Is Babe Ruth ever worth the trouble?

[walruskkkch]

I mean in a dynasty type play starting before he is drafted. So far everytime I pick him up I am disappointed. When he's pitching well he gets switched to a hitter so you can't use him how he was effective and after he is switched he never seems to put up any numbers that are out of the ordinary. He may put up decent numbers but not nearly as good as what he did to American League pitching in real life. For example in my most recent dynasty I picked him up in the middle of the 1919 season as a free agent, no one had signed him. Let him sit in the minors for the rest of the year and then had him starting in Left Field in 1920, he had rating of 95. He proceeded to hit .270 with 23 HRs. In 1921 he hit .280 with 29 HRs. Decent enough numbers except that he didn't even lead the team in homers either year, that was Ty Cobb who it 44 and 33 respectively. Also everyone else on the team was managing to slap the ball around the yard for .300+ averages. Other times I've had him he's done worse. I did play the 1921 season as a start point and he did close to his actual numbers so we know he can do it. ;) Has anyone had him from the start where he's produced anything close to his expected numbers?

[ohms_law]

Beware of names.
:)

The caricatures of real players are often different (sometimes vastly different) then their real life counter-parts. This is mostly intentional, as there is a random element inserted into player generation in order to prevent you (the human player) from having a complete hindsight advantage over the AI. It's also simply variation as well, though. Depending on the environment that the player is in (home field, opposing pitchers, opposing fielders, etc...), some players will distinctly outperform and some will distinctly underperform their historic achievements.

The further away that you begin from Ruth's seminal 1921 season, the further he can drift from that sort of performance as well. Since his real life performance is so far out of the norm, the only direction for him to drift is to regress towards the average.

[walruskkkch]

I can accept all that, except that having the great ones usually turns out better than trying to go with lesser knowns. I also realize that there is variation and perhaps I haven't played enough dynasties to see it for full effect [Ruth having much better seasons than expected on occassion]. The examples I gave for 1920 and 1921 of this dynasty were played at the Polo grounds where Ruth did compete in the same years when a Yankee and when he dominated. Certainly he may well be facing different pitchers and the lineup he was in would be different but surely he could manage a higher HR total than 29. That total is consistent for the most part with the league leaders which is fine in relation to an acceptable performance, but it certainly isn't Ruthian in any sense of what one should expect from him. What intangible is missing? Why was Babe able to produce such dominance in real life that it can't be captured fully in a simulation? My question was posed to see if anyone has had superior seasons with Ruth performing near expectations for himself. When does the statistical variations finally favour a more robust Ruth? DO they ever, for anyone?

I simply haven't seen this consistent underperformance by HOF in real life players. Ty Cobb, Sam Crawford, Christy MAthewson, Pete Alexander, Walter Johnson, and many others all have performed brilliantly even if careerwise their numbers may vary slightly. Namely, they perform at a HOF level even if their batting average may not be as lofty or the steals as many, or the homeruns as frequent. Usually they over produce in some other fashion statistically. Once again I may be drawing from too small a sample since I've only done 4 dynasty games but I can certainly say that when I start a fifth one I will be sure to get Ty Cobb if I can and just plunk him in the lineup for 20 years and watch the fun. Same for Alexander and for many others that I know will come along. I don't play with fictional players so all these guys should be performing against players they had performed against in real life. Maybe not the exact same way or in the exact same combinations but the same basic talent. They seem to do ok. But for some reason Ruth is a disappointment. Sometimes dramatically so, sometimes marginally. I would love to hear from others who may have had him perform elsewise.

[reflections]

R/L HOF members, i've had very weird stats from. For instance I remember having Cobb retire at age 30 with a .260 avg. Christy Mathewson didn't become a started until he was 30 in the same dynasty. I've never had Ruth be so dominant, being outplayed by people like Jimmy Sheckard easily (Although Sheckard should be a HOFer in my opinion.) In my current historical dynasty Babe Adams hasn't even started a game (It's 1908). This adds a bit of surprise to me. You can't just build a powerhouse knowing who is good and who isn't

[ohms_law]

I simply haven't seen this consistent underperformance by HOF in real life players.
You won't see it consistently, it's just that when they do differ they will most likely differ by being worse. It's kind of tough to make one of the best players in the history of the game better then he really was. When a player like Ty Cobb, Sam Crawford, Christy Mathewson, Pete Alexander, or Walter Johnson is "adjusted" they might be slightly better then they were in real life, but more likely will just be different in a fundamental way (more or less power, speed, contact, etc...), and will more likely be changed to be worse.

