Sabermetric Or Traditional

[neojonas]

Markus was saying in another thread, "There is a setting in the game options if you want the AI to be sabermetric (strongly favor L/R splits) or traditional." I'm just curious how people played 2006. Did you use sabermetric or traditional and why? Did you find the AI performed better with one or the other? And for beta testers, how does this look in 2007?

[robster1225]

I haven't been "testing" this, but ever since it was introduced in 2006 I've used it. I honestly can't say why, and I don't know if it is any better or worse than traditional, but it is just the way I prefer to play it, because I think that I would prefer to use splits when setting up lineups than the traditional formula. Sorry I couldn't give you specifics though.

[neojonas]

Yea I'm the same as you. I do it that way but I'm not sure how much of a difference it makes and I'm curious the reasons why people do it one way or the other.

[Icy]

I use it too, as it's also the way i set my own lineups, if a guy is awesome vs lefties and just average vs righties, i want him in my lineups vs left handed pitchers and not vs right ones.

[andymac]

I believe Sabermetric is meant for modern day use where there are lots of platoons. The traditional was put in more for historical play.

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by robster1225

Ever since it was introduced in 2006 I've used it. I honestly can't say why, and I don't know if it is any better or worse than traditional, but it is just the way I prefer to play it, because I think that I would prefer to use splits when setting up lineups than the traditional formula.

Me, too. Since I set my own teams' lineups, I selected sabremetric in the hopes that the AI teams would perform better, since so much had been posted about how easy the AI was to beat in 2006.

Originally Posted by andymac

I believe Sabermetric is meant for modern day use where there are lots of platoons. The traditional was put in more for historical play.

From 1901-1920 platoons were in frequent use. Maybe not as much as in the past twenty years, but as much as in the twenty before that. Platooning really only became 'obsolete' with the advent of big offensive numbers in the 20s. When Casey Stengel revived it, he was reaching back to the days of his youth.

[CBL-Commish]

Originally Posted by andymac

I believe Sabermetric is meant for modern day use where there are lots of platoons. The traditional was put in more for historical play.

Like Curtis said, platooning is definitely not limited to modern baseball. The Indianapolis team experimented with it in the 1880s, and it was definitely in heavy use by the 1910s. George Stallings and the Miracle Braves of 1914 pretty much came out of nowhere because of the heavy use of platooning, and after that it had a golden era - everybody had to have a platoon or two.

There's always, to this day, been a lot of player resistance to platooning, mainly because players (and their agents and salaries) don't want to be labled a part-timer. And it reached a head in the late 20s or early 30s, and platooning almost disappeared until Stengel resurrected it.

Even he faced a lot of opposition - I once read a (IIRC) Baseball Magazine article from the 50s where the author said he thought the Yanks would win 130 games a year if Casey would quit screwing around with this crazy platooning. But it worked, and various managers kept it going, and Earl Weaver introduced all kinds of permutations.

In my opinion platooning is at a lower level now than 20 or 30 years ago. Players have a big financial stake in being seen as a starter, and think (probably wisely) that platooning them will cost money. Corey Patterson didn't hit a lefties a lick last year, but you can bet he'll be begging and pleading to be in the lineup every day so he can get a Juan Pierre contract instead of a Dave Dellucci.