Why I Cheat w/ OOTP

[JerseyPirate]

Originally Posted by mytreds

Bro, how many 17 inning games were there last year? Are you that impatient, you can stand 9 innings but not 10, 11, or 12? Go watch a different sport if you want fast action. Baseball is chess. It’s slow it’s methodical, that’s what makes it great. I’m sorry you and thousands of other fail to see this. 9% of ballgames reach extras. Less than a 1 in 10 chance. A lot to ask to minimize something that’s already minimal.

There were 0 17 inning games last year because of the man on 2nd rule change. The only way to grow the fanbase is to bring new fans in. That's why when games did go 17 innings and ended at 2am local time, only about 5% of the fans stayed and probably same for the TV audience. Do you have kids? Taking your 5 and 8 year old to a 7:10pm start time and knowing the game will be over by 10:00pm and possibly 9:30 is a huge draw and will bring more people out to weeknight games.

[uruguru]

Originally Posted by JerseyPirate

There were 0 17 inning games last year because of the man on 2nd rule change. The only way to grow the fanbase is to bring new fans in. That's why when games did go 17 innings and ended at 2am local time, only about 5% of the fans stayed and probably same for the TV audience. Do you have kids? Taking your 5 and 8 year old to a 7:10pm start time and knowing the game will be over by 10:00pm and possibly 9:30 is a huge draw and will bring more people out to weeknight games.

Dude, what are you talking about? When I was a kid I LOVED extra inning games and double-headers. The idea of going ot the stadium and getting to watch more than 9 innings of baseball felt like a treat to me.

Also, being in CST the west coast games always started 2 hours late and I would literally lie in bed with an earpiece in listening to the radio broadcast as I went to sleep.

One of the unique appeals of the sport is there is no time limit. A game could last 20 innings, an inning could last 20 batters, and an at-bat could last 20 pitches. This is a selling point of the sport for fans, not something the get rid of because of TV programming.

We went to a lot of weeknight games that we had to leave early but we always listened to the rest of the game on the radio on the way home. Nobody missed anything..

[Syd Thrift]

As a West Coast fan I always hated extra inning games because my dad was a classic West Coast baseball fan inasmuch as we usually left around the 8th inning to beat the traffic (read: hit the traffic head on because that’s when everyone else was leaving). Extra innings meant listening to all the action we were missing in the car ride home.

[JerseyPirate]

Originally Posted by uruguru

Dude, what are you talking about? When I was a kid I LOVED extra inning games and double-headers. The idea of going ot the stadium and getting to watch more than 9 innings of baseball felt like a treat to me.

Also, being in CST the west coast games always started 2 hours late and I would literally lie in bed with an earpiece in listening to the radio broadcast as I went to sleep.

One of the unique appeals of the sport is there is no time limit. A game could last 20 innings, an inning could last 20 batters, and an at-bat could last 20 pitches. This is a selling point of the sport for fans, not something the get rid of because of TV programming.

We went to a lot of weeknight games that we had to leave early but we always listened to the rest of the game on the radio on the way home. Nobody missed anything..

You are only looking at it through your lens, not the lens of the average fan. You might have all night but most don't and don't care to spend the whole night. These changes are designed to get more casual/new fans to try it out which needs to be done to keep bringing in new fans.

[uruguru]

Originally Posted by JerseyPirate

You are only looking at it through your lens, not the lens of the average fan.

We all look at things through our own personal lenses and that includes what we perceive as the "average fan".

What is the average baseball fan? Someone who attends the game? Someone who regularly watches their team on TV? Someone who follows them on a daily basis but doesn't watch many games? Someone who follows them because their key fantasy players are on that team?

You don't know what the average fan is any more than I do.

[splat58]

Or you could live in Pittsburgh like me with an owner who doesn't care
[/QUOTE]

I share your pain. And it looks like there's no cure for it.

[darkcloud4579]

it's a single player game, I don't think there's any such thing as cheating in a simulation one-player game. It's just trash to pass off any victories done this way as legitimate without disclosing.

