Last Revised: August 14, 2008

About the MCBL

The Mid Century Baseball League (MCBL) is an online OOTP 6.5 Historical League founded by Rick Mayer that began its simulation in the 1950 season and will journey through the decades setting new records and allowing players who may have been hindered by injuries to flourish.  In 1953, Chris Steele took over as commissioner with the plans of taking this league into the 1980s. All league questions/comments should be directed towards the commissioner.
It is mandatory to have a copy of OOTP 6.5 for this league in order to facilitate roster moves, free agent signings, and other team matters. It is our mission to bring you a great league and a great website. Once again, thanks for joining and I hope you enjoy this league!

Game Play:

• Sims will be held Monday,Wedensday, and Friday of 8 days.
• Lineup exports are due by 4 PM Eastern on the day of the sim. (Sim generally is run between 4pm and 8pm, but can be later on occasion)
• The website will be updated with new league files and new OOTP reports upon completion of the sim and an email will be sent to all owners via the forums, so it is important that you are registered with a valid email address in the forums.

OOTP League Settings:

• Historical League: Starting in 1950
• Coaches/Scout System: Disabled
• Ratings System: 1-10 for all
• Waivers: Enabled (9 days)
• Rule 5: Disabled
• Team Cash Maximum: 15 million
• Salary Cap: None
• Number of Amateur Draft Rounds: 7 (Or until pool is exhausted if less then 7)
• Amateur Draft is held: begins offseason
• Arbitration: Disabled
• Minor League Option Years: Disabled
• Ticket prices: Owner responsibility, managed on Team Front Office screen.
• Promos: Owner responsibility and done via the in-game team calendar.

LEAGUE OFFICIALS

Commissioner: Responsible for simulating games, maintaining and updating website, rosters and transactions, and keeping each owner informed of general league business. The Commissioner, along with the help of the Assistant Commissioner and/or League Presidents, will keep all the teams human owned at all times if possible.

League Presidents: Elected by the Commissioner using a vote or personal discretion. Responsible for keeping their respective league competitive and with active owners. Each can voice his opinion on behalf of the owners on the league's rules, ideas, etc.

Draft Moderator:Appointed by the Commissioner using personal discretion from volunteers. Responsible for assisting other league officials in keeping the amateur draft moving. Able to auto-pick for a team that is to be auto-picked for per league rules or owner instruction.

OWNER RESPONSIBILITIES

• All teams are responsible for their own income and must stay active.
• All owners must have OOTP 6.12 OR 6.5 and must export their lineups.
• All owners are encouraged to have an AIM screenname to commucate with each other.
• All owners must register on the forum, preferably as "TeamGM" (or something that indicates your team name), and must stay active.
• The goal of the league is to field a competitive team while making a profitable organization.
• The purpose of the league is to have fun, so any owner who threatens, is abusive, attacks other owners, or, in any way, tries to undermine the league, will be subject to immediate dismissal.
• The commissioner reserves the right to dimiss an owner for acts detrimental to the league (i.e. verbal abuse, fire sales, cheating, running multiple teams, etc.).
• If an owner is going to be away for an extended period of time, the owner can give the right to another owner to update his/her roster while s/he is gone. No trades/signings can be made during the owner's absence, however.
• Owners are required to send in an export or a "No change" email/PM at least every 3rd sim (once a week). Failure to do so for three consecutive times can result in dismissal.
• Owners are encouraged to write articles about the league or about their team.

ROSTER MANAGEMENT

General Roster Info:

• Teams must have 25 men on their active roster. Roster may expand to 40 in September.
• The max. roster size is 85, 25 ML and 60 Minors.

Disabled List:

• Injured players can be placed on the DL for at least 15 days.
• Placing a player on the 60-day disabled list will result in their removal from the 40-man roster and the player MUST remain on the DL for at least 60 days.
• The DL is only used for players on the 40-man roster. Minor leaguers remain on the minor league rosters and just don't play (this is per the game).

