MLB Dynasty 2016 Thread

A few housekeeping items:

Payouts:

Montana: $378
Habspatrol: $108 - PAID
Green Hornet: $54

Please PM me with your preferred payment method and whether you'd like 2015's entry fee to be taken out of your prize.

Small note, we were in the red after the payouts to begin the season due to Mary and Fitzgerald not anteing up the lifetime memberships last season. Slipped my mind when collecting the entry fees from the new managers, so we're down $24 this season. Not a huge deal, but I wanted to offer transparency on it.

We had kicked around giving 4th and perhaps 5th place free entry in the subsequent season but never seemed to settle on a payout structure. I feel it would be self-serving to go ahead and implement now it as I finished 4th, so I think we should just carry any leftover money forward to next season and implement it then.

I'd like to do this in 2015

1st: $350
2nd: $100
3rd: $50
4th: Free entry
5th Free entry

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Minor League System

We're at 30 spots, my goal has been to end up at 40. Some people think 30 is enough. I'll make a poll.

Protected lists

Administratively, it would be much easier for us Commissioners to simply drop unprotected players off rosters prior to the draft to avoid a "Fergy". Less chasing people to make rosters compliant as well (that's exhausting at times). I'm leaning that way and will make a poll.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

If there are 2 free entries, there won't be the same amount of prize money for the teams in the money.

Not disagreeing with your idea, just saying.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

There's enough this year for one free entry. Next year we'll have enough for two.

$30*19 = $570

1st: $350
2nd: $100
3rd: $50
4th: Free entry ($30)
5th: Free entry ($30)

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$560

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

I have a couple things that I'd like to bring up, if that's okay.

Trades, right now the league makes is tough to offer trades without messing around with your lineup a bit. Can we not have no roster restrictions for trades? Once the trade is made the owners would then make the necessary changes/drops to make their roster legal, but it is a pain when proposing trades in the past.

Stats, I'm wondering if we could look at making some small changes. In my opinion, the pitching stats are kind of flawed. When you start adding things in like extra points for complete games, shut outs, quality starts, etc. the numbers can start to get a little funky because you start duplicating things.

Why not keep it simple and base the points on strikeouts, walks, hits, earned runs, & innings pitched? I'd also argue that there should be some slugging or total base component in there as well, as right now if a pitcher gives up a triple or a single there's no difference, but anyways, a pitcher that pitches a complete game shutout will already have great numbers, but now we're double rewarding them if they pitched a shutout or completed the game as we're already giving them stats for IP, not allowing runs, not allowing hits/walks, etc.

Quality start is a weird one too, a pitcher gets rewarded for pitching 6 runs with an ERA of 4.50?

Just bringing it up as I think it should be addressed and should be more like the hitting stats (which are simple, and make sense IMO).

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

I'm fine with the money changes above, I think that makes sense. And as far as minor leaguers go, whatever the majority wants, I'm fine with, 30-40 doesn't really matter to me. I'd probably learn towards 30 myself if I had to vote.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

braby21 said:

I have a couple things that I'd like to bring up, if that's okay.

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Trades, right now the league makes is tough to offer trades without messing around with your lineup a bit. Can we not have no roster restrictions for trades? Once the trade is made the owners would then make the necessary changes/drops to make their roster legal, but it is a pain when proposing trades in the past.

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Others know the fantrax interface better than I do, but I think the potential problem with this could be processing a trade leading to an illegal roster and one of the trade participants entering into a new weekly period with an illegal roster, forfeiting any points earned in that week. I'd personally much rather deal with the minor annoyance of ****ing about with my roster once fantrax has disallowed the processing of the trade, than deal with the potential of someone losing a weeks worth of points over it.

Stats, I'm wondering if we could look at making some small changes. In my opinion, the pitching stats are kind of flawed. When you start adding things in like extra points for complete games, shut outs, quality starts, etc. the numbers can start to get a little funky because you start duplicating things.

Why not keep it simple and base the points on strikeouts, walks, hits, earned runs, & innings pitched?

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I'm open to this. I helped tweaked the pitching stats last year to more closely resemble what I felt was important (basically the components of FIP, etc) but there was a contingent that wanted to keep old school stuff like wins.

I'd also argue that there should be some slugging or total base component in there as well, as right now if a pitcher gives up a triple or a single there's no difference, but anyways, a pitcher that pitches a complete game shutout will already have great numbers, but now we're double rewarding them if they pitched a shutout or completed the game as we're already giving them stats for IP, not allowing runs, not allowing hits/walks, etc.

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Generally agreed. The existing structure was agreed upon because the overall product of it seemed to pretty fairly reflect the value of pitching Vs hitting. That's the challenge when you start tweaking one set of stats, you don't want to diminish the overall contribution of hitters V pitchers, nor overly punish otherwise productive pitchers Vs other pitchers.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

braby21 said:

I have a couple things that I'd like to bring up, if that's okay.

