I can relate to the complaints

dcordash · 03-27-2022, 03:30 PM

I've seen many posts out here complaining of the simulation and statistical accuracy of OOTP. I've been playing for nearly 20 years (not every year for sure do I purchase) and agree it's, for sure, not exactly what it's marketed as.

Many people, myself for sure, purchase the game to recreate last year/this year. Sometimes historical seasons with some of our fave seasons of the past.

Never have I seen a season that culminated in more than a handful or so of real-life outcomes. Top 10 pitchers/batters/closers/whatever nearly matching. For example, peruse the top 20 batters for any given season you replicate. If you see even 10 from the list that match the actual season...that's an outlier.

Undoubtedly I've completed season's with many more anomalies than close proximities. We ALL know MLB player's numbers can be greatly skewed from season to seasons. Injuries, attitude, many things can play a part. Would be the first to agree. BUT, OOTP generally doesn't even get a 50% "close" match. in other words, of the 906 that start the season..you might have 400 that finish with stats that are within a 10% alignment of what they do in real life. That's not "just baseball" that's a statistical engine that fails to get it right. Nearly a randomized process.
No offense.

Again a lot, if not most, people buy this game in order to create a real-life season. Mimic a favorite team or players they grew up with..predict the outcome of the next season starting with the "actual" lineups that OOTP has packaged in their game.

The standings are seldom close..typically just like picking names out of a hat.

For those that play strictly with fictional teams, which I did for a couple seasons myself, you might "feel" like you're seeing results a little more in line with what the ratings indicate, but that's never been my experience. From nearly 20 years of playing I've never realized that moment, following a completed single-season or even 10-year franchise where stats/W-L matched what the player stats suggested they should. Typically, after a couple of these randomly generated outcomes, I just hang it up and move on to MLB the Show. Which, quite honestly, generated numbers much closer to real-life than OOTP (a sim) that you would expect o.

And, I have a pretty good point of reference and example. Played a lot of Strat-o-Matic board game growing up, both football and baseball, the final season numbers/stats/standings were nearly identical to real-life. Some may not like that type outcome..I thought it was great and why I purchased those games. Wish I could find something similar for the PC.

Rain King · 03-27-2022, 03:45 PM

OOTP is a simulation. It isn't designed specifically for Replay.

It creates realistic player ratings, but sims with the purpose of having realistic variation and gives you a ton of control to tweak the engine. It is not trying to hit exact leaderboards, it is trying to simulate baseball itself in a realistic way. Thus, it isn't using any cheats or adjustments to get individual players to specific numbers. Also, the AI isn't necessarily going to use players exactly how they were used in real life.

It also matters what your settings are. There are ways to optimize it for a Single Season, but other ways of making it something slightly different (i.e. you can have Ted Williams play through the war years or Sandy Koufax continue pitching like his arm wasn't shot.

If you aren't getting numbers you expect, I would recommend posting in the Historical Simulations channel along with your settings and there are plenty of forum members around that can provide advice for getting the type of simulation you are looking for.

congokurtz · 03-27-2022, 03:50 PM

Rain King, well said.

Dcordash, just curious, what are your settings?

And lastly, Strat-o-matic has a windows version if OOTP isn't doing it for you

PSUColonel · 03-27-2022, 04:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rain King

OOTP is a simulation. It isn't designed specifically for Replay.

It creates realistic player ratings, but sims with the purpose of having realistic variation and gives you a ton of control to tweak the engine. It is not trying to hit exact leaderboards, it is trying to simulate baseball itself in a realistic way. Thus, it isn't using any cheats or adjustments to get individual players to specific numbers. Also, the AI isn't necessarily going to use players exactly how they were used in real life.

It also matters what your settings are. There are ways to optimize it for a Single Season, but other ways of making it something slightly different (i.e. you can have Ted Williams play through the war years or Sandy Koufax continue pitching like his arm wasn't shot.

If you aren't getting numbers you expect, I would recommend posting in the Historical Simulations channel along with your settings and there are plenty of forum members around that can provide advice for getting the type of simulation you are looking for.

Another instance where I miss our “thanks” button

MathBandit · 03-27-2022, 08:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dcordash

BUT, OOTP generally doesn't even get a 50% "close" match. in other words, of the 906 that start the season..you might have 400 that finish with stats that are within a 10% alignment of what they do in real life. That's not "just baseball" that's a statistical engine that fails to get it right. Nearly a randomized process.
No offense.

