do or could become. That said I don’t ever invest big money in a scout because I have always found a good scout for under a million dollars unless they were a one year rental. For rebuilding teams I think the scout grows in importance.
Minnesota: Depends - they vary so much it’s tough to gauge how much they help. Wonder if it’s the lack of time scouting since the league just started or what. I imagine prices for guys will be sky high this year but will settle down in the future. Next year you'll probably find a lot of bargain staff. Since everyone will be signing full staffs this year there won't be much competition in Staff FA then.
Moscow: Scouts are worthless to me and I am beyond over them. The vast difference between them and their inability to correctly read a player is worthless. Some players “outplay” their ratings but I prefer to call it what it is, an ignorant scout.
Vancouver: Meh – as mentioned in question 3, I don’t think they produce as much bang for their buck so I don’t value them too highly. I value the analytics side more so I say value that 60% and then my scouts opinion 40%, so I guess it’s not very high.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 1
Vancouver: 2
Moderator Thoughts: Similar thoughts but I disagree with the extreme nature of Moscow’s response. Scouts are not worthless imo.
6. What’s the most money some team will pay a Scout this off season?
Cairo: 4.5 Million. Some team will throw out a 4.5 million bid on a scout and then try to assemble a staff for 1.5 million.
Minnesota: 5 million. Someone will pay up for a top scout. The rebuilding teams will want to get it right. Might only be a 1 year deal though. You can fill out the rest of yor staff for 1 mil if you had to.
Moscow: Some teams will ante up big time for a scout because they don’t have a ton of players to develop and they think they’re getting a secret look at other players. I’ll laugh at them more than anything.
Vancouver: Easily $2++ million – those rebuilding teams want to ensure they get the best scouts because swinging and missing on a player in the draft during a rebuild will set you back years, especially if it’s a single digit pick.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota:2
Moscow: 3
Vancouver: 1
Moderator Thoughts: I agree with the notion that it will be well over 3 million a year even if on a one year deal. I think 2 million is likely the avg salary of really good scout as things shake out.
7. With every coach/scout a free agent how insane do you expect things to be this off season?
Cairo: Insane in the membrane. I honestly think as mentioned in an earlier answer a lot of teams are going to think very short term, not be able to retain key staff members long term and pretty much make it so a lot of the better staffing talents in the game are out of the league after one contract because nobody will be able to afford them and have any semblance of a staff around them.
Minnesota: Pretty nuts. I think we will see a lot of inflated prices this season for staff. People will be bidding against each other and will want to get "their guy". As I mentioned earlier there is probably strategic advantage in waiting a season or two to really go for a staff but that could all be for naught with 36 teams. Maybe there are just too many other GMs looking for an edge for anyone to find a real steal for their staff.
Moscow: I’m not sure if I am dreading coaching FA or absolutely in love with this idea. It’s a clean slate and it should be fun. That being said, some teams are going to whiff badly and be in a huge hole. It’ll be interesting to see how this goes.
Vancouver: It’s going to be wild – 34 teams need 1 HC and 3 assistance and 1 scout and to top it all off, we have this new hard cap so no one really has any clue what is overypaying / underpaying. I think we will see teams err on the side of caution and overpay to ensure they get their guys but to be honest, we don’t know what is the average contract per each position, so this will be absolutely insane.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 3
Vancouver: 3
Moderator Thoughts: 3s across the board it will be utter chaos. If I had thought of it sooner I would have proposed some sort of limited staff draft (Say 2 rounds worth) just to give teams something to build upon. But I didn’t .
Total Scoring and the Awarding of Points
First place w 18 Points: Minnesota (100 PP + 50 for best answer+75 for participating) = 225
Second place w 16 Points: Moscow (75 PP + 75 for participating) = 150
Third Place w 15 Points: Vancouver (50 PP + 75 for participating) = 125
4th Place w Points : Cairo the moderator cannot grade his own answers after all = 0 points (will happily take my 150 for moderating tho )
Moderator: Cairo = 150 pp
Here is it your Coaching FART
We surveyed the contestants on 7 questions related to the upcoming coaching free agency. For each question participants are rewarded between 1 and 3 points. Note that the bonuses are lessoned because we had less contestants. This roundtable you can get bonus points in the following ways:
Highest total score: 100 PP
2nd Highest total score: 75 PP
3rd highest total score: 50 PP
Best Answer of the Roundtable: 50 PP
1. So the league has switched from the old system of a $5 million a year softcap (where teams lost space above the salary cap for being over) to a hardcap of $6 million a year for staff. What are your thoughts on this change?
Cairo: I voted for the new system and the raise to 6 million. Not sure I love it but I think it is easier to manage from a commish perspective then tracking hardcap, but I am guessing the penalties for going over it are going to have to be pretty harsh after this first season which is a test run. Examples would be go over, lose your head coach no matter what or go over more than once lose a first round pick. This may seem really draconian, but realistic if the only deterrent is losing the guy you signed then you have raised his price tag for the whole league, knowing you would lose him and that type of strategery is neither cheeky nor fun.
