Arbitrary nature of SOM cards

Just wondering, but why can't the cards more accurately reflect the player's actual year? There are many examples, but just among scrub players in terms of batting average I noticed today little 'ol Sandy Alomar at .56M is rated at .252 against lefties and .227 against righties on Diamond Dope. (He does go up slightly in the clutch.) Yet he hit a reasonable .265 that year (1977) for the Texas Rangers. I know half the rolls land on the pitcher cards, so usually you see a higher average on Diamond Dope per batter to compensate for that.

Any other examples?

Sandy Alomar only had 83 AB that year. Strat often devalues a card some when ABs are low.
You will not see the same card for a .265 hitter with only 83 ABs and a .265 hitter with 500+ ABs.
These limited action players are often penalized defensively as well.

Strato is not always about accuracy despite the hype.

The biggest thing to keep in mind is that SOM creates the cards with the intent that the player would face the same distribution of players (hitters or pitchers) that he did in his real MLB season. However, in the online game, the 12-team league format creates a much steeper level of competition than that player actually faced. Therefore, he is statistically less likely to be able to repeat the numbers on the cards. I personally don't like the 24-team league format, but I'll bet that performances there do match the cards a bit better. Same with $60M leagues vs. $140M leagues. It's all about the overall pool of talent in the league.

$60m/24 team is a great format.

all true...and also consider it factors his performance in parks he played in. If he were to face the same pitching game for game, with the same players, he would hit within a standard deviation more or less than his stats indicated. The cards are normed to the card values that ended up producing the true stats more often than any other combo. kind of like a monte carlo sim, but there is self consistency required because there is always the other cards that have an effect.

The biggest thing to keep in mind is that SOM creates the cards with the intent that the player would face the same distribution of players (hitters or pitchers) that he did in his real MLB season. However, in the online game, the 12-team league format creates a much steeper level of competition than that player actually faced. Therefore, he is statistically less likely to be able to repeat the numbers on the cards. I personally don't like the 24-team league format, but I'll bet that performances there do match the cards a bit better. Same with $60M leagues vs. $140M leagues. It's all about the overall pool of talent in the league.

I agree. That's why it always stumped me when Bernie would argue against adding players best seasons and gravitated toward their average seasons (not always, but a good percentage on the time).

I think what Bernie argued for was representative years, not average years. Another words a player like Brady Anderson should not get his 50 HR card. Of course that is an extreme example. Similar arguments were made concerning less obvious one or two year wonders such as Maris.