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anpham · 04-14-2003, 03:58 AM

Actually you can't trade a two star player for a 5 blue star player. The computer never accepts them. It usually takes at least a 3 or more and in my case I'm always trading 4 to 5 star players away for minor leaguers. Also a 3 star player generally is a top 8 player at his position who already more than enough to get you a ring. The only reason I trade them is because I can't afford them. If you trade two starters for a minor leaguer (who will only be useable 4 years later) then you've just opened two holes in your starting lineup and gained nothing presently. The only way to fill these gaps is through free agency but I don't sign free agents. I usually don't need the free agents and they usually cost way more than they're worth.

It is technically realistic in real life though. What I have on my roster is a 5 star player. An Alex Rodriguez or a Pedro Martinez. I don't want to pay these guys the 10 million that they're asking so what do you do? Most general managers will trade them. In real life you'll easily get the best two or three players on any minor league farm system or a whole bunch of number one picks in the future. Oakland traded their coach John Gruden for two number 1 picks, and two number 2 picks, plus 8 million dollars just to talk to him. Number 1 draft picks end up as starters almost guaranteed. Number 2's are pretty good too. Tampa then went on to win the Super Bowl in their first year under Gruden. New Orleans traded their entire draft just to get the number one pick to get Ricky Williams. He's now the best running back in the NFL. When you have a sure thing you go for it.

The salary numbers and wins of course aren't realistic (that's only because rookies only cost 300,000 when some rookies cost millions). But if you're sitting there and seeing that your star player is a going to be a free agent and wants 17 million and it'll push you over the cap what do you do? You can let him go for nothing or you can trade him. 99% of the people will trade. If you play in an online league then you have to trade. Sometimes I let them loose and sometimes I trade them. In most cases I trade my superstar for one or two rookies when the other team is offering as many players as there are slots available (I don’t always trade for rookies but in this scenario it’s the easiest way to explain my record). In real baseball I'm technically doing something stupid because you don't trade stars for high school rookies. But in this game most of the 5 star blue rookies turn out to be at least 3 star or greater. This game wouldn't be fun without trades and the computer never offers any trades anymore. They offered trades the first year I played almost every week but I've gone the last 20 years of simulation with maybe 2 or 3 total trade offers from the computer. I have no idea why this happened. But you're supposed to find the most optimal lineup at the most optimal price and the computer's trade AI says that this trade is helping both teams in some way. It was getting kind of ridiculous so that's why I went from the Angels to the Royals, put salary caps, no free agents signings ever, and I even give my starters to last place teams for almost nothing when I have extra players. I still have the same result. Think of if this way. At the worst I’m trading them a 4 star player (my whole lineup is this way). He hit’s .310, 30-40hr, 100+ RBI’s, only 30 years old. He still has 6 or 7 good years in him but it’s going to cost you a ton to keep him. All I ask is for two of their top prospects. In real baseball I’m taking the biggest chance and in real baseball I’m not asking for much. The other team wants a player right now who is guaranteed to put up big numbers. I’m willing to take the chance and wait 4 years or more just to see how these players are going to turn out. If only half of them turn out good then I lose. But if two out of three turn out good then I come out ahead in the long run.

The main problem with the game itself is the scouting is too accurate. The number one prospect really will be a superstar and in real life its the same thing. Troy Glaus hit a million homers in college and the Angels drafted him. It's pretty obvious that he's going to be a superstar and so to sign him it costs you several millions of dollars. If you have a budget you know you cant afford many Troy's sitting in your minors. This game has it so anyone you draft is free until you call them up from the minors and they'll only cost you 300,000 the first three years. If this game was designed so that you had to pay your draft picks immediately then obviously I wouldn't be able to stay under the salary cap and field a bunch of all stars on my triple-A team. But since they make it free then I really don't think anyone whether they are simulating or playing online will give up their superstar for nothing. The only reason a team would keep their star and risk losing him or trade for one temporarily is for a pennant run. But I simulate my game and I'm way ahead and I can afford to lose him so why not trade him? That's what most people would do. Obviously if you were forced to sign your draft pick for 4 years at 5 million each then at that price he's pretty much ready to play for you in the majors. This game has it so you have to wait a couple years while they develop before they have any effectiveness. What's realistic is trading people away. What isn't realistic is letting all your players go for free just because you want to lose games. I'm playing under the OOTP salary rules so my lineup and pitching staff ends up the way that it does. This salary rule isn't the same as it is in real life so it requires a different approach. Even if you approach it the same way in real life you would basically do the same thing. You make trades.

