2026 Team Budgets

PelicansGM wrote:Why are we fighting inflation? Why are we fighting against the normal OOTP financial engine? It's not built to have a fixed cap and it's not built to never experience inflation. At least increase the salary cap since we don't seem to want to get rid of it. That's at least a model that we've seen work in the nfl and nba. 

Also there are plenty of ways to spend cash aside from salary- intl free agents, scout and player dev budgets, etc.

I'm for no cap, we didn't have enough support.

Why are we fighting inflation? Why are we fighting against the normal OOTP financial engine? It's not built to have a fixed cap and it's not built to never experience inflation. At least increase the salary cap since we don't seem to want to get rid of it. That's at least a model that we've seen work in the nfl and nba. 

Also there are plenty of ways to spend cash aside from salary- intl free agents, scout and player dev budgets, etc.

joepott wrote:

PelicansGM wrote:Wait what?? Budgets only change once a year... so everyone will always have the same budget every year. I thought we adjusted owner ratings to level the playing field. Now we're double-leveling the playing field, and more importantly - there's now zero incentive to perform well (except for winning games, but OOTP is way more than that, at least IMO). It would be my suggestion to level budgets now if the way they were was too 'different' for everyone's tastes, and from here on out let people who manage $ and perform well get rewarded for it (we all have generous owners now, so no one will get screwed over even if they place last).

agreed

I originally drafted my team looking toward the future. 10 million difference is very little between top and bottom. So if I win on a regular basis and Palin loses on on a regular basis (this is real not hypothetical) we can at max only have a difference of $10 million in budget. Not sure I like that very much.

the difference was about closer to like 22 mil.  Max was 140 mil- the lowest was 112 or 116 mil.  Please vote in the poll.  There 3 options going leave it going forward and 2 edit options.  Keep in mind that inflation and extra money bring up player contracts but the cap is stable.  Also if you make 50 mil- most of it goes in the garbage (cash cap) and you can only spend 95 mil on payroll.  The growing budgets are only useful for non cap leagues and extra money to release players.  Keeping the budgets down minimizes teams ability to get out of large contracts.  So it depends on your position on these issues.  I'm all for rewarding the better GMs but is it really a reward getting money you can't use but damages the league long term.

PelicansGM wrote:Wait what?? Budgets only change once a year... so everyone will always have the same budget every year. I thought we adjusted owner ratings to level the playing field. Now we're double-leveling the playing field, and more importantly - there's now zero incentive to perform well (except for winning games, but OOTP is way more than that, at least IMO). It would be my suggestion to level budgets now if the way they were was too 'different' for everyone's tastes, and from here on out let people who manage $ and perform well get rewarded for it (we all have generous owners now, so no one will get screwed over even if they place last).

agreed

I originally drafted my team looking toward the future. 10 million difference is very little between top and bottom. So if I win on a regular basis and Palin loses on on a regular basis (this is real not hypothetical) we can at max only have a difference of $10 million in budget. Not sure I like that very much.

I adjusted the budgets to 128,000,000 for everyone.  We are all equal now (market size, owner spending, and budgets).  I'm going to put up a poll about what to do next year going forward. Lets all vote on this.  This is important- we are fighting the game inflation so the talk about this and come to a consensus.

PelicansGM wrote:Wait what?? Budgets only change once a year... so everyone will always have the same budget every year. I thought we adjusted owner ratings to level the playing field. Now we're double-leveling the playing field, and more importantly - there's now zero incentive to perform well (except for winning games, but OOTP is way more than that, at least IMO). It would be my suggestion to level budgets now if the way they were was too 'different' for everyone's tastes, and from here on out let people who manage $ and perform well get rewarded for it (we all have generous owners now, so no one will get screwed over even if they place last).

everyone owner should have a spending level of 7.  I have to check if anyone changed still- I don't have access to the game.  There still a big difference from top to bottom- just under 40 mill.  The top team has 140 mil budget and the low at 112 mil.  The different budgets are still from the uneven owners.  If the budgets keep increasing - it just increases profit that you can't use and will keep free agent asking prices up.  I guess we can discuss further.  We can even them out this year and everyone is on the same playing field - then let change in game in future seasons.

Wait what?? Budgets only change once a year... so everyone will always have the same budget every year. I thought we adjusted owner ratings to level the playing field. Now we're double-leveling the playing field, and more importantly - there's now zero incentive to perform well (except for winning games, but OOTP is way more than that, at least IMO). It would be my suggestion to level budgets now if the way they were was too 'different' for everyone's tastes, and from here on out let people who manage $ and perform well get rewarded for it (we all have generous owners now, so no one will get screwed over even if they place last).

PelicansGM wrote:I guess we're not doing a range for budgets like last year? Was that kind of a gateway into even budgets?

correct- everyones will still change and effect the league average but I think it should keep the current poor and rich teams closer.  I'm open for discussion if we just want to pick one number to stick with if anyone doesn't like the changing budgets.

The other thing I was thinking off was keeping the budgets between 130-139.  Anyone goes over 139 they get bumped down to 139 and anyone below 130 gets bumped up to 139.  But I figured if we all started with the same budget each off season - there would be no griping.

I guess we're not doing a range for budgets like last year? Was that kind of a gateway into even budgets?

The Average team budget this off season was - $127,583,3333.  I am rounding it up to $128,000,000.  All teams over will be reduced to 128,000,000 and all teams under will be bumped up to 128,000,000.  This season all teams will have the exact same budget.  I will maintain this going forward by taking the average at the start of each off season and manually changing it.  

The Salary cap will remain at $95 mil.  

Rank	Team	2026	2026 New	Diff
1	Maine Shipwrights	$140,000,000	$128,000,000	$12,000,000
2	Denver Sky Sox	$138,000,000	$128,000,000	$10,000,000
3	Mississauga Spartans	$138,000,000	$128,000,000	$10,000,000
4	Boston Rebels	$134,000,000	$128,000,000	$6,000,000
5	Key West Pelicans	$134,000,000	$128,000,000	$6,000,000
6	Charming Sons of Anarchy	$134,000,000	$128,000,000	$6,000,000
7	Death Valley Assassins	$134,000,000	$128,000,000	$6,000,000
8	Detroit Mustangs	$132,000,000	$128,000,000	$4,000,000
9	Montreal Hitmen	$132,000,000	$128,000,000	$4,000,000
10	Wisconsin Dells Ducks	$132,000,000	$128,000,000	$4,000,000
11	Whitby Battalion	$130,000,000	$128,000,000	$2,000,000
12	North Shore Honu	$128,000,000	$128,000,000	$0
13	Hartford Harpoons	$128,000,000	$128,000,000	$0
14	Las Vegas Blackjacks	$128,000,000	$128,000,000	$0
15	Savannah Sand Gnats	$126,000,000	$128,000,000	($2,000,000)
16	Cleveland Barons	$126,000,000	$128,000,000	($2,000,000)
17	New York Knights	$124,000,000	$128,000,000	($4,000,000)
18	Chicago Thunder	$122,000,000	$128,000,000	($6,000,000)
19	Portland Rage	$122,000,000	$128,000,000	($6,000,000)
20	Asheville Smokies	$120,000,000	$128,000,000	($8,000,000)
21	South Florida Skeeters	$120,000,000	$128,000,000	($8,000,000)
22	Missoula Xplorers	$116,000,000	$128,000,000	($12,000,000)
23	Tacoma Titans	$112,000,000	$128,000,000	($16,000,000)
24	Thunder Bay Bombers	$112,000,000	$128,000,000	($16,000,000)
		$3,062,000,000	$3,072,000,000