BBM06: where to begin?

[Lunch]

Hi all

I'm English and, as such, I have very little experience of Baseball. I've spent the past 3 days toying around with the features and reading the faqs that came with the game. Now I'm almost ready to begin my first game propper.

Can anyone please share a couple of hints, to a complete new comer, as to which aspects of my roster and overall team setup I should initially concern myself with as the new season begins. There's alot in there and to a novice it's just a bit daunting. Naturally, as with any game, there is going to be an amount of trial and error involved. However, what I think i'm asking for here is an idea of what you vets normally do with your teams at the start of a season. Like a'must do' list or something.

Any comments appreciated. Many thanks.

[petrel]

Hello! Don't know what you know, and what you don't know, but this is what I'd tell someone just getting started in BaseballMogul. I'm using the 05 version right now -- I have the 06 but will not move to it until the season I'm playing is finished.

There should be three drop-down menus on the left hand side: teams, players, budget. You'll be doing all of your general managing here.

TEAMS

My first step would be to go to lineup. Until you feel comfortable with moving players in and out of a lineup, I would choose the "auto-sort" function, which basically lets the computer decide the lineup. I have my own strong theories as to what constitutes a good lineup, which are different from the computer's. Until you have some method of choosing a lineup of your own, I would just use "auto-sort".

For pitching, I'd do the same thing. Go to the "auto-sort" function. However, there's one change I'd make. Look at the roster positions marked "Long" and "Alt".

"Long" isn't an official roster position (like catcher, first base, or second base). "Long" is simply the pitcher designated for "long relief", when your starter gets crushed in the first few innings and you need someone who can throw four or five innings on short notice. "Alt" is the pitcher who will probably start a game if you have two or more injuries in your "starting five" and the injured are not replaced.

In either case, you should make sure "Endurance" for those pitchers is higher than 50. (Or better, Alt Endurance>50 and Long Endurance>75). If you don't have a (good) pitcher who can fill those roles, it's something to think about when offered trades or looking for "free agents", who are players without contracts who are looking for work.

As for Defense I would not hit Auto-Sort. You might get a "top nine" defensive team when you do it, but your best nine defenders are most likely not your best nine players .

For Roster, choose column headings so that "Years" is enabled. Look for players who have "Years" equal to "1". These players will be asking for more money at the end of the year - these players are in the final year of their contract with you. You might want to click that player's name, draw up his screen, and click "negotiate" to discuss a future contract.

You have a lot of flexibility as to when you can do this. If you do it too early, and the player bombs out during the season, you might be stuck with the players long contract. If you do it too late, and the player has a good year, the terms might be unreasonable. (Ex: I had Roger Clemens and he asked for $5.5 million a year - I overlooked signing him though. Two game weeks later, he was asking for $7.2 million and it went up all year. He won the Cy Young that year, but my small-marked Pittsburgh team could not afford the $10m/plus contract he was asking for, so we had to let him go.)

In any event, this will give you an idea as to how to plan for the future. Where will the holes in your roster be the next year?

STRATEGIES

I don't know if you know what the strategy bars mean. If you ask about specific ones, I'll tell you. However, the bars basically determine how the "manager" (or field manager) decides what to do in crucial situations -- the "philosophy of managing" is set by the choices here.

INJURY CONTINGENCY

All this means is that if you like to simulate your team over months at a time, but like to adapt immediately to injuries, the computer will stop automatic play if a player sustains an injury so you can make roster changes. You decide how serious the injury has to be. For non-serious injuries, the game will make an automatic substitution.

I'll talk about "Players" and "Budget" later. Was any of the above helpful at all?

--Pet

[petrel]

PLAYERS

Free agents. This is the point where you're going to have to make a major decision regarding your philosophy: will you be acquiring new players by free agents, or using a farm system?

The joy of the free agent market is that all the best players go there. If you have enough cash, you can sign someone, but you have to be careful. However, if I lived in a "big market" (Boston, New York, Chicago), I would probably acquire many of my players through free agency.

As I like playing small markets (Pittsburgh), I have to put a limit on my spending. If I try spending like the Red Sox or Yankees, I will find myself quickly in debt, since a small town can't recover the money through ticket sales. Right now, I'm at $5 million for hitter and $6 million for pitcher, and will only acquire about one of each. I try to find players that the market has undervalued.

