1973 Off-season Thread

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

Here's the cap story:

Rank Team Payroll
1 Compton Brothers $68,242,530
2 Baltimore Terrapins $67,920,350
3 Columbus Crusaders $64,999,900
4 Colorado Rancheros $64,710,625
5 Atlanta Firecrackers $64,625,530
6 El Paso Alligators $62,856,500
7 Boston Settlers $62,842,180
8 Rio Grande Roadrunners $60,068,900
9 Valdosta Peanuts $58,913,850
10 Brooklyn Brownstones $57,485,750
11 Quad City Thunderstorms $56,719,600
12 New York Highlanders $56,521,330
13 Ann Arbor Wolverines $49,466,440
14 Texas Copperheads $44,443,200
15 Hartford Harpooners $43,175,200
16 Toronto Atlantics $42,200,220

So looking at Compton, guess we'll probably need to come to a decision on how to handle overcap AI teams. I am partial to the idea I threw out of a CL owner handling any RL AI teams and vice versa. It makes sure no true stars are cut, the team is kept within the rules and most importantly keeps it simple and quick.

[kaosfere]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

16 Toronto Atlantics $42,200,220

Wow. Those two I sent you took a huge chunk out of my payroll.

Time to give myself a raise!

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Alan T

So looking at Compton, guess we'll probably need to come to a decision on how to handle overcap AI teams. I am partial to the idea I threw out of a CL owner handling any RL AI teams and vice versa. It makes sure no true stars are cut, the team is kept within the rules and most importantly keeps it simple and quick.

I like that idea.

Another idea is to trade a piece from an above cap AI team to a below cap AI team.

Curious, though, why are the AI teams able to cirumvent the cap? I would think they would have the same limitations making offers that we do.

[graygoose12]

How do you go above the cap like that?

[Young Drachma]

Quad City would be inclined to trade Larry Richmond, who we just acquired, if someone were interested in dealing some pitching or some package of quality players.

But if not, that's okay too.

[Commo_Soldier]

On an off topic note this one is dedicated to FOOL even though it was won against another fool member.

Originally Posted by ekcut

Game#6
Whitesox 5
Phllies 2

Whitesox win series 4-2. THAY ARE THE FIRST EHDL CHAMPION!!!
Way to go Commo Soldier!

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by graygoose12

How do you go above the cap like that?

Probably signed players that was below the cap and then moved people to the majors for spring training or whatever that moved them from a minor league contract to a major league contract is all I can think of without looking at the team.

Either that or funny things can happen involving arbitration figures between seasons unexpectedly to cause cap values to rise as well. Not sure what Compton's case is as I have not looked closely yet at it.

[graygoose12]

Just took a look. He's got his active roster full (40 players).

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by graygoose12

How do you go above the cap like that?

I have no idea. It's the AI being goofy. The AI makes ridiculous amounts of offers on guys after they fail on a deal. It's a very strange problem (likely, a bug that'll never get fixed) related to how AI teams make deals on guys. I restrict them by letting them only bid a day or two during each cycle, but this time, I forget to turn them off and they got over a week, so that's where they got crazier than normal.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

On an off topic note this one is dedicated to FOOL even though it was won against another fool member.

Congrats! (and sorry ekcut)

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

On an off topic note this one is dedicated to FOOL even though it was won against another fool member.

Two fast-sim league titles in your satchel. Not too bad, eh?

[ekcut]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

On an off topic note this one is dedicated to FOOL even though it was won against another fool member.

WTG Commo....I was up 2-0 as well...that stings a bit

[Young Drachma]

Weird, I was wondering where the salary cap info went. Seems it ended up in the trade board somewhere.

Anyway...I was gonna say, the CL rep ought to decide who gets released in Compton to get them under the cap.

[Chief Rum]

Checked out the draft pool. I know it's hit or miss (unfortunately).

There are 34 players rated at higher than 1 star. Only nine pitchers. So a third rounder grabs a one star right now.

Yuck.

[Young Drachma]

Yeah, the rosters get down to 25-man after spring training.

[Commo_Soldier]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

Two fast-sim league titles in your satchel. Not too bad, eh?

Yea, FOOL is a little harder however as you only have one chance to get your team set. With EHDL I was able to see who was effective and adjust as the season went along. As ekcut said however he was up 2-0 and I really doubted my teams ability to pull it out.

