Is anyone else noticing that....

Is anyone else noticing that when you are analyzing mystery cards, it seems like (mathematically) the incidence of walks occurring in actual games seems to be excessive - even when you know what the actual card is?

This is what I'm seeing, from some actual batters/pitchers/leagues (although it is admittedly a small sample size).

I'm thinking that there are 2 possible explanations for this:

1. That the effect of smart managers figuring out which are the best cards, leads to a higher than usual occurrence of walks arising on the batter cards, compared to historical league averages (i.e. when I am analyzing pitchers' performances and comparing to possible cards, or known cards). And/or:

2. That some of the computer-simulated/generated strategies are being used, like "pitch around" in actual games. (By the way, I actually take the time to count and exclude the intentional walks, so I'm not talking about IBB's). The use of the "pitch around" strategy could result in a larger number of walks than what would be predicted by the cards, with a normal random bell curve.

Your thoughts?

Geoff

WIth regard to point (1), I think that pitchers do worse than their card in every category because people's hitters are so good.

Point (2) is interesting, it almost looks like HAL does pitch around hitters in appropriate circumstances; but I doubt the programming is that sophisticated, especially in view of more obvious problems. For example, HAL will often have players attempt the extra base in the 9th when team is behind by two or more and the runner is not the tying or winning run; So it seems like they would fix that problem before fine tuning when to pitch around (rather than IBB) a hitter. Plus, I really don't think there is a pitch-around superadvanced setting. So, no, although it may seem that HAL is pitching around hitters, I think that is not really a part of the programming.

I hope Frank is correct because I think the pitch-around option is horribly executed in Strat-O-Matic--of all the maximal rules that the SOM Online Wiki says is in play, it's the worst.

Here are the maximal rules in use:

http://somonline.wikia.com/wiki/Maximum_Rules

And here are the (@#$%^) pitch-around rules:

http://somonline.wikia.com/wiki/Maximum ... und_option

Here's a rule that let's you cut down power and batting average for a hitter and the only down side is that the chances of a walk go way up. Since you don't mind walking the hitter, it's hardly a down side. At least it's application is restricted to a specific circumstance. (So, it should only have a small impact on the number of walks.)

Perhaps I should trust SOM on this that the power/average reduction isn't too great so there is actually risk in doing a pitch-around instead of issuing an intentional walk. However, the wording does not inspire confidence.

So, does anyone know if the SOM Online Wiki is still current and accurate?

coyote, thanks for that info! So, it looks likely that I'm wrong and that HAL does sometimes pitch around hitters. It would be nice if that could be confirmed or further clarified as to how it works in the Mystery format.