Anyone done any testing on prospect development in v25.2.52?

[mrpoopistan]

Originally Posted by 84Cubs

Ok, show me in which MLB prospect list where Acuna was every rated 80?

I'm not talking about Acuna as ever being an 80-grade prospect. I'm talking about Acuna as an 80-grade current value player. Which is I think is a fair description of a guy who went 8+ fWAR last year and is on track for 7-ish this year IRL. If you see Acuna as a 60-grade prospect who blossomed into an 80-grade pro, that's fine for the point of discussion here.


My point is that the game never generates a single player like Acuna. Ever. Regardless of prospect status. No generated players ever make it out of the DR league alive to become even all-stars, let alone MVPs. 80-grade or 20-grade. That is a very not-baseball outcome.

The same goes for generated US high schoolers. They never make it in my sims. Ever.

The only hope a generated player has in OOTP25 is as a slightly developed college player who's 21 years of age or older.

[Tesla51P]

Originally Posted by mrpoopistan

TCR does not change the distribution of talent. It only makes it more volatile, which annoys me more. Also, development speed settings won't fix the fact that the game drowns every player from the DR and US high schools.


I did a sim after posting today, and it generated one guy who made it close to 80-grade in six years. (77, but this is a notable improvement over the previous sim's zero.) That one guy started as a 21 y.o. American college player with 25/80 talent.


To be clear, the current version of the game insists that there won't be a single generated player who starts out at age 16 in the DR or 18 in the US who'll arrive between now and the end of 2030 and perform even close to an 80 grade. No next Mike Trout. No next Ronald Acuna. They're going extinct.

OOTP already requires too much flipping switches and controls. For example, I don't really need it murdering my drives with WPA graphs and 3D movements for games I'll never check. Adding more knobs to turn means adding more things I might forget each time I set up a game. And OOTP doesn't store those settings.

Lowering the TCR is going to reduce the volatility in the league. A TCR of 50 is going to have many less top prospects see massive potential drops while less lower rating prospects getting massive potential increases will occur as well. If you want to see a higher success rate on top prospects, reducing the volatility is the way to go.

[LacSlyer]

Originally Posted by mrpoopistan

I'm not talking about Acuna as ever being an 80-grade prospect. I'm talking about Acuna as an 80-grade current value player. Which is I think is a fair description of a guy who went 8+ fWAR last year and is on track for 7-ish this year IRL. If you see Acuna as a 60-grade prospect who blossomed into an 80-grade pro, that's fine for the point of discussion here.


My point is that the game never generates a single player like Acuna. Ever. Regardless of prospect status. No generated players ever make it out of the DR league alive to become even all-stars, let alone MVPs. 80-grade or 20-grade. That is a very not-baseball outcome.

The same goes for generated US high schoolers. They never make it in my sims. Ever.

The only hope a generated player has in OOTP25 is as a slightly developed college player who's 21 years of age or older.

I saw you mentioned about players developing over 6 years in a previous post. Is that how long your current game has played that has no 80 grade players?



I ask this because with a quick google search I found there are 270 players ever, since the literal invention of baseball as a professional sport, who have had a WAR equal to Acuna last year, or better, in a single year.


270 players out of roughly just over 20,500 MLB level players ever. That is .013% of players. How many of these 80 grade players are you expecting to see?

Edit: actually it's less than 270 because there are repeat performances by multiple players, like Mayes.

So even if you took it as .013% of players, likely being very generous with that percent, and round the current amount of MLB players to 780 (26x30), that's equal to .10 players should be 80 grade every year.

[Tesla51P]

Originally Posted by mrpoopistan

I'm not talking about Acuna as ever being an 80-grade prospect. I'm talking about Acuna as an 80-grade current value player. Which is I think is a fair description of a guy who went 8+ fWAR last year and is on track for 7-ish this year IRL. If you see Acuna as a 60-grade prospect who blossomed into an 80-grade pro, that's fine for the point of discussion here.


My point is that the game never generates a single player like Acuna. Ever. Regardless of prospect status. No generated players ever make it out of the DR league alive to become even all-stars, let alone MVPs. 80-grade or 20-grade. That is a very not-baseball outcome.

The same goes for generated US high schoolers. They never make it in my sims. Ever.

