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Voting thisTheMcD posted:Akili, SP - yes If we just need filler for the minors, there should eventually be plenty of free agents who will accept minor league deals as the league grows.
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Oct 13, 2014 14:32
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JosefStalinator posted:
Draft Akili, SP 20/48 - Yes. Tawab Ka'im, C 21/42 - Meh. (would advise lower than 300k) Vargas, SS 20/22 - Pass. Internationals Watanabe - Yes (would advise stopping at 200k) Harada - Yes (would advise stopping at 150k) Casas - Yes (would advise stopping at 110k) Rivera - Yes (would advise stopping at 50k) I suggest taking flyers on Casas and especially Rivera since they're cheap and could surprise on the upside, but Wantanabe should be our main target. habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 15:08 on Oct 13, 2014 |
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Oct 13, 2014 15:06
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 : Next we have Mo from Ronkonkoma. Mo, what's your thoughts. : Hey Wael, that Mo Jihad kid bugs me. Look at that beard! What a joker. He just doesn't respect the organization yet. The team should send him back to the minors and teach him that respect.But that's not my main concern. It's our GM gambling on a lowball offer to our second round draft pick! We lost the next David Concepcion because he offered only 150k! Fire Pete Rose, what has he ever done in this game anyways? And don't tell me about America, everyone knows that US stats don't convert over to the real big leagues here in the Eastern Hemisphere.  : I agree, Mo. Very bad negotiating strategy. Everyone knew that Abdul-Muhaimin was represented by Scott Boras. Everyone knew that. So we draft him and lowball him? Unbelieveable.: No way, Wolf. No way. You're just wrong. That's stupid. Rose knows what he's doing. Besides, Abdul-Muhaimin can't hit. You don't go throwing dinar at players who can't hit. That's just stupid.(If anyone is wondering what I'm aping with the talk radio stuff, this dead on impersonation of Mike and the Mad Dog should give you an idea of what I'm going for. They were a long time sports talk radio duo in NYC, listened to them constantly growing up. So stupid, so fun. They also had fans who would call in regularly and get on the air, like Doris from Rego Park, Vinnie from Queens, Bruce from Bayside. That includes Jerry (Seinfeld) from Queens, a huge NY Mets fan. Also, man, is there any way that we can keep Jubs and bin Ayman from getting any more at bats? They're awful. If we can option one of them to the minors to get their head on straight and bring up someone else, I -not Mo from Ronkonkoma- would do that.) habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Oct 13, 2014 |
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Oct 13, 2014 15:16
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Francesa is a cool guy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RI5xJfYH7NI
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Oct 13, 2014 15:27
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habeasdorkus posted:But that's not my main concern. It's our GM gambling on a lowball offer to our second round draft pick! We lost the next Omar Vizquel because he offered only 150k! Fire Pete Rose, what has he ever done in this game anyways? And don't tell me about America, everyone knows that US stats don't convert over to the real big leagues here in the Eastern Hemisphere. Who's this "Omar Visquel" guy?
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Oct 13, 2014 16:29
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Omar Vizquel is an 11 time Gold Glove* shortstop with a career OPS+ of 82. Your prototypical "all-field, no bat" shortstop who nevertheless put up a near hall of fame career over 23 years thanks in large part to being just dynamite at shortstop. Though the better comp for Abdul-Muhaimin might be Rey Ordonez, a three time Gold Glove shortstop who couldn't hit at all (career OPS+ of 59). Even Ordonez was a useful player, though, simply because of how good he was on defense. * Award for best fielder at a position, one per league.
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Oct 13, 2014 16:49
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habeasdorkus posted:Omar Vizquel is an 11 time Gold Glove* shortstop with a career OPS+ of 82. Your prototypical "all-field, no bat" shortstop who nevertheless put up a near hall of fame career over 23 years thanks in large part to being just dynamite at shortstop. Though the better comp for Abdul-Muhaimin might be Rey Ordonez, a three time Gold Glove shortstop who couldn't hit at all (career OPS+ of 59). Even Ordonez was a useful player, though, simply because of how good he was on defense.  Yeah, but he's only like twelve years old right now.
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Oct 13, 2014 16:55
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Oh, good point! Fixed!
