Managing in the minors

[MizzouRah]

A couple of questions for those who are managing a team in the minors.

1. How come when you change a MR to a CL, his ratings go way down?

2. If my team has say, no catcher. Do I just pick another position player and play them out of position?

3. Since I'm just the "manager", is my sole purpose to manage my team's games? Is there anything else I should be doing?


Appreciate any help.

[Raidergoo]

1- Cant explain it

2- You have to lump it. Play someone out of position and hope he picks up the position, or you club sends you a C. Sometimes the AI will be frighteningly ugly to minor league teams.

3- Just win, baby.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by Raidergoo

1- Cant explain it

2- You have to lump it. Play someone out of position and hope he picks up the position, or you club sends you a C. Sometimes the AI will be frighteningly ugly to minor league teams.

3- Just win, baby.

Appreciate the help!!

So I'll tell my backup 2nd baseman.. guess what? grab a catcher's mask!

[magnet]

Isn't too far from the real thing. Lots of players pick up time at other positions on their way up.

[Markus Heinsohn]

Originally Posted by MizzouRah

1. How come when you change a MR to a CL, his ratings go way down?

I suspect you mean the overalll and overall potential ratings. This is easy to explain, these ratings rate the player relative to the other players of that position. So, maybe the guy is a good middle reliever (60 ratings), compared to the closers in the league he is not that good anymore (45 maybe)... makes sense?

[Tycobbler]

I have a question. In spring training while managing a low level team, isn't it supposed to keep stats other than win/loss ?
I'm managing a team in the Eastern League(R) with no major league affiliate and it's spring training and i am 3-0, but stats aren't accumulating in the HTML reports, team roster screen, or the leaderboards. It would be nice to see spring stats. Is this possible ?

sorry to highjack the thread MizzouRah just seemed like the right place to ask a question being a fellow low level manager

[Mattymo]

Originally Posted by Tycobbler

I have a question. In spring training while managing a low level team, isn't it supposed to keep stats other than win/loss ?
I'm managing a team in the Eastern League(R) with no major league affiliate and it's spring training and i am 3-0, but stats aren't accumulating in the HTML reports, team roster screen, or the leaderboards. It would be nice to see spring stats. Is this possible ?

sorry to highjack the thread MizzouRah just seemed like the right place to ask a question being a fellow low level manager

You probably have stats detail on low.

[1998 Yankees]

MizzouRah,

You don't say what level you are managing on. If it's Rookie, then you are probably sharing my "revolving door" experience; daily transactions, guys moving up one day and down the next. Lousy pitchers being dumped on you by the basketful and decent pitchers being released the day after a good outing. Your best players getting promoted as soon as they start accumulating some numbers.

I hate my AI GM boss.

I have found that the GM eventually fills out my team properly, but I have had to play people out of position. As magnet says, this is not unrealistic, especially where I am managing, and you may see someone develop some skill at a new position over the season. The GM does not agree, however; as soon as the player is promoted, his position is changed back to what it was before I changed it.

I notice on my manager home page that I can be in charge of only Setting Lineups/Depth/Pitching Staff; all other Team Control Settings are GM only. You can use your single scout to do all sorts of odd jobs, looking at upcoming teams, other organizations and leagues, even scouting nations if you are that presumptuous. Probably not a good idea, since you don't have the authority to sign anybody and if your AI GM boss is like mine, he'll be too dumb to know talent when he sees it (if he sees it).

Anyway, good to hear from somebody sharing my experience. It's been a nice challenge managing in the minors, but I am ready to move up now.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by Markus Heinsohn

I suspect you mean the overalll and overall potential ratings. This is easy to explain, these ratings rate the player relative to the other players of that position. So, maybe the guy is a good middle reliever (60 ratings), compared to the closers in the league he is not that good anymore (45 maybe)... makes sense?

Yes and thanks.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by 1998 Yankees

MizzouRah,

You don't say what level you are managing on. If it's Rookie, then you are probably sharing my "revolving door" experience; daily transactions, guys moving up one day and down the next. Lousy pitchers being dumped on you by the basketful and decent pitchers being released the day after a good outing. Your best players getting promoted as soon as they start accumulating some numbers.

I hate my AI GM boss.

I have found that the GM eventually fills out my team properly, but I have had to play people out of position. As magnet says, this is not unrealistic, especially where I am managing, and you may see someone develop some skill at a new position over the season. The GM does not agree, however; as soon as the player is promoted, his position is changed back to what it was before I changed it.

I notice on my manager home page that I can be in charge of only Setting Lineups/Depth/Pitching Staff; all other Team Control Settings are GM only. You can use your single scout to do all sorts of odd jobs, looking at upcoming teams, other organizations and leagues, even scouting nations if you are that presumptuous. Probably not a good idea, since you don't have the authority to sign anybody and if your AI GM boss is like mine, he'll be too dumb to know talent when he sees it (if he sees it).

Anyway, good to hear from somebody sharing my experience. It's been a nice challenge managing in the minors, but I am ready to move up now.