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

Yea, FOOL is a little harder however as you only have one chance to get your team set. With EHDL I was able to see who was effective and adjust as the season went along. As ekcut said however he was up 2-0 and I really doubted my teams ability to pull it out.

You damn right FOOL is harder!

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

Checked out the draft pool. I know it's hit or miss (unfortunately).

There are 34 players rated at higher than 1 star. Only nine pitchers. So a third rounder grabs a one star right now.

Yuck.

It's not as bad as I thought, as the talent in the league is dumbing down the stars a bit, I think. I saw some one star players that seem pretty good. But overall, I still think it's a group in need of a talent kick upward.

[Young Drachma]

3 Columbus Crusaders $64,999,900

Talk about threading the needle!

[muns]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

Checked out the draft pool. I know it's hit or miss (unfortunately).

There are 34 players rated at higher than 1 star. Only nine pitchers. So a third rounder grabs a one star right now.

Yuck.

Ya its nasty this year, however last years was fantastic so i guess its balancing out?

[Alan T]

If every year was like the last few years, things would end up a disaster after a while. I havent gotten to fully evaluate the draft pool yet, but I can already tell you that 1 star players in this league are quite good already.

[Commo_Soldier]

Originally Posted by Alan T

If every year was like the last few years, things would end up a disaster after a while. I havent gotten to fully evaluate the draft pool yet, but I can already tell you that 1 star players in this league are quite good already.

I completely agree Roy Richardson is perhaps one of the best 1 star players I have ever seen.

[Cringer]

Stuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuupiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiid. I didn't get any of the 7-9 guys, all nobodies mind you, that I offered contracts to tonight. It's not the first time, won't be the last, but this time is bugging me for some reason. I am not happy about it.

[muns]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

I completely agree Roy Richardson is perhaps one of the best 1 star players I have ever seen.

Man there is another Roy Richardson??? That annoys me in these games.... Ill deal though

The real Roy has a shot at the Hall, anyway we can edit this new guys name??

[Commo_Soldier]

Originally Posted by muns

Man there is another Roy Richardson??? That annoys me in these games.... Ill deal though

The real Roy has a shot at the Hall, anyway we can edit this new guys name??

I think we are talking about the same 1-star Roy Richardson. Whos talent has gotten better but potential down from 3-stars to 1.

[muns]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

I think we are talking about the same 1-star Roy Richardson. Whos talent has gotten better but potential down from 3-stars to 1.

my bad I thought we were talking about the draft pool

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

I think we are talking about the same 1-star Roy Richardson. Whos talent has gotten better but potential down from 3-stars to 1.

Yeah, I think you're looking at the vet. He's 33 and certainly no draftee.

[Young Drachma]

I was taking a look at the milestone watch:

Roy Richardson (COL) 5 hits away from 2000 hits
Fernando Spindola (NYH) 9 hits away from 2000 hits
Tyler Reilly (QCY) 2 HRs away from 300
Jerry Matthews (ElP) 16 HRs away from 300
Benny Myers (COM) 3 wins away from 150 wins
Gabriel Prado (ATL) 65 Ks away from 2500 strikeouts
Tom Williams (TOR) 175 Ks away from 2500 strikeouts
Orlando Diaz (BKN) 14 saves away from 400

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

Yeah, I think you're looking at the vet. He's 33 and certainly no draftee.

Oh got it, not talking about this draft pool by itself.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

I was taking a look at the milestone watch:

Roy Richardson (COL) 5 hits away from 2000 hits
Fernando Spindola (NYH) 9 hits away from 2000 hits
Tyler Reilly (QCY) 2 HRs away from 300
Jerry Matthews (ElP) 16 HRs away from 300
Benny Myers (COM) 3 wins away from 150 wins
Gabriel Prado (VAL) 65 Ks away from 2500 strikeouts
Tom Williams (TOR) 175 Ks away from 2500 strikeouts
Orlando Diaz (BKN) 14 saves away from 400

You want a neat milestone to check out. How about Lang almost certainly to get his 500th career SB--in his fifth season? Look out, Ricky!

[Commo_Soldier]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

I was taking a look at the milestone watch:

Orlando Diaz (BKN) 14 saves away from 400

Who will not get them on my watch.

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

You want a neat milestone to check out. How about Lang almost certainly to get his 500th career SB--in his fifth season? Look out, Ricky!

He's 4th on the all-time list already with 328. That's pretty astounding. Free agent Jeremy O'Herilihy is the career leader with 642.

