Draft Classes

[BaseballFan2015]

I couldn't help but notice how AWFUL this draft class is. This is with scouting enabled, but regardless, this has to be the worst draft class I have ever seen...

[Walpeezy]

looks like the 2000 draft lol a few stars and a bunch of stiffs.

[Rockfan616]

That's how they look now, but I'm sure eventually you'll see some of those guys become serviceable players. They will start off a lot of times with low overall ratings but once the players mature and develop they will get better. I've already seen it happen in my league/season. Be patient, they may look like stiffs now but they'll get better soon. :-)

[llmolsonll]

draft classes have been horrible since OOTP14. You need to adjust player creation modifier to get something better.

Its particularly a problem when you start a MLB game and after 2 years, OOTP runs out of preset draft classes and they become 100% generated by the game. You witness a huge dropoff in talent which is totaly out of par with current level of talent in the big leagues in minor league systems.

Really horrible...

[SilentFox]

In which case, what do you propose we adjust the player creation modifier to?

[SirMichaelJordan]

Originally Posted by llmolsonll

draft classes have been horrible since OOTP14. You need to adjust player creation modifier to get something better.

Its particularly a problem when you start a MLB game and after 2 years, OOTP runs out of preset draft classes and they become 100% generated by the game. You witness a huge dropoff in talent which is totaly out of par with current level of talent in the big leagues in minor league systems.

Really horrible...

That is not true at all. In fact the guys who created the draft classes & minor leagues would probably say otherwise.

[nebradska]

Originally Posted by llmolsonll

draft classes have been horrible since OOTP14. You need to adjust player creation modifier to get something better.

Its particularly a problem when you start a MLB game and after 2 years, OOTP runs out of preset draft classes and they become 100% generated by the game. You witness a huge dropoff in talent which is totaly out of par with current level of talent in the big leagues in minor league systems.

Really horrible...

This keeps getting parroted over and over on the forums, yet it still remains wrong.

The draft classes used to look better because the players were only being compared to other players in the draft class, not the players in the league they were about to be drafted into. Now they're compared to the professionals they're going to be competing against. It's all relative.

[byzeil]

What are their individual ratings? Trying to judge the quality of the players strictly by the 'stars' is not really the best way to do things.

The draft quality in v14 and v15 is fine, they just don't look as exciting as they did before v13. They are rated more realistically.

[Rockfan616]

Originally Posted by byzeil

What are their individual ratings? Trying to judge the quality of the players strictly by the 'stars' is not really the best way to do things.

The draft quality in v14 and v15 is fine, they just don't look as exciting as they did before v13. They are rated more realistically.

That's what I'm thinking too, very few players are able to go right from being drafted to the big leagues anyway without any time in the minors to develop. I can only name a few players who actually were ready for the big leagues when they were drafted (Dave Winfield I know was one and so was John Olerud IIRC) but yeah comparing most guys who come out of college and especially out of high school to the big leaguers is why they have low ratings.

[llmolsonll]

Originally Posted by nebradska

This keeps getting parroted over and over on the forums, yet it still remains wrong.

The draft classes used to look better because the players were only being compared to other players in the draft class, not the players in the league they were about to be drafted into. Now they're compared to the professionals they're going to be competing against. It's all relative.

Nope, it is right. Again, if you start a new MLB league, you obviously start with a certain level of talent in the ML and the minor leagues. The first two preset drafts filled with actual upcoming draftees also reflect the same level of talent. Then you hit year 3 and get a 100% OOTP generated class. This is when the dropoff shows and it is obvious. Anyone who started a MLB noticed that.

A team rebuilding from draft on year 3 will be screwed for quite some time before the talent pool in the league dilutes to the level of players generated in the draft.

So you have two options : the draft classes generated are flawed or the ratings of the starting rosters are flawed.

[llmolsonll]

Originally Posted by Rockfan616

That's what I'm thinking too, very few players are able to go right from being drafted to the big leagues anyway without any time in the minors to develop. I can only name a few players who actually were ready for the big leagues when they were drafted (Dave Winfield I know was one and so was John Olerud IIRC) but yeah comparing most guys who come out of college and especially out of high school to the big leaguers is why they have low ratings.

Its not about ratings, but potential. The new players generated in year 3 have nothing to do with the players involved in the drafts of year 1 and 2, nor the level of talent of the starting rosters or minor leagues.

[SirMichaelJordan]

Originally Posted by llmolsonll

Its not about ratings, but potential. The new players generated in year 3 have nothing to do with the players involved in the drafts of year 1 and 2, nor the level of talent of the starting rosters or minor leagues.

Potential isnt static. Just because you dont see 80 rated potentials during draft time doesnt mean that you wont have 80 OVR players from that class 10 years later.

[llmolsonll]

Originally Posted by SirMichaelJordan

Potential isnt static. Just because you dont see 80 rated potentials during draft time doesnt mean that you wont have 80 OVR players from that class 10 years later.

you are missing my point on purpose...

If the OOTP developpers did a great job coding the game to generate appropriate draftees, why are the OOTP generated draft classes so different from the first two year where players were manually created by the same OOTP developpers?

