League Bylaws
as of 7/20/08

1. The league will be known as the American Basketball Congress (ABC). It will consist of 30 teams representing all 30 current NBA franchises. The teams will have the same names and divisional setup as the NBA. The league will feature an 82 game season using the actual NBA schedule from the previous season and a realistic salary cap system.

2. The league will feature the exclusive use of the Action! PC pro basketball game. It is considered the official league policy of the ABC that everyone is required to purchase the most current edition game disk AND the most current NBA season disk from Dave Koch Sports for use in the ABC (if you have a previous season you can purchase the upgrade to the new game and NBA season disk). Anyone found not doing this, or using a copied or pirated disk, will be removed from the league immediately and permanently. Each team will have a roster of 15 players on it (12 active and a 3 man injured reserve list) and cannot exceed this 15 man limit for any reason. Every owner is required to have an active e-mail client that can be registered with the Yahoogroups newsgroup that you will be able to receive file attachments as well.

3. The ABC is not a sim league. It is expected that all owners are to play all of their games in their entirety. Anyone found not be to observing this rule will be removed from the league immediately.

4. SALARY CAP SYSTEM: In each year there will be a Free Agent bidding period shortly after the completion of the previous season's playoffs. All players that were on 1 year contracts the preceding season as well as all players that played in the NBA the preceding year that are not on any team's roster will make up the player pool for the Free Agent Draft. The Salary Cap will be $60 million. But unlike the NBA, the salary cap for this league will be a hard cap. There will be only two exceptions to the cap, and that is you can go over the cap to sign any rookies you have drafted in the previous July's Super Draft, or if you find yourself at the very start of any season over the cap you can sign free agents to only 1 year bids at the league minimum of $500K to fill out your roster to 15 players. This means you cannot exceed the cap at any time for any other reason. If you go over the cap you cannot make any other trades or roster moves unless they reduce the amount that you are over the cap (even money trades are permissible under this scenario). Once you are under the cap again all trade and player movement restrictions will be lifted. The Maximum salary a player can be signed to is $20,000,000, and the maximum contract length will be 5 years. The minimum salary a player can be signed to is $500,000. This is based roughly on the NBA Collective Bargaining agreement. All salaries will be rounded to the nearest one hundred thousand at all times, and will always be listed in millions (so a salary of $5,250,000 will be listed as 5.25). So you cannot bid $1,000,001 to sign a player, for example. In this example if you want to go over this million dollar bid you would have to bid $1,100,000. This is to keep bookkeeping from becoming a nightmare. And finally, the following limits are placed on bids: all contracts of 3 or more years in duration must be at least $1 million per year. All contracts of 4 or more years must of at least $2 million per year. All contracts of 5 years must be of at least $3 million per year.

The Rookie Salary Cap is as follows: SEE ATTACHED HTML DOCUMENT. Keep in mind that ALL first round picks will be signed to guaranteed contracts for 3 years, with a team option for the 4th year. This means you are obligated to pay the rookies salary for 3 full years. The team option for the 4th year means you can sign him for another year at his rookie salary, or release all rights to the player. All second round picks can be signed for one to three years at the owner’s discretion if they played even one game in the NBA the preceding season. In addition, there will be allowed a right of first refusal for the first contract a player signs after his rookie contract is up. This means all you have to do is MATCH an offer made to your rookie after his rookie contract runs out to retain him. This is an exact match with the existing NBA rule towards this issue. This rule applies ONLY to players drafted from the Super Draft each year. You will still have to be able to fit your rookie under the salary cap to exercise this right of first refusal on a player.

Second round rookie picks will now have right of first refusal on the first contract after their rookie contracts expire. This will in essence make them the same as first round picks, with the exception that 2nd round picks do not get an extra option year at the end of their rookie contract. This will apply only to players drafted in the 2007 draft and later, not to those drafted earlier. Players on a first round rookie contract will be indicated as such on the roster with one asterisk (*) following their salary on the roster page of their team. Players on a new 2nd round rookie contract (matching rights) will be indicated as such by having two asterisks (**) on the roster page, and players on an old 2nd round rookie contract (no matching rights) will be indicated by having three asterisks (***) after their salary on the roster page. These "old" style 2nd round contracts will be phased out via attrition and will become extinct after the 2009 season. 

