Curious what metrics/analysis you look at to see whether your team is performing well early in the season. I don't want to overreact to some early season struggles, yet don't want to let bad performance run too long either!

Given time a team will play to its ratings unless one has the settings set up poorly.

Also don't forget strength of schedule. Or, as they say, the other guys get paid too.

True. I often platoon alot during the season to keep my guys at 100% for the end while alot of others do not.

A good indicator at any point in time is World -> Reports -> Franchise Rankings. Filter by your league, and look at your Starting Lineup, Starting Rotation, and Bullpen and see where you stand in the major ratings.

Started 2-17 one year, ended up with 96 wins on the season.
The players have peaks and valleys throughout the season. Sometimes a bad or mediocre team will start hot and a good team will start slow. This is typically due to players variable performance.

I would say that by 65 games in, you should have a good barometer where each player is -- is he overperforming or underperforming, but I've also seen players have a huge first half and a second half where he sh*ts the bed. So, it's a tough call. If at 65 games in, you see a guy having a career year, it might be time to move him up in the lineup.

That "Franchise Rankings" report is excellent...I thought it was a historical view, like all-time records kinda thing.

Now I know where my next several hours will be spent...doh!

Teams will generally play to their ratings. One year I thought I had a pretty good team. The stumbled into the All-Star break a couple of games over .500. Coming out of the All-Star break they won 18 in a row, then went through a stretch where they were .500 for about a week, then ran off another 13 game win streak. Finished with 103 wins. That's the "streakiest" team I've ever had.

There's always an exception to the rule. This guy has a .675 OPS the last two seasons despite 71/69/77/69/87 hitter ratings. No ratings decline or injuries (they actually went up a few). Went from .825 career OPS to .675 OPS despite going from a heavy pitchers park (POR) to a medium hitter park (MAD). Never been so frustrated with a player.

The formula I use to estimate stats has Tomas slashing .365/.427/.792. That's pretty close to his lifetime stats. Looks like seasons 47-49 were fluky high and in seasons 50-51 the RNG gods are catching up with him. His power isn't enough to get more than 20 HR and his speed isn't good enough to leg out a lot of XBH's.

I don't have a formula, just an opinion - make of it what you wish. Tomas has a real nice ratings line but it could be better. Every one of his hitting ratings is just about five points lower than "stud", which to my mind means he can have very good seasons and also potentially crater seasons. Looked at another way, while 87 Batting Eye is very useful, he'd be a more productive hitter if you could swap that 87 with any of his other batting ratings.

The best thing to do is find 20+ players who have at least 6,000 MLB at bats, look at their career stats, and try to backwards engineer them back to their ratings. Once you have a baseline of where a player should perform, you can start to take chances on guys that you think have underperformed to a certain point in their career. I just traded for a guy in Glavine that has, in my opinion under performed the first five of his six major league seasons. The jury is out on whether or not I made the right decision, but if I'm right, I get the guy at a bargain for how he'll perform.

My first ever draft pick in HBD was in season 43 of Earl Weaver. He was the number 1 overall pick. I chose a C. By the time he was a fully developed MLB Catcher, he had respectable ratings, but his first handful of seasons, he kept underperforming based on his ratings and my formula, but instead of letting him walk by arbing him a third time and taking the Type A pick, I signed him to a long term deal because I trusted my formula. He has since rewarded my confidence in my formula by having a couple .300 hitting seasons.

Player Profile: Daryl Jenkins - Hardball Dynasty Baseball | WhatIfSports

A second note I have noticed is that, like in real life, a truly elite player doesn't come along every season, but each World usually gets at least one guy that is pretty good -- 75+ across the board in offensive ratings and one of their ratings is elite. I see these types of hitters often. The tricky part is understanding the difference between a guy that is 75+ across the board with 95+ contact vs. 75+ across the board with 95+ power/split/eye. While all of these types of players are really good, the guy who has his 95+ rating in power or R split is going to perform significantly better than the guy who has the 95+ rating in L split, contact or eye. So, in my opinion, any formula that doesn't put weights on ratings needs to be closely examined before a decision is made.

Posted by tlowster on 11/15/2020 3:29:00 PM (view original):
The best thing to do is find 20+ players who have at least 6,000 MLB at bats, look at their career stats, and try to backwards engineer them back to their ratings. Once you have a baseline of where a player should perform, you can start to take chances on guys that you think have underperformed to a certain point in their career. I just traded for a guy in Glavine that has, in my opinion under performed the first five of his six major league seasons. The jury is out on whether or not I made the right decision, but if I'm right, I get the guy at a bargain for how he'll perform.

My first ever draft pick in HBD was in season 43 of Earl Weaver. He was the number 1 overall pick. I chose a C. By the time he was a fully developed MLB Catcher, he had respectable ratings, but his first handful of seasons, he kept underperforming based on his ratings and my formula, but instead of letting him walk by arbing him a third time and taking the Type A pick, I signed him to a long term deal because I trusted my formula. He has since rewarded my confidence in my formula by having a couple .300 hitting seasons.

Player Profile: Daryl Jenkins - Hardball Dynasty Baseball | WhatIfSports

Do these 20 players all have to come from the same world? Or can you look at multiple worlds to collect this data?

I think you can do it throughout different Worlds. The intent is to find players with a lot of at bats so you can weed out small sample size, then reverse engineer the players ratings to their stats. Since all players in every World are playing under the same simulation, I think your base formula can be from players in different Worlds.

However, I wouldn't make it that hard on yourself. If you participate in a World that as been around at least 35 seasons, I would start with players in the Hall of Fame and place them in your sample first. This will give you a good barometer of the players that are elite. Then maybe review some guys that have mediocre to above-above ratings like guys in the last three seasons of the all star player awards page (try to find an older player). Finally, stay on the same Player Awards page and take a peak at the gold glove winners for 2b, CF and SS from the last three seasons and try to find an older player. Typically guys that win a gold glove at those positions are not very good hitters unless they are a truly elite player. This should get all three types of players in your sample and you can use trial and error to determine your own formula. I have mine and it works pretty well, but I still struggle a bit with predicting slugging. It is difficult to isolate variability over a season with the variability of speed and power for a hitter.