POTG Hot Take

[Bobfather]

A losing pitcher should never get POTG!! Mic drop.

[Yankee Hotel Foxtrot]

Originally Posted by Bobfather

A losing pitcher should never get POTG!! Mic drop.

In our equivalent of the Superbowl (AFL Grand Final) there is nothing more empty a feeling than a player from the losing team winning our version of the MVP. It's happened more than once, and on one famous occasion in 1989 (not sure if true or apocryphal) the winner of the Norm Smith Medal (MVP) in our then so-called VFL Grand Final was from the losing team- Gary Ablett and he is said to have famously tossed his medal in the rubbish bin in the dressing rooms.
So you're on solid professional sporting grounds for your mic drop Bobfather! Even the winners don't like it- i kinda like the sentiment and the unintended saltiness to it ('you done won player of the game and your team still lost!!)

[SylvesterIronwood]

haha so true.

[uruguru]

The game struggles with evaluating pitchers.

Should a pitcher with a losing record make the All-Star team? It unfortunately happens a lot in OOTP, even when another pitcher has a better record, more innings, and a lower ERA.

[ColumbusJets]

Originally Posted by Bobfather

A losing pitcher should never get POTG!! Mic drop.

Never? How about Harvey Haddix on May 26, 1959.

[Bobfather]

[QUOTE=ColumbusJets;5230329]Never? How about Harvey Haddix on May 26, 1959.[/QUOTE
In this one case, and only because of the weird way the game ended. The exception that proves the rule.

[Bluenoser]

If you're looking at a pitchers won/loss record to see if they deserve POG or an All Star selection, then you're looking in the wrong place.

[uruguru]

Originally Posted by Bluenoser

If you're looking at a pitchers won/loss record to see if they deserve POG or an All Star selection, then you're looking in the wrong place.

OOTP supports historical play. Nobody was using FIP or WAR to evaluate players back in the day and having a pitcher who is 4-9 with maybe a 4.30 ERA is not a guy you ever expected to see in an All-Star Game.

With regards to pitcher evaluation, I literally had a recent postseason where the AI wanted put Don Drysdale in the Dodgers bullpen for the postseason despite the fact that he won 27 games and led the NL in ERA in the regular season.

But there was a pitcher who started a dozen games with a higher ERA in the 3-man playoff rotation instead. I can only assume he had a superior FIP to Drysdale. But it doesn't make sense that a game that supports pitcher BABIP would use FIP to evaluate pitchers.

It was reminiscent of a time in OOTP 25 when the AL's eventual Cy Young winner was left exposed for the 1969 expansion draft because FIP? I dunno. That was the moment that I had to start inspecting the protected lists before the expansion draft. Now I just replicate the real-world draft instead; it's a lot easier.

So I am always on guard to override the AI's pitcher selection for the All-Star Game and making sure the team's are using their proper starters in playoff games.

The game is really wonky in evaluating pitchers. I definitely never let it pick the Cy Young winners.

[Bobfather]

Originally Posted by Bobfather

A losing pitcher should never get POTG!! Mic drop.

I was only talking about it in OOTP.

[ColumbusJets]

Originally Posted by Bobfather

I was only talking about it in OOTP.

OOTP is unlikely to to duplicate the Haddix event because it probably wouldn't let a pitcher go beyond the 10th inning. However OOTP is capable of having a pitcher throw a no hit and no walk game and lose it on reached on error, sac bunt, SB, and SF. I wouldn't exclude that pitcher from POTG.

[Bobfather]

Sounds like the other picture through a shout out.

[Pelican]

I have also seen this, and it made me wince. Particularly where the POTG had a pitcher Game Score one point higher than the losing pitcher.

Too often a SP is named POTG despite some clutch performances by position players. I don't know why OOTP favors pitchers, starting pitchers.

At least I can edit the game summary to remove the over-emphasis and give credit where credit is due. Not that anyone else is likely to read those summaries.

[Bobfather]

9th inning or later, the player who drives in the winning run is the POTG.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Bobfather

9th inning or later, the player who drives in the winning run is the POTG.

Always? What if that player committed an error earlier in the game that resulted in unearned runs, and those unearned runs are why he was in a position to now "win the game"? It's a nice "he made up for his mistake" story, but I'm not so sure I want to reward him for it.

Pitcher goes 9 innings, one unearned run allowed. Pinch hitter drives in the ghost runner in the top of the 10th to win the game, closer comes in to finish it off. Who is POG, Pitcher or pinch hitter? 90% + of the time you may be right. But there are way to many variables to make that a blanket decision IMHO. To be fair it would probably leave us with fewer questionable POG results. But it would/could also leave us some bad calls too.

Not defending what OOTP does now as there are many "huh?" results. Just not sure 100% "if x happens then Y is POG" results are the answer. I don't think this has been tweaked for quite some time. My thought would be they'd try making it better knowing there is always going to be some questionable outcomes.

[Eugene Church]

Don't know for sure, I don't keep records, but "it seems" to me that the POTG is wrong 30% of the time.

I wish the game would not pick a POTG. Well-written game recaps would be preferable to me. The game recaps really need some work, but they are not important apparently to most of the gamers.
OOTP Developers are not very interested in News Stories and Game Recaps. They have always been done poorly. I was on the Beta Team on the PBP and News when it was just a text game. Markus would just write 5 variations in each New Stories and they would repeat ad nauseum. I understand why Markus did so few --- he had far more important responsibilities in coding the game --- It was up to the Beta Team to add enough stories so they would not be so redundant. At one time there were only 5 stories in the Shutout news category. This meant each story would come up every 5 shutouts and each story would be repeated 25 times a season. There were about 125 shutouts a year. I wrote 120 variations describing a shutout, so they would not repeat so often. I also did this for all of the categories in News Stories and also PBP text.

I only lasted 4 years on the Beta Team --- really got burned out doing it.

I now work around it. I do my own game recaps and don't use the term "POTG" --- you can know from my writeup who were the important players in the game.

I also always pick the All-Star Teams and League Award Winners, too.

Yes, I am a control freak that has a lot of time on my hands.

[Pelican]

If we could just flat-out eliminate the very common "Yogi Berra had a tremendous game for the Yankees yesterday, but the Pittsburgh Pirates prevailed, 10-9, on a late home run by Bill Mazeroski...." Talk about burying the lede.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by Pelican

If we could just flat-out eliminate the very common "Yogi Berra had a tremendous game for the Yankees yesterday, but the Pittsburgh Pirates prevailed, 10-9, on a late home run by Bill Mazeroski...." Talk about burying the lede.

Pelican, you hit the nail on the head.... this type is common in game recaps.