AFFL Contracts 101
An introduction to the new Contracts Rules
Before diving into the Contract Rules themselves, it's important to point out that the addition of Contracts and the Contract Rules DO NOT change anything already in the set up for the league:
- Roster and line-up requirements are the same
- Salaries are still determined the same way (Total Points times 100k)
- The Salary Cap still works the same way (2021 Salary Cap = $441.6 Million)
- Before the draft, teams will still select their keepers and have to get their roster (with Keepers) below the Cut Cap (2021 Cut Cap = $220.1 Million
All the addition of Contracts does is add another layer of team management and provide additional tools for managing your personnel and salary cap numbers
Contract Rules: The Basics
These are the most basic of things to understand about the new Contract Rules:
Contract Players/Non-Contract Players and your Roster
- You can put any player on your roster under contract
- Players under contract must become Keepers
- Players don't have to be under contract to become Keepers - you can name non-contract players as your keepers
Length- 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 years
- You can put players on your roster under contract for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 years - BUT you only have 2 of them for 5 years
Contract Cap = 30 years
- You have a Contract Cap of 30 years - it works like a Salary Cap, but for years instead of dollars; you can put as many players (or as few players) as you want under contract, but you have a maximum of 30 years you can give out
Cutting Contract Players
- Normally, when you cut a player, you get 50% of their salary back in cap space - BUT you gain no cap space when you cut a contract player AND you take a cap hit of 50% in each future year of what you would have payed that player
Locked Salaries
- If you put a player under contract their salary locks in place and doesn't change each year based on performance like non-contract players
Contract Rules: A Little More Advanced
These are some parts of the Contract Rules that are a little more complicated. For now, you don't need to know how they work - we'll get to that as we go. For now it's enough just to know that these things exist.
Franchise Tags
- With the Contract Rules, you also have a Franchise Tag - this works mostly like a Franchise Tag in the NFL - you only have 1, it lasts for one year, it uses the player's existing salary, locks them to your team, and can only be used once per player
Structuring Salaries
- Just like in the NFL, once you set up how much a contract is worth - how much your player will make for the entire contract - you can "Structure" it to spread out what you owe the player across each year of the contract
Re-Structuring Contracts
- Also just like the NFL, you can take a contract that's already active and 'renegotiate' how much you'll pay the player in each year that's left on the contract. You can only do this once per contract.
Contract Extensions
- Again, like the NFL, you can add an Extension onto the end of the contract
Calculating Contract Salaries
- There are multiple options for how to calculate the salary you're going to pay the player under contract (and we'll go over them below). To start (this year) we'll only use the more basic ways, but starting next year when people are more comfortable with contracts, there's a really cool Adjustable Rate that will be available (but that's not important right now)
Why Put A Player Under Contract
What's the whole point? What's the 'object of the game'? What benefit is there to putting a player under contract instead of just naming them as a keeper later in the off season?
There are 2 main reasons to put a player under contract:
- Putting a player under contract LOCKS THEIR SALARY IN PLACE - so, if you have a young player with a low price, but you think he's about to explode for a few good years, you can lock his salary in place while he's cheap. Also true of a veteran player that had a bad year that you think he will rebound from, you can lock in the low price that resulted from the bad year
- Every Spring we will have a "Free Agency Signing Period" - this is designed to replicate the NFL's Free Agency Period where other teams can offer Free Agents more money - or a Better Contract - to switch teams. We're going to do this with an auction where teams will be able to steal players from each other by offering more money......more on that in a minute......but basically, if you put a player under contract, you protect him from this and another team cannot steal him
More About This Free Agent Auction
Ok, here's where all the pieces start to move a little bit. We all know what a Free Agent is, but with the Contract Rules, there are now
- Each year, there will be a Spring Signing Period - this is when you can sign new contracts and update existing contracts. This is the time when you can protect players from the Free Agent Auction
- Right after the Spring Signing Period will be the Free Agent Period - this is the auction. It will be two seperate auctions, actually, and they will be long-running (30 days total) auctions held on the MyFantasyLeague site....you'll be able to log in whenever you want to bid or just check it out to see what activity is going on
- This is the "Reason #2" from above for why you would want to put a player under contract - it protects them from being in the auction
