Originally Posted by jpeters1734
The coaching model in OOTP needs an overhaul. I know that it was changed back in OOTP 16, but after almost 3 years, it feels more and more like a setback.
• Bench coaches are not represented properly. I don’t like how the manual says that bench coaches focus more on running and fielding development. That’s not really true. Bench coaches serve as an advisor/second opinion/friend/backup to the manager. The only training they coordinate is the basic pregame stuff, like stretching. The base coaches will usually handle that workload. Not always of course.
• It’s time to implement base coaches and training roles. They are an important part of the game. Base coaches will coordinate infield/outfield practice, base running, and catcher instruction. If anyone’s played football manager, they know what I’m going to say. In FM, you hire guys as general coaches and can assign them to specific training responsibilities based off their strengths. If this was applied in OOTP, then you could have the roles of pitching coach, bullpen coach, hitting coach, outfield, infield, catcher, and base running instructors. The instructor roles could be assigned a 2nd job as a 3B/1B coach.
You could say that we don’t need instructors because they are rolled up into managers and bench coaches. I’d say that a terrible option because you simply have no feedback whatsoever on a coach’s strengths currently. What if a bench coach was amazing a teaching fielding but didn’t know squat about base running? The development tab doesn’t show that. And if it did, it would still a bad option. So, would I just not hire the coach because he can’t teach base running? A real team would hire him for his fielding expertise and would have someone else teach base running. Consider a quote from Joe Maddon regarding a new hire, “Part of his background is he's an excellent third-base coach and he's really an outstanding base running coach, and we wanted to add that skill set to our group,". Adding base coaches and training roles will make the personnel model more engaging and relevant.
• It’s a royal pain in the *butt to find managers and coaches that fit my style. It’s even more of a pain when I find the coach I want, he isn’t interested in coaching at any level but the majors. When I have to click 200-500 times to make an offer to one coach, it removes all the fun. We really need a way to filter out who’s not interested. If I’m searching for a hitting coach for my rookie league, I should not be flooded with hundreds of guys that won’t sign. It wastes time, energy, and is the leading cause why people just turn it off all together. Just let me just enter into a field that I’m looking for a hitting coach for rookie league with a patience preference and only show me those guys that are interested.
• Once I have a list of interested coaches, who should I hire? This is perhaps the most striking example of why the current system is so unrealistic and difficult. What criteria do I have to make that determination? If I’m looking for a hitting coach, there are a few pieces of information available to me; age, experience, focus, reputation, team record, batting average and canned description based off the reputation and focus.
I decide I want a hitting coach with a power focus so I’ve narrowed my list of candidates to 30. Now what do I use, reputation? Does anyone actually know what reputation is based on? Is it based on his ability to develop? Is it based on batting stats, win/loss records, or championships? Is it based on the ability to keep aging veterans sharp on their game? No one knows. A single reputation rating is simply not enough information to make a determination. Do I look at age or experience? I could, but it doesn’t really tell you anything meaningful. Team record obviously shouldn’t be a factor since there’s more that goes into a win than hitting. Side note: many people think the win/loss record is what primarily drives the reputation and if true, makes it even more insane to just go by it. The last thing is a record of team batting average. I know I don’t have to explain the flaw with only using batting average as a measure of a hitting coach’s success.
The only true piece of information I have to hire a hitting coach is preference. Aside from that, I’m essentially making a blind and random decision. This is not realistic, nor is it engaging. It just turns the whole model into a senseless and unsatisfying process.
• The question now is what should we have available to us so we can make informed decisions? We need to bring back the ratings. I know removing them was thought to have made it more realistic, but it’s only caused more problems. I’m not suggesting changing it to how it was in 15, but re-imagining it. A problem I had with it was that the unknown and inexperienced ratings meant that they were terrible at it. It should just be a placeholder until the coach develops some kind of track record. There should also be more fields. Like I said above, there are hitting, pitching, bullpen coaches, IF, OF, C, and base running instructors. All of those should be represented and that will allow us to construct our coaching staff around its strengths and weaknesses. The handle vets, rookies, and players ratings should probably be changed to something more understandable. If a coach is great with rookies, does that mean he’s great with 38 year olds that have never made an ML appearance? He’s technically a rookie. The ratings should be something like fundamentals (for prospects or development) and adjustments (for veterans or to prevent decline).
If bringing back ratings is simply not on the table, what do we do? We would need some way to see the track record of a coach. Who did he work with, who developed under him, who failed to develop, who’s career did he turn around? These are vital pieces of information if we want to make an informed decision for a coach.
Some other random ideas on the topic are:
• Managers should have more control on who the coaches are that we hire. Maybe managers should have to bless off on a coach or you run the risk of him either resigning or refusing to sign an extension. I know some player GMs want to sign coaches with certain preferences so maybe that can be another layer to a manager hire, who he wants to be on his staff. If a manager favors OBP and power, he’d be opposed to hiring a hitting coach with a contact preference.
• Relationships. Many times, managers like to bring on coaches they’ve worked with in the past. This would give the coaching model a little bit more life.
• Player relationships. Why is it that we are able to see player relationships with a manager before we even hire the guy? This seems backwards. You fire a manager once all the players had a bad relationship. You can’t know that until he’s already been in the seat.
• Sign coaches from other teams. This one is simple. Plenty of managers are hired from other team’s coaching staff. We shouldn’t have to wait until another team’s bench coach is a free agent before we can make him our manager.
I know this is a lot, but I feel this is one area of the game that is really lacking. I know my suggestions are not perfect but I hope it's enough to get the conversation going. If the personnel model stays the same for OOTP 19, I think a lot of people will be disappointed.
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