AI sending a position player to pitch - does it ever happen?

[Righty Groove]

Hello all,

I usually don't play out my games, simming one to three days at a time and looking at box scores. After a game went 20 odd innings, I wondered: as far as I can remenber, I have NEVER seen a position player beeing sent to pitch by the AI.

Has it ever happened to you?

I mean, my next day starter just threw 3 innings (and mercifully lost), and my entire bullpen threw their arms out. One guy even got 60 pitches, and he had pitched the day before! He was sure exausthed.

It has to come eventually, right? I mean, at some point, the AI just goes "damn it, just send the backup catcher to pitch and be done with it!". I know the treshold for the behaviour has to be high, otherwise the outcry for it happening to often (and at ill timed opportunities like a key game) would be horrendous. But is it at least a possibility?

[The Game]

I have never seen it. Would lkik to as i know there are many players that have pitching exp

[Orcin]

I have never seen it in thousands of games.

[hefalumps]

I have seen it. I think the first time I saw it was OOTP13. It's an extremely rare circumstance, and I think the AI has to use up pretty much every SP who didn't pitch the last two days before it happens, but it has happened.

Wish I could post a box score or game log from when it happened, but it's been awhile and I wouldn't be able to figure out the last game it happened in.

[RchW]

Originally Posted by hefalumps

I have seen it. I think the first time I saw it was OOTP13. It's an extremely rare circumstance, and I think the AI has to use up pretty much every SP who didn't pitch the last two days before it happens, but it has happened.

Wish I could post a box score or game log from when it happened, but it's been awhile and I wouldn't be able to figure out the last game it happened in.

I thought I seen it too, in v13, but I have no box score. The player used was in fact an infielder who played 4 seasons as a batter and 6 as a relief pitcher.

[JMDurron]

I have seen it multiple times, in both OOTP13 and OOTP14. As far as I can tell, the following conditions are required.

1) All rested relievers must have been used
2) All tired relievers must have been used
3) Any rested starters must have been used

Then, it appears to pick a position player at random from the bench to pitch. I haven't noticed any position players with pitching ability in these situations, but both those players and the situation that would call for them are rare enough that I doubt that is meaningful data.

I think I see it because I play historical (lower control and stamina ratings for historical scrub players, in my experience), and tend to take lots of pitches, which leads to position players being needed by the end of a 4 game series (or doubleheader) if my offense got the job done. I have also seen it in my MLB Quickstart, but it's extremely rare in that environment due to the number of relievers on most rosters.

[Righty Groove]

Thank you very much for everyone's response. It does indeed seem like a very rare occurance (maybe too rare?).

I may be mistaken, but does the game not have an option in pitcher setup to allow SP in relief? Shouldn't that prevent pitchers in the rotation to join a game in relief, even in extra-innings? I have mine set to 'No', but SPs still come in relief in late extra-innings games.

[mm7607]

This is a problem I wish would be fixed. Especially for 2 way players. I have a guy in my league who can hit .300 with 30+ homers but also can win 20 games. He is listed as a SP so the AI never uses him right. I have to do it manually or his hitting skills is completely ignored.

[The Wolf]

Seen it once.

[BIG17EASY]

I saw this happen this morning in my fictional world. I sim a game at a time, using 7-day lineups to set my lineups and I "bench" any relievers who are under 70% health/fatigue so they aren't used. I had two relievers "benched" for that reason, and the rest were available.

I got smoked, 18-1, and the AI put an infielder in to pitch in the ninth inning (he actually came in to get the final out and threw just one pitch). The interesting thing was that the AI did not use any of my rested starters first. Once it was out of relievers, it left that last reliever in for 61 pitches (I think), before turning to the infielder. I was actually very pleased with how this process went, other than maybe I would've liked that last reliever who threw 61 pitches to be pulled a little sooner. It was 13-1 heading into the ninth and he gave up five runs in the ninth before getting the hook, so the game was out of hand before the inning even started.

I'll try to remember to post a box score when I get home tonight.

[hefalumps]

Yeah I've been having it happen a lot in my 1955 historical league. I use "as played" schedules, and as a result some teams get a ridiculous number of doubleheaders on top of each other. And with the historical settings set to use only a handful of relievers, pitching staffs can get exhausted quickly.

