Historical Managerial Tendencies

[majesty95]

I'm having a tough time in a new historical league I started. I'm the Rangers starting in 1983 and my team is FAR under performing what they did in real life. My team is currently 23-43 when their real life counterparts went 77-85. I was hoping to improve on what the real life team did but apparently I am worse for them.

I'm am not playing out any games, just simming them so I'm looking for help on what you guys do to extract the most out of your lineups and pitching staffs.

Here are some key stats:

Cyber Rangers batting: .270/.326/.376
Real life Rangers batting: .255/.310/.366

Cyber Rangers pitching: 4.58 ERA/1.43 WHIP/.295 BABIP/57.6% GB%
Real life Rangers pitching: 3.31 ERA/1.27 WHIP

Obviously my pitching is my problem but I'm not sure how to correct it. I'm getting a lot of ground balls and apparently they're finding their way through the defense. However, I'm using historical transactions so its the same team they had in real life.

I know its a small sample size and maybe things can turn around. However, I'd like to hear what types of things some of you guys do to maximize the talent (or lack there of) on your teams when doing historical replays?

Thanks!

[majesty95]

OK, I figured out part of the issue. The AI had sent Bucky Dent down (which I knew) but I didn't realize he was my best fielding middle infielder. I brought him back up and put him at SS, moved Curtis Wilkerson to 2B and put Wayne Tolleson on the bench. This will give me better defense up the middle while not significantly hurting my offense. I also put Pete O'Brien at 1B instead of 1B (which I didn't even realize I had done). That should help too. We'll see how that goes.

EDIT: I've gone 2-8 since making those changes

[statfreak]

When you created this league, did you select the Single Season reply option? Have you disabled player development? I see you are using historical transactions, but obviously not historical lineups.

Curtis Wilkerson hit .171 in only 16 games in 1983. Based on that and your posts above, I'll assume you did not select the single season reply option upon importing the league.

From the limited information you provided, I would say while you are "replaying" the 1983 season you are not using the actual 1983 ratings and lineups so you can't really compare what is happening in your league to the actual real life counterpart. I only say this because the ratings you are seeing are not intended to mimic the actual 1983 season and will progress / regress at the whim of the OOTP development engine so players will perform differently as you are seeing.

It is possible the team will turn it around and finish closer to expectations, but without additional information regarding your league set up it is difficult to offer any suggestions or advice.

[pennywise]

does the game have this? i had not noticed

[majesty95]

Hmmm. I chose career play as I intended to play through multiple seasons. Is that wrong?

Scouting and coaching are off.
Im using a 3-year recalc with current year doubled.
Ratings are based on real stats.
Overall rating based on all players
Real historical transactions are used

I don't see where player dev is. I'm pretty sure it is off.

I didnt think about it up front. I always use three year recalc. But wanting to basically try and mange the same team to a better record I should have used one year recalc. Can I change this now?

Any other suggestions?

[PhillieFever]

Originally Posted by majesty95

Hmmm. I chose career play as I intended to play through multiple seasons. Is that wrong?

Scouting and coaching are off.
Im using a 3-year recalc with current year doubled.
Ratings are based on real stats.
Overall rating based on all players
Real historical transactions are used

I don't see where player dev is. I'm pretty sure it is off.

I didnt think about it up front. I always use three year recalc. But wanting to basically try and mange the same team to a better record I should have used one year recalc. Can I change this now?

Any other suggestions?

If you want that OOTP has to offer in terms of a replay that you'll probably need to start over with different settings because in the past I've found that changing certain options after the sim has started creates issues. If you do decide to start over let me know what you looking the achieve exactly and I'll try my best to help you settings wise.

[majesty95]

Thanks Phillie.

Basically, I want to take over as manager of the Rangers and see if my managerial skills can guide them to a better record than Doug Radar and Bobby Valentine did.

I'd like the the players to perform fairly close to real life but with some slight variance. Essentially, I want to see if my lineup/staff managing tendencies can make the difference vs what they accomplished in real life. Unfortunately, I'm not super experienced with that. I've always done replays with trading and financials on. I've never tried it this way.

I'm hoping that by giving a certain player more or less PT than in real life or having a player higher or lower in the order or maybe used more/less on the staff that I can change the course of history. Of course, there's randomization so I'm not sure how much I'll be able to attribute to myself but that's the idea.

The biggest issue I've had so far was pitchers staying in far too long, a ton of errors and guys trying to steal too much. Most of that I've finally worked out but those were the things that I noticed having the biggest negative impact. I'm guessing the 3-year recalc too as most of my pitchers are far worse than they were in 83.

Thanks again for the feedback and help!

[majesty95]

After looking at the three years used in the recalc (83-85) many of my pitchers had at least two very good seasons. It doesn't explain why they've been so bad in the sim...

[Charlie Hough]

Several of your pitchers, like Frank Tanana and Rick Honeycutt, and John Butcher, did not have very good 1982 seasons. So this is going to affect their talent level in a 3-year recalc league.

By definition, their ratings will not be based on 1983 alone. They will be based on a combination of 1982, 1983, and 1984, though your choice to double the current season for rating purposes will weight 1983 more heavily.

Your batters are outperforming and your pitchers are under-performing, but this is within the realm of statistical variability, especially when you're balancing ratings across three yeas of stats.

Also, keep in mind that you may not be able to do better than Doug Radar or Bobby Valentine.

[majesty95]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Several of your pitchers, like Frank Tanana and Rick Honeycutt, and John Butcher, did not have very good 1982 seasons. So this is going to affect their talent level in a 3-year recalc league.

By definition, their ratings will not be based on 1983 alone. They will be based on a combination of 1982, 1983, and 1984, though your choice to double the current season for rating purposes will weight 1983 more heavily.

Your batters are outperforming and your pitchers are under-performing, but this is within the realm of statistical variability, especially when you're balancing ratings across three yeas of stats.

Also, keep in mind that you may not be able to do better than Doug Radar or Bobby Valentine.

That's not what I wanted to hear! Lol

Ok, last question. Should I use one year recalc for all ratings and can I use single season reply ratings but sill play multiple seasons?

[statfreak]

Originally Posted by majesty95

That's not what I wanted to hear! Lol

Ok, last question. Should I use one year recalc for all ratings and can I use single season reply ratings but sill play multiple seasons?

You can use single season replay ratings and still have multiple seasons. There should be a checkbox to re-rate players each season and then you can specify if you want ratings based on 1 year, 3 years, etc... (you already know this).

My initial comments were based on the assumption you wanted to try to better the actual real life Rangers record. In my opinion, you have to use the Single Season replay option and base ratings on 1983 only otherwise you are not playing with the same players as the real life 1983 team and therefore can't really compare your results.

Then again, allowing the game to develop players and base ratings on multiple seasons will still give you the same experience, just that strictly speaking you will have different ratings and your results will be more volatile, as you've already seen.

[majesty95]

Originally Posted by Charlie Hough

Several of your pitchers, like Frank Tanana and Rick Honeycutt, and John Butcher, did not have very good 1982 seasons. So this is going to affect their talent level in a 3-year recalc league.

By definition, their ratings will not be based on 1983 alone. They will be based on a combination of 1982, 1983, and 1984, though your choice to double the current season for rating purposes will weight 1983 more heavily.

This makes sense too because a couple guys had good 83's but bad 82 and 84's. I thought it was the next three seasons not the season before, during and after. Thanks for the help!