Associated Fantasy

"Its fine to have ability, but the ability to find ability in others is the true test" -Lou Holtz

AFF Free Agent Auction Guide

2025 Guide

2025 PLAYER POOL

Auction Start/Finish

  • The AFF Free Agent Auction is a LONG RUNNING auction designed to mimic the NFL Free Agent Season
  • Players that are on team rosters but not under the protection of a contract (or tag or taxi) can shop for a contract on another team - AFF teams bidding on players are like NFL teams negotiating potential contracts; sometimes multiple teams are interested, and uyou get bidding wars
  • Auction will start at 12:01am(eastern) on Tue, Jun 31
  • Auction will end at midnight on Tue, July 24
  • Dates Subject To Change
  • Individual auctions in progress will be allowed to finish, final nominations made by midnight, Sun Aug 3
  • Uncertified teams will enter the auction already in progress and their players will be ineligible for nomination until the team has entered

Auction Budget

  • Team Budgets are determined by Formula
  • Formula:(Team’s FULL Salary Cap) MINUS (Current Season Commitments) MINUS (League Minimum Salary x Team’s number of draft picks in Upcoming Draft) MINUS (Dead Money)
  • Each team’s auction budget is listed in their databooks and in the MFL system
  • BEWARE: This formula essentially gives you access to your FULL BUDGET for the season (There's no other way to do it)
    • WARNING: You likely won’t be able to spend your full budget and still get across the CUT CAP. It is each team’s responsibility to know what they can spend
    • If you want a rundown of your available spending, before or during the auction, email league office

Player Pool

  • The player pool is displayed at PLAYER'S POOL
  • Alternately, on each team’s Roster Report on MyFantasyLeague, all UFAs and RFA’s are eligible for bidding
  • NOTE:xRFA are EXEMPT from auction
  • VFA's can be bid on by their own team, but not nominated
  • Players on uncertified teams will be EXEMPT until those teams certify for auction; a supplemental auction will be held later in the offseason IF NECESSARY

Minimum Opening Bid

  • The Minimum opening bid for players is:
  • (Scheduled 2025 Salary + 10%) = Auction Budget
  • The MOB’s for each player is automatically calculated and displayed on the player pool lists on the FA Auction tab of your team databook
  • Opening bids may be higher than the MOB but not lower

Nominating Player/Opening an Auction

  • Bidding on any eligible players must begin by nominating player through the League Office (email me)
  • Default bid is the player's MOB, if you want to open with a higher bid, specify in the email
  • All nominated players received each day before midnight eastern will be entered into the MFL system together overnight before 8am eastern in one batch
  • If for any reason a day gets missed, nomminies will go to auction the following midnight to 6 period with the next batch
  • All nominations are binding HIGH BIDS in the amount of the nomination until another team bids higher
  • Teams may make unlimited and/or simultaneous nominations as long as team has the funds to cover the opening bid(s)
  • Teams may make nominations in any order, at any time, on any day of the auction from start to annouinced final day for nominations
  • Teams cannot nominate their own players
  • UFAs and RFAs have no difference (if not exempt) for the purposes of nominating to auction
  • Once any player is nominated, ALL BIDDING WILL HAPPEN ON MFL IN THE LIVE AUCTION

Bidding

  • Once any player is nominated, ALL BIDDING WILL HAPPEN ON MFL IN THE LIVE AUCTION
  • Teams are responsible for making their own bids on MFL
  • Only teams certified for auction with players eligible for auction may make bids
  • Teams cannot bid on their own players unless player is a VFA
  • UFAs and RFAs have no difference (if not exempt) for the purposes of making bids (same rules for each)
  • Bids must be made in increments of $300k
    • Bids can be made any amount of excess to a standing high bid, but must be in increments of $500k
  • Pick Timer is 120 hours(5 days)
    • Nomination will trigger a 120 hour timer
    • Timer will reset to 120 hours on each replacing high bid
  • PROXY Bidding will be used in this year's auction

RFA High Bid Negotiation

  • Auctions for RFAs DO NOT END with the HIGH BID
  • When auction ends, there is a A 2 ROUND NEGOTIATION PROCESS between the HIGH BIDDING TEAM and the TEAM OWNING RIGHTS to the player
    1. ROUND 1: Team that OWNS RIGHTS to player will have 72 hours to MATCH the HIGH BID or to WAIVE the player
      • If team owning rights to player MATCHES HIGH BID, negotiation returns to high bidding team
      • If team owning rights to player WAIVES, see below
    2. ROUND 2: There's a second round of negotiations if Team Owning Rights MATCHES
      • HIGH BIDDING TEAM may walk away from negotiations here
      • or, HIGH BIDDING TEAM has 72 hours to submit ONE FINAL HIGH BID - bid should be bidding team's "best offer"
      • Team OWNING RIGHTS to player will have a new 72 hours to MATCH the FINAL BID or to WAIVE the player
        • If Team Owning Rights to player MATCHES FINAL BID, negotiation ends, Team RETAINS PLAYER, player finshes existing contract
        • If team owning rights to player WAIVES, see below
  • WAIVED Players
    • If TEAM OWNING RIGHTS declines to match BID in EITHER ROUND they may choose to WAIVE Player
    • When Player is waived, his existing contract is nullified, as-is - Any existing Separation Bonuses must be paid
    • Player is transferred to Higb Bidding Team
    • Team WAIVING Player is COMPENSATED by ACQUIRING Team with (a) Draft Pick(s) according to the chart below
    • Acquiring Team must sign player to a new FA Contract under existing rules
  • PAUSED NEGOTIATIONS
  • League Office will PAUSE any potential cross-negotiations AT THE START
  • "Cross Negotiations are defined as any negotiations where a team could be simultaneously negotiating with two different teams in a way in which they would lose and/or gain conflicting draft picks from/to those teams
  • Negotiations for the auction ending first will proceed to completion before the next begins

