6/25 (F) – Mack – Sim to 11/5/08 (Major awards announced / eve of arbitration / realignment)
6/28 (M) – Nate – Sim to 11/12/08 (Arbitration awards announced / eve of free agency)
6/30 (W) – Mack – Sim to 11/16/08 (free agency begins)
7/2 (F) – Nate – Sim to 12/1/08 (free agency)

Having collected and collated the owners’ sentiment, we are now able to provide some specific plans for the upcoming offseason:

1. Upgrading to OOTP 11. Yes, we will be upgrading to OOTP 11. There were substantially more owners were in favor of upgrading than those opposed.

2. Realignment. Probably more properly called reshuffling, we will be realigning the existing divisions at the start of this offseason. Again, there were substantially more owners in favor than opposed. So, here will be the new division alignments, determined with Nate’s 12-sided die. I’ve added last season’s records for everyone’s information.

Platonic League (491-481)
Pittsburgh 103-59
Brooklyn 90-72
Jersey City 80-82
Stockholm 78-84
Gainesville 74-88
Maryland 66-96

Socratic League (481-491)
Miami 106-56
Seattle 102-60
New York 81-81
Marietta 77-85
Ramapough 62-100
Cairo 53-109

3. Future Plans. As we have indicated in some emails and blog posts, Nate and I would like to expand the league to 16 teams. There would be four divisions, two per league, with four teams in each division. We’ll be starting a discussion soon to see whether other owners are in favor of expansion and, if so, starting to work out the details.

4. Schedule. Given all of this, the following is our planned schedule for the coming offseason sims, with the specific dates in November to be filled in depending on the announced offseason schedule in the game. This will give everyone time to look at what happens after the rollover and make offseason plans accordingly.

6/18 (F) – Mack – Rollover to OOTP 11
6/25 (F) – Mack – Sim to 11/__/08 (Major awards announced / eve of arbitration)
6/28 (M) – Nate – Sim to 11/__/08 (Arbitration awards announced / eve of free agency)
6/30 (W) – Mack – Sim to 11/__/08 (free agency begins)
7/2 (F) – Nate – Sim to 12/1/08 (free agency)
7/5 (M) – Mack – Sim to 12/16/08 (free agency, winter meetings come and go)
7/7 (W) – Nate – Sim to 12/31/08 (free agency)
7/9 (F) – Mack – Sim to 1/15/09 (free agency, almanac created)
7/12 (M) – Nate – Sim to 1/31/09 (free agency)
7/14 (W) – Mack – Sim to 2/10/09 (preseason starts, free agent demands drop)
7/16 (F) – Nate – Sim to 2/20/09 (preseason, free agency)
7/19 (M) – Mack – Sim to 3/2/09 (start of spring training, free agent demands drop again)
7/21 (W) – Nate – Sim to 3/9/09 (spring training)
7/23 (F) – Mack – Sim to 3/16/09 (spring training)
7/26 (M) – Nate – Sim to 3/23/09 (spring training)
7/28 (W) – Mack – Sim to 3/30/09 (end of spring training, demote players to avoid ML service time)
7/30 (F) – Nate – Sim to 4/6/08 (first regular season sim)

Here’s a schedule of sims for the next few weeks:

Wed., 12/2 – Nate – Sim to 8/10
Fri., 12/4 – Mack – Sim to 8/15 (sim to be run mid-day due to schedule conflicts for Nate and me)
Mon., 12/7 – Nate – Sim to 8/20
Wed., 12/9 – Mack – Sim to 8/25
Fri., 12/11 – Nate – Sim to 9/1 (seven-day sim to get to roster expansion)
Mon. 12/14 – Mack – Sim to 9/6
Wed., 12/16 – Nate – Sim to 9/11
Fri., 12/18 – Mack – Sim to 9/16
Mon., 12/21 – Nate – Sim to 9/21
Wed., 12/23 – Mack – Sim to 9/26

For all of you who might still be making contract offers, here’s the anticipated schedule. Times will vary as to when the sim was held, as Eric and I will be “watching” the games I’m simming and therefore making it fit around our work.

Thursday: Game 1, Mack
Friday: Game 2, Mack
Saturday: Game 3, Nate
Sunday: Game 4, Nate
Monday: Games 5-7 (as needed), Mack

We’ll then drop back to an every other day format, most likely, as we move through the 2006-07 offseason.

Here’s an updated schedule for the rest of the regular season. We’ll probably do playoff sims every day, as we have in the past.

7/17 (F) – Mack – Sim to August 10
7/20 (M) – Nate – Sim to August 15
7/22 (W) – Mack -Sim to August 20
7/24 (F) – Nate – Sim to August 25
7/27 (M) – Mack – Sim to September 1 (seven-day sim to roster expansion)
7/29 (W) – Nate – Sim to September 6
7/31 (F) – Mack – Sim to September 11
8/3 (M) – Nate -Sim to September 16
8/5 (W) – Mack – Sim to September 21
8/7 (F) – Nate – Sim to September 26
8/10 (M) – Mack – Sim to October 1 (last regular season sim)

Here’s the schedule after tonight’s sim, running through the rest of the year. It goes way too far out in the future to hope we’ll stick to it exactly, but it gives everyone an idea of where we’re going.

