Season 12 (2030) General Discussion

[Orcin]

Originally Posted by Findest2001

I believe it would depend on the type of pitching you have. If your run differential is because of power hitters with low CON, and your pitchers have high MOV but lower STU compared to other teams, then if you jack up your HR totals I believe you would be covering your variables.
If, in the same scenario, you also jack up your ballpark factor for AVG, you might actually be offsetting any gain you get from power because your pitchers wouldn't be striking as many out so the improved average would help other teams more.

Interesting. Nothing is as simple as it seems, of course.

[joehart]

P406 is clearly the league to be seeded into this season.

No highly optimized whale and many of the teams leading their
divisions/the wild card have as many as 10-14 Gold cards in their lineup.

My youngest son (won Diamond last season) kind of surprised me this
morning with his announcement that he is holding onto one of the wild card spots in Perfect league. I told him to expect a relegation fight all week.

His team also still uses some Gold & Silver players among his pitchers.
No point removing Steve Howe and his 2.35 ERA (0.85 WHIP).

His leaders to drive in runs were Nomar Garciaparra and 95 Ken Griffey Jr (retrained to LF)
So much for his plans to move on from Nomar and use Carew full time as his 1B player.

Thank you for the extra leagues in Perfect league. Another non-super whale will win a championship this season.

[waittilnextyear]

The streakiness in this game is pretty wild!

The Frogs went 19-6 in June, then 9-15 in July. Started today on a 7-game winning streak and now find themselves mired in an 8-game losing streak. It's hard to fathom aside from "that's just baseball." These wild swings are basically coming against the same groupings of divisional foes. Maybe it's just OOTP's elaborate way of telling me that my team is a .500 team.

[old timer]

The schedule finally eased up and the Raccoons went 22-5 in August and now have a 5 game lead over the Ahabs for the #2 WC. The only tough teams we had to play for the month were the Ahabs and Freaks and we took 2 of 3 from the Ahabs and lost 2 of 3 to the Freaks. We have only 6 tough opponents from here on out so that gives us an edge on the Ahabs.

Also of note are the California Quantum Condors -OL which are an ftp team that's playing nearly .500 in this very tough league.

Edit: I just noticed I missed a no-hitter by Don Sutton who just missed a perfect game (had 1 BB). That's the 2nd no-hitter of his career.

[X3NEIZE]

Originally Posted by old timer

The schedule finally eased up and the Raccoons went 22-5 in August and now have a 5 game lead over the Ahabs for the #2 WC. The only tough teams we had to play for the month were the Ahabs and Freaks and we took 2 of 3 from the Ahabs and lost 2 of 3 to the Freaks. We have only 6 tough opponents from here on out so that gives us an edge on the Ahabs.

Also of note are the California Quantum Condors -OL which are an ftp team that's playing nearly .500 in this very tough league.

Edit: I just noticed I missed a no-hitter by Don Sutton who just missed a perfect game (had 1 BB). That's the 2nd no-hitter of his career.

Good luck! I’m a fan of the Raccoons!

[joehart]

Originally Posted by X3NEIZE

Good luck! I’m a fan of the Raccoons!

Fully agree. If only I could have them play the Apes for a few more series. I would really prefer home park advantage in the playoffs against them.
Good luck tomorrow.

[old timer]

The Raccoons have had another great month (18-4 so far and 40-9 for the past 2 months) and have played well so far against the better teams. We also easily clinched the #2 WC spot which was quite the surprise. We'll be playing the Bobcats in the WC game who are a very good team so I'm not getting my hopes up, but we did manage to win 3 of the 7 we played them this season.

Against the playoff bound teams that we played, we only fared poorly against the Winnipeg team, but several of those were close games. If we make it past the Bobcats, maybe we can pull off another upset or two or ...

[Orcin]

The Colonels win the division and will try again to win a PL trophy. Boggs is back at 1B as that experiment failed. Pitching and defense will either win it or not.

