Posted by hockey1984 on 4/26/2022 10:38:00 AM (view original):
I'm going to completely ruin everything Damag and I just said in 2 short paragraphs:

Best 2 players I ever drafted were HS kids.

Johan Butcher
and Jair Sanchez
and both were taken in the 20's of the first round.

Now, to reel it back in, for every Butcher and Sanchez, there are a dozen

Bob Greenwood's
and
Andrew Jeffries

I'm gonna say these guys - being as familiar as I am with them - are two great examples of shopping where the other owners aren't. Johan is one of your most successful health/training projects, bet ten bucks other owners who scouted him talked themselves into another pitcher with a higher health rating or secondary pitches. Same for Jair, that 0 flyball rating probably moved someone's needle.

To piggyback that into the question of LHP, when I started playing this game I went for a balance, figuring that would only make sense. One day in league chat, someone said "how many LHP you guys got" and another owner answered "there are LHPs?" I looked at his pitching staff and he had twelve RHPs.
So I thought about the logic behind it.
80% of batters are RHB. Then narrow that down, how many LHB are really dangerous killer hitters? Six to ten in a world? If you want to find a pitcher with a great LHB split, you pretty much are looking specifically for a LHP... with a mediocre RHB split.

It becomes a question of, get RHPs and just take your damn chances whenever a LHB comes up.

I never went whole hog on it deliberately, but I did find one market inefficiency: I started drafting RHPs with poor LHB splits. Because I'd leave them where they were on my prospect list based on their RHB splits, but I'm sure other owners were shying away from the poor LHB splits.

There are going to be various responses. I personally draft HS players and play them in Rookie Ball, then LoA at age 19, then hiA at age 20, then AA at age 21. I know other successful owners that start players in AA, move them to AAA in their 2nd year, then in the mlb in their third year. Both work fine. The key is playing time. And, by playing time, I don't mean at-bats or IP, I mean games played.

As far as where you should play the player in the minors, I would play him at the spot that is best for that minor league squad. If there is already a player that plays a better defensive 2b than him, I'd play that player at 2b then play the true prospect at LF. He should still develop fine defensively, but will get less reps and less errors in LF so he hurts the team less and he has less chance of injury.

Posted by BardoHBD on 4/26/2022 1:45:00 PM (view original):
Thanks for the very informative responses to my scouting question.

Since you guys insist on being helpful, I have a few more.

I’m sure this has been asked and answered a hundred times, but these forums aren’t the easiest to navigate.

Is there an “optimal” pattern for promoting players to maximize their potential?

Is there an ideal way to play minor league guys at certain positions to maximize their fielding potential? I have 2 20 year olds (going into their second and third seasons) who project to be maybe slightly below recommended second basemen. They’re in LoA and AA right now. Should I be playing them at 2b in the minors?

Last one (for now). If you had a 23 year old in AAA who is ready for the majors, but the majors aren’t ready for him, is there a downside to holding him in AAA one more season?

For me I'll start my top prospects that are 18,19,20 in Low A ball. In theory the more reps a player gets the quicker the gain ratings bumps. You put a kid in the rookie league and they have to wait a week or two to start playing where as with Low A ball they are playing the very next game. And more games.
21 and 22 year old kids I will start in High A. Then I promote the kids at the end of the season and let them have a year in each level until they are ready for the majors or flame out at AAA.

I'll put the kids in the minors where I want them to play when they reach the majors (ss in ss, CF in CF, 2B in 2B etc) I have no idea if this builds up their key fielding ratings but it works for me. I don't focus on my minors too much but as long as they aren't losing 70% of their games I don't really care all that much.

Your 23 year old in AAA should be fine. Some would argue that without ML coaching he will take longer to reach his ratings or won't actually reach his ratings but at 23 I wouldn't worry about it too much. Bring him up when he is ready or there is a spot.

Thanks for the input.

May be a dumb question, but when you say promote at the end of the season, do you literally mean at the end of the season before rollover? Or at some point before the next season starts?

Any time before the World series is over is when you promote your minor league players. Once the World series is over, it's too late. I like to promote right after game 1 of the WS.

So if the previous owner didn’t do this last season, is there any benefit to promoting guys now? Or can I safely keep when where they are to “slow them down” a bit if I want a longer rebuild?