6/15 (M) – Mack – Sim to June 5
6/17 (W) – Nate – Sim to June 10
6/19 (F) – Nate – Sim to June 15
6/22 (M) – Mack – Sim to June 20 (includes amateur draft)
6/24 (W) – Nate – Sim to June 25
6/26 (F) – Mack – Sim to June 30
6/29 (M) – Nate – Sim to July 5
7/1 (W) – Nate – Sim to July 10
7/3 (F) – Mack – Sim to July 15
7/6 (M) – Mack -Sim to July 20
7/8 (W) – Nate – Sim to July 25
7/10 (F) – Mack – Sim to July 29 (4-day sim)
7/13 (M) – Mack – Sim to August 2 (4-day sim, includes trade deadline)
7/15 (W) – Nate – Sim to August 7
7/17 (F) – Nate – Sim to August 12
7/20 (M) – Mack -Sim to August 17
7/22 (W) – Nate – Sim to August 22
7/24 (F) – Mack – Sim to August 27
7/27 (M) – Nate – Sim to September 1
7/29 (W) – Mack – Sim to September 6
7/31 (F) – Nate – Sim to September 11
8/3 (M) – Mack -Sim to September 16
8/5 (W) – Nate – Sim to September 21
8/7 (F) – Mack – Sim to September 26
8/10 (M) – Nate – Sim to October 1 (last regular season sim)

Due to ongoing tech issues and not wanting to rush a sim we’ll delay until Friday and Mack’s sim for the next one.

Edited by Mack to add that I’ll probably run the sim in the early afternoon Pacific time (provided my flight back to Seattle tomorrow morning isn’t interminably delayed).

FYI, here’s the planned schedule for the first part of the 2006 season, once we finish Spring Training today and tomorrow. It’s our normal three sims per week, but we’re not alternating every time as Nate and I have got vacations / business trips planned.

Fri., 5/15 – Nate – Sim to April 6
Mon., 5/18 – Mack – Sim to April 11
Wed., 5/20 – Nate – Sim to April 16
Fri., 5/22 – Mack – Sim to April 21
Mon., 5/25 – Nate – Sim to April 26
Wed., 5/27 – Nate – Sim to May 1 (Amateur Draft Pool announced)
Fri., 5/29 – Mack – Sim to May 6
Mon., 6/1 – Mack – Sim to May 11
Wed., 6/3 – Mack – Sim to May 16
Fri., 6/5 – Mack – Sim to May 21
Mon., 6/8 – Mack – Sim to May 26
Wed., 6/10 – Nate – Sim to May 31
Fri., 6/12 – Nate – Sim to June 5
Mon., 6/15 – Mack – Sim to June 10
Wed., 6/17 – Nate – Sim to June 15
Fri., 6/19 – Mack – Sim to June 20 (Amateur Draft)

Nate and I are planning to change the remaining offseason schedule slightly. It looks like free agents have started dropping their demands, so it makes sense to give people more time to try to sign them. Also, Spring Training in this version of the game looks like a very useful development time that we don’t want to rush through. We’re thinking of breaking it into seven-day sims to allow people to use the seven-day line-up feature and make the most of the time.

If we do change the schedule, it will push the first regular season sim from next Monday to next Friday. The schedule will look something like this.

Tues, 5/5: Mack sim to Feb. 10
Wed., 5/6: Nate sim to Feb. 20
Thurs., 5/7: Mack sim to March 2 (start of Spring Training)
Fri., 5/8: Nate sim to March 9
Mon., 5/11: Mack sim to March 16
Tues., 5/12: Nate sim to March 23
Wed., 5/13: Mack sim to April 1
Fri., 5/15: Nate First Regular Season Sim

Any thoughts, objections, complaints? If we don’t get the sense that people are strongly opposed to this, we’ll go forward this way.

Important note to all owners. The game’s setting was improperly set at letting the imaginary team owner control the budget instead of the players. This had some strange and improper effects. So, I fixed that, simmed a day to make it work, and re-uploaded the league file.

So, if you downloaded it between my last email/blog post and this one, you’ll need to redo it. On the plus side, you now have more money to make your contract extension offers before your players become 2006 free agents.

Here’s the planned sim schedule for 2005-06 offseason. If we’re able to hold to it, we’ll start the 2006 season in three weeks. Sweet.

Under this plan, players will hit free agency during Tuesday’s sim. So you have two only chances to make your final, best offers before players hit free agency or are awarded arbitration.

Monday, 4/20 – Sim to November 3 (all Award winners announced) (Mack)
Tuesday, 4/21 – Sim to November 13 (arbitration, players become FA) (Nate)
Wednesday, 4/22 – Sim to November 21 (Mack)
Thursday, 4/23 – Sim to December 1 (Nate)
Monday, 4/27 – Sim to December 11; conduct Rule 5 draft via draft lists (Mack)
Tuesday, 4/28 – Sim to December 21 (Nate)
Wednesday, 4/29 – Sim to January 1 (Mack)
Thursday, 4/30 – Sim to January 11 (Nate)
Friday, 5/1 – Sim to January 21 (Mack)
Monday, 5/4 – Sim to February 1 (Nate)
Tuesday, 5/5 – Sim to February 16 (Mack)
Wednesday, 5/6 – Sim to March 2 and start of Spring Training (Nate)
Thursday, 5/7 – Sim to March 16 (Mack)
Friday, 5/8 – Sim to April 1 (Nate)
Monday, 5/11 – Opening Day 2006!!! First regular season sim (Mack)

May everyone’s offseason be successful.