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Oct 13, 2014 17:08
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Oct 13, 2014 20:07
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habeasdorkus posted:
 :  I'm so sorry, will Turkey ever forgive me? I doubled his drat offer, the bastard was going to go back to school either way!The bright side is, he'll be back in next year's draft. Jesterea posted:Glad to see those moves paid off as far as calling up Mo Jihad and having Thresher as the full time shortstop. The state of our rotation is unfortunate, but luckily, we've had more than enough offense to compensate. Funny that you say this, because writing the last update was my procrastination for creating a midterm for the class I teach. habeasdorkus posted:Draft I'll try to follow a reasonable budget on the international draft, and I was tempted to have votes on that, but it gets even more inordinately complex. The one other thing to remember is that if we spend over about 350k on the international draft, we face restrictions next year, being able to only spend about 50k on anyone in 1981. Since this draft is so barren, it probably won't matter, but I won't let us go over that limit. I also upped the number of international agents that will be generated in future years. I don't know why but it was set on the lowest setting for this year, which is fine given the inaugural draft, but we will need replacement players for the league in following years or risk a massive talent decline.
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Oct 13, 2014 22:26
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 : July is done, let's see how our team fared! : Yikes, our decline continues. We went 11-13 on the month, our first losing month and worst month yet. What the heck happened!Let's hope it didn't hurt us too much in the standings:  : Son of a bitch! We are now behind Baghdad by two games! There's still plenty of time left in the season, but this is unacceptable!Before we get into the month's events, a quick stat dump: Batting Stats  Lineups  Pitcher Stats  Rotation and Bullpen  :Our starters continue to struggle (aside from Price) while our bullpen shines. : Anyways, let's get rolling! First off, you guys wanted me to pursue Akili in the amateur draft, but not the other two. Here's how our offers ended up: : Heh heh heh. We got a response back from Akili quite quickly: : Excellent! Akili accepted our offer! It was a shame to have to offer 400,000, which is honestly quite a bit of money, but he may pan out to be a decent fourth or fifth starter. Unsurprisingly, Ka'im and Vargas both rejected our $1 offers and will reappear in next year's draft. Oh well.On the international amateur free agents, I throw qualifying offers at each player, as well as a nice clean $100,000 to Watanabe, since he was clearly the superior prospect. He was only asking for 25k, but I wanted to avoid an expensive bidding war.  : Woo! Watanabe jumped at our offer, which is great, because the other players all started very expensive bidding wars between the teams. You can see below, all but Watanabe asked for considerably more money: : Casas and Rivera quickly spiraled well above their value, with casas ultimately commanding a 60k contract. Rivera only ended up asking for 18k, but I had broken it off before, as he indicated there were "multiple teams" in the bidding. He lied, but he also sucks, so no big loss. Harada, however: : We eventually got suckered into offering him another 100k, after the bidding war with other teams was done. But we got Harada! We eclipsed any other team's spending in the entire draft by at least 150k, so go us! Given that the free agent market is basically non existent since the league just started, I think we made a wise choice. Here's how our lowest league looks now, bolstered by all our new prospects: : None of these guys are stellar, but a team that neglects its minors entirely will not put up good teams in the future. They'll also give us depth and good backups should our starters ever get injured. They're still but little noobies for now, so let's hope some of them realize even greater potential with time.The month progressed, and as it did, we were met with a few unfortunate injuries:  This was unfortunate, as Prince Kelley was useful in right defensively despite his offensive shortcomings. His injury came at the same time as Bin Ayman (6 weeks), our best defensive outfielder, and Jub Jub and Imad were forced to play outfield. This is bad, as they are both bad defensively, but for now we have little choice, as we have little depth to cover this many injuries. : But we trucked on, until... : That's right, I forgot to mention the All-Star game is this month!For those who don't know, the All-Star Game is a fun exhibition game played between the best players of the two leagues in the MaILB. Players are selected by ballot (the AI) typically based on skill and popularity. The top vote getters at each position get to come play, and managers are allowed to choose backups and replacements as well. Even if a player does not begin the game as a starter, they will typically get a chance to play at least a bit. The one real ramification of the game is that the winning league gets home field advantage in the final round of the playoffs. As such, we want the Sunni League to win! The ballots were counted and the following players were chosen:  : Jack Price, Rob MacGregor, Cam Stevenson, Franklin Fink, Eric Clink, and John Black were all chosen to represent the Sunni League. This is an impressive roster, and the All-Star distinction is one to be worn with pride. You'll all receive the honors in your award list (page one of the thread).For whatever reason, this first all star game will be played at Beef Ballpark in Islamabad. Cam Stevenson and John Black were chosen as starters, but I'm sure the rest will come in. Let's see the results and look for any good contribution by our boys.  : God drat it. Sunnis came out swinging, and led most of the game, and then it all unraveled in the 8th inning. The Shiites rallied and came up with 5 runs, all they needed, and the Shiite League won the All-Star game. If we somehow make it to the final series, we will be on the road to begin it. Oh well, how'd our guys do?  : Look at that, MacGregor and Price both pitched scoreless innings, while Cam Stevenson and John Black both came up big with 2 hits each, with both recording a double. Black would bring 2 men home with his double, while Cam Stevenson would score thanks to rival Qusay Hussein. : Unfortunately for us, Russian sensation Ivan Drago tripled and scored in the 8th, tying the game and eventually scoring the winning run. Saddam seemed furious and stormed out of the game. Let us hope this does not escalate tensions any.: Anyways, with the All-Star game done, back to league news and events. : Tor continues to be a cancer on our team by somehow getting tired immediately after the All Star break. All teams received a nice extended rest due to the all-star game, and it's only halfway through the season. Tor also has really good stamina, so this seems a bit strange. Regardless, he'll miss a start, and I'll try giving Akinshinju a try to see how it goes. : For gently caress's sake! Well, before he even needs to be covered, Tor already gets more hurt.Oh well, let's see how Akinshiju does as a spot starter, covering Sai Tor's start in the rotation.  : Akinshiju did mediocre for a spot starter, going five innings and giving up five runs (all in the fifth). What was impressive, however, was the 8 runs our boys scored, completely wrecking their starter in the second inning and driving him out before he could even record an out. We had 11 batters come up that inning, meaning everyone got to bat at least once, and we started going through the entire lineup. John Black capped it off with a nice three run home run. : More good news came in the form of a key injury for Baghdad. Let's hope this hurts them in the long run, as he's going to be out for a full month, and maybe longer. : Another bizarre injury sees one of the Cleopatras' players injured in a car accident. Apparently he fell asleep at the wheel, resulting in a tight back. Not sure how that works, but whatever.The rest of the month goes uneventfully, except that I totally didn't notice the trade deadline. The deadline has now passed, which means we can no longer make trades until the season is done. Whoopsie! Without further ado then, let's get to Pete's Awards!     : John Black wins Pete's Hustle and Clutch Award for Excellence for the monthy of July with an impressive performance. He ended up hitting 5 Home Runs for 20 RBI's, averaging .306, with an OPS of .921 and an OPS+ of 151. Combine this with his performance in the All-Star game, and he's really producing at first. This is important, and it shows how much he was missed during his 4 weeks of injury earlier in the season.The other nice thing is that Black shows little sign of aging. This might be bad for Mohammad Jihad, who would love his job, but Black may even be able to serve as our first baseman for another season, or maybe even longer. We have a vesting option letting us keep him for one more year at 750k, which if he keeps this up, is probably worth it. Honorable Mentions:  Franklin Fink deserves a mention here, as he actually put up a slightly better OPS than Black by 4 points. Still, this is called the Hustle and Clutch award for a reason, and doubling Fink's RBI's is pretty clutch. And the OPS+ does not take into account Black's great all-star performance. Better luck next week fink.  Flex Townshend managed to make it onto this list by performing better than any starter this month. He posted an ERA+ of 111, and an ERA of 3.60, edging out Jack Price on the month. He also outlasted Jack on the mound by an impressive 13 innings, in part because he got an extra start, but also by lasting in games much longer. This is good news, as our second starter had been mediocre, and hopefully this portends some improvement on Townshend's part.  Cam Stevenson is really our superstar, and while he had a lovely month last month, he looks back in form this month. He got on base nearly half the time, posting an on base percentage of .443, and stealing 18 bases. His caught stealing was only 7, which while high, is back to a more acceptable amount. He is also scoring an obscene number of runs, demonstrating the important role he plays in getting on base for Clink, Fink, and Black.     KKKLIP ART is the recipient of Pete's Bad Bet of the Month Award for July, mostly because of his abysmal offense. He still is the best defensive catcher in the league, but he needs to pick it up if he is going to be in the lineup on a regular basis. His average of .188 is by far the worst of our starting lineup, and he nearly struck out as many time as he safely hit. His 6 walks are nice, and I have no idea how he managed seven RBI's, but we really should be concerned if he can't manage to stay above the Mendoza line and maintain an average of .200. His average on the year is still .255, so he should be fine, but this month was just bad. Honorable Mentions  Jub Jub makes the list again, mostly because of his terrible defense and offense. I have to give Jub credit, he's kind of becoming our go to guy due to injuries, which is a lot of pressure, but he's worsening the impact of injuries by failing to make up for it. I've now started using Lufti Imad at right where possible, but with Bin Ayman gone, we have a bit of a hole at left and center defensively. We may want to consider moving Jub Jub down once Bin Ayman returns in one day  . Bolivar Mallen made the list again, but just as before, he only did so by the skin of his teeth. He actually had the best month so far this year, and had an ERA of 5.40, his first below 6.00. Good work Mallen, and let's hope you improve, and remember that you're only on this list because you are slightly worse than everyone else.  Mohammad Jihad only made this list because he is still in a protracted slump since becoming our top pinch hitter. He's still new to the majors, and will likely improve, but batting .211 as our first pinch hitter each game is not a good thing. Step it up! JosefStalinator fucked around with this message at 12:23 on Oct 14, 2014 |
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Oct 14, 2014 12:04
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As we are now halfway through the season, tomorrow I'm going to do an overview of some around the league stuff we've been neglecting. This includes a look at the leaderboards, where many of our guys are doing quite well. I'll also go over our finances and general organization stuff, so we can make some decisions on whether we want to call up or call down some players. I'll also talk a bit about playoffs too, as we have yet to decide what to call our League Series and Championship Series. If you have any good suggestions, let me know, but right now they have boring default names. EDIT: I'll also update the first page stuff. Awards are updated though, so go have a look at your dudes there.
