Ball Park Factors?

[thomascmiller2346]

I am new, been advised in forum to gear ball park factors to my team. How do I do this and what should be done?

[QuantaCondor]

Originally Posted by thomascmiller2346

I am new, been advised in forum to gear ball park factors to my team. How do I do this and what should be done?

Park factors are found in: Team Home Screen -> Info -> Ballpark -> Edit Ballpark.

AVG LHB and RHB: Impacts CON of lefty and righty batters, respectively. Adjustable from 0.9 to 1.1

Doubles/Triples: Impacts GAP of all hitters. Adjustable from 0.5 to 1.5

Home Runs LHB and RHB: Impacts POW of lefty and righty batters, respectively. Adjustable from 0.9 to 1.1

[Orcin]

You can only adjust park factors between the end of the season (for you) and the first few games of the new season (Monday AM).So the time to do it is now if you are not in the playoffs. Be sure to "submit team" after making your changes.

[Solafide]

Ugh, I'll need to do this after this week's season. Had no idea on this and am already at work.

[chazzycat]

I have been thinking about the best way to explain park factors recently. It's a complex topic, can be hard to explain sometimes...but also is quite important IMO.

Essentially it boils down to two axes (x & y) which divides all players into four quadrants. One axis is Contact/Gap vs. Power/Eye, and the other is Lefties vs. Righties.

So we have 4 types of hitters:
A) RHB contact/gap hitters (Gary Maddox)
B) RHB power/eye hitters (Mike Trout)
C) LHB contact/gap hitters (Rod Carew)
D) LHB power/eye hitters (Babe Ruth)

So basically you choose one quadrant, and stock your team with that type of player. Pretty straightforward so far. But the complex part comes when you remember that the same axes exist for pitching and defense strategies as well. It's absolutely critical to consider both sides of the game when you're thinking about your park factors. So for example if you build your offense around type A hitters (max RHB contact) then you would also want to have strong RHPs to keep opponents RHBs in check. Also, by throwing all RHP you would get more lefties into your opponents lineups from platoons, who would then be playing at a 10% disadvantage. So you can kind of use your ballpark factors to neutralize handedness advantages. Over time, these add up.

The other axis is critical as well. If your park favors contact over power, that means your pitching/defense strategy should revolve around preventing singles, not homers. The park is already helping prevent homers so it's not the priority. How do you prevent singles? Strike the hitters out and play good defense...those are the two options. Movement rating doesn't do a thing to help with that, despite what you may read about how important MOV is. Ignoring that common advice has been the key to my success for my SmallBallers (5x perfect level playoff appearances and one lucky championship before I spent money). Don't be afraid to try something new if it makes sense in your head, despite what others say.

For my other team though, with maximum HR factor and minimum AVG factors, it makes total sense to prioritize movement rating. And that team is pretty dang effective as well (reached perfect a few times before spending money).

In my opinion, obtaining some kind of synergy between your offensive strategy, and your pitching/defense strategy, via the park factors, is key to success for anyone on a budget. The only question is how extreme one should take it.

[Argonaut]

The thing I'm kind of wondering about with park factors is their affect on batted balls. For instance, if I have a park that favours RHB contact, should I prioritize defense more than I normally would at LF and 3B? Or if I have a LHB park, should I prioritize RF defense and (gasp) 1B defense? Something I might experiment with.

[QuantaCondor]

Originally Posted by chazzycat

I have been thinking about the best way to explain park factors recently. It's a complex topic, can be hard to explain sometimes...but also is quite important IMO.

Essentially it boils down to two axes (x & y) which divides all players into four quadrants. One axis is Contact/Gap vs. Power/Eye, and the other is Lefties vs. Righties.

