Advice For a Newbie!

I started playing several months ago and am up to 12 teams. If anybody has suggestions/answers to the following issues, I would be most appreciative!

[*] I have Joe Kelley ($7.76m), a 3e9. When I have a lead HAL replaces him with Bankhead, a 2e9. All that does is eliminate a 15% chance of a hit on 2/216 plate appearances. Meanwhile, when the opponent comes back to tie the game I have Bankhead hitting in the #2 position instead of Kelley (0.427 OBP). Can I make HAL stop making this bad defensive exchange? Obviously, I did not request it in my preferences.

[*] HAL loves to play Lefty/Righty with relief pitchers. Last night he did this to me in the 7th and by the 10th, he had to bring in one of my starters, who entered the game as an F0. Of course, the starter got rocked and now has to start tonight (I am guessing as a F0?). Is there any way to curb HAL's enthusiasm for playing lefty/righty? I would hate to be a fan and have to sit through four straight pitching changes!!

[*] HAL loves to do double switches when bringing in a reliever. He has even removed a 1 SS in a close game. Is there any way of limiting double switches?

[*] Has anyone ever figured out what running/stealing numbers are considered aggressive or conservative? Does aggressive mean to send the runner on 1-10, 1-12 or ??

Thank you for your time!
Toady

Welcome!

Yes, HAL does lots of things with defensive substitutions. In his defense on this one though, in addition to the slight upgrade in range he takes him from a +2 arm to a -3 arm. Thats a pretty significant change. However, if you want to stop him from doing it, you can try setting Kelley as your defensive substitution in left field. That might do the trick, but if it doesn't work, ritual sacrifice might be the only other hope.

I have no idea how to get HAL to avoid all those left right substitutions except to not check avoid and quick on your relievers, and maybe set your relief settings to conservative. However, once it gets to the late innings, HAL takes control, and you don't know what he might do. I firmly believe HAL drinks during games and what you see is him about a fifth of whiskey into the game.

The key to eliminating the unwanted defensive substitutions is to make sure you don't have any cheap bench players that are better defensively than your starters. Especially at higher caps.

you can try setting Kelley as your defensive substitution in left field.

Thank you, Chris! I am going to try this. It did not occur to me. That just might trick him. On your other suggestion, I have played around with those settings without much luck.

The key to eliminating the unwanted defensive substitutions is to make sure you don't have any cheap bench players that are better defensively than your starters.

Thank you, BC15NY. I actually did this on one team. Not an ideal solution, but it works. I guess I need to have better OF defense to begin with or have bench players that are all 4's.

on your stealing question, aggressive + mean HAL tries to steal 3b and Home more often which isn't rewarding.with all the -2,3,4 catcher arms and the same with Pitcher hold ratings, conservative is the only way to go. then for your Cobb's, Brocks, etc. set the steal more in the Hitter Prefs. unless I'm using a bunch of 16/17''''''s for running or my opponents outfield has weak arms, I usually go normal on baserunning. but, I'm not sure most managers agree?