European Development League

[ripwalk]

I have a 20-team fictional world league, with teams/divisions from North America, South America, Carribean, Asia and Australia....

I want to expand into Europe, but I want to try and do it in a unique way by making it its own separate league.The European teams would play their own schedule and playoffs and never square off against any of the regular international teams ....

I also don't want any of the European teams to be "affiliated" with the rest of the world teams, they are their own entities.

What I do want however is for...
1) The European League to be a lower calibre of baseball
2) The elite players from the European league being able to be good enough to go to the World league and compete.
3) The European league to be another option for fading, aging or never that good former World league players to sign on and be impact players.

So obviously I will want all the players to be in the same free agent pool - How do I ensure that?

Kind of the catch 22 though,I don't want the European league to be looting players from the World league or being able to take some of the top talents to the lower leagues.

In a perfect world I would see older, fading or never that good players from the World league make the decision to sign in Europe and be impact players as I mentioned above... But, is there any realistic way to ensure this?

One thought I had was just making these European teams very small market teams, so they wouldn't have a lot of money/budget and therefore wouldn't be able to sign any of the big names...Would this work? Are there any foreseeable limitations to this?

Is there anything else I can do? What impact does the league level you select have in all this? (Ie.If I make it a A, AA, or AAA calibre designtation league).

Also, I haven't decided if I will allow interleague trading yet, but is there an option to enable it one way or another?

Anyway, of course I will fully backup before I try something like this.. But it's the first time I've ever done something like this and I would appreciate any and all feedback on how to make this as effective as possible.

Thanks,
Cole

[ripwalk]

Also, I'm wondering is there a way to get predominantly european players in this league for the inaugural draft and yearly amateur drafts?

As far as I know I can't make the league nation "Europe" as you can make it USA, Canada, any other country etc.. What's the best workaround for this?

If I choose one European country to base the league out of, will it by default have "foreigners" pop up who are closer in proximity (ie. other Europeans) or will it just end up in a lot of Americans, etc. in the league?

[Sdpm100]

Originally Posted by ripwalk

Also, I'm wondering is there a way to get predominantly european players in this league for the inaugural draft and yearly amateur drafts?

As far as I know I can't make the league nation "Europe" as you can make it USA, Canada, any other country etc.. What's the best workaround for this?

If I choose one European country to base the league out of, will it by default have "foreigners" pop up who are closer in proximity (ie. other Europeans) or will it just end up in a lot of Americans, etc. in the league?

No, I'm afraid it won't have Europeans. It will be based on each country's baseball level as read by the nations.txt file when the universe was first loaded up.
I have asked myself for percentages of players by country for each single league (so you could have 60% Americans for your US based league, but 5% for your Japanese league for example). This is of course much more realistic than the current universe model (what I like to call "the all or nothing model"), but whether it makes it in in future is unknown.

You could, if you really had loads of time to waste, create a "Europe" in the nations.txt, and then change all the country numbers in European cities to the number assigned to "Europe", and then they'd all be Europeans. But then you wouldn't get the mixture of nationalities IRL, nor again is it possible after the universe has been created.

[ripwalk]

Originally Posted by Sdpm100

No, I'm afraid it won't have Europeans. It will be based on each country's baseball level as read by the nations.txt file when the universe was first loaded up.
I have asked myself for percentages of players by country for each single league (so you could have 60% Americans for your US based league, but 5% for your Japanese league for example). This is of course much more realistic than the current universe model (what I like to call "the all or nothing model"), but whether it makes it in in future is unknown.

You could, if you really had loads of time to waste, create a "Europe" in the nations.txt, and then change all the country numbers in European cities to the number assigned to "Europe", and then they'd all be Europeans. But then you wouldn't get the mixture of nationalities IRL, nor again is it possible after the universe has been created.

It won't have any at all?

What if I choose the new league's country to be, say England.... Wouldn't then the "foreigner %" relate to those who aren't from England?

So if I put it at 50 % at least half of the players who be from England and half would be from wherever else, for example?

[Sdpm100]

Originally Posted by ripwalk

It won't have any at all?

Okay, it might have a few, but not a very high percentage.

Originally Posted by ripwalk

What if I choose the new league's country to be, say England.... Wouldn't then the "foreigner %" relate to those who aren't from England?

So if I put it at 50 % at least half of the players who be from England and half would be from wherever else, for example?

Yes that would happen. But that won't help you get more Germans, Spaniards, Italians, as the number of players generated by country is still based on the baseball talent level in nations.txt.
If you just want English players out of the European league then it will be fine.

[Who Killed Kenny?]

There is a way to get a good mixture of other Europeans in your league. Use Feeder Leagues that are based in the countries you want in your European league. Then have those leagues affiliate with your European league. You can have multiple leagues feed a major league.

Lets say you want players from Spain, England, France, Germany, and Greece (for example). Choose one of those Countries as the base country(say England) for your European league. Then create a High School or College feeder league for the other countries (Spain, France, Germany, and Greece). These leagues can have only 2 teams if you want, but I say 4 would be better.

If you do this you'll have a better mixture. The only downside is that your Universe will be a lot bigger. So keep that in mind.

[ripwalk]

Originally Posted by ripwalk

I have a 20-team fictional world league, with teams/divisions from North America, South America, Carribean, Asia and Australia....

I want to expand into Europe, but I want to try and do it in a unique way by making it its own separate league.The European teams would play their own schedule and playoffs and never square off against any of the regular international teams ....

I also don't want any of the European teams to be "affiliated" with the rest of the world teams, they are their own entities.

What I do want however is for...
1) The European League to be a lower calibre of baseball
2) The elite players from the European league being able to be good enough to go to the World league and compete.
3) The European league to be another option for fading, aging or never that good former World league players to sign on and be impact players.

So obviously I will want all the players to be in the same free agent pool - How do I ensure that?

Kind of the catch 22 though,I don't want the European league to be looting players from the World league or being able to take some of the top talents to the lower leagues.

In a perfect world I would see older, fading or never that good players from the World league make the decision to sign in Europe and be impact players as I mentioned above... But, is there any realistic way to ensure this?

One thought I had was just making these European teams very small market teams, so they wouldn't have a lot of money/budget and therefore wouldn't be able to sign any of the big names...Would this work? Are there any foreseeable limitations to this?

Is there anything else I can do? What impact does the league level you select have in all this? (Ie.If I make it a A, AA, or AAA calibre designtation league).

Also, I haven't decided if I will allow interleague trading yet, but is there an option to enable it one way or another?

Anyway, of course I will fully backup before I try something like this.. But it's the first time I've ever done something like this and I would appreciate any and all feedback on how to make this as effective as possible.

Thanks,
Cole

Bump...

Anyone with any tips, ideas, thoughts on this original post and best ways for this to work?