Understanding Minor League Performance in OOTP 26

[Lukas Berger]

Originally Posted by Paul Reuschel's Mustache

Four-plus pages to go through. Here's an overview of the first two pages. These quotes are not the complete respective posts. Lots of good posts followed the last one here. Fascinating discussion.

In addition to all this, there are some other factors I think Matt and I did not mention and only maybe LansdowneSt mentioned in passing.

Probably the biggest reason for the change was to smooth the AI's handling of minor league players and especially top prospects' progressions through the minors.

A pretty significant part of our focus for this year's game was to make minor league AI and the paths for prospects look much more realistic. We did a lot to smooth out minor league roster handling as a whole and especially focusing on top prospects.

In previous versions of the game, a typical HS top prospect's route to MLB might have looked something like this:
2 years in R
Promoted to A. Solid there, not great.
Half a year there, promoted to A+
Completely sucks in A+ because their current ratings make them A/A+ tweeners.
Demoted back to A. Maybe back to R in some cases.
Spends another year there, current ratings improved, promoted to AA, skipping A+ entirely.
Spends like 3 months in AA, then promoted to MLB.

That's not a path any real players have followed, ever, and yet in previous versions of OOTP it was almost a 'typical' path. At least not uncommon. That was not a good thing. This change significantly helps there.

[OutS|der]

Originally Posted by Lukas Berger

In addition to all this, there are some other factors I think Matt and I did not mention and only maybe LansdowneSt mentioned in passing.

Probably the biggest reason for the change was to smooth the AI's handling of minor league players and especially top prospects' progressions through the minors.

A pretty significant part of our focus for this year's game was to make minor league AI and the paths for prospects look much more realistic. We did a lot to smooth out minor league roster handling as a whole and especially focusing on top prospects.

In previous versions of the game, a typical HS top prospect's route to MLB might have looked something like this:
2 years in R
Promoted to A. Solid there, not great.
Half a year there, promoted to A+
Completely sucks in A+ because their current ratings make them A/A+ tweeners.
Demoted back to A. Maybe back to R in some cases.
Spends another year there, current ratings improved, promoted to AA, skipping A+ entirely.
Spends like 3 months in AA, then promoted to MLB.

That's not a path any real players have followed, ever, and yet in previous versions of OOTP it was almost a 'typical' path. At least not uncommon. That was not a good thing. This change significantly helps there.

And this couldn't be done without boosting stats? Players with high potential couldn't just develop faster?

To help the AI, you had to make MILB stats meaningless to real players?
I get eager and promote my two way star to AAA and lock him in as the AI doesn't want to play him both ways, his stats get boosted to make him decent but since he's playing above his level he never develops and I'll never know why, was it TCR, did he just turn out to be a bust or did I over promote him and the game lied to me with his stats?

[rwd59]

Originally Posted by Lukas Berger

In addition to all this, there are some other factors I think Matt and I did not mention and only maybe LansdowneSt mentioned in passing.

Probably the biggest reason for the change was to smooth the AI's handling of minor league players and especially top prospects' progressions through the minors.

A pretty significant part of our focus for this year's game was to make minor league AI and the paths for prospects look much more realistic. We did a lot to smooth out minor league roster handling as a whole and especially focusing on top prospects.

In previous versions of the game, a typical HS top prospect's route to MLB might have looked something like this:
2 years in R
Promoted to A. Solid there, not great.
Half a year there, promoted to A+
Completely sucks in A+ because their current ratings make them A/A+ tweeners.
Demoted back to A. Maybe back to R in some cases.
Spends another year there, current ratings improved, promoted to AA, skipping A+ entirely.
Spends like 3 months in AA, then promoted to MLB.

That's not a path any real players have followed, ever, and yet in previous versions of OOTP it was almost a 'typical' path. At least not uncommon. That was not a good thing. This change significantly helps there.

In your scenario above in 4-5 years they were in the MLB. I would say that the out of the box development settings in this year's version it takes 6-8 years to reach that point if they ever do. I understand the angst many who have posted in this thread feel about this affecting how they play as far as MILB stats is concerned and how realistic this new system may or may not be. I base my decisions to promote players to the MLB based on ratings as opposed to stats. Many times I don't even bother to check their MILB stats at all when deciding to promote. Again this is MY style but may not be anyone else's. I just feel that development is off in this version.

[rwd59]

Originally Posted by OutS|der

And this couldn't be done without boosting stats? Players with high potential couldn't just develop faster?