You do realize that the 'real life' numbers aren't actually supposed to be the baseline, right? The 'real life' numbers include all the outliers that, well, actually happened in that real-life season.

Let's assume that in any given simulation of a season, 10% of players hit their super-high outcome. That means that in a pool of 100 players, 10 of those players hit that super-highroll in Real Life. In that same pool of 100 players, 10 of them hit that super-highroll in OOTP Sim. Statistically only one player super-highrolled both time, which means the other 18 players (9 in each) will have wildly different results between Real Life and OOTP Sim. Now let's do that again with the 10/100 players who hit a super-lowroll, and again 18 players super-lowrolled in one or the other (but not both). That's already 36/100 players who had wildly different seasons between Real Life and OOTP Sim by only looking at the top-10% and bottom-10% extreme outcomes.

dcordash · 03-27-2022, 08:37 PM

I'm just, typically, taking default settings. I'm not saying it's a horrible game by any means. I've gotten 100's of hours of fun out of it over the years. I've just played enuf to know not to expect real-life.

Don't expect a Rod Carew or Wade Boggs to ever bat .300, much less do it pretty much every year like they did in real life. They might..they might not.
But a lot of people (me at least) would expect hall-of-fame players that did consistently put up numbers season in and season out to at least approach the same levels in an "acclaimed text simulation" game.

It's just not going to ingest real-life player stats/ratings and spit out a similar facsimile through game play. Don't expect it to take a '27 Yanks or '75 Reds team to always (even typically )finish above a 2021 Braves team. Although most baseball historians would project that should happen 9 out of 10 simulations. I've done quick season sims where last place teams finish first and vice versa. I would just think..I know, there I go thinking again...that a simulation that is based on statistics would never miss by that much.

Might have to check on that Strat-o-Matic PC game.

Rain King · 03-27-2022, 08:55 PM

If you are having the '27 Yankees competing against the 2021 Braves it doesn't sound like you have a default setting at all.

If you have Wade Boggs and Rod Carew playing in modern statistical environments they are going to put up numbers more inline with modern baseball.

If you have them playing in their own environments they should put up numbers close to their Season/Career most of the time...so I doubt that is what you have set up.

As I said, I think you would benefit from explaining the setup you are hoping for in the historical forum and listening to some advice.

dcordash · 03-27-2022, 10:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rain King

If you have Wade Boggs and Rod Carew playing in modern statistical environments they are going to put up numbers more inline with modern baseball.

If you have them playing in their own environments they should put up numbers close to their Season/Career most of the time...so I doubt that is what you have set up.

I'm trying to figure out what you mean by modern baseball? When I play historical leagues I'll play with whatever the "engine" suggests. Carew -Baseball Boom, Boggs - Defensive Era for example. Sometimes they'll bat .300 or better..sometimes they don't. In real life...always.

Not intentionally trying to slam the statistical depth and awesomeness of the game, just sharing what my own personal experience is with trying to recreate a season (using the suggested "era" mode from the drop-down) and actually seeing results that reflect what actually happened with individual/team stats or standings. It just doesn't work that way. Seldom is it even close.

Some ppl want that. I personally would prefer it, but take what I can get.

I just saw a post today where a guy was pretty upset with what he thought complete failure by the AI to generate real-life numbers. Had seen several over the last couple years.

Just thought I would share my thoughts to those who might expect replication simulation. They aren't going to find it with OOTP. Can still be a fun game.

Rain King · 03-28-2022, 12:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dcordash

Don't expect it to take a '27 Yanks or '75 Reds team to always (even typically )finish above a 2021 Braves team.

I didn't understand this line. It makes it sound like you are playing some kind of cross-era situation.

Either way, expecting any game (including Strat-o-Matic or other Card/Dice games) to be able to essentially recreate the exact same stats is in itself having a misunderstanding of how statistics work. The cards/games provide a baseline way to generate outcomes but are also driven by some kind of random engine and so will have variation.

But also, if you aren't getting anything close to what you expect, in OOTP it is likely you are probably not setting things up in the best way (there are many, many different options when setting up a historical game).

Sweed · 03-28-2022, 01:23 AM

I had Joe Rudi on the '72 A's in strat. He hit .305 that year. I played out that season three times over the summer and he never hit over .275. Too many times he rolled 4, 5, or 6 and got results off the pitcher's card

A weakness of strat cards.

