With Baseball Stats, Trying to Synthesize Real, Fun (Kotaku)

[BobSacamano]

I'm in the middle of my 2nd franchise with the Red Sox, and in the first go Buchholz and Beltre were terrible. In my 2nd franchise, they're still terrible. I guess it's nice to know that I should just go ahead and edit them rather than wait for them to turn it around.

In addition to park effects, the Show really needs to work on old guys playing like they're old. Guys like David Ortiz, Jermaine Dye, and Vlad Guerrero should be getting worse, not producing like it's 2005.

[countryboy]

LOL..Vlad is hitting .326 right now and Jermaine Dye hit 27 homeruns last year. Jeter hit .334 last year at age 35 which was good for 5th in all of baseball for guys with 500+ AB.

You can't just say well..he's old so he shouldn't produce. Talent and skill level still have a say.

[BobSacamano]

Jermaine Dye is a free agent right now because he can't play defense and he put up a .590 OPS in the 2nd half last year. Given his nonexistant knees and horrific second half, it's not exactly a stretch that he'll never be the same player again. In fact, I'm pretty certain of it.

Have you checked Vlad Guerrero's home/away splits? He's put up a 1.153 OPS at the launching pad in Arlington and a .427 OPS on the road (). Granted that's an extremely small sample size, but given his nonexistant knees (Hey, I'm seeing a trend! You need knees to hit), decline in production the previous two seasons, and the aforementioned spits, I'm not at all convinced that he'll sustain that level of production. Guerrero always relied on an extremely quick wrists, which doesn't bode well for his later years when he can't get the bat through the zone as fast.

Derek Jeter is a slap hitter. It's not really surprising that he's aging differently than power hitters.

I won't disagree with you that talent plays a big role in how quickly someone declines, but age and injuries play an even bigger role. Neither of those factors are on Dye, Guerrero, and Ortiz's side.

This is a long-winded post, but the point was that three-year splits are only a part of the equation in predicting players going forward.

[countryboy]

your comment initially was that old players shouldn't be able to produce. And thats what I responded to. There are several examples of guys who were 32+ that still produced.

Yes..a player starts declining due to age, but that doesn't mean that he automatically shouldn't be able to produce, especially in a video game. I mean, at what age would you put the cutoff?

But in any event, thats a different discussion for a different thread as this one is about how a guy noticed that 2 players were having subpar seasons and formed an opinion off of their stats.

[BobSacamano]

Quote: Originally Posted by countryboy

your comment initially was that old players shouldn't be able to produce

...like it's 2005. My point was that this guys should be declining, not sustaining their production. I don't think you need some uniform age cut-off, since I'm pretty sure there are age models that tell you how much the average player declines/improves at certain ages.

I love this game, but the player evaluation/progression could be improved. In my opinion, it tends to overrate older, established guys (the Jermaine Dyes of the baseball world, the Johnny Damons) and underrated the younger, likely-to-breakout guys (the Matt Wieters, the Andrew McCutchens).

Anyways, your point about the article is certainly correct. Weird that a guy who is clamoring for more scientific player models is drawing conclusions on a sample size of... two.

[ComfortablyLomb]

The effect of reduced PED usage in MLB isn't really reflected in The Show. The way it produces outcomes and career paths it feels more like the 90s and early 00s. Tough for the devs to hit a moving target though.