Nolan Ryan No Strikeout King

[majesty95]

What is the deal with the strikeouts in this game?

I started in 1969 and just finished 1981 and Nolan Ryan hasn't had one 300 strikeout season. In fact, he's only averaging 8.4 K/9 for his career. His only season with a K/9 over 9 was 1973 where he struck out 156 in 143 innings.

By comparison, Nolan had five 300 K seasons by this point and had seven full seasons with a K/9 of at least 9.

I seem to remember this from previous versions. Why can the game not neuter outlier performances like this? I suspect Randy Johnson will get equally neutered when he debuts as will Billy Wagner...

The game can handle Babe Rith hitting 4-5x as many home runs as the other players in his generation. Why can't it handle guys striking out significantly more batter than anyone else in their generation?

[David Watts]

Just curious, recalc on or off?

[majesty95]

Now it is a 5-year recalc with current season doubled. The first 4-5 years it was a 3-year recalc with current year doubled. In ether scenario he he would have averaged over 300 Ks for at least one or two of those years. It just seems to neuter the top strikeout guys. Yet top HR guys can out perform the RL yearly leader.

[olivertheorem]

I never play historical so I don't know the details of it well, but is it possible that he just came out on the short end of the random number generator? I mean, he never got 300, but where did he peak in terms of total strikeouts? Perhaps his better seasons (like 1973) he got injured?

[majesty95]

I don't think so. He had two half seasons but with 5 overall and a K/9 of abou 10 at that point in his career I think he should have had at least one. Recalc eliminates a lot of variables. Plus development is turned off so he should be fairly similar to his career baring injury but even the. It would affect anything but that season.

[majesty95]

I just started a test league in 1974 with three-year recalc anNO double weighting current year and Nolan has 4 300 K seasons and three with 10.5 K/9 or better. Maybe it has something to do with the double weighting of the current year? I guess it could have just been random. Also, I'm basing potential on remaining peak years. Does that have any effect?

[ra7c7er]

Sounds to me like the RNG set up bizarro Nolan Ryan. It happens.

[sprague]

This is my opinion. and it bares out the two posts in the thread, one a longer running league with low ryan k's, the other a more new league 1974 and lots of ryan k's.

It has to do with the way the game handles historical players who have played thier last year early age 22-34, and has no "drop off stats" as players who played long past that age. so it just recalcs their last year over and over, hence how roberto clemente can be hitting .350 at age 50 in the other thread.

The problem comes because the way the game calculates stats is by an over all yearly total- say there are 30,000 strikeouts to hand out for a year. If only the players who played a year played then the 30,000 K's get handed out roughly as real life (the ryan stats for 1974 start)

But with lots of good players still around (not retired or in any way dropped off) the 30,000 get more distributed. Its why you in long term historical leagues you have trouble sometimes with guys coming anywhere close to their numbers.

The only tweeks I have found for now (until a revised db can be created to handle this) is a) retire players as per real life or if you want longer careers like do b) manually adjust players each year at ages such as 32, 35, 38 or whatever to create the drop off in recalcs for players with no further stats c) expand the league by 4-8 teams early on, thus the extra players don't take up spots in say a 16 team league but fill out the available spots on the 4 new teams. Its not real life, but it does tend to then make the stats much more real.

For me using the spritze hs db I find I add 10-12 teams to make up for the tremendous amount of good players, and then I still manually edit some players who are having super long careers.

Just passing on my findings and suggestions with historical tests over the years with ootp

[The Game]

Originally Posted by sprague

This is my opinion. and it bares out the two posts in the thread, one a longer running league with low ryan k's, the other a more new league 1974 and lots of ryan k's.

It has to do with the way the game handles historical players who have played thier last year early age 22-34, and has no "drop off stats" as players who played long past that age. so it just recalcs their last year over and over, hence how roberto clemente can be hitting .350 at age 50 in the other thread.

The problem comes because the way the game calculates stats is by an over all yearly total- say there are 30,000 strikeouts to hand out for a year. If only the players who played a year played then the 30,000 K's get handed out roughly as real life (the ryan stats for 1974 start)

But with lots of good players still around (not retired or in any way dropped off) the 30,000 get more distributed. Its why you in long term historical leagues you have trouble sometimes with guys coming anywhere close to their numbers.

The only tweeks I have found for now (until a revised db can be created to handle this) is a) retire players as per real life or if you want longer careers like do b) manually adjust players each year at ages such as 32, 35, 38 or whatever to create the drop off in recalcs for players with no further stats c) expand the league by 4-8 teams early on, thus the extra players don't take up spots in say a 16 team league but fill out the available spots on the 4 new teams. Its not real life, but it does tend to then make the stats much more real.

For me using the spritze hs db I find I add 10-12 teams to make up for the tremendous amount of good players, and then I still manually edit some players who are having super long careers.

Just passing on my findings and suggestions with historical tests over the years with ootp

I know Majesty's PC crashed so he lost his Nolan league but In 2 Nolan tests. 1 yr & 3 yr recalc Nolan had over 4000 K as of 1980 approx. 1 yr recalc Nolan was better then 3 yr Nolan by a decent margin.

[sprague]

Originally Posted by The Game

I know Majesty's PC crashed so he lost his Nolan league but In 2 Nolan tests. 1 yr & 3 yr recalc Nolan had over 4000 K as of 1980 approx. 1 yr recalc Nolan was better then 3 yr Nolan by a decent margin.