The only hope a generated player has in OOTP25 is as a slightly developed college player who's 21 years of age or older.

I've ran some 20 year sims and there are probably too many of these 80 overall players still even with the improved 20-80 scale. All of these players are from the same sim and all have won a Cy Young or MVP.

[locuspc]

I really think the broken way the game handles the built in draft prospects contributes to a lot of the complaints. The first pick in the 2025 or 2026 draft really won't amount to much of anything, because the game doesn't put any good players in those drafts. In long term saves or in pure fictional leagues you would see a lot more top players in the draft amounting to something, although it still would be very hit or miss (as is realistic). But the way the built-in draft class is handled is effectively a bug and it makes it look like top draft prospects fail more often than they ought to if you just look at the first few years of draftees.

[84Cubs]

Originally Posted by mrpoopistan

I'm not talking about Acuna as ever being an 80-grade prospect. I'm talking about Acuna as an 80-grade current value player.

Where do you see MLB rate Acuna as a 80 grade current player? You don't because once they go pro, they stop rating players like this. Of course I could be wrong, and you're welcome to provide a link to something showing otherwise.

[OutS|der]

Originally Posted by 84Cubs

Where do you see MLB rate Acuna as a 80 grade current player? You don't because once they go pro, they stop rating players like this. Of course I could be wrong, and you're welcome to provide a link to something showing otherwise.

If Acuna is projected to be an 7 WAR player then that would equal an 80 grade. While they may stop rating players like this once they go pro, this is still a game and we need a way to rate every player, pro or not.

[Paul Reuschel's Mustache]

Originally Posted by Tesla51P

Some people like me want the game to be as much of a realistic sim as possible while others want more of a casual gaming experience.

I do think it would be nice to have OOTP pre-loaded settings groups to make it easier to set the game up into the style you want. That or making an easy way to export settings for others to easily load them without having to export a whole league.

That's a great idea!

Originally Posted by LacSlyer

You can export league settings and import them as you create a game. You can do the same for game settings as templates.

I've never looked into this but will check it out today. Thanks for the tip!

Personally, I want statistical realism and MLB equivalent player ratings, while also having a few more occasional outliers (19-20 year old stars in MLB / 40+ year old's still producing at a high level in MLB). Lukas Berger mentioned a few days ago that they are working on the game producing more outliers.

[CBLCardinals]

Originally Posted by mrpoopistan

I'm not talking a wire-to-wire 80-grade prospect. Those are rare. I get that part. Ken Griffey, Jr. is rare.


I'm talking anyone who becomes an 80-grade player from an entire set of high school draft and IAFA classes over six years. Even expanding to college drafted, I got one guy when I did a new sim.

Baseball America, one of the top baseball sites around (IMO THE top baseball site) has current MLB 2024 with a total of three current grade 80 players. Three.

I’m assuming DeGrom is as well…he wasn’t listed since on IL so that number is probably four.

80’s are unicorns. BA had Betts, Acuna, and Ohtani as 80’s.

I posted this in another thread but see for yourself Baseball America’s current grades for 2024 MLB starting lineups, rotations, and top 3 bullpen arms. I’ve rolled up the data to visualize reality.

[tron]

I'm in an MLB save entering 2033 and I don't think I've had a single drafted prospect crack the starting lineup since I've started. That's far from an unrealistic expectation. Something definitely changed with development in this release. Is there something I'm doing wrong?

[FantasyDrafter]

Originally Posted by CBLCardinals

Baseball America, one of the top baseball sites around (IMO THE top baseball site) has current MLB 2024 with a total of three current grade 80 players. Three.

I’m assuming DeGrom is as well…he wasn’t listed since on IL so that number is probably four.

80’s are unicorns. BA had Betts, Acuna, and Ohtani as 80’s.

I posted this in another thread but see for yourself Baseball America’s current grades for 2024 MLB starting lineups, rotations, and top 3 bullpen arms. I’ve rolled up the data to visualize reality.

Reminder - most people who purchase that game are not doing so to play “Baseball America Website Ratings”. If OOTP has intentionally adjusted THEIR rating system that’s fine, they just need to make sure they are very transparent about that from the beginning. There is no reason to cloud that in secrecy or say things like “do you trust your scouts, hehe”.