That's where the coaching and scouting helps. It's a star multiplier. This is my first run through OOTP so I have no idea whether or not coaches or scouting actually helps. I haven't tried playing through using this scenario with bad coaches. But assuming that it does then what you have is you trade your 5 star, 30 year old, 10 million plus a year salary, 50 homer man for two blue chip prospects because most teams usually only have at most two. Most of the time they have only one. Those two prospects under good coaches end up with at least three stars. So technically you have two good starters on your team. Some might end up with 4 or even 5 stars. With bad coaches you might end up with junk and have no starters because a lot of those 5 blue star pitchers end up being a 1 star career minor leaguers. Most people wouldn’t trade a 5 star player for the 3rd and 24th best prospect on the list. I wouldn’t but I have to because of the salary cap. 29 teams to trade with is a lot and if you develop a huge minor league system with decent players then making trades with these teams to fill in their holes and taking away their prospects at positions where they're stacked in is the way to go. You might end up with way too many outfielders sometimes but you treat the players like stocks. You hold them and develop them with good coaches until they reach a certain point and then you find them a home on a another team and take someone on that team who might fill a hole on another team who actually has someone you want. Multiple team trades. It makes each year 10 times longer to play. Because if you just sign free agents that's the game for you in 5 minutes. If you have to search each team out and locate the right player for each team and find the right path to get a player on Detroit onto the team in New York so you can have the player on New York who isn't interested in any of your players then it makes the game more interesting.

I haven't played a game where you just sit there and go...Okay if I do this then I win, if I do this then I lose. Should I lose on purpose so that my record is 95-67? Or should I just play in a way that feels right and see how good I can be. What's the point in losing when the point is to win. Playing to lose isn't realistic or right in any way. The other teams field a whole team of players and their payroll is twice mine and I look at their lineup and half their players are 1 star and I wonder why their payroll is so large. I look at my list and all my 11 pitchers are 5 yellow stars and all my 9 hitters are at least 4 stars too. At half the price. Plus my triple-A team could whip them as well. These other teams also make the playoffs and their profit is the same as mine (due to the TV revenue, merchandising, etc) but they have no chance against me in the playoffs. I left the Angels for the Royals and obliterated their team to make it fair and the Angels still went on to win their division 6 years straight. 11 years later their fan interest is still 100 and they still make 30 to 40 million dollar profits each year. If you’re in a market that automatically gives you at least a 80 million dollar payroll then winning the World Series is pretty damn easy. Just sign a couple free agents, hit the simulation button and you have a good chance of winning it. That’s the reason why the Yankees and Braves are so good. They’re so rich they can just buy their rings. I’m not trying to buy my ring, I’m trying to earn it slowly and to be able to keep it always and use the least possible money.

Technically speaking signing free agents is the easiest way to win. There are easily four 40 plus homer men available each year that if you signed them all you would win the championship each year in a flash just so long as you pick a team with a decent sized market. So if you sign two or three free agents, your team at the end of the year just gained three guys and gave up nothing. If you trade for your lineup then you generally have to give up the equal value or more. Obviously if you signed them and traded them instantly for someone else you’re not doing much and that’s why I banned myself from signing free agents. Also the draft only puts out good players up to the 10th pick so if you pick 30th then you're basically getting a useless reliever or a good defensive backup. If you win then the draft is basically useless. You can't predict when there's going to be a superstar number 1 pick so you can release all your stars just to draft him. It's not worth it. So in the end the only real challenge to this game is to win as many games possible and making the most profit at the same time under extreme circumstances. This is when you’re playing on your own. Obviously if you’re playing against other people then it’s a whole new story but this is the way it is. It’s the most efficient.

So you can either just sign free agents every year and just outbid other teams which is pretty easy, or you can develop your farm system and use them instead at 300,000 a pop. If you look at my salary report my team cost me 90 million plus for the first 10 years. Only after my farm system developed was I able to finally start using the rookies in full and that’s why my payroll was slashed in half. It took 15 years of simulation to reach that point. It didn’t happen instantly. Winning the World Series with what the game offers you can happen with the first year or two with doing fairly little by taking other teams stars for free through the free agency pool. With minor leaguers you have to give up something to get what you want and not just fork out the excess cash. Winning the World Series at .860 using only a 52 million payroll takes 15 years of planning and transactions. Winning the World Series at .600 with a 90 million dollar payroll just takes 3 or 4 free agents and a little luck.