Trades, right now the league makes is tough to offer trades without messing around with your lineup a bit. Can we not have no roster restrictions for trades? Once the trade is made the owners would then make the necessary changes/drops to make their roster legal, but it is a pain when proposing trades in the past.

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No, I'm not a fan of that. We allow trades to go through without a review period in this league with the caveat you'll have a legal roster when the trade is completed. The problems it would cause isn't worth it, imo.

Stats, I'm wondering if we could look at making some small changes. In my opinion, the pitching stats are kind of flawed. When you start adding things in like extra points for complete games, shut outs, quality starts, etc. the numbers can start to get a little funky because you start duplicating things.

Why not keep it simple and base the points on strikeouts, walks, hits, earned runs, & innings pitched? I'd also argue that there should be some slugging or total base component in there as well, as right now if a pitcher gives up a triple or a single there's no difference, but anyways, a pitcher that pitches a complete game shutout will already have great numbers, but now we're double rewarding them if they pitched a shutout or completed the game as we're already giving them stats for IP, not allowing runs, not allowing hits/walks, etc.

Quality start is a weird one too, a pitcher gets rewarded for pitching 6 runs with an ERA of 4.50?

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I see where you are coming from, some pitching stats are duplicated. I do like having the bonus points that CG and shutouts bring because they are rare and should be rewarded. I'm open to making them worth less. As for QS/W, I don't love either of them, but the league seems to like some traditional roto stats, and I don't think they are game breaking to leave in. With the advent of specialized 8 man BPs and strict pitch counts, I think QS kinda need to be in there as you just don't see a lot of pitchers going the distance, or even beyond the 7th very often. The slugging / total bases is interesting, and something worth looking at.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

Understandable regarding the trades, it's too bad that some teams wouldn't fix their roster as soon as the trade goes through, but I hear ya's.

I just feel the stats will already reward pitchers for complete game shutouts and we don't need to add even more points. There will be weird instances where a pitcher happens to pitch a complete game but doesn't pitch as well as a pitcher who pitches 8 shutout innings but the pitcher who gave up runs and pitches 1 more inning will end up getting more points.

I guess my argument re: the QS wasn't the best, the 6 innings of 4.50 ERA pitching bugs me in real life b/c I think the stat is stupid, but what I should've said was, again, we're duplicating points. As that pitcher is already getting his points for his 6 innings of work, why do we have to give him more?

I'm fine with traditional stats like wins, saves, same with hitters getting points for runs and rbi's. And totally understand why they would be in, we don't wanna take the fun out of the league trying to be too sabermetric, it's the duplicating thing that I wanted to bring up.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

The year before last, we had Wins only. Since it is somewhat of an unpredictable stat as far as the pitcher is concerned, it was decided that we would cut down the points awarded for wins, and add QS to the mix to take over those points. Sometimes a guy pitches 5 2/3 great innings, gets removed but gets the W. Other times he doesn't get the W, but he is rewarded for a quality start. It's worked out quite well, IMO.

We don't use ERA, WHIP, etc., subtracting points for ER only goes so far. We want to be careful about giving out too many points just for Innings Pitched. As you said, it doesn't necessarily measure good performance on its own, I think a pitcher who throws a complete game or a shutout deserves those extra points, since they did something relatively rare and should be rewarded for it. Duplication is no big deal when you're working with limited stats and aren't using ERA/WHIP. A home run is a duplication since you also get points for a run and an RBI.

I'm not saying we shouldn't keep an eye on some tweaking where needed, but overall I think we've got a great setup here with the scoring.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

I actually thought the pitching scoring was pretty good. I suppose we could up the points for IP and lower W's and QS's.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

braby21 said:

Understandable regarding the trades, it's too bad that some teams wouldn't fix their roster as soon as the trade goes through, but I hear ya's.

I just feel the stats will already reward pitchers for complete game shutouts and we don't need to add even more points. There will be weird instances where a pitcher happens to pitch a complete game but doesn't pitch as well as a pitcher who pitches 8 shutout innings but the pitcher who gave up runs and pitches 1 more inning will end up getting more points.

I guess my argument re: the QS wasn't the best, the 6 innings of 4.50 ERA pitching bugs me in real life b/c I think the stat is stupid, but what I should've said was, again, we're duplicating points. As that pitcher is already getting his points for his 6 innings of work, why do we have to give him more?

I'm fine with traditional stats like wins, saves, same with hitters getting points for runs and rbi's. And totally understand why they would be in, we don't wanna take the fun out of the league trying to be too sabermetric, it's the duplicating thing that I wanted to bring up.