Minnesota: I'm split on it. While I voted to keep the old system I see the cons of it and the pros for the new one. I like that the new system will be easier to explain to new GMs. I like that it will make it easier to track cap. What I'll miss is that strategy involved of investing heavily in coaching if you knew you were going to be losing for a while. Some people felt like it was a burden and if that is the case then it's good that we changed.
Moscow: I like the change overall as makes it much simpler to keep track of long term as coaches contracts rise. It shouldn’t affect Free Agency anymore. Also, gives you a little more flexibility to play with when coaches ask for absurd amounts of money. It sort of dumbs down the game for those GMs who couldn’t handle it and takes another aspect of strategy out. If the idea was to close the gap between bottom tier and top tier GM’s then this did it
Vancouver: I think it’s a good change – I always felt the 5mil was on the lowside, especially with decent scouts having a minimum salary of 2+mil. I also think separating out the 2 caps for coaches and FA makes it a more even playing field because it eliminates significant inflation in coaches which was directly related to teams overpaying because they had to spend their “all in 80mil cap” and felt coaches were the best investment. I think now teams have to budget and make smart offers since they only have a max allotment of $6mil, so spending $5mil on a HC is just ludicrous.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 1
Moscow: 2
Vancouver: 3
Moderator Thoughts: Everybody has solid points but Vancouver nails this particular one. Teams are going to make really bad decisions year one and cost the league talent.
2. Follow up question what teams do you think are most likely to go over the hardcap and how hard are you going to laugh?
Cairo: The team’s that invest really heavily (4+ Million in one spot) It is going to be tough if you tie up a ton of your cap in a scout or head coach. Say between the two you end up with 5.5 million invested. You still have to grab 3 assistants with 500K. Based on Legends I am going to say Spurs, he always invests heavily in a scout and I think that will make it hard to put together an actual staff with 6 million
Minnesota: Cairo - that guy's a buffoon. Man I wish Beijing made it into the committee. Can we vote Cairo out? He's clueless.
Moscow: I would imagine quite a few GM’s go over the hardcap this off-season in attempts to sign someone big to their roster. Since there is no penalty for going over, I won’t laugh but may actually applaud for someone taking a shot. If you miss on a ton of people then overpaying in an area isn’t a bad option.
Vancouver: Washington. I’m not sure he can even count to 6, so trying to manage a budget will be extremely difficult. I won’t even laugh because it’s not nice to make fun of special people and their disabilities.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 2
Vancouver: 1
Moderator Thoughts: Minnesota is right that Cairo guy is a buffoon, best answer of the RT right there. He will probably get replaced shortly on the committee! I don’t really agree with Moscow’s assessment I think GM’s are screwing themselves and the league by pushing the hardcap for guys. Washington is such a predictable response.
3. What do you look for in a head coach, an assistant coach and a scout?
Cairo: I really look for a guy that value the skills I want. I want a great defensive and shooting coach who is really solid in one of the other two areas. I don’t go for the good but not great in all areas HC, because I think you can always find a specialist of an assistant coach on the cheap. Assistant coaches I try to fill in the gaps again with a focus on Shooting and Defense, because those areas form the basis of how I want my team to play. As far as a scout, I like to get a guy who is solid in both current and future, but don’t ever chase the elite scouts as I think they are very expensive and I would rather focus on my coaching staff.
Minnesota: I want breadth of talent in a Head Coach. Since their attributes double for your team it's good to have them have talent in all skills rather than super high in just a couple. Assistants will balance out the talents of the Head Coach and the other Assistants. No need to have 4 guys who excel in Inside. I like current scouts the most because they give you the best reading on a player's athletics as well as their current abilities.
Moscow: I’d like my head coach to be effective in at least 2 primary areas and 2 secondary areas to give me a good base then I normally target 2+1 assistants to make sure my team has depth. For a scout it is simple, I don’t care because the league scout is better. I won a title not opening the game except to test trades and very few would doubt my ability to decipher talent. The Secret Is Out.
Vancouver: In my head coach, I look for a jack of all trades with an emphasis on defense. I want them to be average or above in all 5 areas (ins,sht,hnd,prd,psd) because I try to get assistant coaches that are elite at 2 skills and average in a 3rd. It helps create a good balance and a staff that typically has 4 stars with at least a 5 star mixed in somewhere. In terms of scouts, they are so overpriced that I just try to find a good bargain, where they are elite on 1 side and mediocre on the other. I’ll lean towards the worse guy wanting $60k versus the elite guy wanting $2.2mil.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 2
Vancouver: 2
Moderator Thoughts: Good work by everybody. I won’t go as far as Moscow and encourage the use of the league scout, but he is correct in that scouts tend to be overvalued. Minnesota wins this round by a sliver and two points each to the others.
4. How do you plan on dividing up your money in coaching free agency?
Cairo: Biggest money to a HC, landing one of day 1 would be huge for us. Then I will spend the majority of my remaining budget on assistants and just kind of pick up a scout as I can. I also am pretty seriously considering punting on everything but a head coach and gambling on their being considerably less competition for guys next off season. I say this because I think the majority of GMs are going to go nuts getting guys to sign this year and be at or close to the 6 million hard cap. That is good for now, but as contracts start expiring there are going to be a ton of overpaid coaches that nobody is going to be able to keep with it now being a hardcap. So I would say that a little restraint could serve teams well.
