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Sorry to only post negatively in the complaints and celebrations thread, but here's another blog update.
Recap: 107 wins in Silver last week. No promotion due to 2-3 reverse sweep in the playoffs at the hands of a wild card team against whom I was 6-0 in the regular season.
This week:
- Added Mission Pujols and Yates before season start.
- Had a full season of Jackson Jobe vs. 26 starts last week.
- Added Edsall Walker during the season, who ended up making 11 starts.
- Added 99 Babe Adams as a reliever.
- Put 99 A-Rod at 3B in order to move King Kelly to RF, making DiMaggio a vs. LHP only player (and removing Al Kaline, who wasn't getting enough AB's.)
- Had a full season of Ethan Salas vs. 10 games last week, which should have benefited C Defense.
The result of these 'improvements':
- Went from a 107-win team to 77 wins at the same level.
- Dave Hoskins went from going 7-1 in just 11 starts last season to 1-11 in 22 starts (at which point he went to the bullpen and continued to suck.)
- Yates (a 75K reliever) only accrued 0.2 WAR in 44 IP, whereas the only other Yates in the league was worth 1.3 in 40 IP.
- Had to replace Edgar Martinez at DH after half a season of negative WAR production (.680 OPS.) Made the mistake of replacing him with 'Perfect' Pete Browning, whose 119 CON and 133 BABIP did not translate to a high enough BA to offset the lack of Power and Eye, so he ended up being even worse.
- Pujols was pedestrian at 1.6 WAR. That's a 140K card doing basically nothing in Silver.
- Jackie Robinson was 1.9 WAR worse than the year before (30 fewer plate appearances.)
- Helton was ALSO 1.9 WAR worse, same plate appearances (only staring vs. Righties.)
- Salas (110 C Def rating) was not an improvement over Harry Ford (95 C): 4.15 CERA vs. 3.16(!)
- etc.
I honestly wish that someone with a deep understanding of this game, dev. or player, would explain what goes into player and entire team performance variance from one season to the next. If it really is a matter of 'it's just dice rolls bro' (as some posters assert), then why even bother trying to manage/improve a team? You have no way of knowing what the impact of additions / moves is going to be anyway.
I don't think the 9th worst team gets relegated, so I guess we'll be in Silver again next week. I wonder if the pendulum of 'randomness' swings back the other way again...
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