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

Who will not get them on my watch.

He has almost 100 saves more than the #2 guy.

Taylor Patrick has 289 to his 386 (Diaz)

[Commo_Soldier]

I have a quick question. Are we going to keep turning off and on the ratings over 100? This is the second time I have seen them off.

[Alan T]

Since we were discussing VORP and measuring a team's success by it, and then went to the discussion of predicting future success, I figured I would do a little work for everyone just for discussions sake.

I went through and measured every team's complete organization roster for last year major league VORP. This obviously is just for fun as it has a few flaws:

1) It rates veterans too highly and prospects too low since it can not predict the future, but only what has already occured
2) It does not take into consideration someone with an off year or a year much better than average, only what they did last season.
3) Some teams have an excess of former major league talent that did not perform well and likely won't make it to the majors this year, their negative VORP from the previous year is still held against a team.

That said, just for fun, here is the VORP figured in based on player trades and free agent aquisitions from this offseason:

Team	BVORP	PVORP	TVORP
Valdosta	304.6	142.2	446.8
Boston	218.1	209.6	427.7
Atlanta	184	228.9	412.9
Colorado	122.6	274.5	397.1
Brooklyn	213	142.6	355.6
Rio Grande	152.5	186	338.5
Baltimore	257.7	74.9	332.6
Quad City	273.5	54.2	327.7
New York	196.9	120.5	317.4
Columbus	187.3	73.6	260.9
Ann Arbor	133.1	119.7	252.8
Compton	115.2	130.3	245.5
Hartford	57.5	163.7	221.2
Toronto	101.7	87	188.7
Texas	84	96.3	180.3
El Paso	96.4	76.8	173.2

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Commo_Soldier

I have a quick question. Are we going to keep turning off and on the ratings over 100? This is the second time I have seen them off.

I don't have a preference either way. But I thought they were a bit jarring for folks, so I changed them back when I was just commishing. You can defer that to the Board and I'll do whatever the pulse is. I don't care either way, though I suppose it might help with accuracy of evaluating players? I dunno.

[Young Drachma]

Originally Posted by Alan T

Since we were discussing VORP and measuring a team's success by it, and then went to the discussion of predicting future success, I figured I would do a little work for everyone just for discussions sake.

I went through and measured every team's complete organization roster for last year major league VORP. This obviously is just for fun as it has a few flaws:

1) It rates veterans too highly and prospects too low since it can not predict the future, but only what has already occured
2) It does not take into consideration someone with an off year or a year much better than average, only what they did last season.
3) Some teams have an excess of former major league talent that did not perform well and likely won't make it to the majors this year, their negative VORP from the previous year is still held against a team.

That said, just for fun, here is the VORP figured in based on player trades and free agent aquisitions from this offseason:

Seems accurate based on the stack up. Nice work, Alan.

[Alan T]

Regarding the Compton AI issue. I assume with them being in the RL, people are looking at me to try to sort it out some. In this case, looking through their roster, as Graygoose pointed out earlier, their salary cap overage is due to having 40 people on the Major league roster. They have 21 people up with minor league contracts that would be slated to be 190k each or 3.99 million in total. They currently are 3.2mil over the cap. If they send 15 of those minor leaguers back to start the season with their minor league contracts, it should remove 2.85 million from their figure but still leave them at about 400k over cap.

So it appears they likely will need to cut someone, and that person will have to be at least 500k worth of salary. Looking at their pitching, even with a 40 man roster, they only have 11 pitchers and no one that really fits the need. It is on their batter side that seems to be the best fit for someone to be released.

CF Jay Schultz (27 years old) is scheduled to make 785k this year in salary but is in platoon with a much younger (20 year old) and equally talented CF Denis Core, whom is also paid minimum salary. As Schultz has peaked out on development, and actually lost ratings last season, and hit .204 and .229 the last two seasons, he seems like the candidate that should be released to get Compton under cap.

Releasing Schults will free up 785k in salary, and put them around 67.5 million. Along with 14 other minor leaguers that need to be demoted at the start of the season to fit in a 25 man roster, at 190k each, that would be an additional 2.66 million that would then put them under the 65million cap.

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

It's not as bad as I thought, as the talent in the league is dumbing down the stars a bit, I think. I saw some one star players that seem pretty good. But overall, I still think it's a group in need of a talent kick upward.

