I'd love to hear the thoughts of some experienced players on these matters.

I tend to use fairly long pitch counts with my SPs, and to couple those with very low pull ratings.  For example, I don't think Neil Neagle is a guy most people would have at Pull Rating 1, but I do.

I play in pitchers parks, with good defenses, and I want to get a ton of innings and quality starts from my rotation.  And I do get a lot of both.

The one spot where I feel like this strategy hurts me is with rest between starts.  I feel like my pitchers need to not only be at 100 Fatigue by their scheduled start, but really that they need to be at least at 95 (100) Fatigue, and preferably 100 Fatigue, on the day before their scheduled start.

My experience has been that if I have a SP who is at, for example, 84 (100) Fatigue on the day before his start, then even though he'll be at 100 Fatigue by his start day, he still winds up getting blown up fairly frequently.  I suspect this is due to In-Game Fatigue, and Pull Rating 1.

This makes it difficult for me to, for example, short start a guy to set up my rotation for a big head-to-head series, or to take advantage of off days.  It also means I use my LR/Spot Starter about 4-5 times in a typical season just in the normal course of events.

Any thoughts or suggestions based on your experiences?  Would increasing Pull Rating to 3 on days when a guy is not "fully" rested help?  Should I just accept my 1050-1100 quality IP from my rotation every year and live with a half dozen spot starts a season?  Actively manage Pitch Counts up and down when a guy is going into a start coming off a day when he's at 78 (100) Fatigue?  What do you guys do with your SPs' rest between starts, Pitch Counts, and Pull Ratings?

Note: My rotations are performing very well, and I'm not looking for an overhaul.  Just looking for some small tweaks to maximize the value.     

I won't address all that but the sensible person thinks "This is my starter.  He's obviously better than my other option in long relief, why wouldn't I want him out there for the maximum amount of time?"   After all, it's numbers.  There are no emotions or days when they don't have their best stuff.   So, in my mind, I should find a pitcher's effective PC, set it and set his pull at 1.   I don't do that but that makes the most sense.   My rationale for a high pull is that if my best pitcher is getting destroyed, I've probably lost the game anyway.  So why not get him out earlier and make him available sooner?   Guys don't have routines where they can only go every 5th day so you can bring him back after 2 days rest if he's 100%.

I also try to give my guys a full day at 100%.   WifS has says it doesn't matter but I'm not a buyer.

Posted by MikeT23 on 1/31/2012 11:54:00 AM (view original):
I won't address all that but the sensible person thinks "This is my starter.  He's obviously better than my other option in long relief, why wouldn't I want him out there for the maximum amount of time?"   After all, it's numbers.  There are no emotions or days when they don't have their best stuff.   So, in my mind, I should find a pitcher's effective PC, set it and set his pull at 1.   I don't do that but that makes the most sense.   My rationale for a high pull is that if my best pitcher is getting destroyed, I've probably lost the game anyway.  So why not get him out earlier and make him available sooner?   Guys don't have routines where they can only go every 5th day so you can bring him back after 2 days rest if he's 100%.

I also try to give my guys a full day at 100%.   WifS has says it doesn't matter but I'm not a buyer.

Not a buyer either.  I try to make sure my starters are 100% the day before.  If they're not, I usually spot start someone else and push him back a day.  I'll usually tweak pitch counts such that the 100% the day before is reached consistently.  Having a strong, durable bullpen helps that strategy, especially if your starters are good, but not necessarily elite.

Very rarely do I ever have a pitcher reach 210 IP.  The max usually settles out to about 200 even.  Since in-game fatigue is not that measureable, I set their pitch counts a little bit lower than I would like.  Again, this works best if you have a 'pen that can pitch a lot.

I'll also push my best starters earlier if they reach 100% earlier.  In one league, I start Hardball Dynasty – Fantasy Baseball Sim Games - Player Profile: Dewey Weber every 4th day and rotate my lower stamina guys around him.  He's the one guy on all of my teams that will break the 210 IP (by quite a bit).

Hardball Dynasty – Fantasy Baseball Sim Games - Player Profile: Ryne Narveson is my guy for that.  Traded for him specifically to give me 225+.

I have guys pitch 210+ a lot, and 230+ is not rare either. Is there a reason your starters are limited other than durability/stamina?

Happens to me, in part, because I want that extra day at 100%.    The way I do it is to shorten PC. 

I've never bought into the 'needs to be 100% the day before' stuff. My team ERA ends up about where it should be without doing that.

As for in game fatigue, you only experience that once you get to certain pitch count. Otherwise your player's fatigue is the same throughout the game. Beyond that pitch count, his fatigue will increase in a curved manner (fairly rapidly). 

As for pull setting, I usually set everybody at 1 at least for a while to help avoid appearance fatigue. I prefer to only use 2-3 pitchers in a game.

Alright, well, it seems I'm getting more innings out of my starters than most of you.  On the team I've had for awhile, these are my top 4 SP's Sta, Dur, and avg IP over the past 3 or 4 seasons (depending on how long they've been in the majors):

Tomas Romero       81 24 220.1
Raul Flores               71 24 218
Gerald Sinclair         77 32 242.1
Harry Pineda            94 21 213.2

Still, I wonder does anyone else who tries to give their SPs a full day at 100 Fatigue every try short starting them and upping the pull rating or shrinking the pitch count?  I'd love a little more flexibility in my rotation, particularly down the stretch as big head-to-head series with playoff implications start to pop up.