2037 OOTP Opt Out Decisions, Part 2, 3+ Year Decisions and Wrapup

[Ted]

Okay, so maybe that last one should have been part 1 and part 2. But whatever, this will be shorter. Probably should have broken these up differently.

What have we learned so far from the short term deals?

1) OOTP doesn't have reasonable expectations for contract lengths for older players
2) OOTP doesn't appear to consider that future contracts might not be entirely guaranteed (which is hilarious when you think about the fact the this is the logic driving decisions about options
3) OOTP DOES handle no brainer situations correctly, at least when it comes to players that it considers bad making a ton or good getting a bargain.
4) OOTP struggles more with the middle ground, declining early 30 year old.
5) There some strong evidence that OOTP uses expected player demands rather than existing contracts to decide on options.
6) We as owners tend to forget that players want total money more than AAV, and then are surprised when they go to FA thinking they can get a longer deal that will be worth more than a bigger AAV in 1-2 years.
7) The game seems to factor it's rating of players more than their performance (there are sliders for this for trades with the AI, I don't know if there is a way to adjust AI player evaluation for contract expectations.)


Let's tackle the last group of players, guys with 3+ years to consider.

Juan Sweetworld opted in to 78.72 million over four years after posting an utter garbage year of 0.9 WAR at age 29. The game calls him a 55. 93% of fifteen voters thought he should not opt out.

J.J. McQuade opted in to at least 18 mil over one year, and possible 34 mil over three at age 29 after being a 1 WAR player. The game calls him a 50. No one thought he should opt out. 14 votes

Jayden Harsnett opted out of 36 million over two years that could potentially by 78.7 million over four. He just posted a 2.3 WAR year and will be 31. The game calls him a 65. No one thought he should opt out. 13 votes.

Jimmy Greenwood opted out of 39.39 million over three years after a career best 6.7 WAR season. He will be 32 and the game calls him a 60. 21 percent thought he shouldn't opt out. 14 votes

Sam Romero is not dumb Jim and Nigel? hoped he was. But h'll take home 25 million for being replacement level for the next three years.



Analysis:
Juan Sweetworld - Yup. Massively overpaid and couldn't possibly get that deal in FA? Check and check. Also checks, as in the ones Recte will keep writing.

J.J McQuade - See above, except it's not Recte's money. And people have traded for McQuade twice, so Taylor has hope.

Jayden Harsnett - Hmm. This one doesn't look too good. Harsnett turned down 36 million to reach free agency at 31 instead of 33 (at the earliest). He's not performed that well. I think the game calling him a 65 is what has to drive this. It sees that 65 and thinks that should be a 18-20 mil aav and a 31 year old can get 5-6 years at that rate. This is actually probably a straightforward decision for the game engine. I'm assuming some of these decision might vary year to year, but I bet this oen doesn't. That doesn't mean it's correct. There is no world in which even 3 win players (which Harsnett has only been 3 of 8 seasons) get 18 mil per year. This is just wrong.

Jimmy Greenwood - Another good decision. Greenwood figures he can make more than 39 in his next deal, and hit FA now instead of at 35 when he might get nothing. He might make that amount in the next two years if teams get in a bidding war.

Sam Romero - Not dumb, just bad at pitching.


So in this group of five, we have four good decisions and one bad one. I don't think we learned much here. Longer deals are probably easier to figure out for OOTP than shorter ones, so no brainers are even easier to see. Regarding Harsnett, I really bet it's the game's internal valuation of him that drove the decision (or maybe he had only like a 10 percent change of option out and just did?). If OOTP incorporates randomness into it's decision process for opt outs, I would tell the devs to stop that. Just use math. There's enough fog or war with it already that you don't need to add randomness.

Takeways:
1) Opt outs do NOT decrease owner risk when given to younger players (at the time of the signing) for longer when they are early in the deal.



New totals:
For 18 players we have:
Correct decision 8
Reasonable 2
Understandable but likely wrong 2
Questionable 3
Wrong Decision 3

In terms of voters predictions:
Predicted Correctly: 9
Predicted Incorrectly: 8


Summary:
OOTP in general does not seem to be very good at player option decisions. I would like the above table to have at least 2/3rds in the "correct" or "reasonable" category. The "wrong" category should only get maybe one player every few years. The areas of biggest concern seem to again be:
1) Players overestimation of both the length, and number of guaranteed years of their future contracts, especially for older players.
2) Too much reliance of it's internal grading of players rather than recent performance or performance trend.
3) Again, this is only suspicion, but using probably contract demands rather than existing contracts to decide whether to opt out is wrong minded if that is in fact what the game is doing (and it's the only explanation I have for some players) and ties into point number two.
4) Also again admittedly very difficult to do, but OOTP does not take current performance and the likelihood of a buyout into consideration when looking at mutual options.

Who are the wonkiest players? Old guys who will not get more than a guaranteed year going forward and early 30 year olds who used to be good but are declining turning down AAv's they can't hope to approach in their next deal.

One last point regarding OOTP's handling of this. Our league has a very specific economy. Maybe OOTP works better in the MLB economy. I suspect not, but there are enough differences that it could be the case.

As far as we, the GM's, we probably don't think enough about those 33 year olds who want to try to get one last big payday. They might often opt out of 1-2 years of better AAV than they can get in the future. Whether or not it will work for the player is another question entirely. For some, it very well might. And those moldy oldies might just opt out of anything.

I hope you enjoyed this. Thanks so much to everyone who contributed. I have fun sorting through the players and thinking about it. If you disagree, or have other points, I would love to talk about it.

Also, this is now incomplete. We have to see what these guys demand in free agency AND what they sign for eventually. There were surprised regarding the option decisions themselves (but OOTP and us being wrong), so I expect more surprises in the eventual results.