FYI on MLB licensing

[Zitofan75]

Originally Posted by Bonedwarf

I fail to see what the big deal here is. Who cares if SI get licensed stuff? The fan community serves that need quite simply. Why go rocking the boat and getting bloody lawyers involved when anyone can download the required files anyway?

And remember, law and justice come down to who has the better lawyers, not who is actually right.

Some people felt it was somehow too hard to do this ... never bothered me any but there you go

[Syd Thrift]

One issue I see with official licenses - and if the floodgates open on this, I would not be surprised to see the going rates for statistical licenses to go waaay down because pretty much all you'd be paying for is that picture of Harmon Killebrew - is that they seem to require you to do certain things like give established players better ratings than non-established ones. I see this in Madden and especially the NBA games a lot - there are lots of players who I believe would be really solid role players if given a shot IRL but who in the game are ranked lower in *everything* than starters.

Take Reggie Evans before last year... great rebounder who didn't get a chance to play because he was too small to be that good of a defender and also he can't shoot... well, before last year, he was given very mediocre rebounding rates by both games as well. I'd give y'all a baseball example but I haven't had the stomach for arcade baseball games since Tony LaRussa Baseball. I hope you see what I mean, though... when you get those licenses you find yourself having to do things to appease the people who give them out. One of the biggies is that guys with big contracts and shoe deals are more likely to get pissed off about being rated poorly than guys who are just happy to be on a team.

[Charlie Hough]

Actually, the lower ratings for non-established players are not a requirement imposed by the organizations granting the licenses. The leagues and the player associations don't really get involved in ratings. Their bigger concerns are getting paid and making sure that the game doesn't defame the personal character of players, even fictionally. This is why, for example, you will never see drug suspensions or DUI arrests in a game like Madden.

The lower ratings you mentioned are actually a byproduct of poor research and the assumption that non-established players are not established because they aren't very good. The people researching these teams generally don't have the expertise or the exposure to these lesser-known players to rate them properly. And, besides, who really cares about that second string tackle? You and I might care, but most gamers are focused solely on running up the score with their beloved superstars, so the rest of the players receive less attention.

They base a lot of ratings on hype. So, for example, the wide receiver who was a first round draft pick may get a pretty solid rating in Madden, but the fourth round pick who plays on the offensive line may get a really low rating, even though he's a strong player and ends up starting the whole season for an NFL team. One got the hype and the other didn't.

The only hope is to have good researchers who watch virtually all of their teams' games, who pay close attention to guys coming off the bench in garbage time, and who can really assess the talent of incoming rookies.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by Bonedwarf

And remember, law and justice come down to who has the better lawyers, not who is actually right.

Not always. Money or power can be used to crush people with better lawyers. If you can get it dismissed then you don't have to argue it.

[Zitofan75]

Originally Posted by The Wolf

Not always. Money or power can be used to crush people with better lawyers. If you can get it dismissed then you don't have to argue it.

Except the better lawyers tend to become attracted to the people with money and power in the first place ...

[D Love]

Originally Posted by Questdog

You could use the team names and stadium names, but not the logos.

You could not use team names for sure and most, if not all, stadium names would be treated the same.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by Zitofan75

Except the better lawyers tend to become attracted to the people with money and power in the first place ...

Some of the better ones are drawn to better causes.

But you don't need better lawyers if you have money or power. You just need adequate ones.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Actually, the lower ratings for non-established players are not a requirement imposed by the organizations granting the licenses. The leagues and the player associations don't really get involved in ratings. Their bigger concerns are getting paid and making sure that the game doesn't defame the personal character of players, even fictionally. This is why, for example, you will never see drug suspensions or DUI arrests in a game like Madden.

I never said they were a requirement. I said they were a byproduct of real licenses. And they are. When you're working with someone, you usually don't want to piss that person off. Established players, again, are more likely to get angry at low ratings than guys who just stepped off the plane. FWIW, one reason I only use fantasy players is that I want to avoid 3rd party mods that end up doing the same thing. I'm not saying they do this consciously, but Strat for example was horrible the way they'd always give Gold Glovers the highest fielding ratings at their position, for example, and give the short shrift to some kid who got called up late in the year but who was an absolute wizard afield.

FWIW, I used to know a guy who worked in EA and from what I've heard they actually do quite a bit of research with their ratings. They're still probably the most beholden to that concept I mention.

[Cool Papa Bell]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

I'm not saying they do this consciously, but Strat for example was horrible the way they'd always give Gold Glovers the highest fielding ratings at their position, for example, and give the short shrift to some kid who got called up late in the year but who was an absolute wizard afield.