I finally had a few spare minutes to check out the draft pool. I don't think it is half bad and it is much closer to what I was hoping for if not still a bit too much talent still. You have guys that look like late 2nd round or early third rounders that are 2 - 3 stars, but still have 80s-90s potential in important categories and in normal leagues would be stars.

I'm not fully happy yet with the draft classes, but it is getting closer for me. (Of course my wife would say I'm never fully happy on anything I guess)

[Young Drachma]

We'll do with them like we do with human owned teams and give them until Friday night. Once they're over the cap then, we'll release said player and proceed on with the season, provided they are indeed still over the cap at that point. Thanks Alan.

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Dark Cloud

We'll do with them like we do with human owned teams and give them until Friday night. Once they're over the cap then, we'll release said player and proceed on with the season, provided they are indeed still over the cap at that point. Thanks Alan.

Yeah might as well wait to see if they managed to get under the cap on their own once you switch to 25 man rosters before doing anything anyways. They may just decide to outright cut someone else.

[Alan T]

Yesterday I put together some stats to attempt to show how some teams got better or worse in the offseason based on the players they added to their team. I used the VORP stat to try to accomplish that which measures how much better or worse a player might be than an average replacement player in the league.

Generally the rule of thumb in a 162 game season a Major league position player that is a starter should score somewhere around 25+ VORP to mean they were a pretty normal starting major league player. Positional players that scored 30 or 40+ VORP could usually be considered one of the better players in the league with your all stars and superstars in the higher range of numbers 50+

Starting pitching likewise should usually get 20 or 25+ VORP as well, while relief pitchers just don't see as much action. Usually with a relief pitcher anything positive VORPwise is ok enough. That would mean on average a major league team should have at least 260-300 total VORP on their team to be a team of pretty average major league talent. Since we play a slightly less involved schedule, that total number could be a bit smaller, but most teams should at least shoot for a 250 VORP to be a respectable team. Teams with less than that likely are in for a long season.

From my numbers yesterday:

Team	BVORP	PVORP	TVORP
Valdosta	304.6	142.2	446.8
Boston	218.1	209.6	427.7
Atlanta	184	228.9	412.9
Colorado	122.6	274.5	397.1
Brooklyn	213	142.6	355.6
Rio Grande	152.5	186	338.5
Baltimore	257.7	74.9	332.6
Quad City	273.5	54.2	327.7
New York	196.9	120.5	317.4
Columbus	187.3	73.6	260.9
Ann Arbor	133.1	119.7	252.8
Compton	115.2	130.3	245.5
Hartford	57.5	163.7	221.2
Toronto	101.7	87	188.7
Texas	84	96.3	180.3
El Paso	96.4	76.8	173.2

We can guess that El Paso, Texas, Toronto, Hartford all are probably in for pretty long seasons. We could also guess that Compton, Ann Arbor and Columbus likely will be average teams this year. One interesting thing to note is of these 7 teams, 5 are in the RL. This means based on that an early prediction could say that the RL is very likely to be a two team race between Colorado and Boston with Quad City perhaps figuring out how to slide in there. Keep in mind this has no way to predict how poorly old players will age or rookies will improve though.

The CL looks however that it will have the first close pennant race in a few years this year. Many teams were hoping that Valdosta would end its run this year, and they have fallen back to the pack but likely not as much as others would hope. Based on these numbers it seems really likely that the CL could be quite close however with Valdosta, Atlanta, Brooklyn, Rio Grande, Baltimore or even New York figuring in the mix. Just like Quad Cities in the RL, New York, Baltimore, Rio Grande all have to be considered a bit longer of a shot to pull down the title right now but with the right luck or crafty moves, they could be close enough to sneak into first.

I'm going to make another post tonight before the sim regarding "Luck" in winning the pennant and a look back at past seasons of FOOL to see how it played a factor in some of the years, while in other years we perhaps shouldn't have been suprised at all by the final results.

[Young Drachma]

I love that we're creating an entire wing of sabermetrics devoted solely to fictional baseball.

[Alan T]

One of the most certain things in baseball moreso than any other sport is that the best team does not always win each game, each series or even the FOOL Classic. People cite "luck" or the lack there of as being the downfall of great teams, which can happen with a bloop single or a poor throw being the difference in a game.

Just like VORP is used by people to measure a player based on the average replacement player in the league, people often times use run differential to try to determine how much better or worse a team played compared to their actual record. Some people call this the team's Pythagorean Record which is based on the runs one team scored vs the runs they gave up over the season.

