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| Overview |
| What is this thing? |
| Imagine your traditional fantasy league and a baseball simulator
got together and had a baby. That's what UBGM is. You build a team by bidding on
players through auction just like you would in classic fantasy or rotissere baseball.
You can trade and add players via a free agent list just like in classic fantasy
baseball but instead of just accumulating stats, you build a lineup, manage a roster
and then your team actually plays other teams through our baseball simulator.
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| How does the sim work? |
| Unlike most baseball simulators the UBGM sim uses year to date
stats for the current year. So in 2007 we will be using 2007 stats not 2006
stats. The sim takes over 50 factors into account to determine the outcome of an
event including lefty vs. righty pitcher/hitter matchups and ballpark effects.
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| How does the salary cap work? |
| You should not think of the money you get when you create your team as a
salary cap. |
The money you are given when you sign up for a team should be thought
of as cash on hand. Imagine an owner has hired you to be the
GM of their team and has given $100M to spend. That's all you get. Once you run
out you have to live with your team...
Once you win a player at auction you have to pay that player's salary for the year.
It's just like real life where you might sign a guy and then he performs terribly
(or gets injured) so you really don't want him anymore. The salary is guaranteed even
if you release a player. Once you have paid it you cannot recover it by releasing him.
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| Will UBGM always be free? |
| It will be for 2007. After that we are not sure.
We have done quite a lot of beta testing but 2007 will be our first full season and we
thought we should run the thing through the ringer before we start charging. |
| If you are using current year stats what do you do at the beginning of the season? |
| UBGM games do not start until 2 weeks after the MLB season
starts so most everyday hitters have logged 50+ at bats.
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| Register/Sign Up |
| How do I register? |
| Click on the maroon tab marked register near the top of the
homepage.
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| How much does it cost to register? |
| It is free to register.
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| How much does it cost to play? |
| The 2007 season is free.
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| Are there any other fees other than the initial amount I put in? |
| No. There are no hidden costs. All transactions and trades are free.
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| How many leagues can I join? |
| You can join up to 5 leagues BUT you cannot have 2 teams in the same league. |
| I registered now how do I get a team? |
| If you are not logged in, log in first. Once you login
you should see a "join/create league" link in the bottom right corner of the homepage.
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| I joined a league but I do not want to be part of it anymore how do I get out of it? |
| If the auction has not started yet you can do this by going to the
"Front Office" tab and the go to the "Edit Info" page. On the far right side of the header
(near the phrase "Change Manage Info") there is a link "Kill This Team". Click the link
and you are free to join another league.
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| What is the difference between a standard public league and a GM challenge league? |
| There are 2 main differences. First, GM challenge leagues are
single year leagues and standard public/private leagues can be multi-year. Second,
in a standard league everyone starts with the same salary cap. In a GM challenge
league the starting salary is different depending on the team. Some managers buy
in for less money and start with a smaller salary cap. Others put in the max
and start out with more.
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| Why would I want to start with less money? |
| Some managers like the idea of trying to beat the other
guy even though they started at a disadvantage (i.e. Oakland, Minnesota).
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| Auction |
| What if I can't find a player? |
| They are probably not part of our system yet.
Please email us at support@ultimatebaseballgm.com to see if we can add them.
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| How can I tell how much money I have left? |
| It is near the top of the nominate page and open bids page. You
can also see a snapshot of opposing mangers' cash on the assets page. There is
also a detailed account of how much you have spent on each player on the bid
sheet page.
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| How do I know how much other managers have left to spend? |
| Check the assets page |
| What is the minimum opening bid? |
| $.3 million. ($300,000) |
| Can I get a player for less than his MLB salary? |
| Yes Absolutely. There are 2 advantages to bidding on players
as opposed to picking them up via free agency. The first is that you can get
the player for less than their actual MLB salary. The second is that you can
sign players won at auction to multi-year deals (assuming you are in a multi-year league).
Players picked up on the free
agent wire can only be signed to 1 year deals.
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| When does the auction close? |
| 8pm PST on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday and 8pm PST on the last day
of your auction if it is not a Tuesday, Thursday or Sunday.
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| On my "Bid Sheet" page my max bids column adds up to more than my available assets. Is this a problem? |
| No. This column is simply a way for you to track your bids.
When an opposing manager bids on a player you currently have the high bid one, the
auction manager checks each managers max bid AND it checks to make sure the manager
can actually cover the max bid. If you cannot cover the max bid any longer the
auction manager will adjust your bid to a lower value.
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| I made a mistake on my max bid what can I do? |
| Go to the nominate screen and find the player you want to
change. Click the "edit" link and change the value.
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| Is there any reason to keep any money for the regular season? |
| YES and YES. Every free agent you pick up will have a cost
associated to adding them to your roster. Unless you have some sort of skills in
predicting the future you are probably going to want to pick up some players during
the season. You will get $3 million dollars added to your account after the auction closes
which is enough for about 10 free agent moves. If you have money left over from the
auction you can use it towards free agent moves.
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| The bid history shows that I have made multiple bids on a player but I only remember making one bid. How is this possible? |
| If you are using the max bid option, the system will "rebid" on the
player if another owner tries to outbid you. For example, if another owner bids more
than your original bid but less than your max bid the system will add 2 entries to
the bid history. The first will be the opposing managers bid attempt and the second
will be the system's "rebid" on your behalf.
