Wild Card Advantage

[One Great Matrix]

I think they just get on the game itself because they're that frustrated with their lack of utter dominance, lol.

[OMGPuppies]

Maybe the team that beat you just matched up well against you? It would be pretty boring if the "better" team won all the time.

[TC Dale]

To people posting in the forums here, please learn to disagree without going to the level of calling names. People have their opinions, and even if you do not agree with their viewpoint, at least show civility to each other and stop the immature posts. If the trends continue, there can be some punishments being given for what should be a friendly place to be, and post.

Try to agree to disagree and make less namecalling and trollish behavior, please.


Just a note:

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[Charlatan]

Our brains are good at recognizing patterns that don't exist. When your strong team beats up on a weaker team, it says "that's how it should be!" But when you have a strong team and lose to a weaker team, your brain says "hey, that's not right." So the times it didn't go as expected stick in your brain - and after a few times of this happening, you say "hey, there's a pattern here" - even though there isn't.

In the lack of any specific evidence showing this phenomenon happening, I would say it's just a brain freeze occurring. However, if someone were to analyze the playoff results and show that the weaker team wins like 80% of the time, then perhaps we could start thinking about whether or not there is a real issue.

Until then, I'm moving on!

[quickstep76]

Just one more thing to add here:

The strategy for winning 3 out of 5 games is much different than the strategy for winning 110 out of 162 games. Ask any baseball manager that and they’ll tell you the same thing. If you leave your lineups/rotations and strategy settings the same when you get to the playoffs, then you deserve to lose.

If you lose 3 in a row during the regular season, it means very little, but if you lose 3 in a row in the playoffs, it means everything.
-Lineup construction is different in the playoffs(4 man rotation, either extra bullpen arm or additional defensive substitutions)
-No need to rest players every X days due to the additional days off in the playoffs.
-quick hook or slow hook for your pitchers is so much more important and based on the strengths of your staff

I could go on and on, but I have a feeling most of you know this already. Except for those of you who think the game is ‘broken’ and just roll the same lineup and strategies out for the playoffs and expect to win.
To those of you, I hope we meet in the playoffs.

[X3NEIZE]

The sense of entitlement with some people is out of control... I consider my team to be superior to 99% of the teams out there during the regular season, I don't consider myself the best manager... therefore I dominate seasons and I lose to balanced teams and smarter managers all the time.... it's why I keep playing, I have so much to learn.

There are many factors that come into play in short series.... Strategy, lineups, pen and luck (to name a few)..... you need a healthy dose of all of these to win playoff games.

[Josquin]

Originally Posted by quickstep76

Just one more thing to add here:

The strategy for winning 3 out of 5 games is much different than the strategy for winning 110 out of 162 games. Ask any baseball manager that and they’ll tell you the same thing. If you leave your lineups/rotations and strategy settings the same when you get to the playoffs, then you deserve to lose.

If you lose 3 in a row during the regular season, it means very little, but if you lose 3 in a row in the playoffs, it means everything.
-Lineup construction is different in the playoffs(4 man rotation, either extra bullpen arm or additional defensive substitutions)
-No need to rest players every X days due to the additional days off in the playoffs.
-quick hook or slow hook for your pitchers is so much more important and based on the strengths of your staff

I could go on and on, but I have a feeling most of you know this already. Except for those of you who think the game is ‘broken’ and just roll the same lineup and strategies out for the playoffs and expect to win.
To those of you, I hope we meet in the playoffs.

I don't change my lineup at all for the playoffs, and neither do some of the most successful teams I've seen. Why would you tinker with a lineup that has already proven to have a high probability of winning every series? The only time I would do that is if the opponent has an glaring weakness (e.g. weak against lefties) or to counter an extreme ballpark on the road. Both of these are rare in the perfect league in my experience.

[Kushiel]

You always remember and choke on it when a wildcard team beats you, You just move on when you beat a wild card.

[stl jason]

actually if you look at the wild card history in MLB (since 2012), the WC team beating the top seed happens more often than you might expect (heck, in 2014, both wild card teams went to the WS)...

and prior to the one-and-done wild card era, it wasn't uncommon for the underdog to beat the top teams... definitely annoying if and when it happens to you (especially multiple seasons), but not unusual....

2011 - Cardinals win WS (fewest wins in post season - 90)
2008 - Dodgers (84 wins) sweep Cubs (97 wins) in NLDS
2006 - Cardinals win WS (fewest wins in post season - 83)
2003 - Cubs (88 wins) beat Braves (101 wins) in NLDS
2003 - Marlins (91 wins) beat Giants (100 wins) in NLDS

[Abnerdoubleday]

The solution should be obvious. Stop trying to make your team great. Sell off your top players and shoot for just above average. That way you will be more likely to get one of those coveted wild card spots.

