Alright Boyz, Here We Go!!!! (OOTP 2007 Preview Thoughts...)

[TroyF]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

Troy, that sounds like a number of HOF pitchers I have seen when I play in the Golden Age except that CG and SHO would be much, much higher. The Golden Age is very pitcher-centric but the use of relievers is nowhere near the later eras. I can only imagine that the current/modern trend of more reliever specialists would only intensify to where CG would be a thing of the past. It alos sounds like that it's an era of really good hitters with a few HOF pitchers, explaining the low SHO?

That could be. I'd probably tweak the era settings to be in the late 80's era so I have a bit more complete games, but the relievers are still heavily used.

Looking through this, color me impressed. I'm going to put some "slow" time in tonight and tomorrow before my game goes bye bye, but this is pretty darned fun right now.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by TroyF

That could be. I'd probably tweak the era settings to be in the late 80's era so I have a bit more complete games, but the relievers are still heavily used.

Looking through this, color me impressed. I'm going to put some "slow" time in tonight and tomorrow before my game goes bye bye, but this is pretty darned fun right now.

Troy are you seeing late rounds players becoming great players in their career and 1st rounds players becoming a bust?

How you liking the AI handling waivers and release so far?

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Markus Heinsohn

SkyDog, you'll like this:
http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...04#post2082304

PS: I'll add position to the top of the player profile screen... makes sense.

Very nice on both counts.

[Marc Duffy]

Great great feedback guys, keep it coming. There is just about time to get stuff in before we lock the doors and get the final spit and polish out.

[Eaglesfan27]

Originally Posted by Marc Duffy

Great great feedback guys, keep it coming. There is just about time to get stuff in before we lock the doors and get the final spit and polish out.

One thing that I would consider adding (maybe it is there and I missed it) is the ability to set individual team's media revenue. I've got financials to where I'm much happier with them by raising the "average media revenue" and the bigger market teams are doing well because of it, but it also has given smaller market teams a bit too much money. Still, I'm enjoying this test career much more and it is better than teams going broke. So far, I'm very impressed with everything I've seen and this has gone from a "wait and see" to a definite buy for me.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Eaglesfan27

One thing that I would consider adding (maybe it is there and I missed it) is the ability to set individual team's media revenue. I've got financials to where I'm much happier with them by raising the "average media revenue" and the bigger market teams are doing well because of it, but it also has given smaller market teams a bit too much money. Still, I'm enjoying this test career much more and it is better than teams going broke. So far, I'm very impressed with everything I've seen and this has gone from a "wait and see" to a definite buy for me.

Same here.

Thanks Marc Duffy And Markus.

This game is so much improved. The AI seems a lot better than any version before. I am very happy with the AI after day 1 so far. I still going to dig more into it.

4 days left with preview.

Its a definite buy for me too.

[Buccaneer]

Take this with a grain of salt since all I know is from reading the posts here.

Whenever I play my historical career in OOTP5, I have one significant house rule: I use a self-imposed salary cap while I make sure the AI does not (i.e., they have plenty of money). I was reminded of this from EF27's post about smaller markets having too much money. Is the AI such that even if you have smaller market teams, you will not necessarily dominate them? Or does having such teams around provide more realism while not making the game more competitive?

[BigPapi]

Originally Posted by TroyF

The first player I looked at is fascinating. The guy with 300 wins and 4,305K is the same player. His name is Chris "Fearless" Carrol.

He was the 21 pick in the draft in June of 2016. He started out as a reliever in the minors. He wasn't really good in A ball, but was promoted to AA at the start of 2017. He pitched well there and moved up to AAA. He lit up AAA and was promoted to the majors.

He worked as a reliever during for the rest of that year and the start of the next year. He had 26 saves and seemed to be destined to be a world class reliever until mid August when the team decided they wanted him to start. He started 8 games to finish the year. The following season, he pitches in 22 games, all starts, and racks up a 12-3 record, with a 1.15 ERA, 23 BB and 183 K. He tears his labrum and is gone for 7 months after that fantastic start. He's 22 at this point.

He comes back the next year and has a terrific year, going 15-7 with a 1.98 ERA, 46 BB and 289 K. The following year he herniates a disk 6 innings into the season and misses the rest of the year.