I am looking forward to collections hitting on Monday because it might finally break up this auction house constipation.

[mcdog512]

Originally Posted by Orcin

The Colonels win the division and will try again to win a PL trophy. Boggs is back at 1B as that experiment failed. Pitching and defense will either win it or not.

I am looking forward to collections hitting on Monday because it might finally break up this auction house constipation.

Yea, should be interesting.

[waittilnextyear]

The Frogs are reaching the end of season #4 at Perfect and are once again an also ran. The team is currently in 3rd place at 77-81. 679 runs scored and 743 allowed, so a great team aside from the hitting and pitching. Middle of the pack in various WARs. Defense is 2nd in EFF and 1st in ZR.

The second full week of the "pitching experiment" has come to a close and I must say I'm not quite as optimistic as I was going into this week. Fatigue continues to be the main bugaboo--even with a 9-man bullpen containing up to 6 high stamina starters. It is proving difficult to tell the AI manager to quit wasting guys for an inning here or there so they can better go 4 and 5 innings when needed. This was true even with the "hook RP" slider set one notch from 'slowest.' I suppose it would be possible to micromanage this by checking fatigue levels between sims and then benching certain P's, but that seems like a full-time job. And I already have one of those. lol. It might just be that the settings I'd need to access to make this work are hard-coded into the PT options (things like pitching era and bullpen frequency). And when the bullpen is gassed, that's when things go pear-shaped.

The bottom line right now is the team is on pace to give up 762 runs this week. All with an elite defense, a homer-suppressing ballpark, and in one of the weaker Perfect leagues I've been in so far.

In the team's first year of Perfect, the team gave up 789 runs using a standard pitching staff with slightly worse pitchers and a slightly worse defense than this. So, the difference is seeming smaller, if significant at all. And, that's before shortening the bench and limiting platoon options...

I don't think this experiment is dead (4.48 R/G allowed with and 5.17 R/G allowed without) but I think I'll go back to a normal staff next week and see how these diamond pitchers I've been accumulating do in that configuration. Maybe keep alternating to keep things interesting.

On a more positive note, 80 Richie Ashburn is leading the NC in P404 with a .339 batting average. 77 Tony Gwynn is breathing down his neck with a .334 average and 4 games to play. Would be my team's first batting crown.

[waittilnextyear]

Originally Posted by waittilnextyear

On a more positive note, 80 Richie Ashburn is leading the NC in P404 with a .339 batting average. 77 Tony Gwynn is breathing down his neck with a .334 average and 4 games to play. Would be my team's first batting crown.

Think the pressure is getting to Richie Ashburn? lol. And he was scoreboard watching and saw that Tony Gwynn was having a 4-hit game.

[Magus978]

For the first time since 2027, the New York Patriots will be playing past game #162. Left for dead at the end of August, the Patriots marched to an 18-10 record down the stretch to steal the second wildcard.

All I could ask for is that we gave ourselves a chance to get to the dance, and lo & behold, here we are. We're playing with house money and if we stay hot, we got a real shot at promotion.

Perhaps the "March of the Patriots" has truly begun in earnest...

[Warhawk]

White Tigers somehow went from 66-96 last season to 96-66 this season with no significant roster changes. Meanwhile the Black Panthers also won their division, by 1 game, with 90 wins, after going 82-80 last season. Golden Lions cooled off after a hot start but they still improved from 66-96 to 78-84 in the second season in Gold.

[Westheim]

The idiot Raccoons managed to go 7-20 in September to completely blow a safe cushion against relegation from Perfect, including losing 12 of their last 13, that one including getting swept by one of the other two teams they were trying to beat in relation to the red zone on the final weekend of the season… and stayed alive by a single game, finishing up 62-100. A random 7-3 win in the middle of that death march at the end of the season, against nobody else than THE Red Raiders, bailed them out. I thank the Raiders' Eric Gagne for completely blowing their lead in that one…

The offense on the Raccoons was SO dastardly BAD this year, Big Walt came up with a 2.66 ERA and a losing record, 11-12.

