Thanks for giving this delightful game serious attention. In fact, I would never have known about it but for your video introducing it. The issue of relievers in a replay is a big one. What the replayer has to keep reminding himself is that the manager did not know how his players were going to perform that year...and we do. You have to suspend that knowledge and say, "hey, the manager knows the player has the skills and has done it for him in the past and maybe this is the game where he'll get back on track." We know he won't but the manager had no idea. It actually adds more excitement to the game as you hold your breath on each roll of the dice. Outstanding video and topic.
I've started a 1961 replay and to get the C and D rated pitchers in the game, I simply use the pitchers that were used in that particular game - thanks Baseball Reference! So far that seems to be working pretty well. Thanks for the video!
Thanks Ray! My struggle there is that the game in real life and on my table often don’t line up very well. That’s my Sparky Lyle example in this video. Suppose the game was a 5-4 victory in real life, with Sparky getting the save. But on my table, I lose 8-1. I can’t use Sparky in that game. So I get stuck.
@@KurtBergland you're correct. I should have said that I use the pitchers that were used in the real life game as a guideline for what I will use. I play it by ear, depending on who's been used in previous games. I'm like you though. If I didn't use real life as a guideline, the Chi Chi Olivo's of the world wouldn't get much playing time, if any!!!
Thanks Kurt for another great Pocket Pennant Run video. My guess is that the BA, runs, Ks, HRs and Es will allow start to float toward a medium of all the years as you play the 3 ,4 and 5 starters. As far as the RP issue - as you know As you know, in APBA the starting rotations are based on IP. So the SP at the top of the rotation is not the best rating (A or B) but the guy who logged the most IP (probably Catfish Hunter on the 76 NYY). So maybe the RP "discipline" would be to rank the RPs by their IPs and go first to the RP with the most relief IPs (essentially create an APBA like relief pitcher rotation). Well just a thought. Sorry for the long comment. Thanks again for all your tremendous videos!
Kurt I have run all the numbers and put them into a spreadsheet using the pitcher, batter and power cards. I can email them to you if you like. An example is that an A pitcher vs an A batter with A power will have an .229 batting average. That same batter vs a D pitcher would have a .343
@@KurtBergland So far, the scoring is way down compared to the National Association avg R/Gm, but the game was almost a different animal back then; but the good teams are winning, the lousy teams are losing, and the Athletics are tearing up the Association with the Red Stockings and White Stockings hit on their tail; I love playing old, old seasons!
I enjoyed the video. With all due respect, I have a few thoughts: 40 games is probably too small a sample size; at 22:16 - you may want to make a rule that a reliever cannot pitch in more than 2 consecutive games; I like the stats comparison you are doing, but again not being mean just my opinion, by picking teams from different seasons it’s hard to know what the baseline really should be.
Hi Bruce! Thanks for your thoughts! I agree-40 games is way too small a sample size, as I said in the video. The purpose of the video is to establish some preliminary data and to start what I hope will be helpful conversation. Having said that, I think we can start to see some things that may become trends. The purpose of the varied teams and seasons is to try to give folks who are in the Facebook group an idea of what they might be able to expect-which, by my unscientific count is running about 2/3 doing leagues like this one and about 1/3 doing traditional single-season as played replays. You aren’t being mean at all! Of course it’s difficult to determine what the baseline should be-that’s the purpose of offering comparative seasonal data. The very early results seem to show that the engine handles the current game most accurately, and that that’s what people might expect. The walks, errors, and home runs, at this point, most closely mirror today’s game, and other pieces of the data may begin to move that way as well. Stay tuned.
@@KurtBergland Interesting breakdown of the people playing on FB. Without looking, would have thought more like 50-50. Can Maris hit 61? How many do McGwire and Sosa hit? Can the 69 Mets pull of the miracle? That’s what I was expecting more of. But I totally get the “Who’s better - 27 Yanks or 69 O’s?” line of thinking. Keep up the good work, sir!
@@KurtBergland Watched a short vid by Matt McKeever on the software and I now understand why players are less inclined to play season replays. It's roster size - limited to 15 batters and 15 pitchers
Nice breakdown Kurt. Would you predict that when you play more and use the lower graded pitchers and then combine them to the results you showed today for a more complete set of averages for your categories you will see the results fall into 70’s-80’s ranges?
