Archive of SportingNews.com's old SOM Baseball forum

Usually, the less experienced players, or as I like to call myself, the up-n comer's, ask questions about players and how to put a team together, and rightly so. But, I'd like some opinion's about choosing a ball park.
How did you guys (the experts) pick parks to play? Was it random or was there a certain order to you're picks. Like levels on a video game? What are the easier ones to play in vs. the harder, or you better know what your doing to play in this park, types.
The reason I ask, is that I'm finding my self stuck trying to decided where to play next. Any personal favorites for whatever the reason? Any order you should try to climb or whatever, or is it all the same in the process.

:D

It all depends.

As a general rule, the more stadiums depart from average (I assume that a stadium average is 10-10 10-10 for both hits and homeruns), the easier it is to win.

By this definition, Minute-Maid park, when the line-up is filled by right-handed sluggers and right-handed pitchers is probably the easiest one to win with.

That said, if you are in a live draft, and your opponents can react to your draft picking, you might hesitate to choose Minute Maid, especially if your opponents hasn't chosen his stadium yet.

I know that, as far as I am concerned, if I see a divisional opponent choose Minute Maid, I have two reactions

If I believe he has a better team than mine to fit this stadium: 1-take a more neutral stadium but low HR ratings, 2-get a lot of right-handed hitters who will hit right-handed players but who will fit my stadium as well; 3-similar logic with pitchers.

If I believe I have a better team than his, then I simply take a stadium similar to MM.

Also, the choice of singles depend on the quality of the middle infield .

If you have stellar defensive middle defense (or you aim to get 1s), then you should take high singles in your stadium, no matter what offense you have (so check for Kaufmann or Coors, depending on the quality of your offense). If you have no middle defense (say Young at ss and Kent at 2b), you should check for low single ratings.

If you have 2s, then you should look for catcher ratings---if bad, try to limit singles, if good, make them happen.

That said, the choice of singles will have little impact on your record. If you already have a good team, it will remain good regardless of the single ratings you choose.

So in Petco, you're saying that 1's at 2b and ss are overkill??? But if you have them in coors that's good??

and also....so would you say petco and coors are the hardest to win in??

:?

[quote:980a730b99="DavidRis"]Usually, the less experienced players, or as I like to call myself, the up-n comer's, ask questions about players and how to put a team together, and rightly so. But, I'd like some opinion's about choosing a ball park.
How did you guys (the experts) pick parks to play? Was it random or was there a certain order to you're picks. Like levels on a video game? What are the easier ones to play in vs. the harder, or you better know what your doing to play in this park, types.
The reason I ask, is that I'm finding my self stuck trying to decided where to play next. Any personal favorites for whatever the reason? Any order you should try to climb or whatever, or is it all the same in the process.

:D[/quote:980a730b99]


I think it matter more WHAT players you draft to fit a certain ball park........not so much the park itself...............

I was going to try to play 2006 and use every park in order.........was off to a good start ...had 8 teams thru april.......but a dui, and an injured knee thats kept me from getting paid...have derailed my bid :(

Read this Strategy Forum thread if you're really interested in catcher defense:

http://forums-beta.sportingnews.com/viewtopic.php?t=104965

I stated this in a previous post, but

I had several Busch teams that were unsuccessful, and started to Play at Coors field.

I have had 4 teams finish and all 4 made playoffs (and promptly lost).

It kinda reinvigorated me and changed my way of thinking.

I started drafting differently and my stategy was different.

I also loved the longball.

Worked fine for me. I also used Kent at 2b and Furcal at short on 2 of those teams.

They led the league in DP by a large margin. 1 team had 209 DP in one season.

Yes errors cost games, but the DP's saved alot of potential "big innings"

I played in Shea lot in the 03 and 05 set with good results usually. I would say that the only drawback to picking a "extreme" park" for a typical auto draft is that sometimes you don't get the guys you need.....say alot of lefties in PNC, or alot of righties in MM...then you need to scramble, which sometimes does not work too well...but over all, I agree with MW, extreme parks make others adjust to YOU...not you to them...you always have an advantage at home, which is key to winning IMHO! :)

[quote:31fbfcc813]They led the league in DP by a large margin. 1 team had 209 DP in one season. [/quote:31fbfcc813]

This can be a decieving stat in Coors tho....typically people are on alot more, hence alot more opportunities to have double plays....

MW (Lucky) is correct as usual. Extreme parks give you unique opportunities to gain dollar efficiency.