Greetings,

Curious for your thoughts on abandoning any investments in IFAs and its long-term impacts. IFAs are expensive when you consider it's at least $20mm for most ML-caliber IFAs and the >$15mm for scouting (yes, of course there are exceptions).

Figuring you're spending $35mm for 1 ML player annually through the IFA channel, that would buy you 3 very nice free agents.

Now, that IFA costs you $35mm once, and figure you get 4 seasons of him at the ML level before his arbitration or contract salary jacks up to the same as the free agents. This works out to him costing about $9mm annually while his salary is cheap (amortizing the original $35mm investment).

It seems the math favors going the free agency route over the IFA route, but maybe not by a substantial $$ amount.

Then the extenuating factors come into play, like getting pinched in IFA where you eat a big amount of money cuz no good IFAs you were able to win bidding on...or not enough good free agents worthy of investing that $35mm in.

Curious how those of you who do skip the IFA "bonanza" think about this.

(one upside of skipping IFA is you don't have to look at the never-ending succession of scrubs who flow through IFA emails!)

To me, it depends on where you choose to sacrifice. I don't dabble in IFAs and instead I invest in the draft. You have to invest $20M in IFA scouting, then have enough cash in your prospect budget to chase those players. To me, it basically comes down to punting on IFAs or the draft (and you still need to sign a certain number draft picks, per HBD rules), unless you are sacrificing in other categories (medical? training? coaching?).

I used to invest a lot of money in IFAs, but with the changes that they made to the amateur draft rankings and DITR potentials a few years ago, it moved the needle more in that direction. Also, I've done more of spending 6-10 in International scouts, and just watching what other owners are doing when a "good one" pops up on my radar.

Highly dependent on your league. One of my leagues barely sees any max contracts and is highly competitive in IFA. My other league is the exact opposite. Figure out which way the wind is blowing in your league and exploit whichever market is undervalued.

Or switch things up and grab the last spot in ULB where the total prospect budget is capped at $25M.

I see what you did there...clever ;)

That seems like a very good approach, trying to exploit the under-utilized method in a given league

Yep you have to know your league, then put your money where you get the most bang for the buck.

As originally stated, if you want the Big Fish IFA, you have to go all in on it. To the point of skimping on coaching and scouting ie taking whatever happens in the draft. The upside is you can potentially lock in whenever a generational IFA comes along. You probably never buy a free agent because you see them as overpays anyway. And if sometimes a season comes along when no great IFA shows up, or you eat a bag of money with nothing to spend it on, you take the loss and move on.

On the other hand if you completely ignore IFAs, you have a ton of money to spend on even mediocre FAs. If your league is light on owners going this route, you can corner the market - I've been in a league where a new owner came in and immediately saw no one was dealing so he bought up all the Type As and won the WS first season. You can have a competitive - if overpaid - team all the time and keep winning with veteran team depth, the downside is you probably never have the bright shiny toy player racking up awards.

Posted by brianplath on 7/28/2021 1:10:00 AM (view original):
Highly dependent on your league. One of my leagues barely sees any max contracts and is highly competitive in IFA. My other league is the exact opposite. Figure out which way the wind is blowing in your league and exploit whichever market is undervalued.

Or switch things up and grab the last spot in ULB where the total prospect budget is capped at $25M.

I appreciate the plug for ULB.

Posted by brianplath on 7/28/2021 1:10:00 AM (view original):
Highly dependent on your league. One of my leagues barely sees any max contracts and is highly competitive in IFA. My other league is the exact opposite. Figure out which way the wind is blowing in your league and exploit whichever market is undervalued.

Or switch things up and grab the last spot in ULB where the total prospect budget is capped at $25M.

This is the best advice to be honest.

'Fish where others don't' is my mentality in sim games........ and fishing.

My one league has about half a dozen owners that will bid 20+ million on IFA's so I avoid it and I go free agents (a lot of the time I'll get a legit A pick guy for 6-8 million) in my other league I can pick up quality IFA's for under 10 million so I'll put some money on guys if I have it.

That is one of the tricks of playing sim games against human owners.

Posted by jimt14120 on 7/28/2021 12:23:00 PM (view original):

Posted by brianplath on 7/28/2021 1:10:00 AM (view original):
Highly dependent on your league. One of my leagues barely sees any max contracts and is highly competitive in IFA. My other league is the exact opposite. Figure out which way the wind is blowing in your league and exploit whichever market is undervalued.

Or switch things up and grab the last spot in ULB where the total prospect budget is capped at $25M.

I appreciate the plug for ULB.

Do what I can Jim! I'm a sucker for anything that mixes things up and keeps the game interesting. Don't know if lido came over from my post in Jersey League or not but I've been trying to get the word out.

He did come over, just have more spot to fill. Damn slow go this time around.