Test League: 25 years of stats, stats, and more stats (lots of screenshots included)

[philliesphan26]

So I did a similar thread last year for OOTP 13 and decided to try it again for OOTP 14. The idea is to see what kind of stats the game is generating many years down the line. In this case, I simmed ahead 25 years. I have the league currently open and am willing to sim further/post screens and player cards of anything anybody wants to see, just ask. For the record, this is a 16 team fictional league and EVERYTHING was kept at default. Without further ado, here's some screenshots of the batting leaderboards.

Overview of single season/career leaders:

Career AVG leaderboards:

Single-season AVG leaderboards:

Career HR leaderboards:

Single-Season HR leaderboards:

Career RBI leaderboards:

Single-season RBI leaderboards:

Career SB leaderboards:

Single-season SB leaderboards:

Things are looking pretty good here honestly. In another thread I had mentioned I had seen some slightly "troubling" results about inflated offensive stats in other test leagues I did-- namely SB numbers that looked a bit high, including someone who stole 89 bases one year, and someone else who stole 72 in a different league. Plus, in those leagues I thought the RBI/HR numbers looked a bit high... But this test sim has put my fears about the offensive stats to rest. Through 25 years, there's only been 1 HOF player automatically inducted (Roberto Lujan), which is fine since I manually do HOF anyway. I like knowing that 90 SBs, or 65 HRs, or 160 RBIs is technically possible based on other test sims I've done, but it takes a very special type of player to do it. As it should be. I'm really excited about the results here, and it's really making me look forward to going deep into my league (which I haven't even started yet!)

Anyway, on to pitching:

Overview of single season/career leaders:

Career Wins leaderboard:

Single-season Wins leaderboard:

Single-season ERA leaderboard:

Career K leaderboard:

Single-season K leaderboard:

Career SV leaderboard:

Single-season SV leaderboard:

To me, the pitching stats are a little more worrying than the batting stats. Look at the single-season ERA leaders... there's a lot of 2013 and 2014 performances in there. Not the best of signs, especially since those are insanely low ERAs (sub-2!). I don't mind seeing sub-2 ERAs, but that many in such a short period of time isn't what you want to see if you are going for modern-day stat emulation. NOTE: I didn't bother to post career ERA leaders because most of it is likely relievers... Though the #1 guy was actually a SP for the majority of his career... Other than that, the wins and saves look good (both single-season and career). Strikeouts are probably a little bit high but I don't think that's a huge issue.

In short, I think this may be the best OOTP yet in producing realistic and exciting long-term stats. And there's always the potential for a superstar to have a ridiculously good season... 60+ HR, 150+ RBI, .370+ AVG, 80+ SB are all possible with the right people but still rare enough to not be unrealistic. The only thing that might be troubling is the pitching ERAs, and that only seems to be an issue in the first 3 or so years (if this is anything to go off of). It's certainly a small sample size, but I thought it'd still be good food for thought and maybe create a nice discussion. I can do another test league for sample size sake soon if there's interest.

[bschr682]

I have noticed a lot of high K performances as well. Has me mildly concerned although it is admittedly a breath of fresh air to see the pitchers dominating the hitters these days.

[philliesphan26]

Originally Posted by bschr682

I have noticed a lot of high K performances as well. Has me mildly concerned although it is admittedly a breath of fresh air to see the pitchers dominating the hitters these days.

You're right, although the K numbers are actually very similar to OOTP 13... I just pulled up a league of mine that's 16 years in on OOTP 13 (this is one of my serious leagues, not a test league), and the leader has just over 3200 Ks for his career. There were about 5 instances where someone threw over 300 in a season too. On the high side yes, but at least it's an easy fix (if you choose) via the league value modifiers.

[bschr682]

It is pretty fabulous how much control we have over the league stats through the modifiers. Although I still haven't gotten comfortable using them.

[zroberts1991]

May seem a little nutty but Ive run an 80 year test sims messing with modifiers to get them aligned with v13. If you want pitching outputs similar to ootp 13 I would set strikeouts to .890, babip to .295 and pitcher stamina to .900.