Teams have draft rights to all SD players for a period of two years, even if they do not play in the NBA. A SD pick that does not play in the NBA his 1st season after being drafted can be carried on a team's roster as a supplemental (inactive) player without cost and does not count towards the 15 player roster requirement. On the player's 2nd year after being drafted he would have to be signed or released as per the rules as any other player would be.

5. FREE AGENCY: The Free Agent period is to be from July 1 to September 31. You can place a bid (i.e., Toronto bids 3 years at 5.20 million on Joe Blow) by placing the bid on that player's bid page, which will be made available from the website. The bidding for a particular player starts once the first bid is received. Bidding is considered closed on any given player once there are no bids on that player for 48 consecutive hours. If a new bid is received on that player before the 48 hour period is up then the 48 hour period would start over fresh. Bidding will continue until the 48 hour period without bid is reached, the player is offered the ABC maximum contract of 5 years at $20 million (if your team can beat the maximum bid via the tie-breaker system detailed in the bylaws you can still place another maximum bid on that player), or until September 31, which ever comes first. At 12:00 PM Eastern Time on September 31 the team with the high bid will acquire the player in question for all players that bidding is not closed on. You may place bids on an unlimited amount of Free Agents without regard to your cap situation, but if you sign any Free Agent any outstanding bids you may have out that will not fit under your salary cap will be automatically rescinded. This includes having enough cap room to sign a minimum of 12 players at the minimum salary. THIS IS THE ONLY SITUATION WHERE A BID MAY BE RESCINDED. Otherwise, once you make a bid you are stuck with it, so please bid carefully and wisely. Please note that there will only be allowed one year bids on any players that have announced their retirement, or that have career ending injuries, or any other situation that may end their careers.

The procedure for rescinding any bids due to not having enough cap room due to signing another free agent is as follows: ALL bids on that player will be rescinded to make it as though the team that is short on cap room had never bid on that player, and the bidding will revert to the point of the highest bid where the capped out team had never bid and a new 48 hour time period would start at the time where the Commissioner changes the bids on the player's bid page. For example, Utah bids 1.0 mil on player A, then Dallas bids 1.5 mil, then Utah again at 2.0 mil, then Dallas again at 2.5 mil. If Dallas' bids were struck due to not having enough cap space then Utah's bid of 1.0 mil would be the high bid, and a new 48 hour time period would begin at that point. 

RESTRICTED FREE AGENTS (RFA): At the beginning of the Free Agent period in early July (usually right after the 4th of July holiday) the league office will first put up for bid all restricted free agent players (those that an ABC team has matching rights for). Once a bid settles for an RFA the team with matching rights has 24 hours from the time the bid settles to declare whether they will match the bid or not, keeping in mind they must have cap room to do so. A team with an RFA can bid on their player if they so choose to be able to sing the RFA to a contract of longer duration or the like.

After the RFA's have been put up for bid the league office will release what it considers to be the top tier free agents for that year for bid. This will be defined as the top 20-25% of that year’s free agent crop. After approximately two weeks, the league office will release the 2nd tier free agents, which would be the next 20-25% of players, up for bid. On or about August 15 half of all the remaining free agents will place placed up for bid, and on or about September 1st all remaining free agents would be put up for bid. The reason for breaking them up into groups is that if you do not get the winning bid on a top tier free agent you can then pursue a 2nd tier free agent, or pursue another top tier player. This will also keep some of the lesser free agents from being acquired for unfairly low bids. For example, LeBron James is up for bid. He is probably going to get the max. If we put another player up for bid at the same time someone might sneak in and grab him for much less than he's worth due to all of the attention given to LeBron. Hopefully, this will prevent that. Any player signed from the 1st tier of free agents may not be traded until after all of the first tier free agents have been signed in that given year. After that point all trade restrictions are lifted.