[QuantaCondor]

Originally Posted by Josquin

I don't change my lineup at all for the playoffs, and neither do some of the most successful teams I've seen. Why would you tinker with a lineup that has already proven to have a high probability of winning every series? The only time I would do that is if the opponent has an glaring weakness (e.g. weak against lefties) or to counter an extreme ballpark on the road. Both of these are rare in the perfect league in my experience.

Here's an example: I have a pitching and batting performance model based on data from seasons of performance. It uses a bunch of average values, like the average number of rhb or lhb expected, corrections for any adjustments for park factors, etc. When I get to the playoffs, I don't have to use averages, I can just look at the lineup and use exact data. Why would I not do that?

I will say that I think this is possibly more relevant for FTP players. If you have perfect Walter Johnson, Ed Walsh, etc. then it doesnt matter because theyll be the best regardless of the circumstances. But there's a big difference in performance between maybe going for a Brett Anderson against a 4-lefty team with some real good righty hitting RHB as opposed to like a gold Dizzy Dean or gold Greg Maddux. And the choices of extra bullpen arms is also very relevant.

[Matt Arnold]

To me, I find the biggest playoff decision is that last roster spot. You don't need your 5th starter, and your bullpen gets more rest too. So if you have 1 or 2 spots to play with, it's the decision - do you want an extra matchup lefty in the pen? A power bat off the bench? A defensive sub in the outfield? A pinch runner?

Every year I try something different. Some years I just take the team that brought me. One year I switched to a 3 man rotation with 9 bullpen arms for the series to exploit platoons. Other times I've just added a new player for the next year and just set my lineup with him in it. Other times I literally can't get to my computer to log in Sunday so just hope that things are set right.

But overall, the playoffs are a different beast. I can guarantee you we have no explicit checks to give a WC team an edge, so if you keep losing to them, better to either hope for better luck or take a closer view of what you do to set up for the playoffs to see if there's a better strategy. And if you find that, let me know since I still don't know the trick.

[PocketsAintFull]

I think i've lost (& won a few, to be fair) with the same lineup from the regular season, a highly adjusted lineup, to managers who've changed for the postseason, and managers who haven't even checked in.

So to summarise.... I guess it's just the Playoffs, really

[<Pion>]

Originally Posted by Abnerdoubleday

The solution should be obvious. Stop trying to make your team great. Sell off your top players and shoot for just above average. That way you will be more likely to get one of those coveted wild card spots.

Great idea, but tried and failed... or maybe it's because I don't even get out of the wildcard game to face the good teams

[Josquin]

Originally Posted by QuantaCondor

Here's an example: I have a pitching and batting performance model based on data from seasons of performance. It uses a bunch of average values, like the average number of rhb or lhb expected, corrections for any adjustments for park factors, etc. When I get to the playoffs, I don't have to use averages, I can just look at the lineup and use exact data. Why would I not do that?

I will say that I think this is possibly more relevant for FTP players. If you have perfect Walter Johnson, Ed Walsh, etc. then it doesnt matter because theyll be the best regardless of the circumstances. But there's a big difference in performance between maybe going for a Brett Anderson against a 4-lefty team with some real good righty hitting RHB as opposed to like a gold Dizzy Dean or gold Greg Maddux. And the choices of extra bullpen arms is also very relevant.

Yes, I can see how playoff roster adjustments would be more relevant to teams that have to make tradeoffs because they don't have cards that are good in everything. But I don't think the whales that are complaining about losing to WC teams have that problem. I suspect the real problem is that it is difficult to evaluate total player value for position players (it is much easier for pitchers), so they THINK they have the best players at each position, but they don't. I've run linear regressions based on multiple seasons of simulation data, and the results were quite surprising in some cases.

[HRBaker]

Another thing that happens (and I've done this myself) is that WC teams sometimes tend to spend their season PPs (or actual cash) on improving their teams just before the playoffs; One - to insure the WC spot, and Two - to improve chances in the playoff series.

A number of my WC teams went into the playoffs not the same team that played the regular season.

[One Great Matrix]

45 teams have a .700+ regular season winning percentage. Those 45 teams have won a total of 232 championships.

45 random teams with a regular season win % of .550-.600 have won a total of 72 championships.

232-72, go ahead and post every time you DO win your league championship maybe, too.

You can check out the history for yourself under UNIVERSE-->Mangers & Rankings...you can even sort by total championships & you see that the most successful regular season teams are the most successful postseason teams as well. But there are going to be upsets.