They're keeping gameplay sliders at default while changing autosubs sliders, slight change to penalty sliders, and making small adjustments to see the impact. There's a significant impact when you change autosubs on the gameplay. ALOT of testing has been going on by many people.
Core gameplay first, stats will come. Then penalties after.
Personally I play cpu vs cpu and I've tried about 4 different slider sets GEARED for CPU vs CPU mode and Josh's still play the best at this point for me. It's the most fluid, the QB's dont' take as many coverage sacks. It's just better.
Just need to get gameplay perfect and then work on penalties, cause only getting 2-5 penalties per team right now.