The money is definitely better. My team was clearly not even close to being ready for D.IV when I promoted last season; I promoted only because I was in a bot league. I did not get the season ticket holders bonus because I did not win my league; I promoted through bot cleanup because I had a 21-1 record (I lost to the only other human manager, who was in the other conference). Despite that, I still collected the promotion money and pulled $100K+ for the first several weeks and now, despite being in 7th in my conference with a 2-17 record, I'm still making 70K+ a week even though I spend $20K on the draft and my arena is only 58% full. Plus, from being in said bot league I got one awesome trainee
(22091670) and one really good trainee
(22091651). I'm almost certainly going to get demoted this season, but I got both those guys single-position training, am set to get another decent player in the draft, and have $1.5 million sitting in my account. Not a bad season's work if I do say so myself. Moral of the story: promote if you can even if it's premature; at worst, you can tank, stockpile huge money, AND get a good draft pick. It's kind of boring losing every game, I'll admit, but I'm hopeful it'll be worth it in the long run.