Settings for new cap league?

[jcairns]

Hi all,

I'm starting a new cap league (full keepers/dynasty) on Fantrax and am looking for some tips, as I haven't done a cap league before. It'll be H2H, and I'm fine setting up all the categories, matchups, etc.

I'm looking for help with the cap and rosters themselves. Preferred approach would be to mimic the NHL, but we will likely only have 12 or so teams. Given the way NHL contracts and the cap are set up, what makes the most sense?

Do you set the roster limit to 23 "pro" (active) players, and have a minor league that can bring your maximum contract total to 50? How would you handle the farm team cap? Is there something else I am missing here that I should think of?

As for the cap itself, is there any general rule of thumb for adjusting it to match the smaller league size? Since we will have 12 teams, instead of the NHL's 31, more higher-earning players will be available to roster.

Thanks in advance for any and all tips!

[Eskimo Brother]

There was a thread started earlier this morning asking very similar questions. You can check out my reply there.

In addition to that, the points I would make, are that some sort of minors system is recommended, and that limiting yourself to "mimicking the NHL" may prove to hinder you in more ways than it helps. Try to be a little flexible off the bat if possible. If you get through my other post and maybe the article too, and still have questions/concerns, then let me know.

[Moses]

Hi all,

I'm starting a new cap league (full keepers/dynasty) on Fantrax and am looking for some tips, as I haven't done a cap league before. It'll be H2H, and I'm fine setting up all the categories, matchups, etc.

I'm looking for help with the cap and rosters themselves. Preferred approach would be to mimic the NHL, but we will likely only have 12 or so teams. Given the way NHL contracts and the cap are set up, what makes the most sense?

Do you set the roster limit to 23 "pro" (active) players, and have a minor league that can bring your maximum contract total to 50? How would you handle the farm team cap? Is there something else I am missing here that I should think of?

As for the cap itself, is there any general rule of thumb for adjusting it to match the smaller league size? Since we will have 12 teams, instead of the NHL's 31, more higher-earning players will be available to roster.

Thanks in advance for any and all tips!

- Your cap has to be much higher than the NHL cap. In a 12 team league something around $100,000,000 is about the right starting point. You are going to need to do some math to tweak it just right but $100M is a good number it start spit balling with. They last thing you want to do is have superstar players sitting on the waiver wire because they are to expensive. (NOT - under-performing players, they deserve to be on the WW)

- I like using the CAP HIT that he NHL is paying the player.

- Farm Cap? - Don't worry about the $$$ just the number of games played

- RE: "Thanks in advance for any and all tips!"

My advice is to write the rules down in advance. There are lots of resources in here and most of it can be copy/paste from other leagues rules. The point is WRITE IT DOWN. You want black and white rules that require no interpenetration. No grey areas.

[jcairns]

Thanks for all the advice both of you.

- Farm Cap? - Don't worry about the $$$ just the number of games played

Any reason why you say not to worry about the $$? Otherwise teams with a bunch of farm-eligible players could stream them all in to play a bunch of games without them counting towards the cap. Or would you mitigate that by not allowing "call ups" so to speak?

[Moses]

You limit the 'streaming' by setting a GP maximum.

In simple terms you are setting it up in a way where:
- you can only have x number of games played per week/month/year
or
- you can have x number of call-ups per week/month/season
or
- you can have x numbers of transactions per week/month/season
or
- once player x is on the roster he cannot go back to the farm
or
- you can only have x number of farm eligible players on your active roster at one time

... you get the picture

In others words you do place a limit on 'something' to minimize streaming. All (or most) players on your farm are going to be making $925k (league minimum) or less as they will be on entry level or relatively small contracts. If the farm roster size is, say for example, 20 players the combined salary for each team is going to all be about the same.