UNITED STRAT BASEBALL ASSOCIATION
2006 CONSTITUTION
1. OVERVIEW
A. The USBA is a continuous ownership draft league and will consist of twenty (20) teams.
B.. All USBA games will be played head to head,
via the internet, using the most current version of Strat-O-
Matic CD-ROM computer baseball game.
C. USBA members are required to own the latest
version of Strat-o-Matic CD-ROM computer baseball game, currently 12.0, and have AOL
Instant Messenger.
D. The commissioner, with support from a league president(s), reserves the right to do whatever is required during the season to do what is in the best interests
of the league.
2. MORALS CLAUSE
A. All
members will treat each other with dignity and respect. Under no circumstances will foul language be tolerated.
Any owner violating this clause will be warned and possibly fined draft pick(s) and/or terminated from the league. Any subsequent violations could cause
that owner to be termintated from the league if a lessor
penalty is applied first.
3. STRUCTURE
A. The USBA will consist of 2 sub-leagues, designated as the American
and National leagues. Each sub-
league will
consist of ten (10) teams.
B. The
USBA will be made up of four (4) divisions, two (2) in each league, designated AL East, AL West, NL East and NL West.
Each division will consist of five (5) teams.
C. The
American league teams will use the designated hitter. The National league
will not use the
designated hitter.
4. DRAFTS AND TEAM ROSTERS
A. Team Composition
1. Each team shall consist of 35 players with room for uncarded contracted players or carded minor
leaguers who fall under the minimum required statistics (*see Minor Leaguers Section 19), for up to 40 players. A team may never have more than 35 active players at any time. These players may be
obtained through the draft, free agents, or trades. We will use actual MLB salaries based on the latest current year salaries as of March
1st for each year and, if available, the Baseball Today salary database
will be used.
a. The current salary cap is $78 million and will remain at that until
it is deemed necassary to have it
changed.
2. You may sign a player at his current ML salary for 1, 2, or 3 years maximum. Once signed, this
salary does not change until his contract is up at which time a team can keep the player at the
following rates. A player with a contract of 0-5 million can be resigned once his initial contract is up for
his actual MLB contract, 5-7.9 million a 50 percent raise, above 7.5 up to 9.9 million a 33 percent
raise and above 10 mil up to 15 million max, a 10 percent raise.
a. Once someone reaches the 15 million dollar max they can be re-signed
for that price
indefinitely.
4. The MAXIMUM a player will be paid is $15 million dollars.
5. If a team cuts a player still under contract, then the team that cut him is still under obligation to pay
the player unless another team drafts him. His contract will follow the player to the drafting team and the new team
has to abide by the pre existing contract in terms of years and salary. Note: the current ML
salary of a player who has an unpublished salary due to retirement, rookie status, etc... shall be 300k.
6. Any team that has players who are under contract but are uncarded
due to retirement, injuries, etc.
may either buy out the remainder of the contract or pay the contract as it exist at that time. This is not
meant to punish teams but it is meant to not bail an owner out after applying a bad contract to
a player. The player will also be counted as a roster spot but he may
be moved into the 36-40 player
range. The 36-40 player range was created as to allow teams a way of dealing
with an uncarded
contracted players without it counting against a usable roster spot. Example's
listed below;
a. { Aaron Sele $2,000,000 (3) year contract } To buy out his contract all in one season it would
cost you $6,000,000 against your cap. That would clear up the $2,000,000
each year for the following
two seasons. The benefit would be getting rid of the contract all in one
year but it would depend on you
having the cap space to be able to deal with a contract this way.
b. { Aaron Sele $2,000,000 (3) year contract } To just pay for the contract for the entire length of it.
This would cost you $2,000,000 per season until the contract expires.
7. It is imperative that each franchise put alot of thought into contracting
players. Carded players who
are under contract may be cut but the franchise must pay the remainder of the salary (See Section 4,
subsection 6, examples a and b. You will not be responsible for paying
that salary after that season if
another team picks that player up while he is under contract, either during the free agent adds or the
free agent draft. If that player is picked up as a free agent during the
season his contract gets voided
and he gets treated as a regular free agent.
