Setting up a historical league with independent minors

[hmatthias]

I was thinking of setting up a fictional historical league, starting in 1901, with unaffiliated minor leagues (basically independent leagues at the correct minor league level). I want this set up so I have to scout the minor leagues to find good talent, and be able to sign that talent. To do this, would I have to allow free agents in the independent leagues, so I can sign them when their contracts run out? I am afraid if I don't allow free agency in those minor leagues, they will never be able to leave that team (without a trade of some kind), which kind of defeats the purpose...

[ctorg]

Originally Posted by hmatthias

I was thinking of setting up a fictional historical league, starting in 1901, with unaffiliated minor leagues (basically independent leagues at the correct minor league level). I want this set up so I have to scout the minor leagues to find good talent, and be able to sign that talent. To do this, would I have to allow free agents in the independent leagues, so I can sign them when their contracts run out? I am afraid if I don't allow free agency in those minor leagues, they will never be able to leave that team (without a trade of some kind), which kind of defeats the purpose...

You can either allow free agency in the minors or you can allow trades with them and try to "buy" minor leaguers with cash and/or players. I'd go with the former route and set the minor leagues to allow free agency after one year of play. I've done this before and it has worked okay. The annoying thing, though, is that sometimes the minor league teams will lock up a good player for five years with a contract. I wish there was a setting to only allow one-year contracts in a league and have all players become free agents unless they resign during the year each year. That's kind of more like how the old system was.

[Kelric]

Now see, I would probably not allow free agency and would restrict myself to 'buying' the players. Different play styles, indeed.

[ashantewarrier]

Hey CT....you can probably edit financials so that minor league teams do not have the resources to lock up a good player for so long.

[hmatthias]

Thanks for the advice. My next question is, when I set up the indpendent leagues, it has an option for what level they should be. Does this control the quality of players in the league? If not, should I edit the financials so that the lower minors will pay less?

[ashantewarrier]

I am doing a similar exercise myself right now. I am setting up a 1901 league with independent minors.

I may be wrong but I think it controls the quality of players generated for the draft and free agency. From what I've read on the message boards adjusting team financials (i.e. minor teams with small market revenue) will prevent minors from hoarding star major league caliber players.

Here are some links for reference:

Adding a new league without creating new players


Salaries, expectations, and early retirements

Unaffiliated Leagues versus Unaffiliated Teams

[hmatthias]

Wow, thanks for all the links! I think I will probably do what was done in the first link, and see how it goes. Maybe I will find some "diamonds in the rough" in the minors, but I want to have to work for it!

[ashantewarrier]

Originally Posted by hmatthias

Wow, thanks for all the links! I think I will probably do what was done in the first link, and see how it goes. Maybe I will find some "diamonds in the rough" in the minors, but I want to have to work for it!

No problem...!

[ctorg]

Originally Posted by ashantewarrier

Hey CT....you can probably edit financials so that minor league teams do not have the resources to lock up a goof player for so long.

I tried, but not with much success. Maybe if I set it so that all the teams are constantly destitute so they can't sign guys it would work better. I haven't tried that.

[hmatthias]

Started my league this weekend, and set the "media contracts" lower the further down the quality of league, which seems to be doing what I want. Also set the contract to ignore market size for the sake of simplicity. It is causing teams to sign 1 or 2 guys for big deals, and the rest at minimum, which is what I wanted to see.

[ashantewarrier]

Originally Posted by hmatthias

Started my league this weekend, and set the "media contracts" lower the further down the quality of league, which seems to be doing what I want. Also set the contract to ignore market size for the sake of simplicity. It is causing teams to sign 1 or 2 guys for big deals, and the rest at minimum, which is what I wanted to see.

What does your league configuration and settings look like for your independent minors?

[hmatthias]

Settings are similar to the link that was posted in this thread. Minor leagues from a spreadsheet I found in this forum on minor league history from 1901-present. I set the levels according to this as well. Right now I have approx 10 minor leagues running. Every year some fold/change, and I will try to keep up with this. I am just hitting the first "draft", which will generate lots of free agents, which should help with some problems I had in 1901 with few free agents. Some teams had injuries that caused them to go below the minimum roster limit, so I had to clear some of the injuries to continue. Hopefully I won't have to do this in 1902.

As for media contract, I took the major league money ($60,000 in 1901), and divided in half as I went down. So a AAA level minor league team got $30,000, AA $15,000, and so on. This caused the lowest level teams to only get like $3,500, so they couldn't get silly with money, which is what seemed to be happening before I did this.