[Iu29]

I won't use the ghost runner. Without the ghost runner, you see games like this one:

It was the deciding game of an OOTP22 playoff series, both teams run by computer, 1912 Red Sox vs. 1939 Yankees, the teams were tied 4-4 after 18 (!) innings (This league was made up of great 20th and 21st century teams, plus four "super" teams made up mostly of all-time greats -and a few not so greats!. I allowed teams to make trades, and allowed teams to draft extra players from great teams that weren't quite good enough for the league). In the top of the 19th, Tris Speaker singled for the Red Sox, stole second, and went to third on Ivan Rodriguez' single; then after Moises Alou flied out, Neal Ball's single scored Speaker and advanced Rodriguez to second; next, Wil Cordero's flyout advanced Rodriguez, who scored on Heinie Wagner's single; the next batter Pete Kilduff whiffed to end the inning. In the bottom of the inning, Charlie Keller flied out, Joe DiMaggio whacked a solo dinger, but Joe Gordon flied out and Bill Dickey grounded out as the Red Sox won (the team I personally ran, the Stars, one of the "super" teams, finished with the best record, 139-17 (!) and won the World Series 5-3 over the "super" team from Tennessee. The Stars hit .306 with 540 HR (!) as a team, with a 2.46 team ERA. The major-league leaders in BA, HR, and ERA, respectively, were the Stars' Ty Cobb who hit .387, the Stars' Babe Ruth who hit 75 HR, and the Stars' Pedro Martinez who had a 1.64 ERA- and he had a home park that increased homers about 50%). The Stars usually win the WS, but in OOTP20 (with the same players as the OOTP22/23 Stars, not necessarily the same season), they were beaten in the WS, 5 games to 4, by a Cleveland team (drafted by computer) that included Lefty Grove, Ted Williams, and Hank Aaron, but only went 99-69 compared to the Stars' 121-47.

Right now I'm playing an OOTP23 league with the same four "super" teams (again the same players, not necessarily same season), plus the 30 best three-year 20th and 21st century teams (players with 1 B-R WAR per a 162 game season in any of the three years, who are not on OOTP's middle year roster, are added), plus the standard 2022 players, but-

strikeouts modifier set to .654
SB attempts modifier set to .972
no ghost runner (same as the previously mentioned OOTP22 league)
no three-batter rule (also same as the previously mentioned OOTP22 league)

and I moved about 150 of the best players (with $10 million salaries or a certain amount of B-R WAR per season) back to the team on which they spent the biggest part of their first six seasons (in spite of this, the Yankees and Dodgers are leading their divisions about 1/5 of the way through the season; the Stars have the best record once again).

The only concession to "modern" baseball I made with the three leagues I mentioned, was that I used the DH (I did that so the Stars could play Ted Williams regularly and the other "super" teams could play one of their great stars who would otherwise sit on the bench).

[Syd Thrift]

I mean, I don't use the extra guy at 2nd base in extra innings because I'm doing a fictional/historical league that's in 1972 and I want to make things as "realistic" as possible. That said, extra inning games can be extremely annoying and tedious, especially during the Second Deadball Era. Like, it's all well and good to talk about these "tense" 19 inning 2-2 games but it's a completely different thing to play them out, where both benches are completely spent (so there's not a lot to do each at-bat except hit "play" - I should note that I handle substitutions for both teams but allow the AI to choose offensive/defensive strategy) and somehow the freaking long relievers on both teams have thrown 7 innings of shutout ball. And then it feels like suddenly bunts go from being 80% effective to 50% at best, and guys annoyingly stay at 3rd base when making a play at the plate would end the game... just UGH.

[Durfio]

Originally Posted by uruguru

Dude, what are you talking about? When I was a kid I LOVED extra inning games and double-headers. The idea of going ot the stadium and getting to watch more than 9 innings of baseball felt like a treat to me.

Also, being in CST the west coast games always started 2 hours late and I would literally lie in bed with an earpiece in listening to the radio broadcast as I went to sleep.

One of the unique appeals of the sport is there is no time limit. A game could last 20 innings, an inning could last 20 batters, and an at-bat could last 20 pitches. This is a selling point of the sport for fans, not something the get rid of because of TV programming.

We went to a lot of weeknight games that we had to leave early but we always listened to the rest of the game on the radio on the way home. Nobody missed anything..

Exactly this! As a kid, I was always excited by extra inning games. It was extra baseball for free! And obviously, these were also the best games! After a full 9 innings, the 2 teams are even, fighting for every pitch to get an out, or scratch out a run. Now a winning run can be scored off of 2 outs without first getting a baserunner, because abracadabra! It's kids stuff. Feels like Little League ideas. They easily could've sped up the game by doing a better job enforcing the existing rules.

[Ratbelly]

Nm

[Fenway0025]

Originally Posted by Brad K

Proof the 2B runner doesn't fit the game.

The real proof is that they don't use it in postseason. The rule sucks.