How do you make closers more effective?

[Pirates Fan]

Have been waiting for and answer to another poster's question, but it has been largely ignored over the last few days. I figured a different subject line might help.

Here's the original thread:

Horrible closers

Now, can one of the OOTP veterans please answer?

Thanks in advance.

[swampdragon]

I think the best way to document the problem is to compare your historical league's Blown Save percentage with real-life statistics for the same year. Pitchers blow saves on a daily basis, and stats for one individual can always be just one of those things. If there's a big statistical discrepancy league-wide, that would be an indication of a problem, and I'm sure it would be looked at.

As for one-third of one run leads being blown in the 9th, that really doesn't sound too far off to me. Most of your modern closers have ERAs over 3.00.

[Left-handed Badger]

1/3 is a bit much. Even the worst closers usually dont blow more than 6-8 saves a year. (or else they become a MR very quickly.) I'd say 20% should be absolute max for a regular closer. ANd really not over 15%.

Remember those 3.00+ ERAs. They come into a game for inning with as much as a 3-run leeway. Even an ERA of 4.50 means you only give up a run every 2 innings. Which would theoretically average to one run every 2 appearances.

[swampdragon]

Originally Posted by Left-handed Badger

1/3 is a bit much. Even the worst closers usually dont blow more than 6-8 saves a year. (or else they become a MR very quickly.) I'd say 20% should be absolute max for a regular closer. ANd really not over 15%.

Remember those 3.00+ ERAs. They come into a game for inning with as much as a 3-run leeway. Even an ERA of 4.50 means you only give up a run every 2 innings. Which would theoretically average to one run every 2 appearances.

So if you have a one run lead, as opposed to two or three, it's not that unusual to cough it up. As I said, the only way to really tell would be with league-wide stats. But with 15 games a day, you're likely to see blown saves more days than not.

[enuttage]

BaseballEvolution.com - Keith - Linear Saves

...and scroll down.

edit: I'll add that thought I haven't paid *that* much attention to it, from what I've seen, save percentages in OOTP VERY closely mirror that of real-life MLB.

[Pirates Fan]

swampdragon,

I wasn't the original poster, but hopefully he's lurking and will post the data from his league either here or in his original thread. But I hear what you're saying. In the game I'm currently playing (SOM), Roy Face is sucking while lesser relievers are able to shut down rallies. I have written this off to being only 39 games into the season.

However, the original poster's results gave me pause about OOTP. So ...

enuttage,

That was a helpful link, thank you, as well as your experience with the saves in OOTP. I figured most OOTP gamers would have gone ballistic if the relievers were routinely less effective than in real life.

Until we hear from the original poster, then, it seems it's not a big deal.

Or is it?

Geoff

[swampdragon]

Originally Posted by Pirates Fan

swampdragon,

I wasn't the original poster, but hopefully he's lurking and will post the data from his league either here or in his original thread. But I hear what you're saying. In the game I'm currently playing (SOM), Roy Face is sucking while lesser relievers are able to shut down rallies. I have written this off to being only 39 games into the season.

However, the original poster's results gave me pause about OOTP. So ...

enuttage,

That was a helpful link, thank you, as well as your experience with the saves in OOTP. I figured most OOTP gamers would have gone ballistic if the relievers were routinely less effective than in real life.

Until we hear from the original poster, then, it seems it's not a big deal.

Or is it?

Geoff

Two last points. First, reliever records more than any others are prone to sample size distortions. Face gives up a three run shot in the 9th inning of the opener to blow a save, and his ERA goes to 27.00. It will take 8 perfect innings to get back to 3.00, and in real life he likely won't get there until June, even if he pitches consistently well. If 8 out of 10 converted saves is OK, and 6.5 out of 10 indicates a problem, you need a huge sample size of save opportunities before you can safely say there's a problem. Second, OOTP has no clutch rating. It doesn't know Lee Smith from Joe Borowski. Accordingly, any ability a pitcher may have to bear down with men on base and get the results he needs is not accounted for beyond raw statistics. There are a number of pitchers that may not be expected to deliver the real-life BABIPs which they exhibited in a particular season. You're likely to be unhappy if you expect a 1.12 ERA out of 1968 Bob Gibson, or 511 wins from Cy Young. DIPs has something to do with pitching unpredictability as well, but I'll let one of the experts on the theory expound on that. I'm likely to get it wrong.

[Pirates Fan]

Originally Posted by swampdragon

Face gives up a three run shot in the 9th inning of the opener to blow a save, and his ERA goes to 27.00. It will take 8 perfect innings to get back to 3.00, and in real life he likely won't get there until June, even if he pitches consistently well. If 8 out of 10 converted saves is OK, and 6.5 out of 10 indicates a problem, you need a huge sample size of save opportunities before you can safely say there's a problem. Second, OOTP has no clutch rating. It doesn't know Lee Smith from Joe Borowski. Accordingly, any ability a pitcher may have to bear down with men on base and get the results he needs is not accounted for beyond raw statistics.

swampdragon,

The way Face is going, he won't get his ERA down till next spring training.

By the way, I'm not using any non-stat-based features of SOM. I want the results to determine who's clutch, not artificial sweeteners, so the OOTP engine will be fine for me.

Thanks for the deeper explanation.

Geoff