5. YEARLY FREE AGENT AND ROOKIE DRAFT
A. Draft and Player Acquisition:
1. You are required to have 35 players on your team unless you meet the following requirements;
All positions must have at least 750 at bats (exception is pitching) and your pitching staff must have at
least 1480 innings pitched with you starting pitching having the ability to make 162 starts. Each team
will have a minimum of 32 players on their roster.
2. Eligible players to be drafted are any players who played in MLB the previous season and received a
player card for that season. IMAGE-ONLY players are not draftable. You may not keep an uncarded
player if his contract has expired, but you may keep him if he is still under contract. The limit is 40
players total however. This means that if you are in the unlikely position of having more than 5 uncarded players
under contract, you will have to cut one or more to stay under the 40 man maximum.
3. The teams win/loss record shall determine draft order for all non playoff teams. The team with the
worst record drafts first and so on. If there is a tie, head to head records
will determine the drafting
postition with the team with the winning record drafting first. If there
still is a tie, then road records will
be used, and if still a tie, a coin flip. Playoff teams will be seeded
at the end of the list, with the World
Series winner picking last, WS series loser second to last and so on. Ties
for teams eliminated at
same time in post season will be determined by best record picking after the other team.
4. The draft shall consist of as many rounds as it takes to get all teams up to 32-35 players. Any of the
first five round picks may be traded or waived prior to the beginning of the draft if the owner realizes his
team will reach the 35 man roster. If the team hits the 35 man roster
and still has picks left then he will
forfiet the remaining picks if not traded.
5. A team may pick up free agents during the season as long as the team can afford them and keep
under the 35 man max. If you pick up a free agent, then you have
to pay the player his full ML salary
and he is not protectable. If you cut a player during the season
to make room, you still must pay the
cut players salary. Another team may pick this player up, and will have
to pay the same salary that the
old team was paying. If the cut contracted player is picked up by another
team then the original team
will only pay for that season. If the cut contracted player remains a
free agent then the original team is
responsible for his entire contract until drafted or picked up via free agency.
The team that picks up the
free agent will lose him at the end of the season like any other free agent.
ALL FREE AGENTS ACQUIRED DURING THE SEASON ARE
RELEASED BACK INTO FREE AGENCY AT THE END OF THE
SEASON.
6. BALLPARK CHANGES
A. Prior
to the Player draft, a Ballpark draft will be held for any team that wishes to change parks. Ballparks will be awarded by a seperate random drawing. The
teams will draft ballparks from worst to first.
7. PENALTIES FOR LATE PLAY
A. Penalties
for unexplained late play are the following,
1st time - a warning
2nd time - 5th round draft pick
3rd time - 3rd round draft pick
4th time - 1st round draft pick
5th time- dismissal
*The Commish reserves the right to waive any penalties.
8. COMPUTER MANAGERS
A. All
owners must submit a computer manager for the up coming play period between the CM Roster File having been sent out up to the following Thursday
by midnight, est.
B. If
an owner doesn't send his computer manager by the Sunday following the due date then the
Commisioner will create a computer manager for that team. The computer
manager created by the commisioner
will be the one used for that block and it cannot be altered. Any overusage
problems and associated
penalties will be the complete responsibility of the owner.
C. The computer managers sent by the owners will remain unlocked.
9. PLAYING THE GAME
A. Since
this is a computer game Max Rules, with the exception of Force Daily Injuries and Allow extra pre-
1900 errors, will be used.
B. Prior to the start of each series, teams are required to designate
a number of players as Inactive, in order to bring
their Active Roster to 25. Active rosters must contain a minimum of 5 pitchers who are eligible to START and they must
include the scheduled Starters for that series. (Must be rated as Starter or Starter/Reliever)
Each team must have four (4) starters
who is a starter only and the fifth (5th) can be a starter/releiever whom
is avialable to pitch in that series.
C. Teams
must send their Computer Manager, with "STARTERS SCHEDULE" during the submission period after
the end of the play period and prior to the start of the new play period.
D. All
players designated as Inactive, prior to the start of a series, must remain in the Minor Leagues until the completion of the current series. .EXCEPTION: SEE INJURIES BELOW
E. Active
rosters expand to 35 players on September 1st.
F. All
games are to be played with out dice mode/card image unless mutually agreed upon by both managers.
10. PLAY MONTH SCHEDULE
A. Trade Deadline and Free Agent claim period deadline is final Sunday in Play Month
at midnight Pacific.
