Major flaw 1/2: Pinch Hitting

[Dutch Alexander]

Over the years playing this game I have observed a serious flaw considering pinch hitting. This only occurs when playing out your games. Personally I play out all my games, usually in one-pitch mode. My pinch hitter always performed so bad that my pitchers were actually outhitting my pinch hitters. See attached below an overview of the performance of my pinch hitters over the years. In a game like this that tries to simulate baseball the feeling of realism is everything and a flaw so blatant kills the immersion factor. I opened a thread about this subject a few month ago. Not sure how to link a thread and too lazy to figure it out, but if you search for 'pinch hitting' you'll find it. Thread basically ended with Marcus saying he didn't think a problem existed but that he would tweek some settings in the upcoming patch.
Not sure what he did excactly but it seems to have worked. Since that patch my pinch hitter have actually 'hit'. Below also find attached my PH totals in my current game.

Last few months I've been out at sea without any possibility to post here, nor not much opportunity to play the game, so it's been awhile since the last thread. Difficulty with this problem is that it only occurs when playing out your games, therefor it takes a very long time to get sufficient data. Because of the limited playing time sample size is small, but it looks like the problem has been fixed. As you can see my pinch hitters have hit very well since the patch. If anything, my pinch hitters have hit too well! Allthough the sample size is small it does seem that one of the two major flaws has been fixed. Have others who play out their games observed simmilar results?
If you look at my PH totals for my current game you'll notice only one thing out of the ordinary: BB drawn by my pinch hitters.
Which leads us to the second major flaw for which I will open another thread.

[tomwolf2008]

I don't think I saw a problem, I played out all my games and my teams PH all roughly fall around .200 BA, which seems right compare to Major League data.

And btw, I looked up data and there are some team's PH BA is barely over 1, so it could be you just have very bad luck. You need others to have a similiar occurence to decide there is a problem. (I realize this is what you are doing right now)

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by tomwolf2008

And btw, I looked up data and there are some team's PH BA is barely over 1, so it could be you just have very bad luck. You need others to have a similiar occurence to decide there is a problem. (I realize this is what you are doing right now)

As you can see the data I provided is data collected over many years. This has got nothing to do with sample size or bad luck. PH do not hit .130 in almost 1000 AB out of bad luck. Also if you read the old thread you'll see there are others who have reported the same thing. This PH flaw is just a very simple observation on my part of a real problem. But like I said it seems to have been fixed.

[tomwolf2008]

Originally Posted by Dutch Alexander

As you can see the data I provided is data collected over many years. This has got nothing to do with sample size or bad luck. PH do not hit .130 in almost 1000 AB out of bad luck. Also if you read the old thread you'll see there are others who have reported the same thing. This PH flaw is just a very simple observation on my part of a real problem. But like I said it seems to have been fixed.

I played out games over years as well. Now, by Bad luck, I don't mean your pinch hitter would hit .130 over 1000 AB by bad luck, but by bad luck you could just have bad pinch hitters. (Which, btw, actually might be a problem of OOTP since OOTP seems to have a lot no-bat no-glove players on the bench so naturally those players will hit poorly)

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by tomwolf2008

I played out games over years as well. Now, by Bad luck, I don't mean your pinch hitter would hit .130 over 1000 AB by bad luck, but by bad luck you could just have bad pinch hitters. (Which, btw, actually might be a problem of OOTP since OOTP seems to have a lot no-bat no-glove players on the bench so naturally those players will hit poorly)

Sure, but that would mean I've had bad PH every single time. And not just bad PH but historically bad PH. Every single time. Unlikely. Also pre-patch my 2012 Cards went 3 for 40. Post patch in a new game they have gone 34 for 115. This is not bad luck but a real problem, which seems to have been fixed. Believe me, I have spent many hours researching this.
Also you say you have had different results, but is that from memory or from looking at actual data?

[tomwolf2008]

Originally Posted by Dutch Alexander

Sure, but that would mean I've had bad PH every single time. And not just bad PH but historically bad PH. Every single time. Unlikely. Also pre-patch my 2012 Cards went 3 for 40. Post patch in a new game they have gone 34 for 115. This is not bad luck but a real problem, which seems to have been fixed. Believe me, I have spent many hours researching this.
Also you say you have had different results, but is that from memory or from looking at actual data?