[walruskkkch]

Like I said, I haven't played a lot of dynasties so the extent of my data is limited. If I play enough I'll see those players have bad careers eventually. I only bring up Ruth in this regard because I have yet to see him perform at an HOF level and it seems strange that he doesn't and I was wondering what other players have experienced with him.

[reflections]

I've never really had Ruth be dominant like he was. He usually is just one of the better players in the league.

[dolfanar]

"Historical Players" are essentially random players with historical names in BBM. When Nolan Ryan's arm regularly peters out at age 29-30 you know you aren't dealing with a game even trying to make the players perform like their real-life counterparts...

[reflections]

"Historical Players" are essentially random players with historical names in BBM. When Nolan Ryan's arm regularly peters out at age 29-30 you know you aren't dealing with a game even trying to make the players perform like their real-life counterparts...

True that.
If people want them to be more like R/L counterparts they have to some clever editting.

[walruskkkch]

Totally random? If you are playing with historical players only it's just as possible that say, Phil Rizzuto, will have a career similar toTy CObb as Cob would? Now i can see how outside factors may derail the potential, or maybe enhance it but to not have the potential there to begin with? Is that true? So far in my play I've found that while some unknown or least expected players have great careers most of the Real LIfe HOF players do well, unless something outside acts upon them like injuries or getting buried in the farm system. The only real exception to that which I have seen is Babe Ruth and I readily concede that I may not have played enough to see the randomness even out.

[ohms_law]

Their not random at all. dolfanar just wants them to be exactly the same every time is all. He's advocated for the game to move in the direction of a replay sim for a long time now.

[HoustonGM]

Their not random at all.
Well, that's not exactly true, when stated like that. There is randomness involved. What you meant to say is that they're not entirely random. ;)

[ohms_law]

There's a random factor that's inserted into the players, but that doesn't make them "essentially random". As soon as I saw dolfanar say that I know it would be misconstrued, which walrus proved above, and that's why I replied the way that I did.

[walruskkkch]

THanks for the clarification. I do play games like Strat-O-Matic where you are trying to recreate exact performance for a season. I like Mogul because of the changing potential over a succession of seasons.

[ohms_law]

Which is exactly the point of the design. What I was saying above is that dolfanar wants to change Mogul so that it behaves like Strat in terms of historical players.

[walruskkkch]

It would be a different game then, wouldn't it? Alternate history may have a common starting point but then choices and luck will change the trajectory of the ensueing time line. It may not vary much, it may vary alot but it all depends on how the potentials play out. What would be nice is to game out a What if Babe RUth didn't get switched to a hitter type of scenario. WHich we can't do. :) But even if you start allowing to free flow of choices to change history their still is a high factor to contribute to the continuity and closeness to the existing history to persist. In the end Ty Cobb's career may not play out exactly like it did in real life but the abilities that he brought to the game still exist and how they play out will probalby force the new history to be fairly close to the reality. Barring larger factors like serious injury and such.

[dolfanar]

Their not random at all. dolfanar just wants them to be exactly the same every time is all. He's advocated for the game to move in the direction of a replay sim for a long time now.

Ohms, don't put words in my mouth.

First they are random.

Random predicted stats.
Random Career Peaks and Potential.
Random Career Longevity.
Play Randomization (even with identical predicted stats

The ONLY thing BBM uses Lahman for is generating 18 year old predicted stats, which even then are a reverse projection from their real life stats.

In BBM the only thing you are guaranteed is that Nolan Ryan will be generated as an 18 year old with a tendancy to Strikeout players. He isn';t even more LIKELY to have a career similar to his real life one. He is in fact MORE likely to end his peak years at 31 then he is to pitch into his 40's. Babe Ruth as the OP points out almost NEVER develops into the player he was in real life.

Sim Babe Ruths career 100 times with BBM and you will never once get a career result within 10% of his real life one. Same with Rickey Henderson, Ted Williams and any number of RL players. In BBM scrubs regularly turn into superstars.

So in BBM you are far, far, FAR more likelyu to have a historical player NOT behave or produce as he would in real life. That's random by any definition.

What I "advocate" is for Lahman to be used as more than a marketing device, and actually used to create historic players that are more likely to perform to their RL levels given similar conditions. In BBM you need to ride the editor constantly to even get anything close. I mean, if the ratio was even 50/50 it would be a VAST improvement!


Which is exactly the point of the design. What I was saying above is that dolfanar wants to change Mogul so that it behaves like Strat in terms of historical players.

No dolfanar doesn't want "to change Mogul so that it behaves like Strat in terms of historical players".