04-14-2003, 03:58 AM	#62
anpham Bat Boy Join Date: Apr 2003 Posts: 10	Actually you can't trade a two star player for a 5 blue star player. The computer never accepts them. It usually takes at least a 3 or more and in my case I'm always trading 4 to 5 star players away for minor leaguers. Also a 3 star player generally is a top 8 player at his position who already more than enough to get you a ring. The only reason I trade them is because I can't afford them. If you trade two starters for a minor leaguer (who will only be useable 4 years later) then you've just opened two holes in your starting lineup and gained nothing presently. The only way to fill these gaps is through free agency but I don't sign free agents. I usually don't need the free agents and they usually cost way more than they're worth. It is technically realistic in real life though. What I have on my roster is a 5 star player. An Alex Rodriguez or a Pedro Martinez. I don't want to pay these guys the 10 million that they're asking so what do you do? Most general managers will trade them. In real life you'll easily get the best two or three players on any minor league farm system or a whole bunch of number one picks in the future. Oakland traded their coach John Gruden for two number 1 picks, and two number 2 picks, plus 8 million dollars just to talk to him. Number 1 draft picks end up as starters almost guaranteed. Number 2's are pretty good too. Tampa then went on to win the Super Bowl in their first year under Gruden. New Orleans traded their entire draft just to get the number one pick to get Ricky Williams. He's now the best running back in the NFL. When you have a sure thing you go for it. The salary numbers and wins of course aren't realistic (that's only because rookies only cost 300,000 when some rookies cost millions). But if you're sitting there and seeing that your star player is a going to be a free agent and wants 17 million and it'll push you over the cap what do you do? You can let him go for nothing or you can trade him. 99% of the people will trade. If you play in an online league then you have to trade. Sometimes I let them loose and sometimes I trade them. In most cases I trade my superstar for one or two rookies when the other team is offering as many players as there are slots available (I don’t always trade for rookies but in this scenario it’s the easiest way to explain my record). In real baseball I'm technically doing something stupid because you don't trade stars for high school rookies. But in this game most of the 5 star blue rookies turn out to be at least 3 star or greater. This game wouldn't be fun without trades and the computer never offers any trades anymore. They offered trades the first year I played almost every week but I've gone the last 20 years of simulation with maybe 2 or 3 total trade offers from the computer. I have no idea why this happened. But you're supposed to find the most optimal lineup at the most optimal price and the computer's trade AI says that this trade is helping both teams in some way. It was getting kind of ridiculous so that's why I went from the Angels to the Royals, put salary caps, no free agents signings ever, and I even give my starters to last place teams for almost nothing when I have extra players. I still have the same result. Think of if this way. At the worst I’m trading them a 4 star player (my whole lineup is this way). He hit’s .310, 30-40hr, 100+ RBI’s, only 30 years old. He still has 6 or 7 good years in him but it’s going to cost you a ton to keep him. All I ask is for two of their top prospects. In real baseball I’m taking the biggest chance and in real baseball I’m not asking for much. The other team wants a player right now who is guaranteed to put up big numbers. I’m willing to take the chance and wait 4 years or more just to see how these players are going to turn out. If only half of them turn out good then I lose. But if two out of three turn out good then I come out ahead in the long run. The main problem with the game itself is the scouting is too accurate. The number one prospect really will be a superstar and in real life its the same thing. Troy Glaus hit a million homers in college and the Angels drafted him. It's pretty obvious that he's going to be a superstar and so to sign him it costs you several millions of dollars. If you have a budget you know you cant afford many Troy's sitting in your minors. This game has it so anyone you draft is free until you call them up from the minors and they'll only cost you 300,000 the first three years. If this game was designed so that you had to pay your draft picks immediately then obviously I wouldn't be able to stay under the salary cap and field a bunch of all stars on my triple-A team. But since they make it free then I really don't think anyone whether they are simulating or playing online will give up their superstar for nothing. The only reason a team would keep their star and risk losing him or trade for one temporarily is for a pennant run. But I simulate my game and I'm way ahead and I can afford to lose him so why not trade him? That's what most people would do. Obviously if you were forced to sign your draft pick for 4 years at 5 million each then at that price he's pretty much ready to play for you in the majors. This game has it so you have to wait a couple years while they develop before they have any effectiveness. What's realistic is trading people away. What isn't realistic is letting all your players go for free just because you want to lose games. I'm playing under the OOTP salary rules so my lineup and pitching staff ends up the way that it does. This salary rule isn't the same as it is in real life so it requires a different approach. Even if you approach it the same way in real life you would basically do the same thing. You make