I am gonna GM now, so things will go slower. I simmed out the 1901 season. Was really cool to see some of the higher minor league teams get aging stars to boost attendence and try to win.

[hmatthias]

Sorry, one more thing. I had free agents turned off in the minors, but I think I'm gonna turn them on for 1902. The AI isn't smart enough to buy players off of other teams, and I want to see some player movement in the minors. Hopefully this will cause it. Still gonna leave it off in the Bigs.

I did get trade offers from the minors, however. Traded an aging catcher to Hartford for a young shortstop. That was kind of cool...

[No Pepper]

A saved game, quickstart, template...seems to be in order here. I've always wanted to test the game with this setup but never have the time. Best of luck hmatthias, keep us posted!

[hmatthias]

I can try to do this with my current 1901 settings. Don't want to step on people's toes though, as I have facepacks and logos from other sources. I guess it would be ok if I cited the creators though. Any ideas?

[ashantewarrier]

Originally Posted by hmatthias

I can try to do this with my current 1901 settings. Don't want to step on people's toes though, as I have facepacks and logos from other sources. I guess it would be ok if I cited the creators though. Any ideas?

If you cite the other creators it should not be a problem. Roster packs have been created by using other peoples works as long the other creators were cited. As long as you do not clain the work (i.e. facepacks and logs) as your own.

In any event can you e-mail me your template?
My e-mail is:
rnjguard-ootp@yahoo.com

Thanks!

[hmatthias]

I'll save it off and send it to you this weekend when I finally get a chance to play again (darn real life!). A few other notes about my setup:

1. I am playing with 15 man rosters currently for all leagues, which seems accurate for the time with what I have read. I plan to expand them as time goes on.

2. I scheduled the minor leagues to play each team 15 times, rounding to even number of scheduled games if neccessary (the generator doesn't like odd numbers). No playoffs in any leagues, including the majors right now, until 1903. Got the number 15 from looking at the amount of games played in the minors around this time, and it seemed to be a workable formula. Also helps in financial management, as minors play less games, so make less money.

[ashantewarrier]

Originally Posted by hmatthias

I'll save it off and send it to you this weekend when I finally get a chance to play again (darn real life!). A few other notes about my setup:

1. I am playing with 15 man rosters currently for all leagues, which seems accurate for the time with what I have read. I plan to expand them as time goes on.

2. I scheduled the minor leagues to play each team 15 times, rounding to even number of scheduled games if neccessary (the generator doesn't like odd numbers). No playoffs in any leagues, including the majors right now, until 1903. Got the number 15 from looking at the amount of games played in the minors around this time, and it seemed to be a workable formula. Also helps in financial management, as minors play less games, so make less money.

So how many games does each team play? 15 team game schedule? Are there inter-league games between each A-class?

Thanks! I'll be looking forward to your file soon!

[hmatthias]

depends on how many teams are in the league. The California league in 1901, for example, has 4 teams, and plays 46 games (15 games against each team, rounded up to nearest even). The leagues with 10 teams play 136 games, etc. No interleague, as I have no idea how to set that up. Oh, forgot one thing. Each minor league (right now) is a one division league. That seems to be how the early minors were set up.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by hmatthias

Each minor league (right now) is a one division league. That seems to be how the early minors were set up.

By far the most common alignment in minor league baseball history is that of an eight team league arranged in a single division. Second place would belong to a six team league arranged into a single division. Third place would be a tie between four team and ten team leagues, again with both aligned as single divisions.

The first split into divisions in the minors didn't happen until 1957, and even then only lasted one year. The first league to split into divisions and have that alignment stick for subsequent seasons was the Pacific Coast League in 1963.

Note that the higher classification of minors in earlier years played schedules as long as, or even longer, than the majors. The AAA and AA equivalent levels commonly played 154 game schedules, and in some years played 168 game schedules. It wasn't until 1965 that minor league seasons became 148 games or less. However, in spite of schedules as long as or longer than the majors, the seasons didn't last that long.

154 game schedules were generally played in 151-152 days, or in some cases were played in just 144-145 days. 168 game seasons were played in either 167 or 159 days. Needless to say, the minor league schedules were peppered with many scheduled doubleheaders.

The majors, by contrast, took 167-168 days to play a 154 game schedule from the 1930s onwards, and generally took about 175 days before then.