Discussion - Roster rule changes

[Rangers]

The new exco group has had some discussion on some long discussed roster rule alterations and is considering the following changes:

1. Officially setting a minimum of 25 database players

This must include one catcher and is only in effect during the season - Opening Day through August 31 (since September roster moves are not reflected in the DB). This would go into effect this spring.

2. Removing the draft slots

We were hesitant to do this too quickly, since GMs have presumably made moves with the idea that they must fill those spots effectively in mind. In my mind, having a period (like we do now moving forwad) where rosters must have no more than 40 non-7/8 players mitigates this concern, but that is my feeling, not the exco's. And a transition date would be a part of this discussion.

Together these would make the roster rules simple. During the season, we have a roster limit of 50 players with at least 25 database players. In the offseason, 50 players, period.

Thoughts? Please keep comments on topic and constructive.

[Rangers]

I wanted to add one thought on the draft slots. In my opinion, the need for this has disappeared with the improvement of the quality of league GMs. As noted in a couple of responses to my draft reviews, there were some fairly clueless GMs back in the old days, and some of us hadn't had much practice at developing a roster or drafting.

Now that acquiring prospects is much, much more competitive (I've been around since 2005, and it is a whole other story from even then), the opportunity to add nice players is that much more valuable. Before, a 4th or 5th rounder didn't hold all that much value because players equivalent to that were readily available. Therefore forcing a number of spots to recent drafees legitimized the draft itself. Now, if you want to add young players, you're smart to accumulate and do well with your draft picks. The draft now has a natural value, including even later picks. Note how many late picks Jagger and I made, despite the fact that this was a poor draft and that we were both already over our minimum of ten draft players.

[Mariners]

I like a 40-man roster with some sort of differentiation of 'minor leaguers' (currently 'draft roster' of 10).

The 40 man roster should be a 40 man roster used however a GM wants. But the added '10 players' should be any players not in the SIM, '05s, '06s, '07s or '08s, whatever, as long as they are not in the SIM.

I don't have an opinion on the "25 man" part, so I'll leave those opinions for others.

[Giants]

Again, I'll point out the problem with using the DB as the be all end all, which is the vagaries of who gets projections. For example, my 2nd round pick last year Clayton Mortensen popped up in this years database with a useless projection. Obviously I had no intention of using him this year, but if I were to lose his prospect eligibility for a useless sim that would suck. Essentially, what eliminating draft slots would do is benefit the teams that want to sign high risk/high reward youngsters (especially the Dominican bonus babies), at the expense of teams who prefer more ready talent.

My position on this is "if it ain't broke don't fix it," there is nothing at all wrong with the current roster setup (which if anything is much easier to understand since we started using numbers and OOPSS, remember that ridiculous x-y-z crap when I first joined?), and the impact of this rule change would be to encourage people to draft and stash 16-18 year olds, which would ultimately diminish the free agent pool if these guys broke out. On the other hand it certainly sucks to have to make decisions on guys who haven't played above low A (like how I'm going to have to burn a roster spot on Sebastian Valle's apparent GCL potential, and had to cut Randall Delgado for the same reason). I definitely like 25/25 better than 40/10, but my vote is pretty solidly for no change is necessary.

[Twins]

I think I'm with Jake on this one. I don't think any change is necessary. The current system is easy enough to understand, and it makes for some interesting roster decisions, and I think it adds some fun to the draft.

[DBacks]

I am 100% in favor of this change. I think allowing GMs more control over their roster spaces is a positive thing.

[Yankees]

I think we've got the draft thing under control - don't see any real reason to change.

[Tigers]

I have to say I'm with Jake on this one. I think there should be a risk involved with signing a 16 year old international prospects and I think it is a good thing for the league to make GM's make a decision on draft prospects after two years (essentially three full seasons of proball) on whether or not they are worth keeping on their 40 man roster.

It allows for more player movement in the free agent market, IMO.