3 Different Types of Free Agent - With the new Contract Rules, the AFFL now has 3 different types of Free Agent:
- Regular Free Agent (RFA) - these are the traditional type of Free Agents - any player that's not on any team's roster. These have nothing to do with the Contract Rules and nothing to do with offseason activity
- Unrestricted Free Agent (UFA) - these are players ON TEAM ROSTERS that are NOT UNDER CONTRACT - during the season, they are just like a normal player on your roster before we had Contract Rules, but in the off season this designation becomes important for the auction
- Restricted Free Agents (RFA) - these are players ON TEAM ROSTERS WITH CONTRACTS, BUT IN THEIR FINAL YEAR OF CONTRACT, like UFA's, during the season, they are just like a normal player on your roster before we had Contract Rules, but in the off season this designation becomes important for the auction
There will be a section below with more info on the Auctions, but for now, here's what's important to know:
The Unrestricted Free Agent Auction:
- For the 1st Auction (or Free Agent Period) - ALL UFA's (players on team rosters without a contract) will be put up for auction
- Teams bid on players (if they want to) with ACTUAL SALARY CAP dollars
- Any team that bids the Winning Bid on any player will get that player for their team - THE CATCH IS you will have to put that player under contract for the winning bid amount
- The Minimum Bid for any player will be $500,000 MORE than the player's current salary - meaning you have to pay the player more than they currently 'earn' to get the player on your team (maybe a lot more, depending on how the bidding goes)
- You don't have to bid on your own players, UNLESS any of your players are bid on by another team, then you will have to OUT-BID them to keep that player (AND then sign them to a contract for that amount)....OR....if you don't want the player, you can just let them be stolen, but you won't be compensated
- Any of your players that nobody bids on, stay on your roster as UFA's with their current salary - you can then make them Keepers or cut them later in the off season before Cut Day
The Restricted Free Agent Auction
- Their will be a Second Auction for RFA's - players in their last year of contract will be put up for auction....but this one is slightly trickier
- The minimum bid for an RFA is $1,000,000 above their current salary and the contract must be at least 2 years
- Teams DO NOT BID on their own RFA's even if another team bids on them
- Once there is a WINNING BID, the team that CURRENTLY OWNS the player, has the option to EITHER let the player go to the bidding team OR to match the bid
- If they let the team with the winning bid have the player, that team must sign the player to contract (at the amount of wining bid AND they must compensate the team they steal the player from with a draft pick(s) - (1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 1st and 3rd round, depending on the price of the player)
- If the team that owns the player chooses to match the winning bid, they keep the player BUT they must sign them to a new contract for that amount
There are more details involved with these auctions and possible twists and turns different strategies involved with setting up your contracts for dealing with the auctions, but these are the basics, and that's all you need to be aware of at this point in the tutorial. I just wanted to sort of outline the auctions to demonstrate why you would want to put a player under contract in the first place (besides the money reason). Now, let's look at some actual examples of applying contracts to a roster......
Setting Up Your Contracts
In this section, we'll take a look at an actual roster and run through some strategies and examples for how and why you might want to distribute your contracts. Along the way, I'll explain some of the "Advanced Rules" that were mentioned above, and I think it's going to give you a really clear understanding of how the contracts are going to work.
I'm going to use the existing 2021 Stars' off season roster for this example.
When I look at this roster, what I see is a nice, solidly balanced group of players on offense, defense, and special teams....and if you remember, the Stars were a contender last season, but maybe needed just a few more pieces of the puzzle, SO as a manager, one of my goals with contracts would be to lock in the core of players as best I can.
Another thing I see, is that it's a relatively expensive roster, so another goal I would have would be to try to free up some cap room while still holding on to those core players.
So let's go one contract at a time, and not only will you see some General Strategies for how to use the new Contract Rules, but the each example will explain each of the different ways to set up the contracts. The first guy I'm looking at is
Ezekiel Elliot - as a coach, managing this roster, I'd be thinking "ok, he's a legitimate franchise back, so I want to lock him up long term" so I'll use one of my 5 year contracts on him. But what do I pay him? I have 2 options:
- I can use his current season salary: $24.4 x 5yrs = $122.0million
- Or I can use his prior season salary + a 10% signing bonus: $37.6 x 5yrs = $188.0m +$18.8m(10%) = $206.8m
- Obviously, Option #1 is the much better deal.