Then starts the legendary run. 8 Cy Young awards in 9 seasons. His high ERA during the stretch is 2.22. His low ERA was 1.38, a season in which he went 21-4 with 30BB, 303K and 144 hits given up in 234 innings. Yikes.
He starts to fade a bit at the end and spends the last year of his career as a middle reliever before retiring.

His final numbers = 300-130, 28 saves, 2.45 ERA, 3,901.2 IP, 2,944 H, 755 BB, 4,305K, 10 complete games (?), 7 shutouts (?), and a .95 WHIP

He spends his entire career with the same team, signing extensions most of the time. The most lucrative was a 3 year, 74 million dollar extension.

I'll bet his endurance was borderline reliever/starter material- which would explain why he started as a closer- but couldn't finish his games as a starter.

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by cougarfreak

Sim season 107 went to 10:40. Not bad considering the amount of data. This is default league (2 8 teams leagues), with 5 levels of minors. My computer is a new laptop, 1.66 ghz dual core, with 2 gigs of ram.

I cut that time in 1/2 for season 108 by moving the saved game directory to a 2nd hard drive that was pretty empty except for the game. Time was 5:44.

[TroyF]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

Troy are you seeing late rounds players becoming great players in their career and 1st rounds players becoming a bust?

How you liking the AI handling waivers and release so far?

So far the waivers and release looks a ton better. I haven't seen a lot of goofy moves by the AI at this point. (I haven't dug deep into it yet)

As for the draft picks, the MVP of the AL in 2095 was a 15th round pick. The Cy Young winner was a 13th round pick and the rookie of the year was the first player taken in the draft a couple of years previous.

The draft history is ridiculously deep. You can review every player picked in every draft. It so happens the first player I randomly clicked on, the 24th pick in the first round in 2054, never made the majors and it wasn't due to injury. He just never developed and retired after 6 years in the minors. I looked at a few players who did develop and then I clicked on a guy who was the 8th pick in the 2040 draft. A pitcher who also never made it. (well, he did make it to the show for a cup of coffee. Three games worth, but he ended up 15-38 at AAA and was out of baseball after 8 years. Again, no injury that caused it, he just sucked.

Last guy I clicked on was a catcher picked #5 overall. He started professional ball at 20. Got up for some cups of coffee at 23 and 24. Ended up as a starter at age 27. Full time starter for 2 years (very average years). He ended his career with 388 games and a 256 AVG, .292 OBP and was out of baseball by his 10th year, with only 3 of those years spent fully in the majors.

Seems to be ok to me.

[Markus Heinsohn]

Originally Posted by Eaglesfan27

One thing that I would consider adding (maybe it is there and I missed it) is the ability to set individual team's media revenue.

When you're the commish, you can edit each teams financial numbers in the team options screen (click on team home, then the ballpark&options sub tab)

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

Troy are you seeing late rounds players becoming great players in their career and 1st rounds players becoming a bust?

How you liking the AI handling waivers and release so far?

In my experience in my 108 year old sim I've seen some good variation. I'll try and post some of my findings tonight for leaderboards and draft rounds.

[Hammer755]

Markus,

Is there any chance that the player history can be grouped into some sort of bolded heading categories, such as 'Transactions', 'Ratings', 'Injury', 'Awards' etc.? With a player who has played a long time, like in SD's example a page or two back (Post #78), it becomes extremely difficult to sort through a hundred lines of mixed information in the player history.

[Eaglesfan27]

Originally Posted by Markus Heinsohn

When you're the commish, you can edit each teams financial numbers in the team options screen (click on team home, then the ballpark&options sub tab)

I have play in commish mode enabled, and I'm still having trouble finding this for other teams besides my main team.

Nevermind, I found the "Act as" button. It's in the upper right hand corner for anyone looking for it.

[Ksyrup]

Originally Posted by Hammer755

Markus,

Is there any chance that the player history can be grouped into some sort of bolded heading categories, such as 'Transactions', 'Ratings', 'Injury', 'Awards' etc.? With a player who has played a long time, like in SD's example a page or two back (Post #78), it becomes extremely difficult to sort through a hundred lines of mixed information in the player history.

I noticed that immediately while looking at some screenshots. Categories are a must.

[Markus Heinsohn]

Originally Posted by Hammer755

Markus,

Is there any chance that the player history can be grouped into some sort of bolded heading categories, such as 'Transactions', 'Ratings', 'Injury', 'Awards' etc.? With a player who has played a long time, like in SD's example a page or two back (Post #78), it becomes extremely difficult to sort through a hundred lines of mixed information in the player history.