trades. That's where the coaching and scouting helps. It's a star multiplier. This is my first run through OOTP so I have no idea whether or not coaches or scouting actually helps. I haven't tried playing through using this scenario with bad coaches. But assuming that it does then what you have is you trade your 5 star, 30 year old, 10 million plus a year salary, 50 homer man for two blue chip prospects because most teams usually only have at most two. Most of the time they have only one. Those two prospects under good coaches end up with at least three stars. So technically you have two good starters on your team. Some might end up with 4 or even 5 stars. With bad coaches you might end up with junk and have no starters because a lot of those 5 blue star pitchers end up being a 1 star career minor leaguers. Most people wouldn’t trade a 5 star player for the 3rd and 24th best prospect on the list. I wouldn’t but I have to because of the salary cap. 29 teams to trade with is a lot and if you develop a huge minor league system with decent players then making trades with these teams to fill in their holes and taking away their prospects at positions where they're stacked in is the way to go. You might end up with way too many outfielders sometimes but you treat the players like stocks. You hold them and develop them with good coaches until they reach a certain point and then you find them a home on a another team and take someone on that team who might fill a hole on another team who actually has someone you want. Multiple team trades. It makes each year 10 times longer to play. Because if you just sign free agents that's the game for you in 5 minutes. If you have to search each team out and locate the right player for each team and find the right path to get a player on Detroit onto the team in New York so you can have the player on New York who isn't interested in any of your players then it makes the game more interesting. I haven't played a game where you just sit there and go...Okay if I do this then I win, if I do this then I lose. Should I lose on purpose so that my record is 95-67? Or should I just play in a way that feels right and see how good I can be. What's the point in losing when the point is to win. Playing to lose isn't realistic or right in any way. The other teams field a whole team of players and their payroll is twice mine and I look at their lineup and half their players are 1 star and I wonder why their payroll is so large. I look at my list and all my 11 pitchers are 5 yellow stars and all my 9 hitters are at least 4 stars too. At half the price. Plus my triple-A team could whip them as well. These other teams also make the playoffs and their profit is the same as mine (due to the TV revenue, merchandising, etc) but they have no chance against me in the playoffs. I left the Angels for the Royals and obliterated their team to make it fair and the Angels still went on to win their division 6 years straight. 11 years later their fan interest is still 100 and they still make 30 to 40 million dollar profits each year. If you’re in a market that automatically gives you at least a 80 million dollar payroll then winning the World Series is pretty damn easy. Just sign a couple free agents, hit the simulation button and you have a good chance of winning it. That’s the reason why the Yankees and Braves are so good. They’re so rich they can just buy their rings. I’m not trying to buy my ring, I’m trying to earn it slowly and to be able to keep it always and use the least possible money. Technically speaking signing free agents is the easiest way to win. There are easily four 40 plus homer men available each year that if you signed them all you would win the championship each year in a flash just so long as you pick a team with a decent sized market. So if you sign two or three free agents, your team at the end of the year just gained three guys and gave up nothing. If you trade for your lineup then you generally have to give up the equal value or more. Obviously if you signed them and traded them instantly for someone else you’re not doing much and that’s why I banned myself from signing free agents. Also the draft only puts out good players up to the 10th pick so if you pick 30th then you're basically getting a useless reliever or a good defensive backup. If you win then the draft is basically useless. You can't predict when there's going to be a superstar number 1 pick so you can release all your stars just to draft him. It's not worth it. So in the end the only real challenge to this game is to win as many games possible and making the most profit at the same time under extreme circumstances. This is when you’re playing on your own. Obviously if you’re playing against other people then it’s a whole new story but this is the way it is. It’s the most efficient. So you can either just sign free agents every year and just outbid other teams which is pretty easy, or you can develop your farm system and use them instead at 300,000 a pop. If you look at my salary report my team cost me 90 million plus for the first 10 years. Only after my farm system developed was I able to finally start using the rookies in full and that’s why my payroll was slashed in half. It took 15 years of simulation to reach that point. It didn’t happen instantly. Winning the World Series with what the game offers you can happen with the first year or two with doing fairly little by taking other teams stars for free through the free agency pool. With minor leaguers you have to give up something to get what you want and not just fork out the excess cash. Winning the World Series at .860 using only a 52 million payroll takes 15 years of planning and transactions. Winning the World Series at .600 with a 90 million dollar payroll just takes 3 or 4 free agents and a little luck.