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Curt Flood Triple-Era Free Agency League (1961/1981/2001)
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$150 million Budget of Auction Money – (NOT WIS salary prices)
Yes DH.
5-year Max Contracts.
16-24 Teams depending on the interest level.
(No Salary Cap other than the $150 million Auction Budget)
Stadiums ~ Upon Sign Up or any time thereafter – pick any active 1961/1981/2001 stadium.


How the Free Agency bidding will take place:
In the next few days I will list all of the 1961/1981/2001 WIS database players by position from Highest WIS Salary to lowest. Once we have 24 or 16 committed owners, I will roll out all of these players for Bidding in salary tiers by Position highest to lowest salary over 15 Rounds of Auction Bidding. I will sitemail my daily bids to the first (2) owners daily that send me bids Before I open their bids. ** Since the first few Rounds will have most of the impact players, we will Run Rounds 1-3 of the Auction Over 3 day periods per Round so that everyone can see how much each player is fetching & feel out the market. The 3rd Day of each Round will be a final deciding Silent Bid, barring a tie.


MINIMUM bid is $50K per player. (please bid in no less than $50K increments)

Bidding will be done via “Silent Auction” sitemail. Players will be up for bid in tiers over 15 Days for Auction. Everyone has $150 million in Auction Money to Bid/Spend on their Roster. I will keep a running Roster Tab for each owner in excel & update it daily to let you know what you have already spent & how much you have left.

5 Years is the Maximum Contact that you can Keep your players for (at the price you paid for them Per Season). For example, if you win Willie Mays for $16 million, $16 million is Mays Salary for 1961 and is subtracted from your $150 million Available Auction Budget. You can keep Mays for up to 5 years and pay him $16 million Per Season in 1962, 1963, 1964, & 1965 if you wish to – (OR) you can cut him sooner if you wish when you decide on your Keepers/Cuts going into the Next Season. All Cut Players & New database Rookies will become Free Agents up for bid the following seasons. You are the GM ~ You decide.

Each Round of Bidding will end at midnight (EST) each day.
Highest offered Bid per Player wins that Player. I will sitemail & Post the daily results every night.

Ties- If there is a tied bid on a Player, Any & All OWNERS TIED can Upbid the following day.
If NONE of the tied owners upbids on a Tied Player the next day, that player will go back on the open market for New bidding the following day.

** Contingency Bids ** You can prioritize your bidding each based on the Players up for bid if you want to, especially when you start running out of cash. For Example: “I want to bid $15.5 million on Willie Mays, if that isn’t the winning bid on Mays, I want to bid $12 million on Hank Aaron. Unless you spell it out for me, Whatever Players are listed first on your Daily Bid Sitemail – I will apply your Remaining Salary towards those Players in the order in which you list them. If you are outbid by another owner, I will move down your sitemail list & apply whatever money you have left towards the players you have listed.

End of Auction “Broke Owners Draft”- If you run out of money before you roster 25 players, there will be a Broke Owners “Draft” Snake style of the remaining Players Pool. I will randomize your sign-up numbers for the Draft Order. These players can ONLY be signed to 1-year deals & must be cut going into the next season. Extra money DOES NOT roll over into the next season, so use it or lose it. Or save a little extra for Trades.

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IN-Season TRADES ~ are Allowed within the $150 mil Budget
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In Season, Teams can make trades subject to the standard 6-team veto so long as it keeps both parties under the $150 million Budget Cap. (I will keep a spreadsheet of everyone’s Team Salaries & $150 million Budget on a team by team spreadsheet)

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Free Agency History
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Curt Flood retired with the third most games in center field (1,683) in NL history, trailing Willie Mays and Richie Ashburn. Flood became one of the pivotal figures in the sport's labor history when he refused to accept a trade following the 1969 season, ultimately appealing his case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Although his legal challenge was unsuccessful, it brought about additional solidarity among players as they fought against baseball's reserve clause and sought free agency.
In a letter to Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, Flood demanded that the commissioner declare him a free agent:

December 24, 1969
“After twelve years in the major leagues, I do not feel I am a piece of property to be bought and sold irrespective of my wishes. I believe that any system which produces that result violates my basic rights as a citizen and is inconsistent with the laws of the United States and of the several States.
It is my desire to play baseball in 1970, and I am capable of playing. I have received a contract offer from the Philadelphia club, but I believe I have the right to consider offers from other clubs before making any decision. I, therefore, request that you make known to all Major League clubs my feelings in this matter, and advise them of my availability for the 1970 season.”