Minnesota: I don't know percentages but the bulk of it will go to the Head Coach because Training Camps are so important. I don't want to lose an asset that way. This time around I will probably invest more in Assistants too. I think it will be pretty important to have a good staff.
Moscow: It’ll likely be something along the lines of 3.5 mill head coach with 2 1 mill assistants and a value assistant with the bare minimum going to the scout but I haven’t looked in the game to make offers yet.
Vancouver: Without divulging too much information into my madness, I will be spending around 30-40% on a HC depending on who accepts, 50-60% on AC and roughly 5-10% on a scout. With EVERY team needing coaches, it’s literally anyones guess as to what bids are in the realm of winning or are not even in the equation. It is definitely going to be interesting to see what goes down today.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 3
Vancouver: 3
Moderator Thoughts: 3s for everybody. Very similar thinking, not as much diversity in answers with this question. Who wrote such a bad question?!?
5. How important are scouts in your opinion?
Cairo: They have a lot of value, it is important to know what guys actually can do or could become. That said I don’t ever invest big money in a scout because I have always found a good scout for under a million dollars unless they were a one year rental. For rebuilding teams I think the scout grows in importance.
Minnesota: Depends - they vary so much it’s tough to gauge how much they help. Wonder if it’s the lack of time scouting since the league just started or what. I imagine prices for guys will be sky high this year but will settle down in the future. Next year you'll probably find a lot of bargain staff. Since everyone will be signing full staffs this year there won't be much competition in Staff FA then.
Moscow: Scouts are worthless to me and I am beyond over them. The vast difference between them and their inability to correctly read a player is worthless. Some players “outplay” their ratings but I prefer to call it what it is, an ignorant scout.
Vancouver: Meh – as mentioned in question 3, I don’t think they produce as much bang for their buck so I don’t value them too highly. I value the analytics side more so I say value that 60% and then my scouts opinion 40%, so I guess it’s not very high.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 1
Vancouver: 2
Moderator Thoughts: Similar thoughts but I disagree with the extreme nature of Moscow’s response. Scouts are not worthless imo.
6. What’s the most money some team will pay a Scout this off season?
Cairo: 4.5 Million. Some team will throw out a 4.5 million bid on a scout and then try to assemble a staff for 1.5 million.
Minnesota: 5 million. Someone will pay up for a top scout. The rebuilding teams will want to get it right. Might only be a 1 year deal though. You can fill out the rest of yor staff for 1 mil if you had to.
Moscow: Some teams will ante up big time for a scout because they don’t have a ton of players to develop and they think they’re getting a secret look at other players. I’ll laugh at them more than anything.
Vancouver: Easily $2++ million – those rebuilding teams want to ensure they get the best scouts because swinging and missing on a player in the draft during a rebuild will set you back years, especially if it’s a single digit pick.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota:2
Moscow: 3
Vancouver: 1
Moderator Thoughts: I agree with the notion that it will be well over 3 million a year even if on a one year deal. I think 2 million is likely the avg salary of really good scout as things shake out.
7. With every coach/scout a free agent how insane do you expect things to be this off season?
Cairo: Insane in the membrane. I honestly think as mentioned in an earlier answer a lot of teams are going to think very short term, not be able to retain key staff members long term and pretty much make it so a lot of the better staffing talents in the game are out of the league after one contract because nobody will be able to afford them and have any semblance of a staff around them.
Minnesota: Pretty nuts. I think we will see a lot of inflated prices this season for staff. People will be bidding against each other and will want to get "their guy". As I mentioned earlier there is probably strategic advantage in waiting a season or two to really go for a staff but that could all be for naught with 36 teams. Maybe there are just too many other GMs looking for an edge for anyone to find a real steal for their staff.
Moscow: I’m not sure if I am dreading coaching FA or absolutely in love with this idea. It’s a clean slate and it should be fun. That being said, some teams are going to whiff badly and be in a huge hole. It’ll be interesting to see how this goes.
Vancouver: It’s going to be wild – 34 teams need 1 HC and 3 assistance and 1 scout and to top it all off, we have this new hard cap so no one really has any clue what is overypaying / underpaying. I think we will see teams err on the side of caution and overpay to ensure they get their guys but to be honest, we don’t know what is the average contract per each position, so this will be absolutely insane.
Question Scoring:
Cairo: N/A
Minnesota: 3
Moscow: 3
Vancouver: 3
Moderator Thoughts: 3s across the board it will be utter chaos. If I had thought of it sooner I would have proposed some sort of limited staff draft (Say 2 rounds worth) just to give teams something to build upon. But I didn’t .
Total Scoring and the Awarding of Points
First place w 18 Points: Minnesota (100 PP + 50 for best answer+75 for participating) = 225
Second place w 16 Points: Moscow (75 PP + 75 for participating) = 150
Third Place w 15 Points: Vancouver (50 PP + 75 for participating) = 125
4th Place w Points : Cairo the moderator cannot grade his own answers after all = 0 points (will happily take my 150 for moderating tho )
Moderator: Cairo = 150 pp