[Rangers]

I have to say I'm with Jake on this one. I think there should be a risk involved with signing a 16 year old international prospects and I think it is a good thing for the league to make GM's make a decision on draft prospects after two years (essentially three full seasons of proball) on whether or not they are worth keeping on their 40 man roster.

It allows for more player movement in the free agent market, IMO.

How does having no draft roster decrease the risk involved with signing a 16 year old? You still have to waste the same inactive roster spot either way. I don't feel all that strongly about this, but I think you guys are overrating the strategy involved and how much drafting young kids hurts someone under the current rules versus ones with no draft slots.

[Tigers]

I have to say I'm with Jake on this one. I think there should be a risk involved with signing a 16 year old international prospects and I think it is a good thing for the league to make GM's make a decision on draft prospects after two years (essentially three full seasons of proball) on whether or not they are worth keeping on their 40 man roster.

It allows for more player movement in the free agent market, IMO.

How does having no draft roster decrease the risk involved with signing a 16 year old? You still have to waste the same inactive roster spot either way. I don't feel all that strongly about this, but I think you guys are overrating the strategy involved and how much drafting young kids hurts someone under the current rules versus ones with no draft slots.

I don't see where Jake or myself proposed eliminating the draft roster? I think having the draft roster is a good idea and we should continue to have it and manage it the way we currently do.

[Rangers]

I have to say I'm with Jake on this one. I think there should be a risk involved with signing a 16 year old international prospects and I think it is a good thing for the league to make GM's make a decision on draft prospects after two years (essentially three full seasons of proball) on whether or not they are worth keeping on their 40 man roster.

It allows for more player movement in the free agent market, IMO.

How does having no draft roster decrease the risk involved with signing a 16 year old? You still have to waste the same inactive roster spot either way. I don't feel all that strongly about this, but I think you guys are overrating the strategy involved and how much drafting young kids hurts someone under the current rules versus ones with no draft slots.

I don't see where Jake or myself proposed eliminating the draft roster? I think having the draft roster is a good idea and we should continue to have it and manage it the way we currently do.

Huh? The proposal is to change it. You're proposing to not change it. Hence the comparison "but I think you guys are overrating...how much drafting young kids hurts someone under the current rules versus ones with no draft slots".

[Tigers]

How does having no draft roster decrease the risk involved with signing a 16 year old? You still have to waste the same inactive roster spot either way. I don't feel all that strongly about this, but I think you guys are overrating the strategy involved and how much drafting young kids hurts someone under the current rules versus ones with no draft slots.

I don't see where Jake or myself proposed eliminating the draft roster? I think having the draft roster is a good idea and we should continue to have it and manage it the way we currently do.

Huh? The proposal is to change it. You're proposing to not change it. Hence the comparison "but I think you guys are overrating...how much drafting young kids hurts someone under the current rules versus ones with no draft slots".

Eliminating the draft slots decreases the risk of signing 16 year old international players because GM's would now have 10 additional roster spots (the draft slots that are now being converted to regular roster spots) that they can stash those prospects on for an unlimited amount of time/seasons while they develop. I don't see where that is a good thing for player movement in the league.

Under the current system as a GM you have to make a decision on whether or not it is worth it to move those younger players on your 40 man roster and sacrifice a roster spot for them. If they are still at low levels in the minors and you don't think its worth it, that player gets released out into the open market and other teams, rebuilding teams can get a shot at signing those players.

[Rangers]

I would maintain that that is a minimal factor. First of all, no one in the league has more than a couple of 16 year olds at a given time. Of that relatively small group, even if you double it to consider all Latin kids from two classes, they sort themselves out in terms of being worthy of a roster spot (not a draft spot or non draft spot, any roster spot period) in short order.

The fact of the matter is that if I were to prefer stashing addtional non-draft prospects in those ten spots, they're going to be midlevel players almost to a guy. A few of those may be Latin kids from several years ago (not two, more like four or five), but more often they're pitchers who have sustained injuries and had their development stalled as a result. And even when it's an issue, it's an issue over one or two spots most of the time. Just based on the natural order of things, if you have 25 prospects, around 40% of them will probably come from the last two drafts.

