Why historical beta team raved out OOTP 2007

[rasnell]

Here's one more example of why the historical beta team members raved about the dramatic improvements in OOTP.

I just finished simming 18 seasons and Bob Gibson was with my team the entire time. Here are his career numbers.

Stat/Sim/Real Life

Wins/241/251
Losses/176/174
ERA/3.03/2.91
K/3,123/3,117

Considering all of the variables, including totally different teams, drafts, trades, injuries, matchups, this is absolutely amazing how accurately the stars of the game are turning out.

[The Wolf]

I've had some similar numbers. I was probably the leading squeaky wheel about how weak 2006 was in this area, and we got enough historical grease slathered on in 2007 you may have noticed that I and a lot of other people who also had issues with 2006 are not complaining one bit about weak historical suppport in 2007.

[Zitofan75]

Originally Posted by The Wolf

I've had some similar numbers. I was probably the leading squeaky wheel about how weak 2006 was in this area, and we got enough historical grease slathered on in 2007 you may have noticed that I and a lot of other people who also had issues with 2006 are not complaining one bit about weak historical suppport in 2007.

I'm a purely fictional player.

Or rather, I'm a purely fictional player until 2007. Now, I'm running a historical league and I plan to take over SF sometime in the very early 21st century with all this massive and wonderful history added in. What an amazing system this is. What amazing stats I'm getting. I am bummed about Mantle giving it up after a CEI after a year but that's how it goes sometimes.

[rasnell]

After many, many hours of beta testing, I love the fact that :

1. We don't lose Ted Williams for four or five years of his prime and he actually sets every MLB record for BA, hits, HR, OB.

2. We see just how great Shoeless Joe Jackson would have been if he wouldn't have gotten involved with gamblers at such a young age. He tops Rose and Cobb in hits.

3. We learn the names and are sent to the Baseball Encyclopedia and other books to learn more about the deadball era players.

4. We see realistic surprises and what might have been if J.R. Richard had not been knocked down by a stroke.

5. What Pete Rose did in hits is sheer willpower and durability and is hard to match, even in the most accurate sim, because he defies the normal curve for aging and injury.

6. Bert Blyleven repeatedly is a solid pitcher and when you look at his real life numbers you understand why.

7. Just how remarkable Babe Ruth was as a pitcher and a slugger as you play the games out, look at all of the rest of the players of his era, and know that nobody knew about steroids yet.

8. We never have a strike or the season interrupted by a work stoppage. My love of baseball is not quite the same as it used to be before the strike. Yet nothing seems to destroy this game because of how great it is. Just as we're losing these great inner-city kids who are outstanding baseball players and had the door opened by Jackie Robinson, the game saves itself by finding all these super Japanese and Latin American athletes. Can you imagine the career numbers of Ichiro if he had started his pro career with MLB?

9. Modders give us the ability to see all of these historic players, even back to 1901, with real pictures. We get to play in the stadiums with photos from any era.

As I wrote in my first blog related to this release, OOTP 2007 is making history with a Japanese parent company (in a nation that truly appreciates and puts baseball first as its favorite sport), a subsidiary in London that brought the world Football Manager, a German developer whose love of the game is obvious and his drive to bring us the best simulation is proven by the results, and the ability to show the world how and why baseball became such a huge American pastime.

[Le Grande Orange]

Well, I would argue that #1 and #8 should be possible to recreate in the game (at the user's option of course). The effect of WWII on the major league rosters and the various altered/shortened seasons are significant historical events in baseball, and thus deserve inclusion.

They're on my list of suggestions for OOTP2008 naturally...

[rasnell]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

Well, I would argue that #1 and #8 should be possible to recreate in the game (at the user's option of course). The effect of WWII on the major league rosters and the various altered/shortened seasons are significant historical events in baseball, and thus deserve inclusion.

They're on my list of suggestions for OOTP2008 naturally...

I agree with you. Anything that allows us to customize in any way we want is a good thing.

But the alternate universe we're presented with is quite fun and interesting.

We're certainly have more options and choices than with any other baseball sim. But, being the demanding folks that we are, we need even more in OOTP 2008.