Gives me stats similar to what I saw with v13.. not saying these fully mirror what you will see in baseball today but if you are looking to keep your league records in tack from an imported league these should give you similar stats

[chickennoodle77]

Nice to see that Tim Floyd had a decent baseball career following his basketball coaching stints at ISU, USC, and with the Bulls....

[jaa36]

Keep in mind that strikeouts per game have increased (and are at a record high) over the last few years- so it's not surprising that OOTP 14 at default settings would produce higher strikeout rates than OOTP 13 did at default settings.

The other numbers look great. I'm curious if a longer-term sim at these settings will yield any 300 game winners. I'll probably bump the stamina modifier up and the reliever frequency down in my solo league to increase the odds of getting one.

[Lafayette53]

What sort of career-tracks are you seeing?

[zroberts1991]

Forgot that I already had my pitcher stamina set to normal in league strategy so disregard my stamina settings if yours are set to low.

I ran two separate sims using default age/dev modifiers and the ones that had been posted on this board for ootp 13. I still like that age/dev. modifiers scaled down, you will have players with longer careers and will get a few more players hitting the 3000 hits and 300 wins marks

[Tycobbler]

I'd like to no more about the career of Will Richards. At first glance the name Wade Boggs comes to mind, and i'd like to see if their stats are similar.

[Shadow Knows]

What immediately stands out is the lack of longevity. All-time greats should be playing much longer, and the career records relative to the season records suggest they're also cratering before the end. It's just not plausible that so many players could routinely hit 45-50 home runs in their primes, yet average less than 30 over short careers. It basically requires a Griffey-esque coda, which there isn't time for when playing only 14 or 15 years.

Same story for pitchers. There are only two who have the kind of career length you'd expect from the greats, and even they didn't manage to sniff 4,000 innings. Given the record 262-inning season and the strikeout leaderboard, it obviously isn't that they're limited to 160-190 innings a year, it's that they're not sustaining 210-240 for as long as they should.

[philliesphan26]

Originally Posted by Shadow Knows

What immediately stands out is the longevity. All-titwo greats should be playing much longer, and the career records relative to the season records suggest they're also cratering before the end. It's just not plausible that so many players could routinely hit 45-50 home runs in their primes, yet average less than 30 over short careers. It basically requires a Griffey-esque coda, which there isn't time for when playing only 14 or 15 years.

Same story for pitchers. There are only two who have the kind of career length you'd expect from the greats, and even they didn't manage to sniff 4,000 innings. Given the record 262-inning season and the strikeout leaderboard, it obviously isn't that they're limited to 160-190 innings a year, it's that they're not sustaining 210-240 for as long as they should.

I agree. This is why you see people turning down the player aging modifiers for batters and pitchers. I'll probably end up doing that for my league too after seeing this.

As for Will Richards, I will post his player card when I get the chance but I'm at work all day if I remember correctly he hit over .300 every season except his last two (and one of those seasons he hit .298.

[beorn]

Originally Posted by zroberts1991

May seem a little nutty but Ive run an 80 year test sims messing with modifiers to get them aligned with v13. If you want pitching outputs similar to ootp 13 I would set strikeouts to .890, babip to .295 and pitcher stamina to .900.

Gives me stats similar to what I saw with v13.. not saying these fully mirror what you will see in baseball today but if you are looking to keep your league records in tack from an imported league these should give you similar stats

Not nutty at all in your goal -- to keep some continuity in an existing league.

But it does beg the question whether you need to make adjustments to the modifiers.

Granted, OOTP14 out of the box seems to produce more pitching dominated leagues... but if this is based simply on the modifiers, then importing a league from 13 to 14 SHOULD bring along the modifiers that made 13 play the way it did.

