My First Feeder Draft FAILING Bad, Help!

[HawkyTom]

Hello, I recently setup my first OOTP league and it was basically the following: MLB Quick start + Feeder leagues - trimmed minor leagues to 4 teams each.


Based on the research I did the proper amount of feeder teams was 5*4=20 --> 20x30 = 600 --> 100 feeder teams. This is from the feeder league guide/manual...I set my league rules to 20 draft rounds & "feeder league players only".


I've been playing and managing each game and playing 'stats only', and I just had my first Draft Class "published" so the draft is in 30days. I took a peak and saw 100% fictional created players..630 players (none of them are my feeder league players), even though I had told the game "feeder league players only". (I guess the game decided to make fictional players even though I asked it not to, or else it would have been 0 players available)


I now realize that when setting the age ranges as suggested to 14-17 & 18-21, and set the creation age of the players to 14-14 & 18-18. It results in all of the feeder league players being age 14/15 & 18/19 currently (year 1 of feeder league = all freshman)....which is why none of them are entering the draft....What's the best work around for this? and how do people normally approach this situation?

If I were to do this over again tomorrow (or fix it in the off season) my best idea to address this would be to make the initial players for year 1 have the full creation range at player creation(before making minimum age range = player creation age). So it would be closer to 25% freshman, 25% sophomore, 25% junior, 25% senior etc...instead of my current 100% freshman. Also I'd imagine that if I didn't make any changes then the following years will be 100% sophomore --> 100% junior --> 100% senior --> new batch of 100% freshman created!! BAH...I could've swore I saw in the feeder league guide that it suggested to set the minimum age range to equal the player creation age for best results...maybe I misread something.


Sorry for rambling, but this is complicating for me as a first time OOTP'er! Should I have made a couple 'temporary feeder leagues' that I would delete after the first 1-4 seasons (when my actual feeder leagues would start pumping out players with 4 years of statistics??).
Example:
-my current/permanent 100 feeder teams (with evenly distributed INITIAL age groups for the inaugural season, but age creation minimum-->all newbies will become freshman/4yr of stats)
-add temporary col+hs league with all seniors (delete this after 1 season/draft)
-add temporary col+hs league with all juniors (delete this after 2 seasons/drafts)
-add temporary col+hs league with all sophomores (delete after 3seasons/drafts)

So during the 1st draft I'd only have 1yr of stats, 2nd = 2yr stats, 3rd = 3yr stats, 4th = full 4yr of stats...and from then on being good to go, but that's better than my current setup I think (my assumption is 0 players for yr 1-3 then all players come out in 4th yr with 4 yrs of stats, then rinse/repeat). Or maybe I wouldn't have to do that at all if I had the evenly distributed ages rather than 100% freshman...UGH I give up right now!


Can some feeder experts please help me with any advice on how to best address/fix this for next season/following years...or completely starting over my franchise if I absolutely have to. (or what the negative repercussions would be in the big picture if I just ride it out or apply a tweak in the offseason to alleviate the issue).

Not sure how I'm going to evaluate for this draft with 'stats only' and having absolutely no stats at all and 'very low' in scout accuracy, lol.

[GiantYankee]

Originally Posted by HawkyTom

Hello, I recently setup my first OOTP league and it was basically the following: MLB Quick start + Feeder leagues - trimmed minor leagues to 4 teams each.


Based on the research I did the proper amount of feeder teams was 5*4=20 --> 20x30 = 600 --> 100 feeder teams. This is from the feeder league guide/manual...I set my league rules to 20 draft rounds & "feeder league players only".


I've been playing and managing each game and playing 'stats only', and I just had my first Draft Class "published" so the draft is in 30days. I took a peak and saw 100% fictional created players..630 players (none of them are my feeder league players), even though I had told the game "feeder league players only". (I guess the game decided to make fictional players even though I asked it not to, or else it would have been 0 players available)


I now realize that when setting the age ranges as suggested to 14-17 & 18-21, and set the creation age of the players to 14-14 & 18-18. It results in all of the feeder league players being age 14/15 & 18/19 currently (year 1 of feeder league = all freshman)....which is why none of them are entering the draft....What's the best work around for this? and how do people normally approach this situation?

If I were to do this over again tomorrow (or fix it in the off season) my best idea to address this would be to make the initial players for year 1 have the full creation range at player creation(before making minimum age range = player creation age). So it would be closer to 25% freshman, 25% sophomore, 25% junior, 25% senior etc...instead of my current 100% freshman. Also I'd imagine that if I didn't make any changes then the following years will be 100% sophomore --> 100% junior --> 100% senior --> new batch of 100% freshman created!! BAH...I could've swore I saw in the feeder league guide that it suggested to set the minimum age range to equal the player creation age for best results...maybe I misread something.


