Strat-O-Matic Baseball 365

I've found the 4 aces strategy incredibly more boring than the low-cost match-up starter strategy. The latter certainly depends on a super reliever. With the 4 aces, it's autopilot, very few lineup changes and no real pitching changes. On the other hand, the match-up approach leaves more money for hitting (big advantage) and requires a quick analysis of approaching teams and ballparks for the starter per-game function. My experience is that the right type of match-up starter teams win bigger than 4 aces, which tend to win, but not at a high rate. I've had many tams of both types.

Recent 4 aces teams:
https://365.strat-o-matic.com/team/1528859
https://365.strat-o-matic.com/team/1538567 (underway now)

Match-up starter teams:
https://365.strat-o-matic.com/team/1530691
https://365.strat-o-matic.com/team/1534968

I’m too lazy to dig up team links, but I rarely employee the four-aces strategy because of the level of fun. I just started a league using such a team, and I, too, find it to be incredibly boring. I’ve had reasonable success with five-man budget rotations — although not always all budget, often top-heavy with one or two aces. And it’s more fun to manage the pitching staff, unless you have too many teams and not enough time.

Agree with the comments on the fun part...though if you have a lot of teams, which I never have had more than 2 or so until recently with 8. and it's a chore, especially with 24 team leagues.

But the thing I usually find troublesome is having to avoid some of the great S7*/S8* cards because otherwise the bullpen will get smoked every now and then. And always the chance to have lots of hitter parks. So I usually wimp out, lose faith, and go traditional staff.

I recently tried a redux on 4 aces--4 mediocre of similar ability with high endurance, Mickey lolich types, and a moderate bullpen of 1-2M types. Results were decent and I spent less. Team was decent, a mediocre 85-ish win wild card, but not outstanding.

4 Aces strategy leverages the two of the three biggest gaps in the current pricing structure, namely: (#1) top-end starters are way too inexpensive relative to mid-range starters and (#2) there is a sharp drop-off in position-player salaries around 3.00-4.00M, making it easy to scoop up bargains below that price point. Simply stated, 4 Aces teams are the easiest to build.

Cristano's innovation wasn't exactly that he invented the strategy, rather, he calculated that in a Finals league, where most managers were using some version of match-up starters approach, he could gain a competitive advantage by leveraging S9* starters who had been ignored by other managers.

Hack's teams are loaded with super high-value position players. However, in a Barnstormer's finals draft, you're not going to be able to put all of those cards on a single team.

Well some of us will be watching the finals league with great interest