[joefromchicago]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

1. The highs and lows aren't as extreme in early leagues as they ought to be. The dead ball era in particular was a time when even though the league hit .250 or lower, .400 hitters were not uncommon.

This has long been a problem, not just with 19th century players.

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

2. To exacerbate this, managers in the game platoon guys and put them on regular "start and sit" rotations all the time, meaning that instead of getting 150 games and 550+ PAs a season, everyone but superstars in their prime top out in the 120s in games played and 450 or so PAs. This may not seem like a big deal but over the course of a career his might cost a potential Hall of Famer 1200 or more PAs and be the difference between a 2700 hit career and breaking 3000.

How big are your rosters? A typical 19th century club might have carried as few as 12 players. That's not possible in OOTP - the roster minimum is 15, but that should probably be the roster limit at least until the 1890s. And how long are your schedules? Only one player who played his entire career in the 19th century had over 3000 hits - Cap Anson. Nobody else even came close.

I do agree, however, that OOTP platoons players like it's 2015 even if the league settings are for 1885. Not knowing anything about computer programming, I don't know if that's something that's easy to fix or not, but there hasn't been a whole lot of interest in modifying strategy settings to replicate deadball-era baseball.

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

3. On the flip side I see way too many pitchers with losing or near losing records and close to 250 career victories. If you look at guys who fit these criteria in real life baseball you'll see this is mostly a late 20th century phenomenon.

I've seen that too. Not sure how to fix that. It may have more to do with injury ratings as with anything else.

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

4. Generally speaking, pitchers hit too poorly during this period relative to the league and as a result the game tends to compensate by making most starting caliber players at least adequate at the plate. Max Bergen types are basically non- existent - a player might hit that poorly for a season but they'll quickly be benched.

I've never noticed this.

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

- Cut waaaaay down on trades. I like to base all my leagues transactions on actual trades and purchases conducted by the league in a given season and one thing I've found is that in the dead ball era in particular teams simply did not trade as much as they do now. Even the Very Low setting produces too many of them. A lot of the time a team with a gaping hole at a position would just sign a minor league free agent or at most purchase a player from the minors, especially if they weren't a big city club. Sometimes the Louisville Colonels had to live with an average field no hit shortstop for years at a time (well, the real life Colonels developed Honus Wagner but you get the idea).

You're right - trading was an innovation that a lot of people, at first, didn't even think was possible, either legally or according to league rules. Peter Morris in A Game of Inches says that trades were "pretty much unheard of" until 1883, so trading should be disabled until then and set at "very hard" thereafter.