People claim a team with a better Pyth. Record than their actual record just got unlucky or had a bad streak of games. Often times you could even expect a team who is playing worse than their Pyth. record to improve over the remainder of the season. (ie: a team in August that currently is 5 games below what their Pyth record would indicate might be able to expect an improvement over the last two months of the season to keep them in a pennant race). I personally believe that it is not just luck that is a factor, and I feel often times you will see teams with records worse than their Pyth. record to often be on the wrong end of 1 run games, extra innings games and/or perhaps have a suspect bullpen.

Whether it is a bad bullpen or luck however, sometimes you can use Ptyh record to explain a suprise from the postseason that you did not expect.

In 1968, Ann Arbor was the reigning FOOL champs and were expected to be a major contender in the mix once again. Things did not quite go well for them and they ended up finishing a distant 12 games behind Colorado for the RL title. Colorado after a fairly dominant regular season ended up being handled without a bunch of difficulty by Rio Grande in 8 games. Was Rio Grande really that much better? Did Ann Arbor really drop off that much?

Looking at the Pyth record, we find that Ann Arbor for most of the season appeared to have outplayed Colorado but just lost some really poor games. Ann Arbor ended up with an expected record of 93-61 while Colorado ended up with an expected record of 87-67. Based on Run differential, Ann Arbor should have finished 6 games ahead of Colorado, yet choked big time. It is interesting to note that same year, Rio Grande also appears to have played over their heads when they finished the season with a 98-56 record, but their Pyth record was only 92-62. This means that the FOOL Classic actually went fairly close to what might have been expected, but it also suggests had Ann Arbor done a bit better in the regular season they could very possibly have won the FOOL Classic in back to back years that season. It probably did not help that much that their closer lost 10 games that season though.

With both of the FOOL Classic teams from 1968 having overachieved to make it to the post season, it leaves the question open for 1969 if they would be able to do it again or if new teams would show up. Indeed there were two new teams in the FOOL Classic with Compton facing off vs Brooklyn.

In this case once again both teams played slightly over their heads but not nearly as much as Colorado or Rio Grande from the previous year. Compton ended with a Pyth. record of 92-62 while Brooklyn had a Pyth record of 93-61. Based on run differential, these two teams were fairly even and that showed up in the FOOL Classic in one of the closest FOOL Classics in history as Brooklyn edged out Compton in the 9th game just by a hair.

The same thing can be used to explain other results in the FOOL Classic besides just blow outs. We can fast forward to just last year 1972 where many people probably expected Valdosta to beat Colorado, but no one expected a shut out. Looking back however it is tough to say that a team that won 106 games -UNDERachieved- but indeed based on the Pythagorean record, the expected win total for Valdosta should have been 112 games instead. Even though Colorado also slightly underacheived, the run differential suggested there should be a 14 game difference between the two teams and thus a series that was not nearly as close as people expected.

Is Pythagorean record foolproof or even useful? Who knows, but it is fun to look at and use it to try to explain things that happened unexpectedly. My previous post mentioned a loose expectations of teams for this upcoming season based on players that were aquired, but we can see here now that sometimes the best teams do not win, and there have been several seasons where the arguement could be made that a team played well over their heads to make it to the postseason...

1973 should be an exciting year to watch as there are quite a few teams who have realistic expectations of making the playoffs.

[Young Drachma]

Excellent work/research.

[Chief Rum]

Good stuff, Alan. Great read.

[Commo_Soldier]

Nice job Alan and DC on these reports, they are really interesting.

[Chief Rum]

I was looking over the emails from the last sim and saw they got all messed up again. Normally this is not a big deal, but I was just thinking it would be nice to have seen them to know what reactions I got from my offers or what players I offered (since I can often send out many offers, usually MLCs, every sim, and I can't bother to write all those names down or remember who I offered MLCs to). Feedback would be useful to me in making offers in the future.

Just another way this game dicks us around sometime. I don't have a clue why the message queue should ever be messed up. That's another Programming 101 issue right there.

[Chief Rum]

Wait for it...







Waaaaaaiiiiiiit for iiiiiiiit...








































Gonna need just a few minutes to set my spring training roster. Good news--draft list is done!

[Young Drachma]

It wouldn't be FOOL if Chief wasn't asking for more time. Maybe I need to cut you off from these, clearly it's benefitting you in the win column.