No, sorry. The only info stored is the data and the text. This would be something for 2008.

[CraigSca]

And lastly, I'll just chime in that I've always felt the four main attributes for a pitcher, namely "stuff", "control", "movement" & velocity are less than optimal. I've always felt that "stuff" WAS "movement" (mixed in with a little velocity).

I know this is me chiming in at the 11th hour and it's not a feasible change (and ultimately up to the developer), but I've always felt the attributes should be:

Control - directly correlates to the number of walks a pitcher allows
Velocity - pretty obvious
Movement - obvious as well, and should be on a per pitch basis, but not really feasible to do so
Command - the ability to SPOT pitches. It's one thing to be able to get a pitch over the plate and not give up a walk. What makes a pitch effective is the ability to throw it to the location the pitcher wants.

I always felt command of pitches was overlooked in the OOTP attributes.

[MizzouRah]

Troy and EF, can you do some deep waiver looking and what not? Are you seeing the pickup and release over and over or the AI releasing prospects or waiving them?

Thank you!

[TroyF]

I'm not seeing any pickup and release with prospects. I'm also not seeing as much minors toggling, though it's not gone 100%.

Skimming through there was one guy who was designated for assignment by his AA team and the same team received the player 3 days later. That isn't happening as often from what I can see.

One thing I don't like: I'd like to be able to click on an individual player and see every transaction he's ever had. I'm not seeing any catch and release at this point.

[MizzouRah]

Thanks!

[cougarfreak]

Especially for you JB:

My test sim ran 108 years. Here is how the HOF'ers break down by draft round. I was running an 8 team league, 25 round draft, and did not change hall of fame criteria.



HOF Pitching report
1st round draft picks: 33 of 64 (14 were first overall picks)
2nd round: 11
3rd round: 2
4th round: 2
5th round: 2
6th round: 2
7th round: 1
8th round: 1
10th round: 2
11th round: 1
13th round: 1
16th round: 2
20th round 1
112th round:1 (inaugural draft)

2 foreigners who weren’t drafted


HOF Batting report:
1st round draft picks: 65 of 103 (6 first overall picks)
2nd round: 9
3rd round: 5
4th round: 5
5th round: 2
7th round: 2
8th round: 1
9th round: 1
11th round: 1
15th round: 1
16th round: 2
17th round: 1
21st round: 1
23rd round: 1
57th round: 1 (inaugural)

4 foreigners who weren’t drafted




So 20 of the 108 first overall picks became HOF'ers.

[CraigSca]

While I have no real data to measure that against, having 20 HOFers out of 108 first overall picks sounds like a pretty good ratio.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by CraigSca

While I have no real data to measure that against, having 20 HOFers out of 108 first overall picks sounds like a pretty good ratio.

My exact thoughts as well. That number just "feels" about right for baseball.

[cougarfreak]

I don't think I'll have time to do a "bust" search of all the draft picks with only a 5 day trial, but I'll see what I can come up with maybe..........for just overall first picks in the draft tomorrow at school. My students have a "reading" day anyways, so I should have some time.

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

My exact thoughts as well. That number just "feels" about right for baseball.

And I'd say that's a marked improvement over the 2006 version. Damn near nothing "felt right".

[MizzouRah]

Any improvements making a start say, managing a team in single A?

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

Any improvements making a start say, managing a team in single A?

Such as?

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by cougarfreak

Such as?

I didn't play ootp 2006 for very long, but I remember some issues such as not having enough players to field a team, many players of the same position, stuff like that...

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

I didn't play ootp 2006 for very long, but I remember some issues such as not having enough players to field a team, many players of the same position, stuff like that...

I'll see if I can get something done in the next couple of days and get back to you. I didn't try that for the 06 version, so it'll all be new to me.

[Buccaneer]

Originally Posted by cougarfreak

Especially for you JB:

cougarfreak, you are apparently working under the assumption that jb actually understands the question, let alone your analysis.

[TexasT]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

Same here.

Thanks Marc Duffy And Markus.

This game is so much improved. The AI seems a lot better than any version before. I am very happy with the AI after day 1 so far. I still going to dig more into it.

4 days left with preview.

Its a definite buy for me too.

Am I reading this right. You got a preview copy and haven't bought the game yet? Just curious.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

I didn't play ootp 2006 for very long, but I remember some issues such as not having enough players to field a team, many players of the same position, stuff like that...

