Any way to keep the initial talent over time in a fictional league?

[Joelman111]

I'm setting up a fictional league and I want to sim the first ~25 years so that the league has some backstory before I start to manage a team. I notice that every test simulation I set up, the initial talent is awesome with hitting leaders slashing .340/.440/.650 and pitching leaders with ~2.00 ERA. These are great and the numbers I want to see! However, over time these great leaders vanish and the hitting leaders slump back to around .320/.400/.600 and the pitching leaders end up at 2.80-3.00 ERA. The offensive environment stays relatively stable, but the leaders are just not there anymore.

I have a 24 team league, each team with AAA, AA, A, and R affiliates. I have 3 feeder leagues: 1 with 26 colleges, 1 with 4 junior colleges, and 1 with 24 high schools. Finally, I have an independent league for the scrubs that get cut or are undrafted (this league does not have an amateur draft and just signs free agents). I have disabled automatic free agent creation and the amateur draft only uses feeder league talent. I also have a default amount of international free agents, scouting discoveries, and established international free agents.

Anybody have any advice on keeping the talent level up in a fictional league? Happy to discuss more details about this league I'm setting up (I've put in a ton of work with custom logos, uniforms, stadiums, and more).

[Rain King]

How many rounds is your draft? Do you have the option checked to create additional draft-able players. What are your international amateur settings?

When there are no longer outliers, that is usually a symptom of your league talent being too high, not too low.

Basically, once the average league talent rises to a certain point it is no longer likely that any individual players can get high enough above that line to be a significant outlier.

[Joelman111]

Originally Posted by Rain King

How many rounds is your draft? Do you have the option checked to create additional draft-able players. What are your international amateur settings?

My draft is 16 rounds (20 rounds was recommended by the manual, but that's not quite sustainable with my number of feeder teams). I am not creating additional draft-able players- my amateur draft uses feeder league talent only. As stated, the international amateur settings are on default.

Originally Posted by Rain King

When there are no longer outliers, that is usually a symptom of your league talent being too high, not too low.

I have heard that before, but I'm not certain the league can get by with fewer feeder teams. Just numbers wise. Also, I am concerned that if there are fewer players, then there will be fewer chances for true outliers to be created. For example, the odds of getting a guy with 70 contact AND 70 power AND 70 eye is extremely low, so having fewer players means there is less of a chance of a player like that being generated. Maybe I'm thinking about this incorrectly and the game will ensure outliers are created regardless of number of players.

Originally Posted by Rain King

Basically, once the average league talent rises to a certain point it is no longer likely that any individual players can get high enough above that line to be a significant outlier.

This logic makes sense to me. Is there any way for me to tamp down the amount of talent coming out of feeder leagues? Like just have them produce more scrubs? That way I can keep the number of players created the same, but just lower the average talent level.

[MathBandit]

Originally Posted by Joelman111

Also, I am concerned that if there are fewer players, then there will be fewer chances for true outliers to be created. For example, the odds of getting a guy with 70 contact AND 70 power AND 70 eye is extremely low, so having fewer players means there is less of a chance of a player like that being generated. Maybe I'm thinking about this incorrectly and the game will ensure outliers are created regardless of number of players.

While that's true, the bigger effect is that if you have too many guys, then there aren't any 50/45/45 pitchers with jobs for those elite hitters to feast on, since there's too much talent and even the bad teams have 55/50/55 arms at the back of their rotation.

It's why IRL absent shenanigans with the ball (or an explosion of players eating a full and balanced breakfast of Wheaties every morning), outlier record-breaking seasons tend to follow expansion, since adding 2 teams means giving MLB regular roles to 50 guys who weren't good enough to hold a roster spot previously.

[Joelman111]

Originally Posted by MathBandit

While that's true, the bigger effect is that if you have too many guys, then there aren't any 50/45/45 pitchers with jobs for those elite hitters to feast on, since there's too much talent and even the bad teams have 55/50/55 arms at the back of their rotation.

It's why IRL absent shenanigans with the ball (or an explosion of players eating a full and balanced breakfast of Wheaties every morning), outlier record-breaking seasons tend to follow expansion, since adding 2 teams means giving MLB regular roles to 50 guys who weren't good enough to hold a roster spot previously.

That makes sense. I did just try a simulation where I lowered all the PCMs to .9 (to hopefully create more scrubs) and that gave me good, but inconsistent results. For example, the leader in BA would hit .330, but the dropoff was steep and sometimes 5th place would be below .300, which isn't what I want. It seems like the top stays higher, but the talent drops off rather quickly. Anyone have PCMs that really work for them?

[Joelman111]

Digging deeper after trying PCMs set to .9, it seems like its just causing everybody to bunch up at lower ratings. Like I have a ton of 40-60 contact guys, but barely any 65+. There are just too few talented guys in the league overall. I think this is a problem with the way OOTP handles distribution of talent- it just creates so many more middle of the road guys vs. the initial created players. Would love for them to address this disparity in a future update.