For example, Detroit and I played five games in three days. In the fourth game, they were getting blown out 14-5 after six innings. And their pitchers were all wiped. So starting the bottom of the 7th, the AI brought in backup 3B Bob Dillinger to finish the game. He went the final two innings and gave up six runs (five earned) on six walks and four hits, throwing 69 pitches. We won 24-9.

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by hefalumps

Yeah I've been having it happen a lot in my 1955 historical league. I use "as played" schedules, and as a result some teams get a ridiculous number of doubleheaders on top of each other. And with the historical settings set to use only a handful of relievers, pitching staffs can get exhausted quickly.

For example, Detroit and I played five games in three days. In the fourth game, they were getting blown out 14-5 after six innings. And their pitchers were all wiped. So starting the bottom of the 7th, the AI brought in backup 3B Bob Dillinger to finish the game. He went the final two innings and gave up six runs (five earned) on six walks and four hits, throwing 69 pitches. We won 24-9.

Is the AI using any rested starting pitchers before going to the position guys?

[hefalumps]

Originally Posted by BIG17EASY

Is the AI using any rested starting pitchers before going to the position guys?

Unfortunately the game in question was over a month ago in game-time, so I don't remember how tired everyone was. But they had a MR with 3/20 stamina *start* the game - so I'm assuming all of their SPs were spent. And all of the MRs they used seemed spent too - here's their lines:

Player                IP    H   R   ER    BB   K   PI
Clevenger            5.0   10   6    6     4   0   92
Coleman              0.0    2   5    4     1   0   15
Kelly                0.0    1   2    2     1   0    7
Tremel               1.0    1   6    3     7   0   68
Dillinger            2.0    4   5    4     6   0   69

The fact that Tremel needed 68 pitches to finish the sixth and start the seventh before the position player Dillinger relieved him makes me think they were about out of pitchers. Seven walks... that seems like some serious fatigue.

EDIT: Multiple edits go get the alignment of the pitching stats right.

[msc123123]

It happened to me in a major league replay. A pitcher went out for the season in 1871 and they had the first baseman pitch the rest of the season. Needles to say they went 2-25.

[BIG17EASY]

Here's my pitching box from that game. I use a 6-man rotation, but one of my rested starters was in the lineup, so I had at least one, maybe two fully rested starters available. The AI didn't touch them before going to Johnson to get the last out.

[FunkyBike1]

Just happened to me as well. The Braves (AI) manager put in Brett Gardner in the fifth inning when their entire bullpen was exhausted (most of them getting 1 or 2 outs - good job AI!). It was 8-0 at the time; he gave up 10, all earned, and it ended 18-0.

Edit: Happened again, same teams. 13-0 with 0 outs in the 9th. Neil Walker allowed 2 inherited runners to score but didn't give up any of his own. Final score 15-0 with a 2 hit shutout by Matt Moore, who also had a stolen base.

[snepp]

This one goes back a few versions...

http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...-l-record.html

[CBL-Commish]

I have a universe with a lot of low-level independent leagues with very small rosters (I think 15 is the minimum). When you have fewer than ~20-man rosters you'll see position players pitch frequently.

My subjective opinion (I need to mine some data) is that the position players are much worse than they should be based on real life data. Looking at this page and doing some calculations it looks like position players pitching in the majors have about a 7.25 ERA since WWII. That's taking out guys like Ankiel, or basically everyone who'd thrown more than 10 innings in their careers.

My experience is that every single position player who is pitching in OOTP is flat-out terrible. Look at some of the anecdotal evidence from this thread - most of the players give up 4, 5, 6 runs an inning, walk every third batter, etc. From the bb-ref data, almost half of all pitching position players since WWII gave up ZERO earned runs. That rarely happens in my OOTP experience. I've never seen (or at least noticed) a Chris-Davis-pitches-two-shutout-innings-for-the-win performance in OOTP.

I know this is pretty far down in the noise, and Markus needs to avoid making this a cheat/exploit (i.e. a 7.25 ERA guy in the majors might just be a really good pitcher a couple levels down, so you could just stock your indy league pitching staff with washed up utility infielders). But I think it could use a good look to see if there's a problem that might be fixable.

[Mikex5]

I have 13 and it happened to my team. They were thrashed something like 23-2. The previous game, I blew through my bullpen and lost by a huge score. So 2 position players actually pitched. It was a raod game, so I didn't play it out.

[Carlton]

Since I play historical, I see it often

Players like Cy Seymour who have 100 experience at P in the fielding category and some pitch ratings will be used if need be