Ghost players are back and you set roster min and max now for amount of players.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by cougarfreak

I'll see if I can get something done in the next couple of days and get back to you. I didn't try that for the 06 version, so it'll all be new to me.

Really appreciate it, thanks!

I know there are "ghost" players back into the game, ala v6.51, but I still might start out in the minors and work my way up - by the time I get there, I should have mostly all fictional players. Although, if it's like last year's, I guess if I purchase this game, I could start a historical career or something along those lines.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by TexasT

Am I reading this right. You got a preview copy and haven't bought the game yet? Just curious.

yep

Marc Duffy ask anybody here that want to preview ootp 2007 to PM him. So we are the lucky ones.

[TroyF]

As far as the draft goes, I think you'll find in real MLB, there are more busts. The problem is you don't get to draft Mike Piazza in the 62nd round. More of the players from the 25 rounds need to be hits.

I said problem, but I don't really mean it. Who the hell wants to draft 50 or 60 guys and sign another batch of undrafted guys every year? That'd be like a root canal. This is one place where I like that the draft isn't like real life. Make it more talented, make it so that a lot of the guys at least hang on in the low minors for a few years and not to the point I have to spend 6 weeks on the draft.

I'm happy with it the way it is.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by TexasT

Am I reading this right. You got a preview copy and haven't bought the game yet? Just curious.

He's not the only one who got a preview copy that hasn't pre-ordered the game, EF didn't and Troy probably didn't either. I think they had some sort of offer out there for anyone at some point.

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

Really appreciate it, thanks!

I know there are "ghost" players back into the game, ala v6.51, but I still might start out in the minors and work my way up - by the time I get there, I should have mostly all fictional players. Although, if it's like last year's, I guess if I purchase this game, I could start a historical career or something along those lines.

I'm betting if you choose to be a minor league manager, you are going to have to play with minors filled. I'll see if I can get to it before Wed.

[cougarfreak]

Originally Posted by TroyF

As far as the draft goes, I think you'll find in real MLB, there are more busts. The problem is you don't get to draft Mike Piazza in the 62nd round. More of the players from the 25 rounds need to be hits.

I said problem, but I don't really mean it. Who the hell wants to draft 50 or 60 guys and sign another batch of undrafted guys every year? That'd be like a root canal. This is one place where I like that the draft isn't like real life. Make it more talented, make it so that a lot of the guys at least hang on in the low minors for a few years and not to the point I have to spend 6 weeks on the draft.

I'm happy with it the way it is.

I agree...........I was going to look into some real Hall of Fame data, but hell my guess is 75% of the HOF'ers were brought into the league before the draft, so there is not much of a point in doing that.

[Joe Canadian]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

He's not the only one who got a preview copy that hasn't pre-ordered the game, EF didn't and Troy probably didn't either. I think they had some sort of offer out there for anyone at some point.

I haven't pre-ordered either, and I have a copy. Marc made an open offer to people in the other OOTP2007 thread to PM him if they were interested.

Anyways... until the preview forum is working for me all post my stuff here.

I'm greatly impressed by the game, I couldn't get into last year's version at all, this game just "feels" better from the start. Sim speed is amazing, I simmed two seasons of a fictional league in under 5 minutes. Laying down 10-30 years of history for fictional leagues is going to be a breeze now, in the old versions (pre SI) this process could take all day.

A couple of things... after my first season, once the playoffs ended all the teams fired their GMs, even the league champ.

Another thing, could someone change the name of the province of "Newfoundland and Labrador" to "Newfoundland." Yeah, I realize the province changed it's name, and it is correct within the game, but it doesn't fit in the text field, and it leads to city name being under the "City of Birth" title line.

[Swaggs]

Wow... I just did this for fun, but here are all of the #1 picks since baseball instituted an amateur draft. There are actually no Hall of Famers yet, but I bolded all the players that have a reasonable chance.

Looking at anyone from the past 10 years probably doesn't tell us anything, as they have not played enough yet, but only Griffey and Rodriguez look like sure-thing HoF, with Chipper Jones a pretty near lock and Harold Baines with an outside shot at some point in the future.

I am actually alright with the 20 of 100 or so, though, because you have to consider that the drafts are compacted quite a bit into a manageabe number of rounds.

