From the category archives:

Stratomatic

Strat-O-Matic baserunning tips

August 19, 2009

Here are a few baserunning tips to think about when deciding on a lineup.

1. Think more aggressive against a quality starting pitchers. Taking more baserunning chances against guys like Tim Lincecum makes perfect sense. There usually aren’t very many baserunning opportunities against these pitchers so you need to make the most out of these chances.

2. Be less aggressive on the base paths against pitchers like Nick Blackburn. These pitcher cards allow a high number of singles and other on-base chances which means you’ll have an ample amount of scoring chances.

3. Be aware of the home field advantage max rule. When you are playing on the road you may lose some rolls due to the home field advantage rule so you may want to run a little more aggressively.

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Cheap pitchers outperforming multi-million dollar pitchers

August 14, 2009

One of the cool things about playing the Strat-O-Matic Online baseball simulation game is you get to decide, as a manager, when you want to start a real-life journeyman over a real-life All-Star. What you know about these players in real life doesn’t matter. You don’t need to consider how old they are and you know they won’t get better or worse over time because their true talent levels are already laid out on the player cards. It’s all about probability.

I was able to find some match ups where my .50 cent pitcher out performed the opponents multi-million dollar starting pitcher. I’m sure I would have found a lot more of these matchups but TSN had to remove some box scores from 2001-2005 because of space issues.

1969 Season: Ken Brett (.50M) vs Dave Boswell (6.92M)

Ken Brett blanks Cats, 2-0

Ken Brett pitched a complete game shutout despite allowing 6 walks. Brett ended up 1-4 for the season but had a lot of no decisions. He pitched well for me. He ended up with a 3.02 ERA in 12 starts.

2003 Season: Paul Abbott (.50M) vs Tim Hudson (8.87M)

Holey Sox beat Bosox 10-3

I found a few box scores from the 2003 season. In this game, Hudson got rocked in the 2nd inning as my team scored 5 runs with 5 if the 6 hits being singles. Abbott was 12-4 after this game but ended up with a 13-9 record.

2003 Season: Paul Abbott (.50M) vs Barry Zito (7.13M)

Holey Sox blow out Brunswick Bosox, 12-0

Abbott went 7 strong scoreless innings striking out 6 batters and walking 1.

Lefty killer, Edgar Renteria, blasted a home run in the bottom of the third inning. Three batters were walked after that which led to three other runs in the inning.

2007 Season: Kevin Slowey (.50M) vs Fausto Carmona (7.00M)

Kevin Slowey shuts out Panthers, 10-0

Kevin Slowey pitched a complete game shutout with 9 strikeouts in AT&T Park while Fausto Carmona went 8 2/3 innings allowing 5 earned runs.

6 other Slowey vs ‘Goliath’ matchups:

Another match up against Fausto Carmona (7.ooM)

Javier Vazquez (5.44M) charged with the loss

Cole Hamels (4.96M) loses pitching duel

Matt Cain (4.75M) is the losing pitcher

Javier Vazquez (5.44M) absorbs another loss

A.J. Burnett suffers the loss

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Tips for determining a winning team in ATG4

August 11, 2009

Earlier, I wrote about using the Strat-O-Matic Baseball Online: All-Time Records to help with player selection. Studying the team records section (Team 80) can help in determining what makes a successful team.

First, take a look at the Most Wins section. Looks like you might need to go extreme when deciding on a park to play. Two teams chose hitter parks and three teams went for pitcher parks.

You probably can’t really determine what makes a winning team by going through these other categories. The leaders under Team Errors – Fewest, however, showed quite a bit of success. These teams averaged 88 wins.

Defense

Looking back in the Most Wins section, it looks like you must have at least 3 or 4 starting 1′s in your lineups. These record holding teams averaged 4.5 starting ’1′ position players. A team called The Wrong Stuff 441 had 8 1′s in their starting lineup!

All teams have a ’1′ at second base. This is no surprise as there appears to be plenty ’1′s in the player set. At short stop, however, there’s only 10 players with a ’1′ range so you will see more 2′s being used at shortstop. The bottom line is that you need good defense up the middle. No 3′s or 4′s.

Hitting

In outfield, you will see that Frank Robinson was used a couple times. It’s quite a solid card. He hits for power, has good OBP, has speed.

Tony Gwynn, Tris Speaker, and Bobby Bonds also appear on at least 2 teams.

Pitching

These top $80 million dollar salary teams averaged about 24M for their pitching staffs.

Of the 6 teams, there were only 5 pitchers over $5M. 3 out of the 6 teams didn’t have a pitcher over 5M. Using a staff with pitchers who can pitch on 3 days rest is the way to go. John Clarkson was picked up twice as well as Fred Norman.

It looks like the key to winning is to not spend much on relief pitching. Of the 6 teams, there’s not one relief pitcher over 4M. I see Ron Perranoski appearing a couple times. Firpo Marberry had success a couple times.