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Oct 14, 2014 12:12
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quote:Sunnis came out swinging, and led most of the game, and then it all unraveled in the 8th inning. The Shiites rallied and came up with 5 runs FINALLY! VENGEANCE FOR THE MURDER OF HUSAYN IBN ALI! Question, is there any way to get Ramadan to have an impact on games? I doubt it, but my sperginess needed to ask. quote:Mohammad Jihad only made this list because he is still in a protracted slump since becoming our top pinch hitter. He's still new to the majors, and will likely improve, but batting .211 as our first pinch hitter each game is not a good thing. Step it up! What a bum! habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 14:50 on Oct 14, 2014 |
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Oct 14, 2014 14:46
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.82 ERA? Allowing a .144 AVG only? .71 WHIP (currently undercutting an MLB record)? 486 ERA+? 2.24 FIP? Let the Freak Show continue.
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Oct 14, 2014 15:10
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Catching up on the past few days, I know this is old at this point but if a player isn't at "impossible" to sign you never have to go past his demanded bonus to sign him. I don't know about impossible because I've never actually tried to sign someone like that since it's always some scrub I drafted past the fifth round.
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Oct 14, 2014 15:24
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Tor... Tor what are you doing? What do you do when your fantasy player is tanking? Other than cry, I mean.
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Oct 14, 2014 15:29
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Saitorr posted:Tor... Tor what are you doing? You gotta summon the spirits of baseball, and call upon the Gods of Hustle and Clutch to give your player more Grit and Determination to Step it Up. IcePhoenix posted:Catching up on the past few days, I know this is old at this point but if a player isn't at "impossible" to sign you never have to go past his demanded bonus to sign him. I don't know about impossible because I've never actually tried to sign someone like that since it's always some scrub I drafted past the fifth round. Yeah well, I did that, but the thread really wanted to draft all the impossible players at the top of the draft. I kind of worked, we just lost one SS because he wanted more than double his demand.
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Oct 14, 2014 20:50
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Man, our starting rotation is draging us down in a bad way.
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Oct 14, 2014 22:21
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 Well, we've got through one half of the year. Let's take a look at the team in some depth, and see how we compare around the league. Our Beautiful Portrait  Here's how our team looks at the end of July. Not much has changed - Mohammad Jihad was rushed to the majors, and a couple bench guys have moved around, but otherwise pretty identical. Minor Leagues  Here's how our organization looks overall. We have a few prospects scattered across our minor league teams, but it's otherwise pretty bare. The good news is that none of the other teams have much either - the first year of a new league is always front loaded, as no teams have decided to sell off their good players for long term prospects quite yet. Most of our prospects are new, and are still in Single A. AA has not much to speak of, while AAA has a few backups that have made some major league appearances. None are set for starter status save maybe Diya al Din, but the rest are at least experienced enough to not automatically fail in the majors, and could serve as bench guys or utility defenders if need be. Statistics  We already took a look at our statistics in the update, but let's see them again to look for any general trends: Batting Stats Lineups Pitcher Stats Rotation and Bullpen In terms of batting, there's not too much to complain about. We have the best leadoff batter in baseball, with Cam Stevenson leading in many categories (as we'll see soon). Behind him are Clink, Fink, and Black, all of whom are hitting very well. Fink and Black are older and not always 100% consistent, but typically at least one is hot, and with Clink consistently good beside them, we really have little to fear offensively. Tresher, Kelly, and Cash Considerations make up our next tier, and are actually starting to come together. Tresher has shone since his early offensive troubles, and while .244 is not an ideal average, his solid defense is probably worth the cost. Kelly has come together nicely to ensure Right Field is solid, if not spectacular, batting a cool .283 on the year. Cash Considerations comes out slightly ahead on offense, especially with the number of doubles he has hit, but suffers a bit from lackluster defense. He's not a liability in CF by any means, and he's still our best option out there, so all three are ensuring that our 6 and 7 spots are anything but black holes. KKKLIP Art is a tier of his own, as one of the best defensive catchers paired with one of the worst offensive starting catchers. He'll keep trucking along for now, but his bat needs to be more reliable if he wants to put up a positive WAR. In pitching, our bullpen is pristine. MacGregor and Friar John are a tag team of