The Defensive Spectrum

[jlech1805]

I've been thinking about the defensive spectrum a lot before I start my post trade deadline sim.

Looking forward to hearing other's opinions.

The biggest issue I have is with the positional experience.

Take Jose Iglesias as an example. Should he really have 0 experience at 2B? Imagine he was on the same team as Andrelton Simmons, Iglesias would not have a position to play at all. Maybe his bat wouldn't justify starting at 2B but you he'd deserve some spot starts there.

You could apply similar logic to a Billy Hamilton + Kevin Kiermaier situation where neither have corner OF experience.

I understand that forcing a player to play out of position will gain them experience but can the AI manage that risk vs longer term reward?

Essentially, I am wondering if positional experience should be tethered or applied down the defensive spectrum. If you can play CF you can play LF or RF. If you can play SS you can play 2B. Everyone can play 1B etc etc.

[Elysian Fields]

Originally Posted by jlech1805

I've been thinking about the defensive spectrum a lot before I start my post trade deadline sim.

Looking forward to hearing other's opinions.

The biggest issue I have is with the positional experience.

Take Jose Iglesias as an example. Should he really have 0 experience at 2B? Imagine he was on the same team as Andrelton Simmons, Iglesias would not have a position to play at all. Maybe his bat wouldn't justify starting at 2B but you he'd deserve some spot starts there.

You could apply similar logic to a Billy Hamilton + Kevin Kiermaier situation where neither have corner OF experience.

I understand that forcing a player to play out of position will gain them experience but can the AI manage that risk vs longer term reward?

Essentially, I am wondering if positional experience should be tethered or applied down the defensive spectrum. If you can play CF you can play LF or RF. If you can play SS you can play 2B. Everyone can play 1B etc etc.

I am with you. I am not sure how the computer handles it, but the human manager can do this and the players will do fine, if they have good defensive skills or high adaptability.

[NoOne]

when they have the ability but lack experience, just how much is that effect?

definitely less of a problem for some positions, but all positions have nuances. pretty sure you move that aging SS to 1b and even at the end of the first year he won't have too many errors and know(xp) the positions well enough before june.

as far as the ai... i see plenty of cross-trained players. minors are quite chaotic when ai does it, lol.

['94 EXPOS]

I hear your point.

However, using your scenario I would point out that if you put Iglesis at 2nd he would learn the position very quickly given his ratings. By the end of one season he would likely be rated higher at 2nd then ss (based on my experience).

Ultimately, while your suggestion has merit, I think the game does a good job (most of the time) with postional rankings.

[jlech1805]

Thanks for the feedback.

My main concern is on the AI side of things, although to be fair I am usually pretty narrowly focused on my own org's minor leagues to notice cross training for other teams.

My guess is it could also manifest itself in the daily lineup decisions, trade/ free agent markets at the AI might not "see" all the positions a player could fill.

The bigger question might be how much does the AI weight experience vs physical talent when evaluating a player's rating at each position?

What is great about this game is you can play it however you want.

I think I am going to mess around with some sort of tethered based experience at each position.

[Huckleberry]

Not sure if this is in line with what you're saying, but I suggested a similar sort of concept here:

http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...d.php?t=278000