I haven't played much historical in OOTP(too busy with my normal on-going dynasty) but reading the original post I have to wonder about settings.

He says "default". Not sure what that includes...
Is the development engine on? Recalc? Players created based on what time frame of their career? Real lineups? etc. etc.

Isn't there a setting for "replay"?

Without knowing some detail in how the game is setup there isn't much one can say, is there?

oldfatbaldguy · 03-28-2022, 02:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sweed

Too many times he rolled 4, 5, or 6 and got results off the pitcher's card

A weakness of strat cards.

When Sports Illustrated was publishing games 50 years ago, their baseball game had a twist on the Strat-O hitter-card-or-pitcher-card system. You rolled on the pitcher's chart first. Most of the time, the pitcher's chart just told you to roll again on the batter's chart. But if it was Bob Gibson or some other dominant guy, sometimes you'd roll a strikeout and that was it, you never got to the batter's chart. Relative to the standard of gaming in 1971, it worked pretty well.

Sweed · 03-28-2022, 09:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldfatbaldguy

When Sports Illustrated was publishing games 50 years ago, their baseball game had a twist on the Strat-O hitter-card-or-pitcher-card system. You rolled on the pitcher's chart first. Most of the time, the pitcher's chart just told you to roll again on the batter's chart. But if it was Bob Gibson or some other dominant guy, sometimes you'd roll a strikeout and that was it, you never got to the batter's chart. Relative to the standard of gaming in 1971, it worked pretty well.

Sounds like a good idea.

One other issue with Strat was a guy like Duane Kuiper who hit 1 HR in his career in 3379 ABs could easily hit 5 or more in a season if he hit the pitcher card enough.

I remember playing with the 1980(?) Orioles and Kenny Singleton had hit 29 HR IRL. At the all-star break for me he had 2. This is probably the biggest outlier I ever had. That season I never finished. Nothing to do with Singleton being so far off. It just came as I was trying to squeeze in one more season with that year's cards before the bug to play Strat Football came calling in the fall.

In short, while Strat was a great game, I never got the extreme accurate results I see so many say they got. I've never played on computer but did wonder if they fixed this issue of P or Batter card? I know when I got advertisements from them about going computer it said you still played with the cards. So no?

oldfatbaldguy · 03-28-2022, 03:01 PM

My son played computer Strat when he was younger and the best thing about it was the text commentary. Similar to pre-animation OOTP, but with even more flavor. If you were managing Cleveland in April the "announcer" would give updates on the Cavs game.

jdw31158 · 03-28-2022, 04:47 PM

This is just my opinion, but why buy a game if you're just wanting things to be just like they were in real life? That's why I love OOTP. It's close enough to real life but with enough randomness to make it really interesting. In OOTP Babe Ruth may be a superstar or he may be a journeyman. That's what I like about it. But I get others may like exact replays.

OutS|der · 03-29-2022, 06:42 AM

League totals have a massive affect on how players perform.
Auto cal before the season starts can help but even then I find it massively affects the totals for players.
Plus the game engine changes every year.
I’ve run tests where I create a perfect player and then let them run wild in a season, will use the same year, same league totals, same players, only to see say in OOTP21 the player has pitched in 5 games, never stuck out less then 23 players in a game, In OOTP18 he’s lucky to strike out 18 and has never broken 20 in multiple replays.
I’ve stopped playing the last few years as I’m sick of seeing players shatter the strike out record like clockwork

plinko83 · 03-29-2022, 08:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sweed

Sounds like a good idea.

One other issue with Strat was a guy like Duane Kuiper who hit 1 HR in his career in 3379 ABs could easily hit 5 or more in a season if he hit the pitcher card enough.

I remember playing with the 1980(?) Orioles and Kenny Singleton had hit 29 HR IRL. At the all-star break for me he had 2. This is probably the biggest outlier I ever had. That season I never finished. Nothing to do with Singleton being so far off. It just came as I was trying to squeeze in one more season with that year's cards before the bug to play Strat Football came calling in the fall.

In short, while Strat was a great game, I never got the extreme accurate results I see so many say they got. I've never played on computer but did wonder if they fixed this issue of P or Batter card? I know when I got advertisements from them about going computer it said you still played with the cards. So no?