[snepp]

A rating distribution chart comparing talent at initial creation vs 30+ years in the future would be interesting. I'm probably not bored enough to do it though, but I really want to. Where's RonCo hiding when you need him?

[darkcloud4579]

I tend to juice the PCMs in my leagues so that you get more balance and that ratings don't matter as much which feels realistic to me, it also creates lots of diffusion where guys will be good for a bit but dropoff for all sorts of reasons and that's more realistic to me than having the dudes who standout based on blue ratings and then you're annoyed when they don't dominate, I prefer the real-life scenario where the difference between 100 and 500 is razor thin and circumstantial to their market/team/situation.

[Joelman111]

Originally Posted by darkcloud4579

I tend to juice the PCMs in my leagues so that you get more balance and that ratings don't matter as much which feels realistic to me, it also creates lots of diffusion where guys will be good for a bit but dropoff for all sorts of reasons and that's more realistic to me than having the dudes who standout based on blue ratings and then you're annoyed when they don't dominate, I prefer the real-life scenario where the difference between 100 and 500 is razor thin and circumstantial to their market/team/situation.

Interesting... What numbers (estimated) do you typically use for your PCMs?

[Joelman111]

Originally Posted by snepp

A rating distribution chart comparing talent at initial creation vs 30+ years in the future would be interesting. I'm probably not bored enough to do it though, but I really want to. Where's RonCo hiding when you need him?

I've tried this in the past actually... I found the distribution to basically be what I described where the initial crop of players have a lot more top-end players with fewer middle of the road guys. Then as the league progresses, these tend to bunch more toward the middle. Maybe I will try it for this version of the game as well (if I do, I will share it here).

[snepp]

Originally Posted by Joelman111

I've tried this in the past actually... I found the distribution to basically be what I described where the initial crop of players have a lot more top-end players with fewer middle of the road guys. Then as the league progresses, these tend to bunch more toward the middle. Maybe I will try it for this version of the game as well (if I do, I will share it here).

That would be fantastic, if you hit the "bored enough" stage to do it. I did a couple rounds of amateur draft scouting comparisons between different scout types and that was enough spreadsheet time for me.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by Rain King

How many rounds is your draft? Do you have the option checked to create additional draft-able players. What are your international amateur settings?

When there are no longer outliers, that is usually a symptom of your league talent being too high, not too low.

Basically, once the average league talent rises to a certain point it is no longer likely that any individual players can get high enough above that line to be a significant outlier.

My league is in its 79th season... the players are getting too old... very seldom do I see players 18-21 years old being productive... they can't make the active roster... they get stuck on the reserver roster.

Is there a remedy for this problem?

The number of productive and impactful rookies are getting fewer and fewer each season.

[kidd_05_u2]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

My league is in its 79th season... the players are getting too old... very seldom do I see players 18-21 years old being productive... they can't make the active roster... they get stuck on the reserver roster.

Is there a remedy for this problem?

The number of productive and impactful rookies are getting fewer and fewer each season.

The problem should be fixable, but it depends on what is the real source of the problem.

Are the young players appearing in the league with ratings that are too low? You would need to change player creation modifiers.

Are the young players not developing fast enough? There is a setting to make them develop faster.

Are veteran players not starting to decline when they should? There is a setting to make players start their decline earlier.

Are the veteran players not declining fast enough as they age? There is a setting to make them decline faster.


My guess is that you want to increase the batter and pitcher developing speed to help them get to their potential faster, but maybe the problem is in the way new players enter the league, which could be trickier to resolve.

I would recommend a read through this part of the manual: https://manuals.ootpdevelopments.com...player_options

[Joelman111]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

My league is in its 79th season... the players are getting too old... very seldom do I see players 18-21 years old being productive... they can't make the active roster... they get stuck on the reserver roster.

Is there a remedy for this problem?

The number of productive and impactful rookies are getting fewer and fewer each season.

This seems like a problem for a different thread. You may want to start a new one in the general discussions so it gets more eyeballs.

As kidd said, you need to do a bit more digging to find the real issue as there a lot of potential resolutions. I will say that 18-21 year olds are very rarely impactful at the major league level. Most players are around 22-24 when making their major league debut.

If you prefer that players finish their development at a younger age, you may want to adjust the "development target age" to be younger. Go to league settings, players & team tab. On the left side is the player development settings. The target age will determine at what age players finish developing. If you want them to develop faster, you can change the development speed in the same area.

If the problem is that the talent level in the draft is too low, you will need to raise the Player Creation Modifiers in the league settings->league settings->players tab.

[Eugene Church]

Thanks to Joelman111 and kidd_05_u2 for their replies and help.

Really appreciate it.