Suggested Guidelines - Please VOTE to ratify, thanks.

GUIDELINES – STICKBALL LEAGUE

1. MAJORS - NO TANKING - Re-building is fine; however, owner's need to field the most competitive team possible given their roster. Owners believed to be tanking will receive a trade chat from the commissioner and steps will need to be taken to improve the owner's ML team or said owner will be removed from the world.

1. EVERY new owner is asked to make a 3 year commitment;

2. $30M minimal player budget (spent);

3. No ML players playing grossly out of position;

4. Competent major leaguers at the ML level;

5. No unwarranted fatigue issues in the majors;

6. 5 Season Minimum Wins: 54/114/180/245/308 (which is very reasonable – if you keep your wins North of 60, you'll have no troubles with this); and,

7. An owner may be given a 1 year "grace period" by the commish OR the vote of 10 owners (any owner can initiate the vote, but a brief check-in with the commish is appreciated).

2. MINORS – Owners simply must pay at least some attention to the minors. Having them automanaged is okay, but there must be enough pitchers on the roster to not run into fatigue issues. While no exact number of players is a requirement, starting the season with 29 players and 15 pitchers/level will automatically meet this guideline.

3. SALARY CAP - $100M ($40M min.). This somewhat minimizes the # of max salary contracts that can be offered, and is designed to guard against having to find an owner for a team with bad contracts if the original owner bails. Rule V exemption: It is possible that payments from having Rule V players drafted from a team will put said team over the cap. In this case, the owner will not be forced to transfer $, however, the "player payroll" will not be allowed to exceed $100 million.

4. CASH IN TRADES - The amount of cash in a trade cannot exceed the players' remaining salary plus $1M. Up to $1M cash in a deal is permissible in a trade involving otherwise equitable player-talent. Trades for a scrub plus cash are not permitted. This is to be voted on using HBD's existing VETO TRADE system. Expect venom in cases of abuse.

5. BALLPARKS - No city changes for a returning owner are permitted without commissioner approval. City changes HAVE been approved, so this is not a sticking point in Stickball League. If a new owner takes over a franchise, then they can choose any city they'd like – all parks are up for grabs, no restrictions.

6. REMOVALS - The commissioner has final say on removals. If something is not covered here, but warrants removal, the final say is up to the commissioner. No owner will be removed without being warned unless the owner blatantly goes about trashing his team in violation of fair play. In these cases, the fair play guidelines serve as the unwanted owner's warning.