Fictional ALWAYS... does me no good to put in players I know from the real world, although I've been so out of touch with baseball the past few years, that nearly all real players are fictional to me now LOL.
In addition, people always get mad when real players don't perform like the real players. This illusion of cloning goes away with fictional players.
- I create two leagues, each with four 4-team divisions for a total of 32 teams.
- No abhorrent wildcards, all division winners qualify.
- No abhorrent DH rule, pitchers bat.
- No abhorrent Interleague play, what is the purpose of leagues then?
- Weighted schedule -- play your division more than the rest of your league. 30 games against each division opponent, 6 against each of the rest of league for a 90/72 split.
I make the roster moves, etc and the play out the games 1 week at a time, stopping only when something requires my attention.
I also sim 20 years before I take over. Just about to take over my first season (2013) in OOTP14 (just bought yesterday), and first simmed 1993-2012 to build up history, records, etc. My team was pre-determined too, so I don't get to pick from the best or worst to take over, I take over the team I had chosen in advance.
In 20 years they went to the playoffs 3 times, including a 3 peat in 2000-2002. However they have never won it all. They did the final simmed season 2012 and had the best record in baseball with 102 wins but got swept in the first round (go Braves!)