What year did you start the season's in game? Was it retire by actual year, or AI decides when to retire players?

My speculation would be if you started in say 1966 (or whatever was Ryan's first year) and by actual retirement, his numbers will be better than say a game begun in 1940 with AI in control of the retirements (ie long careers for guys who never had them in real life)

[ThatSeventiesGuy]

Ryan won 351 games with over 4600 strikeouts in my historical...and he played his first six seasons or so as a reliever!

[majesty95]

Originally Posted by sprague

What year did you start the season's in game? Was it retire by actual year, or AI decides when to retire players?

My speculation would be if you started in say 1966 (or whatever was Ryan's first year) and by actual retirement, his numbers will be better than say a game begun in 1940 with AI in control of the retirements (ie long careers for guys who never had them in real life)

Started in 1969. Lahman DB. No played dev, Did not retire according to history. Used three-year recalc with current year doubled. Those were the settings for the Ryan who never had a K/9 above 9.1. He still was on pace for 300 wins and over 4,000 strikeouts, he was just getting there at a far slower rate than real life.

The current test is the same but without the current year doubled and potential based on remaining peak years (vs reaming years of career). In theory, not much has changed but he is performing far more closely to what he did in real life (4 season over 300 K and three over 10.5 K/9)

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by sprague

This is my opinion. and it bares out the two posts in the thread, one a longer running league with low ryan k's, the other a more new league 1974 and lots of ryan k's.

It has to do with the way the game handles historical players who have played thier last year early age 22-34, and has no "drop off stats" as players who played long past that age. so it just recalcs their last year over and over, hence how roberto clemente can be hitting .350 at age 50 in the other thread.

The problem comes because the way the game calculates stats is by an over all yearly total- say there are 30,000 strikeouts to hand out for a year. If only the players who played a year played then the 30,000 K's get handed out roughly as real life (the ryan stats for 1974 start)

But with lots of good players still around (not retired or in any way dropped off) the 30,000 get more distributed. Its why you in long term historical leagues you have trouble sometimes with guys coming anywhere close to their numbers.

The only tweeks I have found for now (until a revised db can be created to handle this) is a) retire players as per real life or if you want longer careers like do b) manually adjust players each year at ages such as 32, 35, 38 or whatever to create the drop off in recalcs for players with no further stats c) expand the league by 4-8 teams early on, thus the extra players don't take up spots in say a 16 team league but fill out the available spots on the 4 new teams. Its not real life, but it does tend to then make the stats much more real.

For me using the spritze hs db I find I add 10-12 teams to make up for the tremendous amount of good players, and then I still manually edit some players who are having super long careers.

Just passing on my findings and suggestions with historical tests over the years with ootp

Very interesting. I have a question in regards to your statement about recalc and players that reached the end of the recalc years. So you're saying that when a player reaches the end, the game recalcs his final year over and over each season? So even with development on, guys will be brought back to their final season ratings? I guess what I'm asking is, the player is brought back each offseason to his final recalc ratings even if he takes OOTP development hits? I'm stunned by this if that's how it works.

[fcabanski]

"Used three-year recalc with current year doubled."

What does that mean, and are there similar settings for a standard game?

[Biggio509]

Originally Posted by fcabanski

"Used three-year recalc with current year doubled."

What does that mean, and are there similar settings for a standard game?

No only for historical. The game recalculates the player's ratings based on what they did.

3 year recalc the game bases ratings on the player's performance over three years. double current year means the game puts twice the weight on the current year.

So Ryan's ratings in 1986 would be based on what he did in real life in 1984, 1985, and 1986. If you double weight the current year his 1986 stats will count twice as much in the averaging to come up with ratings.

This is the problem outlined. The game calculates historical ratings based on actual stats so say X power should relate to Y strikeouts. However, to keep the league in line with real life league totals determine Ks and the Ks are distributed by ratings. So if Nolan Ryan plays longer than his career and with prime ratings then it affects Roger Clemen's Ks because there is another elite pitcher in the mix eating up HGH's Ks. So even with "B12" HGH doesn't get his K totals.

[Biggio509]

Originally Posted by sprague

But with lots of good players still around (not retired or in any way dropped off) the 30,000 get more distributed. Its why you in long term historical leagues you have trouble sometimes with guys coming anywhere close to their numbers.

Your suggestion maybe easiest but it seems like it would be possible to adjust the league totals for the elites who didn't retire so if Ryan stays on with his prime ratings you adjust Ks by 300 in the league totals. Theoretically possible but it would be a lot of work to guess at what numbers you need and it may backfire.

[pstrickert]

Originally Posted by Biggio509

So Ryan's ratings in 1986 would be based on what he did in real life in 1984, 1985, and 1986. If you double weight the current year his 1986 stats will count twice as much in the averaging to come up with ratings.

Not quite correct. The 3-yr recalc option would use 1985, 1986, and 1987, to determine Ryan's ratings for 1986. See here: Out of the Park Baseball Manual

[bwburke94]

OOTP doesn't know names, only numbers.

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by bwburke94

OOTP doesn't know names, only numbers.

So if Nolan Ryan is a soft tossing pile of beef, you would be alright with that?

[Assos]

I have had games in the past versions when Nolan never evolves from a bullpen thrower.