Player Development: Is it hard for a player to reach his full potential?

[Jayzone]

I have done a little study on player ability progression since. If you are interested, it's in this very same thread on page 2 and 3 (assuming default post number viewing per page).

Hi, first time poster here.

I was playing Season Ticket Baseball 2003 and recently made a switch to OOTP6. Great game, by the way.

The Question is about player development in the new OOTP (OOTP6 in particular) games. So far I have played 6, 7 seasons and I observed that it seems to take a long time for a player to reach its full potential (or never). In the solo fictional league that I am playing right now (2 league, 12 team, Scout/Coach ON), I have seen quite a few of high-potential pitchers (all three potential rating in 70s, 80s) that has their ability rating stuck at 20/30/40 after promoted to AAA (after they had good seasons in AA). This applies to both high-school and college pitchers. For the pitchers that have successfully made it to the bigs, they always seem to be lacking in one rating (usually suff or control that stays below 40/50 when its potential is above 60). This non-developing situation continues even when they enters their "supposely-prime-years" age - 26,26,28,29. So, a lot of high profile players (4/5 star prospects) end up as 1 star "project player". (Hoping some day they will become great) As for position players, same thing happens but less frequently. I have seen players who are in their late 20s/early 30s that have 70 potential rating and 50 ability rating .

Comparing to STB2003, all players seems to have developed to their full potential (more or less) when they enters their prime years. I am wondering if this is something new since OOTP5 or is it new to OOTP6 or I am not developing the players the right way? (well, same thing happens to computer's prospects too) Or a few solo seasons are just a small sample size and all prospects are unlucky during this time?

By the way, I always try to have my coaches to have at least "Good" in ratings and seldom try rush players. Also, the player development setting is to default (0%).

Anyone has any insight care to share? Thanks.

[Da Cubs]

I have noticed that some of those "great" prospects never turn out. On the other hand, some of those 1 or 2 star players turn out to be pretty good ballplayers. I think the development depends on the hidden factors and to me, that's what makes this game one of the best.

[Henry]

The variances in the new game are much greater and highly dependent on the quality of you scouts and coaches.

Henry

[Jayzone]

Yes, this "uncertainty" in player potential does make OOTP6 a great fun. However, if most of college pitchers with high rating turns out to be a bust (not even becoming a mediocre pitcher), this would make finding good future franchise players/rotation anchor a bit frustrating at least, isn't it?

Well, I guess present GMs in the bigs have trouble finding future rotation anchor/franchise players anyway.

[Jayzone]

Henry,

As I stated, I tried to hire good coaches. All my current ones (soucts, coaches, and minor managers) have LEGENDARY rating, and I still see this to happen.

[Da Cubs]

I would hope that college pitchers would be a little more reliable than high school pitchers. I haven't played enough to give you a honest answer if this is true or not, as this is the first year with college and high schoolers. I myself have been swayed to try and play with ratings off, stars on, no coaches....and hope for the best. This "new" way of playing for me brings up a new set of challenges that I look forward to.

[Jayzone]

It is just a bit frustrating that a lot of players aren't become "little Roy Halladay" (go through struggle early in their careers but eventually turns out ok (doesn't need to "great" like Halladay))

my 2 cents.

[Jayzone]

By the way, this player development trend is just an observation, not a thorough study.

[Da Cubs]

Jayzone,

Haven't you seen players that you thought were useless suddenly become pretty good players?

[Jayzone]

Da Cubs,

Yes, I have seen those as well. When I found them, it's a pleasant surprise. However, what I mostly seen is just 'career year' - rating not change but great year.

I play with rating, coaches ON because I want to slowly break into OOTP6. And also because I want to see how the game works. It seems that I have to un-learn a lot from STB2003. Well, I am not compaining.

Good stuff, that OOTP6 is.

[Henry]

Originally posted by Jayzone
Good stuff, that OOTP6 is.

Thank you, Master Yoda

Give it some time. College players will have a better chance than HS players, but the quality/experience of your scouts makes a big difference in whether they are accurate or not - plus as I said much more variation of busts versus surprises.

Henry

[Jayzone]

Henry,

Besides the point that I use LEGENDARY scouts/coachs/minor managers, I turned ON player editor trying to see the "real" player ratings and their development. I am still, well, studying how the game works so that I can become Master Yoda or Darth Vader in OOTP6. Ha ha.

Just kidding. I think I still have a long way to go to the day when I can turn off everything.

[Jayzone]

Back to the topic on whether it's hard to reach full potential or not.

I have a story on a player that I'd like to share. RHP Carlos Enriquez is currently in the solo fictional league that I am playing. The league as mentioned above is a 2-league, 12-team setup with coaches and scouts ON. I created the league for 1981 and sims for 24 years (until 2004) to creat 'history'. This also helps to have the league filled with league generated talent as opposed to the intial draft class.

Player history: Carlos Enriquez is drafted in third round in 1998 and stayed with the team until 2004 when I pick a team (another one) and started to 'play' as one of the GM. After I took over my team, I traded for Carlos seeing him having great talent, so he is with my team since 2004 until now - the start of 2006.

notes:
the rating is presented as ability/potential score. For all data besides 2006 are all taken from almanacs, so the rating are shown as seeing through scouts's eyes. This is the best I can do since I don't have the backup league for those years anymore. To offset this, I put the scout's rating at the end so that you can have a better idea of how accurate the rating is. As for the rating in 2006, it is the *TRUE* rating (player editor ON) to show how far (or not) that Carlos have come. The number in brackets in Player develpment is the date that Carlos receive the changes in ratings.