[Lukas Berger]

Originally Posted by llmolsonll

you are missing my point on purpose...

If the OOTP developpers did a great job coding the game to generate appropriate draftees, why are the OOTP generated draft classes so different from the first two year where players were manually created by the same OOTP developpers?

There is a difference because we intentionally rate many of the current players in the MLB quickstart, including draft prospects, on a somewhat different matrix than the fictional guys are rated on. This happens for a few reasons (some of which I've forgotten, was searching for an old injury log post that explained this further but couldn't find it), but especially to keep them around a bit longer than they'd stay around otherwise before the world is entirely taken over by fictional players.

Beyond that, we may have somewhat generally overrated the real players in the first few draft classes. As I've stated repeatedly, the real draft classes are very much a wip at this point and most of the ratings still need to be adjusted.

What you're seeing here doesn't really mean much except that some of the real players are rated a bit higher than some of the fictional guys are rated.

The game quickly sorts this out, so it's not really an issue except insofar as the first few draft classes in the MLB quickstart are relatively strong and the next few are relatively weaker.

Since that sort of thing happens all the time irl (strong and weak classes alternating) it's not really terribly unrealistic, nor does it create any long term problems in the distribution of talent in game.

Both the devs and the beta team have extensively tested player generation both in the MLB quickstart and other game formats in long term sims and have found that there aren't actually any issues with how the talent is distributed, things work out just fine as is and in fact it works out much better than in OOTP13 when the talent in the draft classes started out high and was quickly decreased.

If you have any long-term sims or other hard data that would make a case that there is an issue, I'd love to see it, but I really don't expect that to be forthcoming as this has already been well tested and found to be well balanced as is.

If any adjustment is needed, it would likely be that we'd need to lower the ratings of the real draft classes rather than to raise the ratings of the game generated classes.

[hfield007]

I don't understand why people yearn for the days of ridiculous potential on the first few rounds of the draft...


Why do you want the game to be less real?

[JMDurron]

Originally Posted by hfield007

I don't understand why people yearn for the days of ridiculous potential on the first few rounds of the draft...


Why do you want the game to be less real?

People want their initial look at the draft class to be exciting. It used to be, now it isn't, and the payoff comes much later. That is a very significant psychological adjustment that is completely independent of the actual end result talent level of their league. "They'll look fine later" might be an accurate, but unsatisfying response to the "They look worse than they used to!" complaint.

[Lukas Berger]

Originally Posted by JMDurron

People want their initial look at the draft class to be exciting. It used to be, now it isn't, and the payoff comes much later. That is a very significant psychological adjustment that is completely independent of the actual end result talent level of their league. "They'll look fine later" might be an accurate, but unsatisfying response to the "They look worse than they used to!" complaint.

Yeah, that's fair enough. One possible solution as has been suggested elsewhere, is to use the relative ratings feature and set it to AAA or AA level. That way you'll see some of the same high ratings and greater spread of ratings that OOTP13 had.

[BIG17EASY]

Originally Posted by lukasberger

Yeah, that's fair enough. One possible solution as has been suggested elsewhere, is to use the relative ratings feature and set it to AAA or AA level. That way you'll see some of the same high ratings and greater spread of ratings that OOTP13 had.

This is extremely important. And you can go even further and set the ratings relative to A or Rookie level for the last five or so rounds to try to find that one guy with good potential for Class A with good work ethic who could blossom. I never had a problem with the change to the draft classes that was introduced in 14, although I agreed that the draft itself lost a lot of the "fun factor." But now with the ability to use the relative ratings feature, I find it to be more fun than it was before 14, when we had 3-5 rounds of 4-star or higher potential guys, most of whom would never come close to fulfilling that potential.

[rstoomeyii]

I kind of enjoy the draft class not being "exciting". I don't want it to be round 5 and I'm still snagging guys who right off the bat have potential ratings of 60/80 and up. The way I see it you pick up the studs in the first 1-3 rounds depending on the strength of the draft and then after that you start looking at players a little closer. "This guy doesn't have much HR potential but his contact and eye/discp potentials are great." Or "this pitcher throws gas but he is never going to be able to control it." "This guy has good potential but he his leadedship and work ethic are low, I think i'll pass." These are all great things to think about that make OOTP awesome

[SirMichaelJordan]

Originally Posted by rstoomeyii

I kind of enjoy the draft class not being "exciting". I don't want it to be round 5 and I'm still snagging guys who right off the bat have potential ratings of 60/80 and up. The way I see it you pick up the studs in the first 1-3 rounds depending on the strength of the draft and then after that you start looking at players a little closer. "This guy doesn't have much HR potential but his contact and eye/discp potentials are great." Or "this pitcher throws gas but he is never going to be able to control it." "This guy has good potential but he his leadedship and work ethic are low, I think i'll pass." These are all great things to think about that make OOTP awesome

...And then those same guys fall to 20 potential mysteriously during the season.

That problem was a major gripe for people playing OOTP13. Unfortunately TCR was wrongly blamed.

Also I agree with this post 100% It's exactly how I draft!