I ran a quick test. I created a league in 2012 in OOTP13 and ran a season. Then, at the start of 2013, I imported into OOTP14. Here's what happened to league ERA and BA over the next 20 years. See what you think:


My sense is that there is no abrupt change, but rather a very gradual one. This implies that Markus did not so much change the "League Total" modifiers, as he changed the player creation modifiers. Thus, established players went on playing about as they had. But when newly created players in OOTP14 reached the majors, they altered the overall results.

In some ways, this may be more disruptive to online leagues, where teams that have invested heavily in young pitching in recent seasons find that those pitchers are not worth what they thought. On the other hand, there will be no abrupt change in the league stats.

And, if I am right in my guess here, it means that it is player creation modifiers that would need adjustment, if you want to keep an OOTP13 league going with the status quo balance between pitching and hitting.

[mauboy]

Poor Drummers of Brooklyn.

[jaa36]

Here's my test league, 40 seasons, major league plus five levels of minors, feeder high school and college leagues, and amateur (but not established) international players. DH in both subleagues, stamina increased to "normal," reliever and closer frequency decreased to "high."

I am really impressed with the numbers at these settings. The league ERAs and batting averages are very smooth and consistent, especially starting in 1893, 12 years after the league started. Reasonable chances to attain 25 wins, 350 K, 60 HR, 250 hits, 75 SB in a single season, and 300 wins, 3000 hits, 500 HR in a career. When I set up my league for real (post patch), I'll likely use these settings, sim 15 years, and then delete the history.

[philliesphan26]

Originally Posted by jaa36

Here's my test league, 40 seasons, major league plus five levels of minors, feeder high school and college leagues, and amateur (but not established) international players. DH in both subleagues, stamina increased to "normal," reliever and closer frequency decreased to "high."

I am really impressed with the numbers at these settings. The league ERAs and batting averages are very smooth and consistent, especially starting in 1893, 12 years after the league started. Reasonable chances to attain 25 wins, 350 K, 60 HR, 250 hits, 75 SB in a single season, and 300 wins, 3000 hits, 500 HR in a career. When I set up my league for real (post patch), I'll likely use these settings, sim 15 years, and then delete the history.

Nice! Looks good man. Though lots of the single season records are from very early on... Makes the need to delete the history after a decade or so even more needed. Otherwise I like it. What were your player development and aging modifiers?

[Cryomaniac]

Here's some stuff from my tests. The ERA numbers seem quite low, and not just early on. Hinton was damn good though, he had sub 2.00 ERAs from 2014 to 2018 and again in 2020 before a couple of serious injuries derailed his career a bit.

[byzeil]

This is a comparison of the same league in both v13 and v14 after a 31 year sim.

This league was created in v13. I cleared out all team/player history in the league and then imported it in v14. I made no other changes to either league.

OOTP13 Year to Year Summary


OOTP14 Year to Year Summary


OOTP13 Season & Career Batting leaders


OOTP14 Season & Career Batting leaders


OOTP13 Season & Career Pitching leaders


OOTP14 Season & Career Pitching leaders


What I seem to see is that initially offensive output was higher in v14 than it was in v13 and pitching ERA was higher in v14 compared to v13. But then they converged when I hit about year 21/22 of the sim. The v14 numbers seemed to come back into line with the v13 numbers.

This seems to indicate that the v14 PCMs produced better pitching/poorer hitting. Early on in the v14 league the stats were produced by players created in v13. But as more players who were created in v14 made it to the majors the league batting stats lowered and the pitching stats improved.

Here are graphs representing League BAVG and ERA over the 33 years.

[philliesphan26]

Wow great post man. The graphs really do say it all, and it backs up what beorn was saying earlier.

[philliesphan26]

Originally Posted by Tycobbler

I'd like to no more about the career of Will Richards. At first glance the name Wade Boggs comes to mind, and i'd like to see if their stats are similar.

Here he is. Had a bit of a pop to his swing, managed a 20 HR season once. Decent gap hitter. Not as fast as expected, but above average. A victim of the shortened career, only played in the Majors from 2016-2028. 9 hits shy of 2000, who knows what would have happened if he didn't decline so rapidly...