Directors' Commentaries.

[struggles_mightily]

A lot of people write stuff down to help them with their leagues and universes. A solo player might make notes remarking on the performance of particular players; speculating about future trade options; or containing general comments about league-wide phenomena they don't want to see pass-by unnoticed. A player who is interested in the development of an entire league or universe (rather than just a team) might make notes about elements of history not captured by OOTP: "retired numbers", for instance, or award winners in categories not normally considered by the game.

The ultimate realisation of these recordings is the Dynasty Forum, which I love reading. However, I'd be willing to bet that many players who couldn't stomach a full-blown "dynasty" keep a litany of private notes in various .txts, .docs, .xlses and so on. I'd also imagine that many players who do have "dynasty" threads nevertheless like to keep a wealth of "deleted scenes" away from public view.

What do you do? I'd love to know.

Personally, I:

-- Keep a record of "retired numbers" for each team in most of the universes I run. My lengthy semi-historical replays (those intended to be lengthy, anyway -- I don't think I've ever gotten further than 1910, always starting in 1901) always feature such notations.

-- Often make a list of the rosters (or lineups & rotations, at least) of all teams in the league. I just like to make sure I know, even whilst quick simming, the character of each of the squads in my league. This sometimes feeds into a more ambitious 'pre-season predictions'-type report.

-- , when playing solo, keep records of which prospects are on the cusp of promotion, demotion or release. I really love the prospect-watching element of baseball. My notes were inspired by someone who does a very similar real-life report on the SoxProspects.com forums.

-- Sometimes make quite detailed mini-news report-ish records of trades; free agent signings; retirements; playoff games; and anything else that strikes me as being of interest. What I like best is the feeling that I don't have to comment upon a particular development (as I kind of would in a "dynasty"), but that if a particular situation strikes me as interesting, I can write about it. In an old Red Sox 2007 season game I was playing, I wrote a like 1,000 word report about our trading deadline needs and chips. It just struck me as a fascinating topic given the cusp-of-contendership position the team was in; so I went to town.

-- Always always always record a 'Best 9' for a league every year. I think it's a really awesome way of recognising player achievement, and it annoys me that baseball generally only picks 'best teams' for constituent parts of the game (Golden Glove, Silver Slugger).

In the future, I would like to:

-- Do my own 'top fifty prospects' reports. Again, I love prospect-watching. I'm hoping to build my own formula which combines statistics to-date, age level, scouts' opinions, and a small 'subjective' element.

-- Do extensive pre-draft reports and maybe even a mock draft. Prospects, you see -- I'm fond of them. Also, this will (once my league is twenty-or-so years old, anyway) be my first chance to use feeder leagues. College (or 'university' in this case) stats enable one to add a bit more meat to the evaluation of players pre-draft.

-- Figure out the WARP of every player in my league. Most of these ideas relate to my planned fictional league with OOTPX, which will (at the outset) contain only eight teams and thus be quite manageable. I think that WARP is the best stat for giving one a 'quick and dirty' idea of a player's contributions. Basically, you can convert VORP into Batting Wins quite easily, I believe. Then I'll just use the player's defensive ratings and defensive innings per position to have a stab at creating something UZR-ish. I love advanced stats, and having WARP for all players would be awesome.

-- Getting WARP values will allow me to do all kinds of cool stuff. But the main thing I want to do is a keep a record of all free agent signings (of significant value, anyway) and trades, so that I can at a later point analyse their shrewdness via reference to WARP accumulated post-deal.

In fact, I probably will start a dynasty for this league. Too much stuff to keep it all to myself.

So... what about you?

[treedom]

I have a Perl script which extracts the names and attributes of all the players in my system and puts them into two csv files: one for batters and the other for pitchers. I open those files in excel and organize the players by level in my system and position. I love to micromanage my minors, so this is a good way for me to keep everyting straight.

I add notes re. what plans I have for each player. I add visual ques in the form of bolding or colour coding. Starting lineup players are italicized. Top prospects are bold. Filler players are greyed-out. There's a field for denoting players on the verge of promotion which is bright red.

I also wrote a quick little app which outputs visual reports like this for my system: http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z...ever/ir_ex.jpg I keep one report per season. It's fun to look back through them.

[struggles_mightily]

Originally Posted by treedom

I also wrote a quick little app which outputs visual reports like this for my system: http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z...ever/ir_ex.jpg I keep one report per season. It's fun to look back through them.

Um, that's awesome... Ever thought about making that app. public?

I think that I need to improve my coding $ki11z in order to take it to the next level as regards this sort of stuff. I can do a bit in Visual Basic, but it's all a bit wonky.

[treedom]

Originally Posted by struggles_mightily

Um, that's awesome... Ever thought about making that app. public?

I had grand plans for it, but then my son was born, so it's remained in a sort of half-finished unpolished state since.

[struggles_mightily]

Originally Posted by treedom

I had grand plans for it, but then my son was born, so it's remained in a sort of half-finished unpolished state since.

Jesus, man, get your priorities straight!

[Siv]

I had always wanted to have some type of team database so see where players are progressing in the organization. I know prospects are penned to replace so and so, but to have something like your perl script that will show development and perceived needs would be great. If you could publish this that would be wonderful.

i too would love to put this in Access or Excel and have some meat that goes with it based on stats, scouting reports and such. I have a lot of sheets of paper around my computer tracking this or that, but if i could export it into these programs and organize it that would be wonderful and fulfill my analytical side.

[Siv]

Originally Posted by treedom

I had grand plans for it, but then my son was born, so it's remained in a sort of half-finished unpolished state since.

I believe your priorites are right on!! Children are our future and a way to get to the ballpark and eat lots of great junk.

[Malleus Dei]

Originally Posted by Siv

I believe your priorites are right on!! Children are our future and a way to get to the ballpark and eat lots of great junk.

I have four grandsons, stairstepped a year apart, who will soon be old enough to give their grandfather great excuses to go out to baseball games all the time.