reliability, having only blown 3 saves across a combined 32 successful ones. Even that belittles their skill - they have ERA's of .82 and 1.83, implying some real pitching skill. Behind them are Xerxes Ironfist and Alex Campbell, both of whom have shone despite their relatively low usage. In non-save situations these guys have kept us in the game and allowed our offense chances to come back - and Xerxe's four wins are a testament to his role in tie or slightly behind games that he locks down for our offense to return to form. The real bane on our team is the starting pitching. Jack Price has lived up to expectations, but little else positive can be said for our rotation. Mallen has barely scraped by at fifth starter, and there's little distinguishable difference between our second, third, and fourth starters, all of whom have hovered around a 4.00 ERA. That might be fine for fourth starter, but our second starter should try to get back into the 3.00 zone. Or, put better, only Jack Price has an ERA+ over 100. This is the major threat to our chances at winning the division. How does this all shake up for our team, relative to the rest of the league? Here's our team's stats compared:  You can actually see here i am bad at counting monthly win-loss counts This is all compared only to the Sunni League. Offensively, you can see we are stellar pretty much across the board. We are clearly a contact team built around getting on base, with low slugging, homeruns, and extra base hits, but dominating in on base percentage, running the basepaths well, and rarely striking out. On the pitching side, things don't seem as dire as you'd think. We have the second best ERA in the league, with our bullpen's ERA being an absolutely phenomenal 1.94. The statistic that is disturbing here is our starter's ERA of 4.15, bad enough to land us sixth in the league. Our guys are giving up too many home runs, and runs overall, but there is hope if our starters can pull it together. Defensively, we have the third best defensive efficiency in the league. This may actually understate our defense - we are likely not 1st or 2nd due to some difficulty in the outfield in Bin Ayman's absence. As he returns, tomorrow, things should improve. Front Office Let's check in with our owner to see how he rates us.  Welp, apparently he's quite angry with us. We aren't doing that poorly all things considered, but given his unmerciful nature, he likely wants to fire us if we can't at least win the division. There's still plenty of time, but let's hope he's not too angry with our spending too.  Here's how our budget shakes up. We have about 300k left for free agents, which really doesn't matter, and will hopefully turn into profit for signing extensions for our players for next year. We have about 1.2 million left on that front, which is good, because we may want to resign some of our players to continue with us next season. Overall, our little Japanese adventures didn't end up costing us too much, and we should be fine for the season. If we were to re-sign everyone to next season, we would need about 1.6 million. We'll see who is doing well and who we might be able to lowball to keep around, or if anyone is lovely enough to let go. That's for after the playoffs, though. Next year we may need to be a bit more conservative, but that's fine. Leaderboards Here are the leaderboards, which show how every player is doing relative to every other player in both leagues. Batting Leaders  A couple things stand out here. Cam Stevenson is wrecking in Hits, Stolen Bases and Runs Scored, a product of his great ability to get on base and the guys behind him hitting really well. In fact, the aforementioned trio of Black, Clink, and Fink show up all over the place, and while they don't lead any of the metrics, the fact that our one team has someone in the top 5-10 in every metric, sometimes two, is a great sign for our offense. It should be noted that both Kelly and Cash Money show up on the stolen base list, demonstrating our team's speed. Cam is likely our main candidate for MVP, but right now he lags behind in WAR, but only .3 behind two other players in our league. Let's hope he's recognized for his abilities. Pitching Leaders  Pitching is pretty much a two man show. Jack Price is second in strikeouts and fourth in ERA, and he's our only starter who shows up, with Townshend receiving some props for striking out lots of guys and walking few. MacGregor makes the list for his saves, which have dropped off some due to our team's slow decline. Price is a contender for the pitching MVP, but for now he appears to be overshadowed by our league's Bin Firas. Let's hope we can get him the award in the following months. Team Strategy Lastly, now that we have some decent statistics, let's revisit strategy.  Feel free to make any suggestions as you see fit. Don't worry about saying for innings 1-3 do this... I'll just set them across the board for simplicity. JosefStalinator fucked around with this message at 06:11 on Oct 15, 2014 |
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Oct 15, 2014 06:05
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I'm going to gamble against the rest of the league's fielding prowess and say more Stealing Bases, Hit & Run and Run & Hit. We've got great speed. If we can get an extra base here or there, we should. Also Hook Starting Pitchers more quickly. The bullpen's dominant, let's get to them a little earlier. Again, I don't think we're losing by a lot, so keeping a run off the board could well be the difference.
