HCKL Chat/Trades

If any of you guys are interested in play by e-mail leagues, I am in a very interesting one that has just had an unexpected vacancy. The league format is 26 teams, you are allowed 30 guys who meet the following criteria: Hitters with 100+ real life PA, pitchers with 30+ IP. You are allowed another 5 guys who failed to met the criteria above but meet: hitters with 50 real life PA, pitchers with 25 real life IP.

The really interesting parts are two-fold.

1. There is a salary structure. You will have a year to figure it out, since the roster is mostly set.
2. Team rosters are 60 guys. Any slots not occupied by players in the above two categories are occupied by minor leaguers, amateurs, and foreign professionals.
3. Players who have appeared in the majors but do not meet the two appearance threshholds above may be includes with you minor leaguers, as you can see by the fact that this team has Hochevar and Wang.

Your active roster is:

ANDERSON, Brett
ATCHISON, Scott
BARNEY, Darwin
CROW, Aaron
DEGROM, Jacob
DEN DEKKER, Matt
DUDA, Lucas
GARCIA, Jaime
GILES, Ken
GILLASPIE, Conor
GRANDERSON, Curtis
GRIFFIN, AJ
HAMELS, Cole
HANIGAN, Ryan
HARDY, JJ
JOHNSON, Kelly
JONES, Garrett
KERSHAW, Clayton
LAROCHE, Adam
LOBATON, Jose
OBERHOLTZER, Brett
PLOUFFE, Trevor
SAMARDZIJA, Jeff
SCHEPPERS, Tanner

Note that this is only 24 guys. The waiver draft is coming up on the 19th, and you will have an opportunity to scrounge among the leavings. (You can also draft random minor leaguers and international guys.)

Your current minor leaguers are:

ASHER, Alec TEX
CHANG, Yu-Cheng CLE
GATTO, Joe LAA
HERANDNEZ, Teoscar HOU
HOCHEVAR, Luke KC
JAY, Tyler U Illinois
KEMP, Tony HOU
KOLEK, Tyler MIA
KUBITZA, Austin DET
LINDGREN, Jacob NYY
LIVELY, Ben PHI
MCPHEARSON, Matt ARZ
MECIAS, Yoel PHI
PUELLO, Cesar NYM
RIJO, Wendell BOS
SMITH, Carson SEA
SMITH, Dwight Jr. TOR
SMITH, Mallex ATL
TARPLEY, Stephen PIT
WANG, Wei-Chung MIL
WINDLE, Tom PHI

This is only 21 guys. In theory you could add 15 more guys, only one of whom is required to be active. This is pretty short notice for drafting from such a large pool, but you might enjoy it.

Just revisiting this for curiousity sake:

It's that time fellas - SIM TIME!

I have not done a full sim in a while, but I had the chance to put the teams in over the weekend, so the prognostications/analysis below are the result of multiple simmed seasons with 25-man rosters. I recently added another 8G RAM to the desktop, so that helped crunch things a lot faster, could do a full season in around 3 minutes, used to be closer to 8 minutes.

For those of you like me with some big injury rolls, these sims will likely underestimate your performance a bit, but should still be close. I did 5 full sims total.

Season 1:
E: Qk, C: Zim, W: Palm, WC: Smokey

Palm had 97 wins, other playoff teams in low 90s. Smitty & Craig were close with wins in the upper 80s.

Season 2:
E: Smokey, C: Zim, W: Craig, WC: Qk

Smokey had 98 wins, I had 94 as did Craig, Zim had 91. Palm & Smitty contended.

Season 3:
E: Qk, C: Zim, W: Craig, WC: Smitty

Craig had 99 wins, Smitty 97, me 93 and Zim 87 in this go-round. Palm & Smokey contended with wins in the mid 80s.

Season 4:
E: Qk, C: Zim, W:Palm, WC: Stoney

A bit of an outlier as I had 96 wins, Zim 91, and the West had Palm at 86 and Smitty and Craig at 83 & 82. Stoney snuck into the WC with 85 wins as the West beat each other up down the stretch.

Season 5:
E: Smokey, C: Lev, W:Palm, WC: Qk

Smokey busted out with the only 100+ win season with 101. Lev snuck into the Central title with 82 wins to 81 for Zim, the only time Zim didn't win the Central. Palm had 89 wins to take the West and I took the WC with 91 wins. Jason had 88 wins as the WC came down to the last day of play.

So based on 5 sims, I think we see some pretty strong trends:

1) Zim wins the Central. It's close but there is enough evidence to call this one.

2) The West is the div of death in Season 1. Their low win totals are due to beating the crap out of each other. I'm going to call it for Palm but it's close.

3) The East seems to be a 2-horse race between me & Smokey. I am going to call it for my team since my bench is much deeper which will come into play down the stretch, but I will need some injury luck.

4) The WC is likely to come from the East. The Central seems weaker overall after Zim, and the West has 3 good teams that take away wins from each other.

Happy to field any questions!

Qk

Just revisiting this for curiousity sake:

It's that time fellas - SIM TIME!

I have not done a full sim in a while, but I had the chance to put the teams in over the weekend, so the prognostications/analysis below are the result of multiple simmed seasons with 25-man rosters. I recently added another 8G RAM to the desktop, so that helped crunch things a lot faster, could do a full season in around 3 minutes, used to be closer to 8 minutes.

