Strat-O-Matic Baseball 365

I wanted to get some opinions from the boys on this topic.

Most teams that I construct fair pretty well. Sure there are some duds where things just don't click. But for the most part, my teams can stay in the race the entire season.

A few times, I'll crack 100 wins, win my division only to lose in the semi's or finals when the team just falls flat on it's face.

I know some teams just get hot late in the season, get some favorable rolls, and go on a streak. I sometimes meet these teams in the playoffs. Usually, I have a winning record over these teams during the regular season.

I seem to never get hot in the playoffs. It usually goes the other way.

Here's an example:
http://onlinegames.strat-o-matic.com/team/814187

This was a theme league with vets. I led the league in pitching and was 5th in hitting. They played well the entire season. My pitching stayed strong during the semi's, but the hitting disappeared. Sometimes, I get the hitting, and my pitchers become cannon fodders. Occasionally, both disappear.

Back to the subject of this thread. My questions are... What makes up a team built for a short series? What makes up a team built for a 162 game season? Is it even possible to have these types of teams in Stratomatic?

visick

I tend to build for the season and hope for the best on the playoffs, which explains my low conversion rate for titles. my tendency to take on a lot of high injury risks often works for the regular season, but if 1-2 guys get 15 gamers, I'm screwed in the playoffs.

Yeah, I haven't run into that problem.

It just seems no matter what the league is, it usually ends up the same way...

I'm getting tired of hoping for the best in the playoffs.

I take the same approach as Treymo and Visck, which is to build a team for the regular season. I, too, use a lot of players subject to 15 game injuries, but generally limit myself to taking players with injuries on 2 or 12. It's next to impossible to build a team for a short series and have success throughout the season, as the variety of teams per league is usually too great. Of course, it almost goes without saying that you can't get a ring without first making the playoffs.

I've also experienced a lack of playoff success. I've had many teams finish with the best or second best record in the league, only to get beat in the semis by teams that lost the season series to my team. One quarter of my playoff teams in 12 team leagues have gotten a ring, mostly the result of a higher success rate since the transition. None of my 7 playoff teams in 24 team leagues have gotten a ring.

I learned a couple valuable lessons with my first online team way back in ATG4. It was a post WWII $100 mil DH league. My team had the best record in the league with 98 wins. The next best team had 93. My team was second in the league in runs and ERA and led the league by far in run differential at +212. It lost the season series to just one team. But my team got beat in extra innings in the last game of a best of 5 semis as a result of a set of highly improbable events. My cheapo bullpen by committee, which saved 55 of 74 games and was 19-18 during the season, got torched in the playoffs, including Ron Perranoski, who was 7-4 with a 1.75 ERA with 11 saves in 15 chances, mostly in middle relief, during the season.

The 2 playoff lessons I learned from that team were: 1. That it's difficult in a short playoff series to overcome bad luck; and 2. The bullpen is more important in the playoffs than the regular season.

I still think the best practice is to build a team for the long haul and to hope for the best in the playoffs, with the caveat that in the playoffs it's important to take advantage of any favorable match ups.

P.S.: Below is a link to to a rare (for me) smallball ATG6 $100 mil DH team in Forbes '57 that got a ring. Aside from being a smallball team, what was unusual about that team for me is that I took a chance on the $9.48 mil Larry Walker card (with an injury on a 3). He missed 38 regular season games, including 15 down the stretch when the playoffs were in doubt. Using such a player is like having a ticking time bomb that you know will explode, but you're not sure when, but hope that it doesn't hurt you when it happens. Although Walker was healthy for the playoffs, DH John McGraw, who had an awesome .511 regular season OBP, missed the last four and a half games of a 7 game Finals due to injury. The reason I went smallball was because the league used the "Dream League" format, where managers pick entire teams at a time, rotating picks over 12 seasons, so each manager takes a turn at picking his full team in all 12 spots. That season, my team was the 11th team drafted in a 12 team league. Enjoy!

http://onlinegames.strat-o-matic.com/team/813933

You don't make the playoffs if you don't have success in the long haul of the regular season.

I'd like a little more luck and success in the playoffs.

I don't expect it anymore, especially with my more successful regular season teams...

Hey at least HAL has settled on a pattern for me.

This is the 4th striaght semi-finals game with this exact pattern.

Win 1 of 2
Win 1 of 2
Win Game 5
Lose game 6
Lose game 7 (game 7 tonight for the 4th team)

3 of those 4 had homefield and best reocrd in the league.

Can't even get a free credit, when the game hates you, then the game hates you.

I'm not a fan of playoffs in ATG. I don't know why we can't have other options such as two division winners which just meet in the finals. I'd choose that every time.

But to answer Viscik's initial question. Obviously you have to design a team that makes the playoffs. I used to have considerable success with changing my team composition after game 126 to make the playoffs, even with the 20% hit. But to win the playoffs I think one's best bet is to look at the teams that you think are likely to make the playoffs just before opening day and try to create favorable matchups, to the extent one is able to, against those teams. One example: against extreme park lefty or right teams, a couple of cheap extreme relievers can prove invaluable in the playoffs.

Bottom line though, the playoffs are still a crapshoot. One can understand the desire of MLB to wring every dollar they can out of fans, thus creating long drawn out playoffs that see too many wild cards winning it all. But why can't SOM at least give us an option for different playoff configurations, including no playoffs? Especially since this is ATG, prior to 1969 it was win your league or bust. They could probably even do it without hiring another half dozen programmers, although it might take them several years to figure out how. Just sayin...

Do whatever you can to not win 100 games or more as my last 5 of those teams all lost in the semis.