Sorry for rambling, but this is complicating for me as a first time OOTP'er! Should I have made a couple 'temporary feeder leagues' that I would delete after the first 1-4 seasons (when my actual feeder leagues would start pumping out players with 4 years of statistics??).
Example:
-my current/permanent 100 feeder teams (with evenly distributed INITIAL age groups for the inaugural season, but age creation minimum-->all newbies will become freshman/4yr of stats)
-add temporary col+hs league with all seniors (delete this after 1 season/draft)
-add temporary col+hs league with all juniors (delete this after 2 seasons/drafts)
-add temporary col+hs league with all sophomores (delete after 3seasons/drafts)

So during the 1st draft I'd only have 1yr of stats, 2nd = 2yr stats, 3rd = 3yr stats, 4th = full 4yr of stats...and from then on being good to go, but that's better than my current setup I think (my assumption is 0 players for yr 1-3 then all players come out in 4th yr with 4 yrs of stats, then rinse/repeat). Or maybe I wouldn't have to do that at all if I had the evenly distributed ages rather than 100% freshman...UGH I give up right now!


Can some feeder experts please help me with any advice on how to best address/fix this for next season/following years...or completely starting over my franchise if I absolutely have to. (or what the negative repercussions would be in the big picture if I just ride it out or apply a tweak in the offseason to alleviate the issue).

Not sure how I'm going to evaluate for this draft with 'stats only' and having absolutely no stats at all and 'very low' in scout accuracy, lol.

The section that I highlighted is exactly what I would have suggested. When I experienced this problem, I started from scratch.

[HawkyTom]

Alright thanks, I figured that this would end up being what I needed to do. I really wish there was a way I could salvage my current season, but it would probably be more effort than it's worth.


I did some experimenting in a fresh league just now with 100 feeder teams (50col + 50hs) and had following from the initial creation batch.


HS players: (~25% / 312 players desired at each level)
age14=245 (19.6% TOO LOW)
age15=305 (24.4% great)
age16=292 (23.4% good)
age17=408 (32.6% TOO HIGH)


COL players: (~25% / 312 players desired at each level)
age18=238 (19% TOO LOW)
age19=317 (25.4% great)
age20=319 (25.5% great)
age21=376 (30% TOO HIGH)


Estimated Draft Class Eligible players: (600-625ish minimum desired)
yr1= 784 (WAY TOO HIGH)
yr2= 611 (barely enough to avoid non-feeder created players)
yr3= 622 (enough to avoid non-feeder created players)
yr4= 483 (WAY TOO LOW...over 100 non-feeder league players would be created just to supply the 20rounds)


I'm thinking that ideally it would be nearly an exact 25% mix of FR/SO/JR/SR at each level for a consist number of players in the draft each year.


Ideally for 2500 total players(1250 COL / 1250 HS) across 100 teams @25%distribution, it would be ~312 players in each age group. That would give ~625 players from the feeder league each season, which would be fantastic. (need 600 for the full 20 rounds to avoid created/non-feeder players in my draft)...that would produce great results every year...sadly that's not what I'm getting!!


Initially too many Seniors&Freshman...going to make the draft classes go from too big-->perfect size --> perfect size --> too small ---> too big ---> etc...Wish it was closer to 25% age distribution across the board so the draft classes sizes wouldn't fluctuate so much, even if it might not be as realistic.


Under this current system draft class sizes will be fluctuating constantly and never produce a steady/stable amount of players...? An option for 25%/25%/25%/25% starting distribution would be nice! Or some other workaround I'm not aware of.

[HawkyTom]

Ok I've spent a lot of time since my initial post trying to figure out feeder leagues and I've simulated my league for numerous seasons and have been recording various things that are happening and trying to find out how to fix the problem!!


League Setup for test = MLB Quick Start with AAA, AA, A, R. (30organizations / 150 teams total)...100 feeder teams(50 NCAA & 50 HS). Amateur Draft length is the suggested 20rounds for this league setup. (Amateur Draft is setup to be filled with "Feeder Players Only". This is what's recommended by the Feeder League Guide that everybody recommends. That's a fantastic guide, but I don't think the feeder teams/leagues themselves are behaving how they are intended.


