I'm New to the NBA series....

So I'm English and know very little about the NBA. I bought NBA live 09 to see what it's like and I'm hooked on it. Never realised how exciting a sport could be until playing this game! Dynasty mode is addictive VERY addictive and I'm really enjoying it but there's a few things I'm not sure on. If anyone could answer any of the following, I'd be grateful....

1. Trading - Am I a dumb a$$ or is it really hard to improve your team through trading? I've tried trade blocking everyone and all I get are ridiculous counter offers that don't benefit me at all. Does anyone know any players that are easy to acquire through trading. If say I wanted to get a really big name in like Lebron or Kobe, is it even possible?

2. Rookies - Do they improve much? is it worth giving them much court time?

3. I have Quentin Richardson on my Knicks roster. His salary is 8 million per year. (from the start) is this wayyy too much considering he is rated 71.

4. How is my lineup? I started with the Knicks as they needed some work. I have no particular allegiance to any NBA side but geographically they are probably the closest NBA team to the UK! I've gone purely on getting players with better ratings than the previous players.I know nothing about these players at all.


C: Diop
PF: Gooden
SF: Battier
SG: J. Crawford
PG: J Richarson

Players I have on the bench are Stuckey, Q Richardson, Gallinaro (sp), James, Jefferies, and a couple of rookies from the draft at teh beginning of season 2.

5. Draft picks - Are they worth keeping? or should I use them as collateral to trade for better players?

6. The Salary cap - I don't get it? If it's a cap how can you go over it? how much is any one team allowed to go over it?? When I try to make trades teams obviously are different totals over the cap? how do I know if they have room to trade or not?

All help is appreciated from a rookie Brit enjoying the NBA live experience. Please remember, I know very little about basketball or the NBA so please explain answers in laymans terms.

Thanks

Welcome to the Forum!

1. The CPU tends to make rather insulting offers and counter-offers. Generally speaking it's easier to make trades with teams that are struggling as they have more incentive to make changes. Also note that trade value comes down to a player's overall rating. If the total value of the overall ratings you're trading is equal to the total value of the overall ratings you're receiving (or you're giving up more than you're receiving), you stand a good chance of having the trade accepted. The interest bars for your players, indicating just how willing a team is to acquire your player, is also a good guide.

2. Players have hidden development attributes which determine their likelihood of developing. Aside from the monthly training through the Academy drills, player development takes place between seasons and comes down to the hidden potential rating. When you're drafting generated rookies in subsequent seasons, you can see their development potential while scouting them. What you do in the games and whether you give them time or not does not have an impact on their development. It's something we want to see in future games but to date development in the series doesn't work that way.

3. It is, but because real life salaries are used you're at the mercy of bad contracts that exist in real life.

4. It's a decent lineup for a rebuilding team.

5. The more games you win, the lower your pick in the Draft will be. Therefore if you're doing well, it might not be a bad idea to trade the picks away. Note that lower picks also have lower trade value, however.

6. The NBA utilises a soft cap, which means teams are able to exceed it but there are penalties and conditions. Teams can go as far over the cap as need be when re-signing their own players (in real life there's a luxury tax threshold for going too far over the cap but this is not represented in the game). Teams that have a positive value for cap space are under the cap, a negative value indicates they are over the cap.

In trades involving one or both teams being over the salary cap, the total value of the salaries from one team cannot be more than 125% of the salaries coming the other way. In other words, if you're over the cap and trading a player with a salary of $5,000,000, the player coming the other way cannot have a salary larger than 6,250,000 or smaller than 4,000,000.

Thanks for the welcome!

1. So if I wanted say 2 players, at OVR's of 60+80 (140) I would have to give away a higher total i.e a 65+80 (145)?

2. So check the potential hope for some luck in the draft. What can I do if my draft players suck? just hope for a good trade?

3. Q. Richardson has to go then. He has 2 years left on his contract though!! DAMMIT!

4. Glad you said that as I did select rebuilding! Jason Richardson turned out to be a real great trade and having Jamal Crawford form the start was very handy! I think I traded out Randolph and someone else but I've since gained Battier who has been much more effective defensively.

5. Damn, so doing my utmost to get to the playoffs and achieving nothing really cost me in the draft huh! lol

6. Thanks for clearing that up makes more sense now.

So if my team was your team... who would you try and trade in? who would you use as bait?

1. You wouldn't have to, but the CPU naturally likes it when you sweeten the deal a bit. Basically, you need to at least offer equal value for the CPU to consider agreeing to the deal, with other factors such as how well they're doing and how interested they are in the players you're offering playing a role. They also don't like to end up too weak at a position following a trade. It is possible to get the better of the CPU with practice, but generally speaking a fair offer with equal total of overall ratings is your best bet of getting a trade accepted.

2. Pretty much, if they don't pan out then you should certainly consider trading them. You can give developing them in the monthly sessions a shot but some players are never going to be stars.

3. See if you can sucker a team into trading you an expiring contract in return. You might have to take a player with a slightly lower overall rating but then you'll get the better end of the deal when the contract comes off the books at the end of the season.

4. You've certainly got a bit of firepower there. If you can get the team to overachieve, so much the better.

5. Pretty much! The NBA Draft assigns the highest picks to the teams with the worst records from the year before, with the lottery determining which of the teams that miss the Playoffs will get the top three picks and then the rest of the picks being assigned in descending order so that the team with the best record has the lowest draft pick. The logic behind it of course is that the better teams don't need to add the top talent coming into the league whereas the bad teams need the help and thus get first choice of the new players.

6. No worries. The game uses a somewhat simplified version of the NBA's salary cap and fortunately there's an indicator on the Trade Players screen which will display a green tick or red cross depending on whether the proposed trade meets the salary cap requirements which makes things much easier, no matter whether you're familiar with the NBA's salary cap or not.

So with regards to the draft and salary cap:

If I am flying during the season and I am set to get a low pick in the draft I am probably better off using my 1st draft pick as a sweetner for a trade? By the time I get to pick I'd imagine all the real talent would be gone.

Would I gain anything by staying under the cap at all? or just a warm fuzzy feeling inside for playing by the rules?

I'd say so. In a strong draft class there's a chance you could pick up a decent player with good potential which would be a worthwhile pick but you can better afford to give up a lower draft pick. It may be passing on a steal in the draft but if you're already on top then it's something you can afford to do.

The main benefit of staying under the cap is that you can offer more money to free agents from other teams. There are exceptions that allow you to go over the cap to re-sign your own players but to sign players from other teams, you must have cap room to offer them anything more than the mid-level exception or league minimum contract. So if you wanted to sign a top free agent who is demanding over $15 million, you need to have over $15 million available in cap space.