B. Every Play period will end on a Monday at midnite Pacific.
C. The computer manager file will be sent out on the next day, Tuesday. This file will be used to create your
computer manager for the next play block. This computer manager is due
by Thursday at midnight, est.
D. The
computer managers must be in by Thursday at midnite Eastern. See Rule concerning Late CMS
E. The play ball file will be sent out that Friday morning or the night before
(Thursday) if enogh computer
managers are received by then, typically 15 or more.
11. PLAYER USAGE
A. Player usage will be limited as follows:
1. Players are limited to 100 percent of Actual At Bats
or Innings Pitched
2. Pitchers, who are not rated as Starter, may not perform in that role,
Pitchers who are rated as a
Starter only may only pitch in relief under the
following conditions:
a. All
of the teams remaining available Relief rated pitchers are fatigued
b. The
team has no remaining Relief rated pitchers available.
B. Starting
Pitchers designated with an asterick (*) must have at least 3 days of rest. All
other starting pitchers
must have at least four (4) days rest. Any pitcher starting games with less than
required rest will be suspended
for one (1) game beginning the first week of the upcoming month. If the
infraction occurs in September,
the suspension will begin immediately if possible, if not possible, the commissioner will determine the appropriate penalty. A second
offense by an owner will result in a player suspension of 3 weeks. A third offense by an owner will result in that player being released into the free agent pool and
the owner will lose a
5th round draft choice the following year.
1. A Starting pitcher may only start on 3 days rest if he has an asterick
(*) listed by his rating.
C. Starting
pitchers must go 4 innings or allow 3 runs before they can be removed.
D. Position
Players may not pitch in ANY GAME.
E. A
pitcher may be used to pinch hit for a position player during a game only if that team has no remaining position
players available on the bench.
F. A
player may not field a position for which he is not rated, unless said game goes into extra innings, after 9 innings have been completed a player may freely field a position
for which they are not rated.
H. If
an ineligible player appears in a game or an illegal move is made and said infraction is caught by the opposing
manager before the first At Bat is resolved in the next half inning, then the UNDO LAST PLAY
function will be used to revert to the point in
the game just prior to the infraction taking place and the infraction corrected. If the infraction
is caught after the first At Bat is resolved in the next half inning then the
ineligible player shall immediately be removed
from the game. Any player who has exhausted his allowed usage will be manually flagged as "Injured" with the league files by the
Commissioner. Said players will
remain "injured" for the remainder of the regular
season.
J. Each team must have at least two (2) players rated for each position when playing
a series.
12. PENALTIES / INJURIES
A. Penalties
will be assessed for overusage, tardiness and any other behavior that infringes upon the spirit of the
league, unless the league office grants specific permission to do so.
B.
Player Overusage: Managers are expected to act in the spirit of fair competition, as such, if a player is overused
by more than the allowed 100% usage then the penalty will be as follows:
1. Suspension of the player for the rest of the season, including
playoffs.
2. . If steps are taken to stop further overuse and if the player is within 2% of overuse, (i.e. e-mail all managers
to take player from the roster, stop further use of the player, notify league office, etc.) the team will lose a 5th Round Draft pick the following year. If the player is
overused by 3% or more,
part 3 of this rule will apply. If more
than one player is overused, the manager will lose the next
highest pick as well. If four or more players are overused the manager may be expulsed from the
league.
3. If no steps are taken to prevent overusage or the player is overused by 3% or more as listed on part 2, the manager
will lose the player entirely plus draft pick(s) as stated in part two of this rule. The
manager will also be placed on probation for the following season. Any further overuse of players the
following season may result in a immediate expulsion from the league.
4. Special circumstances can allow the commissioner to reduce the
penalties if deemed necessary.
C. INJURIES
1. Injuries will be used but will only affect the series being played.
Players will be given "REST" and
injured players will be available for duty during
the following series. Prior to the start of each series the
home team will select "Set off days, give each team 15 days rest".
2. INJURED PLAYERS MAY BE SUBSTITUTED FOR BETWEEN GAMES.
13. SCHEDULE
A. Each team will play a 162 game regular season schedule.
1. Each team will play 1 month on the schedule and the games must be completed
during that "Play
Period”. The deadline for playing games
will be as posted on either Website or email notifications.