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| Roster Management |
| How many players can I have on my roster? |
| You can have 25 active players and up to 5 players on your DL.
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| How often can I move players between my DL and my active roster? |
| As often as you want but you cannot add players to your DL
that are not on the actual MLB DL and you cannot exceed 25 players on
your active roster.
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| What is the maximum number of players I can pick up in a given year? |
| As many as you can afford. To pick up a player you must pay
their salary for the current year. This will either be $300,000 if they were
not a player originally bought in the auction or the amount the final auction
amount of the player if the player was bought at auction and then subsequently dropped.
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| How do I add players? |
| Go to the Front Office tab and click add players.
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| What if a player is sent to the minors? |
| You can keep them on your roster but are not allowed to play
them in games.
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| Why does it cost $100,000 to buyout a players salary if I have already paid for him for the year? |
| This is just a way to keep managers form making frivolous adds and drops.
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| How do trades work? |
There is a three step process for trades:
1) First you suggest a trade to another manager through the trade page of the
Front Office tab.
2) UBGM will send an email out to the manager you suggested the trade to. If
the opposing manager accepts the trade it goes to the commissioner for approval.
3) The commissioner has 3 days to approve the trade. After that the system will
automatically approve the trade. Players will actually switch teams at
midnight after the third day (72 hours).
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| Lineup Management |
| How do I manage my lineup? |
| Go to the team tab and then click the lineup link.
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| How come I don't have any players? |
| You will not have any players until players close in the
auction. The auction processor runs at 8:05pm PST and will add players to your team.
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| I don't understand how to set my lineup. What does all of this stuff mean? |
| Please click on the "Lineup Help" or "Rotation Help" link on the
lineup page. There are detailed instructions and even pictures.
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| What is a leash? |
The leash helps the sim decide when to yank your pitcher.
The longer the leash the longer your pitcher will stay in the game. You can set
a different leash for each pitcher. The defaults are 16 for a starter and 6 for
a reliever. You may want to make the leash shorter for your closer or longer if
you have a dominating starter who eats up lots of innings. It's entirely up to you.
Here is the formula:
(Pitches Thrown/10) + (Runs Allowed * 2) + (Runners On Base)
If the number generated by this formula is more than the leash length, the
sim will pull the pitcher.
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| Can I put a starter in a reliever role or a reliever in a starter role? |
| You can do whatever you want but be aware that there is an
overuse penalty for any player who goes over his real life MLB innings or at bats.
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| How do I know which starter is pitching which game? |
| The player in slot St#1 will start game 1, St#2 will start game 2,
etc. Game 6 will start the rotation over again with the player in slot St#1.
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| What is the mop up slot? |
| The player in the mop up slot will only come in when your team
is winning or losing by more than 6 runs.
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| How does the sim choose relievers? |
| It is pretty complicated really. In a save situation the sim
will always put the closer in unless he has already been used or the starting
pitcher is throwing a no hitter. The other thing to know is that in middle relief
situations the sim will choose the player in Mid1 first and then Mid2 and then Mid3.
If you want to give the player in slot Mid1 a break you should switch him to a
lower slot.
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| Can I have a pitcher in more than one slot? |
| Yes. With the exception of the rule below
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| Do I have to have a 5 man rotation? |
| Yes. The UBGM software logs the last start a
pitcher made and requires that there be 4 games between starts. If you put a player in
a multiple slots in the rotation the sim will switch him out at gametime.
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| What happens if I leave a starting slot empty? |
| The sim will fill the slot at the start of the game. It
tries to pick the best eligible pitcher which often times is a reliever.
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| I have 2 players in the same position on my starting lineup. What will happen when the game starts? |
| The sim will find the empty position and fill the slot with a
player on your bench. If there is no player on you bench that can play the position
the sim will grab a player from the free agent pool. For hitters this will be the
player with the highest OBP regardless of the number of at bats they have. You will
be charged $100,000 for this player.
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| What if I don't have my starting lineup filled out? |
| Same answer as last question.
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| The Simulator |
| What engine do you use to run the sim? |
| The UBGM sim is proprietary and was developed by UBGM.
There is no third party involved.
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| How do the preferences affect the sim? |
| There is a lot of math involved here. You should know that the
preferences are taken into account on just about every play and do make a difference
in the outcome. For example, if a player gets a hit, his speed where the ball is hit
and the baserunning preferences you set will determine whether he tries to stretch it
into a double.
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| Is the game situation taken into account? |
| Yes. We tried to take everything into account. For example,
late in a 1 run game a player will probably not try to score from first with no out
no matter how fast he is. Conversely if there are 2 outs and you are down by 1 run,
the player is much more likely to try to score than he normally would be.
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| What is an overuse penalty and how does it work? |
| If the player's total fantasy AB/IP for the year are more than
the actual MLB number the performance of the player decreases. We call this an
"overuse penalty". The degree to which the performance is degraded has a direct
correlation to the amount of innings, or at bats, that the individual plays in over
their actual amount. For example, a player who has 500 MLB at bats for the year and
is only a couple of at bats over in UBGM will not see as much of a decrease as a
player that has 30 MLB at bats but has 60 UBGM at bats.
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