Scouting Reports are Broken

[geoffmatt17]

Note: I'm saying reports, not scouting.
Note: I'm not hijacking the thread on SP's being scouted as RP's, because I want that to be addressed and resolved. I notice it in every single league I play in (see signature), and it's been a topic of conversation over the last month or two as we advance through years of drafting etc. I can provide screenshots and examples abound. It is, however, another example of how these reports are broken. Please don't forget this thread: http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...d.php?t=297327

It goes beyond the SP/RP issue. Here's an example with picture proof. I have a 29 year old right fielder who has led the league in hits 4 years in a row. As you can see in the following images below, he is
1. a proven great contact hitter
2. league average corner OF'er
3. has awful, but existent ratings in the IF (1B)

Here's his profile page:


Here's more info on his defense:


Here is his scouting report which says:
1. he owns a glove that will prove useful in the infield (no mention of outfield, although it states he's a right fielder)
2. he doesn't yet own a bat.


And lastly, here's my scouting info, showing the ratings of my scout and that I spend the max on scouting to avoid such snafus:


I don't expect to live or die by the scouting reports. I do, however, expect them to be pretty close to EVERYTHING else that's already pretty close. There's no excuse for this player to have a scouting report touting him as a defensive specialist in the infield who may or may not develop a bat.

[wallewalls]

It seems like that last sentence of the scouting report is whats bugged, as the rest of the paragraph seems to match up. I've noticed discrepancies between reports and actual stats/ratings before and i'm stuck also on how much stock to put into those scouting reports.

[Drstrangelove]

I don't read the scouting reports like they are gospel. It's one guys opinion and his opinion is not only imperfect, but based on some things I don't care about. Mostly, I am looking for his input to see if I he agrees or has some insight. And the verbiage is the part I pay the least attention to as far as the report.

[PSUColonel]

Originally Posted by Drstrangelove

I don't read the scouting reports like they are gospel. It's one guys opinion and his opinion is not only imperfect, but based on some things I don't care about. Mostly, I am looking for his input to see if I he agrees or has some insight. And the verbiage is the part I pay the least attention to as far as the report.

Yes, but his overall assessment needs to be consistent with the component grades he handed out.

[Drstrangelove]

I haven't studied scout vernacular. What the OP seems to be doing is reading scout comments and trying to reverse engineer the scout ratings from the comments.


That would be great for example if we all knew what "doesn't own a bat" means to that scout about that player in that league at that time. If it means he can't hit with much power for the position the scout is considering and compared to what that scout wants, then it might make some sense. In my 30 team league, only 3 or 4 out of the 60 starting first basemen and right fielders have power that low. So, what would help is a guide explaining the scout verbiage, but otherwise, I try to not take comments literally.

[Sweed]

I take the scouting text report as something that will never be as accurate as the actual number ratings. IIRC the text blurbs were taken out of the game at one time and only returned by user request. This made sense for the "stats only" crowd as it gave reason to have a scout at all. These blurbs will be less accurate, adding more fog of war, IMHO for the stats only players otherwise what is the point? If playing stats only you don't want, at least I wouldn't think you would, explicitly accurate text. I think those guys want a more general report and let the stats talk for themselves?

When you combine the two, number ratings and text report, you may see some fog of war issues but, to me, in that case the number ratings trump the scouting blurb for the reasons already listed.

Having said that I'm not seeing huge issues on the example you provide. My interpretation is he is not being touted as a defensive specialist in the infield. Too me, the "owns a glove that will prove useful in the infield" is true. If he has the ability to move to 1b to accommodate a double switch, cover an in-game injury, or a day to day injury, or allow you to put one more LHB in the lineup he has shown he does indeed have a "glove that will prove useful in the infield".

I suppose the bat comment is a bit strange but could be associated with what is expected of a corner outfielder. Maybe the engine grabbed a wrong line of text because it became "confused" when trying to find a batting description while considering multiple positions? I could argue that while he can certainly hit that for his positions, corner outfield or first base (certainly not middle infield material) he does have a lack of power. So yeah, "lacks power" would be a better description and could be cleaned up in future versions. Also I see he is a groundball hitter, fine for a leadoff batting OF or middle IF with speed (which he has) but not something I would expect from a firstbaseman (his only legitimate place to play on the IF. 3b is out with that DP rating).

1. he owns a glove that will prove useful in the infield (no mention of outfield, although it states he's a right fielder)

Actually it says "He is a very sure handed and reliable right fielder", that ties nicely into his OF ratings.