The real effect is minimal, so the question is whether having the extra rules is worth the minimal strategic difference.

[Tigers]

I would maintain that that is a minimal factor. First of all, no one in the league has more than a couple of 16 year olds at a given time. Of that relatively small group, even if you double it to consider all Latin kids from two classes, they sort themselves out in terms of being worthy of a roster spot (not a draft spot or non draft spot, any roster spot period) in short order.

The fact of the matter is that if I were to prefer stashing addtional non-draft prospects in those ten spots, they're going to be midlevel players almost to a guy. A few of those may be Latin kids from several years ago (not two, more like four or five), but more often they're pitchers who have sustained injuries and had their development stalled as a result. And even when it's an issue, it's an issue over one or two spots most of the time. Just based on the natural order of things, if you have 25 prospects, around 40% of them will probably come from the last two drafts.

The real effect is minimal, so the question is whether having the extra rules is worth the minimal strategic difference.

Possibly minimal, possibly not.

I think the rule is worth having and helps promote some player movement that otherwise wouldn't happen under the proposed change.

[Rangers]

I think the rule is worth having and helps promote some player movement that otherwise wouldn't happen under the proposed change.

Fair enough.

[Tigers]

I think the rule is worth having and helps promote some player movement that otherwise wouldn't happen under the proposed change.

Fair enough.

Just to be fair, I don't think the other option was a bad idea, I just think the current system is better for promoting additional player/prospect movement.

[Giants]

I would maintain that that is a minimal factor. First of all, no one in the league has more than a couple of 16 year olds at a given time. Of that relatively small group, even if you double it to consider all Latin kids from two classes, they sort themselves out in terms of being worthy of a roster spot (not a draft spot or non draft spot, any roster spot period) in short order.

The fact of the matter is that if I were to prefer stashing addtional non-draft prospects in those ten spots, they're going to be midlevel players almost to a guy. A few of those may be Latin kids from several years ago (not two, more like four or five), but more often they're pitchers who have sustained injuries and had their development stalled as a result. And even when it's an issue, it's an issue over one or two spots most of the time. Just based on the natural order of things, if you have 25 prospects, around 40% of them will probably come from the last two drafts.

The real effect is minimal, so the question is whether having the extra rules is worth the minimal strategic difference.

I think that what will happen isn't so much that every team is going to go nuts with 16 year olds, but that a few teams will wind up stashing them all and we'll have the same problem we had before they were draftable of a certain few GMs getting the benefit of the entire market, only this time in terms of quantity as well as quality.

[Royals]

I'm with Jake, Brennan and the others. I don't see the need for a change and the current setup forces gm's to pay attention to the minor leagues, as they should. I know Gabe has always been in favor of changing this as he (at least seemingly) doesn't like dealing with prospects. That's an important thing in baseball though, developing young talent.

[Dodgers]

I'm still catching up on posts, so I reserve the right to be corrected where I have missed discussions (that I haven't read yet), but as far as I remember my answers are right.

I'll respond to Jake's original post since it seems most of the posts afterwards were agreeing with his.

Again, I'll point out the problem with using the DB as the be all end all, which is the vagaries of who gets projections. For example, my 2nd round pick last year Clayton Mortensen popped up in this years database with a useless projection. Obviously I had no intention of using him this year, but if I were to lose his prospect eligibility for a useless sim that would suck.

This problem would actually be alleviated by the proposed rules change! It would be 25 in-sim minimum, not maximum. Since there wouldn't be a "draft roster", there would be no "prospect eligibility" to lose, so if you wanted to use him as a pinch runner after rosters expand, you could do so without any "penalty" as there currently is.

My position on this is "if it ain't broke don't fix it," there is nothing at all wrong with the current roster setup (which if anything is much easier to understand since we started using numbers and OOPSS, remember that ridiculous x-y-z crap when I first joined?), and the impact of this rule change would be to encourage people to draft and stash 16-18 year olds, which would ultimately diminish the free agent pool if these guys broke out. On the other hand it certainly sucks to have to make decisions on guys who haven't played above low A (like how I'm going to have to burn a roster spot on Sebastian Valle's apparent GCL potential, and had to cut Randall Delgado for the same reason). I definitely like 25/25 better than 40/10, but my vote is pretty solidly for no change is necessary.