The Rebels were fat in the red in Bronze in the middle of the season, but rallied to finish 76-86, third in division. Which is still meh, y'know.

The Accountants on the other hand might rally past the terrible dead-ended Rebels for good already this season. After trailing the Rochester Bombers for most of the year, they rallied past them in August, and held a 3-game lead to win the division, 92-70. Their Bronze Cup path begins in the LDS against Lake Sarah with the same record in the #2/#3 game. We won the season series, 4-3.

Apart from that, the Accountants sit on 18k PP because I keep getting outbid for cards while asleep. Even a royal idiot would be able to do some upgrade with that stack! Lemme quickly search for an R.J. DeWeese card here.*

*dynasty Raccoons in-joke

[dancariaz]

I think I just had my weirdest season so far. My team finished:
- 1st in batting WAR (4th in runs scored, 1st in AVG, 1st in OBP, 2nd in OPS, 1st in wOBA)
- 5th in pitching WAR (4th in runs allowed)
- run differential of +76

and all I got was a losing record (80-82)

[RunninYakAngler]

My YakAnglers survived a tough division battle with the Hemet Hounds and won the division with an 87-75 record. Made several changes this season with varying degrees of effectiveness. 84 Darin Erstad and 85 Carl Furillo were both pack pulls and are outplaying their ratings. The Kuwn Tong Dogers (sic) are heavily favored to win the World Series after going 131-31 and resting/not playing multiple Perfects throughout the season. They appear to be a pack only team which blows my mind.

The Marathoners first season in Diamond was better than expected but far from great. They played .500 ball throughout the season and stumbled to the finish line with a record of 78-84. Starting pitching was their Achilles heel all season with most with ERAs above 5 and even into the 7s. Offense held their own but it appears you can't get by on high Gold pitchers in Diamond.

The Miners finished 2nd in their division with an 88 - 74 record, 17 games behind the Florida Marlins. The only additions made this season were 88 Frankie Frisch and 88 Steve Carlton, with Carlton being added in the last week and is not looking to be a good buy. Adding Frisch created a problem at 2nd base where Oquendo has been for ages. I decided to move Marty Marion from 3b to SS, putting Renteria on the bench. Oquendo moved to 3rd opening up the 2b for Frisch. This seemed to work great as they went 19-7 to close out September.

[JasonC23]

Originally Posted by Westheim

The idiot Raccoons managed to go 7-20 in September to completely blow a safe cushion against relegation from Perfect, including losing 12 of their last 13, that one including getting swept by one of the other two teams they were trying to beat in relation to the red zone on the final weekend of the season… and stayed alive by a single game, finishing up 62-100. A random 7-3 win in the middle of that death march at the end of the season, against nobody else than THE Red Raiders, bailed them out. I thank the Raiders' Eric Gagne for completely blowing their lead in that one…

I can't tell if I should say "You're welcome!" or "Sorry..."

[old timer]

The Raccoons survived the WC game by defeating the Bobcats 6-4. I feel bad for the Bobcats who won 111 games only to be out of it by losing only 1 game. I really don't like the 1 game WC "series".

We're off to play the Wilmington Blue Rocks, winners of 122 games (we won 107, 2nd least amongst playoff teams). We split the season series with them, 3-3, but I don't feel optimistic here.

Good luck to everyone who remains!

[old timer]

The Raccoons won the opener against Wilmington, defeating Cy Young 3-2. You know, if that shadow dude is right, then the super teams in the playoffs should fear the mighty (little) Raccoons! That special playoff code should really help us this year, right?

Edit: We're up 2-0 on Wilmington now after winning 11-4 at their home (they had an .827 home WPct). It's back to the Evergreen Forest where we'll be facing Walter Johnson. We beat him the last time we faced him, but I'll be surprised if we can do that again.

[old timer]

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