The total amount of the contract is the determining factor in all free agent bids. For example, a 4 year contract at $10 million per year (total contract of $40 million) will always beat a 3 year contract at $13 million (total contract of $39 million).  Any players not bid on in the Free Agent Auction will go into the Turkey Shoot (see below). Tie-breakers on maximum contracts will be decided as follows, using a confirmable source for the drawing such as a published lottery site. A team may only win one tie-breaker on a maximum contract player per season. If all teams involved in the tiebreaker on a max. contract player did not have the player the previous season, then all teams will receive exactly equal odds of winning the tiebreaker (2 teams involved, both get 50% chances, 4 teams involved all teams get 25% chance and so on).

6. RELEASING PLAYERS: All players that did not play even one minute in the NBA the previous season (DNP's) may be released without penalty during the off-season. This is to keep a career ending injury from tying up your cap room for any period of time. All other players may be released at any time during the off-season up to August 1st with the following penalty: 50% of the TOTAL AMOUNT due his contract, which will be applied to the salary cap via a one-time hit against the cap in the season the player is released. For example, you have signed Keith Van Horn to a 4-year contract at $10 million a year, for a total value due his contract of $40 million. If you should choose to release him at this point you will have to absorb a one time salary cap hit of $20 million in the year you choose to release him. Any player in the final year of his contract may be released at any time up to August 1st of each new year, but the team will be liable for 100% of his salary for that year. In other words, if you want to cut a player in the last year of his contract that is making $5 mil for that year you may do so, but you will have to eat the full $5 mil as a salary cap hit. Releasing players with 2+ years may done as is now listed (one time salary cap hit of 50% of the player's total remaining contract value). In all cases where you release a player you also forfeit any and all rights to that player. All players released due to cap reason must be done do by August 1st of each year. After August 1st you are liable for the player’s entire year’s salary.

If a team should find themselves over the cap and/or in excess of the 15 player limit (see below) at the very start of the season after adding in the previous season's Super Draft picks, he may release as many players as necessary to get back under the limits without penalty as needed. This team cannot make any trades or other roster moves without getting back within cap/player limits. This rule applies only to a roster at the immediate beginning of the season only, and cannot be used at any other time.

HOW THIS APPLIES TO SUPER DRAFT PLAYERS: If a Super Draft (SD) player does not play at all in the NBA in the year that he is drafted in the SD (what should have been his rookie year in the ABC) he may be released without penalty. By doing this you relinquish any and all claim to the player. If you choose to keep an SD player on your roster that did not play his full, guaranteed rookie salary, as defined in the ABC's rookie salary cap document, will count against your salary cap.

1st round picks can be cut at any time during their contract, but it will always be at a cost of 100% of the total value of the remaining contract. For example, Player A is in the 1st year of a 3 year 1st round rookie contract at $2.00 mil per year. His buyout (one time cap hit) would be $6 million (3 years x 2.00 mil per year). In the 2nd year the buyout would be $4 mil, and in the final year it would be $2 mil. You may still cut any rookie pick that is a DNP player at no cost.

2nd round picks from the previous year's Super Draft may be cut without penalty at the very start of the new season, and before any trades or roster movement is made by that team in a period designated by the Commissioner each season

7. DNP (DID NOT PLAY) PLAYERS: Any player that did not play even one minute in the previous NBA season will be considered a DNP player. You can release a DNP player at any time while he maintains the DNP status without penalty. If you choose to keep a DNP player it will only cost 50% of his salary towards your salary cap for one year that he is a DNP player. This is so that you can keep a player who may have had a season long injury but is expected to recover and play the following season. This special 50% dispensation applies only to players who were injured and not to players out of the league for other reasons (i.e., lack of skill). This special 50% dispensation is only for one year. If the player is completely injured for a second season and you want to keep him it will be at his full salary value, or he may be released without penalty.

8. GAMES PLAYED AND PLAYING TIME: Rosters consist of a maximum of 15 roster spots at all times. You cannot carry more than 15 on your roster at any given time. The ABC will use the pre-game injury feature of the Action game. This feature will determine each game which players are eligible. All teams must carry the full 15 man roster for the regular season.