Why not just hijack my account and cut out the middle man?

[ohms_law]

You're not correct dolf. Sorry to have called you out like that, but facts are facts. None of this:


Random predicted stats.
Random Career Peaks and Potential.
Random Career Longevity.
is true. All of those are based on a formula that's integrated into the game.

[walruskkkch]

How random? Is there a range that historical players would be expected to fall between?

[Clay Dreslough]

Random Career Peaks and Potential.
Random Career Longevity.You're right. These are randomly generated with each new game.

What I "advocate" is for Lahman to be used as more than a marketing device, and actually used to create historic players that are more likely to perform to their RL levels given similar conditions.But I think it's a huge exaggeration to call Lahman just a 'marketing device'. Mogul loads in every historical stat for any season you start in. And looks ahead 25 years to create ratings for every player loaded. And then loads historical rookies for every season that Lahman has data. We also integrated all of Lahman's team data, including franchise movements, and use the yearly averages as calibration for the simulation engine. That's a lot of programming effort, not just marketing hype.

That said, I totally understand where you are coming from. You would like Baseball Mogul to be more of a replay. At present, that is not what Baseball Mogul is. Baseball Mogul is essentially a 'General Manager Simulation'. In order to fairly simulate the experience of being a GM, you can't have the benefit of hindsight in making your GM decisions. If you know that Nolan Ryan is more likely than not to be dominant past age 40, that will affect whether you choose to sign him to a long-term deal.

I realize that for many people, Baseball Mogul is more than just a general manager simulation. It's a flexible tool for simulating baseball games, past or future. As such, I see how the product would be more enjoyable to you (and others) if historical players followed their historical career paths more closely. So, I'm considering adding options in future versions that make this possible. My first priority is an option where career peaks and longevity would better match historical performance.

[ohms_law]

How random? Is there a range that historical players would be expected to fall between?
It depends on what you're talking about. There's a small randomization inserted into all players whenever they are created. On top of that, there's "randomization" in player's development. When you begin a game with Ruth (or anyone else) at 18 the opportunity is always there for them to hit their historic career norms. However, over the years from 18 to 21, 25, 27, 31, or whenever, there's also opportunities for things to go wrong (or right) for the player that didn't historically. That's not random at all really, but in terms of what's been discussed above that (player development) is a huge "random factor". It's also the key factor in keeping the game an actual game, instead of a replay sim.

[walruskkkch]

Ok, but at the start [18 years old] the randomness is within certain parameters based upon their actual career, correct? From that point on other random factors will impact their development which may take them futher up or down from their historical path.

On the question of General Manager vs historical accuracy there is always going to be a dynamic tension at work. On the one hand, as baseball fans, we enjoyed the careers of our heroes and other great players so managing them is a treat. We like to see how they produce under out command but we also have an expectation that the talent will show through. At that point the tension arises, our expectations knowing how good someone was and whether they then produce as expected. If we just wanted to general manage a team and truly wanted it to be a "clean" development then you wouldn't need historical players. You really would have no extra knowledge on who would or wouldn't develop into a HOF type player. But that then takes away the other part of the equation and the "fun" one may have. Trying to balance those competing desires is hard and, on the whole, I think Mogul does a very good job of it. Most of the argument is whether it would be desirable to nudge more in one direction or the other. In the end though is whether the game is enjoyable as it plays. Whether it satisfies more than it disappoints and IMO this games succeeds. Everything else is just esoteric discussions which any sport revels in. What else is baseball that a complex game that breeds arguable minutae?

[ohms_law]

Ok, but at the start [18 years old] the randomness is within certain parameters based upon their actual career, correct? From that point on other random factors will impact their development which may take them futher up or down from their historical path.
Correct.

I agree with you about the last part, too. I probably get a bit too defensive about this issue since it's been an argument for... well, forever around here. I just really don't want to see this changed, since to me that would fundamentally alter the game.
I wouldn't mind at all if there was some option to turn off most of the random factors though, as Clay mentioned above. People should be able to play the game that they want to play, after all. There is a "Don't randomize" option already when you begin a game, and getting that feature to work the way that people expect it to is what should be concentrated on. I'm pretty confident that if/when Clay gets to it, that's what he'll change too. Heck, I'd use that feature myself occasionally.

[dolfanar]

Ok, but at the start [18 years old] the randomness is within certain parameters based upon their actual career, correct? From that point on other random factors will impact their development which may take them futher up or down from their historical path.

In a word NO. BIG NO.

What does the game do? It takes a players career, and generates a COMPLETELY random career path that is skewed toward a median. Nolan Ryan is MORE likely to have a 8-12 year career as he is a 20-25 year career.

