Using Three Team Trades in NBA Live 2001
The three team trade interface does indeed work in NBA Live 2001, however it does not work as perfectly as we would like. It is possible to orchestrate a deal between three teams, but aside from the usual restrictions of the Salary Cap, roster space, limit of players that can be traded by one team (5) and the CPU's willingness to do the deal, a three team trade has some additional restrictions to consider:
- In Franchise Mode you can only trade between human and CPU controlled teams ie. if you are the Chicago Bulls and you are putting together a deal with the Denver Nuggets and Los Angeles Clippers, you can only trade players between Chicago and Denver, or Chicago and Los Angeles. You cannot make trades between Denver and Los Angeles. HOWEVER...if you are controlling two or three of the teams in the trade, or you are playing Season Mode with "Modify CPU Teams" switched on, this restriction is not enforced. Also, this restriction is not enforced when setting the default rosters.
- ALL teams must agree to the deal. All human controlled teams agree to the deal by default. If you are dealing with two CPU teams, it may be a bit harder.
- The trade must satisfy the conditions of the salary cap for each team involved in the deal.
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Disadvantages & Limitations
- Because it is not possible to trade between two CPU teams in Franchise Mode, it may be difficult to make the trade work under the salary cap. Hence, it's usually difficult to work out a fair deal that both CPU teams will agree to.
- The box/manual is correct - you CAN trade up to 15 players - but only if you trade away 10 of your players and receive from the CPU teams a TOTAL of 5 players (NOT 5 from each team). And that won't work unless all teams have a sufficient amount of players or roster spaces.
Bottom line, because of these restrictions you'll sometimes be on the losing end of the deal while your CPU opponents will have forfeited a couple of good players for a couple of your best players, with three or four decent players thrown in as filler.
So, why bother to use it?
There are some instances where a three team trade is useful. The feature does in fact work - you can make a transaction that involves three teams. You simply just have to work within the restrictions, making sure all of the salaries match and work under the cap. It then becomes a matter of satisfying each of the CPU teams with the players you're offering.
Specifically, three team trades are useful when you wish to make two trades, but for some reason, you are unable to make both due to salary cap restrictions, unappealing trade offer, etc. A three team trade can alleviate salary cap problems, which in turn may allow you to put forward a deal that is both fair for all teams, and appealing to the CPU. Most of the situations in which you will find the three team trade useful involve salary cap restrictions or the ability to make a fair deal that is appealing to all teams involved. And of course if you're a patchmaker, it comes in handy as when you're updating the rosters.
Making use of three team trades
First of all, you need to keep in mind the basic principles of trading with CPU teams. CPU teams want at least equal value in return on deals that you propose (ie matching overall ratings and matching totals of overall ratings when multiple players are involved) and do not want to be left weak at a certain position. A three team trade should therefore include two CPU teams with whom you wish to trade and players that the CPU teams are likely to want in return.
Note that sometimes it's easier to simply trade with one team at a time; you should only look at three team trades if it's beneficial from a salary standpoint. If you're having difficulty making the salaries match, this is when you should look to involve a third team so that you can make sure the value of the salaries you're trading is equal to the total salaries you're receiving (or within the threshold). Note that all teams must satisfy this condition. In this way, it's possible to combine two trades with salary cap difficulties into one three team deal that works under the cap.
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