Hello,

I am going to solely focus on my Norfolk team this year and need some advice. I have made this team better over the last 3 seasons since taking over but definitely lack some solid pitching. I have a lot of players up for arb this year and am wondering if i should release some to make way for some cap space. If I release players going into arb, I don't have any sort of penalty correct? I don't take on a portion of their signed contract or even if they don't sign with another team?

All your arb guys look like they have some value. I always look to trade my arb guys. Even if I'm only getting back a backup shortstop, defensive catcher with high PC, or a back-end reliever. But if you do decide to just release a guy, if you do it before you go to arbitration, there won't be any penalty.

No, you can release players going into arb with no penalty. I would definitely release Rios before his 3rd season.

Okay. Another question. If I waived a few guys, can I try to trade them while they are going through waivers?

Yes.

Okay, awesome. Another thing. What's the appropriate amount to offer in arbitration? Should I always offer 100% of demands?

I usually offer 10% more than the league average listed if that's less than their demands..

Posted by Mr_Kid on 7/18/2017 9:24:00 AM (view original):
Okay, awesome. Another thing. What's the appropriate amount to offer in arbitration? Should I always offer 100% of demands?

I don't know if you guys remember, but 1-2 years ago there was a snafu with the HBD servers and the admins needed to roll the game back and re-sim the day. I imagine that must have really sucked for playoffs, imagine if you won a game 7 on the first play and then lost it on the replay, I'd be so mad....

But anyways, I bring this up because one of the leagues had to re-sim the arbitration period. One of the teams offered his arb guys the same amounts (70%) on both the first sim and and the second sim, and the first time he took it and the second time he did not. So based upon that outcome, we concluded that arb decisions are RNG instead of stat-based or offer-based or anything else like that.

So imo it's best to just offer everybody 70 and hope for the best

Gotcha. Can I only release arb eligible players prior to entering arb? Or can i still release during the arb period with no penalty?

You can release them up until the last second of arb day with no penalty. Assuming, of course, you didn't arb them.

okay gotcha.

someone was telling me i need to release before arb day lol

Some people don't know as much as they think they do.

haha!

Make sure you release or arbitrate BEFORE the LAST cycle. I got screwed a few seasons ago thinking the last cycle occurred overnight. When I logged on after the 11PM EST cycle and went to arbitrate, the computer had already auto-arbitrated. I wasn't pleased.