This rule change does not affect these 16-18 year olds at a very large scale in my opinion, since currently you are able to have more than 10 draftees at one time, so anyone who really wants to have them can still currently grab them.
Theoretically:
The choice between choosing a current 0- or 8- after you have the required 10 draftees would be at roster spot #40 currently. If the rules change it would be at roster spot #50.
However:
This ignores the fact that right now you are REQUIRED to have 10 draftees. Currently I have 9 draftees, so if I wanted to sign one of these 16-18 year olds, the decision for me is at roster spot #50 except that instead of choosing between a reliever for example and the 16-18 year old, I'd only have to choose between the 16-18 year old and another 8- draftee, making me MORE likely to take the 16-18 year old.

Additionally, it is not like we're increasing the total roster size or doing away with drafts, eventually teams will need to make decisions on the players that they are drafting, so it's not like you can stash the guy for 5 years without ever having to consider getting rid of him for someone else, in order to keep him you would have to give up on taking the same player in the next year's draft.

[Reds]

Because there is no waiver type system I believe the existing set-up should remain. Allowing teams to have 50 major league players without restricting movement could lead to the dilution of the free agent pool. However, the 25 player minimum does seem like a good idea.

[BlueJays]

Question... Are there a lot of teams under the proposed 25 man minimum? I'm not sure I understand the point, why penalize a rebuilding club that may be at 23 or 22.

I think you should just have to field a full 1-9 and staff. Don't see a need to enforce 25 database players.

[Giants]

Shawn, in your first quote I was responding to Jag's first post in the discussion which brought up the old 40/10 idea. As for the other point you raised, teams that are in rebuilding mode would snap up everyone under 18 who had an interesting DSL season and see what they turned into. Meanwhile the contending teams would stash everyone of value from the free agent pool, I understand and have come around to that point as well. I'm not saying it's a terrible idea or that the league wouldn't function if the rule was changed, I'm just saying that there's no compelling reason to make the change, and that this new system would have different faults that were equally obnoxious as the current draft system so the advantage of making a switch is mitigated.

Nate, last year there were probably 4-6 teams under 25 at various points of the year. The big issue for me (as Brett and I argued ad nauseum last year) is having catchers on the roster, because without having a catcher playing the results get ludicrous (as in multiple passed balls per game and whatnot). I think the idea behind 25 players is that a realistic baseball team should be put in the field for every simmed game, especially games in September in tight races.

[Rangers]

The big issue for me (as Brett and I argued ad nauseum last year) is having catchers on the roster, because without having a catcher playing the results get ludicrous (as in multiple passed balls per game and whatnot).

The issue here is that you don't watch Rangers games regularly. The idea of multiple passed balls per game isn't ludicrous at all to me. It's major league baseball.

[Giants]

Salty behind the plate full time will be even more fun when Feliz, Holland, and the gang get into the rotation. It'll be fascinating to watch who gets fooled by more of their pitches, the hitters or the catcher...

[Dodgers]

As for the other point you raised, teams that are in rebuilding mode would snap up everyone under 18 who had an interesting DSL season and see what they turned into. Meanwhile the contending teams would stash everyone of value from the free agent pool, I understand and have come around to that point as well. I'm not saying it's a terrible idea or that the league wouldn't function if the rule was changed, I'm just saying that there's no compelling reason to make the change, and that this new system would have different faults that were equally obnoxious as the current draft system so the advantage of making a switch is mitigated.

Isn't this kind of the point? Bad teams get a chance to get some good players?

Consider it this way regarding the DSLs: under the current system, you get 10 shots at carrying these guys for 2 years for FREE. Under the new system, you don't get any freebies, as their spot could be utilized by ANY other player.

Maybe I'm just not seeing it in your arguments, but I don't see the faults of the new system.