Very frustrating for sure. Made the playoffs in R, AA, AAA and ML only won one round in RL. in the ML playoffs offense stalled as expected, I don't have much of that, but the kicker was my pitcher appeared in 3 games, gave up runs in all appearances and actually blew 2 games. This of course came after I extended his contract after his Cy Young calibur season.

https://www.whatifsports.com/hbd/Pages/World/Standings_Playoffs.aspx

Yep...disappointment is the only word I can use to describe my playoff experiences so far as well. I have 2 stud SP's that have won the last 5 Cy Young's between the 2 of them (3 for one, 2 of the other) in the AL and I usually get bounced in my 1st playoff series

The obvious 2nd guess is why would I have a Cy Young candidate ( https://www.whatifsports.com/hbd/Pages/Popups/PlayerStats.aspx?pid=7040350 ) SP work out of the pen. My answer is Starting Pitching was the teams best unit. I had 4 starters that I considered equals so I figured I can replicate Taylor with the other SP's and I would rather have a lock down option that can throw multiple innings in the pen. Possibly I could get Taylor into every game. Like I said he was ineffective in every appearance.

Just bad luck.

It is the playoffs. If the best players always performed at the best levels and the best teams always won, it wouldn't be as exciting. Some teams perform better in the playoffs than the regular season.

The playoffs can be frustrating for sure. I have had 100 win teams go out in the first round. My first WS win was a team that I thought had no chance to get out of the first round. It just takes a hot streak at the right time. I just played in the WS and the other team won 8 straight to get to there...I think they were the 6 seed. The only thing I would say about putting the SP in the bullpen is would you rather have him for two potential starts(14-15 innings) or out of the pen for maybe half that many innings depending on how the sim uses him.

The playoff Gods are a cruel group. There’s a fair amount of luck involved.

It’s also a different game in the playoffs. 4th and 5th starters get skipped. Your top reliever gets a ton of work.

Because of that I only carry 8 or 9 pitchers in playoffs . So more matchups and platooning. More pinch hitting and pinch running.

Last season I won my first WS with my Seattle team. Lost the division title on a tiebreaker so we were the 5th seed. The team played well all season but I didn't think I had a WS caliber team in a tough world, but things just kept going my way.

1/ My rookies/young players carried their weight. None were stars but they didn't crap the bed.

2/ My starting catcher was a guy I found without a contract in the middle of the previous season. He outhit his ratings for a full season and a half. And his defensive ratings are more DH caliber than C.

3/ My two best regulars, for the first time ever, kept hitting all the way through the playoffs. Every season before they'd gotten beat by better pitching in the playoffs. This time they finally lived up to their ratings.

4/ I had two stud SPs plus one rookie SP who pitched really well at home, but poorly on the road. With the off days in the playoffs, I was adjusting my rotation every day to make this work out. Every other SP I started got lit up. In the WS, I started my top stamina SP in games 2, 5 and 7. I can't stress enough - literally almost every pitching move I made worked out.

I'm not saying any of this to say look at me, I was a great manager. What it means is that for me to win that WS, pretty much every single thing that needed to work out in my favor, did.

It could be worse. In Gibson I had the team with the best record for 4 seasons, each year we got bounced out in the first round.
My work cut back my hours so I had to cut out one of the teams I owed so I cut out Gibson. Next season the new owner won the WS with the exact team I had the season before.

I mean, at least the fake players got their rings.