Once this COMPLETELY RANDOM career path (in terms of peak start and end, potential and longevity) is established NO AMOUNT OF PLAYER DEVELOPMENT OR MEDICAL SPENDING will make ANY differance. NONE. ZILCH. ZERO.

This isn't a case of variation through play, this is a case of RANDOM CAREER PATHS which are completely indipendant of in game choices or decisions.


What I advocate is NOT, NOT, NOT a "replay". Never have, never will. What I want is that the game generate players and actually USE lahman to generate a career path based on the players REAL LIFE careers.


For those who do not get nearly into the "stats soup" side of things, the career path determines how "great" a player is. If you look at Pete Rose real career in BBM terms, you are looking at a player who peaked around 24 and stayed at that level til about 38. His Peak start and peak end SHOULD be 24-38, with high longevity since he played 7 years past his peak end. IF BBM decides to give him a Peak end of 30, then there is no way he will ever play to 38, let alone 45, and nothing short of editing the player will change that.

By the same token a player like Ellis Valentine, who was a great young prospect IRL probably peaked around 22-23, and petered out quickly after that. High potential, low longevity. In BBM if the same player is generated with a Peak start of 25, and aPeak end of 34 then you have Hank Aaron Jr. on your hands, even with crappy medical and farm team spending.

That's random.



That said, I totally understand where you are coming from. You would like Baseball Mogul to be more of a replay. At present, that is not what Baseball Mogul is. Baseball Mogul is essentially a 'General Manager Simulation'. In order to fairly simulate the experience of being a GM, you can't have the benefit of hindsight in making your GM decisions. If you know that Nolan Ryan is more likely than not to be dominant past age 40, that will affect whether you choose to sign him to a long-term deal.

Clay, if Nolan Ryan is just a power pitcher who is not any more likely to play past 40 as Sandy Koufax is, then he isn't Nolan Ryan. Period. His longevity defined him. Nolan Ryan in BBM is a random pitcher with a famous name.

No one is asking for guarantees, just for the players to be far more LIKELY to have careers that resemble there real life ones. some randomization is great, total randomization defeats the purpose of having historical players to begin with. Besides, if someone actually wants total randomization... that's what fictional players are for...

[RedsoxRockies]

Dolfnar, if you don't like Mogul, why do you keep playing it and stuff?

[dolfanar]

Dolfnar, if you don't like Mogul, why do you keep playing it and stuff?

Because something like 12 years ago I got hooked on a game called Tony Larussas Baseball 3, and then migrated to BBM which at the time was the complete package. More than anything else the BBM interface is the best, most intuitive one out there(I include all sports games -- Not just Baseball). I still play the game for modern play occasionally, once you get into fictional play the game works much better (Though even there player development needs TONS of work). Right now my play time is split 50/50 with OOTP though, and every year BBM falls increasingly behind.

So why do I care? Because I genuinely WANT BBM to be better. It's Baseball presented the way I WANT to play it.

And that's the LAST time I will answer this question.

[reflections]

I've chimed in on threads that seem to follow this one. The search for a recreation of baseball history instead of a new exciting creation of the baseball time line. Its why i've done more than my share of homework to have over 100 Negro league baseball players added and upwards of 150 NBL players added. I made a few points about players that pass away in the middle of seasons (Thurman Munson) or pass away during the offseason (Chick Stahl, Roberto Clemente) and the fact that if not edited in BBM they would still play past their R/L. I find it fresh that maybe Ruth isn't as powerful a hitter as in R/L but Jimmy Sheckard is a monster of player. Ellis Valentine has been far above what he was for me a few times and Ron Guidry has been a shadow of himself. It's what is exciting for me in BBM. I take the time to look for players that maybe didn't get great shots historically (Played in the PCL for years, but only played a few games in the MLB). Or players like Satchel Paige and Luke Easter who definitely didn't get their fair due as MLB players but now can. So it seems as though people who want exact replays can just go in and edit if it's that important. Cause if when playing you already knew Ruth was going to hit 700 plus home runs then how could the AI even fight you. It would be such a advantage to the player that it would uneven the game in my mind. With so many other obvious issues, I hope this isn't something on the top shelf to be worked on for the next BBM.

[Yamato]

I once had Ruth, and he had an even better career. This was on Mogul level, and he hit over 900hr and retired at 44.

[RickD]

I like the complete randomness of the game. I started in 1913 as the Yankees.....drafted a lot of RL superstars who did not pan out as they did in RL bul had some other guys step up and be just good enough to not get sent down. I had a lot of dry years but still won 26 WS by 2000!