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Oct 15, 2014 14:14
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oldskool posted:I'm going to gamble against the rest of the league's fielding prowess and say more Stealing Bases, Hit & Run and Run & Hit. We've got great speed. If we can get an extra base here or there, we should. Not for more aggressive base running, we're doing well without forcing anything. I'll agree with getting the starters out earlier if they're struggling.
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Oct 15, 2014 14:48
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Jesterea posted:Not for more aggressive base running, we're doing well without forcing anything. I'll agree with getting the starters out earlier if they're struggling. Concur. You can reach a point of diminishing returns with aggressive baserunning. But we might as well lean on that sweet bullpen. We're the KC Royals of Muslim (and Israel) Baseball!
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Oct 15, 2014 15:20
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Less stealing The players on the team stealing a lot of bases are also not stealing at an efficient rate so they should be stealing less, not more.
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Oct 15, 2014 17:35
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Stop Bunting so much (at all)
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Oct 15, 2014 18:49
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tadashi posted:Less stealing Actually, our big three basestealers are probably pretty close to the break even point and I'd bet that Cam is over it. That is, the point where the number of bases we gain outweighs the number of outs we're giving up getting caught stealing. We don't hit many home runs, or even a ton of extra base hits, so the break even point is lower than it would be for a club that hits a lot of dingers and thus don't need to get runners to second as often to score them. According to this, the MLB break even rates for batters ranges from needing to steal successfully 77% of the time when Giancarlo Stanto is up to needing to be successful only 62% of the time when Dayan Viciedo is batting. Given that we're leading the league in scoring despite being 5th in XBH and 6th in HR, I think the current strategy is working quite fine. Also, send Mo Jihad down to the minors. He's not going to improve without regular playing time and he's not getting that as our pinch hitter.
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Oct 15, 2014 19:12
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habeasdorkus posted:Actually, our big three basestealers are probably pretty close to the break even point and I'd bet that Cam is over it. That is, the point where the number of bases we gain outweighs the number of outs we're giving up getting caught stealing. Being at the break even point is a bad thing. We want running to help the team, not to be a pointless stat-padding exercise.
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Oct 15, 2014 19:20
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Less stealing and more bullpen sounds good.
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Oct 15, 2014 19:27
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IcePhoenix posted:Stop Bunting so much (at all) I can't believe you'd say that after the last few days in the MLB playoffs.
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Oct 15, 2014 19:28
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Trade all our bullpen guys and fast guys for players who can actually hit dingers Obviously our struggles come down to not hitting enough dingers.
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Oct 15, 2014 19:31
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TheFlyingLlama posted:Trade all our bullpen guys and fast guys for players who can actually hit dingers Then trade those guys for starting pitchers worth a drat. Then... PROFIT!
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Oct 15, 2014 19:45
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We're past the trade deadline, so that's a no go, but it can be a good (see: bad) strategy for the offseason! I think, while there's some disagreement, the general consensus is to cut down on the base stealing, be more conservative on the base paths, and reduce the amount of bunting. I won't outright disallow any of those strategies, but I'll move the sliders down that way for each, and we'll see if we get better base-stealing ratios and some more run production as a result. For the baseball newbies, wikipedia has a good example of when a stolen base occurs: 'A stolen base most often occurs when a baserunner successfully advances to the next base while the pitcher is pitching the ball to home plate.' This is a risky strategy, for the catcher can throw the ball to wherever the runner is going, and if he can get it there in time, the player will be out. This represents a wasted base runner, because if the guy batting then hits a home run (or any other kind of hit), it will only score one run instead of two. It can be a good strategy for a team like ours if guys can get on base then reach second, as a single afterwards will score them. There's other ways to move runners though that aren't as risky, so many advise against using steals. Some guys are good baserunners, and are able to consistently steal bases without getting caught. Most of the people in this thread feel like we are getting caught too often and wasting our baserunners, so we are cutting it back. Bunting (  ing) is where a batter, instead of swinging, holds the bat in front of them and bounces the ball off their bat and towards the ground. This is considered a waste of an at-bat by most, though it might be useful in limited situations to let other guys already on base move forward. We won't be doing that too much.I'll also Hook starting pitchers more often, which simply means we will replace them with our bullpen sooner rather than later. This is probably a good thing, as our bullpen is pristine and criminally underworked, while our starters are mediocre at best. I may set Price's individual strategy so that he isn't as impacted by this strategy, since he is actually good. EDIT: This is an intentional simplification, don't go after me baseball nerds! JosefStalinator fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Oct 15, 2014 |
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Oct 15, 2014 22:57
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Send Mo Jihad down.