So we have 4 types of hitters:
A) RHB contact/gap hitters (Gary Maddox)
B) RHB power/eye hitters (Mike Trout)
C) LHB contact/gap hitters (Rod Carew)
D) LHB power/eye hitters (Babe Ruth)

So basically you choose one quadrant, and stock your team with that type of player. Pretty straightforward so far. But the complex part comes when you remember that the same axes exist for pitching and defense strategies as well. It's absolutely critical to consider both sides of the game when you're thinking about your park factors. So for example if you build your offense around type A hitters (max RHB contact) then you would also want to have strong RHPs to keep opponents RHBs in check. Also, by throwing all RHP you would get more lefties into your opponents lineups from platoons, who would then be playing at a 10% disadvantage. So you can kind of use your ballpark factors to neutralize handedness advantages. Over time, these add up.

The other axis is critical as well. If your park favors contact over power, that means your pitching/defense strategy should revolve around preventing singles, not homers. The park is already helping prevent homers so it's not the priority. How do you prevent singles? Strike the hitters out and play good defense...those are the two options. Movement rating doesn't do a thing to help with that, despite what you may read about how important MOV is. Ignoring that common advice has been the key to my success for my SmallBallers (5x perfect level playoff appearances and one lucky championship before I spent money). Don't be afraid to try something new if it makes sense in your head, despite what others say.

For my other team though, with maximum HR factor and minimum AVG factors, it makes total sense to prioritize movement rating. And that team is pretty dang effective as well (reached perfect a few times before spending money).

In my opinion, obtaining some kind of synergy between your offensive strategy, and your pitching/defense strategy, via the park factors, is key to success for anyone on a budget. The only question is how extreme one should take it.

I agree that those four player archetypes, and equivalent park factor setups, are the basic constructions for a team. But it gets more complicated if you consider taking a hybrid, which I'd argue most teams do. Usually you see the "hybrid" being either all-in lefties, all-in righties, all-in CON/GAP, or all-in POW/EYE. But there are possible cross-breeds as well. For example, my Cottons, who I built as a lefty killer (despite rolling only 1 lefty SP), have the following:

R CON: 1.1
L CON: 0.9
GAP: 0.5
R POW: 0.9 (testing changing this to 1.1, probably meta dependent)
L POW: 1.1

The Cottons have been unbelievably successful against lefty teams at home with this build, mostly because righty CON, lefty POW/EYE, and low GAP are relatively off-meta (at least for FTP players). So, you don't necessarily need to commit to a quadrant or a slice or whatever. You can have success with anywhere from 1-3 of these player archetype mixes, your team just needs to be built to reflect your decision.

[chazzycat]

Originally Posted by Argonaut

The thing I'm kind of wondering about with park factors is their affect on batted balls. For instance, if I have a park that favours RHB contact, should I prioritize defense more than I normally would at LF and 3B? Or if I have a LHB park, should I prioritize RF defense and (gasp) 1B defense? Something I might experiment with.

I'm not 100% sure, but I do suspect that to some extent. It just makes sense. It was a factor in my decision to experiment with Jeff McNeil in LF (my park favors LHB contact). I've still got the elite defense in RF with Ichiro, which presumably more lefties would be hitting it that direction.

[chazzycat]

Originally Posted by QuantaCondor

I agree that those four player archetypes, and equivalent park factor setups, are the basic constructions for a team. But it gets more complicated if you consider taking a hybrid, which I'd argue most teams do...

Oh, definitely. I was mostly just trying to explain the basic gist of it. And of course you still have to play half your games on the road...going too extreme could hurt there. It's all a delicate balancing act.



If I had to venture a guess though, your "lefty killer" anti-meta strategy is probably much better suited to OL, compared to regular random leagues. In my experience in the random leagues, the teams have mostly neutral parks. They mostly just got there with good players without even touching park factors. OL is totally different in that respect, with most teams having an extreme park setup, as far as I can remember.

[QuantaCondor]

Originally Posted by chazzycat

Oh, definitely. I was mostly just trying to explain the basic gist of it. And of course you still have to play half your games on the road...going too extreme could hurt there. It's all a delicate balancing act.



If I had to venture a guess though, your "lefty killer" anti-meta strategy is probably much better suited to OL, compared to regular random leagues. In my experience in the random leagues, the teams have mostly neutral parks. They mostly just got there with good players without even touching park factors. OL is totally different in that respect, with most teams having an extreme park setup, as far as I can remember.