No direct benefit. However, you typically don't want players to repeat levels and even if you do have players repeat a level, he certainly should not be repeating it twice. There are not too many things I am rigid on in this game, but prospect development is one of them. To me, you either slow cook em or move them quickly, but you rarely repeat them at the same level if you can help it.

The only exceptions I can think of to this are prospects that had a major injury or prospects that are sitting in AAA because they are blocked by players in the MLB.

Posted by BardoHBD on 4/26/2022 4:24:00 PM (view original):
So if the previous owner didn’t do this last season, is there any benefit to promoting guys now? Or can I safely keep when where they are to “slow them down” a bit if I want a longer rebuild?

Its a little tricky with the timing but I'll run my prospects through spring training, then after they have their first ratings bump (it will say opening day on the ratings page) that is when I will promote them so that they get the 'promotion' bump. I have no idea if both of these will improve a players rating but I do know that if you promote, trade, demote etc during spring training that you will only get the promotion, trade, demotion ratings bump and won't get the 'opening day' bump.


Edit: A lot of this is probably more superstition then actual fact. But hey, I don't bring a banana when I go fishing and I don't talk about a pitchers potential no hitter during the game so I am big on superstition. (Hence my St. Louis team name)

Posted by hockey1984 on 4/27/2022 10:37:00 AM (view original):

Posted by BardoHBD on 4/26/2022 4:24:00 PM (view original):
So if the previous owner didn’t do this last season, is there any benefit to promoting guys now? Or can I safely keep when where they are to “slow them down” a bit if I want a longer rebuild?

Its a little tricky with the timing but I'll run my prospects through spring training, then after they have their first ratings bump (it will say opening day on the ratings page) that is when I will promote them so that they get the 'promotion' bump. I have no idea if both of these will improve a players rating but I do know that if you promote, trade, demote etc during spring training that you will only get the promotion, trade, demotion ratings bump and won't get the 'opening day' bump.


Edit: A lot of this is probably more superstition then actual fact. But hey, I don't bring a banana when I go fishing and I don't talk about a pitchers potential no hitter during the game so I am big on superstition. (Hence my St. Louis team name)

Agreed -- trades, promotions, injuries will often times prevent spring training bumps and since spring training bumps tend to be more significant bumps than regular season bumps, you want to try to avoid losing that spring training bump.

Speaking of spring training. Should I be inviting all of my real prospects regardless of their current ratings to get them some reps?

Posted by BardoHBD on 4/28/2022 4:32:00 PM (view original):
Speaking of spring training. Should I be inviting all of my real prospects regardless of their current ratings to get them some reps?

My spring training team, I play my major leaguers the first two or three games - subbing them out after three or four innings - and the last two or three games. Everything in between goes to minor league prospects.

Posted by BardoHBD on 4/28/2022 4:32:00 PM (view original):
Speaking of spring training. Should I be inviting all of my real prospects regardless of their current ratings to get them some reps?

Yes, prospects should get into as many games as possible, especially ST. Get them into spring training, try to get them into every regular season game (using rest replacement settings to avoid fatigue) and try to get them into as many MiL playoff games as possible.

You might only squeeze a point or two more in each rating by maximizing game appearances like this, but that's pretty significant across 4 batting ratings and 2 or 3 fielding ratings.

On thing I have found very helpful for minors with regards to promotion is using the color system available in the player profile. Here is my system:

Rd 1 draft pick: Blue Circle
Supplemental pick: Pink
Rd 2: Black
Rd 3: Orange
Big IFA signing I want to track: Green
DITR: Yellow
Try out camp signing or pathetic draft pick: red (for demotion/dropping purposes)

If there is another player I want to make sure is progressing through the minors I will give him a pink circle. That way I make sure all of those with colored circles that are non-red are getting promoted through the system without having to remember all of the players. It really helps on a phone when stuck somewhere toward the end of the season and needed to promote/demote to progress those future MLBers

I use color dots too. Glad they added more of them last season.

Posted by tlowster on 5/4/2022 5:00:00 PM (view original):
I use color dots too. Glad they added more of them last season.

Interesting to see suggestions of lots of dots. Me:

Green - ML
Yellow - Maybe
Red - cut release decision in pre-season

What else are people using them for?