[bpasinko]

I am currently doing a 1901 mogul dynasty, and I have had the same problems with Ruth, I tried resimulating each year or each week to get him up to 50 or so homers but it doesn't work, or its not worth the effort to cheat him to get to his 'normal' stats. I've had no problems with any other player I have come across though...Sam Crawford, Ty Cobb, and Rogers Hornsby all have had amazing and amazingly similar careers, each occasionally getting close or hitting 400 as well.

But, I noticed when you go to edit Ruth for his predicted stats and what not, that it gives him way to many At bats, it has him taking like 1000 abs and predicted 118 homers, then he just hits like 27-35 homers. I tried editing his peak to be normal, like his best years and still hit the same. I'll try drafting Ruth again, but this is the 2nd time and it's the same problem, could it just be Ruth that is really messed up?

Thanks

[ohms_law]

or its not worth the effort to cheat him to get to his 'normal' stats.
Define, "normal". By any definition that I can think of, Babe Ruth's historical stats are far from "normal".


could it just be Ruth that is really messed up?
I doubt it. Ruth's historic performance, as I mentioned above, is really far outside of the norm... the chances are good that in some alternate universes, if he had to redo his seasons again, that he wouldn't repeat his historical performance.

[RickD]

I've had him hit 50 once without adjustment!

[ohms_law]

I've seen him hit 70 before... but, I've also run 100's of 110 year sims (1901-2021).

[RickD]

Cool!

[boomboom]

As for Babe Ruth, The most I have ever seen him hit for a career was 354 homers... the most in a season was 35 (still a giant number...but not Ruthian)

Dolfnar, if you don't like Mogul, why do you keep playing it and stuff?


y behind.

So why do I care? Because I genuinely WANT BBM to be better. It's Baseball presented the way I WANT to play it.

And that's the LAST time I will answer this question.

You should never have to anwser the question on why you play this game. I agree with you about this and believe that this game should have real life stars play like real life counter parts, or at least make it an option. Baseball Mogul has the best interface of any sports game ever made.

I have personally played OOTP exclusively since late June. Mostly because of the real roster rules.

[reflections]

Man what fun is it to play a game when you already know how the players are going to play?

[walruskkkch]

Knowing their potential to play is not the same thing as actual performance as other random factors start to set in from draft day on. The information that we have, that say Ty Cobb is a really, really, really good ballplayer, is not necessarily the information that the MLB teams of 1905 had when he entered the draft. So we enter the model with more information than the computer. But this information also informs our expectations. We know Ty's career, we know what he can do so we end up expecting to see that performance. The same is true with Ruth. The point I wanted to get information on, and thanks to everyone who's chimed in on this, is whether it seems in your experience that Ruth lives up to his expected performance more often than not, certainly compared to other greats and it seems, so far, that most people see him as being disappointing. What I'm seeing emerge as the reason for this seems to be that Babe was so far overperforming against his contemporaries that any attempt to have him match that performance would be outside a fair set of parameters for the game itself. In the end Babe was just too damn good and any attempt to replicate it would unbalance the game play moreso than any other player. Maybe that's not the best way to phrase it, but that seems to be the situation. WHile players like CObb and Hornsby et al. can approximate their performances Ruth has to be so much higher that he can't really be set to his real life level. I suppose that is more a comment on just how damned good Ruth was than any negative reflection on the game itself.

[ohms_law]

You've got it, walrus.

For the record, there can be Ruthian players in Mogul (players who do play really far outside of the "normal" parameters, for the league). It's just that the game is intentionally designed not to allow it often at all. Personally, I don't think that's a bad thing. Maybe the possibility is slightly low though, although I'd personally go real easy on adjusting it. For one thing, there's no single variable to say "make this percent of players really great". There needs to be a series of events that happen in order to create those players. More importantly though, if there are too many (more than 1 every few generations) then that's just not realistic. There's only been one Babe Ruth in the history of the game, after all. If you sim from 1901 out to 2101 though, I guarantee that you'll have two or three "Babe Ruth's" though, which is why I don't feel that there's any sort of problem. That Ruth isn't named "Babe Ruth" isn't an issue, to me.

[bpasinko]

I wasn't clear how I said 'normal', I think I was trying to say Ruth's real life stats are far from normal to the rest of the league but to get Ruth to achieve Ruth's normal stats you'd have to cheat by not saving when he doesn't hit a homerun every week or whatnot...because it's clear he doesn't become close to the Ruth he was, except some seemingly random occurrances that some have you have mentioned.