It got even more extreme after you left it, as well. Last season 11/30 teams were lefty teams, and I think that's a decrease from a couple weeks ago.

So, definitely, I do not recommend just plucking park settings from someone and assuming it will work. I think the big takeaway is that you really just need a coherent strategy to score runs and prevent runs. Anybody whose team is built well around a particular strategy seems to have success.

EDIT: Also, as an interesting note, we recently had an OL team which got misplaced into a generic Perfect League after promotion from Diamond. That team made the playoffs in their random Perfect league. Then, upon re-entry to the Perfect OL League, they went 60-102 (or something like that) and were instantly demoted back to Diamond. I don't think the rostered players in OL are anywhere near the quality of an average random playoff team in Perfect, but nearly every regular player in Perfect OL has a refined strategy. It just goes to show that, except for some obvious extreme cases, park factors are much more important than player quality. Even the lone Perfect Big Walt that is in the league hasn't had the ERA crown in 4 years.

[chazzycat]

Originally Posted by QuantaCondor

EDIT: I don't think the rostered players in OL are anywhere near the quality of an average random playoff team in Perfect, but nearly every regular player in Perfect OL has a refined strategy. It just goes to show that, except for some obvious extreme cases, park factors are much more important than player quality. Even the lone Perfect Big Walt that is in the league hasn't had the ERA crown in 4 years.

I totally agree. I see it every week...my team with its 3 perfects and like a dozen golds, crushes far more talented teams (in terms of OVR) on a regular basis.

[Sipimi]

Originally Posted by Argonaut

The thing I'm kind of wondering about with park factors is their affect on batted balls. For instance, if I have a park that favours RHB contact, should I prioritize defense more than I normally would at LF and 3B? Or if I have a LHB park, should I prioritize RF defense and (gasp) 1B defense? Something I might experiment with.

I guess it depends partly on if the hitters you face have a spray or pull tendency.

[Argonaut]

Originally Posted by Sipimi

I guess it depends partly on if the hitters you face have a spray or pull tendency.

There's that piece too, though on the aggregate hitters will pull to the opposite field moreso than otherwise.

I'm interested in the nuts-and-bolts behind park factors and batted balls. Like, the OOTP engine sees 1.10 LHB AVG and 0.90 RHB AVG and does a good job of reflecting this skew in long-term statistics and results. But say in one case you had a 60 rated LF and a 60 rated RF, and in the other case you had a 50 rated LF and a 70 rated RF.

Would the latter setup be better for this park? Would the engine "understand" that a better right-fielder helps to mitigate the 1.10 LHB AVG park? What do these factors even "mean" in terms of park dimensions, especially if you also have 1.10 LHB HR.. a wide right field area and a tiny fence?

My gut feeling is that the OOTP engine will get this right.. especially because it seems to reflect the advantages of bunting against the infield shift. But I don't know the nuts-and-bolts of how it gets it right.

[QuantaCondor]

Originally Posted by Argonaut

There's that piece too, though on the aggregate hitters will pull to the opposite field moreso than otherwise.

I'm interested in the nuts-and-bolts behind park factors and batted balls. Like, the OOTP engine sees 1.10 LHB AVG and 0.90 RHB AVG and does a good job of reflecting this skew in long-term statistics and results. But say in one case you had a 60 rated LF and a 60 rated RF, and in the other case you had a 50 rated LF and a 70 rated RF.

Would the latter setup be better for this park? Would the engine "understand" that a better right-fielder helps to mitigate the 1.10 LHB AVG park? What do these factors even "mean" in terms of park dimensions, especially if you also have 1.10 LHB HR.. a wide right field area and a tiny fence?

My gut feeling is that the OOTP engine will get this right.. especially because it seems to reflect the advantages of bunting against the infield shift. But I don't know the nuts-and-bolts of how it gets it right.

Probably hitter BABIP is opposed by defender Range for the relevant batted ball location. So, if opposing hitters pull more, then those fielders would be more important. I don't think it's a stretch at all for this to be integrated, I think I'd even expect it.

