Question about historical play

[Big Mikey]

Sorry I completely missed that. It's what I get for going out drinking and staying up ridiculously late on a tuesday when I know I have to be up by 7 the next day.

[Rongar]

Well what I want to do is start in 98 where Tampa came in but conduct the draft myself rather than start with the team they have, or create a team using current rosters. So the more in depth the better. If you want to point me in the direction of where I can find those 'scientific' methods that would be apreciated. Do you have a link?

Hi, Mikey...for what it's worth, here is "Rongar's scientific approach" written for previous enquirers...it applies to the 07 & 08 versions of BM.

This is how I do mine: I go to a year of my choice, usually in the sixties, since I'm more familiar with the useful players of that era, you being a young fella (I presume), might want to play in a more recent year, where, incidentally, there are more players for the taking (30 teams in 2006, compared to 24 in the nineteen- sixties).

First thing I do is click on News/Standings...I'm looking for the weakest team available, so that in coming seasons, we go nowhere but up!

To do this, I click on any of the toolbars at the top of the screen "Streak"; "Last 10"; "E.R.A."; etc, and in the top right-hand corner of the new screen I see a box "projected record", indicating the AI's prediction of the strongest and weakest teams in the coming season.

In the year that I've chosen, this happens to be San Diego – at present I’m in Atlanta which happens to be the “default” team that we all land in when we begin a new game in this particular year. (say 1969), so I click on team/lineup , and in the dialogue box which then appears, I scroll down until I reach my chosen team.

The Padres starting line-up now appears, and these are some of the players that I intend to trade off for my draft choices.

First thing I do here, is to count all the players (fielders & pitchers) that I have available to trade, and find that I have 53 in all, which is plenty enough to trade with, since the maximum number I can take from the other 23 teams in the 2 Leagues is a total of 46, my requiring (by self-imposed rule) each team to give up one “unprotected” fielder and pitcher, each.

At the end of my drafting, I’ll ensure that the seven guys that I’ll have left over from the original team are the pick of the Padres – the idea is to trade off my deadbeats for their not-quite-deadbeats.

Personally, looking over this particular Padre line-up, I would reserve Jones; Kirby; Podres; and Caldwell; who were all good pitchers in real life, plus rl big hitter Nate Colbert, and a couple of young catchers, -NOT the first-stringer, Canizzaro – who can field well.

You’ll find that the pickings are lean, when it comes to unprotected pitchers and catchers, when drafting from the other teams

To ensure that I can get the players that I want from the other teams, I now click on League/Options/ Commissioner which mode enables me to do all kinds of cheery tweaking to the game.

For now, I just wish to strong-arm the competition into giving up some of its lesser players, so I click on Players/Trades and my team now appears, with another team below “Washington Senators”. This will be the first team that I’ll draft from.

As in real life, I’ll respect the “protected” and “rookie” rule.
For me, the first eight of the Senators’ batters, and the first seven of its pitchers will be “protected”…any fielder, and/or pitcher I scroll down upon after that, will be fair game, save if he be a rookie who has played not even one game in the major leagues (pink lines denote a “vet”, only blue lines appearing, shout “hands off!”)

In short. I pick Gary Holman, the best of a poor selection, because of his fielding & split-batting stats (I study the stats only in scouting reports, ignoring the text, which I consider to be mostly rubbish, and wish that BM would scrub, allowing us to write our own)

In return, I’ll give up catcher Canizzaro, whom I’d already resolved to sack ‘cos of his poor fielding – wiser heads than mine opine that a leaky catcher can undo one’s entire pitching corps.

Normally, the AI team could yea or nay the trade, but, in “Commissioner” mode, it has no choice. I click “Add to deal” for each of the respective players, then “Force Trade” and the switch is made – you’ll now find Holman to be the last in YOUR line of fielders, with Canizzaro, gone.

I now scroll down past the first seven “protected” Senator pitchers, and find one or two, not-bad relievers, however I was hoping to snag a starter, but no joy here – the Washington unprotected starting pitchers are either ineligible (true-blue) or inept (engorged ERAs)… so..

Back to the batters, a rule, strictly of my own, in expansion drafting, is, if that I can’t have one each of a pitcher or batter, from a particular team, then I’ll go for either two hitters, or two hurlers.

But the Senatar’s hitters look no better than they did the first time around, so, in the end, I decided to defer my final pick from Washington, until I see how I do with the other picks from the expansion draft.

So, I scroll up to the next team, St Louis Cards to take two picks from them….and so it goes, until I’ve grabbed two players each, from the 23 teams of my competitors.

I hope this helps.

[Big Mikey]

Thanks, I'll have to decide who's to use either your's or beerchaser's but either way thanks for the help.