This Has My Attention: New Questions

I posted about the suspicious outcomes of the game when I returned some months ago and was met with a lot of resistance. That said, I was perhaps misinformed on several elements. Since then I have come to "feel" that the game is legitimate. I watch a lot of my games and things seem to run about how I would expect them to. When my teams do poorly I chalk it up to my execution being weak. This at least gives me a better mindset for playing as I can take all the blame and all the credit and try to do better next time. I am having fun.

That said, there are obvious merits to leveling the playing field. Not only does it help protect the realism of the game but also can help to drive off the best players, who often play for free and annihilate paying customers, causing them to quit. If you think about it, a lot of the best managers of all time seem to have quit at one time or another (if not several times) due to suspicion. Is that a coincidence?

https://365.strat-o-matic.com/league/expanded/462980

All I want explained is how can the pythags be so wildly off across the board. There appears to be a soft correlation (not just with the league posted above) with teams who have a negative run diff picking up extra wins, while teams with positive run diffs bleed wins. Why? It at least hints at of some type of equity mechanism.

https://365.strat-o-matic.com/league/expanded/462561

Here’s me losing 13 games of run diff. 22-40 in one run games must be the culprit! That’s it!!

Okay, you convinced me. The problem I have is that no where to be found is the league where I go 40-22 in one run games and finish with a +13 pythag. It’s +/- 3, or a huge helping of the bad left tail only. This strikes me as very, very odd.

This isn’t me losing my mind because Ruth is hitting .230 in the first half of the season. This has been going on for the better part of a year now, and I wouldn’t even be posting about it otherwise.

Also, I didn’t forget how to win, so my grapes can be sweet as I complain:

https://365.strat-o-matic.com/league/expanded/462635

Two things. The stat nerds say 100 win teams will have a pythag exaggerated to the upside. Um, no, I guess not. Further, all the negative run diff teams picked up extra wins, while all the positive run diff teams lost wins.

Hmmm.

One aspect of the game that can skew differentials is blowouts. Coming into a game with a tired bullpen (however that works) and your starter gets shelled and then the cheap relievers come in and get smoked. A few games like that can paint an unrealistic picture. Another example would be star pitchers getting injured in the first inning. Some sets can also be extremely disadvantageous for one manager and their differently could downswing by 40.

Pythag doesn’t tell you where you’re going and it doesn’t tell you where you’ve been. Pythag tells you where you are. No where does Bill James say that lopsided scoring will throw things out of whack. If you have x runs scored over y runs given up, the formula will tell you what your record is to within three games.

Let’s say that because of Strat ballparks, bullpens, outsized stats, etc. that the pythag exponents should be changed so the +/- isn’t so out of whack. That’s fine by me.

I repeat myself again, no matter what the formula is, it appears there’s weight being added to positive run diff teams. It’s not precise or anything like perfectly correlated, but it’s concerning to me that results attributed largely to luck are not forming a bell shaped curve.

FWIW, I don’t think this is a conspiracy theory thing to chase off high performing managers. I do think it may be a “realism” governor of some kind to prevent overly lopsided standings from discouraging newer or underperforming players.

That is what I would think as well, it would be a for realism/balancing. The game could be considered a circus if it stray extremely far from real baseball (aka 150 win teams). It's hard to imagine that now if we assume it's all "legit" but no one can know for sure.

If I am to understand correctly the one run games are pure luck so should be 50-50 skill provides no affect and team construction has no impact. So that a manager who wins 55% of the time when you subtract out the 46 one run games to be 55% wins would have 66 wins and 50 losses or 57% wins. And only in those games does actual skill enter.

This is what you must believe if Bill James stat theory is to believed. It is an obvious absurdity to me and why blindly going on database of stats from 120 leagues leads to the wrong conclusion.

In each of the leagues JPAV posted the team with the most one run victories was either first or second best in fewest runs allowed in the league. I surmise in general a team that has a league leading runs against category will have more one run games, if I had time I would go through the Barnstormers leagues and post all the data on teams that have fewest runs allowed in a league by 75 or more and teams that scored the most by +75 or more and line compoare to amount and outcome of one run games.

The major problem is the bullpen logic was destroyed and values of bullpens crushed while unbalanced lineups thrive throughout the realm of this onlne game. You cannot apply rules derived against 120 leagues of baseball and apply it to the 15,000 leagues played here while the outcomes of the players is changed due to computer whims. So managers are pitching S8 starters to S0, which hits late in games and comparing that to a stats derived where no starter goes more than 7 innings in today's games.

Sandy Koufax went 10-0 in 1-0 games, I don't think he was lucky. Greg Maddux was 11-1 in 1-0 games, I don't think he was lucky
And here are the 10 pitchers with the best winning percentage in 1–0 games (min. 10)
1. Sandy Koufax, 10–0, 1.000
2. Greg Maddux, 11–1, .917
3. Steve Carlton, 12–2, .857
4. Don Sutton, 9–2, .818
(tie) Jerry Koosman, 9–2, .818
6. Dean Chance, 13–3, .813
7. Nolan Ryan, 11–3, .786
8. Jim Palmer, 9–3, .750
9. Mike Cuellar, 8–3, .727
10. Gaylord Perry, 12–5, 706

This idea of a Bell curve and team composition does not have an impact on the outcomes is wrong I believe.

All I know is that THIS is total bullshit https://365.strat-o-matic.com/league/expanded/462958
And when my credits are gone, I'm done.

What has my attention now is that Experience Level: Starter managers appear to be really loved by HAL. As SteveF just pointed out. This is true in many of my own leagues that I’m looking at as well right now. Further, I think that many of these Starter level managers are not Starter level managers, if you know what I mean. Which really sours me on the tours, which seem to have a number of managers who only play 7-8 teams a year.

gk: It’s too late tonight to start parsing over the words “luck” and “skill”. But no, I don’t think you are understanding me correctly. But that’s okay, my venting convinced HAL to let my -10 pythag Comiskey team make the playoffs on the last night of the season, so it’s all good.

By the by…

https://365.strat-o-matic.com/league/expanded/462980

The two teams with the best one run records were Experience Level: Starter. I finished ahead of the Marchers in runs allowed by 67 runs. I am not really understanding at all what you’re saying.

By the by…

https://365.strat-o-matic.com/league/expanded/462980

I think the problem as evidenced by J-Pavs team in the league noted above is that in some cases Pythag is not that good of indicator. I scanned through the game scores and found that most of the run differential comes from 11 games (diff. of 9 runs or more) noted below. I did not see those kind of scores going the other way. The bullpens in ATG9 are not as good or as deep as in say a 2021 leagues. Once you bounce the starter, which happens with a good offensive team as in this example, you then get to run up the score on the weaker bullpens. Many of the RPs with salaries of less than $1 mil. In this context there is no conspiracy. Pythag may not be able to to address the types of team difference that can occur in ATG.

Gm RS RA Diff.
5 15 0 15
7 12 3 9
44 11 0 11
56 20 5 15
83 18 1 17
91 11 2 9
95 15 3 12
130 13 1 12
133 13 1 12
144 17 3 14
155 20 1 19
TOT 165 20 145