2. Once all games are finished the rosters will updated for trades and
free agent pickups.
3. Once the new rosters are sent out, each manager must send the computer
manager, which will
include the "Starter Schedules" for the
upcoming play period.
4. League games will be scheduled within the CD Rom game itself, but the
actual day/time that these
games are actually played, during each "Play Week"
is left to the managers.
5. All games in each scheduled series must be completed by the end of
the current "Play Period".
League files for each successive "Play Months"
cannot be released until all series from the previous
month have been completed. Managers who are continually
involved in late series will have their
membership reviewed by the Commisioner and may
face expulsion from the league.
6. ALL GAMES must be played between two human opponents. Under no circumstances
are any
league games to be played one manager vs. a HAL
computer manager controlled team. Teams
must immediately inform the Commissioner if they
are unable to manage their teams during a
current, or upcoming, "Play Month".
7. Teams may elect to bring in their own Fill In manager. If the
team is unable to supply their own "Fill-
In" manager, the Commissioner will make arrangements
for someone to step in and manage the
team’s games. All results from games managed
by Fill In managers are final and binding.
*ANY
MANAGER FAILING TO NOTIFY THE LEAGUE OFFICE THAT HE WILL BE UNABLE TO PLAY
HIS GAMES AND FAILS TO DESIGNATE A FILL IN MANAGER IN TIME FOR THOSE GAMES TO BE
COMPLETED WITHIN THE DESIGNATED PLAY PERIOD WILL BE SUBJECT TO PENALTIES
UP TO DISMISSAL.
15. TRADES
A. Teams may freely trade players from a period immediately following
the previous season's World Series up to 3 days prior to the player draft.
B. Trades
will be allowed during the draft as long as it does not slow down the draft process. All decisions as to
whether trades are allowed or discontinued during the draft, if problems arise, belongs to the commissioner.
C. Post
season rosters players are eligible if they are on the roster August 1st, or the first day of the August play
month
D. Trade
and free agent request deadlines for the each "Play Period" is 24 hours prior the Game Deadline.
E. Teams
may not make any trade that would place their current roster above the team roster limits. You may however freely release
players into the Free Agent Pool, in order to make room on your roster for a trade.
(such a release does not void any contractual
obligations, it only frees up a roster spot)
F. Trades
must also fit within the salary limits imposed by the salary cap. At no time
may a team exceed the 75
million in roster obligations after assuming the contracts of all acquired players.*
*Cash may not be included in any trades, ie: no ones salary cap will ever be anything other than 75 million.
G. Once a player has been traded from a team, he will be ineligible to play for that
team again for the remainder
of that season, UNLESS, said player has played for more than one other team, prior to being
re- acquired.
H. Draft
picks may be included as part of a trade, but ONLY (3) DRAFT PICKS from the next years draft
Rounds 1 - 5, may be offered as part of
any trades. NO draft picks may be traded for rounds 6 and beyond.
I. After
a trade has been agreed upon, all parties involved must submit a trade proposal via email to every USBA
franchise owner. The trade will be reviewed by the Commissioner and the League
President(s) to ensure that no rules have been violated. The Commissioner and the League President(s) reserve the right
to ask for a league wide vote for any trade that
appears to be over welmingly one sided. We will need for atleast
(8) owners to agree that it so before we ask that the trade to be reworked.
J. Trades
which have been "Approved" may only be rescinded if all of the managers involved in the trade agree
to do so.
K. At
the conclusion of the current "Play Month", all "Approved" trades will become "Official, with the Commissioner
actually moving the players to their new teams prior to the release of the next months league files. All officially "Approved" trades will be posted on the USBA Forum as well as on a master sheet which will
be kept by the commissioner.
16. FREE AGENT POOL
A. All carded players who are not on a USBA roster, at the conclusion
of the Free Agent Draft will be placed in the Free Agent Pool.
17. FREE AGENT ACQUISITIONS
A. Teams
may acquire players via Free Agency from April 30th of the season until the trading deadline July 31st.
All Free Agent claims during the month will become active at the start of the next play period.
B. Teams
may select FA’s 1 week prior to Games deadline for each upcoming play period.
