Quote:
Originally Posted by old timer
I'm still testing things out in game to get a feel for how changes to defensive ratings can impact a team and I thought I'd share the results.
I made changes (upward) to Campaneris' range and arm ratings and to Green's as well. I noticed that Holtzman's HA were always better than RL and Hunter's were worse, so I switched their GB% (where do those numbers come from anyway?). Holtzman went from 51 to 47 and Hunter from 47 to 51. I figured since I improved the middle infield defensive ratings, this would lower Hunter's HA and raise Holtzman's HA and that's what has happened so far in 6 tests.
In RL, Green didn't even play full time that year, but the AI uses him as the starter all year. Even changing Just Green's or Campaneris' defensive ratings, but not both, made a noticeable improvement in the A's pitching outcomes. Also, those small changes in GB% made more of an impact than I expected, but maybe it wouldn't have if I had run more tests. So MANY variables, each of which can have a significant impact on the outcome. 
Those were the only 4 changes made in the whole league. The A's team pitching stats more closely resemble RL and the team consistently wins the division (all 6 times - small sample size, I know). Except for usage, the individual pitchers (on the A's) also performed closer to RL. However, I'm not suggesting these are the changes needed to make the A's play more like RL. I was merely interested in how "little" changes could affect certain outcomes.
I wonder how much better the game can do with rating players. Short of people doing the ratings manually (like roster sets in other games), does anyone believe the in-game ratings can be made much better? |
Your experience does suggest that if they could be made better, that the game would indeed come closer to replicating real life. So we would be tinkering with a real change rather with a cosmetic one. It also suggests that relatively minor changes in a position or two might do the job. Now, if we only knew which ones...
I think we should give the upcoming patch a try, since Markus has said he will try to improve defensive imports. Then we can analyze the imports vs. what we know about the players.