Hi JJ! Difficult to extrapolate. My guess at this point would be that averages will be slightly lower than that era, but power will be slightly higher (perhaps on a 1987 level?) but that runs scored should be comparable. That’s my hypothesis at this point.
The game stats will obviously reflect the quality of the pitchers used. But, the issue I have is the individual stats are going to suffer because of the broad range of each Player rating. Its a very abbreviated attempt similar to APBA to have a small amount of results available for a large amount of players. You’re just not going to get much separation with individual stats. Thanks Kurt
Thanks Bruins. I tried to explain in the video that I think there WILL be separation because four total variables (batter rating, pitcher rating, power, and opposing defense) ALL have an impact on averages and even slugging. I think the sim is getting shortchanged in this area. Time will tell if it turns out to be enough separation, I suppose, but I’m pretty confident that there is separation because of these four competing variables.
@@KurtBergland Your going to have separation, But it will come in groups of players rather than having two guys at .315 avg and three at .309, Your going to have a group of players batting between .300 and .320 with the I think there’s five variables Kurt with the addition of Pitchers Control rating that exist at the top row of the card’s. Along with the amount of variable results you get in the columns.You know as well as I there’s a possibility of almost 200 different Batting Avg’s available in any given year. Even with eight variables it still not enough in my opinion. Thanks, For all you do for our hobby.
As for relief pitcher usage on a full season replay go by the innings they actually pitched during the real season. Should stop any overuse of any pitcher. As you say the game situation will dictate which pitchers are used game by game as the season wears on. Hope that makes sense
I enjoyed the video. But can you answer this? The batter gets a penalty for hitting the same side as the pitcher, but the pitcher doesn't get a penalty for opposite sides. Has this been factored in?
Pitcher’s penalty would be the batter doesn’t get downgraded. I assume lefty/righty percentages figure into the batter’s grade. But here again, with only four grades it’s a broad swath for sure.
It seems like PPR is low on offense from what I have seen from others. It will be interesting to how much your offense increases using the third and fourth pitchers.
Seems like it is. From what I’ve played into the next batch of games, it still looks a little low overall. I don’t think it will be too low from a runs scored standpoint to be playable and enjoyable-but the home run totals are definitely best suited for 21st century baseball.
Final thought: all tabletop sports games are about abstraction. Some things just need to be simplified. Otherwise you would have a game that requires 4 dice rolls and chart lookups for each pitch! Who wants that game? Not me. But abstraction can detract from realism. More abstraction may mean less realistic results. Each gamer needs to find the game or games that have the right level of abstraction and are fun, but give enough realistic results.
Without question. My feeling is that the games that minimize abstraction to the nth degree, and there are several around today, are on the endangered species list. The importance of PPR isn’t PPR, but the genre (with increased abstraction) that it has demonstrated has an incredible market. Watch what happens over the next twelve months as designers follow this example.
I agree simplicity is best with just enough detail to keep it interesting I don't get caught up in individual statistics as much, close enough is good enough in the end it's wins and loses the road to get there isn't as important to me.
It seems to me that you should take the average runs scored etc., from each of the years from which your 40 teams come from to get the real life averages from your combined 'fictional' 40 team league. Then you will be able to compare apples to apples (the real life 40 team leage averages) with the stats that PPR produces for you.
My batting averages are low also. I have found the defensive play card doesn’t provide enough “action”, so I am trying this change: singles are allocated to 9D, 10C and 11B. That makes for more risk/reward for defenders and should boost the offense a bit.
Thanks for giving this delightful game serious attention. In fact, I would never have known about it but for your video introducing it. The issue of relievers in a replay is a big one. What the replayer has to keep reminding himself is that the manager did not know how his players were going to perform that year...and we do. You have to suspend that knowledge and say, "hey, the manager knows the player has the skills and has done it for him in the past and maybe this is the game where he'll get back on track." We know he won't but the manager had no idea. It actually adds more excitement to the game as you hold your breath on each roll of the dice. Outstanding video and topic.
Thanks Terry!
I've started a 1961 replay and to get the C and D rated pitchers in the game, I simply use the pitchers that were used in that particular game - thanks Baseball Reference! So far that seems to be working pretty well. Thanks for the video!
