Pricing updates

Mark,
I would strongly urge that you exercise great caution in interpreting the park data you presented from the Barnstormers Tour. There are several potential problems with this data, not the least of which is small sample size. A serious confounding variable is that your data ignore cap size, which is a huge determinant of park efficacy. It would be prudent, before drawing any inferences, to also examine the ball park data available to the community from Diamond Dope park actuals. The Diamond Dope park data is comprised of all the ATG 6 leagues that were not live draft leagues on the TSN live draft site, up until Gabriel decided to stop collecting this data, perhaps a year and a half or two years ago.
Here are the most frequently used parks from Diamond Dope Actuals across all caps.
Park Uses Win Pct.
1. Minute Maid 437 .526
2. Hilltop 307 .515
3. Forbes ’57 294 .522
4. Fulton County 246 .504
5. Polo ’41 232 .511
6. Petco 201 .500
7. Dunn 194 .525
8. Fenway ’67 166 .499
12. Anaheim Stadium 119 .476
I never play in neutral parks except when required to by the Barnstormers Tour, so I certainly agree with that finding of Mark’s.
However, cap x ballpark interaction effects are very powerful and should be taken into account if one is planning on adjusting pricing based on ball park type.
The most commonly used parks are all extreme parks, for obvious reasons, they tend to confer an advantage except for parks high in both singles and homers (less unique). A maxim I live by, is that all other things being equal, the higher the cap the better bomber teams do and the worse small ball fares. The converse is equally true.
Let’s take a look at win% as a function of cap in several of the above parks. I suspect the general effect is robust across all parks especially for the pure small ball and pure bomber teams. My gut tells me that the lefty righty stuff is more complex…
Minute Maid
60M .507
80M .513
100M .523
140M .536
200M .532
Forbes ‘57
60M .530
80M .531
100M .525
140M .504
200M .495
Fulton County
60M .502 (only 3 uses though)
80M .495 (50 uses)
100M .494
140 .514
200 .513
Dunn
60M .528
80M .522
100M .522
140M .533
200M .531

Good post.

Pricing except when overly priced favorites are often on the waiver wire is the only concern we should have at this time.

Higby is a great value, so what. If you searched the million cards and found him good for you (and isn't that rewarding and fun) list him high and hope you get him. I'd really, really, really want game play better and better explained etc.....100 other things before we waste manpower brainpower and time on repricing. Just my 2 pennies.

In another thread Adrian had posted an idea about averaging pricing based on multiple park environments. This is how the 200X games are priced to help create bargains in all park environments and reduce the benefits of putting players in their primary park.

However, this methodology didn't not work for ATG. I tried it back in either III or IV and the size of the card set screws things up.

So for the next version of pricing I am considering adding a premium to cards that have extreme BP HR results (i.e. zero or one and seven or eight). By adding on this artificial modifier, these players will be overpriced in the average park environment, which hopefully encourages usage of other players in those parks. These extreme BP cards would still be good values however when moved to the right park environment.

Looking for thoughts and comments,

Mark

Just to be clear, what I was proposing was a usage-based model where players started with their neutral salaries, but then gravitated to their salaries at the parks where they were used the most.

One way to have a usage model is to set salaries for players at each park and then average the uses. I am pretty sure bbrool's model could be used that way by adjusting the park factor.

So...

Ruth original hypothetical salary $18M.

Ruth Fenway, $24M times 200 uses
Ruth Busch, $20M times 100 uses
Ruth Royals, $16M times 100 uses

Add that together and divide by the number of uses and you get a new salary of $21M. It's easily automated at that point. Know what I mean? Once a year might be a good refresh timeframe.

Got in late to night and heading out of town this weekend, so won't be able to respond to the first round of comments for a few days. Some good comments.

Mark

2 things: 2 questions

1. Look at Druids post on the caps-

2. ala NEV (at least my interpretation?)- in large caps-- being compensated with a player who is very overpriced for a guy you lose is where I think you get hurt most: I.E. Mays, Carl who doesnt get put on draft cards yet is always a comp pick in someones draft.

Question:
Can you explain how defense factors into the price- does it change by position? a 1 at SS worth more than LF? and how do E ratings factor?

Does your model take into account price Caps?

The success or failure of small ball and or bomber parks in various parks has in my opinion nothing to do with the pricing of players but rather the scarcity of high priced small ball players and the plethora of bomber players, and the influx of great pitchers with no ballpark home runs on their cards. In other words as the cap goes up the number of players is actually shrinking dramatically and the great percentage of those players are suitable for bomber parks. The only way to give a small ball player a chance is to be able to make pitchers with many ball park home runs much cheaper, which would cause on the lower caps small ball to be even more dominant.

Trying to adjust pricing to a "correct" model in such a diverse usage scenario is an extremely challenging endeavor. Just using the shuffle the deck feature really will also effect the relative value of players.

Pricing except when overly priced favorites are often on the waiver wire is the only concern we should have at this time.

Higby is a great value, so what. If you searched the million cards and found him good for you (and isn't that rewarding and fun) list him high and hope you get him. I'd really, really, really want game play better and better explained etc.....100 other things before we waste manpower brainpower and time on repricing. Just my 2 pennies.

I agree with this. It's great having some of these values IMO. Imagine a set where every card was priced absolutely perfect (if such a thing were possible). No Higbes. Well, that would kind of suck, wouldn't it?

In fact, if it were possible to price everything perfectly, I'd be in favor of randomly varying every card price 2-3% or something ridiculous like that just so those values still exist.

The Last Druid is correct in all he says.

You asked where the cards are undervalued - wrong question. As Nev, pointed out - the fun is in finding value.
If you want to tweak pricing the question should be what factors might we be overvaluing?

I will point out that speed and defense appear to be over valued by the current pricing model. I call it the Scooter problem. His 1-17 running and 1e12 are great, but in most leagues Luke's 2e32, 1-15 cheaper card is gone and Scooter is on the FA wire. Speed is somewhat mitigated by all the minus arms in the outfield and behind the plate. Chuck Knoblauch's 1-17 and 1e12 card presents the same issue. Rarely used.

While we are not privy to the formula behind the pricing it has seemed to me that 1-17 and above command a premium that may not be warranted. Similarly, the ramp for defense may exaggerate value. Scooter has a lower NERP in every park I checked (I'm easily bored) than Luke (who I think is fairly priced).

- Scott

Even if he isn't the last of the druids, can't argue his point. But Charlie has a great point of view as well...both point to the vagaries and complexities of any approach at lasso-ing pricing nirvana.

-ATG Tourist

Some of the new ATG 7 card prices are just nuts. As usual, the worst are the pitcher cards. The most extreme example appears to be the $5.19 million bob friend card, which I doubt I would use in any park if it was priced at $3 million. He's just awful.