Got to agree with this.

[jpeters1734]

Originally Posted by OutS|der

I get eager and promote my two way star to AAA and lock him in as the AI doesn't want to play him both ways, his stats get boosted to make him decent but since he's playing above his level he never develops and I'll never know why, was it TCR, did he just turn out to be a bust or did I over promote him and the game lied to me with his stats?

I think this is a really good point. I've been experiencing a lot of issues with my minor leaguers being unhappy with their role, with no explanation, maybe due to them being in too high of a level despite decent stats.

When we have to think so much about what the game mechanics are doing to our players, it really breaks immersion and makes it not fun

[Lukas Berger]

Originally Posted by OutS|der

And this couldn't be done without boosting stats? Players with high potential couldn't just develop faster?

To help the AI, you had to make MILB stats meaningless to real players?
I get eager and promote my two way star to AAA and lock him in as the AI doesn't want to play him both ways, his stats get boosted to make him decent but since he's playing above his level he never develops and I'll never know why, was it TCR, did he just turn out to be a bust or did I over promote him and the game lied to me with his stats?

I mean, this is just real baseball, no? Minor league stats are not infallibly predictive of future MLB performance in reality, so why should they be in the game?

Teams wouldn't spend millions of dollars a year on scouting departments if all they had to do was look at minor league stats to know how good a player really is.

They thought they could do this back in the early Moneyball days, but quickly found out it does not really work, at least not in isolation.

Stats are one data point, and a useful one for sure, but they are fallible and they do 'lie' when taken without any other context.

Look at a guy like Kristian Campbell as a quick example. Everything about his MiLB stats and even ST stats said he was MLB ready. Turns out, not so much.

Anyway, regardless of the arguments for and against, it's not like we want to actively tick folks off here, and there are clearly some pretty valid arguments why a lot of folks dislike this change.

I guess the ultimate solution here is likely going to be something along the lines of making this yet another setting, where folks who want to have potential influence minor league stats can turn that on, and those who hate the idea can turn it off.

We'll probably also slightly decrease the strength of the adjustments even if it's turned on.

I don't want to promise that's what we'll do, that's more for Matt to decide, but things certainly seems to be heading in that direction.

[uruguru]

They should just call current ratings 'ability', and potential ratings 'tools'

Get away from this automatic mindset that players are on some sort of rating treadmill where their current ratings linearly progress to their potential ratings.

The OOTP devs seem to be saying that in leagues where there is a high disparity in ability, players with tools have a minor performance advantage, but that they slowly lose it as they move to more competitive leagues (MLB).

And, in fairness, I seem to remember a professional NBA player (high tools) a few years ago hit something like .250 in AA ball while having zero ability.

It's like everyone has assumed there's a single-factored performance track in the game and is freaking out that it's dual-factored. Understandable, but at the end of the day is it more realistic?

[sixto]

Originally Posted by Zooerp

A scout that gives a 20-80 scale rating based exclusively on data, is giving their opinion based on their interpretation of that data, not plugging numbers directly into a formula.

A scout is giving their opinion, period. It's not data, is what I'm saying. So it can't be used like data.

Current ability ratings are the numbers here that are designed to be used in place of data. But I'm glad you brought this up, because as I thought about this issue, I realized something for the first time: as implemented in the game right now, "Current Ability" is also just an opinion!

I know this because I can set a player to have 500 power (this is in OOTP25 now, I don't have 26) as a current ability, and yet that player can still hit 8 HR in an environment where the top HR hitters typically hit around 40.

If Current Ability were being used as data, then a player with X rating should hit Y home runs in a season. Yes, there can be noise, and we want there to be noise — nobody wants a player in a MLB sim to robotically output the same statistics season after season.

But as implemented in OOTP, "Current Ability," like "Potential Ability," is a suggestion, not a fact. The game is clearly designed to buff and nerf current ability as it likes. Whatever factors are affecting an individual player's ability to reach his Current Ability ratings, I can't see them.

Another door into this issue, tangentially related, is the way that a user, even with the aid of the editor, is powerless to prevent a player from deteriorating once he reaches a certain age, as the game is coded to force that player to deteriorate. Even with the editor, you can't see whatever ratings there are that make that player deteriorate — although I believe (can't prove) that the AI managers can see those ratings.

[Zooerp]

Originally Posted by sixto

A scout is giving their opinion, period. It's not data, is what I'm saying. So it can't be used like data.

