Quote:
Originally Posted by Statsman1
Thank you, Mr Watcher and Mr Thrift - I guess I hadn’t really paid enough attention to the Morale-O-Meter in enough situations to see and measure impacts. I had the feeling that morale of a player would have an effect (else, why is it there?) on something, but mostly chemistry, but since not playing over time would impact the player’s morale, I appreciate very much that you confirm that there is a correlation there, as intangible as it might be.
I suppose “rust” would be a factor; I would like to think that if a guy was bummed about not playing, he would be so ecstatic to see the field that he would go 4-4 or throw a 2-hitter, instead of having a negative results for finally playing. Guess I will have to see how that goes.
I guess, then, if I sit a guy for 3 weeks for no other reason than I don’t trust him, and his morale is NOT negative in any way, then he is fine just cashing the cheques.
I have always used a player I don’t trust, for whatever reason, in an easy situation that won’t get out of hand, just to give that player some innings or at-bats, but I tend to have my favorite guys and I am most definitely not a platoon-type manager.
I will have to pay more attention to that now. Thank you!
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IME when it comes to morale, winning cures everything, and conversely if you're losing then you're going to hear from a whole host of guys who think they should be starting or hitting higher in the order or who are just playing poorly and want to blame someone for it ("Player Performance" is indeed one of the factors that goes into morale).
I think platoons can get players mad as well if they think they should be starting full-time and (especially) if they are the right-handed half of it (i.e. if you're not spelling the other guy against RHP they're only playing a third of the time). So it's not a panacea. I know that IRL back in the 40s and 50s Casey Stengel pissed off several Yankees players by subbing them in and out a lot - Jerry Priddy especially but I think Scooter aired his grievances to reporters on more than one occasion, and Hank Bauer later said that Stengel platooned him and Gene Woodling early on to "make [them] both mad" (in context he was saying that this made both of them play harder and it was a compliment to Stengel but I'm sure that at the time he was just plain unhappy). In-game, if you're going through a 65-97 season, I'd just expect everyone who's 30 or older to be not happy with you in some way, shape, or form.