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Oct 16, 2014 01:08
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Here's the new strategy: And I Sent Mo Jihad back down to AAA, and brought Bin Ayman back in as our pinch runner/utility outfielder. He apparently now expects to be a major league bench player, but he should get over his demotion (and we'll bring him up eventually anyway).
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Oct 16, 2014 08:55
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  : Well boys, we had a great August, which was much needed. We finished the month 21-8, which is actually our best month, eclipsing our brilliant April. : The standings reflect our great play this month, and we picked up five games on Baghdad, moving up to three games over them for the division! Cairo and Riyadh are long gone, and at this point, Baghdad is the only threat.Let's take a quick look at the stats, and get to the week's events. Batting Stats  Lineups Pitching Stats  Rotation and Bullpen  While the details are explained below, Akinshiju shone in four starts for the team this month, covering for Sai Tor and Albrecht Alby.. I'll leave him in the rotation now, and once Alby comes back, we may have a decision to make regarding Mallen. Don't expect Akinshiju to stay this good forever, but he may serve as a better fifth starter. : Well we really tweaked our strategy to see if we can't minimize our starting pitching woes, as well as reduce the number of runners we are losing to poor base-running. This might hurt Cam Stevenson's stolen base lead, but we are in a close division race, and winning is more important. : Welp. Another day, another extension of Sai Tor's injuries. I can't decide if it is actually good to have him off the mound or not. At least it's only for four days. : Well that is a good thing. Akinshiju didn't do so well the first time we had him start in Tor's stead, but this time he made it through 8 innings giving up no runs. The game was tied and we won it in the 10th inning (thanks to a KKKLIP ART sacrifice fly). It's just one good outing, but it definitely makes me feel better about Tor's troubles.But, Sai Tor returned, and he returned to mediocrity. Somehow we keep winning games he starts though - perhaps its some reverse lucky charm?  : Phew, scared me for a second, but it's only a short injury. Black will be back, and Jub Jub can barely cover first in the mean time. : We played an important two games against Baghdad shortly after Black's return, and won both games. Sai Tor actually started the second game and made it through 8 innings, allowing only two unearned runs. Good show by Tor, and while he did actually earn this one, his lucky charm appears to continue working in our favor. : But then as soon as we get some good news, we are hit with some bad. Albrechy Alby is diagnosed with elbow soreness, and will need to miss three weeks. I upgrade Akinshiju to the bottom of our rotation, for lack of any real alternative, and hope he can do alright until Alby returns.I called up Carlos Reyes to cover the roster position. He's probably the only real alternative to Akinshiju who could cover for our rotation, so we can test him in the bullpen first while Akinshiju starts for a few weeks.  : Black is minorly injured again, but it's "day to day" meaning he can still play, just at a diminished capacity. I'm getting a bit concerned about the frequency of these injuries, but as long as they stay minor, there's not much we can do about it.    : Eric "Eager Beaver" Clink continues to produce under the radar, and set a team record by hitting safely in 27 games in a row. This is a very impressive achievement, Eric Clink actually now holds the record for consecutive games with a hit at 27, five above the closest contender. Clink is something special, and we should appreciate that we are only paying him a paltry 55k dollars.  : Welp. Albrecht Alby is hurt worse than we thought, which means Akinshiju is going to have to stick around for a while longer. He's done well so far, so hopefully it won't hurt too much, but there's a good chance he falls back to earth eventually. : Not to be outdone by Eric Clink, Cam Stevenson has his own hit streak going. It currently stands at 23 games, and is now the second longest streak in our league's young history, and four games behind Clink.   :   Cash "Money" Considerations was so impressive this month that he managed to win the league's rookie of the month award. A rookie is a player with no previous major league experience, which would seem to make no sense in a new league, but the game considers players to have played in the majors according to their skill and age. Either way, a great month by considerations! Congrats!And now, Pete's awards!    This was the hardest month yet, but Pete's award ultimately went to Eric "Eager Beaver" Clink. This was hard, because while he put up an extremely impressive 160 OPS+, he only lead the team in the month in hits and average. Still, his hitting streak record is worthy of note, because who doesn't love guys who get lots of hits? I have to admit that the tie-breaker for this award was Eric Clink's consistent second place showing each month, and he deserved the recognition worthy of his position. As long as we have Clink on the team, we have a bargain and one of the best third basemen in the league. And given his age, he'll be around for a long time. Honorable Mentions  Xerxes "The Xerx" Ironfist nearly won this award himself, as he posted an impressive 17 and one third scoreless innings across the month. Our strategy to go to the bullpen more often paid off in dramatic fashion - for Xerx had been criminally underused, with Friar John and MacGregor stealing many relief opportunities. We can look to Xerx for good things in the future, and his youth means he could anchor down our middle relief for some time. Another month, another impressive performance by John "Whiteboy" Black. He put up an OPS+ of 194, leading the team in doubles, triples, and homeruns, along with a slew of other impressive accomplishments. While his nagging injuries are a concern, he's making first one of our most productive positions, as it should be.  