C. Teams
wishing to add a player from the Free Agent Pool, to their roster, must submit a claim to the Commissioner.
D. Only
ONE (1) Free Agent claim per team will be allowed per every PLAY PERIOD until July 31st, when two (2) can be added.
E. Free
Agent claims must be accompanied by a tentative “release” if roster limits will be exceeded, before the player
can be added to a team’s roster. *See Roster Limits for further, SECTION
4.A
ANY
TEAM THAT DOES NOT SUBMIT A “RELEASE” IF REQUIRED WILL HAVE ITS FREE AGENT
CLAIM IGNORED.
F. If
any teams, with a worse record than the team originally making the claim, put in their own claim for a listed
player, then the team with the worst overall record will have the player in question added to their roster,
at the end of the current "Play Month".
G. Once
made, a Free Agent claim cannot be rescinded. Teams DO NOT retain the rights to players
added via Free Agency. Players added via
Free Agency must be released at the end of the current
season. Free Agents picked up via Trade
will be released into the Free Agent pool at the end of the year.
NOTE: Our
rules state that a team is obligated to pay a contract as long as two conditions exist.
Player in question
is NOT under contract* by another team and time still exists on the player in
question
contract. *See Roster,
Contract obligations, SECTION 4.A subsection 5
H. Free
Agents will be paid full salary if acquired and will remain under the responsibility of signing team until traded.
18. LEAGUE FILES
A. Required "Option" menu settings will be set by the Commissioner prior
to league files being made available
each "Play Month". Managers are not to change
any of these settings, unless requested to do so by the Commissioner.
B. Managers
are allowed to set the following options to his or her personal preferences: Offense and Defense color,
Play by Play Color, Play by Play Background and Sound.
C. Upon
completion of each series, the Home team manager is required to email the Game Result and Print Files to the Commissioner. ALL FILES MUST BE MAILED TO THE COMMISSIONERS OFFICE
IMMEDIATELY UPON COMPLETION.
D. Receiving
League Files:
1. League files for the current "Play Month" are to be available the Friday morning of the start of every
play period. These
files will include: Roster, Stats and Print Files.
2. After extracting the current league files, to their corresponding folders,
the teams are required to run
"SCHEDULE BATCH CHANGE" function in order to set your
scheduled games to Manual, while
setting all other games to "HOLD".
E. Submitting Files:
1. From your cdrombb\export folder, select all the Game Result files that
begin with "2006US", zip
them, and name the Zip file as per USBA file naming
conventions.
2. Re-name the Print files, from the current series; located in your cdrombb\print\2004US
folder, as per
the USBA naming conventions, see below.
3. Select the Print files, from the current series, in your cdrombb\print\2003US
folder, and add them to
the Zip file containing your Game Result files.
4. E-mail the Zip file, containing your Game Results and Print files,
to the Commissioner.
5. Print Files: May 5 series NAN vs. POA folder will be labeled May5 NAN@POA.
Individual game print
files should be renamed as follows 050706 NAN@POA is
for the May 7 game between Nantasket
and Portland.
19. POST SEASON
A. Team rosters will be set when we begin play for the month of August in regards
to the post
season.
B.
The playoff format will consist of two division winners and two wild card teams in each league. The two
division winners with the best record
will have home field advantage in the first round. At no time will a wildcard
team have home field advantage.
C. Each
post season series will be a best of 7 series, with the higher seeded teams having home field advantage hosting games 1,2,6
and 7. In the event that teams are tied, for purpose of determining home field
advantage, tie breakers will be used in the following order:
1. Head to head record
2. Division record
3. Total runs scored minus total runs allowed
4. Coin flip
The World Series will be a best of 7 series, with the winner
being crowned USBA Champions. Home field
for the World Series will be determined
with the team with the best season record having home field
advantage. In no case will any wild card
teams have home field advantage during the playoffs.
D. A
Post season league will be created for the entire post season. Injuries will
not be used during the playoffs. Days off will be given between games 2 and 3 and games 5 and 6 for each post-season
series. There will
be a one (1) day break between games 7 of each series and game 1 of the subsequent series. One (1) day off will be given..
E. Post
Season Rosters Prior to the start of post-season play:
1. Each participating team must name a 25-man play-off roster. This roster will be used for a series
and they may be changed the next series so long as the players changed meet the required playoff
criteria.