Thanks Ray! My struggle there is that the game in real life and on my table often don’t line up very well. That’s my Sparky Lyle example in this video. Suppose the game was a 5-4 victory in real life, with Sparky getting the save. But on my table, I lose 8-1. I can’t use Sparky in that game. So I get stuck.
@@KurtBergland you're correct. I should have said that I use the pitchers that were used in the real life game as a guideline for what I will use. I play it by ear, depending on who's been used in previous games. I'm like you though. If I didn't use real life as a guideline, the Chi Chi Olivo's of the world wouldn't get much playing time, if any!!!
Thanks Kurt for another great Pocket Pennant Run video. My guess is that the BA, runs, Ks, HRs and Es will allow start to float toward a medium of all the years as you play the 3 ,4 and 5 starters. As far as the RP issue - as you know As you know, in APBA the starting rotations are based on IP. So the SP at the top of the rotation is not the best rating (A or B) but the guy who logged the most IP (probably Catfish Hunter on the 76 NYY). So maybe the RP "discipline" would be to rank the RPs by their IPs and go first to the RP with the most relief IPs (essentially create an APBA like relief pitcher rotation). Well just a thought. Sorry for the long comment. Thanks again for all your tremendous videos!
Thanks John!
Kurt I have run all the numbers and put them into a spreadsheet using the pitcher, batter and power cards. I can email them to you if you like. An example is that an A pitcher vs an A batter with A power will have an .229 batting average. That same batter vs a D pitcher would have a .343
Thanks! How does defense play into it?
@@KurtBergland Since its only one single and only against a C or D defense it improves the batting average .007.
Very good information!
Thank you!
I've started an 1871 replay; pretty fun so far
Great! Let me know how it goes!
@@KurtBergland So far, the scoring is way down compared to the National Association avg R/Gm, but the game was almost a different animal back then; but the good teams are winning, the lousy teams are losing, and the Athletics are tearing up the Association with the Red Stockings and White Stockings hit on their tail; I love playing old, old seasons!
@@farpointgamingdirect very cool-please keep me posted with updates!
I enjoyed the video. With all due respect, I have a few thoughts: 40 games is probably too small a sample size; at 22:16 - you may want to make a rule that a reliever cannot pitch in more than 2 consecutive games; I like the stats comparison you are doing, but again not being mean just my opinion, by picking teams from different seasons it’s hard to know what the baseline really should be.
Hi Bruce! Thanks for your thoughts! I agree-40 games is way too small a sample size, as I said in the video. The purpose of the video is to establish some preliminary data and to start what I hope will be helpful conversation. Having said that, I think we can start to see some things that may become trends. The purpose of the varied teams and seasons is to try to give folks who are in the Facebook group an idea of what they might be able to expect-which, by my unscientific count is running about 2/3 doing leagues like this one and about 1/3 doing traditional single-season as played replays. You aren’t being mean at all! Of course it’s difficult to determine what the baseline should be-that’s the purpose of offering comparative seasonal data. The very early results seem to show that the engine handles the current game most accurately, and that that’s what people might expect. The walks, errors, and home runs, at this point, most closely mirror today’s game, and other pieces of the data may begin to move that way as well. Stay tuned.
@@KurtBergland Interesting breakdown of the people playing on FB. Without looking, would have thought more like 50-50. Can Maris hit 61? How many do McGwire and Sosa hit? Can the 69 Mets pull of the miracle? That’s what I was expecting more of. But I totally get the “Who’s better - 27 Yanks or 69 O’s?” line of thinking. Keep up the good work, sir!
@@bruceberkowicz6427 thanks Bruce!
@@KurtBergland Watched a short vid by Matt McKeever on the software and I now understand why players are less inclined to play season replays. It's roster size - limited to 15 batters and 15 pitchers
@@bruceberkowicz6427 but that’s not true. Every player on every team is available, you just can’t put them all on the roster card.
Nice breakdown Kurt. Would you predict that when you play more and use the lower graded pitchers and then combine them to the results you showed today for a more complete set of averages for your categories you will see the results fall into 70’s-80’s ranges?
Hi JJ! Difficult to extrapolate. My guess at this point would be that averages will be slightly lower than that era, but power will be slightly higher (perhaps on a 1987 level?) but that runs scored should be comparable. That’s my hypothesis at this point.