The game is unfinished (and in my opinion it is not really possible to start actively playing) and some have a bigger problem with that than others. I don’t blame those that are tired of paying for the right to beta test a company’s product. I kinda feel the same way. I just want to play the game.

[Daniel_09]

I think there are several issues that are coming together here.

The first is that the game allows you to edit infinite settings which makes you build the universe you want, if for example you want more players with 80/80 rating is very easy by editing the values of the player creation modifiers, if you think that the prospects do not reach their full potential you can set the TCR to 0 where all players in 99.9% reach their full potential since there is no variation of talent.

If you think that the initial rosters do not have adequate ratings, you can edit them yourself as well as download a roster set that is more to your liking.

And the other issue is the actual and potential ratings of some players. If for a season of 7 WAR or more a player is 80/80, I think we are not understanding very well the real and fictitious evaluation of the players. in my opinion the last player with 80/80 rating verifiable in time is Mike Trout between 2012 and 2019.

And at the level of potential the last one would be Wander Franco grade 80, which he could never prove it in reality.

And at the level of settings the OOTP team tries to place for the enjoyment of the majority, that's why they are defaults settings. The positive thing is that we can play it in infinite ways.

[Daniel_09]

Originally Posted by Daniel_09

I think there are several issues that are coming together here.

The first is that the game allows you to edit infinite settings which makes you build the universe you want, if for example you want more players with 80/80 rating is very easy by editing the values of the player creation modifiers, if you think that the prospects do not reach their full potential you can set the TCR to 0 where all players in 99.9% reach their full potential since there is no variation of talent.

If you think that the initial rosters do not have adequate ratings, you can edit them yourself as well as download a roster set that is more to your liking.




And the other issue is the actual and potential ratings of some players. If for a season of 7 WAR or more a player is 80/80, I think we are not understanding very well the real and fictitious evaluation of the players. in my opinion the last player with 80/80 rating verifiable in time is Mike Trout between 2012 and 2019.

And at the level of potential the last one would be Wander Franco grade 80, which he could never prove it in reality.

And at the level of settings the OOTP team tries to place for the enjoyment of the majority, that's why they are defaults settings. The positive thing is that we can play it in infinite ways.

a season like Acuña's last year can only be achieved with TCR greater than or equal to 100 because it is a remarkable change of talent between 2022 and 2023, since Acuña as a player was always considered a player between 65 and 70/80 potential, of course a game can not simulate some real changes that players make from season to season.

This is what we want to emulate through the development lab, which is its first version, and it is showing quite satisfactory results, which as everything in life needs some adjustments in time to satisfy the majority.

[snepp]

Originally Posted by Daniel_09

I think there are several issues that are coming together here.

The first is that the game allows you to edit infinite settings which makes you build the universe you want, if for example you want more players with 80/80 rating is very easy by editing the values of the player creation modifiers, if you think that the prospects do not reach their full potential you can set the TCR to 0 where all players in 99.9% reach their full potential since there is no variation of talent.

If you think that the initial rosters do not have adequate ratings, you can edit them yourself as well as download a roster set that is more to your liking.

And the other issue is the actual and potential ratings of some players. If for a season of 7 WAR or more a player is 80/80, I think we are not understanding very well the real and fictitious evaluation of the players. in my opinion the last player with 80/80 rating verifiable in time is Mike Trout between 2012 and 2019.

And at the level of potential the last one would be Wander Franco grade 80, which he could never prove it in reality.

And at the level of settings the OOTP team tries to place for the enjoyment of the majority, that's why they are defaults settings. The positive thing is that we can play it in infinite ways.

I give this post a grade of 75.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Daniel_09

I think there are several issues that are coming together here.

The first is that the game allows you to edit infinite settings which makes you build the universe you want, if for example you want more players with 80/80 rating is very easy by editing the values of the player creation modifiers, if you think that the prospects do not reach their full potential you can set the TCR to 0 where all players in 99.9% reach their full potential since there is no variation of talent.

If you think that the initial rosters do not have adequate ratings, you can edit them yourself as well as download a roster set that is more to your liking.

And the other issue is the actual and potential ratings of some players. If for a season of 7 WAR or more a player is 80/80, I think we are not understanding very well the real and fictitious evaluation of the players. in my opinion the last player with 80/80 rating verifiable in time is Mike Trout between 2012 and 2019.