1965 Rick Monday Kansas City Athletics Outfielder
1966 Steve Chilcott New York Mets Catcher
1967 Ron Blomberg New York Yankees First baseman
1968 Tim Foli New York Mets Shortstop
1969 Jeff Burroughs Washington Senators Outfielder
1970 Mike Ivie San Diego Padres Catcher
1971 Danny Goodwin Chicago White Sox Catcher
1972 Dave Roberts San Diego Padres Third baseman
1973 David Clyde Texas Rangers Pitcher
1974 Bill Almon San Diego Padres Shortstop
1975 Danny Goodwin[1] California Angels Catcher
1976 Floyd Bannister Houston Astros Pitcher
1977 Harold Baines Chicago White Sox Outfielder
1978 Bob Horner Atlanta Braves Third baseman
1979 Al Chambers Seattle Mariners Outfielder
1980 Darryl Strawberry New York Mets Outfielder
1981 Mike Moore Seattle Mariners Pitcher
1982 Shawon Dunston Chicago Cubs Shortstop
1983 Tim Belcher Minnesota Twins Pitcher
1984 Shawn Abner New York Mets Outfielder
1985 B.J. Surhoff Milwaukee Brewers Catcher
1986 Jeff King Pittsburgh Pirates Third baseman
1987 Ken Griffey, Jr. Seattle Mariners Outfielder
1988 Andy Benes San Diego Padres Pitcher
1989 Ben McDonald Baltimore Orioles Pitcher
1990 Chipper Jones Atlanta Braves Shortstop
1991 Brien Taylor New York Yankees Pitcher
1992 Phil Nevin Houston Astros Third baseman
1993 Alex Rodriguez Seattle Mariners Shortstop
1994 Paul Wilson New York Mets Pitcher
1995 Darin Erstad Anaheim Angels Outfielder
1996 Kris Benson Pittsburgh Pirates Pitcher
1997 Matt Anderson Detroit Tigers Pitcher
1998 Pat Burrell Philadelphia Phillies Third baseman
1999 Josh Hamilton Tampa Bay Devil Rays Outfielder
2000 Adrián González Florida Marlins First baseman
2001 Joe Mauer Minnesota Twins Catcher
2002 Bryan Bullington Pittsburgh Pirates Pitcher
2003 Delmon Young Tampa Bay Devil Rays Outfielder
2004 Matt Bush San Diego Padres Shortstop
2005 Justin Upton Arizona Diamondbacks Shortstop
2006 Luke Hochevar Kansas City Royals Pitcher

[TroyF]

Swaggs,

Your study pretty much hit what I figured the anser would be. Most of the first overall picks make it to the show. Not a lot become hall of famers. But again, we are compressing the real MLB draft by over half. So I expect a lot of the first rounders are going to develop into decent players.

I have no issues with 20% of the HOF coming from first round picks.

[TroyF]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

He's not the only one who got a preview copy that hasn't pre-ordered the game, EF didn't and Troy probably didn't either. I think they had some sort of offer out there for anyone at some point.

No, I didn't pre order. Not sure what EF's comments will be, but unless I find something horrible in the next couple of days, I'm pretty set on ordering it. I'm actually having to tear myself away from the computer, which is always a good sign.

I'm sure there are going to be some things that pop up, but this is a fun game and I'm going to be dissapointed when the trial version runs out.

Looks like Duffy's marketing ploy worked.

[Eaglesfan27]

Originally Posted by TroyF

No, I didn't pre order. Not sure what EF's comments will be, but unless I find something horrible in the next couple of days, I'm pretty set on ordering it. I'm actually having to tear myself away from the computer, which is always a good sign.

I'm sure there are going to be some things that pop up, but this is a fun game and I'm going to be dissapointed when the trial version runs out.

Looks like Duffy's marketing ploy worked.

I've scoured transactions on a bunch of player cards and not found any major problems. Guys are getting signed and released a bit around the end of their careers, but stars and solid players are being handled much more reasonably than what I saw in the demo last year and read about. There are still a few things that are suboptimal including the aforementioned lack of organization on the player's cards re: injuries, transactions, etc. Another thing which I just PM'd Markus about and I'm hopeful he can address, but I'm getting crashes as I get further into my career. It's about 100 years in, but fast simming isn't an option any longer because I'm getting a Microsoft C++ runtime error at the end of most years. However, when I'm really playing the game I'm sure it will take me a long time to get 100 years into a career (it has 200 years of history since I imported all of the "real history." and that won't stop me from buying.