I understand all the critiques that it's no fun necessarily knowing how everyone will perform, but if every dynasty you start Ty Cobb performs similar to his real stats, and Ruth doesn't then that's a problem. There should be no reason that at least in my times of playing that Ruth hasn't come close to Ruthian stats.

If there is one historical player to get perfectly right I feel its Ruth. Having him go from pitcher to hitter is a really cool attribute that I like, but it could be perfect if he just became a 50+ home run hitter. Again, some of you have mentioned some times where he hit 50 home runs or what have you, but still no word of Ruth having a Ruth like career, yea the game shouldn't have every historical player achieve their exact stats, but at some point the simulation should get real close right?

[filihok]

Maybe this is just evidence of how special Ruth really was.

[RickD]

I've had Ruth hit over 500 HR's and sometimes over 600 without adjustments!

[walruskkkch]

"I guarantee that you'll have two or three "Babe Ruth's" though, which is why I don't feel that there's any sort of problem. That Ruth isn't named "Babe Ruth" isn't an issue, to me.
"

I assume that you mean that the Babe Ruth will have a Ruthian career 2 or 3 times out of a 100 simulations not that some player would have a Ruthian career randomly. If that is the case I can see why there is a difference of opinion. Before the obvious question that would follow a different question first. OVer a 100 sims how often did you find a Cobb, Hornsby, et al. had season commensurate with their established numbers? So far in the number of sims that I've done it's been alot closer to each and everytime than 2-3% of the time. Which now leads to the obvious question. Why does it appear that other players more often than not have "similar" historic careers to the expected norms than Babe Ruth does? IF they were operating from a similar random chanceness than wouldn't one expect to see a lot more poor Ty Cobb careers like we see for Ruth? Is that 2-3 out of 100 figure accurate in general for players? Should we expect to see matching historic careers for all the players just 2-3% of the time? How much is the randomness off of the historical record? Are there parameters to control that and how do they apply to all historic players rather than fictional players? If it is just for Ruth that raises the question of why just him.

[HoustonGM]

I think it's "just Ruth" because Ruth's real-life numbers are so wildly extreme. Cobb and Hornsby and the like were undoubtedly great players, but they weren't single-handedly lapping the league like Ruth was.

[reflections]

Ruth was indeed special.
Probably the one who changed the whole course of baseball. I mean he outhomered whole teams.
I don't see BM has having something in it to put a player so far ahead of every other player (except for Chuck Norris)
Nor would I really want that.
For me I like having other unknowns or barely knowns play far above what they were like in R/L. Having Ellis Valentine and Andre Dawson be Bash Brothers before Jose touched a needle is great. Of course watching Sandy Koufax go down in flames pitching 6 years for Cleveland sucked. lol.
But it's the game. It's nice not completely knowing who is going to turn out like their namesake and who is going to outplay theirs.

[geniuslegume]

"I guarantee that you'll have two or three "Babe Ruth's" though, which is why I don't feel that there's any sort of problem. That Ruth isn't named "Babe Ruth" isn't an issue, to me.
"

I assume that you mean that the Babe Ruth will have a Ruthian career 2 or 3 times out of a 100 simulations not that some player would have a Ruthian career randomly.

If I understand Ohms correctly, your assumption goes exactly opposite as to what he was saying. He means that through those simulations, you'll find that 2 or 3 players will have amazing careers, much the way Ruth did, though those players won't necessarily be Ruth himself.

[HoustonGM]

If I understand Ohms correctly, your assumption goes exactly opposite as to what he was saying. He means that through those simulations, you'll find that 2 or 3 players will have amazing careers, much the way Ruth did, though those players won't necessarily be Ruth himself.
Yeah.

[justanewguy]

Here's the solution:

When you want Ruth to be Ruthian, sim week by week. Start with the first week. If he had a Ruthian week, save the game and sim another week. If he doesn't have a Ruthian week, load the last save, then sim until he has another Ruthian week. Repeat.

Eventually he'll have a Ruthian career.

[walruskkkch]

That doesn't sem quite right. But if I can rephrase it. Out of a 100 simulations you might expect to have 2-3 players with careers so far above expectations or the best "ever". Much as Ruth, in his only career it was possible to have :) , had a career so far above and beyond anyone else. Is that the argument?

[ohms_law]

If I understand Ohms correctly, your assumption goes exactly opposite as to what he was saying. He means that through those simulations, you'll find that 2 or 3 players will have amazing careers, much the way Ruth did, though those players won't necessarily be Ruth himself.