Flood v. Kuhn (407 U.S. 258) was argued before the Supreme Court on March 20, 1972. Flood's attorney, former Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg, asserted that the reserve clause depressed wages and limited players to one team for life. Major League Baseball's counsel countered that Commissioner Kuhn had acted "for the good of the game."^{[citation needed]} On June 19, 1972, the Supreme Court, invoking the principle of stare decisis ("to stand by things decided"), ruled 5–3 in favor of Major League Baseball, citing as precedent a 1922 ruling in Federal Baseball Club v. National League (259 U.S. 200). Justice Lewis Powell recused himself owing to his ownership of stock in Anheuser-Busch, which owned the Cardinals.^[4]

Although Flood's lawsuit lost amany consequences followed. One of the worst things that happened to Flood was being blackballed from baseball following his lawsuit. There were questions similar to “Do you realize you won’t be able to play in the MLB ever again?” or “You realize you are going to lose your job?” Everyone Flood consulted was convinced he would be blackballed from baseball. Flood soon came to realization that his career was over as he later said,
It would be difficult to come back. And besides, I don’t think I’ll be getting the opportunity to play again. As big as it is, baseball is a closely-knit unit. I doubt even one of the 24 men controlling the game would touch me with a 10-foot pole. You can’t buck the Establishment.^[17]
Another outcome of Curt Flood's lawsuit, albeit 26 years later, was the Curt Flood Act of 1998. Gary R. Roberts, a graduate and author in the Marquette Law Scholarly Journal, explains the Act as:
[T]he conduct, acts, practices, or agreements of persons' in the business of organized professional major league baseball directly relating to or affecting employment of major league baseball players to play baseball at the major league level are subject to the antitrust laws to the same extent such conduct, acts, practices, or agreements would be subject to the antitrust laws if engaged in by persons in other professional sports business affecting interstate commerce.^[18]
This act did exactly what Flood wanted; it stopped owners from controlling the players’ contracts and careers. Not only did Flood help modify the Reserve Clause, he also helped bring in the 10/5 rule, which is also known as the Curt Flood Rule. The rule states that when a player has played for a team for five straight years, and played in the MLB for a total of ten years, they have to give the club their consent to be traded.^[19]
Flood sat out the entire 1970 season.^[4] During this period he was bombarded with hate mail from fans, who accused him of trying to destroy baseball; his teammate Bob Gibson estimated "He got four or five death threats a day."^[20] The Cardinals sent two minor leaguers to the Phillies in compensation for Flood's refusal to report. One of them—centerfielder Willie Montañez—went on to a 14-year major league career. In November 1970 the Phillies traded Flood and four other players to the Washington Senators. He signed a $110,000 contract with Washington but played only 13 games of the 1971 season, with a .200 batting average and lackluster play in center field. Despite manager Ted Williams's vote of confidence, Flood retired. He had a lifetime batting average of .293 with 1,861 hits, 85 home runs, 851 runs, and 636 RBI. Defensively, Flood posted a .987 fielding percentage in his major-league career.^[21] Later that year Flood published a memoir entitled The Way It Is in which he spelled out in detail his argument against the reserve clause.^[8] Four years later, in what is now remembered as the Seitz decision, arbitrator Peter Seitz ruled that since pitchers Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally played for one season without a contract, they were entitled to become free agents. The ruling essentially nullified the reserve clause and opened the door to widespread free agency.^{[citation needed]}

Interested Owners & City Stadiums
(I'll pick 12th)
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(12) royhobbs09
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Curt Flood Free Agency League sitemail list:
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royhobbs09;

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Very interesting, but if the league only gets up to 16 teams I think having 3 eras is too much - maybe just have 1961/2001.

Far too time consuming.Far to complicated

different strokes for different folks :))

I ran something similar a few years back with a single season Auction League starting in 2001 that lasted 5 or 6 seasons before people started losing interest ~ I thought it would be more fun & interesting to incorporate (3) Eras & keep the available new talent each season as lively as possible without it being too much to "scout out"

I'll probably Post a classified in the Regular Theme Leagues as that'll get more eyeballs & interest than the regular Progressives get. Still compiling all of the Available Players Lists ~ couple more nights & I should have those particulars sorted out

* Hey fellas, I have set this League up with all of the Available Players Lists & Rounds over in the THEME LEAGUE Classifieds to get more eyeballs & interest... Cheers & thanks for looking!