In-Season Free Agency:

• In-Season Free Agency involves the acquisiton of free agents during the season.
• It is a bidding process where teams may make offers to a free agent to play for their team.
• Free agents signed to a team can only be signed to 1 year contracts.
• The highest offer made before a sim will be made to the player.
• Offers are made in the free agent claims forum with a message subject line of: (POS) (Player Name), example: SP Joe Ballplayer.
• In the body of the message, the offer is made, for example: $1.5M for 1 year. Since they can only be for one year, you need not indicate the year, but it is good practice for contract extentions.
• If the highest offer is accepted, the player will be placed on that team immediately after the sim.
• If the offer is not accepted, the next highest offer is offered to the player until the player signs
• A limit of two bids per team per sim will be allowed.
• In the event a player will sign for a Minor League Contract, but a actual dollar amount was offered to the player, that player will be modified after signing to the appropriate contract amount offered on the forum.

Sending players down and waivers:

The way to move a player from your active, 25-man roster to your minor leagues is as follows:

• You can drag the player from the Active Roster to AAA. At this point, it will either be complete or you will get a pop-up box asking if you wish to put the player on waivers and designate them for assignment.
• If you say yes, the player will be placed on waivers and will be moved to the DFA holding pen.
• It will take 2 sims for your player to clear waivers (your player will be transfered to another team if someone claims him while he is on waivers at the end of the waiver period)
• Once your player has cleared waivers (2 sims) you will have to move the player from the DFA holding pen to your AAA roster. You *MUST* do this between the 2nd or 3rd sim from when you started, otherwise the player will be released when they run out of DFA days (per league rules).
• The player in question will need to be placed back on your 40-man roster before moving to AAA if he has a major league contract (league minimum counts)

Another approach is to drag the player to the 'waivers' section while they are still on the ML roster. Once they have cleared waivers, you are free to move them around.

PLEASE BE ADVISED: Some players will have the right to refuse assignment to the minors.

Refusing Assignment:

• Some veteran players will 'Refuse to take assignment' in the minors, so the owner will either need to keep him in the majors or release him.

Designated for Assignment:

• When a team makes a trade, signs a free agent or selects a draft pick, all players received are put into this section, which means that each team MUST designate the player(s) to ML, AAA, AA, or A (neither the game nor the commissioner will do this for you). The maximum number of days is 16 (the game still reports 10), meaning that you have 16 (sim days) to designate them or release them. If you fail to place a player from DFA to a roster within 16 in-game days (two sims), the player(s) will be released from you team into free agency. This will emphasize the importance of owner participation and failure to comply on repeated occaisions will result in your removal from the league.
• DFA restrictions are not enforced during the off-season.

Releasing Players:

• When releasing a player, the team is responsible for the full terms of the released player's contract unless the player is picked up via waivers.
• If a player has multiple years left on his contracts, the team is still responsible for the full terms of the contract.
• Players may be released in-game.

CONTRACT EXTENSIONS

• Can be offered from May 1 through the end of season.
• You will have unlimited on each player, however after a while the player may refuse negotiations.
• If a player is offered Arbitration, a team can either choose to do nothing and the player will receive the stated contract for 1 year; a team can also offer the player a multi-year contract; or if a team chooses to do so, release the player.

TRADING

• Both teams must agree on a trade, one team will begin a thread with "Team-Team Trade" and the other must reply with "accepted" and with a brief explanation of the deal. The deal must be accepted within a 48 Hr period, or it will not be processed.
• All trades must include a player from each team, due to in-game limitations.
• Trades coming 48 hours prior to an owner's quitting or firing will be voided so as to forbid a fire sale.
• You can't trade future draft picks, meaning only the upcoming draft's picks can be traded. (Exception: In preseason, you can trade both the current draft and the upcoming year. Ex: It is the offseason before the 1954 season. You can trade your 1954 picks (which is presently going on) or you can trade your 1955 picks.)
• You can only trade picks from the first 4 rounds.
• You can trade cash, as long as your team has it to trade.
• You can trade after the July 31 deadline but only after all players involved have cleared waivers.
• You can trade injured players, however you must justify your knowledge of the injury prior to the trade being processed.
• The commissioner and assistants can come together to void trades if suspicious prior to the trade being processed.
• Any concerns regarding fairness of a trade should be brought to the commissioner/league president's attention.
• All trades will be processed AFTER the weekly sim, unless otherwise noted.