Not to turn this into a strat discussion, but I found strat to be very accurate. As to your Duane Kuiper situation, if you were playing any level above the basic game, that couldn't happen, because Kuiper would have a W for power, and any HR rolled on the pitcher's card would automatically become a Single**.

As for Singleton, that just seems like a crazy, one in a million outlier. It happens.

Syd Thrift · 03-29-2022, 09:48 AM

Games will have a normal distribution based on the stats. It happens. The SOM computer game directly messes with the cards as written to help recreate seasons like the aforementioned Duane Kuiper’s or, more commonly, slow hitters who don’t get very many triples, so it kind of makes me laugh when people say “you see all the stats up front in SOM”. If you play the cards and dice version, perhaps.

Also, because it was designed as a computer game, OOTP isn’t tied to a one-roll, one-outcome approach and so it’s not. People have done work in looking at how the game operates and it’s basically determining 3TO, then if it’s an automatic hit or out, then the ball location, and then if necessary a roll (or two, or three, who knows) against the fielder to determine if a play is made. Part of why you don’t have percentages is that the game doesn’t really work like that. And, of course, a larger part is that many / most of us prefer being in the dark about this.

USF · 03-29-2022, 08:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dcordash

I've seen many posts out here complaining of the simulation and statistical accuracy of OOTP. I've been playing for nearly 20 years (not every year for sure do I purchase) and agree it's, for sure, not exactly what it's marketed as.

Many people, myself for sure, purchase the game to recreate last year/this year. Sometimes historical seasons with some of our fave seasons of the past.

Never have I seen a season that culminated in more than a handful or so of real-life outcomes. Top 10 pitchers/batters/closers/whatever nearly matching. For example, peruse the top 20 batters for any given season you replicate. If you see even 10 from the list that match the actual season...that's an outlier.

Undoubtedly I've completed season's with many more anomalies than close proximities. We ALL know MLB player's numbers can be greatly skewed from season to seasons. Injuries, attitude, many things can play a part. Would be the first to agree. BUT, OOTP generally doesn't even get a 50% "close" match. in other words, of the 906 that start the season..you might have 400 that finish with stats that are within a 10% alignment of what they do in real life. That's not "just baseball" that's a statistical engine that fails to get it right. Nearly a randomized process.
No offense.

Again a lot, if not most, people buy this game in order to create a real-life season. Mimic a favorite team or players they grew up with..predict the outcome of the next season starting with the "actual" lineups that OOTP has packaged in their game.

The standings are seldom close..typically just like picking names out of a hat.

For those that play strictly with fictional teams, which I did for a couple seasons myself, you might "feel" like you're seeing results a little more in line with what the ratings indicate, but that's never been my experience. From nearly 20 years of playing I've never realized that moment, following a completed single-season or even 10-year franchise where stats/W-L matched what the player stats suggested they should. Typically, after a couple of these randomly generated outcomes, I just hang it up and move on to MLB the Show. Which, quite honestly, generated numbers much closer to real-life than OOTP (a sim) that you would expect o.

And, I have a pretty good point of reference and example. Played a lot of Strat-o-Matic board game growing up, both football and baseball, the final season numbers/stats/standings were nearly identical to real-life. Some may not like that type outcome..I thought it was great and why I purchased those games. Wish I could find something similar for the PC.

I know a lot of OOTP customers that play fictionally and really enjoy that part of the experience which is not offered by SOMBB.
There is a setting under league options named "League Totals". This will closely resemble the stats of all the players in the league as a total. How they individually all play out depends on many factors some of which are options that are not even included in SOMBB like player development, morale, team chemistry, coaching etc.. etc.
You can also edit players ratings if you wish with ease in OOTP.

I play both OOTP and SOMBB and I like each product for their strengths.

andjbock · 03-31-2022, 09:21 AM

As much as you would want to realistically mimic real life, player names are just skins wrapped around numerical ratings/values.

JerryShoe · 04-01-2022, 08:22 PM

I played Strat since the 1968 season with cards, obviously, and played the computer game as soon as in came out, around 1990 or so. I had a project that encompassed 1950 forward that I had to scrap when I purchased a new PC with no floppy drive (remember them?) and was told I had to re-buy the 60 or so seasons to continue it. Nah. During the shutdown I wanted to try it again, but along with their prices going up, they no longer offer breaks on multiple season purchases like the used to. So now I'm doing it with OOTP, which isn't as accurate as SOM but is "in the ballpark". I can remember doing SOM 1961 and Maris had 62 homers. I did 1961 and OOTP and he hit 51 and Mantle hit 53. Know what? That's good enough; it's not 31 and it's not 91. To me OOTP is about 85% of SOM's gameplay (not counting the GM and financial stuff) at about 1/70 (for me) the cost.