The initial feeder squads for year 1 were created via 'fill rosters with fictional players' with age creation range 14-17 & 18-21. (FR/SO/JR/SR all created). Then immediately afterwards I change the creation ages to 14-14 and 18-18 respectively as suggested for the best results, while keeping the minimum/maximum age limits of the leagues themselves the same. (No roster limits are enforced on the feeder teams, maybe I'll experiment with this next, but I read to not use them or else they create issues)


RESULT/STARTING POINT:
-1250 players for NCAA & 1250 players for HS league (via fill roster w/ fictional players)
-Exactly 25players for each team.
-This should give ~312.5 HS&COL players for a total of ~625 of the needed 600.
[NOTE:] During the Year 1 Amateur Draft(2013) I had 630 non-feeder players in the draft that are from the Real Life Draft Class...but after that I didn't run into any more problems having non-feeder players join the drafts.




Amateur Draft Pool Size: (need 600minimum for 20round draft...~625 preferred to accommodate supplemental draft picks with a few leftovers)


2013 Draft: 751 (121 only from feeders + 630 real life draft class guys)
2014 Draft: 790 (too many)
2015 Draft: 598 (nearly exact minimum)
2016 Draft: 659 (solid number here)
2017 Draft: 1734 (what the heck happened? 768NCAA/958HS)
2018 Draft: 945 (way too many)
2019 Draft: 623 (great)
2020 Draft: 570 (not quite enough)
2021 Draft: 1261 (way too many)
2022 Draft: 1023 (way too many)


After the 2017 draft it inflated the MLB FA from 902players(pre-draft) to 2201 (day after draft) to 2357 (month after draft).


Feeder Teams after starting decide to increase their rosters to sizes ranging from 25 to 51 players PER TEAM...fluctuating wildly from year to year...which is easily seen in Total players playing on a NCAA/HS Team:
2013: 1250 HS + 1250 NCAA (starting point...2500players total)
2014: 1998 HS+1812 NCAA players
2015: 2491+2125
2016: 2137+1792
2017: 2223+1823
2018: 2572+2107
2019: 1894+1712
2020: 1965+1723
2021: ETC...too many


Some players played either 5 YR in highschool or 5 YR in college...a couple I noticed...(all were created in initial 2013 class, ran out of time to see if that would continue to happen down the road or not)


[Feeder players were created on 3/30/14(?) whatever the 1st day of MLB quickstart is]


MLB Draft Class players DOB's ranged from:
-youngest NCAA = 6/5/91
-oldest NCAA = 3/31/91
-youngest HS = 6/6/95
-oldest HS = 3/31/95


BAD SEEDS:
-5YR NCAA Player with DOB = 6/5/95
-5yr HS Player with DOB = 10/2/98 & 2nd player w/ 11/22/98 DOB
-example of 4yr HS+ 4yr COL players DOB = 5/8/98, 7/27/97, 11/7/97




There were a lot of both HS&COL in each draft...about 50-50 or slightly more HS because they had more players per team consistently for some reason. Also there are ~5-10 players from college who either failed to sign when drafted and thus re-enter the draft...or undrafted college player ---> re-enters next year. Also a lot of high school unsigned or undrafted going to college feeder league.


On the bright side...my computer was able to simulate a full calendar year in this league setup in about 5 minutes, not sure how good/bad that is, but good enough for me.


Why am I getting draft classes ranging from 570-1734 players when the Feeder League Guide says this is how I should do it and that I'd get 6-9 players per team and expect about 600-900(?) players.


Sorry this is all I can do for now, going to be late for work!! HOW CAN I FIX THIS???

[HawkyTom]

I've had to resort to scouring all for the forums for every post that every mentioned the word "Feeder" in OOTP 14's 'new to game' and 'general' boards and I found an amazing post that pretty much got shrugged off or ignored...but I think it was a very valid observation into the root problem.

Reading this post was very insightful and I never really considered/challenged the section he quoted, but what he mentioned seems to be spot on to what might be causing issues:

Originally Posted by Khan

I know below is the generally accepted rule, but you might want to rethink it depending on how your feeders are setup and how they interact with your major league. I don't know how others have their feeders setup but for me they are usually a short season, only a couple months.

I say this because right now the game creates new players for your feeder leagues when the draft pool players are released to the draft.

So let's say your in your 1st season of your feeder league consisting of a 18-21 years olds. Feeder league season ends and players are released to the draft, while a new batch of 18 year olds are created.

Unfortunately these new 18 year olds are being added to current crop of 18 year olds already in your feeder. This all depends on how long your feeder season is, but for me I only use short season feeders so the initial guys will have only aged 2-3 months before the new guys were created.