That doesn't sem quite right. But if I can rephrase it. Out of a 100 simulations you might expect to have 2-3 players with careers so far above expectations or the best "ever". Much as Ruth, in his only career it was possible to have :) , had a career so far above and beyond anyone else. Is that the argument?

humm... these two statements read pretty much exactly the same, to me.
:)

Anyway, yea. That's what I was saying.
I wanted to show y'all something about this, but I need to put it together first... give me a sec.

Here we go. It's not a perfect list at all, but it's representative at least.
Top 20 batting seasons, as measured by distance above the league average:

year Name H 2B 3B HR BB SO Rate (H+2b+3b+HR+BB)-SO
1920 Ruth, Babe 3.64 4.92 3.51 42.26 10.84 5.44 59.73
1921 Ruth, Babe 4.03 5.40 5.74 30.79 10.36 5.69 50.62
1919 Ruth, Babe 3.36 5.53 5.44 30.82 8.02 4.02 49.14
1918 Burns, George 8.90 9.21 8.24 20.68 5.58 5.09 47.52
1927 Ruth, Babe 4.10 3.58 3.56 33.32 9.42 6.61 47.37
1927 Gehrig, Lou 4.66 6.42 8.01 26.10 7.50 6.24 46.44
1946 Williams, Ted 5.17 6.54 6.47 19.80 11.22 2.87 46.33
1875 O'Rourke, Jim 2.96 2.94 4.87 28.50 6.87 1.69 44.45
1924 Ruth, Babe 4.35 5.05 3.15 27.11 10.18 6.44 43.39
1946 Musial, Stan 6.70 8.84 16.17 8.34 5.25 2.02 43.27
2007 Rollins, Jimmy 5.52 4.84 24.99 7.09 3.57 3.09 42.93
2007 Granderson, Curtis 4.82 4.84 28.74 5.44 3.79 5.13 42.50
1923 Ruth, Babe 4.33 5.87 5.83 21.42 11.51 6.78 42.18
1913 Cravath, Gavvy 4.95 6.43 6.42 23.49 4.40 3.94 41.75
1996 Johnson, Lance 6.10 4.42 27.95 2.06 2.33 1.55 41.32
1926 Ruth, Babe 3.93 3.64 2.17 27.34 9.38 5.63 40.83
1911 Schulte, Frank 4.22 4.92 8.49 21.86 5.19 3.91 40.77
1915 Cravath, Gavvy 3.57 4.99 2.89 27.59 5.65 4.01 40.68
1948 Musial, Stan 5.61 6.76 11.70 13.59 4.45 2.04 40.07
1919 Burns, George 7.29 9.59 8.16 10.63 8.02 3.81 39.87


I really should use standard deviations instead of the average, and/or use linear weights instead of straight weightings, but... this is good enough for a quick and dirty look, I think.

This rather starkly shows just how far above "normal" Ruth was, don't you agree? Ruth hit more than 30x the league average number of home runs 4 times. The closest anyone else has gotten is Jim O'Rourke in 1875...
The point here is that there's not really any way for a mathematical model to take this sort of possibility into account without screwing up the whole model. The only thing I can think of would be a specific system for Ruth to make him particularly special, but... think about the effect of that. If that were put into place, no matter what team you're playing, what human player wouldn't do anything possible to acquire him? With the current system you're likely to have 2-3 guys like Ruth over a 150-200 year period of time, but it's likely not going to be Ruth himself. He'll pretty much always be a great player, normally even a Hall Of Famer, but he probably wont be Babe Ruth. Personally, I don't see the problem with that.

[HoustonGM]

I really should use standard deviations instead of the average, and/or use linear weights instead of straight weightings, but... this is good enough for a quick and dirty look, I think.
For a VERY quick and dirty look, yes...I mean...Lance Johnson, Jimmy Rollins, Curtis Granderson...the triples really distort that, so it's really not close to a list of the 20 best offensive seasons. :p

Here's something that I think illustrates it better. Babe Ruth's career OPS+ (OPS relative to league average, 100 is average) is 207. He had 11 seasons over 200. Babe Ruth holds 8 of the top 20 single season OPS+ marks. Barry Bonds with 4 and Ted Williams with 2 are the only other players with multiple seasons in the top 20. A single season OPS+ of 200 or better has been done a total of 59 times. Babe Ruth's OPS+ for his ENTIRE CAREER was over 200, and as I said, Ruth owns 11 of those 59. He led his league 13 times in OPS+. He was just a run-producing machine. He dominated the leaderboards of every offensive statistic throughout his career. His Black Ink score is 161. The average HOFer is 40. Gray Ink, 340. Average HOFer is 144.