Edited to add: No, I didn't preorder. I was firmly in the wait and see camp. I saw Marc's offer on here and sent him a PM.

[MrBug708]

I loaded the game Sunday at 930; will that hurt the amount of days I can play it? Or is it 5 days ending on Sunday?

One thing I noticed from the start was that when randomizing cities, you can get assigned the same cities. And while I know LA and NY has those options, in the pre-existing teams, it has their league next to it. Maybe make it possible where there are not two teams in the same league?

[Joe Canadian]

Originally Posted by MrBug708

One thing I noticed from the start was that when randomizing cities, you can get assigned the same cities. And while I know LA and NY has those options, in the pre-existing teams, it has their league next to it. Maybe make it possible where there are not two teams in the same league?

I don't really understand the point of randomizing cities. You end up with divisions that have teams scattered around the country, which isn't very realistic.

[MrBug708]

Originally Posted by Joe Canadian

I don't really understand the point of randomizing cities. You end up with divisions that have teams scattered around the country, which isn't very realistic.

Like the Rangers being in the West and the Stro's in the Central?

[Ben E Lou]

I'm in the "didn't preorder, has the preview" group as well. One thing I would say is that it seems to have a low number of bugs/quirks for a game that isn't set to be released for a bit.

[Ben E Lou]

One issue I just noticed, checking the stats this morning 86 years into the sim: at default settings, the game doesn't appear to be properly creating/valuing any Tony Gwynn type players. After 86 years, the 3,000-hit players are 20-30 HR guys at the very least, and most have 500+ homers for their careers. The lowest HR total of a 3,000 hit guy in my league is 385. He had 13 seasons of >20 HRs. Gwynn never hit more than 17, and only had 135 for his career. I don't know if singles hitters are declining too early, or what, but there are still guys in real life like Suzuki and Pierre, who pile up the hits, but don't hit for power.

Further evidence of this issue is that all six 240-hit seasons in my league were accompanied by at least 31 home runs, and that every single one of the 230-hit guys who hit LESS than 31 homers never played a full season after age 32. I'd say that contact-only hitters are declining too fast, or not valued enough by the AI teams, or something.

A typical example is a guy I'm looking at right now. He had a max of 20 homers from age 22-31, but hit over .3011 every season, inlcuding hitting .336 at age 31. with 11 HRs. However, he completely dropped off the map after that. He only got 226 ABs at age 32, despite still having 72 contact. It dropped to 64 the following year, an dhe only got 32 ABs.

[Ben E Lou]

More evidence that this may be a creation issue, combined with an AI issue: every .390+ batting average season (and there were 11 of them) was accompanied by at least 29 homers.

[Markus Heinsohn]

Originally Posted by SkyDog

One issue I just noticed, checking the stats this morning 86 years into the sim: at default settings, the game doesn't appear to be properly creating/valuing any Tony Gwynn type players. After 86 years, the 3,000-hit players are 20-30 HR guys at the very least, and most have 500+ homers for their careers. The lowest HR total of a 3,000 hit guy in my league is 385. He had 13 seasons of >20 HRs. Gwynn never hit more than 17, and only had 135 for his career. I don't know if singles hitters are declining too early, or what, but there are still guys in real life like Suzuki and Pierre, who pile up the hits, but don't hit for power.

Further evidence of this issue is that all six 240-hit seasons in my league were accompanied by at least 31 home runs, and that every single one of the 230-hit guys who hit LESS than 31 homers never played a full season after age 32. I'd say that contact-only hitters are declining too fast, or not valued enough by the AI teams, or something.

A typical example is a guy I'm looking at right now. He had a max of 20 homers from age 22-31, but hit over .3011 every season, inlcuding hitting .336 at age 31. with 11 HRs. However, he completely dropped off the map after that. He only got 226 ABs at age 32, despite still having 72 contact. It dropped to 64 the following year, an dhe only got 32 ABs.

The AI player evaluation is using pretty modern formulas (developed by baseball prospectus), which indeed may lead to 'undervaluing' contact-only guys. But only from the traditional point of view, as in reality these guys are not really valuable. A .260/.350/.450 guy is more valuable than a .300/.330/.370 guy.

Maybe next year I'll add a toggle to enable a more traditional evaluation method.