03-27-2022, 03:30 PM	#1
dcordash Minors (Double A) Join Date: Jul 2011 Posts: 103	I can relate to the complaints I've seen many posts out here complaining of the simulation and statistical accuracy of OOTP. I've been playing for nearly 20 years (not every year for sure do I purchase) and agree it's, for sure, not exactly what it's marketed as. Many people, myself for sure, purchase the game to recreate last year/this year. Sometimes historical seasons with some of our fave seasons of the past. Never have I seen a season that culminated in more than a handful or so of real-life outcomes. Top 10 pitchers/batters/closers/whatever nearly matching. For example, peruse the top 20 batters for any given season you replicate. If you see even 10 from the list that match the actual season...that's an outlier. Undoubtedly I've completed season's with many more anomalies than close proximities. We ALL know MLB player's numbers can be greatly skewed from season to seasons. Injuries, attitude, many things can play a part. Would be the first to agree. BUT, OOTP generally doesn't even get a 50% "close" match. in other words, of the 906 that start the season..you might have 400 that finish with stats that are within a 10% alignment of what they do in real life. That's not "just baseball" that's a statistical engine that fails to get it right. Nearly a randomized process. No offense. Again a lot, if not most, people buy this game in order to create a real-life season. Mimic a favorite team or players they grew up with..predict the outcome of the next season starting with the "actual" lineups that OOTP has packaged in their game. The standings are seldom close..typically just like picking names out of a hat. For those that play strictly with fictional teams, which I did for a couple seasons myself, you might "feel" like you're seeing results a little more in line with what the ratings indicate, but that's never been my experience. From nearly 20 years of playing I've never realized that moment, following a completed single-season or even 10-year franchise where stats/W-L matched what the player stats suggested they should. Typically, after a couple of these randomly generated outcomes, I just hang it up and move on to MLB the Show. Which, quite honestly, generated numbers much closer to real-life than OOTP (a sim) that you would expect o. And, I have a pretty good point of reference and example. Played a lot of Strat-o-Matic board game growing up, both football and baseball, the final season numbers/stats/standings were nearly identical to real-life. Some may not like that type outcome..I thought it was great and why I purchased those games. Wish I could find something similar for the PC.

03-27-2022, 08:37 PM	#6
dcordash Minors (Double A) Join Date: Jul 2011 Posts: 103	I'm just, typically, taking default settings. I'm not saying it's a horrible game by any means. I've gotten 100's of hours of fun out of it over the years. I've just played enuf to know not to expect real-life. Don't expect a Rod Carew or Wade Boggs to ever bat .300, much less do it pretty much every year like they did in real life. They might..they might not. But a lot of people (me at least) would expect hall-of-fame players that did consistently put up numbers season in and season out to at least approach the same levels in an "acclaimed text simulation" game. It's just not going to ingest real-life player stats/ratings and spit out a similar facsimile through game play. Don't expect it to take a '27 Yanks or '75 Reds team to always (even typically )finish above a 2021 Braves team. Although most baseball historians would project that should happen 9 out of 10 simulations. I've done quick season sims where last place teams finish first and vice versa. I would just think..I know, there I go thinking again...that a simulation that is based on statistics would never miss by that much. Might have to check on that Strat-o-Matic PC game. Last edited by dcordash; 03-27-2022 at 08:43 PM. Reason: adding for clarity

03-29-2022, 06:42 AM	#15
OutS\|der Hall Of Famer Join Date: Apr 2010 Location: In A Van Down By The River Posts: 2,760 Infractions: 0/1 (1)	I can relate to the complaints League totals have a massive affect on how players perform. Auto cal before the season starts can help but even then I find it massively affects the totals for players. Plus the game engine changes every year. I’ve run tests where I create a perfect player and then let them run wild in a season, will use the same year, same league totals, same players, only to see say in OOTP21 the player has pitched in 5 games, never stuck out less then 23 players in a game, In OOTP18 he’s lucky to strike out 18 and has never broken 20 in multiple replays. I’ve stopped playing the last few years as I’m sick of seeing players shatter the strike out record like clockwork