Actual data I have quite a lot solo leagues running. It could be just my good luck that I didn't see a problem too if it actually has one

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by tomwolf2008

Actual data I have quite a lot solo leagues running. It could be just my good luck that I didn't see a problem too if it actually has one

Data from the current version of the game? The patch I talked about was released 4 or 5 month ago. The PH problem occured only before this patch.

[tomwolf2008]

Originally Posted by Dutch Alexander

Data from the current version of the game? The patch I talked about was released 4 or 5 month ago. The PH problem occured only before this patch.

I'm talking about current, as well as previous version of game. (Now I see it I don't PH that much so that might be part of reason)

[VanillaGorilla]

Originally Posted by Dutch Alexander

Believe me, I have spent many hours researching this.

Take a couple minutes and post the individual PH stats from a broken league along with the full season batting stats from those same players. Thanks.

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by VanillaGorilla

Take a couple minutes and post the individual PH stats from a broken league along with the full season batting stats from those same players. Thanks.

Like I said before, problem seems to have been fixed. So not sure where you're going, but below 2 examples, both from OOTP12.

[VanillaGorilla]

With the full season data of the Cubs roster posted (why only half data for the Mets?) what jumps out at me, more than the BA, is the K rate.

These look like K rates for pitchers, and cannot be explained away by an increased frequency of ABs vs Closers.

It looks like that in, perhaps, in one pitch mode when a PH was entered into the game, his hitting rating were not, and the resultant pitcher/batter outcome was resolved as if the hitter was still the one that had been substituted for....often, a pitcher.

On this topic, your presented data indeed does make a strong case that something was amiss.

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by VanillaGorilla

(why only half data for the Mets?)

Ah, this game is the only one where I have ever progressed beyond the first season. This data comes from the third and final season that I played. At this point I was pretty much eliminated from the playoffs and grew tired of it and quit. Data for this season was easily retrievable, data from the first two seasons were no longer retrievable.

[The Game]

Dutch, I can't argue with your data and I wish I would have tracked my data as you did to put up against yours. I have had a team PH average over .300 in my ABF the last 2 years and in my other custom league it was .275 for 1 team over 6 seasons and .281 over 3 seasons for another team. It is .125 for my current team 96 games into the 2012 season. No DH in any of these leagues. For the team that I was with for 6 years. I had many real MLB players as PH namely Daryl Ward. Ward started about 10 games a year the rest of his AB's were all as a PH. Roughly 60 AB's each year. For my current ABF I had a backup SS that i traded for after 17 games that already was 5 for 9 PH. He hit .390 as a PH for me roughly 80 AB. This season he is 2-5 and is my starting 3B. My 5th OF last year went 10-30 this year 0-11.
Did you look at MLB teams over the course of several years or just sample one team one season that had great PHers?
I have 3 leagues in progress right now I will try to to track them the next 3 years (almost 4 months real time) and put that data up against yours.
I have only had issues PH a few seasons out of over 50 overall seasons across 11-13.

[RchW]

Originally Posted by VanillaGorilla

With the full season data of the Cubs roster posted (why only half data for the Mets?) what jumps out at me, more than the BA, is the K rate.

These look like K rates for pitchers, and cannot be explained away by an increased frequency of ABs vs Closers.

It looks like that in, perhaps, in one pitch mode when a PH was entered into the game, his hitting rating were not, and the resultant pitcher/batter outcome was resolved as if the hitter was still the one that had been substituted for....often, a pitcher.

On this topic, your presented data indeed does make a strong case that something was amiss.

Wow! that is an amazing observation that just simply would not have occurred to me. It's like you took my blindfold off.

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by The Game

Did you look at MLB teams over the course of several years or just sample one team one season that had great PHers?

The table I inserted in the first post has all the PH data I ever assembled playing this game with NL teams. Second column in the table shows from what version of the game the data comes from.

I always use the MLB Quickstart that comes with each game.

1. I choose one team to play with and just use it's standard roster, only making the odd trade here and there.
2. I pretty much use the default settings.
3. I do not use the take button.
4. I play out all my games, never simulate any.
5. I play in one-pitch mode.
6. Sometimes I switch to pitch-by-pitch mode during the game, depending on the game situation.
7. I always use the warm-up rule.

