I'm considering calling up this guy to the majors this season, any opinions?

 Hardball Dynasty – Fantasy Baseball Sim Games - Player Profile: Eugene Waters

Why not?

Posted by therunner24 on 6/21/2015 8:31:00 PM (view original):
I give them at least 4, but more like 5 years in the minors (generally draft high schoolers) as it takes time for them to be better than my starters, but more importantly, I do not want to pay major league rates / arbitration for development

The fifth year in the minors is a waste. A player may improve a bit in his fifth year, but if he's not ML ready by the end of the fourth year, he never will be. As for saving money, that's important. But you're not really Saving anything if the guy isn't in the majors. You're still paying someone an ML salary to occupy that position while your prospect is hitting 75 homers at AA.

I was holding back because I was concerned his development may be hurt by being at an inappropriate level due for his age. After reading this thread, it seems that shouldn't be a concern

So based on the reasoning in this thread, the best development path is to put a player onto an ML team as soon as you can afford to give them max playing time as practicable without hurting your ML team.  That way they will be coached by your best coaches (assuming your best is in the ML) for the longest time.  

Posted by SufferinSox on 7/2/2015 12:13:00 AM (view original):
So based on the reasoning in this thread, the best development path is to put a player onto an ML team as soon as you can afford to give them max playing time as practicable without hurting your ML team.  That way they will be coached by your best coaches (assuming your best is in the ML) for the longest time.  

I wouldn't go that far. The players guide does say that development is affected by age/appropriateness for playing level. So I certainly wouldn't put a guy at a level where he is overmatched by the competition. For example, I wouldn't put my pitcher with 50/55 splits in the majors, because he isn't ready for it (also because he'll lose a lot of games).

bump.  It wasn't my thread, though I posted on it.

Posted by MikeT23 on 6/11/2015 7:55:00 PM (view original):
If anyone answers this definitively, just redline their lying ***.

IMO, you could put a player with your best coach, play him at 100% all the time, have 20m in training and that would be the best you could develop him.    But there is no way to know this to be fact. 

My response.

When setting 'Call Bullpen' settings for prospect SPs in the minors, should they always be at 1? We are looking to pitch these guys as much as possible right? Or could that push them towards injury?

Posted by sjpoker on 8/7/2015 8:24:00 AM (view original):
When setting 'Call Bullpen' settings for prospect SPs in the minors, should they always be at 1? We are looking to pitch these guys as much as possible right? Or could that push them towards injury?

Innings pitched or games played? good question, I have no definitive answer

From what I have seen there is no harm in promoting young players to higher levels with better coaches, even the big leagues.  As long as they get enough playing time, they grow nicely.  'Enough' playing time is not the same is maxing out their playing time, since platooning is often very effective, and I would always advise against playing guys who are exhausted.  


MOST RELIABLE PROSPECT DEVO STRATEGY:  END OF SEASON PROMOTIONS.  Mid-season promotions might accelerate a single development cycle for a player, but it's hard to milk this into any reliable acceleration of their development.  However, there's one time when you know you're getting the prospect an extra devo cycle, and that's after the regular season has ended.  Player with 4 regular season cycles?  Promote them during or (my preference) after the playoffs, and they get the 5th cycle.  Player with 5 regular season cycles (or more)?  Promote them too, and often they get a 6th cycle.  

With a few elite prospects, I have promoted the player to keep playing in the playoffs of a higher level team (e.g. HiA to AA), which yielded a productive devo cycle.  2 or 3 playoff rounds later, with the playoffs over, I promoted again, and there occurred another devo cycle with a ratings bump.  Two ratings bumps from end-of-season promotions is nothing to sneeze at.  

I apply this strategy across my whole farm system, and my back-of-the-envelope guesstimate is that it gets ML-worthy prospects ready for the bigs 1/2 a season or even a full season earlier.  This hopefully gets players well on track to reach their ceilings, and even if they are not, young prospects developing faster are more tantalizing trade chips… 

Posted by tzentmeyer concerning the recent update:

A few other prospect-player development adjustments we'd prefer not to explicitly detail.*

Per the above statement, player development has been adjusted in the recent update.  How much of an affect will this have nobody knows yet.  Just remember that all the advice in this thread was based on experience obtained before the update.