[chazzycat]

For the past week and a half I've been somewhat consumed by my fourth team, over in the BFF league. In doing so, I think I stumbled across the secret to OOTP...stop checking your team! The SmallBallers and SaberCats are both having their best seasons EVER right now since I've been ignoring them.

The SmallBallers last season did win the wild card, as predicted. And it was another strong +200 year. But they got swept by the Senators in the playoffs.

This year, they look like the best team in their league, and that includes a megawhale. They've literally lost 1 game in June, including a 20-game winning streak, my best ever. Their division lead stands at 23 games. Ty Cobb has been a revelation, tearing up the league with an OBP over 400, and 110 steals since I acquired him.

Now, to be honest, a huge part of this is just luck from having only 1 true whale in the league. Furthermore, that whale has more of a power-build, with Ruth & Bonds types hitters. I've come to understand through these teams, that the makeup of the leagues each week plays a huge role in my chance of success.

The SaberCats, while not quite as dominant, are having a truly excellent season as well. Their run differential of +150 already is an all-time high, and it's just June. Pythag has been a bit unfortunate, at -8, but I'm hoping it won't matter, with a six game lead in the division. I'm guessing this pace is not completely sustainable, but they could fall off plenty in the second half and still make the playoffs.

Again with the SaberCats, I believe the makeup of the league is playing an important factor. There are a few whales in their league...very good teams - but they are contact-oriented. This seems to have the effect of leaving more homers for me, and my team is taking full advantage. I have noticed this before too. Like in the seasons I don't make the playoffs, usually I see 2-3 power based megawhales in the league that year. My theory is that there's got to be some number of homers allotted to the league or something...it seems like a zero-sum game. If someone else hits more homers, you get less.

This all brings me to the BFF league. This is a league organized over on Discord. It's FTP and with a rule that you can't sell historical gold+ cards you pull from packs. So it's not possible to pull a top card and finance your whole team.

I decided for this league, I would go with a SaberCats type build. Why, you might ask? There were a few reasons:

1) On Discord, there is a channel called roster advice, which I peruse sometimes. The advice there is pretty consistent, advocating for contact & defense. Which makes sense...I mean this thread is proof it works best. But the point is - I went into the league knowing that the community of players would most likely be going that direction.

2) Using the logic I mentioned above, I thought it might be possible to gain an advantage over the other teams by zigging while everyone else zagged. They could all fight over the singles & doubles allotted to the league, with diminishing returns, while I gobbled up the homers.

3) I could also save some PP by going for a different type of player, while the other 29 are bidding each other up.

4) My starter pack gold card was 81 Ian Kinsler. A second baseman with mediocre defense, but a little pop, seemed like a much better fit for Sabercat-style team. The homer factors would help him, and the lowered AVG factors would lessen the impact of his bad D.


So far, it seems to be working. I'm going for POW and EYE just like the SaberCats. I'm leading the league in homers by over 60 already around mid-season. My offense is ranked 7th overall. My team is in the middle of the division hunt in what seems like probably the toughest division in the league. And my roster, in terms of PP value, probably ranks close to last.

Several of the teams have either pulled really good cards from packs, or got some gold achievements to finance their teams. And a lot of the managers are really good at generating PP in the AH as well. So there's a pretty noticeable disparity across the league in roster values. I haven't been lucky on pulls or achievements, and my PP-generation skills are definitely lacking compared to the other players. It feels good though, to be in contention purely from my strategic choices (I think).

Unfortunately for me, some of the cards pulled so far include Trout, Judge & perfect Yaz. Additionally, 3 non-planned teams snuck into the league by mistake and they have more power than the BFF teams. So I didn't get quite the monopoly on power that I had hoped for. But still, it's been a blast watching all the dingers!