Expected Role Issues in Historical Games

[Charlie Hough]

This may be an issue where this feature is working by design but not optimally or realistically. When simulating a historical game, players will often have unrealistic or unreasonable expectations for their role, and they don't seem to take into account how they were used in the most recent season or what the roster situation is with the ballclub.

For example, pitchers will expect to be in the rotation even if OOTP has set their position as RP in the free agent pool. Pitchers will also expect to be starters when there were six or seven pitchers who shared starting duties for a team that used a four-man rotation in that historical season. All six can't be in the starting rotation at the same time.

As another example, in a game starting in 1916, Bill Fincher expects to be in the starting rotation, even though his previous season was in AA minors, and his 1916 stats were entirely in relief except for one game.

Similarly, George McQuillan expects to be a starter even though he only started in 3 of his 21 appearances in the 1916 season in real life.

Granted, I have pitcher stamina based on a pitcher's entire career in my game, so that could be a factor. Some pitchers may be expecting a starting role because their stamina is high because they spent most of their careers as starters. But if they weren't starters in the season that was the basis for all their other ratings, I would prefer to avoid them expecting to be starters. When this happens, it causes problems across the league, where a number of pitchers have these expectations, but they're in the bullpen where they should be, and they've now very unhappy with their teams.

This is probably not an easy thing to fix or get OOTP to handle better, particularly if part of it hinges on pitcher stamina settings. Maybe I will have to stop using morale as the only solution. But ideally I would like to see players have more realistic expectations relative to their MLB experience, how they were used in their most recent season, the team's roster situation, and maybe their real-life usage (at least when the game is initially created and also if you're using recalc).

[Charlie Hough]

Here is another great example: William Rummler, a LF, expects to be in the starting lineup even though he played just 27 games in MLB in 1916 and was in the AA minors otherwise. His ratings are quite good, but they're not better than Burt Shotton, the other LF at his position on the St. Louis Browns. Their ratings are virtually equal, but one expects to be in the starting lineup and the other in the middle of the lineup.

I've had to turn off morale because there are just far too many instances like this, where players are expecting to be starters, and they all end up with very low morale. I had never tried playing with morale until now, but it's just not usable under these circumstances.

[LansdowneSt]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Here is another great example: William Rummler, a LF, expects to be in the starting lineup even though he played just 27 games in MLB in 1916 and was in the AA minors otherwise

After nearly a century, many baseball historians still wonder how Shoeless Joe Jackson’s career might have turned out were he not permanently banned from baseball after the fixing of the 1919 World Series. The same question remains for another slugging outfielder who was also thrown out of Organized Baseball after he was accused of taking a bribe to influence the outcome of games. No, not one of Jackson’s Black Sox teammates, but a lesser known minor leaguer named Bill Rumler.

Already a veteran of three major-league seasons, Rumler led the Pacific Coast League in batting in 1919 with a .362 average. Only 28 years old, he seemed certain to get a chance to return to the major leagues. But he and two Salt Lake City Bees teammates reportedly accepted money to throw a late-season series against Vernon (California), allowing Vernon to win the league pennant. Rumler was suspended from Organized Baseball and spent the next eight years playing in the outlaw leagues.

When his ban was finally lifted, Rumler’s first season back was eerily reminiscent of Roy Hobbs in Bernard Malamud’s novel The Natural, published more than two decades later. Now 38 years old, Rumler returned to the Pacific Coast League with Hollywood in 1929 and hit .386 with 26 home runs, leading the team to the pennant. With that kind of production, eight years removed from his last game before being suspended, one can only imagine what kind of career Rumler may have had if he had been eligible to play during the prime of his career. - SABR
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From the Natural:

Pop Fisher : Hobbs. I'm sending you down Hobbs, Class B ball. Tomorrow you go to the Great Lakes Assocaition.

Roy Hobbs : All right. You make the rules.

Pop Fisher : That's right, that's right and you ain't been playing by 'em. Don't you remember signing a contract!

Roy Hobbs : I remember signing a contract, to play ball not to be put to sleep by some two bit carney hypnotist! I won't do that Pop! I can't.

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Maybe Bill feels the same as Roy. He signed a contract to play ball. He won't sit. He can't

[LansdowneSt]

George McQuillan was the Doc Gooden of the Deadball Era. In 1908 he enjoyed one of the best rookie seasons in history, going 23-17 for the mediocre Phillies with a sparkling 1.53 ERA in nearly 360 innings of work (in 1985 the young Gooden posted an identical ERA). An unusually fast worker even in an era of briskly paced games, McQuillan pitched with “supreme self-confidence” according to Baseball Magazine, becoming known as the brightest young pitcher in the game. Within three years, however, his career came crashing down in a sordid web of alcoholism, sexual escapades, and financial troubles. - SABR

Interesting bio this one. Seems the type to make it "all about himself". Certainly, as you read it, you'll see he isn't lacking confidence in himself, even when he should.

[LansdowneSt]

Not much on Bill Fincher aside from the fact the then-salesman for Standard Oil tragically committed suicide with a pistol to the head in Shreveport, Louisiana in 1946.

But my point, is that players believe they should play. Some more than others. Some deserve to and some don't - but none of them look at their stats and make cold, objective decisions. So, some of that stuff is realistic and managers and GMs do get frustrated by it the same way you did. Everyone's got a story. Even the OOTP stats and skills wrapped in the name of a player...