Decide how much will be done through free agency. During the game, you want to hit F3 a lot "Finances" and see if you are gaining money or losing money. If you're losing, you might have spent too much and may need to unload that agent you just paid for. But you won't survive in the free agent market as a small market player without common-sense budgeting.

Find players is obviously, an engine for finding players. It only offers a few things to search by. My advice: go to "Roster", find "Select All Players". You can then choose column headings and sort as needed.

Trades If there's a good player you want that's contracted to another team, you might want to offer a trade. Choose the players from both sides, and go for it. You can also offer a trade for cash only, or cash only for a trade.

If a trade is turned now, you can ask for a "hint" and the other team will tell you what it's looking for (at least in older versions of Baseball Mogul). You should ALWAYS ask for "Get Counter Offer" which allows the computer to make a new offer similar to the ones you make. You can also "Balance Cash" to make the offer even financially. However, always ask for "Get Counter Offer" if a trade goes south; you can see how close or how far you are away from the other team's terms.

Trading Block One of the great things about Mogul. You put a player on the trading block, and it basically says, "Here's a player. To all other teams: what will you give me for him?"

You can ask for "any players", you can ask for specific positions (shortstop), you can differentiate between veterans and rookies (untested players), or...you can ask for cash. If you're playing a small market team, this is a great way to raise cash. When the creditors are pounding at the door of your suite, you throw a player off the snowsled and out to the barking wolves behind. (For example, I have Adrian Hernandez, an okay pitcher who is in the last year of his contract. I'm in debt, so I can't renegotiate. Therfore, since I still have his contract, I'll ask someone to give me cash for him. The Diamondbacks will give me $2 mil, more than any other team. I let Hernandez go, stick the $2 mil in my pocket and let the D-Backs worry about resigning him.)

Two important notes.

1. Avoid debt. When you go into debt, you can't get free agents. You can't renegotiate with your players. You can't resign players about to become free agents. You're basically forced to sell/trade those players. Avoid debt -- it limits your possibilities.

2. In the "Trading Block" screen, do NOT always accept the best trade. I had a player that the Rockies offered $6 million for. The next best offer was Baltimore, with $4 million. The Rockies are a league rival this year. If I take the money, the choice could come back to haunt me in the playoffs. Baltimore's in another league and another division. I take Baltimore's $4 million over Colorado's $6 million.

Be careful in trading with rivals! Your rival could make a good trade, but a bad trade will come back to haunt you double as not only have you weakened yourself, you've strengthened your rival at the same time.

--Pet

[Griswel]

My few hints:

- always have the best scouts you possibly can afford. Doctors are nice, scouts are gods.

- defense matters - up the middle, C/SS/2B/CF. Other than that, defense is merely okay.

- Pitching is critical - the difference between a top pitching staff and a bottom pitching staff is much larger and harder to overcome than the difference between a top lineup and a bottom lineup (unless you have stacks of cash for Free Agents, in which case all problems are easily solved).

- Starters matter - alot, so does your first reliever (i.e. closer). After them I would NOT spend alot on relievers. Paying $50m for four starters and $5m for your closer is fine, paying $3-4m for other relievers is nuts if you ask me.

- Troll for relievers late in the free agent process, when their salary demands are lowest. At easier difficulty levels grab a few extra (young) relievers every year in the $1m range, sign them for two years, then trade them for cash and prizes after only one year.

- Play the big cities - baseball's competitiveness is a joke. Big market teams can compete year after year if they are managed with anything like competence. Even a genius in a small market team will only challenge now and then. I'm taling Championships here, the real prize, not merely respectable regular season records. BBM is easier than real life, but the same general rules, and problems, apply.

- Watch the draft - steal the top guys. It's easier to trade for a team's top pick than you'd think. At lower than Mogul you can get a top prospect for the relievers you signed last year to two year contracts. You get players for free, pay them and use them for one year, then trade them away for top draft picks.

- learn to love Hockey. Real baseball is dull for anyone who hasn't grown up watching cricket (no offense :P). Hockey rules.

North American Sports ranked by excitment level
1 - Hockey
2 - Lacrosse
3 - Curling
4 - Baseball
5 - Standing in front of the closet, waiting for Cindy Sheehan to come out

[Lunch]

I'll talk about "Players" and "Budget" later. Was any of the above helpful at all?

Hi and thanks for replies. Pretty much everything you have said has been helpfull. In particular you advice about the pitchers meant that I went back and changed my line-up around.

