SP*

When I 1st starting playing start-o in the early 70's there was no such thing as a 5 man rotation and no TJ surgeries

Ditto here. Though on the TJ thing one has to wonder if that was because nobody was injuring their elbow or because once they did it went undiagnosed and all we remember is that guy did not live up to his potential and just faded away.

When I 1st starting playing start-o in the early 70's there was no such thing as a 5 man rotation and no TJ surgeries

Ditto here. Though on the TJ thing one has to wonder if that was because nobody was injuring their elbow or because once they did it went undiagnosed and all we remember is that guy did not live up to his potential and just faded away.

Bob Gibson CG 58% of his games, since 2012 MLB CG's 4%. Starters are pitching less and going down faster than (insert your own joke)

Thanks for the correction. Was I wrong in that it ever was 200 IP, and now it is lowered to 195? I only ask because of Valen's post about the history of the * designation and the implication for older sets if they did away with the *. I know 5 innings in a season of 162 games is hardly a major change, so the consequence for the older sets is at best marginal.

When I 1st starting playing start-o in the early 70's there was no such thing as a 5 man rotation and no TJ surgeries

Ditto here. Though on the TJ thing one has to wonder if that was because nobody was injuring their elbow or because once they did it went undiagnosed and all we remember is that guy did not live up to his potential and just faded away.

In a day when there were fewer teams and much, much cheaper players (without long-term guaranteed contracts), I suspect injured elbows and dead arms were simply sent to the minors to fill out a roster (with hopes they come around again) or just cut outright.

I wonder if sports injuries have promoted or supported at least some of the innovation in health care? Remember when a knee injury that required surgery was a season-ending injury? I never heard of getting a scoped surgery till some athlete knee injury; now I know all sorts of people who have had a scope-style procedure.

Or maybe I am just getting older and my circle of family, friends and peers are all going in for procedures now....

Pitchers rarely pitch on three days rest anymore, but it does happen. Just the other day Justin Masterson pitched on three days rest in real life (without much success but that is besides the point). Also pitchers do pitch on three days rest in the playoffs. I think pitchers could pitch on three days rest, just like they used to do not so long ago and on-line SOM is basically a big "what if" anyway. Just like we are able to use players with less than 500 ab on a daily basis or platoon players who were full time players in real life.

I am not saying it is right or wrong, I am just giving the rationale. I think whether or not on-line SOM allows us to use four man rotations is a fair debate to have. However, I also believe you could do this in real life, it is just that no manager wants to get the negative feedback for blowing out their ace's arm.

The cards are designed to be used with their original teams and a lot of the ratings are designed to make sure if you play the same teams and lineups used in real life for the stats to be similar. But with draft leagues the numbers will always be skewed. I think the asterisk is intended to mean the pitcher can pitch on three days rest if needed because of injury or a big game. The asterisk is problem not intended to mean you can always use a four man rotation, but again this is for fun and a big "what if".

One of the ratings/features that I would like to see dropped from the on-line game is the so called "clutch" ratings which are really meant to be a RBI adjuster for stock team replays. It is an option, just like ballpark weather effects, which are NOT used in the on-line game (thank goodness). I don't think the "clutch" rating has any business in draft leagues, but it is a minor detail and probably adds more strategy.

ps. I always thought 200 innings was the cutoff for asterisk pitchers too, so I learned something new about SOM today. Good discussion guys! I don't have a problem with four man rotations because I think if you really wanted to you could do it in real life. After all there is a decades long precedent for it.

Another thing to consider is in the on-line game the teams do not get any days off, so we could look at it like some guys are pitching on three days rest but some of the time it would be four days rest if there were days off.