RFA Compensation

  • FINAL HIGH BID EQUALS:
  • $6.6mm-$11.99m -Compensation = 6th Rd Pick in Current or Next Available 6th+7th
  • $12.01m-$18.0m -Compensation = 5th Rd Pick in Current or Next Available 5th+7th
  • $18.01m-$24.0m -Compensation = 4th Rd Pick in Current or Next Available 4th+6th
  • $24.01m-$30.0m -Compensation = 3rd Rd Pick in Current or Next Available 3rd+5th
  • $30.01m-$36.0m -Compensation = 2nd Rd Pick in Current or Next Available 2nd+4th
  • >$36.0m -Compensation = 1st Rd Pick in Current or Next Available 1st+3rd
  • "CURRENT DRAFT" refers to the upcoming AFF Draft
  • If awarded "NEXT AVAILABLE" Picks, Team may choose:
    • Take the next available of EACH awarded pick by taking the FIRST available of each in current and future drafts as they occur
    • May defer earliest available pick to take BOTH awarded picks in the first year in which they occur concurrently
  • If COMPENSATING TEAM has multiple picks in an awarded round, COMPENSATING TEAM's original pick will be awarded
    • If Original Pick is unavailable, earliest pick in round is awarded
  • AVAILABILITY of picks is determined based on timing of HIGH BID ending the player's auction, NOT the end of negotiations - cross-interest negotiations will be paused
    • EXAMPLE: Timer runs out on Team A's RFA #1 with Team B as high bidder at 1pm on a Tuesday - Team B enters negotiations with Team A
    • Timer runs out on Team B's RFA #2 with Team C as high bidder at 5pm on a Wednesday - Team C negotiations with Team B will be paused by league office until draft compensation in Team B/A negotiations are settled

Signing Players

  • ALL Players won at auction must be signed to a 1 year FA Contract with winning bid as base (NOTE: account for the year in your contract count)
  • These players are on the Can’t Cut list for the remainder of the season
  • Up-Front Bonus: the maximum allowed is now 50% of the difference between high bid and old salary
  • EXAMPLE:
    • Player’s scheduled salary is $20m
    • Player’s MOB is $22m
    • High bid = $28m
    • Max UpFront Bonus is $4m
    • $28 minus $20 = $8 x 50%
    • Bonus would = $4m, Salary would = $24m
    • See Contract Rules > Free Agent Contracts for more Info

The LIFECYCLE of an Auction Player

  • Hopefully a helpful EXAMPLE.....
    • LB John Smith is on an AFFL team's roster and NOT UNDER CONTRACT, making $20m as a UFA 
    • This makes him available for nomination and bidding in the auction with a Minimum Opening Bid of $22m
    • Several teams are interested, and bidding goes to $32m and the high bid of $32m wins him
    • They now MUST sign him to a 1 year FA contract with a BASE of $32m
      • Let's say they pay him a max Up Front Bonus because it makes financial sense to do that
      • Max is 50% of the base minus original salary, so 32 minus 20 = 12 x 50% = $6m bonus; His salary for the year becomes $26m - BUT his BASE is still $32m
    • He plays that year for his new team on the Can't Cut list
    • He plays well, scoring 382 points on the season
    • NEXT YEAR
      • Spring Signing opens, and LB John Smith now has an EXPIRING FA Contract with a base of $32m (and a formula salary of $38.2m based on his total points)
      • His new team has 3 options:
        1. Sign him to a 1 year FA Extension at Base + 15% which would be ($32m x 1.15)= $36.8m
        2. Sign him to a new Standard Contract (2-5 years), Base = lowest of: Base+30% (32x1.3=$41m) or current formula salary minus 10% - he scored 382, so current formula is $38.2 minus 10%=$34.38m......and there's a 10% signing bonus with this one
        3. Waive him directly to auction
      • Given those options, his new team decides to sign him to a 3 year contract at $34m
      • BUT
      • Let's say, before they actually sign him, he gets arrested for murder, and they decide to waive him to the draft pool instead
      • If they WAIVE him, he's removed from their roster WITH HIS CONTRACT BASE SALARY of $32m set as his current season salary
      • NOTE: during the course of the season you will come across free agent UFA players (waiver wire) with a notation of "24FA$" - these will be players like this and the notation explains why their salary is different from their formula salary
      • By the end of Spring Signing, our LB murder suspect john Smith is released to the draft pool with a $32m salary
      • And then a month later, it turns out to be a case of mistaken identity
      • A third team drafts him, and he plays at $32m for the season, scoring 391 points
      • The FOLLOWING Spring will open with him as a UFA with a $39.1m salary and able to be signed to a new contract at either $39.1m (current formula salary) OR $38.2m (his previous formula salary) with a signing bonus