I was probably not making myself very clear when I asked for help, though. As far as the interface goes, and the majority of the function buttons, I was reasonably clear from using the glossary and faqs as a guide. What I was more concerned about was just where to start with my team. I guess most prople have a short list of things they get to work on whenever they begin a new game. It might be looking at players and sorting the roster or strategies, or whatever and it was more this type of help I was asking for. Basically how they prepare for the new season before they hit the 'sim games' button. There seemed alot of choices to make.

Having said this, I was unsure about the farm system and free agents. You suggest using free agency if I am not short on $. Well, I decided to go with SFG since they are my favourite team and $ are not a major problem. So I'm
doing as you advised but also keeping one eye on my younger farm players.

Anyway, as I said, your advice was straight forward and very usefull so thanks alot. I just played through my first 3 months on 'coach' difficulty. After a mixed start, and following some of your advice, I am now at the top of the NL West by 5 games.

[SFSteveG]

I'll let you troll the boards for what you want to find but some things that may become important soon are things like player development in the minors and the like. Use the dropdown menu un the lineup/pitching screen to check out your minor leaguers stats and promote/demote midseason if they deserve it(i.e. great/poor stats).

I also make sure before I start each season that I only have one player of each position in each level of the minor leagues. This ensures maximum player development.

When signing/trading players make sure to look at contract years and age. A great player at 37 signed for the next 5 years will almost always soon become a drain.

Also, make sure you release unnecessary minor leaguers when it becomes obvious they won't make it on your, or any team.

[Lunch]

I'll let you troll the boards for what you want to find but some things that may become important soon are things like player development in the minors and the like. Use the dropdown menu un the lineup/pitching screen to check out your minor leaguers stats and promote/demote midseason if they deserve it(i.e. great/poor stats).

I also make sure before I start each season that I only have one player of each position in each level of the minor leagues. This ensures maximum player development.

When signing/trading players make sure to look at contract years and age. A great player at 37 signed for the next 5 years will almost always soon become a drain.

Also, make sure you release unnecessary minor leaguers when it becomes obvious they won't make it on your, or any team.


Sound advice. Thanks alot :cool:

[Lunch]

Can anyone explain the difference between Team Payroll on the finances screen and the Annual Budget figure which includes the cost of farm/medic/scout + plyr salaries? Surely this is the Team Payroll :confused:

Also, am I right in thinking that if I sell an expensive player (earning, say, 5M or more) that my Cash figure will go up by the amount I get for him, and my Payroll Budget will also increase? If the Payroll Budget dips below the Team Payroll can I still buy players?

Many thanks in advance.

[petrel]

Lunch,

Three completely different things as it turns out, from how I'm reading the information posted by other people.

Team Payroll

The amount of money spent on player salaries only. In this case "the team" means "the players".

Annual Budget

From the Expenses Screen. The sum of scouting, farm system, medical, and "team payroll".

Cash

If you sell an expensive player for cash either in whole or as part of a deal, your total cash will go up by whatever cash you get for him. If you just trade a player for another player, your cash will not go up.

Payroll Budget

From what I understand, this figure means absolutely nothing. It's simply an estimation of what your budget should be to stay competitive. If your team payroll is above "Payroll Budget", you can still sign players, since the only function of Payroll Budget is to advise new Baseball Mogul players. If you feel confident, ignore it.

General rule: as long as you have Cash - in other words, cash doesn't have a red number, indicating that you're in debt - you can sign any free agent and renegotiate any player contract. Once you hit debt, though:

a) you can't sign any free agents,
b) you can only make trades that decrease total payroll.

With the negotiation functions of BM06, I don't know how a debt works at the end of the season. Can you keep players if you can negotiate cheaper contracts for them while in debt? Or must you let everyone go who wants to go if you're in debt? If anyone else is reading this thread, please let me know.

--Pet

[Lunch]

Pet,

again, many thanks for making things more clear.

[Lunch]

Just played through my first 6 seasons (so far so addicting), now I've decided to strat over on Mogul with '93 SF Giants and really get into it.

Just wondered if you all bother with the strategies? Do they impact all that much on the game play? Does anyone just leave them alone?

Also, how much impact will an unhappy pitchers/Hitters mood have on thier performance? If My guy wants to leave for another club, and I don't get someone in who they'll like, will they eventually quit complaining and learn to love my club.

Thanks.