Minor league management - how do you keep track of it all?

[wellsoliver]

I'm interested in how you manage your minors. Do you let the AI take care of them, or do you carefully manage a player's movement through your organization? If the latter, much time do you spend tweaking things, and what kinds of methods do you use to keep track of it?

[wellsoliver]

I forgot to mention- the specific example is I added a guy to my 40-man b/c I wanted to pull him up due to someone going on the DL. So I do, but he was pretty key to the AAA team, but to properly fill out the AAA roster, I have to move someone from AA, then from A to AA-- you can see where that's going. All in all it seems to be quite an effort just to move a guy.

Any tips?

[ike121212]

I let the AI handle it. With injuries, it's just more work than I want to deal with. I wish I had the option to lock certain prospects into roles....maybe someday.

[wellsoliver]

Does the AI mess with guys who may be in AAA but on the 40-man roster?

[William Foster]

Originally Posted by wellsoliver

Does the AI mess with guys who may be in AAA but on the 40-man roster?

What do you mean?

I just set up my depth chart so it takes a lot of injuries for me to have to get off my lazy ass and fix the lineups. It also keeps the AI FAR FAR AWAY from my team which is only a good thing.

[satchel]

Originally Posted by wellsoliver

Do you let the AI take care of them, or do you carefully manage a player's movement through your organization? If the latter, much time do you spend tweaking things, and what kinds of methods do you use to keep track of it?

I carefully manage my players' progress through the minors, and manually set up all lineups and pitching staffs.

[Biggio509]

It can be a lot of work to manage the minors but I find it rewarding. I like to play GM and less of a manager. So most of my time is tweaking rosters in between sims. That does mean that an injury in the bigs makes impacts all the way to Short A or the rookie leagues. Although this does depend on how you set roster limits. If you have high limits then you have to do less of this but also not that means a lot more players not playing. If you use MILB rules, 24 man active roster for AAA and AA, 25 man for A, 30 for short A, and 35 for rookie then you have to do a lot of shuffling with injuries.

I generally let minors managers set lineups. The game is a lot better now about putting in big prospects that need to develop over better players who are not likely to get past the current level they are in. The problem is when you want to develop someone into another position. There is no way to tell a manager the organization wants that pitcher with good batter ratings to become a 2B or an outfielder to learn to back up first. The computer will put players generally in a position they already have skills in even if you manaully change the position. The computer plays little attention to listed positions and will start a better hitter even if his fielding at a position is 1. Sometimes you will find the computer assigns a player a fielding position he has not played before but it is rare. So that puts a monkey wrench in the works when you want to train players for different positions. You have to play GM and minor league manager then.

The game is less of a headache in shuffling rosters than a real GM. IRL there are reserve rosters for every minors team above short A that works like the 40 man roster and there are minor league waivers, free agents, and maximum service time limitations for players to play in some leagues. So there is less to worry about than a real GM. I am not sure if I want that in the GM. Part of me wants total realism and part of me is not sure I can handle it.

[jasonn29tn14]

I never let the AI manage my minor league teams. At the beginning of each month I'll take a close look at every player and if he's doing well I'll bump him up to the next level. (Usually once my guys are at AAA it takes a trade or injury for me to promote them to the majors) I carefully set my lineups to make sure all my guys who aren't just scrubs are getting playing time. If I have 2 pitch pitchers with good stamina I'll make sure to put them in the rotation in the minors to (hopefully) convince them to learn a third pitch. It takes alot of time to do this - but is worth the effort in the end. I guess the one thing I do let the AI decide on its own is how to deal with injuries. I never put minor leaguers on the DL and don't remove them from lineups or rotations either. As far as I'm concerned it's the AI manager's job to deal with it as best he can until next month when I check it all again.

[Green & Gold Heart]

I used to manually manage minors but lately have been letting the AI run it. I got tired of spending all that time looking at scrubs who never make it higher than Single-A. All I do now is cut players who are too old in rookie ball and scrub minor league lifers blocking prospects in AAA and AA.

[treedom]

Originally Posted by satchel

I carefully manage my players' progress through the minors, and manually set up all lineups and pitching staffs.

Same here. I like to sim slow. I go one day at a time, then check all boxscores for my organization, and make any necessary tweaks to lineups, staff and rosters.

[Carlton_Willey]

Originally Posted by Biggio509

The problem is when you want to develop someone into another position. There is no way to tell a manager the organization wants that pitcher with good batter ratings to become a 2B or an outfielder to learn to back up first. The computer will put players generally in a position they already have skills in even if you manaully change the position. The computer plays little attention to listed positions and will start a better hitter even if his fielding at a position is 1. Sometimes you will find the computer assigns a player a fielding position he has not played before but it is rare. So that puts a monkey wrench in the works when you want to train players for different positions. You have to play GM and minor league manager then.

What you do is go to the player's individual strategy screen and select the position you want him to learn. Then go to the lineup screen and ask the manager to set all depth charts and lineups. He'll be starting at the position you selected in all flavors of the team's lineup.

Further, he'll continue to start at that spot even after he's promoted to a higher league.

I've used the player strategy screen setting to 1) train a guy at a new position or 2) force the AI to start a high potential player over those with higher current ratings. This feature has been in the game for a few versions now.

That's all the micro managing I need to do. A few players set to play at the spots I want them to, and then let the AI chug away.

[wellsoliver]

Carlton- do you let the AI manage minor league pro- and demotions?

[Carlton_Willey]

For the most part, yes. I simply click the AI organize button. It has been doing a decent job for me in OOTPX, although I've only gotten through 3.5 seasons in X. Previous versions did well for me, too.

I do check stats and I 'weed' at the end of the season and again after the draft picks arrive to prevent any kind of blockage by old-never-gonna-make-its and too many C's in my organization.

I tend to over draft C's, SS's and SP's often forgetting OFs of any kind. This after the first 3-4 rounds when the possibility of decent hitters is gone. So I draft the best possible player in the first three-4 rounds, then go for defense at C and SS as well as SPs. I'll pick MRs if my scout really likes them and they are still on the board late. In OOTPX, I've trying to pick high ratings in Intelligence and work ethic, but haven't noticed that really coming through as a strategy yet, but its early.

[bosunmate]

Originally Posted by wellsoliver

I'm interested in how you manage your minors. Do you let the AI take care of them, or do you carefully manage a player's movement through your organization? If the latter, much time do you spend tweaking things, and what kinds of methods do you use to keep track of it?

I play a Historical league with ghost players, so i let the AI make ALL decisions concerning the minors..