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Originally Posted by Charlie Hough
I once saw Yogi Berra spend only a couple of seasons as a regular player and then rot away as a third string catcher and reserve list victim until he retired.
It was all because Elston Howard arrived as a rookie in 1955, and the Yankees made him their everyday catcher as opposed to an outfielder who also player catcher behind Berra. Berra had just won the Defensive Player of the Year Award at catcher, but the Yankees didn't care.
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Seems to me that's more of a problem in how the AI assesses player value than anything else. Fix the way the AI weighs the abilities of players, and what you described shouldn't happen anymore (or at the very least it should happen a lot less).
Another aspect is that in 1955 major league teams could open the season with 40 players on the active roster. It wasn't until the 31st day of the season that active roster went down to 25 players (and remained at 25 until Sept. 1st when the limit went back up to 40).
A side note:
In 1957, MLB changed the rules so that the active player limit at the start of the season was 28; it went down to 25 on the 31st day of the season. This move was partly at the request of the minor leagues, as it left them with more players available for their rosters than was case when MLB teams played with up to 40 players for the first month of the season. This rule lasted until 1968, when it was changed so that the active roster limit was 25 right from the start of the season.