And at the level of potential the last one would be Wander Franco grade 80, which he could never prove it in reality.

And at the level of settings the OOTP team tries to place for the enjoyment of the majority, that's why they are defaults settings. The positive thing is that we can play it in infinite ways.

Well said.

[Tiger Fan]

Let me preface this by saying I don't play modern day leagues and I exclusively play stats only (ratings hidden) but I do have a lot of experience with fictional player draft classes. So I can not speak on the default rookies including in the modern day setup, I feel I have lot of experience with draft class and fictional player progression.

Now while I do think there are some minor tweaks still needed to fictional draft classes, I believe the results are very good and for anyone who is not seeing some 4.5 and 5 star guys on draft day living up to their potential, I am not sure what settings you are changing, because that is not what I found in this quick test.

I took an out of the box default modern day league using all of the quick start settings. I let in sim, with all teams entirely on AI control until November of 2041, stopping only to short-list the 4.5 and 5 star players (Scouting set to 100% accuracy) in the 2028, 2029 and 2030 draft classes. I forget to keep a screenshot on the 2028 draftees on draft day but have one included below for the 2029 and 2030 classes as well as a snapshot of career MLB stats for all of those players as November 2041.

To me that is a pretty good mix compared to real life. Early retirements are heavily skewed towards pitchers as you would expect due to arm injuries. There are players that lived up to the potential as well as plenty who didn't - just like a real-life draft. Now, it is very clearly a small sample size but based on that I believe the argument that ALL 5-star players bust is quite simply incorrect or the person has altered their league setup, likely unintentionally, in some way to make it happen.

In fact, I would go as far as saying it is a huge improvement towards realism compared to previous version. We all know how many MLB draft picks bust and I have felt some past versions of OOTP treated draft picks like it was the NFL, where a first round was almost certainly going to be a very good to great player. In my mind, this year's version of draft class player creation and development -while still perhaps in need of some minor tweaks- is about as good as I have seen in any build of the game.

But that is just my .02 cents from a person plays almost exclusively fictional leagues.

EDIT- I should also add there were some non 4.5/5 star guys at the draft that received talent bumps and became 4.5/5 star big leaguers.

[ChrisJNelson]

Originally Posted by tron

I'm in an MLB save entering 2033 and I don't think I've had a single drafted prospect crack the starting lineup since I've started. That's far from an unrealistic expectation. Something definitely changed with development in this release. Is there something I'm doing wrong?

This is my experience too and I hate that the problem is being twisted as people being upset that sometimes highly-rated prospects bust.

We all get that. But again, the issue is that for many of us, it seems that no matter what we do, generated prospects never become great. Maybe OOTP24 was unrealistic the other direction, but that doesn't mean it's fixed now.

[SidHickenbottom]

I'm doing my best to accept that the changes are just the new normal and make adjustments to the way I play, but my two cents are that the focus on 80 grade player distorts the real impact of the changes, just like focus on super young prospects making the bigs distorted the conversation during the beta/early launch. I probably don't want a bunch of 80 grade players. What I do want is a 12-team fictional league that doesn't have only 4 SP under 30 years old ranked over 40 overall 10 years into a save, only 7-8 SP under 30 even making major league rosters, and where everybody else is filling out rotations is over 30.

[thenewchuckd]

Originally Posted by SidHickenbottom

but my two cents are that the focus on 80 grade player distorts the real impact of the changes, just like focus on super young prospects making the bigs distorted the conversation during the beta/early launch. I probably don't want a bunch of 80 grade players. .

This.

Actually I don't really care about the ratings to be honest. I am simply asking to be able: with the right staff & the right budget, etc to be able to make good decisions (and maybe even get some timely feedback when I didn't)

Also, am I the only one having trouble getting every single top rated 16 year old international amateur that I spend top dollar on out of the minors? I'd even take a guy who can get to be a utlity player or play in AAA.

[Rain King]

I just did a 40-year test sim of a fictional universe on default. On Opening Day 2064 looking at Current Ratings with 100% Accuracy filtered on players from the Dominican Republic that were originally IAFA I am seeing the below numbers.

80: 2
70: 4
50+: 50

Here is the breakdown for all players.

80: 14
70/75: 26
50+: 462