- I'll get Elliot for 5 years for a total of $122 million that number is the "Total Contract Value" of the contract
- His "Base Salary" will be $24.4 million - that's his current season salary and also the number the contract is "Based" on - that makes him the 10th highest paid RB this year, when I think he's going to be much better than 10th best over the next few years, so it's a great deal. When submitting his contract, there's a dropdown box for "Base Salary Formula" and we would select "Current Salary" because that's the 'formula' we're using to calculate his Base Salary.
But we're not done with him yet.....
Now we get to "Structure" his salary. If you remember from the "Advanced Concepts" section of this tutorial, we can spread out the "Total Contract Value" - $122m - over the life of the contract - 5 years
- So I can pay his $122m spread out across the 5 years of contract
- The only 2 rules are - what I pay him in each of the 5 years must add up to $122m (the Total Contract Value) AND I have to pay him a minimum of 10% in each year
So, remember we're also trying to save some cap space this season, so this is how I would structure him:
- $12.2m in Year 1 - that's 10% of the total and saves me like $12 million dollars this season
- $34.9m in year 2
- $34.9m in year 3 - what I pay him in years 2 and 3 are pretty high, BUT, he was worth $37.6 just last year, so I'm counting on him still being worth the premium, and paying the high price in years 2 and 3 allow me the lower prices in years 1, 4, and 5
- $20.0m in year 4
- $20.0m in year 5 - I'm choosing to get his price down in his final 2 years of contract because those will be his 9th and 10th career seasons and he may begin to show signs of decline; I'm thinking, maybe I'll try to trade him in one of those years, and I don't want his salary to be too high for someone to be interested in a trade
So that structures out his contract: it's a 5yr/$122m dollar contract; the minimum ($12.2m) in year 1, then $34.9 + $34.9 + $20.0 + $20.0 (=$122.0m) over the next 4 years.....and my contract cap now drops from 30 years to 25 years remaining
- If I cut him at any point over the next 5 years, I'll have to pay 50% of each yearly total that remains in each year that remains as a cap penalty.....BUT
- If I trade him, his contract goes with him and his new team takes on those obligations
It will look like this on the Active Contracts Chart on the Contract Info Page:
The 2 Y's at the end indicate that "Yes" his contract can be Re-Structured and "Yes" he can be placed on a Franchise Tag.....don't worry about that for now, we'll get to that later. And remember, these are examples, there's no right or wrong way to choose a contract length or how to Structure it - you may have the same player and decide on a shorter contract length or choose to spread his payments in a different way - it's all a judgement call based on how you value him and on how you want to manage your long term budget
Let's move on to the next player.....
Jumping over to the Defensive side of the roster, Blake Martinez anchors this defense, he's had several solid years in a row and promises to have several more, so again, were I managing this team, I would try to lock him up and save some cap space. Maybe this time I don't want to use my other 5 year contract - I only have one more for as long as Elliot's contract remains active.
So we'll sign him to a 4 year deal....we've got the same 2 options for determining his Base Value
- I can use his current season salary: $29.9 x 4yrs = $119.6million
- Or I can use his prior season salary + a 10% signing bonus: $30.7x 4yrs = $122.8m +$12.3m(10%) = $135.1m
Again, in this example, we find using the current salary is again a better deal. So once more we're going to select "Current Salary" on the "Base Salary Formula" dropdown box on the Contract Form. Now we'll Structure the salary across 4 years like we did with Elliot, trying to save cap space for this year
This time, lets go with:
- $11.9m in year 1 (the 10% minimum)
- $11.9m in year 2 (the minimum again)
- $11.9m in year 3 (the minimum one more time)
- $83.9m in year 4(the balance due on his Total Contract: $119.6 minus $11.9 minus $11.9 minus $11.9 = $83.9m, due)
Now why in the hell would I structure it like that? Well, maybe I'm thinking he's going to be productive through the whole length of his contract, so let's save a lot of cap space on the front end, and then down the road, maybe next year, when I have more cap space to play with, I'll RE-STRUCTURE his contract.