Carlos Enriquez RHP
Birthday: 4/13/1979

Year Stuff Movement Control Velocity Record                           stars       Coach     Scout
1998 17/66   29/60     9/73    89-92 A   10-10 3.64 165.2IP 142K 63BB   3.5 Outstanding LEGENDARY 
1999 18/66   40/60    12/54    89-92 A    9-9  2.89 171.0IP 112K 56BB   3.0   LEGENDARY LEGENDARY
2000 20/66   45/78    14/54    89/92 A   11-7  3.44 162.1IP 109K 45BB   3.5   LEGENDARY LEGENDARY
2001 20/85   56/97    15/54    89-92 A    8-9  3.75 173.0IP 112K 75BB   5.0   Excellent LEGENDARY
2002 20/85   60/100   15/70    89-92 A   10-11 3.48 170.2IP 115K 59BB   5.0   Excellent LEGENDARY
2003 19/85   67/100   22/70    89-92 A    4-7  4.41 112.1IP  57K 44BB   5.0 Outstanding LEGENDARY
2003                                 AA   4-3  3.83  54.0IP  33K 24BB
2004 20/85   78/100   24/70    89-92 AA  10-10 4.17 164.0IP 115K 67BB   5.0   LEGENDARY LEGENDARY
2005 26/85  100/100   24/70    89-92 AAA 10-7  4.36 154.2IP  92K 73BB   2.0   LEGENDARY LEGENDARY
2006 26/85  101/104   24/70

Year Spring Training                  Player Development
1998                                  (10/2) improved his pure stuff!
                                      (10/2) command improved!

1999 good pitching sessions!          (8/28) control seems to have taken a bump...
     lost some throwing velocity
     has improved his control!

2000 increased his throwing velocity!

2002                                  (9/18) movement has improved!
                                      (9/18) command improved!
                                      (9/18) command improved!

2003 good pitching sessions!
     has improved his control!

Injury History
Injured on 5/2/2003 with a Stiff Shoulder, out for 5 days...
Injured on 8/22/2004 with a Pulled Elbow Ligament, out for one week...

As it can be clearly seen, Carlos starts out as a good but not great HS pitching prospect out of the draft class 1998. During his career, he received several "potential up!" and relatively small amount of potential drops. Also, he has never suffer severe injuries (2 minor ones). From the coaching that he received (mostly LEGENDARY), I would've expect Carlos will be a average pitchers (ability in 40/50's) by now. As noted by most recent AAA stats, Carlos still has big control problem and rarely strikes peoples out. This is shown as his K/BB ratio is a pedestrian 1.26. One thing to note is that computer never mishandle Carlos (aka rush Carlos).

The potential rating for Carlos is still very high. My plan for him is that I will treat him as a project player where if he can get his rating up then that will be good (maybe Carlos is a late boomer). If not, then he will just go down in history as a big bust: draft not as huge prospect -> grows to show great potential -> but never materialize it.

If Carlos can't turns it around even with the best scouting/coaching that I can provide, I am leaning to maybe the minor manager does NOT have a huge effect on helping a player grow.

I thought that computer and I have done the best job that we can to help Carlos. Isn't that so?


Henry said:
"The variances in the new game are much greater and highly dependent on the quality of you scouts and coaches."


But those "variance dependence" has been minimized or maximized to its most postive effect in this case, is it not?


Anyone has any thoughts on Carlos and "It's hard for a player to reach his full potential."?

By the way, should I still have hopes that Carlos will turn out all right one day?

[Jayzone]

One to bear in mind that the league is simed/played with OOTP6.01. So the scouting for Carlos has this new effect:


- Adjusted scouting, players with less than 3 years of pro experience now are harder to scout, and the scout
is less likely to make a mistake. Note : This will apply to current leagues, so you may see different
ratings on younger players now with the patch. This does not apply to leagues where scouting is disabled.

[Muppetus Galacticus]

Jayzone - whatever happens to Carlos, make sure you keep us posted on how he's getting on I have faith in him

Muppetus Galacticus

[Jayzone]

Thanks. I still have faith in Carlos too

I am a slow simmer, so Carlos's story will probably not end in a few weeks. I always thought that players who (1) are not rushed (2) have no severe injury history and (3) receive good nuturing will reach at least *half* of their potential when entering prime years. Apparently, Carlos might be the *unlucky one*. (Or maybe he has hidden attitude problem?)

However, in the current league that I am playing, I am observing a few similar cases like Carlos (high potential with stalled developement).

[smeyers003]

I had a pticher that was very similar to Carlos. When he was drafted he was a 5 star prospect with high potential. He had slight drop offs in potential and developed slowly.

He finally made it to AAA and turned to a 2.0 gold star player, so I figured he was just a bust but I would keep him just in case.

At 28 in AAA he suddenly reached almost full potential and by September he had gone from a 2.0 gold star player to a 4.5 all-star. He started in the majors the next year and finally realized his true potential at 29, and is now a dominating pitcher. So keep your hopes up for Carlos.

[Jayzone]

Nice!!

Noted that Carlos is not a big prospect to begin with (a legit prospect but not HUGE). He has potential bump up during minor league career but the rating is not keeping up. Some would almost say that Carlos's stuff and control stalled right from the beginning. I should see what Carlos can do

By the way, how *big* the jump is your pitcher? Is it like 40,50 increase in ability?

[Jayzone]

Oh, Carlos is turning 27 on 4/13 this year (2006). So.... I don't have to worry about him for another year? (like your guy turns around at 28)

[Jayzone]

By the way, are you using scout/coachs? If you do, are they like Outstanding/LEGENDARY? I (and the computer GM that draft him as well) tried to give him the best *education* that he can get, but so far the effect is minimal. (just look at his reocrd and coach rating)