Poll: How to decide Free Agent Ties

[Virtual Jarmo]

What should we do guys?

Pros:

Highest yearly amount: The player in real life would likely select to get paid up front.
Lower team in standings: Give lower seeded teams an opportunity at parity as well as ensure they reach the cap floor
Most years offered: Financial, long-term security
Higher team in standings: The player would probably rather play for a contender

Cons:

Highest yearly amount: Plenty of "rental" contracts in FA
Lower team in standings: Defies realism to play for a bad team
Most years offered: Cap circumvention with a lowball offer for a longer duration
Higher team in standings: Produces no parity and unfortunate for rebuilding/lower teams

This poll expires Sunday night. Any tie bids will have to wait until a consensus is reached.

[DevilsGM]

I did vote on highest team in the standings, but thats under the assumtion the contracts are exactly the same. But I do believe it should go #1 Highest yearly salary then if a tie breaker is still needed #2 Highest team in the standings. Because lets face it players want money now for the most part and would rather win and this is comming from a basement dweller at the moment.

[Montreal Canadiens]

I think it should be total contract amount. For Example, if someone offered Sidney Crosby 4 years, $5M, with a full bonus, that would be 24.666. (Years x base salary + signing bonus). That way, if someone else offered Crosby 3 years, $5M, $2M bonus. It's obviously not as much money and their number would be 17.

Just my thought.

[CapsGM]

I think it should be total contract amount. For Example, if someone offered Sidney Crosby 4 years, $5M, with a full bonus, that would be 24.666. (Years x base salary + signing bonus). That way, if someone else offered Crosby 3 years, $5M, $2M bonus. It's obviously not as much money and their number would be 17.

Just my thought.

We don't do signing bonuses for UFAs. Either way, total contract amount already wins the UFA outright, but we're trying to determine who gets the player in the event of a tie; i.e. a 4 year, $16 million deal or $4 million per year, vs. a 2 year, $16 million deal or $8 million per year.

[Commish Bub(NYR)]

We don't do signing bonuses for UFAs. Either way, total contract amount already wins the UFA outright, but we're trying to determine who gets the player in the event of a tie; i.e. a 4 year, $16 million deal or $4 million per year, vs. a 2 year, $16 million deal or $8 million per year.

Yeah, but we could. And since you're only allowed to offer 1/2 the yearly salary as a "max" bonus, that could throw in an extra wrinkle in your UFA offer. So:

2 yrs at $4M per plus a max bonus of $2M = $10M total
vs.
3 yrs at $3M per plus a max bonus of $1.5M = $10.5M total

It undercuts the argument for "more money per year and more money up front (bonus)", but it's worth a thought.

[Parker]

I dislike the idea of using signing bonuses to count for ANYTHING if we're shooting for increased realism, given that EHM's financials are so broken that unless a team is managed very badly there's no reason they wouldn't show a $25M profit every season, which means (before the signing bonus rule change at least, which was put in place specifically to address the lack of "real value" that a team's available cash represents) the team could easily afford to give out five maximum signing bonus contracts every season. I like standings better as a tiebreaker because it adds realism; as DevilsGM mentioned, players would rather play for a winning organization. I don't think it puts bottom-feeder teams at a disadvantage because weaker teams are likely to have a lot more room in their budgets to win bidding wars over the powerhouses. Just my two cents.

[SharksGM]

I thought about it and at the risk of complicating things, it would seem to make sense to announce that the bids are tied and allow another 12 hours for teams to submit max one new bid each.

[NashvilleGM]

I think it should be variable:

YOung players are looking for longer contract, stability, money. Dont really care if contender or not.

Older players (30+ ?) are looking for contending team, money.

Something along that...

[TorontoGM]

Yearly wins and high end players only considering offers from contenders is pretty unfair for teams such as mine. I'm pretty much forced to lose and draft till we win. I don't care what anyone says, players want money, stability and a comfortable place to live and play. You tell me players don't want to play in the "center of the hockey universe"?

[CapsGM]

Yearly wins and high end players only considering offers from contenders is pretty unfair for teams such as mine. I'm pretty much forced to lose and draft till we win. I don't care what anyone says, players want money, stability and a comfortable place to live and play. You tell me players don't want to play in the "center of the hockey universe"?

Ties are very uncommon. And chances are, the lower seeded team likely has more cap space to offer the player, so it's not a big deal.

[DevilsGM]

Besides any GM that builds his team purely through Free agency should lose his job......*ahem*Glen Sather*ahem* But yea just like Caps I don't find it that big of a deal, EHM can be a fickle misstress and some teams will find themselves lower on the totem poll than they thought it should even out and it doesn't mean you can't win a bid just means you actualy have to win it not just tie.

[Virtual Jarmo]

From here on out, this will be the tie policy that you guys have voted on. It will go in the Rulebook.

[TorontoGM]

Yearly wins and high end players only considering offers from contenders is pretty unfair for teams such as mine. I'm pretty much forced to lose and draft till we win. I don't care what anyone says, players want money, stability and a comfortable place to live and play. You tell me players don't want to play in the "center of the hockey universe"?

Ties are very uncommon. And chances are, the lower seeded team likely has more cap space to offer the player, so it's not a big deal.

Having to overpay for a player cause I didn't win as much as the other team is a big deal to me.

[Virtual Jarmo]

Yearly wins and high end players only considering offers from contenders is pretty unfair for teams such as mine. I'm pretty much forced to lose and draft till we win. I don't care what anyone says, players want money, stability and a comfortable place to live and play. You tell me players don't want to play in the "center of the hockey universe"?

Ties are very uncommon. And chances are, the lower seeded team likely has more cap space to offer the player, so it's not a big deal.

Having to overpay for a player cause I didn't win as much as the other team is a big deal to me.

Guys, the discussion is moot now because we have a tiebreaker in place. And it has nothing to do with standings.