Remember "Re-Structure" in the "Advanced Rules" section? Every contract can be Re-structured once in the contract's lifetime. Meaning, I could set it up like this, and next year I could calculate what's left to what I owe him, and redistribute it across the 3 seasons that are left. So it's one of the options to keep in mind when deciding how to structure each contract.
Here's how the Active Contracts chart would look:
My Contract Cap now drops from 25 down to 21 years left available......I've now saved $12.3m in cap space on Elliot and $18.0 on Martinez for a total of an extra $30 million in cap space for this season
So let's move on and take a look at another player.......
Corderelle Patterson caught my eye. He's listed as a WR - his primary position - but he served as this team's Kick Returner last season and was phenomenal in that roll, starting 12 times and totaling 180 kick returner points which was 3rd in the league at that position.
Now, I'm not sure I want to use a contract on a Kick Returner, plus, I'm not sure how much value I could gain on him at $18.0m compared to what he may score in the future - in other words, 180 points (or $18.0m) could be a high point and maybe he'll regress, so if I contract him at that price, I might be over-paying in the future.....
But I have another option - I'm going to place him under my "Franchise Tag". That's another one from the "Advanced Rules" section.
- Every team has 1 Franchise Tag each year
- It doesn't affect the player's salary at all
- But it protects him from having to go into the Free Agent Auction
- The only catch is that I can never use it on him again
- You submit it with the same contract form, just checking the box for "Franchise Tag" instead of "Standard Contract"
- There's also an option for "Franchise Tag" on the dropdown for "Base Salary Formula"
It doesn't count against my Contract Cap and it doesn't save me any cap space, but it allows me to protect a valuable player.
Notice the "N" in the box for "TAG" - that indicates that he is now ineligible for a Franchise Tag in the future.
Moving on to another player.....
Let's look at Brandin Cooks he's been pretty consistently productive as a possession receiver throughout his career and is projected to be equally productive this season......he had a pretty bad year in 2019, but he bounced back last season.
Remember, for selecting a Base Salary, we have 2 options:
- Current Season salary....OR
- Prior Season salary plus a 10% signing bonus
So, keep in mind, salaries are based on prior season stats. So his current year salary is based on 2020 stats and his prior season (2020) salary is based on 2019 season stats.
- Cooks current salary is $26.9 million....but
- His prior season salary was only $11.8 million
Even with adding a signing bonus, it's going to save a ton of money to use the second option. Let's say we sign him to a 3 year contract using his prior season salary for a Total Contract Value of $35.4 million (11.8 x 3).....that will give us a Signing Bonus of $3.5 million (10$ of Total Contract Value) that we have to pay this year.
Here's what we can do....We'll Structure his deal to pay him $8.3 million in year 1 and also his $3.5 million signing bonus....see what I did there? 8.3 + 3.5 = 11.8, so we're still only taking a $11.8 million cap hit this year which is far less than his $26.9 million current salary. Then we pay him $15.3 in year 2, then $11.8 in year 3 - which all adds up to the $35.4 million Total (+ the signing bonus)
If we do it this way, on the contract form we would select "Prior Season Salary" on the "Salary Formula" dropdown
Notice that only the Contract money appears here, the signing bonus money would appear on the Signing Bonus chart
Now we're used both "Current Season" and "Prior Season" for the Base Salary calculations....now we'll look at a player that gives us a chance to use another option......
Cam Newton - love him or hate him, in this league, you pretty much have to lock up any player that puts up 385 points in a season. So first we look at our 2 options - Current Salary and Prior Season Salary....
Cam's current salary is $38.5 million.........then, when we look for his 2020 salary (from his 2019 stats) we find that he only started in 2 games and only scored a total of 16 points for the whole season.....
....DON'T WORRY, THERE'S A RULE FOR THAT
The "Salary Formula" you would use is the "Corrected Prior Season" formula (there's also a "Corrected Current Season" formula)
In the Contract Rules (in the Calculating Salaries section) there are a set of formulas that must be used for any player who started in less than 12 games - the formulas are the same for either current season or for prior.