03-27-2022, 03:45 PM	#2
Rain King Hall Of Famer Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 3,323	OOTP is a simulation. It isn't designed specifically for Replay. It creates realistic player ratings, but sims with the purpose of having realistic variation and gives you a ton of control to tweak the engine. It is not trying to hit exact leaderboards, it is trying to simulate baseball itself in a realistic way. Thus, it isn't using any cheats or adjustments to get individual players to specific numbers. Also, the AI isn't necessarily going to use players exactly how they were used in real life. It also matters what your settings are. There are ways to optimize it for a Single Season, but other ways of making it something slightly different (i.e. you can have Ted Williams play through the war years or Sandy Koufax continue pitching like his arm wasn't shot. If you aren't getting numbers you expect, I would recommend posting in the Historical Simulations channel along with your settings and there are plenty of forum members around that can provide advice for getting the type of simulation you are looking for.

03-27-2022, 03:50 PM	#3
congokurtz Minors (Double A) Join Date: Aug 2015 Posts: 167	Rain King, well said. Dcordash, just curious, what are your settings? And lastly, Strat-o-matic has a windows version if OOTP isn't doing it for you

03-27-2022, 08:55 PM	#7
Rain King Hall Of Famer Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 3,323	If you are having the '27 Yankees competing against the 2021 Braves it doesn't sound like you have a default setting at all. If you have Wade Boggs and Rod Carew playing in modern statistical environments they are going to put up numbers more inline with modern baseball. If you have them playing in their own environments they should put up numbers close to their Season/Career most of the time...so I doubt that is what you have set up. As I said, I think you would benefit from explaining the setup you are hoping for in the historical forum and listening to some advice.

03-28-2022, 01:23 AM	#10
Sweed Hall Of Famer Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Iowa Posts: 7,054	I had Joe Rudi on the '72 A's in strat. He hit .305 that year. I played out that season three times over the summer and he never hit over .275. Too many times he rolled 4, 5, or 6 and got results off the pitcher's card A weakness of strat cards. I haven't played much historical in OOTP(too busy with my normal on-going dynasty) but reading the original post I have to wonder about settings. He says "default". Not sure what that includes... Is the development engine on? Recalc? Players created based on what time frame of their career? Real lineups? etc. etc. Isn't there a setting for "replay"? Without knowing some detail in how the game is setup there isn't much one can say, is there?

03-28-2022, 03:01 PM	#13
oldfatbaldguy Major Leagues Join Date: Dec 2020 Posts: 395	My son played computer Strat when he was younger and the best thing about it was the text commentary. Similar to pre-animation OOTP, but with even more flavor. If you were managing Cleveland in April the "announcer" would give updates on the Cavs game.

03-28-2022, 04:47 PM	#14
jdw31158 Minors (Double A) Join Date: Jun 2014 Posts: 166	This is just my opinion, but why buy a game if you're just wanting things to be just like they were in real life? That's why I love OOTP. It's close enough to real life but with enough randomness to make it really interesting. In OOTP Babe Ruth may be a superstar or he may be a journeyman. That's what I like about it. But I get others may like exact replays.

03-31-2022, 09:21 AM	#19
andjbock Hall Of Famer Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Somerville, MA, USA Bats: Right Throws: Left Posts: 3,640	As much as you would want to realistically mimic real life, player names are just skins wrapped around numerical ratings/values.

04-01-2022, 08:22 PM	#20
JerryShoe Minors (Double A) Join Date: Aug 2021 Posts: 122	I played Strat since the 1968 season with cards, obviously, and played the computer game as soon as in came out, around 1990 or so. I had a project that encompassed 1950 forward that I had to scrap when I purchased a new PC with no floppy drive (remember them?) and was told I had to re-buy the 60 or so seasons to continue it. Nah. During the shutdown I wanted to try it again, but along with their prices going up, they no longer offer breaks on multiple season purchases like the used to. So now I'm doing it with OOTP, which isn't as accurate as SOM but is "in the ballpark". I can remember doing SOM 1961 and Maris had 62 homers. I did 1961 and OOTP and he hit 51 and Mantle hit 53. Know what? That's good enough; it's not 31 and it's not 91. To me OOTP is about 85% of SOM's gameplay (not counting the GM and financial stuff) at about 1/70 (for me) the cost.