I really want to see far more choices and ability to customize within the solo play in-game. I would like the choice of what stats to view onscreen in the game, where the boxes are dragged and dropped on the screen, the ability to re-size the stadium view on screen to where I want it, the ability to see both lineups on the same screen in all views, shortcut keys that allow me to program exactly what stat display and exactly what window to go to while in the game. For example, pressing "P" would take me to my pitchers with the filtered stat display exactly the way that I set it.

[PotatoPeeler]

Originally Posted by rasnell

4. We see realistic surprises and what might have been if J.R. Richard had not been knocked down by a stroke.

I am currently playing around with the idea of doing a dynasty based on J.R. Richard. While Richard has not reached 300 wins in any of the test sims I've run thus far (5 or 6 to date), he has reached 3000 Ks in all of them and in a couple, he's made it to 4000. Also, he's been inducted to the Hall of Fame every single time.

[redsox45]

Originally Posted by rasnell

After many, many hours of beta testing, I love the fact that :

1. We don't lose Ted Williams for four or five years of his prime and he actually sets every MLB record for BA, hits, HR, OB.

In every sim I have run, he actually plays better than Ruth himself. Not just marginally better, but he really sets some amazing records.

2. We see just how great Shoeless Joe Jackson would have been if he wouldn't have gotten involved with gamblers at such a young age. He tops Rose and Cobb in hits.

I agree here too. Although, Cobb has suffered CEIs in a couple of my recent sims, so he's been a flameout, but Shoeless Joe regularly hits over 3000 career hits.

3. We learn the names and are sent to the Baseball Encyclopedia and other books to learn more about the deadball era players.

And this is the fun part. I have regularly visited baseballlibrary.com since I started testing this year. Some names, like Bernie Kauff, I had never heard of, and was surprised that they actually had pretty good careers IRL as well as OOTP.

Even tracking down duds like Showboat Fisher (who in a recent sim was dominant for 15 years) and George Winter (who in my most recent sim racked up 345 wins).

4. We see realistic surprises and what might have been if J.R. Richard had not been knocked down by a stroke.

Bo Jackson comes to mind here. In my sims he's dominant into the mid 90s and actually has a respectable career instead of suffering a CEI as he did IRL.

As I wrote in my first blog related to this release, OOTP 2007 is making history with a Japanese parent company (in a nation that truly appreciates and puts baseball first as its favorite sport), a subsidiary in London that brought the world Football Manager, a German developer whose love of the game is obvious and his drive to bring us the best simulation is proven by the results, and the ability to show the world how and why baseball became such a huge American pastime.

I agree 100% with this, rasnell. You have really captured the essence of historical play and why it is so fun. This would've been a good response to the thread a couple weeks ago asking why people play historicals...very good response.

Will

[akw4572]

What database are you guys using, and what recal setting?

[BaseballMan]

Im not so sure historical leagues are more accurate.
I used the lahman database and Mickey Mantle hit 536 hrs.
But he only hit 53 in 1961. Sandy Koufax went 160-83 so something must be wrong with the game. I just dont see how Markus could take time off when we are getting inaccurate stats like that.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by BaseballMan

Im not so sure historical leagues are more accurate. I used the lahman database and Mickey Mantle hit 536 hrs.

Which is, of course, exactly the number he hit in real life.

Originally Posted by BaseballMan

Sandy Koufax went 160-83 so something must be wrong with the game.

LOL, the historical Koufax was 165-87.

I'm getting these kinds of results myself. You have to love it.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by akw4572

What database are you guys using, and what recal setting?

Lahman, 3 year recalc.

[redsox45]

Lahman 5.4 with 3 year recalc is the best way to go. You should get pretty solid results withthat.

Will

[Erik W.]

Originally Posted by redsox45

In every sim I have run, he actually plays better than Ruth himself. Not just marginally better, but he really sets some amazing records.

Hotdog Effect and Beer Gut Factor aren't in the game yet.

Edit: Grr, I mis-read. I thought you were talking about Ruth.

[Jordan]

Can't wait to get started. Does anyone use Gambo's DB?

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by redsox45

Lahman 5.4 with 3 year recalc is the best way to go. You should get pretty solid results with that.

I sure do.