Due to the Action PC game using an excellent fatigue system there will be no need for per game playing time limits. If you want to play a player when he is fatigued and suffer through his vastly reduced efficiency it is up to you. However, the following rule for fouls will be enforced. A player with 2 personal fouls in the 1st quarter must rest until the start of the 2nd quarter. A player with 3 personal fouls in the 2nd quarter must rest until the start of the 3rd quarter. A player with 4 personal fouls in the 3rd quarter must rest until the start of the 4th quarter. A player with 5 personal fouls must rest until the 6:00 to go mark of the 4th quarter. These limits will be waived during April games, and during all playoff games to simulate the extreme nature of late season & playoff games.

Players can play at any position they are rated for by the Action PC game. During all league and playoff games you must have at least 2 players rated for play at each of the five positions. A player may count at multiple positions if he is rated there. For example, Kevin Garnett is rated at PF, SF and C. He may be counted at all 3 positions for the purposes of this rule. Players may only play out of position when there are no other option available (no substitutes available due to injury, foul trouble or fatigue). Each team is allowed to petition the league to add a position(s) to up to no more than 2 players. The website 82games.com will be the determining factor if the player receives the rating or not, and that player must be listed as playing at least 1 % of time at that position to be rated there. No player will lose a position rating as rated by DK Sports for any reason.

Finally, all league games to be played as neutral court games. This is set under the league rules, so there shouldn't any way anyone could accidentally play without it. Therefore, we will play all games, INCLUDING PLAYOFF GAMES, as neutral court games.

PLAYOFF USAGE: Only players with at least 20 regular season GP on the official ABC rosters are eligible for post-season play. They are also subject to the following limits based upon real life games played: players that 20 -23 regular season games are allowed to play in 3 games of any 7 game playoff series; players with 24-29 GP can play 4 of 7, players with 30-36 GP can play up to 5 of 7 games, players with 37-43 GP can play 6 of 7 games, and players with 44 + GP can play all 7 games of any playoff series. Which games they do or do not play is completely up to the team's Coach, but these limits apply to each and every playoff series. Failure to observe this rule will results in forfeiture of the playoff series in question.

9. OVERUSAGE PLAYERS: Any player meeting the following criteria shall be considered an overusage player and will be made eligible for 70 GP and a DUR rating of 9: less than 70 NBA GP and less than an average of 20 minutes per game, and all ratings less than 6 with the exception of def. reb. which can be 6. The Dunk, Clutch, Durability and Sportsmanship ratings would be ignored for the purposes of determining overusage waivers.  No team would be allowed to have more than 2 of these players, regardless of how many qualify, and if more than 2 qualify the team or League Office will select the two that are most needed for that team to receive waivers.

10. PENALTIES: All owners are expected to meet all league deadlines established by the League Office. 1st offense will receive a $250,00 fine against the salary cap. 2nd offense will receive an additional $250,000 fine against the salary cap and the loss of a #2 Super Draft pick. 3rd offense will result in another $250,000 fine towards the cap and the loss of a #1 Super Draft pick. 4th offenses are subject to expulsion from the league without notice. If an owner is removed from the league for being habitually late, or for any other reason, his fines will be deleted and not be passed on to the new owner. An exemption from any penalties can be granted by the League Office, but will be issued very sparingly if at all, and only in cases of extreme emergencies. The Commissioner reserves the right to add to these penalties in any way he sees fit, up to and including expulsion from the league.

11. SUPER DRAFT: The Super Draft will take place each year in early July and will utilize the 60 rookies actually drafted by the NBA teams in the June NBA Rookie Draft. No other players will be eligible (i.e., undrafted rookies). The draft will take place via chat room at a designated time and date (a preference list sent to the Commissioner may be used for those teams that cannot make the draft live). The draft order for non-playoff teams (or teams holding those picks) will be a draft lottery directly tied to the NBA Draft lottery in the following manner: Each team in order of our finish will be assigned to the NBA team with the corresponding order of the NBA Draft lottery, and we will use their order as for determining our lottery picks. For example, if in the ABC Utah, Houston and Boston have the 3 worst records in that order, and Portland, Seattle and Denver have the 3 worst in the NBA lottery, then Utah will be equal to Portland's pick in the NBA lottery, Houston equal to Seattle, Boston equal to Denver, and so on down the line. All playoff teams would then draft in inverse order of last season’s win-loss percentage. The final caveat to the draft order is that the team that win the ABC Championship (or the team holding that pick) will always pick last in both rounds, and the team that lost in the Championship Series the previous season (or the team holding that pick) will pick 28th in both rounds of the SD. Your Super Draft picks are tradeable, but only for the next year's draft and not for any future drafts. Once the draft is completed in July the picks for the next season become tradeable.