[NCBeachBum]

As one of those stats-only players, I can tell you these reports could use some pretty serious tweaks. No matter what scout I hire, he hates 99% of all players, and says none of them will ever be major leaguers. If you go into a draft class, there will be 2-5 guys on whom he is at least somewhat sanguine, and everyone else is some version of organisational depth. If you down the top 100 prospects list, same thing, 2-5 guys he think will make the majors. It's common to open up a Cy Young or MVP winner and be told he will never break camp with a team. All the scouts are massive pessimists.

[NCBeachBum]

Dola,

While I have a few minutes, I'll dig out two or three good examples.

This is a 33 year old first baseman with a career .908 OPS who just won the MVP with a .370/.445/.583/1.028, 21 HR, 7.2 WAR season.

[geoffmatt17]

You can try to positive spin this any way you want, but the bottom line is this is a career .868 OPS (+134 OPS+) player, and the report's conclusion is that he doesn't own a bat. If that's OK to you, I'm not sure what else to say.

[NCBeachBum]

This gent was just taken 4th overall in the draft, and is rated as the game's #21 prospect. A college draftee, they started him out in short A ball, where he hit .307/.352/.605/.957 (154 OPS+) with 1.3 WAR in 27 games. They then promoted him to A, where he hit .276/.338/.437/.774 (120 OPS+, that's not an offensive league) with 2.6 WAR in 64 games.

[NCBeachBum]

Hmm, somehow I failed to put the attachment on that one, and apparently you can't edit it in.

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by geoffmatt17

You can try to positive spin this any way you want, but the bottom line is this is a career .868 OPS (+134 OPS+) player, and the report's conclusion is that he doesn't own a bat. If that's OK to you, I'm not sure what else to say.

So basically agree with you or be wrong? Got it

Already said the bat comment is a bit strange and AI could have grabbed a wrong text line description, then simply guessed as to a reason if it wasn't a mistake. The rest of the report makes total sense.

In the big picture it makes no difference as you have the numbers to go by. I'd post it in the "text errors, typos, cosmetic" thread here http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...d.php?t=286237 so it can be looked at for v20. Like pbp it will always be a work in progress.

[NCBeachBum]

This last one will take a bit more context, because he isn't an award winner this season, and I suppose you could argue he could have taken a devel hit since winning last year's Cy. Aged 32, 7 full major league seasons, 118 wins, 37.4 WAR, a career 128 ERA+, and two CYs. In his Cy season the year prior to the most recent, he had 5.5 WAR and a 140 ERA+. In the most recent season, i.e. one in which he was not an award winner, he had 5.4 WAR and a 119 ERA+, but only a 12-4 record in 33 starts and 187 2/3 IP (either his offense or bullpen should be ashamed, and his defense definitely should be, because his FIP- in those two seasons were both an identical 74).

[NCBeachBum]

That's all I have time for at the moment, but just think about it this way: if you ran a RL team and your head scout turned in reports to you with those lines speaking about those players, wouldn't you run him out the door so fast he got a nosebleed? Except that this is every scout.

[Matt Arnold]

A few of these text lines were missing conditions, FYI. The "doesn't yet own a bat" one was missing a check on the player's batting capability, so that was a bug. The purpose of these "new" scouting reports was to avoid the cases like previously where you'd get a guy like Andrelton Simmons who grades out as an excellent player, and the text line on him read that he was a "middle of the lineup bat". Of course, writing these new thousands of lines of text, some will be off.

We'll certainly look at things more going forward. But if you do have lines that don't make sense (relative to the scouted values, not necessarily their performance), let us know and we can definitely check to see about missing conditions. But keep in mind, the text will only relate to the ratings - the last case, what ratings show up for the pitcher? The text there makes sense if he's being scouted as a mid-rotation pitcher, so it may be more that the scouted ratings are off, rather than the text being wrong.

[geoffmatt17]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

A few of these text lines were missing conditions, FYI. The "doesn't yet own a bat" one was missing a check on the player's batting capability, so that was a bug. The purpose of these "new" scouting reports was to avoid the cases like previously where you'd get a guy like Andrelton Simmons who grades out as an excellent player, and the text line on him read that he was a "middle of the lineup bat". Of course, writing these new thousands of lines of text, some will be off.

We'll certainly look at things more going forward. But if you do have lines that don't make sense (relative to the scouted values, not necessarily their performance), let us know and we can definitely check to see about missing conditions. But keep in mind, the text will only relate to the ratings - the last case, what ratings show up for the pitcher? The text there makes sense if he's being scouted as a mid-rotation pitcher, so it may be more that the scouted ratings are off, rather than the text being wrong.

Great feedback, appreciate the response Matt!

It really seems like it's the final sentence that's out of line when there are problems.