Also if you use a short season feeder, your newly created guys will age quite a bit possibly before they even play a game. ie some of the newly created 18 year olds will be 19 by the time they even play.

Just something to think about and why I asked for more control over feeder league creation of players in the "back to work" thread.

Now I need to just figure out how to apply his thoughts into making the feeder system work better!! My first thoughts are having a nearly full season worth of college/hs (even though unrealistic, to avoid the 18yo's only aging 3months)...I'm hoping this helps keep the size of the draft classes from getting larger than expected. Possibly having to hold the draft in the offseason and just run the feeder leagues concurrently with the MLB/minors. (making college/hs almost like just another Minors, but below rookie ball and ending with a draft)

Although it would also help if I could keep the roster sizes under control.

Hopefully in the end I can figure this all out and get an ideal feeder situation setup! If I do I'll let people know what I had to do, because I'd imagine this being so hard to implement is why a big reason so many people dismiss using feeder leagues.




*****[EDIT:]*****


Just read this info for the upcoming OOTP 15...looks like things are going to get better/easier!!

Originally Posted by Markus Heinsohn

Feeder leagues in OOTP 15 have been improved. From the new feature list:

- Added option to add full default feeder league system to a league, which calculates the number of feeder leagues / teams needed to function properly
- Added new option to define when players in feeder leagues are draft-eligible (relative to maximum age)
- Added new option to base AI lineup / pitching staff decisions either on potential or current ability, which is useful for feeder leagues

[Papa3]

I haven't read much of the OP or any of the responses BUT I'm new to OOTP and use feeders very successfully. I'll briefly share how I get them to work.

When I initially set up the leagues, I create about 65% college and 35% high school using the recommended formula.

I then set college creation age to 18 to 21. I set high school to the 14 to 17. I set age limits the same. As soon as the feeders are created, I change "creation" age for college to 18 to 18. Then
change "creation" age for high school to 14 to 14. You have to change these before you start the inaugural season.

And that's pretty much it. It results in draftees typically playing for 4 years and coming out at ages 19 and 22.

One more note, I personally use a very small JUCO league as well with creation and roster ages 18-19. Of course after initial creation, you also have to creation back to 18 to 18. This gives me 20 year olds in the draft with two years of stats. But make sure the league is EXTREMELY small (maybe 6 teams) and adjust the number of college and high school teams back two teams for every one JUCO team. That's because half the two-year JUCO team is draft eligible each year instead of a quarter of the four-year college and high school teams.

I always get a nice number of superstar quality (maybe the first 2-4 picks) with much of the first round typically yielding quality players.

I also had a diamond in the rough pop up in the 16th round -- a future triple crown winner. But usually I'll find a few decent major leaguers as late as the 6th or 7th rounds, but they aren't at all common. It all just feels very realistic.

[YanksFan]

Originally Posted by Papa3

I haven't read much of the OP or any of the responses BUT I'm new to OOTP and use feeders very successfully. I'll briefly share how I get them to work.

When I initially set up the leagues, I create about 65% college and 35% high school using the recommended formula.

I then set college creation age to 18 to 21. I set high school to the 14 to 17. I set age limits the same. As soon as the feeders are created, I change "creation" age for college to 18 to 18. Then
change "creation" age for high school to 14 to 14. You have to change these before you start the inaugural season.

And that's pretty much it. It results in draftees typically playing for 4 years and coming out at ages 19 and 22.

One more note, I personally use a very small JUCO league as well with creation and roster ages 18-19. Of course after initial creation, you also have to creation back to 18 to 18. This gives me 20 year olds in the draft with two years of stats. But make sure the league is EXTREMELY small (maybe 6 teams) and adjust the number of college and high school teams back two teams for every one JUCO team. That's because half the two-year JUCO team is draft eligible each year instead of a quarter of the four-year college and high school teams.

I always get a nice number of superstar quality (maybe the first 2-4 picks) with much of the first round typically yielding quality players.

I also had a diamond in the rough pop up in the 16th round -- a future triple crown winner. But usually I'll find a few decent major leaguers as late as the 6th or 7th rounds, but they aren't at all common. It all just feels very realistic.

Did you change any Player Creation Modifiers or League Totals in your college or high school leagues?

Are u seeing top picks in the draft with odd batting averages and stats? Ex., a high school kid hitting .350 or college kid batting .289. I only ask because i've tested feeders a couple of times and this just seems odd to me when compared to the ootp generated draft guys who's stat lines are more in line with where they're picked.