I'm a newbie owner and I don't understand why there is a 50 percent penalty for transferring payroll budget. Is it because people were abusing this and using coach and prospect payroll to add to player payroll? To me, that's just an ownership question as it is spelled out pretty clearly that those transfer decisions will affect you in the future.

I hope I am not opening old wounds here. Lol.

It's a penalty for budgeting incorrectly.    I've done a 180 on it but, if you budget 100m in payroll and spend 78m, you either did something wrong or your intentions were to chase big money IFA after the transfer. 

IMO newly formed(about a year ago) opinion, coach/prospect/payroll should just be one category.    

I can see the coaches being separate, but basically, I have $1.3 million just sitting there in the coaches budget that I can't do anything with. Dead money. Should be able to transfer without a penalty.

Posted by drummer_66 on 11/15/2015 7:05:00 PM (view original):
I can see the coaches being separate, but basically, I have $1.3 million just sitting there in the coaches budget that I can't do anything with. Dead money. Should be able to transfer without a penalty.

Without the penalties, setting your budget would be pointless. The current system makes you think about how you want to organize your budget.

I did the same thing when I started out  drummer and a mentor pointed out to me that the problem was when I set the budget in the first place, not the functionality of the game. I really couldn't argue.

The problem I am running into is I took over a team with a couple of big salaries so I had to set it higher than I wanted to. So I am strapped on salary as I didn't want to get screwed elsewhere. Newbie problems, I guess.

mbriese: Why would it be pointless if you can still transfer money? Maybe there should be a limit amount for transfers instead of such a massive penalty. Also, the $1.3M I have in coaches salary can't be moved because you have to have at least $2M to transfer (before the 50% penalty).

Without the penalties the cost of IFA would skyrocket to the point that the only way to get a good one would be to slash salary (thus incentivizing tanking) so you would have $40M to compete for the studs. As is, the system puts a premium on planning. Knowing that anything under $2M would be wasted, you could have spent $1.3M more on coaching. While RL comparisons are iffy, the penalty makes sense in mirroring the difficulty MLB teams would have shifting gears in April. In RL, suddenly having an extra $1.3M to spend on, say, scouting, would be of limited value since the 150-200 best scouts would already be under contract for the year. Team doctors and trainers would be set. Most FA would be taken except the odd Stephen Drew. Extra $ available in mid-March would be of limited value.

To answer the original question about why there are such penalties, the problem is similar to what you suggest but in reverse. It would be Payroll going to Prospects, rather than the other way around. You can already budget as much as you want for Payroll. But owners who don't think their teams are competitive in the current season could dump salary (Payroll) and transfer the savings to Prospects to ensure signing an IFA stud. That has multiple negative consequences — 1-Affecting pennant races by giving one or two teams great players at reduced cost (if I'm dumping salary, I don't need to get as much quality back) and 2-Driving up IFA prices, which in turn can lead more owners to dump salary.

Cool. Thanks, Josh.