Thanks contrarian, your clarification on page 1 looks accurate.

Concerning Sparky's decision to remove a pitcher based on performance (before reaching a pitch count), my anecdotal experience is that earned runs seem to be an important factor. If a lot of runs score after there are two outs in an inning that was extended by an error, the pitcher is more likely to survive than if the same number of runs were scored without an error. A pitcher with Call Bullpen = 3 might give up 8 runs in a such a game, if few of them are earned runs, but would not be allowed to stay in a game long enough to give up 8 earned runs. I don't have any box scores handy to back that up, it is just the impression I've developed.

I've been on this site for a long time but am considering using an approach I've never used before due to the limitations of a league I'm joining.
In short I have great starting pitching and more than enough of it and for all purposes no quality relievers.
If I set all my starters to be available for relief and my other pitchers to mopup will Sparky pick one of my starters in all but mopup situations or will he always pick one of the mopups first. Trying to understand whether I will have to pick one of those starters as my "reliever" or can I share that role across all of them

Yeah that will work like you want it to. The mop ups won’t come in unless it’s a blowout. Just make sure you set the inning available for the starters to early in the game.

Also, to determine which starter to use in relief, the sim will first use the starter whos furthest away from his scheduled start. So you can determine the exact order of who comes in when.

Thank you. Thats the way I'm going to go. 4 strong 300IP starters 1 mediocre long reliever and the rest mop ups.
Should be fascinating to watch.

The sim will always put the long reliever in rather than one of the starters checked for use in relief so be careful with that.

good luck!

Posted by contrarian23 on 8/4/2015 10:35:00 AM (view original):
bump.... I've seen too many complaints recently about Sparky's use of the mop up.

If your mop up pitcher was brought into the game in a situation that you do not believe warranted it, it is ALWAYS because no other option was available to him at the time.

Specifically, it is very likely that one of the following was true:
-- Your other pitchers were fatigued below their autorest (this is most often the case...and when you look AFTER the game, the pitcher you think should have been used may now be at 100%, but before the game - which of course you can no longer see - he was at 94, and you set his autorest to 95)  
-- Your other rested pitchers were set to come in later in the game (if you set "inning available" = 7 and it's the 6th inning, then you have effectively told Sparky to use the mop up rather than this pitcher)
-- Your other rested pitchers were already used in the game (surprisingly common....user whines "why didn't Sparky use Eckersley" and what do you know, Eckersley was already used earlier in the game)
-- Your pitcher was ejected (yup, it happens)
-- Your pitcher was pinch hit for 
-- Your pitcher reached his pitch count
-- You just brought up the pitcher from AAA or from the waiver wire or via trade and forgot to check his relief box
-- Etc, etc, etc.

The point is, there is always a reason, based on YOUR settings.  It's not a glitch.

Still the most commonly misunderstood facet of the game, and not just for new users...

Posted by contrarian23 on 3/14/2016 3:12:00 PM (view original):
For those who may be seeing this for the first time...these are the most important sentences in the original series of posts:

In summary, Sparky will manage according to your instructions EXACTLY as you have provided them to him. He is not going to override them, no matter how much you may want him to, or how much you think “common sense” should dictate otherwise, unless he has no other options.

This is the most important point in this entire thread: Sparky’s use of the bullpen is extremely logical. By “logical” I don’t necessarily mean that every decision Sparky makes is exactly the way I would make it, or you would make it, or a real manager would make it. By “logical” I mean that WIS has programmed him with very specific rules about which pitchers to use, in which order of priority, based on inning and score differential AND YOUR SETTINGS. There are – as far as I know – absolutely no documented glitches in this part of the algorithm. There is no line of code that says “bring the mop up in the late innings of a tie game, even if other better (and fully rested) pitchers are available.” So, if you find that in fact Sparky did bring in a mop up in that situation, it’s always because he had no other options available based on the instructions you gave him.

I see this happen in almost every league I am in...someone at some point will complain "SIM brings in mop up in crucial situation instead of guy I think he should have used instead." I even see, surprisingly, very experienced owners ***** about this from time to time. When this happens, it is 100% due to your settings, not due to any glitch in the system, and certainly not due to WIS's algorithm randomly deciding to screw your team over.

I wrote the original posts for this thread more than a decade ago...and have since removed them for reasons I won't go into here. Time permitting, I may provide an updated guide to how the SIM algorithm uses your bullpen...someday. But the text in red here is the TL;DR.