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I'd agree that ordinary, predictable, statistical variation accounts for a lot of the sim-to-sim "inconsistency" you found. There might be something else going on, though. I was thinking it could be the DIPS-based engine in the case of the pitchers, particularly Moose Haas vs. Pete Vuckovich. It seems like, in your sims, Haas usually did better than IRL, while Vuckovich did worse.
Here are their real-life stats:
Moose Haas 1982
IP: 193.3
H-HR: 217 / 10.10 per 9 innings
HR: 15 / .70
BB: 39 / 1.82
K: 104 / 4.84
ERA: 4.47
Pete Vuckovich 1982
IP: 223.7
H-HR: 220/ 8.85
HR: 14 / .56
BB: 102 / 4.10
K: 105/ 4.23
ERA: 3.34
In the defense-independent categories, Vuckovich narrowly edged Haas in home runs allowed (by .14 a game), while Haas struck out .61 more batters per game and had *much* better control, walking batters at less than half Vuckovich's rate (amounting to a rather large difference of 2.41 walks a game!).
The other big difference between them is on hits on balls in play--precisely the stat that's heavily influenced by fielding. According to DIPS (to simplify it greatly), when two pitchers on the same team have a big difference on hits allowed, it's probably due mostly to chance. So, agree or disagree with the DIPS approach, OOTP might be telling you that Haas was really a better pitcher than Vuckovich that year, and that Vuckovich's Cy Young was something of a mirage.
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