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Top 9 starters for pitchers parks in ATG4

August 3, 2009

Griffith Stadium

I was browsing the ballparks for the ATG4 player set and Griffith Stadium ’41 caught my eye. The is the only ballpark with zero ballpark home runs from both sides. I decided to browse the pitchers from this set and came up with 9 pitchers that may fit well in a ballpark such as Griffth Stadium:

1. John Cerutti $1.23M (BP – 5 vs L, 6 vs R)
I couldn’t find any pitcher under 1M worth considering. John Cerutti at $1.54 was the first bargain found.

2. Floyd Bannister $1.54M (BP – 6 vs L, 5 vs R)
Cerutti’s card may be a little better than Bannister but Bannister only needs 3 days rest between starts.

3. Fred Norman $1.76M (BP – 7 vs L, 4 vs R)
This reverse lefty may be worth considering but he does allow quite a bit of triples against left-handed batters.

4. Jim Merritt $2.27M (BP – 0 vs L, 8 vs R)
I’m wondering how often this pitcher is chosen. Looks like a good card. He has 91% out chances against left-handed batters. 8 ballpark diamonds from the right side ideal for a pitcher’s park.

5. Pedro Ramos $2.33M (BP – 7 vs L, 3 vs R)
He was 11-20 in 1961 with Minnesota. I wonder how he would fare in Griffith Stadium.

6. Bruce Hurst $2.41M (BP – 8 vs L, 1 vs R)
Here’s another reverse lefty. His low double and triple chances are excellent.

7. Ed Whitson $2.89M (BP – 3 vs L, 8 vs R)
He can work on only 3 days rest. Doesn’t give up and singles against- right handed batters but all other chances are extra base hits.

8. Mike Scott $3.2M (BP – 0 vs L, 8 vs R)
This reverse righty must be hard to get. 81% out chances against left-handed batters. Most of his safe chances are walks which is something to look for in a starting pitcher.

9. Tom Browning $3.39M (BP – 4 vs L, 3 vs R)
Looks like a decent card. He has low bk and wp numbers and a -2 hold.

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Newbies guide for ATG4 player selection

July 30, 2009

If you look at my profile (SOM) you’ll notice that I have rarely played in any All-Time Greats leagues. I prefer playing in 200x leagues where I can simulate the outcome with the CD-Rom game. I still enjoy browsing the ATG card sets every once in a while, however. ATG IV was released a while ago and I haven’t really studied the cards until now.

While browsing the set I was wondering how I could build a competitive team without having any ATG4 experience. Then, I remembered that official records for ATG leagues are kept by Mighty Moose, Strat-O-Matic Baseball Online’s official record keeper. For newbies, this data can be quite valuable for selecting a new team.

Batting

Take a look at At Bats and Hits leaders. You’ll see George Sisler a few times. Now, take a look at his card. .407 batting average, a 1 at 1B, AA base stealing, with 1-17 speed.

Under the Doubles section you’ll notice Bob Meusel listed in the top 2. He hits 15% of his doubles against lefties and 9% against righties. He could be a good pick for a pitcher’s park. He has a ‘-5′ throwing arm is a 1 in the outfield.

Ralph Kiner is dominating the leader board in Home Runs. Look how many home run chances he has on his card. It would be nice to have him on any team. I wonder how hard it is to grab him.

Bobby Bonds and Jose Canseco are the only ones listed as Strikeout leaders. I would probably avoid these two.

Pitching

You see Pete Alexander listed all over the leader boards. I’d like to see if there’s been a team with Alexander that had a losing record. This guy only allows singles on his card.

Dick Radatz shows up twice under the Relief ERA leaders. When deciding on relief pitchers for your team, make a note of his best results. The higher the better. Anything over 40 is good. Radatz is 44 against lefties and 51 against righties. Also check out the leaders under opponents batting average. Radatz is listed twice there as well.

You’ll find Bruce Sutter and Dennis Eckersley listed the most times under Relief WHIP. I would probably prefer Eckersley ($4.71M) over Sutter($5.19M) because I like Eck’s 66 best results against righties. Also, Sutter has a high wild pitch count (wp-20).

I’m not sure if the Games Finished leader board will help us decide on a pitcher but if Wilcy Moore is the ‘all-time leader’ he has to be popular. He’s only $.3.5M. Wait a minute. Take a look at his relief endurance – r5. Now I see why he has the all-time record in games finished. I would have to say that I must go after this pitcher.

Noodles Hahn ($7.02M) gives up a lot of hits but with a name like that it would be neat to have him on my team.

Juan Marichal shows up a quite a few times under Home Runs allowed. If you are in a pitcher park I suppose he might be a good addition.

J.R. Richard is dominating the leaderboard in Strikeouts. Also check out the leaders for Strikes Per 9 Innings. He has 49 strikeout chances against righties. He is definitely worth considering as one of your starting pitchers.

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