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Any help would be appreciated. Here's the situation:

I have Luis Castillo as my second baseman. Of course he is injury-prone, so I have the platoon of Bruntlett (a $.56m 5L) and Hairston ($.99m 1R) as back-up. Unfortunately in the two series where Castillo's gone down, HAL has brought in Bruntlett to play vs. lefties [i:f1adab7013]and[/i:f1adab7013] righties. Hairston is no A-Rod, but his card vs. righties is much better than Bruntlett's.

Is there any way to get HAL to play Hairston as fill-in 2B vs. righties, insteado of Bruntlett? I do have Bruntlett checked for "avoid right-handed pitchers" but that hasn't helped. Would listing Hairston as a 2B second baseman defensive replacement help my situation, or would that confuse HAL and have him yank a healthy Castillo 2B-1 in late innings? Would dropping Bruntlett or Hairston for another player help? Any other thoughts?

Here is my team: [url=http://fantasygames.sportingnews.com/baseball/stratomatic/2006/team/team_other.html?user_id=792]Let Hairston Play[/url].

Thanks in advance.

Interesting problem, I've gone back on my teams to see if I faced a similar problem but I haven't, so unfortunately I can not speak from experience. However, I think the way I'd set it up would be to list Hairston as PH vs RHP and pinch runner, and Bruntlett and PH vs LHP. Problem with listing either one as def. replacement would be what you mentioned i.e. Castillo being lifted in the 8th w/o injury for a "def replacement". By placing Hairston as PR my hope would be that when Castillo gets a HBP HAL would get Hairston off the bench and leave him in the game.

Hope some of this helps. Good luck.

I don't think there is any way to control the lineups that HAL makes when players are injured. Listing people as PH/PRs would, as you suspect, most likely just result in in-game moves that you don't like, without any effect on what HAL will do with the lineup once Castillo gets hurt. A drop or trade sounds like the only solution to me.

Thanks for the ideas. I think I'll try Cummings approach first, and list Hairston as my PH vs righties (he is my best pinch-hitter that way, anyway). If that doesn't work, I'll have to try Dean's approach and ditch Bruntlett.

Any other thoughts?

I think dean's approach is correct. this is one reason i don't like platoons for injury guys.

they work ok if your guy goes down for multiple games but HAL is idiot for the 1sy 2sy game injuries.

the problem is HAL chooses the replacment by thier HR chances. truth is HAL digs the long ball, and will always choose the best person to do just that, be damned about OBP, BA or def.

HAL's choices for Castillo's replacement vs. righties in McAfee Coliseum (my homepark):

Hairston
2B-3e22
HIT=22.4
OB=37.4
TB=34.7
HR=0 (weak)

Bruntlett
2B-2e37
HIT=5.8
OB=12.8
TB=20.6
HR=4

Why does HAL always choose Bruntlett when Castillo is injured? I doubt HAL cares that Bruntlett is better defensively, so Geekor's explanation makes the most sense. Thanks for teaching me something new about HAL's "intelligence."

I had a thread on this subject and Geekor and Bernie came in on the discussion. Yiur fear Biomechman is real. I did that, i.e. tried to get HAL to choose a replacement that was better than the one HAL wanted. Bernie suggested to use the defensive replacement idea. That worked but then HAL thought I was asking for the main player to be replaced in the 7th or 8th. So it's a wash, you can use the defense replacement to get HAL to choose the right injury replacement but he does get confused about late inning replacement.

Now that I know HAL's "logic" I can make the roster moves necessary, replacing one of these two bench players.

That's why, except in the OF, I don't like to carry multiple position bench guys really, unless they are there to cover multiple positions alone.

If you only have 1 bench guy that can cover 2b, he will surely be used, etc.