[walruskkkch]

I understand and appreciate what you are saying. And thank you for going to the trouble to more graphically explain it. It comes down to the fact the Babe Ruth is just too damn good for the game itself. :) Funny, ain't it? Like I said I understand. I also accept the reasoning and why things have to be the way they are but that still doesn't erase the bit of sadness knowing that it will be a rare thing ideed to witness Babe Ruth having an actual career reconstruction similar to real life. When it happens I should enjoy it and treasure it.

[ohms_law]

When it happens I should enjoy it and treasure it.
See, that's the thing though. To me, having the game the way it is makes it better for exactly this reason. We tend to prize things that are difficult to achieve or rare, while we tend to not care about those things that are easy to acquire even if whatever it is may be valuable.

[walruskkkch]

Of course now I'll never persue Ruth for my team and just be content watching Harry Heilmann hit .360 out in right for 12 years. :)

[reflections]

Of course now I'll never persue Ruth for my team and just be content watching Harry Heilmann hit .360 out in right for 12 years. :)

Harry is the man in many of my dynasty.
Along with some other underrated players from around that era.

[walruskkkch]

Always liked Harry. Never found room for him based on timing and who was ahead of him.

[reflections]

Ken Williams and Sherry Magee are also some guys who are just beasts in my current dynasty. Both have hit 50 home runs plus for the past 4 years.

[justanewguy]

Seriously, shouldn't the 2 Babe Ruth threads be merged??

[walruskkkch]

I'm trying to break Ken Williams into my current team, but He's got CObb, Veach and Wheat ahead of him.

[reflections]

Man that's a outfield.
I mess around sometimes and put the DH in both leagues. lol.
Get's some of the unsung guys playing time earlier.

[walruskkkch]

I am using the DH. George Sisler. Hal Chase is my first baseman. Like I said, tough to break into that. Although it is 1917, Chase is 34 and a spot may open up in a couple of years.

[vaskov17]

I always thought the potential rating is in the game (and goes up to 500), just so the top players in any era of baseball would have a very high rating and that would force them to be great in any game.

[ohms_law]

I always thought the potential rating is in the game (and goes up to 500), just so the top players in any era of baseball would have a very high rating and that would force them to be great in any game.

Not really. The potential rating controls the likelihood that the player will hit his draft day peak, more or less.

Anyway, after re-reading parts of this thread... primarily for reasons that I've explained above, I'll readily admit that I've never actually fixated on Ruth at all. The main thing that I'm thinking about right now is this:

But, I noticed when you go to edit Ruth for his predicted stats and what not, that it gives him way to many At bats, it has him taking like 1000 abs and predicted 118 homers, then he just hits like 27-35 homers. I tried editing his peak to be normal, like his best years and still hit the same. I'll try drafting Ruth again, but this is the 2nd time and it's the same problem, could it just be Ruth that is really messed up?
It's entirely feasible that Ruth's stats are far enough out of whack (see above) that the game is having real problems properly projecting him. I simply don't have a clue about this, since I've never really looked at all. So, if anyone has the time, can you take a look at his projected stats over several games and see if they seem out of whack consistently? If that's true, then that's a real problem.

[reflections]

I am using the DH. George Sisler. Hal Chase is my first baseman. Like I said, tough to break into that. Although it is 1917, Chase is 34 and a spot may open up in a couple of years.

Chase is another guy who is always a beast for me.

[walruskkkch]

Good fielder, great average, good speed and deadball era power [triples] what's not to like?

[reflections]

Good fielder, great average, good speed and deadball era power [triples] what's not to like?

At least they don't have the one attribute he had......Gambling. lol

[walruskkkch]

SHould be a type of injury. "Suspended for gambling". See Jackson, Joe.

And Ken Williams finally got a shot to play full time, Sisler went done for 90 days with an injury. Started putting up good numbers and then BAM! 20 day injury. No justice at all.

[ohms_law]

SHould be a type of injury. "Suspended for gambling". See Jackson, Joe.
ugh... no thanks.

[walruskkkch]

Vat? u no laff at mine joke?

[ghettostar]

It's entirely feasible that Ruth's stats are far enough out of whack (see above) that the game is having real problems properly projecting him. I simply don't have a clue about this, since I've never really looked at all. So, if anyone has the time, can you take a look at his projected stats over several games and see if they seem out of whack consistently? If that's true, then that's a real problem.


This might be the issue as Ohms and i had injected into a recent debate. i hope someone takes him up on the suggestion that his predicted stats be looked over with a keen eye. I would but im not much of an 'historical' player.:o