Yep.. and it's been quite frustrating having to mess with my pitching staff and lineups all the time.. friggin LaRussa leave me alone!

[Tycobbler]

Hmm i changed them to very high, and simmed a few games and still nothing. Granted they were set to low; maybe i'll need to have them set to very high before ST i dunno.

[Tycobbler]

nm i'm a dummy lol

Still have alot to learn about this game ST stats are limited to the ST page only. shoot me now lol

[1998 Yankees]

Hey guys! How's this for managing the rookie minors? Take a look at the Sarasota starting pitcher's line: 16.2 IP and 232 pitches! Endurance of 72, so this is well beyond the call of duty to say the least!

I checked (I manage the Bradenton Pirates in the GCL): I must have caught the Reds in between roster transactions that day, because they had only two middle relievers on staff and both of them were injured. The closer was the only other relief pitcher around.

So, my guys were hacking and flailing away at this guy for 8 or 9 innings while he was "totally exhausted." Shows you how bad they are (note the 14 K's). They are lucky I'm NOT the GM.

BTW, I have 50 middle relievers on my team right now, most of them terrible and inactive.

This is funny even though a bit frustrating; I played this entire game out. As I said elsewhere, enough managing rookies. I'm going for a Single A job next year, by gum!

[1998 Yankees]

Dola,

Anyone think it's easy managing in the minors? Take a look at this career record. OK, I got a little lazy in 2006-2007, simmed these seasons (I want to get to the ML GM level soon), and got canned for my (lack of) efforts. I was lucky to snag a job in AA right after that, cleaned up my act, and took my team to the league championship round. Unfortunately, my idiot AI GM boss decided to pull some of my key players after winning the first game. We lost the series, of course.

The minor league AI needs tuning; too many roster moves up and down, sometimes the same people from one day to the next. Too many knucklehead decisions like releasing the guy who just pitched a shutout yesterday. People playing as MLB GM's probably don't notice this going on in the minors, unless they are seeing it in their own affiliates. It does seem to improve as you move up in minor league levels.

All in all, an interesting challenge. I feel like I managed my butt off to win the division and the first round of playoffs, despite my moron boss.

[thbroman]

Hey, folks, this interesting thread has raised a question:

Is it FUN managing a team in the minors? Is the only way to claw your way up the ladder to have the difficulty on easy? I've never really thought of giving this RPG aspect of the game a try, but what you say here has me intrigued.

BTW, @Markus: Here are 2 suggestions for minor-league features for the next release: chewing tobacco and pin-up posters of Susan Sarandon!

[1998 Yankees]

Originally Posted by thbroman

Hey, folks, this interesting thread has raised a question:

Is it FUN managing a team in the minors? Is the only way to claw your way up the ladder to have the difficulty on easy?

Not sure what you mean by "difficulty on easy," but managing in the minors is fun up to a point as long as you see the everchanging rosters as a challenge like I did. It does start wearing a bit thin after a few seasons, as your teams repeatedly suffer from AI roster mismanagement and fall below .500. Theoretically, the other teams in your league have the same handicap but I don't think it's a level playing field. At least, I'd like to think so.

The other reason I did this was to give me time to learn the game by reading the game guide and these forums and by observing what goes on at the MLB level as I was playing. Now, however, I am growing impatient (despite my satisfaction with my latest season) to become a GM and apply my learned skills. Having started at rookie level (and at 23 tender years of virtual age), I estimate that it will be 3-4 more seasons, or 11-12 total seasons managing in the minors, to reach MLB if I follow the remaining AA-AAA career path. This is assuming that I do well enough to get offered a GM position. I'm not sure how strict the game is in this approach.

Not for everyone, I realize. People who want to manage in the minor leagues would probably do well starting at the AA level, certainly not the rookie leagues where the craziness is worst (like having to sort through 50 MR's on your pitching staff to find the ones that you want to use).

[Raidergoo]

Originally Posted by thbroman

BTW, @Markus: Here are 2 suggestions for minor-league features for the next release: chewing tobacco and pin-up posters of Susan Sarandon!

I am told that they had to take the cheesecake out of the beta builds last winter.

[Twelvefield]

Originally Posted by thbroman

Is it FUN managing a team in the minors?

To answer this question properly from my point of view, I think it needs to be discussed in four parts:

No,
No,
No.

And finally, in conclusion, No, not at all, really.

[1998 Yankees]

Originally Posted by Twelvefield

To answer this question properly from my point of view, I think it needs to be discussed in four parts:

No,
No,
No.

And finally, in conclusion, No, not at all, really.

Ha! Convincing arguments, well said. There's simply no further debate!

[thbroman]

Originally Posted by Twelvefield

To answer this question properly from my point of view, I think it needs to be discussed in four parts:

No,
No,
No.

And finally, in conclusion, No, not at all, really.

So why does anyone do it?
But perhaps more constructively, is there some hope down the line of making managing in the minors more fun? Given the difficulty of teaching the a.i. to handle its farm system intelligently, I don't suppose we should expect to see this as an advertised feature in the next release.