AMATEUR DRAFT

• The draft order will be determined based on reverse order of record. The team with the worst record will go first. In the event of two or more teams with the same record, the sum of their minor league records will be used. If two or more teams are still tied, the Pythagorean Record will be used. If there is still a tie, a coin toss will determine who gets the higher pick.
• The last picks of the draft order are determined by how the teams finish in the playoffs (World Series winner picks last, WS loser picks next to last. When playoffs begin, the losers of each round will pick just before the WS participants)
• There will be at least 3 rounds beginning in offseason
• The draft will be done via the forum with each team having 12 hours from the previous pick to make his selection in the 1^st round, afterwhich the pick will be auto'd.
• Draft Lists are encouraged, it will help things go much quicker.
• Beginning in the second round, each team will have 6 hours to make their pick prior to being auto-picked.
• Once your team is auto-picked due to time limit, you will continue to be auto-picked unless you provide a list. This is to keep the draft moving.

OFFSEASON SCHEDULE

• Season flip will occur no later than two scheduled sims after the World Series.
• The Amateur draft will begin no later than 24 hours after the season has been flipped, unless otherwise noted.
• Free agency will begin on the next scheduled sim, except in expansion years.
• 6 days of free agency will be simmed at a time, on normal sim days i.e. 3 times per week, unless otherwise noted.

League Expansion

OVERVIEW

• The league is planned to expand in the offseason prior to 1961, 1962, 1969, 1977, 1993, and 1998, just as Major League Baseball did.
• The teams will have the top picks in each round of the Amateur Draft.
• The expansion draft will take place during the offseason before Free Agency.
• Each expansion team will be created AFTER season flip and will receive:
  1. Fan Interest set to 50
  2. Team Market set to Average
  3. Fan Loyalty set to Average
  4. League Cash Cap in money.
  5. Merchandise revenue for the previous season set to $10,000,000.
  6. Local TV Deal will be set to expire at the end of the season and will be set to $15,000,000
  7. National TV Deal will be set to expire at the end of the season and will be set to $25,000,000
• A new schedule will be generated after the season flip to assure all teams have complete schedules.
• It is important for owners to set their ticket price before the season starts, assuming they want to charge fans to see a game.

ELIGIBLE PLAYERS

• All players not drafted in the previous 2 Ammy Drafts are eligible for the expansion draft.
• You must list all of your players who were selected in the previous 2 Ammy Drafts to assure they are protected. Failure to do so will result in these players being available in the expansion draft.

PROTECTED PLAYERS

• From the eligible list, each major league team will protect 12 players prior to Free Agency.
• Each team will be able to protect 3 more players in each subsequent round of the draft.
• As a result, each team must provide a list of 21 protected players, in order to facilitate the expansion draft.
• Failure to provide a list will leave your entire team unprotected.

EXPANSION DRAFT RULES

• The Expansion Draft will last 3 rounds.
• A coin flip will determine the order of the draft. The winner may choose the 1st and 4th picks, or the 2nd and 3rd picks in the first round of the expansion draft. The person who gets the 2nd pick in the expansion draft will get the first pick in the amateur draft while the person who gets the 1st pick in the expansion draft will have the 2nd pick in the amateur draft.(the 1969 expansion will be different since 4 teams get added - order will be determined and the teams will pick 1-2-3-4-1-2-3-4, but amateur draft will be 4-3-2-1)
• After the first four picks, the teams will alternate selections for the rest of the draft.
• Two players per existing team will be selected in the first round (until 20 teams exist in the league, at which point only one player per team will be selected).
• Prior to the second round, each team will protect 3 additional players.
• The second round will proceed in the same manner as the first with exception of only one player per existing team will be selected.
• Prior to the third round, each team will again protect 3 additional players.
• During the third round, the top nine American League teams and the top nine National League teams by standings will lose an additional player
• The goal of the expansion draft is to give each expansion team enough players to field a team.

Relocation/Stadiums

Teams will relocate as they did in Major League Baseball history.

New stadiums will occur as they did in Major League Baseball history as well.

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