FWIW, I used to know a guy who worked in EA and from what I've heard they actually do quite a bit of research with their ratings. They're still probably the most beholden to that concept I mention.

Well, I have to say that in regards to Strat, this is mainly not true. Just taking 2005 as an example, in the National League all of the Gold Glovers got a 1 rating and were very deserving, but Bobby Abreu won in RF and was a 3. In the AL, Derek Jeter won a Gold Glove and did not get a 1 and he normally does not, even though he ranks quite high in all SS fielding ratings. All of the other Gold Glove winners are fantastic fielders and deserved their 1 ratings. There were multiple other players who gained 1 ratings who did not win a Gold Glove in either league.

Over the years, there have been many players who won Gold Gloves and did not get a 1 rating...and many, many more who gained a 1 rating and did not win a Gold Glove. I think in the case of rookies, unless they had a significant impact for a team, they generally do not get a high rating defensively. I pretty much agree with this, since a month does not a season make I think. What has bugged me more over the years has been the propensity for MLB in general to give Gold Gloves to players who had good offensive seasons. Not sure what the correlation is to that. Strat on the other hand has tended to give the 1's to players who's teams win, I'm assuming to make sure they win in a replay using the game.

[Syd Thrift]

Admittedly, I haven't played Strat in years. Maybe they've started to listen to their fanbase. But even a decade ago they were horrible about this. Didn't they go along and give Raffy a 1 in 1999? Maybe they gave him a 2 (and didn't give any other 1Bmen in the AL a 1 that year), but it was something similarly goofy.

[Cool Papa Bell]

[quote=Syd One of the biggies is that guys with big contracts and shoe deals are more likely to get pissed off about being rated poorly than guys who are just happy to be on a team.[/quote]

For some of the prima donnas, this is probably true. Though Barry Bonds isn't even a part of the MLBPA and what would he care if Strat or some other game makes him a slug in LF last year....which they did. Doug Glanville got pissed a few years ago when SOM gave him a 3 in the OF and Brady Anderson wasn't happy with his 2 some years back, though they may have been having a little fun with the SOM developers since they are (were?) avid players of the game.

I think that may pretty much be the only reason to have a license...if the players like it and endorse it with mentions in interviews, etc...then the fact you have a MLPBA hologram sticker on your box or website doesn't mean a thing. That's what you get for your licensing money...good PR from the guys who play the game. Heck, Joe Morgan and John Miller mention SOM quite often. I would bet they won't mention OOTP without a licensing agreement. And believe me, I'm not advocating getting one, just advocating with the devil.

[Cool Papa Bell]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

Admittedly, I haven't played Strat in years. Maybe they've started to listen to their fanbase. But even a decade ago they were horrible about this. Didn't they go along and give Raffy a 1 in 1999? Maybe they gave him a 2 (and didn't give any other 1Bmen in the AL a 1 that year), but it was something similarly goofy.

That was a joke, that's for sure...he DH'd more than he played first base, yet he got a great rating...go figure. But that was true of MLB as well, since he won the Gold Glove that year in real life even though he DH'd 3/4 of the season and only played in the field about 30 games.

The OF arms in SOM are sometimes off too, though that's a hard thing to calculate with an algorithm. Guys with great arms do not pile up outfield assists every year. If a guy is not being run on, he can't throw anyone out, right? That would be the another plus to not using a database download and buying or getting with the game a database that someone actually edited with real life facts in mind. How do you build an rating off of some calculation if a guy did not have very many assists to base it on. I remember Brian Downing back in the early 80's would get 20+ assists a year, but that was because he was run on 1st to 3rd in LF because he couldn't reach the cutoff man. Stats can sometimes...and in some cases often times..not mimic real life that well.

[Carplos]

Just to be pedantic: MLB doesn't give decide the Gold Glove winners.

Not that they'd actually be any more critical than the writers.

[Charlie Hough]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

When you're working with someone, you usually don't want to piss that person off. Established players, again, are more likely to get angry at low ratings than guys who just stepped off the plane.

I'm not sure where this is coming from. Professional athletes are not storming into EA Sports or any other developer and complaining about their ratings. They have already signed off on their images, likenesses and other information through their player associations. Once the player's association signs off on a licensing deal, that's the end of the line. The player no longer has a say in what happens. If they're truly upset, which I highly doubt that any athlete is going to be, then their only recourse is to opt out of the licensing deal through the player's association. That can prevent the game company from including the player in its games, but it accomplishes nothing.

