Are Live players worse?
 

I see comments which suggest to me that Live players are, all else being equal, less useful than others. Is this the consensus?

With what being equal?

If the actual ratings are the exact same then the players are the exact same

The overall seems inflated for live players but there are a lot of questionable overalls out there

"All else being equal" meaning that in general, I feel like people prefer non-live cards, and I wonder if that holds even if the ratings are the same. I agree, if the actual ratings are the same, it shouldn't matter, but I rarely see someone trying to build a team of only live players, while I do see attempts to build teams without Live players. My experience is admittedly limited. :)

Ratings are not the same. In most cases historical cards have better ratings. So why would someone build a team of live players unless they were making a theme team?

So I'm not wrong that historical cards are more highly regarded, but the reason is solely that they tend to have better ratings. Thus, if I am trying to build a better Perfect Team without any theme considerations, I should just go for the best players, regardless of live/historical status.

Right now, purely by happenstance and reliance on ratings, I have a pitching staff that is 5 historical starters, 1 historical starter in a relief role, and 6 live relievers. This just seemed to happen, and it got me wondering if there was a reason.

In my mind I add +10 to historical overalls when I evaluate them.

Also for the consistency. Live players will have their ratings fluctuate (some substantially). When you spend X thousands of points, you somewhat know what you're getting with non-live. With live, you may lose 10k pp because the reliever went from a 95 to a 79 in a week. Could also gain points if players improve.

You can also find more non-live pitchers with higher movement/control if that's how you're wanting to build your team too.

Also generally find substantially higher defense on non-live cards too.

I used live cards for a long time, won a diamond series with it so it's not like they're bad but have since switched to mostly non-live (bar 1 card). More consistent performances for the style of team I'm trying to build. I'm also F2P and some of the non-live cards are crazy expensive so that makes a difference too.

Historical players' ratings don't change, so you don't have to worry about their value tanking like you would with a live card. This is mostly relevant to perfect and diamond cards.

Also, IMO, it is a bit easier to evaluate how good a historical card is based on multiple seasons of data, because you don't have to worry about what effect the ratings changes might have had on the stats.

It’s because good live relievers are much easier to find.

Live SP - total trash, except for 100 rated pitchers, who are mediocre.
Live RP - decent if you can find the right ones. Great value cards.
Live batters - there are a few good live batters, mostly those with high contact or good defensive skills. DJ Lamahieu or Andrelton Simmons come to mind. The 100 rate cards are fairly decent too but generally wont perform well at perfect level (except Trout, he's a god).

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Yelich can hit anywhere as well.


LIVE cards can work at the lower levels, but around gold level it gets more challenging.

Well, it's certainly true they are riskier. But that also makes them more affordable. So generally, I think for FTP players it's a mistake to ignore them. You can really get some value out of live cards if you are careful about it.

It's also undeniably true that as you move up the ranks to perfect level, fewer and fewer of them become viable. That just makes sense because you're competing against the best players who ever lived...most guys playing today just aren't all-time legends, just a few players can hang really. So you should be planning to ditch most live cards eventually. The question is...when?

In my opinion you can still use quite a lot of live cards all the way up to diamond level and be successful. My SaberCats are pretty solid proof of that. Guys like Aaron Judge, Yasmani Grandal (and of course Trout) are consistently solid contributors to a good diamond team. That team struggled pretty hard in perfect though.

Specifically for perfect level, of those not previously mentioned, Scherzer stands out to me. There are 8 of him in my league and they averaged 3.5 WAR this season. That's pretty solid production for a guy you can pick up for 25k (helped me for sure).

Rendon is also a pretty consistent 2-4 WAR guy at perfect, you could do a lot worse at 3B.

I cannot figure out live cards at all. Hunter Dozier is top 20 in MLB in OPS and top 15 in slugging % and yet is still a bronze card. his numbers are very similar to Bostons Devers. I don't expect him to be a platinum by now, but sheesh, I woulda thought a high silver at the very least

I've been saying this for quite a while. Also biased since I'm a KC fan.

It's a function of his projections for the season though. Whit's the same way imo.

Live cards are not inherently bad. However, MLB currently values skills differently than this game (whether this is due to game mechanics, preferences and biases of the community playing, or a combination thereof). The "3 True Outcomes" approach guarantees no shortage of live pitchers with high stuff but lower movement/control and live batters with high power but low avoid k.

MLB's current meta has significant compatibility issues with this game's meta.

I find this particularly interesting. I found myself going for 3 True Outcome hitters a lot, and I've never cared about Avoid K. But in PT, esp. after reading folks here and elsewhere, I've learned to use players like Gwynn 69 (.300 average over 3 levels and 11+ seasons). My only current Live 100 player is Tatis Jr., who has been an OK hitter and mediocre defender over 4+ seasons, most at Diamond Level.

Live Trout is probably the best value player in the game. He sells around 40K but if it were historical I could see 100K easy.

Well, it should be clear that when you take the best player seasons of all time and compare them to the LIVE players, that the best players of all time "should" be much better than just about anybody in that crop (with a possible exception of Mike Trout, who belongs in that rarefied company).

Now go one step further and consider that most of the historical cards rated 100 are PEAK cards, so are based on more than one season.

The only issue is that they appear to have a 40-100 scale for current players AND for historical all-stars., So the OVR scales are not comparable. So, naturally a 100 for a Babe Ruth, or Joe Dimaggio, or Ted Williams, etc. PEAK card is going to be tons better than a 100 LIVE card.

I started 69 Gwynn for like 6 seasons in Perfect until I upgraded to the 82 Ichiro. Gwynn still on the roster, just not starting anymore.

Also Tatis Jr live makes a pretty decent 1B. Gets rated up to 97 at first base once he's trained. He's currently my starting 1B as well. This season he's hitting .290/.354/.479 (.833 OPS, 119 OPS+) with 20 home runs and 98 RBI in 150 games. Normally out of the 5 spot.