External Transactions
Designation for Assignment
Cut players are designated for assignment. Designation immediately removes the player from the Majors and subjects him to a 2-3 day waiver process. Waivers run for at least two days but are processed during the middle of the night following expiration of the 48-hour period. Such players are available to trade during that period if the trade deadline has not passed. If they are not traded during that period, they are given to the highest waiver claimant. If the player is not claimed on waivers, the player is cut. Designation is not revocable. Salary refunds are not applicable to players unclaimed on waivers. See the Payroll section for more information.
Mid-Season Free Agents
Any unsigned player can be acquired mid-season. Players who are acquired mid-season are MS-contract players, paid a prorated league minimum.
Players drafted in the Snake Draft with non-guaranteed contracts may be freely swapped for a replacement player who is of the same type (i.e. position player or pitcher) until the end of April. Replacement players cannot subsequently be swapped for other replacement players. Players dropped with NG status do not confer NG contract status when signed by a new team; such player has MS contract status. Players with NG contracts cannot be kept at the conclusion of the season.
Waiver Claims
All dropped players will be placed on waivers, as described above, for 2-3 days. Any team may put in a claim for a player on waivers, and the player will be awarded to the team that is highest in the waiver order at the time the claim is processed. During the offseason and Week 1 of a new season, the waiver order will mirror the AA Draft order but will not reset until the conclusion of Week 1 of the new season. Starting in Week 2 of the season, the waiver order will be reset at the start of each week to the inverse of the LDB standings. If a team claims a player, they will temporarily drop to the bottom of the waiver order until the order resets. Tiebreakers on waiver claims for teams with identical records will be determined by whatever method CBS utilizes.
Awarding a player results in the acquisition of that player, pending roster space being made available for the new player. The claiming team assumes the remaining salary burden of the player, calculated by remaining weeks in the LDB regular season.
Teams may not claim players that they themselves dropped. Teams must wait until a player clears waivers to reacquire such players.
Trades
Trades may occur at any point in the offseason and regular season, until the league trade deadline. The trade deadline is the end of week 15. All trades must have timestamp of 11:59 PM EST[1] on Sunday of week 15 or earlier, or have been announced to the league in a reasonable manner before that deadline.
Trades will be subject to approval by a vote of the other managers in the league. If greater than one-half of the non-involved managers veto a trade, the trade will be cancelled. The veto window is three days. All trades are immediate. A veto of a trade will be prospective; if vetoed, the players traded will have their stats count for their teams that temporarily held them.
Trades may involve players, cash, and other assets, such as, but not limited to, future draft picks, RFA rights, etc. Trades may include a "player to be named later" so long as that player has not accumulated any LDB stats between the trade and the player changing hands. As a general policy, trades are looked upon favorably, regardless of the types of assets involved. The full terms of a trade need not be fully disclosed to the league and may involve gentlemen agreements and other conditions. However, trades are subject to the following restrictions:
- No trade may involve an agreement to temporarily hold or "rent" a player. Any trade that attempts to work around the ban on renting players is also prohibited. For example, a trade involving an agreement to later send back a player of similar value could be considered a workaround. Whether a trade constitutes a rental or an attempted workaround will be determined by the Commissioner(s).
- Transfer of a player's RFA rights is prohibited once that player is nominated in the Majors Draft or selected in the Snake Draft.
- Injury contingencies may be included in trades, but the conditions of the contingencies must be clear to be enforceable. Injury contingencies with ambiguities will not be enforced by the league. Injury contingencies need not be disclosed to the league. But unless there is clear, unambiguous, written documentation of a contingency between the trading parties, a contingency will not be enforced.
In any trade made after the Majors Draft, it is assumed that teams trading away a player pays the salary of such players. However, in any trade made in the offseason or mid-auction, it is assumed that teams receiving players pay the full salary of such players.
Bets Involving LDB Assets ("Friendly Wagers")
"Friendly wagers" are the only class of transactions that can include yet-unrealized future assets (money, AA picks past the 2-year allocation window, yet-unborn naming rights to sons/daughters, etc). Friendly wagers cannot adversely impact the competitiveness of the league. If there is question about whether a wager will affect the competitive balance of the league, the Commissioner(s) will determine whether such wager will. All assets involved in friendly wagers will be held in escrow, a spreadsheet that will spell out the parties, terms, timeline, and payouts of the friendly wager. Friendly wagers are bound to the team, rather than the owner, such that a owner's departure does not invalidate the wager (unless specified in the terms of the wager). In the event a team's owner leaves the league, new prospective owners should be made aware of the team's wagered obligations before agreeing to take control of a team, as the assets are held in escrow and will only be released pursuant to the terms of the wager.
- ↑ The standard time zone for LDB is Eastern Standard Time.