I can imagine some NFL players playfully needling the Madden developers over their ratings, since EA Sports does a ton of special events and tournaments in cooperation with the NFLPA, but I've never heard of an incident where a player in any sport truly raised hell over his ratings. Some have gotten angry and sued companies for using their likeness without a license, but that's a whole other story.

[Curtis]

"Strat on the other hand has tended to give the 1's to players who's teams win, I'm assuming to make sure they win in a replay using the game."

Amen to that, brother. The year the Mariners set the AL record for wins, Stratomatic gave 1s to six starters and a sub, which was patently ridiculous.

Mets announcer Ron Darling frequently refers on air to his work for S-O-M. He's one of the guys responsible for determining the fielding ratings. I guess he must get paid well for it, since he's mentioned skipping out on team events and promotions for the broadcast in favor of confering with the guys at Strat.

It would be a great idea if they had one (or more, but it would get expensive) of the regular reporters or announcers for each team to help rate people. Consensus is always better. I'm listening to Darling and Hernandez poo-poo an outfielder's range, while Mets Inside Pitch is raving about it.

And the same thing that was said about not being able to rate outfielder's arms based on their real life assists can also be applied to the game. I had Pudge as my catcher for six years, and he never made the top ten leader board for either runners thrown out or percentage gunned down… because no one ran on him.

[Cool Papa Bell]

Originally Posted by Curtis Cook

Amen to that, brother. The year the Mariners set the AL record for wins, Stratomatic gave 1s to six starters and a sub, which was patently ridiculous.

Strat misses the boat...as they so often do...in that the majority, if not vast majority, of gamers out there are not replaying the seasons and expecting the exact same MLB results. What would be the point of that? Gamers are playing in draft leagues, where MLB results are unimportant, or they are doing historical simulations, using a past MLB season and playing and/or GMing for one or more teams.

There's that whole definition of historical replay and historical simulation again which has come up in other posts. I feel that there is no such thing as a historical replay. It's a misnomer in itself. Like jumbo shrimp. History is what it is...history baby...gone...poof...never to happen again... Though as a footnote to that, one should always learn from history, particularly the mistakes made thru history, but I won't go there.

A simulation on the other hand, is just that and what OOTP and other games are. The game sets up as close to real life the dynamics involved...which are myriad and can never be replayed, only appoximated...and then you go from there, using your own dynamics and historical player names. SOM thinks they are more historically accurate than any other game. That is a crock of you know what, having played the game for close to 30 years now. Before computers, in leagues I played there were always deviations. Since computers, the game as somehow become more statistically accurate? Maybe...or maybe it's like a lot of SOM gamers think, in that the program is manipulating results to come out more accurately on paper. If that were not true, how can the fact that stats are sometimes widely different when comparing rolling the dice totals and computer program generated totals.

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by Cool Papa Bell

Strat misses the boat...as they so often do...in that the majority, if not vast majority, of gamers out there are not replaying the seasons and expecting the exact same MLB results. What would be the point of that? Gamers are playing in draft leagues, where MLB results are unimportant, or they are doing historical simulations, using a past MLB season and playing and/or GMing for one or more teams.

Before computers, in leagues I played there were always deviations. Since computers, the game as somehow become more statistically accurate? Maybe...or maybe it's like a lot of SOM gamers think, in that the program is manipulating results to come out more accurately on paper. If that were not true, how can the fact that stats are sometimes widely different when comparing rolling the dice totals and computer program generated totals.

The paper and dice game can't compensate for players who do very little of something, like walk, strike out or ground out less than half as often as the major league average, because half the time you'll be getting your results off someone else's card. Supposedly the computer game makes an adjustment for that, but the gurus at Strat won't say how they can do that without throwing off the frequencies of the other results occuring. Anything that's kept a secret is immediately suspicious in my book.

If you set the playing time limiter to the middle ('try to hold playing time to the player's actual, but don't be anal about it'), you often get extreme overuse of fringe players. My first season with the computer game I drafted four All Star relievers, but the two best relievers on my squad ended up being guys who pitched nine and twelve innings in real life, and 99 and 90 innings for me. My best friend had Piazza as his starting catcher and .220 defensive replacement with maybe ten at bats for his back-up. The computer sent Piazza to the disabled list in mid-May, and despite injuries being limited to fifteen games max, left him there for the rest of the season. His back-up got enough plate appearances to qualify by the end of the season (and batted third), and my friend missed the playoffs by one game. Yeah, Strat isn't totally historical.

Of course, with any random number generator you'll have statisical anomalies, but some of them seemed oddly planned. The year that Sosa and McGuire hit 66 and 70 their S-O-M counterparts had 65 and 71, respectively. The year Bonds hit 72 he finished in the low 50s in our league, though he did lead in OBP.