Do players get “itchy”? Or, do I HAVE to play them?

[Statsman1]

I have been an OOTP guy for many moons, but I don’t know if this question has been answered anywhere…

If I have pitchers or platoon players that just never play, does this reduce their effectiveness when I do see fit to finally throw them into a game?

I think it was Strat-O-Matic that had an “itchy” status for guys who had been sitting too long, which I believe impacted their abilities and you kind of had to get them into a game. I feel like I have to use a lesser reliever, for instance, just to get him into a game after two weeks, even if I have better options available to me.

EDIT - Something I just thought of - I don’t necessarily mean that the player’s mood goes south because he has been sitting - but if he is grouchy that he hasn’t been playing, and I finally DO play him, will his effectiveness be affected there too?

Does this make sense? Anyone have ideas here?

Thanks, guys!

[Fabtron7]

APBA was where you'd get Itchy pitchers! Played that game for years before I converted.

But to the best of my knowledge that doesn't happen in OOTP

[Statsman1]

Originally Posted by Fabtron7

APBA was where you'd get Itchy pitchers! Played that game for years before I converted.

But to the best of my knowledge that doesn't happen in OOTP

APBA! That was it! Thanks for clearing that up!

[BirdWatcher]

Morale is a thing in OOTP (unless you chose to turn that feature off, I think) and is linked, at least a little bit, to performance on the field. So if you don't play a guy regularly who expects to play regularly it can and generally will affect his morale and low morale can and generally will lead to some performance suppression.

The extent to which this happens is not clear and likely underlying personality traits also play into this. My sense has always been that morale-based performance effects are subtle, but that doesn't mean that they can't be somewhat significant. And, of course, having players with low morale can influence overall team morale as well. Though there are a lot of factors involved there having to do with whether the team is winning, what kind of leaders you have in your clubhouse, etc.

Also, morale for an individual player can suffer even if you are playing them regularly but not batting them where they expect to bat in the lineup or using them in the role they expect and prefer. A common example is when they see themselves as middle of the order hitters and you are batting them somewhere else in the lineup, this can lead to poor morale and poor morale can suppress performance somewhat.

I think it is less clear (for me, at least) with pitchers. But I have certainly recently experienced my veteran potential future Hall of Fame closer express great dissatisfaction with not being used in that role any longer. How much that dissatisfaction led to his great decline in effectiveness as opposed to how much his great decline in effectiveness led me to not trust using him as a closer any longer isn't even that clear to me. But I suspect that both were happening simultaneously.

OOTP does also have built into it players getting rusty, out of game shape or sharpness, with non-use. I think that generally requires much longer stretches of non-playing due to extended injuries and off-seasons and the like, but it has never been clear to me whether a relief pitcher who I haven't been getting enough work lately might experience some temporary decline in effectiveness due to non-use as well. (I have always guessed that it might.)

Perhaps someone else has more definitive answers to offer in this regard.

[Syd Thrift]

OOTP players do indeed get rusty if you don't play them at least every few games or so. This has a small decrease in their effectiveness and also a small increase in their injury proneness. IME the single largest place you see this effect is the first games of spring training - those first 3-4 days are basically where you'll see the largest portion of injuries, major ones included, all season long.

But yeah... 2 weeks, a player will be less effective. The game won't necessarily tell you that they're rusty or what have you but they will be. It's also one good reason to put players who just got off the 60 day DL into a minor league rehab stint before calling them up: in the rehab stint they usually won't get used as hard as you might use them in the majors, and then if they do get hurt again you don't have to play around with your 25(6)/40 man rosters again. And you *do* see how much a guy's pitched over the last 5 days. I will generally try to make sure that everyone on my team who needs to be able to pitch in some kind of leveraged situation always has at least some non-zero number of pitches in that timeframe, even if it means using a setup guy for an inning at the end of a blowout loss.

[BirdWatcher]

BTW, "added more blather" as a reason for editing your original post is just a top-notch reason in my book and makes me smile.