[Sipimi]

Originally Posted by Argonaut

There's that piece too, though on the aggregate hitters will pull to the opposite field moreso than otherwise.



I'm interested in the nuts-and-bolts behind park factors and batted balls. Like, the OOTP engine sees 1.10 LHB AVG and 0.90 RHB AVG and does a good job of reflecting this skew in long-term statistics and results. But say in one case you had a 60 rated LF and a 60 rated RF, and in the other case you had a 50 rated LF and a 70 rated RF.



Would the latter setup be better for this park? Would the engine "understand" that a better right-fielder helps to mitigate the 1.10 LHB AVG park? What do these factors even "mean" in terms of park dimensions, especially if you also have 1.10 LHB HR.. a wide right field area and a tiny fence?



My gut feeling is that the OOTP engine will get this right.. especially because it seems to reflect the advantages of bunting against the infield shift. But I don't know the nuts-and-bolts of how it gets it right.

My (simplistic) understanding of it is that a multiplier is applied to all hitters of the same side regardless of where they hit the ball. After that, having a better defensive right/left side of the field depends entirely on the type of batters you face, so if you've facing my 9 RHB spray hitters it wouldn't make a difference and RF would still be slightly more important than LF.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that if I use a specific park factor (ex.: 1.1 RHB with 0.9 LHB) I'll also use RHP to maximise the number of LHB in the opposing team lineup, which reduces the potential added impact of the RF in that specific case

[Argonaut]

Also got me thinking about spray hitters and how they play into park factors. Ichiro bats left, but he sprays it. I assume he gets a benefit from 1.1 LHB AVG. But because he sprays it, is he hurt by 0.9 RHB AVG? Or is the 1.1/0.9 coefficient just applied to the handedness of the batter? But then that would mitigate the park affects on batted balls that we've been talking about.

Think about it... Ichiro sprays it to LF in a 1.1 LHB AVG park. The LF goes: "Crap, the park factor gods are telling me this ball is harder to get to than a RHB ball hit to me. What do I do?"

There's so many moving parts to this.. hard to keep track of! I'll be able to run OOTP simulations at work in a couple weeks, haha. Maybe then I can figure something out.

[chazzycat]

Originally Posted by Argonaut

Also got me thinking about spray hitters and how they play into park factors. Ichiro bats left, but he sprays it. I assume he gets a benefit from 1.1 LHB AVG. But because he sprays it, is he hurt by 0.9 RHB AVG?

Pretty sure the answer is no, mostly just because my team is full of LHB spray hitters and they get the job done.

[Argonaut]

Originally Posted by chazzycat

Pretty sure the answer is no, mostly just because my team is full of LHB spray hitters and they get the job done.

Yeah, I'm sure.. but then that doesn't make logical sense? I mean, if the LF sees a LHB coming up to the plate, does he think.. "hmm, if the ball is hit to my area I'm going to give it a 1 second headstart."

I know it's all abstracted but if you think about it closely, the park factors are kind of arbitrary. Interesting and fun to build teams around.. but arbitrary and not really baseball-y.

[chazzycat]

Originally Posted by Argonaut

Yeah, I'm sure.. but then that doesn't make logical sense? I mean, if the LF sees a LHB coming up to the plate, does he think.. "hmm, if the ball is hit to my area I'm going to give it a 1 second headstart."

I know it's all abstracted but if you think about it closely, the park factors are kind of arbitrary. Interesting and fun to build teams around.. but arbitrary and not really baseball-y.

LOL, ok I get what you're saying.

If it helps you keep the immersion, how I think about L/R factors is how shadows can fall on either side of the plate. That would make it harder for batters on one side to pick up on the ball.

[Argonaut]

Originally Posted by chazzycat

LOL, ok I get what you're saying.

If it helps you keep the immersion, how I think about L/R factors is how shadows can fall on either side of the plate. That would make it harder for batters on one side to pick up on the ball.

Yeah, I guess my Vikings Longhouse Stadium is purposely designed to shine sun/bright lights in the eyes of RHB.