In this case, the one used would be "started in less than 4 games but at least 1" and that formula is (Total Points) divided by (Number of Starts) times (16) + (30%) times (100k)
So for Cam's Prior Season Corrected Base Salary it would be (16 (Total Points) divided by 2 (number of starts) x 16) = 128 + 38.4 (30% of 128) = 166.4 x 100k = $16.6 million (rounded)
Quite a deal, isn't it.....but like all of these other contracts that are such great deals for your salary cap numbers, keep in mind, the risk associated with all of them is that you're locked into paying for them regardless of if they get injured or traded or benched whatever may happen to them in real life over the length of their contracts, or, if you cut them, you'll still take cap hits (50%) for them.
Anyway, for this example, let's just keep things simple, sign him to 3 years at $49.8 m ($16.6 x 3) with "Corrected Prior Season" selected in the dropdown, and pay him $16.6 in each year......and since the "Corrected Salary" we're using is from his Prior Season, we also have to pay him a signing bonus (10% of Total Contract Value). That would be a signing bonus of $5.0 million - that's 10% of $49.8 = $4.98 rounded to 1 decimal place = $5.0 million
We're saving so much on him, we decide to just take the cap hit on the $5 million signing bonus and don't structure the salary to recover it the way we did with Cooks. Again, notice the $5 million does not appear on the Active Contracts chart but will show up on the Signing Bonus chart
Next.....
George Kittle missed time last season like Cam did in 2019....let's see if we can get the same sort of sweetheart deal for him, this time for using the "Corrected Salary" formula for his Current Salary....
2 options:
- Prior Season Salary (2020) = $30.6 million
- Current Salary (2021) = $17.9 million...but he's got "less than 12 starts" so we have to "correct" it, let's take a look...
In his case, he played in 8 games, so the formula (found in the Contract Rules, Calculating Salary section) is "If a player STARTED in less than 12 games, but at least 8, Corrected Salary Formula for that season = (Total Points) divided by (Number of Starts) times (16) + (10%) times (100k)"
Applying that to Kittle's numbers we get:
179 divided by 8 = 22.375 x 16 = 358 + 35.8 (10%) = 393.8 x 100k = $39.4 million (rounded)
So in THIS example, it's going to be a better deal NOT to use his corrected salary and just go with his prior season salary of $30.6 million
We'll make this one for just 2 years....but we've got to pay him a signing bonus too because we're using "Prior Season" for our "Base Salary Formula
Remember, the signing bonus is 10% of Total Contract Value, so $30.6 million (Base Salary) x 2 (years) = $61.2 (Total Contract Value.......10% of $61.2 = a $6.1 million signing bonus (that still keeps us around $12 million cheaper than if we had used his Corrected Current Season salary and not had to pay a Signing Bonus)
At this point, we've saved a bunch of room toward our cap space on Elliot, Martinez, and Cooks, and maybe we're worried Kittle doesn't bounce back and maybe we'll look to trade Kittle next season if he has a mediocre 2021....so let's split the $61.2 million by front-loading the contract and paying him $40 million this year, and just the remaining $21.2 the following season. On the other hand, if he has a really good 2021 season, there are rules that let us give him a Contract Extension next year to protect him from Free Agency and keep him locked up for another 3 years (it's not important to know those rules, just know that they exist)
Here's how it will look - again, with the signing bonus not showing up here, but on the Signing Bonus Chart
Now let's look at just one more player.....
In this league, the Safety position is designed to anchor your defense - essentially it's set up to have the sort of importance of a quarterback on offense. With 245 total points in 2020, Tracy Walker was a solid piece of the Stars' roster.......
the 2 options:
- Current Season: $24.5 million
- Prior Season: $30.9 million
So we'll use current season for the better deal.......but diving deeper, if you're managing this team, you would maybe be thinking 2019 was Walker's first fulltime season after being drafted in 2018, and he scored 309 points (creating the $30.9 million prior season salary) which is great for a young safety....but then he regressed last year to the 245 points (and the $24.5 million current season salary)......
So maybe now you have doubts about whether he can be the real deal and be worthy of a long term contract. Maybe you want to take a wait and see approach with him. You don't want to leave him Unsigned, because then he's exposed to the Free Agent Auction where another team could poach him......so, what to do?
Well, he would be a good candidate for a Franchise Tag, but you already decided to use that on Patterson....so here's another option....