F. PLAYOFF
USAGE AND ELIGIBLES:
1. Any player who meets the following conditions can be used in the playoffs
as the owner see's fit:
a. STARTING PITCHERS: May
not start on less than 3 or 4 DAYS REST depending
on whether pitcher has asterick (*) associated. Starter pitchers must have 80 innings and
a starter rating on his card.
b. POSITION
PLAYERS: Must have 125 at
bats. If the player has a catcher rating on his card
he needs to have only 60 at bats.
c. RELIEVERS: Must have 25 innings and a relief rating
on his card.
20. MINOR LEAGUE PLAYERS
A. Each
USBA franchise will have a minor league system. The minor league system will
consist of twenty (20) players who will be uncarded with one exception. The following rules will apply for each teams minor
league system:
1. Each player protected on a teams minor league system can't be carded
for that upcoming season,
with one exception (listed in subsection c). If that player is carded then that franchise has three (3) options;
a. Sign
the carded minor league player to a contract for the base salary of $300,000.
b. Release
the carded minor league player into the upcoming season's draft.
c. You may protect a carded minor league player only if he meets the following
criteria:
(1) The carded minor league player can be protected in the minor league
system if he
has no more than thirty (35) at bats or fifteen (15) innings pitched. The
protected carded
minor league player will count as one of the twenty (20) minor league players.
B. Each
franchise will have the oppurtunity to replace each player that is either signed or released.
If nobody is signed each franchise can replace up to five (5) players. The exception to that is if any
franchise has more than five (5) minor league
players carded (signed or released) for the upcoming season,
then he can replace each carded (signed or released) player up to the amount of twenty (20).
1. Examples:
a. If
a franchise has twenty (20) minor league players that are uncarded for the upcoming
season, then he can replace five of those minor league
players in the minor league draft, if
desired.
b. If
a franchise has two (2) players that are either signed or released because of being
carded, that owner can replace no more than three
uncarded players and the two carded
players (For a total of five players).
c. If
a franchise has 5-20 players that are either signed or released because of being carded,
that owner can replace each player who was either
signed or released.
C. Each franchise is allowed to have no more than (20) minor league players in their
minor league system with one exception. If you pick up a minor league player in a trade during the previous season or off season and your total number of players exceed (20), that
will be permitted but you will need to reduce the number of
players in your minor league system to (20) prior to the start of the upcoming expansion draft.
21. LEAGUE OFFICERS
A. The
USBA will have two League Officers: A Commissioner and two league presidents. These
three officers will be
responsible for running the day-to-day business of the USBA. These three positions are currently held by Stephen O'Hare (Commissioner), Not filled (AL President) and Not filled (NL President).
B. Responsibilities
of the Commissioner:
1. The Commissioner will be responsible for filling league openings, advertising
such openings,
interview interested candidates, and approve or
deny membership applications.
2. Prepare both the regular season, and post season, schedules and import
those schedules into
Master USBA files.
Build the Master Files for both regular season and post season.
3. Determine the date/time and vehicle (email, chat, etc) for the yearly
Free Agent/Rookie Draft/ Run
the FA/Rookie draft lottery prior to each draft
4. Receive Game Result and Print files from each USBA 'Play Week", import
those files into the Master
league files, and make these updated league files
available to the league membership prior to the
scheduled start of the next 'Play Week'.
5. Furthermore the commissioner will maintain back- up copies of the Master
League Files Review.
6. Rule on grievances involving both AL and NL teams.
7. Arrange for "Fill In" managers when an owner is unable to manage his
games for a particular 'Play
Month', and cannot provide his own "Fill In" manager
Review.
8. Approve trades between AL and NL teams and make official all trades
that have been approved.
C. Responsibilities
of the league presidents:
1. Review and approve trades made between USBA teams.
2. Review, and rule on, grievances involving USBA teams.
3. Make sure that leagues members are following the rules and procedures
as set forth in the
Constitution.
D. Rules
Committee:
1. The Commissioner and the league presidents will collectively make up
the USBA Rules committee
and a unanimous vote is required to change any rules. No rules will be changed during a season, but any necessary rules interpretations
be the sole responsibilies of the Commissioner and the league
presidents. All cases will be considered final and binding.
