Ohtani-Keeper Leagues

I've sent an email to support to see if the game engine will allow both Ohtani cards to be on a roster at once. Let's see what they say.

Yeah, this seems like a no-brainer. Can't believe SOM couldn't figure out something as simple as having two different numbers assigned to his 2 different cards so they can put him on the same team. We can have Jose Ramirez, hitter, and Jose Ramirez, RP on the same roster....but they can't figure out how to have the SAME guy on 1 team as a hitter/pitcher. Ridiculous.

Got a response:

Hi Bill,


Unfortunately the game engine will not currently treat Ohtani as one player but two separate players. While we are not able to provide the ability to have both players drafted, we can force both Ohtani's on one roster by request. Please keep in mind that this has not been fully tested and there may be unexpected problems that occur by doing this.

So this works, it allows him to be on the roster, just not on the autodraft. You'd think they would have play tested for this though.

Someone may want to play test a league making this request though to see if it's worth screwing the integrity of a keeper league to do it.

Thanks for looking into this Bill

There is a lot of coding involved to have the game handle a two-way player (pitcher - hitter) properly. I'm not surprised Strat didn't invest in the change. It would have required a lot of testing. And it's unclear how much bang for the buck. How many years will Ohtani play both ways and who else coming up will?

In any case, there might have been a middle ground with Ohtani being only a DH. They might have been able to make Ohtani a "ninth" pitcher hitting card. Then make him selectable as a DH. Technically, only his pitching card is drafted. Not, sure if this could have worked. Stats also a problem. But, the "ninth" pitcher hitting card was the only approach I thought could be achievable.