[RoyalsBlue]

Originally Posted by redsox45

Lahman 5.4 with 3 year recalc is the best way to go. You should get pretty solid results withthat.

Will

Other than stolen bases, in mine. Using the default historical settings, in 1901 the teams AVERAGED 277 steals per team in the AL and 276 in the NL. Other than that, the overall stats looked pretty good.

I suppose I could work around that by only simming 1 year at a time, then adjusting the historical settings for steals before simming the next season with my next one.

[bababui]

Originally Posted by rasnell

After many, many hours of beta testing, I love the fact that :

1. We don't lose Ted Williams for four or five years of his prime and he actually sets every MLB record for BA, hits, HR, OB.

2. We see just how great Shoeless Joe Jackson would have been if he wouldn't have gotten involved with gamblers at such a young age. He tops Rose and Cobb in hits.

3. We learn the names and are sent to the Baseball Encyclopedia and other books to learn more about the deadball era players.

4. We see realistic surprises and what might have been if J.R. Richard had not been knocked down by a stroke.

5. What Pete Rose did in hits is sheer willpower and durability and is hard to match, even in the most accurate sim, because he defies the normal curve for aging and injury.

6. Bert Blyleven repeatedly is a solid pitcher and when you look at his real life numbers you understand why.

7. Just how remarkable Babe Ruth was as a pitcher and a slugger as you play the games out, look at all of the rest of the players of his era, and know that nobody knew about steroids yet.

8. We never have a strike or the season interrupted by a work stoppage. My love of baseball is not quite the same as it used to be before the strike. Yet nothing seems to destroy this game because of how great it is. Just as we're losing these great inner-city kids who are outstanding baseball players and had the door opened by Jackie Robinson, the game saves itself by finding all these super Japanese and Latin American athletes. Can you imagine the career numbers of Ichiro if he had started his pro career with MLB?

9. Modders give us the ability to see all of these historic players, even back to 1901, with real pictures. We get to play in the stadiums with photos from any era.

As I wrote in my first blog related to this release, OOTP 2007 is making history with a Japanese parent company (in a nation that truly appreciates and puts baseball first as its favorite sport), a subsidiary in London that brought the world Football Manager, a German developer whose love of the game is obvious and his drive to bring us the best simulation is proven by the results, and the ability to show the world how and why baseball became such a huge American pastime.

Ted Williams missed 4 years; Jackson was involved with gamblers and even had he played a full career there is no assurance he would have broken the records; JR Richards was injured..playing 'what if' scenarios is definitly fun and interesting but its not historical. Lets not get carried away.

Accurate ratings for the mental/behavioral parts of the game are missing from OOTP but show up in baseball history in the form of the Black Sox, Denny McLain and a drove of historic players who had their career cut short through self-destructive behaviors like alcoholism.

Its important to keep the pressure on to make sure the game moves in a direction that will replicate real life baseball in as many ways as possible. That being said, OOTP2007 is by far the best OOTP yet.

[delta]

Originally Posted by bababui

Ted Williams missed 4 years; Jackson was involved with gamblers and even had he played a full career there is no assurance he would have broken the records; JR Richards was injured..playing 'what if' scenarios is definitly fun and interesting but its not historical. Lets not get carried away.

Accurate ratings for the mental/behavioral parts of the game are missing from OOTP but show up in baseball history in the form of the Black Sox, Denny McLain and a drove of historic players who had their career cut short through self-destructive behaviors like alcoholism.

Its important to keep the pressure on to make sure the game moves in a direction that will replicate real life baseball in as many ways as possible. That being said, OOTP2007 is by far the best OOTP yet.

I don't really know if I understand this sentiment. If you just want to see the reproduction of actual historical results there's a site you might want to check out: www.baseball-reference.com

They're all there.

[MizzouRah]

3. We learn the names and are sent to the Baseball Encyclopedia and other books to learn more about the deadball era players.

This is #1 for me. I spend half my time simming and playing the game, the other half googling various players to read more about them. I love what this part of the game has done to my baseball knowledge.

I was just talking to my dad today about how I'm currently in 1910 and "Big Ed" Walsh has a career 1.87 era so far. (real life was 1.82) Just talking about various players I never about facinates me.