Cash "Money" Considerations won the rookie of the month award, batting a clean .333 average. He played well, even if he was overshadowed by vets and older players, but he is really starting to show the potential we hoped for when we first drafted him. As he develops, he may only improve.   Poor Flex Townshend win's my Bad Bet Award this month. His stats tell all that need to be said - over 6 starts, he put up an ERA of 7.20, and actually only narrowly avoided being worse Bolivar Mallen in terrible pitching. As a second starter, this is completely unacceptable. Hopefully it's just a bump in the road, but it was particularly awful, and deserved some serious shaming. Honorable Mentions Has Bolivar Mallen appeared on this list every month? He put up the worst ERA in the rotation, again, with 7.52. Not much needs to be said, but one thing is worth consideration - Akinshinju replacing him once Alby returns in a few weeks. KKKLIP ART continues to struggle, and managed to only hit .179 this month, bringing his average for the year down to .239. This is a bit concerning, but his defense remains solid at catcher.  Reeve Tresher only barely made this list, hitting .221 on the month, leading the team in strikeouts at 26. He should be fine, it's just that with a great month, the few mediocre players receive more negative attention than they deserve.  Goon Note The coming month is our last month, and we are in the final stretch. We need to stay ahead of Baghdad, who have recently gotten their star players back from injuries. One thing to consider is whether we want to demote Mallen to the bullpen in favor of Akinshiju once Alby gets healthy in 1-2 weeks. Also, if anyone wants Akinshiju,  and it shall be done. I can't guarantee he won't start sucking right away though.Also, if the race is really close, I may stop before the season ends to show a dramatic divisional race. We'll see how it goes! JosefStalinator fucked around with this message at 10:40 on Oct 16, 2014 |
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Oct 16, 2014 10:11
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Ride the hot hand. Keep Akinshiju in the rotation as long as you can and demote Mallen.
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Oct 16, 2014 10:28
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I wish I knew more about baseball in order to understand all the numbers and things, but the writeups are doing enough that I can keep up somewhat.
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Oct 16, 2014 13:45
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My steals lead!  Antitonic posted:I wish I knew more about baseball in order to understand all the numbers and things, but the writeups are doing enough that I can keep up somewhat.
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Oct 16, 2014 14:19
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It's pretty awesome that 2 young players are doing so well already. This team has a chance to be a juggernaught for a long time if we can find a replacement for Fink once he starts to lose steam. Also, Tresher is almost holding his own at the plate. That means his glove might also be good for his position if he already has 4.6 WAR accumulated. Would it be possible to show the leader boards by position after the season so we can see where our guys ended up?
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Oct 16, 2014 14:45
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Antitonic posted:I wish I knew more about baseball in order to understand all the numbers and things, but the writeups are doing enough that I can keep up somewhat. I'm trying to do what I can to both be concise and keep the thread readable to non-baseball people. Does anyone have a good glossary link that explains each stat, just for quick reference? (I know each one has more or less been explained at one point). This link: http://manuals.ootpdevelopments.com/index.php?man=ootp15 is good for general game mechanics, though. oldskool posted:My steals lead! You may still grind out first place in steals, so don't panic yet! Your dude still stole tons of bases this month. tadashi posted:It's pretty awesome that 2 young players are doing so well already. This team has a chance to be a juggernaught for a long time if we can find a replacement for Fink once he starts to lose steam. Also, Tresher is almost holding his own at the plate. That means his glove might also be good for his position if he already has 4.6 WAR accumulated. One thing to remember re: Fink/Black is that Both have vesting options for 750k that they play in 135 games. This means that Black needs to stay perfectly healthy to barely play in 135, while Fink should meet it just fine. We can, of course, bench them to intentionally have them miss their 135 option if we don't want to re-sign them for next year. Right now it seems like theyre doing well, but will it last?
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Oct 16, 2014 15:01
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| # ? May 12, 2024 05:25 |
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Tor's using the rope-a-dope strategy. He is intentionally taking a hit to stats to lull the opposition into a false sense of security.
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Oct 16, 2014 16:33
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