Current ability ratings are the numbers here that are designed to be used in place of data. But I'm glad you brought this up, because as I thought about this issue, I realized something for the first time: as implemented in the game right now, "Current Ability" is also just an opinion!

But as implemented in OOTP, "Current Ability," like "Potential Ability," is a suggestion, not a fact.

In real life, "Current Ability", as it's evaluated by MLB teams to inform their decisions, is a suggestion, not a fact.

[sixto]

Originally Posted by Zooerp

In real life, "Current Ability", as it's evaluated by MLB teams to inform their decisions, is a suggestion, not a fact.

No. In real life, current ability is a player's ability to play baseball. There actually is no such thing as a rating for this — the best we can do is use his stats to assess his current ability, and stats are data.

Current ability in the game is a rating that generates a player's stats. It's a number, like 236 or 464, on a scale, let's say 550 or 600. The game must have a number that it uses to create results. Think of how tabletop baseball games work. You roll the dice, you get a result, you check the result against a result table, and there you have it, a plate appearance or a stolen base attempt. If you've been around long enough you know that OOTP used to work exactly this way.

We may not be able to see this number — I don't believe we can — but at some point in the process, the game is converting some sort of Current Ability data into outcomes. That the game is also obscuring this data in some way may be why a person would think that Current Ability is (ought to be) a suggestion. But even if Current Ability ratings are variables, they are still numbers that lead to outcomes.

Potential ability can never be data, since it describes the future.

[Zooerp]

Originally Posted by sixto

No. In real life, current ability is a player's ability to play baseball. There actually is no such thing as a rating for this — the best we can do is use his stats to assess his current ability, and stats are data.

Potential ability can never be data, since it describes the future.

If we're trying to simulate real life, the best we can do is use his stats and a scouts evaluation of his tools as they relate to the current MLB environment to assess him as a player. One can easily imagine two players capable putting up the same stats at AA, but if called up to the majors at the same time would have vastly different outcomes, because their "Current Ability" plays differently at different levels.

You acknowledge there's no such thing as a true rating for "Current Ability" to play baseball but also insist that the number OOTP uses to represent this must be the only thing used as data in the dice roll.

All the people jumping to the conclusion that this means minor league stats are completely meaningless are making a huge leap, imo.

[Brad K]

A player's output is determined by inputs higher than that shown by 100% accurate scouting. But now the 100% setting is not what is says it is - what it's been "forever" - and is instead a lie. If a person goes to the editor is what is shown there also a lie?

Not knowing the exact effect of a game feature is desirable. Outright deception is not.

[Brad K]

Was the thread title changed at the OP's request or with his permission? Seemingly lost with the proliferation of message boards is the old time concept of not changing a person's words, so I'm wondering if that concept was ignored.

[jpeters1734]

Originally Posted by Brad K

Was the thread title changed at the OP's request or with his permission? Seemingly lost with the proliferation of message boards is the old time concept of not changing a person's words, so I'm wondering if that concept was ignored.

I requested the change so it better reflected the message

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by jpeters1734

I requested the change so it better reflected the message

OK, cool. Thank you for responding. Glad it's not like some past moderation events.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by jpeters1734

I requested the change so it better reflected the message

You have uncovered facts for the Wiki. I hope you post to it.

[Lucas718]

This is a very interesting thread. I feel like we got a peak behind the curtain into the inner workings of the "fog of war". So if my simple mind is understanding what I've read, I should be skeptical of a minor leaguer whose actual and potential ratings are very different and is putting up good numbers, knowing that the numbers have been artificially inflated.

I kinda now wish I didn't know that

[WhiskyTango]

.

[WhiskyTango]

Originally Posted by Lukas Berger

I mean, this is just real baseball, no? Minor league stats are not infallibly predictive of future MLB performance in reality, so why should they be in the game?

Teams wouldn't spend millions of dollars a year on scouting departments if all they had to do was look at minor league stats to know how good a player really is.

This is valid. I myself cannot comprehend stats-only. That's hardly realistic.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by Lucas718

This is a very interesting thread. I feel like we got a peak behind the curtain into the inner workings of the "fog of war". So if my simple mind is understanding what I've read, I should be skeptical of a minor leaguer whose actual and potential ratings are very different and is putting up good numbers, knowing that the numbers have been artificially inflated.

I kinda now wish I didn't know that

Rather than not knowing, wouldn't it be better if the situation didn't exist?