I've actually been giving this problem a lot of thought. I think the problem is not that players are taking minimum contracts to help their team. That idea in itself is fairly well-intended, but the problem is that players aren't sacrificing much since they can easily generate that money elsewhere. We could simply raise expense costs or lower payments from media/graphics, but that punishes the new players, who need the money the most.
The big issue seems to be that costs don't inflate over time, so there's no reason for experienced players to start to demand more money once their TPE skyrockets (other than the minimum salary). It's a hard problem to solve, so I don't pretend there's an easy fix, but I think I've got an idea.
(1) Have the league provide a bonus for players that sign contracts at least double the minimum. This will reward players that demand more without directly pulling from team salaries. As a starting number, say 50% of the difference. So, if I'm due a minimum of $1 mil and sign a $3 mil / year contract, I would receive a bonus of $1 mil from the league for each year (50% of the $2 mil difference over the minimum). This encourages players to want more money just like a real player, kind of like the word count bonuses for article except for a simple flat rate.
(2) Since #1 pumps money into the system without raising costs, also increase the value of TPE expenses for more experienced players.
(2a) Increase pro equipment by $500,000 for each pro equipment of that type purchased previously by a player. Budget equipment would not go up or increase the cost of future pro equipment.
(2b) Increase +5 training for non-rookies from $1 mil to $1.5 mil. Rookies can purchase +5 for $1 mil until the end of their first drafted season as "Weekly Rookie Training".
The numbers and other details can all be tweaked, of course. It's more about the idea as a whole. We want to encourage big TPE and highly active players to aim for bigger contracts, so a team can't easily stack the best players. On the other hand, players can still sign low to help their team and stay with their friends, but they'll actually be sacrificing something to do so since the bigger contracts reward more and $$$ would matter more as time goes on. This is a big change and the problem may not be big enough to warrant a solution of this size, but I'm just brainstorming at this point.
The big issue seems to be that costs don't inflate over time, so there's no reason for experienced players to start to demand more money once their TPE skyrockets (other than the minimum salary). It's a hard problem to solve, so I don't pretend there's an easy fix, but I think I've got an idea.
(1) Have the league provide a bonus for players that sign contracts at least double the minimum. This will reward players that demand more without directly pulling from team salaries. As a starting number, say 50% of the difference. So, if I'm due a minimum of $1 mil and sign a $3 mil / year contract, I would receive a bonus of $1 mil from the league for each year (50% of the $2 mil difference over the minimum). This encourages players to want more money just like a real player, kind of like the word count bonuses for article except for a simple flat rate.
(2) Since #1 pumps money into the system without raising costs, also increase the value of TPE expenses for more experienced players.
(2a) Increase pro equipment by $500,000 for each pro equipment of that type purchased previously by a player. Budget equipment would not go up or increase the cost of future pro equipment.
(2b) Increase +5 training for non-rookies from $1 mil to $1.5 mil. Rookies can purchase +5 for $1 mil until the end of their first drafted season as "Weekly Rookie Training".
The numbers and other details can all be tweaked, of course. It's more about the idea as a whole. We want to encourage big TPE and highly active players to aim for bigger contracts, so a team can't easily stack the best players. On the other hand, players can still sign low to help their team and stay with their friends, but they'll actually be sacrificing something to do so since the bigger contracts reward more and $$$ would matter more as time goes on. This is a big change and the problem may not be big enough to warrant a solution of this size, but I'm just brainstorming at this point.
Thanks to Jangorhino for the sig.