For those of you like me with some big injury rolls, these sims will likely underestimate your performance a bit, but should still be close. I did 5 full sims total.

Season 1:
E: Qk, C: Zim, W: Palm, WC: Smokey

Palm had 97 wins, other playoff teams in low 90s. Smitty & Craig were close with wins in the upper 80s.

Season 2:
E: Smokey, C: Zim, W: Craig, WC: Qk

Smokey had 98 wins, I had 94 as did Craig, Zim had 91. Palm & Smitty contended.

Season 3:
E: Qk, C: Zim, W: Craig, WC: Smitty

Craig had 99 wins, Smitty 97, me 93 and Zim 87 in this go-round. Palm & Smokey contended with wins in the mid 80s.

Season 4:
E: Qk, C: Zim, W:Palm, WC: Stoney

A bit of an outlier as I had 96 wins, Zim 91, and the West had Palm at 86 and Smitty and Craig at 83 & 82. Stoney snuck into the WC with 85 wins as the West beat each other up down the stretch.

Season 5:
E: Smokey, C: Lev, W:Palm, WC: Qk

Smokey busted out with the only 100+ win season with 101. Lev snuck into the Central title with 82 wins to 81 for Zim, the only time Zim didn't win the Central. Palm had 89 wins to take the West and I took the WC with 91 wins. Jason had 88 wins as the WC came down to the last day of play.

So based on 5 sims, I think we see some pretty strong trends:

1) Zim wins the Central. It's close but there is enough evidence to call this one.

2) The West is the div of death in Season 1. Their low win totals are due to beating the crap out of each other. I'm going to call it for Palm but it's close.

3) The East seems to be a 2-horse race between me & Smokey. I am going to call it for my team since my bench is much deeper which will come into play down the stretch, but I will need some injury luck.

4) The WC is likely to come from the East. The Central seems weaker overall after Zim, and the West has 3 good teams that take away wins from each other.

Happy to field any questions!

Qk

My team not mentioned once in that whole thing, yet I made the playoffs...

Folded like a cheap suit once I got there, but made it none the less.

Yeah I basically nailed the East & West, whiffed on the Central and WC. No offense Bill but I think you had everything go right for you with a neg RD and Exp W-L of 76-86 but ending up 11 wins higher. Meanwhile Smokey, my WC pick, ended up 8 wins under his projection, and no one else put a solid run together at the end.

The real miss of the season is the Central though. I picked Zim, and I am still not sure why his team was as bad as it was. He outhomered his opponents by 230 to 182 and usually that is a recipe for success. Defense might be the biggest factor as he started a 4 @ 3B and a 3 @ SS. Mercer's offense was so bad Zim would have been better with a 2-range $.50 guy. Those extra baserunners probably cost him a lot in his park. OB was also a factor as his .308 team OB was bottom half of the league.

Conversely, Stoney was outhomered 176-120, but his .327 team OB & team D was strong enough to give him a positive RD and take the div. Vs RHs he had a 1 SS and 1 3B (3 2B but the OB outweighed the D in Altuve's case). Also 1s at C & CF. Good park choice to suppress HRs and maximize his D & OB effect.

Yeah I basically nailed the East & West, whiffed on the Central and WC. No offense Bill but I think you had everything go right for you with a neg RD and Exp W-L of 76-86 but ending up 11 wins higher. Meanwhile Smokey, my WC pick, ended up 8 wins under his projection, and no one else put a solid run together at the end.

The real miss of the season is the Central though. I picked Zim, and I am still not sure why his team was as bad as it was. He outhomered his opponents by 230 to 182 and usually that is a recipe for success. Defense might be the biggest factor as he started a 4 @ 3B and a 3 @ SS. Mercer's offense was so bad Zim would have been better with a 2-range $.50 guy. Those extra baserunners probably cost him a lot in his park. OB was also a factor as his .308 team OB was bottom half of the league.

Conversely, Stoney was outhomered 176-120, but his .327 team OB & team D was strong enough to give him a positive RD and take the div. Vs RHs he had a 1 SS and 1 3B (3 2B but the OB outweighed the D in Altuve's case). Also 1s at C & CF. Good park choice to suppress HRs and maximize his D & OB effect.

No worries, my only real issue, is now I'll be getting my @$$ kicked by the other 3 playoff teams in season 2. I was hoping switching up the divisions would be a benefit in season 2, but I highly doubt that now.

Pardon the interruption.

Paging qksilver (see private msg).

Is this picked allowed? Has played in MLB this year, but not last? Just clarifying as to update my list if it is.

Should be, if this league sues the rules most others do, and I believe it does, so long as he had no MLB experience prior to the current MLB season, he's eligible. It's been said before how summer prospect draft picks can be more valuable than Spring picks, especially if they come very late in the MLB season, and this is why. I'm pretty sure this is the way we've done it in this league too/

Of course qksilver could come on and refute this and checking the rules I see this:

All players who have not played in MLB are eligible for the prospect draft including unsigned US or international amateurs.

so there is no mention of summer picks using the same criteria, and I can see how an argument can be made to not allow it.

I checked last years draft before I picked. Dave picked up deGrom in round 5 then.

Looking to move Desmond and Jhonny Peralta for supp or prospect picks

Hi guys - FYI I will be in a new hire orientation all day so can't move us along. Will start clock tomorrow, sorry for delay.

Thanks,
Qk

Hope the new boy on the block had a great first day! Now the fun!