Teams that miss any or all of their Super Draft picks by failing to be at the draft live, having someone to make their picks in proxy, or by sending the Comissioner a written list for his picks will have his picks made using teh actual order of the NBA Draft, but will be fined $1 million for each 1st round pick missed and $500,000 for each 2nd round pick missed.

12. TRADE PROCEDURE: In the event of two or more owners agreeing on a trade the following procedure must be adhered to: all trades must be reported by BOTH parties by sending it to the league newsgroup at ABCHoops@yahoogroups.com within 48 hours, unless given express permission by the Commissioner to do otherwise, or the trade will be ruled invalid. The Commissioner has & will use the power to overrule any trade he feels is detrimental to the balance of the league for any reason. In cases where the Commissioner is not available for an extended period please notify Shawn Roach of the trade.

In-season trading is allowed in the ABC, within the following parameters. The final trade deadline will be on January 25th. At that time all rosters will be considered final until the next off-season. In-season trades made in one interval will become valid the following interval. Also in-season trades cannot be finalized unless EACH AND EVERY owner has his results up to date and on time. If anyone is late or otherwise not up to date the trade(s) will be bound over until the next calendar month. If anyone is late or otherwise not up to date on the final trade deadline (January 25th), then the all outstanding trades will be ruled null and void. However, the trade may still be consummated during the next off-season if both coaches agree. Rosters cannot exceed 15 spots at any time, for any reason, including in-season trades.

13. GAME REPORTING: Each owner is responsible to see that his game results & stats are reported on time on a twice-monthly basis. All games scheduled for the 1st thru the 15th of any month are due in to the League Office by the 15th of that month. All games scheduled for the 16th thru the end of that month are due into the League Office on the last day of that month. If an owner should fall behind in the playing and/or reporting of his games and/or stats to a point where the Commissioner should doubt his ability to finish the season that owner can and will be replaced. Constant missing of deadlines is cause for removal from the ABC without notice.

14. PLAYOFFS: At the close of the regular season the ABC's "Second Season" will begin. There will be 8 teams from each conference that qualify for the playoffs. The playoff seeding procedure will mirror that of the NBA at all times. All game 7's in all series will be mandatory head to head play. To facilitate this all series will be allowed 14 days to be completed. Games 1 thru 6 will be due within the first 10 days of the period. This will allow 4 days for the scheduling and playing of a game 7 if needed.

15. TIEBREAKERS: The following is the order of sequence for breaking all ties in the ABC:

1. Best Road win-loss record
2. Head to Head season record
3. Best record within the same division (applies only if teams from the same division)
4. Best record within the same conference (applies only if teams from the same conference)
5. Random draw tied to a confirmable source such as a state lottery results, etc.

16. EXPANSION: In the event the NBA expands the ABC will follow suit the following season. In their first year of existence the expansion team will select after all lottery teams have picked in the the round of the Super Draft, and in the same position in the 2nd round of the Super Draft. In any future ABC expansion the expansion team will have their salary cap limited to 66% of the existing ABC cap for that season in its first year, and 75% of the existing cap in its second year. Year 3 on it will have the same cap as all other ABC teams. This is based upon what the NBA actually did with the Charlotte Bobcats franchise in real life

17. TEAM OPENINGS: In the event that a team becomes vacant for any reason the League Office will take whatever steps necessary to replace that owner. Once a new owner is found he will not be permitted to make any trades what so ever until 24 hours AFTER the date his name is announced. This is to give all league owners an equal chance to make deals with the new owner. A new owner that inherits a team prior to the start of any season that did not make the playoffs the previous season can terminate without penalty one contract within the 1st two weeks after he is named the new owner, up to the end of the free agent period for that season.

18. The Commissioner reserves the right to make any rulings necessary that are not expressly covered in these bylaws. This includes, but is not limited to, interpreting rules, defining loopholes, and any other ruling that may become necessary.