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My overall suggestion when it comes to tinkering with complex scoring systems is this: Take a look at the finished product and identify individual pitchers that you feel were either overly assisted by, or overly punished by the existing system. We look at those examples and identify where the system can be tweaked to bring those guys in line with where their performance dictates they should have been (we did this last season with elite 8th inning guys...in our inaugural season, even a shitty pitcher who was getting trotted out for save opportunities was a near elite piece to have, but a complete and utter lock down 8th inning guy was borderline worthless to a top team). We tweaked the scoring and the reliever scoring was a lot better this year imo, though I do think that it benefited the SP's a bit too much and I was already thinking about proposing changes to the group (14 of the top 20 performers this year were SP)

So yeah, I wouldn't worry about the exact mechanics of the system itself, as long as the product of the system passes the "eye test" (oh, the ironing) when you review how the various groups performed at the end of the season.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

Habspatrol said:

I actually thought the pitching scoring was pretty good. I suppose we could up the points for IP and lower W's and QS's.

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Way better than last year imo, but now it's too damn high.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

MindzEye said:

My overall suggestion when it comes to tinkering with complex scoring systems is this: Take a look at the finished product and identify individual pitchers that you feel were either overly assisted by, or overly punished by the existing system. We look at those examples and identify where the system can be tweaked to bring those guys in line with where their performance dictates they should have been (we did this last season with elite 8th inning guys...in our inaugural season, even a shitty pitcher who was getting trotted out for save opportunities was a near elite piece to have, but a complete and utter lock down 8th inning guy was borderline worthless to a top team). We tweaked the scoring and the reliever scoring was a lot better this year imo, though I do think that it benefited the SP's a bit too much and I was already thinking about proposing changes to the group (14 of the top 20 performers this year were SP)

So yeah, I wouldn't worry about the exact mechanics of the system itself, as long as the product of the system passes the "eye test" (oh, the ironing) when you review how the various groups performed at the end of the season.

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This is pretty much my take.....and Id go a slight step further and say it's not even so much how certain guys are ranked, as it's that you want a clear delineation between groups/tiers of the elite guys, great guys, good guys average guys, below average, shit, etc....

You want their overall value in real life, to be reflected in our league as possible....and that's best represented imo, via their relative point production vs their peers.

On that front, I think Deckie & Mindz did a pretty bang up job.....when you look at the various tiers between SP's in our league, year to year, they all pretty well mirror their real life representations, imo.

I don't think there are very many players you can point to, who's final season point tally doesn't pretty accurately reflect their overall value. (minus defensive contributions, obviously)

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

You don't use ERA & WHIP because you can't, we play points based not percentage based, and we do use a points system that takes into consideration earned runs and base runners allowed, aka ERA & WHIP.

A home run is not duplicating points for a run and rbi, b/c those are two different things. As a hitter you are only swinging the bat once, yes. But you did hit a home run, you did score a run, and you did hit yourself in so you do get a RBI.

I do understand wanting to remove points because a Win is not in the pitchers control, but that's baseball and I think we do want to have things like wins, saves, runs, and rbi's b/c they are fun and they are still kept track and commonly known. I just don't see why the innings pitched, strike outs, and the lack of earned runs and walks/hits doesn't do justice for a pitcher who pitches a complete game shutout and why he needs bonus points on top of those points that he earned. IMO that would be like giving a hitter bonus points for a 4 hit game, or hitting for the cycle, he's already getting those points, he doesn't need the bonus.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

PS not trying to sound like I'm bitching, just trying to make my argument. I know I'm the new guy and signed up for the league the way it was.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

braby21 said:

You don't use ERA & WHIP because you can't, we play points based not percentage based, and we do use a points system that takes into consideration earned runs and base runners allowed, aka ERA & WHIP.

A home run is not duplicating points for a run and rbi, b/c those are two different things. As a hitter you are only swinging the bat once, yes. But you did hit a home run, you did score a run, and you did hit yourself in so you do get a RBI.

I do understand wanting to remove points because a Win is not in the pitchers control, but that's baseball and I think we do want to have things like wins, saves, runs, and rbi's b/c they are fun and they are still kept track and commonly known. I just don't see why the innings pitched, strike outs, and the lack of earned runs and walks/hits doesn't do justice for a pitcher who pitches a complete game shutout and why he needs bonus points on top of those points that he earned. IMO that would be like giving a hitter bonus points for a 4 hit game, or hitting for the cycle, he's already getting those points, he doesn't need the bonus.

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We have set out to find a way to accurately determine a player's value in each game. So really, if a guy pitches a complete game and the team doesn't have to go to the bullpen then that's probably worth a little bonus. Maybe we could cut down the amount of points they get for it.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

braby21 said:

PS not trying to sound like I'm bitching, just trying to make my argument. I know I'm the new guy and signed up for the league the way it was.

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Nobody should take it as bitching. This is how we perfect scoring systems... with manager input.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

Just wanted to throw that PS in as I'm the new guy and didn't want to come across as a complainer...

I would argue that the pitcher is getting a bonus for pitching that extra inning, through our regular point system. And other pitchers could get hurt because his team has a better closer (or better manager!) and gets hurt by not having the chance to pitch just 3 more outs for X amount of points.

But I'm beating a dead horse. I certainly would vote for reducing the amount of points for any duplicate 'bonus' points, if we want to keep some of them in.

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

When can we add players?

Re: MLB Dynasty Offseason Thread

No