We sign him at the $24.5 million price tag, but only to a 1 year deal. That does a few things:
- It gives him PARTIAL protection in the Auction. He would be a Restricted Free Agent because he will be in his final year of the 1 year contract
- That means you have the right to match the highest bid and still keep him.....OR.....
- If the high bid turns out to be more than you want to pay, you would receive a draft pick in this year's draft as compensation........OR.......
- If nobody bids on him, you keep him for the 1 year contract, and then next year can sign him to an Extension......AND.....
- Even if he has a real breakout year and scores, say, 400 points, you can still use the 2021 $24.5 million price tag as the Base Salary on the extension because it will then be his "Prior Season Salary".....OR....
- You could then use the Franchise Tag on him to just lock him in for another single year
The rules for draft pick compensation are in the Contract Rules in the Contract Free Agency section and the compensation is based on the base salary of the high bid if you choose not to match it:
- For RFA's with a (new)Base Salary of $0-$10 million, acquiring team will compensate the original team with their upcoming 3rd round draft pick
- For RFA's with a (new)Base Salary of $10.1-$20 million, acquiring team will compensate the original team with their upcoming 2nd round draft pick
- For RFA's with a (new)Base Salary of $20.1-$30 million, acquiring team will compensate the original team with their upcoming 1st round draft pick
- For RFA's with a (new)Base Salary above $30.1 million, acquiring team will compensate the original team with their upcoming 1st and 3rd round draft picks
Note, Restructure is marked N because since it's only a 1 year deal, there's nothing to restructure.
Bringing It All Together
Everything in the section above have just been EXAMPLES of what is possible. If you were managing the Stars' roster, maybe you would handle things differently; maybe give the Franchise Tag to a different player, maybe change the lengths of some of the contracts or sign additional players - there are no right and wrong ways to manage your personnel, only judgement calls.
But taking the examples we did use, and the way we set them up, let's see what we've done from the big picture level:
- We've given contracts (and our Franchise Tag) to Elliot, Martinez, Patterson, Cooks Newton, Kittle, and Walker.
- Without contracts, those players combined would have cost us a total of $180.1 million
- So if you were selecting your keepers at this point, you would be starting to approach the $220 million Cut Cap
- But under the Contracts we've signed, those players combined will only cost a total of $125,6 million giving you a lot more room against both the Cut Cap and, eventually the Salary Cap
- There's also an additional $14.6 million in signing bonus money we'll take as a Cap Hit, but that only counts against the main Salary Cap and not the Cut Cap, and we still come out ahead anyway
- We've used up 18 Contract years against our Contract Cap of 30
- This leaves us with 12 available Contract Years going into the Free Agent Auction.....any player we make the winning bid on in the auction MUST be placed under contract for the amount of that winning bid, and the bidding process includes both salary money and years (more on that in the Auction section of this tutorial)......so.....
- More available Contract Years = More Bidding Power
- Also, after the draft, you have the ability to put a contract on any NFL rookie you draft or any NFL rookie you pick up as a UDFA in the 48 hours after the draft
- If these are the only Contracts we sign, once they all cycle next season on April1, it will drop to 12 Contract Years (against the cap of 30), giving us room for new contracts on other players we may have acquired between now and then
Before the draft, when it comes time to name Keepers, you would make these 7 players your keepers (@ $125.6 million toward the Cut Cap of $220.6 million).....BUT THAT"S NOT ALL....
Let's say you don't win any bids or acquire anyone else in the auction, and let's say Thomas Logan ($22.4m), Myles Jack ($23.3m), and Avery Williamson ($21.6m) - who you didn't put under contract - went through the Free Agency Auction and no other team bid on them, so they're still on your roster......you can them name them as Keepers too, without giving them contracts, bringing your total roster costs to a total of $192.9 million - still under the Cut Cap
Again, these are all just possibilities. We've managed to make some really good deals and put together our core roster for well below what we could have done without Contracts, BUT IT WON"T ALWAYS WORK OUT THAT WAY.
We were purposely putting things together with the goal of increasing cap space for THIS season - that means we're going to pay more down the line. And over time, there's also going to be Contract players that we may decide to cut, taking on those cap penalties (50%) for their future contract years.......So don't think of Contracts as being primarily about saving money towards the cap, a better way to think of them is that they are a way to PROVIDE OPTIONS - lots of them - for managing your roster.