[Statsman1]

Thank you, Mr Watcher and Mr Thrift - I guess I hadn’t really paid enough attention to the Morale-O-Meter in enough situations to see and measure impacts. I had the feeling that morale of a player would have an effect (else, why is it there?) on something, but mostly chemistry, but since not playing over time would impact the player’s morale, I appreciate very much that you confirm that there is a correlation there, as intangible as it might be.

I suppose “rust” would be a factor; I would like to think that if a guy was bummed about not playing, he would be so ecstatic to see the field that he would go 4-4 or throw a 2-hitter, instead of having a negative results for finally playing. Guess I will have to see how that goes.

I guess, then, if I sit a guy for 3 weeks for no other reason than I don’t trust him, and his morale is NOT negative in any way, then he is fine just cashing the cheques.

I have always used a player I don’t trust, for whatever reason, in an easy situation that won’t get out of hand, just to give that player some innings or at-bats, but I tend to have my favorite guys and I am most definitely not a platoon-type manager.

I will have to pay more attention to that now. Thank you!

[Statsman1]

Originally Posted by BirdWatcher

BTW, "added more blather" as a reason for editing your original post is just a top-notch reason in my book and makes me smile.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by Statsman1

Thank you, Mr Watcher and Mr Thrift - I guess I hadn’t really paid enough attention to the Morale-O-Meter in enough situations to see and measure impacts. I had the feeling that morale of a player would have an effect (else, why is it there?) on something, but mostly chemistry, but since not playing over time would impact the player’s morale, I appreciate very much that you confirm that there is a correlation there, as intangible as it might be.

I suppose “rust” would be a factor; I would like to think that if a guy was bummed about not playing, he would be so ecstatic to see the field that he would go 4-4 or throw a 2-hitter, instead of having a negative results for finally playing. Guess I will have to see how that goes.

I guess, then, if I sit a guy for 3 weeks for no other reason than I don’t trust him, and his morale is NOT negative in any way, then he is fine just cashing the cheques.

I have always used a player I don’t trust, for whatever reason, in an easy situation that won’t get out of hand, just to give that player some innings or at-bats, but I tend to have my favorite guys and I am most definitely not a platoon-type manager.

I will have to pay more attention to that now. Thank you!

IME when it comes to morale, winning cures everything, and conversely if you're losing then you're going to hear from a whole host of guys who think they should be starting or hitting higher in the order or who are just playing poorly and want to blame someone for it ("Player Performance" is indeed one of the factors that goes into morale).

I think platoons can get players mad as well if they think they should be starting full-time and (especially) if they are the right-handed half of it (i.e. if you're not spelling the other guy against RHP they're only playing a third of the time). So it's not a panacea. I know that IRL back in the 40s and 50s Casey Stengel pissed off several Yankees players by subbing them in and out a lot - Jerry Priddy especially but I think Scooter aired his grievances to reporters on more than one occasion, and Hank Bauer later said that Stengel platooned him and Gene Woodling early on to "make [them] both mad" (in context he was saying that this made both of them play harder and it was a compliment to Stengel but I'm sure that at the time he was just plain unhappy). In-game, if you're going through a 65-97 season, I'd just expect everyone who's 30 or older to be not happy with you in some way, shape, or form.

[Statsman1]

You cannot please everyone, all the time. I guess it would be unlikely that every single player is thrilled with life at any given time.

I wonder how entwined the morale, relationships and Team Chemistry are.

I had just hired a new manager to start the season, and instantly, he had a “Bad Relationship” with a third of my team. The report was that the mood in the clubhouse is good, but could be better. But we are 5-1 to start the year, and no messages of open revolt or uprising are coming to the fore. As long as everyone’s mood seems to be “happy face or better” I presume there is no plot to overthrow the regime.

Just when I think this game is complicated but I am making progress, I find something else to keep me up at night. Guess that’s why I preorder…Markus has me brainwashed….

[Pelican]

Agreed on the depth (and thus challenge) of the game. I do miss the APBA reminder that a player was getting “itchy” - although they tended to be players who fully earned their spot on the bench.