As you can see in the table my PH have performed bad every single time without exception. And not just bad, but beyond historically bad. This data from 5+ seasons is so far removed from anything you would expect to happen, that there clearly was something wrong. In 987 AB's they produced a BA of .131, an OB% of .210 and a SLG% of .186. This is well beyond anything that can be explained by simple change.
Over this period my pitchers were actually outhitting my PH's.

Originally Posted by The Game

I have 3 leagues in progress right now I will try to to track them the next 3 years (almost 4 months real time) and put that data up against yours.
I have only had issues PH a few seasons out of over 50 overall seasons across 11-13.

If you look at the second table in the first post you'll see the PH data from my current game. I started this game after the patch, mentioned before, was released. As you can see my PH's in this game (played the same way as always) perform markedly different. Although this is a relatively small sample size the difference in performance is so striking, it seems something has changed since the patch. It seems the PH problem has been resolved. So in yoúr 3 leagues in progress you should see normal performances from your PH's.

[Dutch Alexander]

Here is the link by the way to the old thread I started about Pinch Hitting many month ago for anyone that is interested. Hope the link works, never tried it before.

http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...t=pinchhitting

[Dutch Alexander]

Originally Posted by VanillaGorilla

It looks like that in, perhaps, in one pitch mode when a PH was entered into the game, his hitting rating were not, and the resultant pitcher/batter outcome was resolved as if the hitter was still the one that had been substituted for....often, a pitcher.

It could be that something like this happened indeed. In the old thread about pinch hitting (for which I posted a link in my previous post), there was a concensus that the problem seemed to only affect pinch hitting for pitchers.
My AL teams seemed to do all right in PH. They produces the following batting line in 3 seasons. Still a bit mediocre and only a small sample size, but much more realistic.

[Dutch Alexander]

So to recap and conclude this thread:

1. There used to be a problem with pinch hitting;
2. Pinch hitters performed as pitchers or worse;
3. Problem seemed to occur only when pinch hitting for pitchers;
4. As VanillaGorilla observed so astutely cause of the problem may have been the following:

   Originally Posted by VanillaGorilla

   It looks like that in, perhaps, in one pitch mode when a PH was entered into the game, his hitting rating were not, and the resultant pitcher/batter outcome was resolved as if the hitter was still the one that had been substituted for....often, a pitcher.

5. Marcus did not think there was a problem, but tweaked some code;
6. This change was included in a patch that was released about 4-5 month ago;
7. Since this patch pinch hitters seem to perform normally.

So all in all a good development that brings this game another step closer to perfection.

[Dutch Alexander]

One final update on the PH issue. I just completed the regular season in my present game and below are the final results of my pinch hitters. A relatively small sample size, but a significant difference from past seasons. Overall batting line looks realistic for PH. Only thing that is off here is the number of BB's. But that's caused by the warm-up rule (which is broken as explained in other threads) which I used for the first 107 games in this season.

So, once again, it seems that in the past when PH for pitchers, the result of the AB was determined by the pitchers batting rating, not the PH bating rating. This explaines the poor performance (including high k rate) of PH in the past. Since an early patch for v.13 this problem has been fixed and now PH hit as themselves instead of hitting like pitchers.

[OldFatGuy]

I didn't read the whole thread, but I've harped on this issue a hundred times, only to be ridiculed, but when you read responses saying so and so plays out their games and had good pinch hitting what I noticed was it only happened in leagues without a DH, and pinch hitting specifically for the pitcher. I mentioned this before and was roundly ridiculed again.

But I saw a couple of posts above where someone said it looked like when one would pinch hit for a pitcher, it was as if the pitcher's ratings were still used, and that's EXACTLY what I and others have been saying for several versions now.

I am glad to hear that it's fixed, and I won't raise the other issues that I know with the same amount of confidence are real issues too but because it only happens playing out games it's difficult to impossible to gather enough data to placate the "too small of a sample size" folks (who are correct, but never considered the fact that even though one person didn't have the data, the fact that many, many people reported the same problem should be considered as well IMO).

But I would ask one question to the developers. How was this problem "fixed" and do you still stand by the claim that results are obtained EXACTLY THE SAME WAY playing out games as when simming them?? (Not asking for specifics or trade secrets on exactly how it was fixed, but am curious as to generally if it was a problem of using the pitcher's ratings instead of the pinch hitter's or was it something else entirely??)