If that is what the results turn out to be that’s great as far as I’m concerned. 80’s is my favorite decade.
The game stats will obviously reflect the quality of the pitchers used. But, the issue I have is the individual stats are going to suffer because of the broad range of each Player rating. Its a very abbreviated attempt similar to APBA to have a small amount of results available for a large amount of players. You’re just not going to get much separation with individual stats. Thanks Kurt
Thanks Bruins. I tried to explain in the video that I think there WILL be separation because four total variables (batter rating, pitcher rating, power, and opposing defense) ALL have an impact on averages and even slugging. I think the sim is getting shortchanged in this area. Time will tell if it turns out to be enough separation, I suppose, but I’m pretty confident that there is separation because of these four competing variables.
@@KurtBergland Your going to have separation, But it will come in groups of players rather than having two guys at .315 avg and three at .309, Your going to have a group of players batting between .300 and .320 with the I think there’s five variables Kurt with the addition of Pitchers Control rating that exist at the top row of the card’s. Along with the amount of variable results you get in the columns.You know as well as I there’s a possibility of almost 200 different Batting Avg’s available in any given year. Even with eight variables it still not enough in my opinion. Thanks, For all you do for our hobby.
:-) wind howling again
Good stuff 👏 👍
Lol
As for relief pitcher usage on a full season replay go by the innings they actually pitched during the real season. Should stop any overuse of any pitcher. As you say the game situation will dictate which pitchers are used game by game as the season wears on. Hope that makes sense
It does. It’s difficult to do, but it makes sense.
I enjoyed the video. But can you answer this? The batter gets a penalty for hitting the same side as the pitcher, but the pitcher doesn't get a penalty for opposite sides. Has this been factored in?
Hi Rick-I don’t know the answer. Does anyone reading this know?
Pitcher’s penalty would be the batter doesn’t get downgraded. I assume lefty/righty percentages figure into the batter’s grade. But here again, with only four grades it’s a broad swath for sure.
Have you looked at the data after using version 2.0's rules tweak of the platoon advantage?
It seems like PPR is low on offense from what I have seen from others. It will be interesting to how much your offense increases using the third and fourth pitchers.
Seems like it is. From what I’ve played into the next batch of games, it still looks a little low overall. I don’t think it will be too low from a runs scored standpoint to be playable and enjoyable-but the home run totals are definitely best suited for 21st century baseball.
Final thought: all tabletop sports games are about abstraction. Some things just need to be simplified. Otherwise you would have a game that requires 4 dice rolls and chart lookups for each pitch! Who wants that game? Not me. But abstraction can detract from realism. More abstraction may mean less realistic results. Each gamer needs to find the game or games that have the right level of abstraction and are fun, but give enough realistic results.
Without question. My feeling is that the games that minimize abstraction to the nth degree, and there are several around today, are on the endangered species list. The importance of PPR isn’t PPR, but the genre (with increased abstraction) that it has demonstrated has an incredible market. Watch what happens over the next twelve months as designers follow this example.
@@KurtBergland Totally agree!
I agree simplicity is best with just enough detail to keep it interesting I don't get caught up in individual statistics as much, close enough is good enough in the end it's wins and loses the road to get there isn't as important to me.
It seems to me that you should take the average runs scored etc., from each of the years from which your 40 teams come from to get the real life averages from your combined 'fictional' 40 team league. Then you will be able to compare apples to apples (the real life 40 team leage averages) with the stats that PPR produces for you.
Ok, fair enough, but what would I then do with that information? It’s important, but it wasn’t used to normalize the ratings in any way.
You would then compare your replay results to those numbers (rather than the several seasons you picked).
@@captainnolan5062 seems like a huge error margin either way, right?
@@KurtBergland With a smaler sample size you can never be sure.
My batting averages are low also. I have found the defensive play card doesn’t provide enough “action”, so I am trying this change: singles are allocated to 9D, 10C and 11B. That makes for more risk/reward for defenders and should boost the offense a bit.
That could do it! Let me know more when you’ve played more with the system that way.
Errors jump because more balls were put in play. Less strikeouts.
Less strikeouts can also produce more errors because more balls are being put into play.
True-a host of new variables