I agree, the random debut mode is a blast (other than Ben Paschal always being overrated, see another post
) and is a great intro to some forgotten players I may not have heard of otherwise. I play with recalc and player development on, which tends to give realistic results while also using the game's aging algorithms. It's a toss-up, but I use real stats as it tends to give greater advantages to players with longer careers IRL, and like to play without free agency as well as it puts more emphasis on the amateur draft. I also play with the default reserve roster (15-man); increasing it tends to give the user a bigger advantage as you can stockpile prospects because the AI isn't too aware of the real-life trajectory with recalc on.