FAQ: How Sparky Uses His Bullpen (2012 Update) - Page 3 - SimLeague Baseball

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Contrarian, your explanations make a lot of sense, until something comes up that is completely unexplainable. In my most reason league, my starting pitcher got ejected from the game in the second inning for arguing balls and stikes. I have never seen that before. SParky cycles through my relief staff until it gets to my second to last relief pitcher - a fatigued long reliever (85%) with a MPC of 10 pitches. Sparky lets him pitch 2 innings, allow 16 runs and throw 75 pitches before bringing in another pitcher. I do not understans this at all.

1/4/2013 8:26 AM

contrarian23

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I don't believe there is ever an "unexplainable" decision. In every single case I am aware of in which (a) Sparky has made an "unusual" decision and (b) a support ticket has been sent inquiring as to why - it has always turned out that there is a very logical explanation. The most common ones are (a) pitchers were fatigued and therefore not available (b) the settings were not what the owner thought they were (forgot to check a relief box, forgot to set a pitch count, etc).

If I could give newbies one piece of advice on the bullpen it would be this: if you find that your relievers are being used in unexpected ways, or counter to your instructions, there is always a logical reason for it. There are absolutely no documented errors to the algorithm - no instances where Sparky says "I know the instructions say to use Pitcher X, but I'm going to use Pitcher Y anyway."

I say no "documented" errors deliberately. If anyone has concrete evidence of an error in the algorithm - and has the support ticket response from admin to prove it - please post that here so that we can understand what the error is.

2/16/2013 9:03 PM

contrarian23

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Bump for:
(a) relevance
(b) an update as to how Sparky chooses between 2 pitchers with the same setting (appears to be based on OAV)
(c) to thank sincerely the kind soul who deemed it necessary to negative-rate all of my recent posts. So clever of you. Your generosity, maturity, and contributions to the site are an inspiration to all of us.

3/7/2013 6:10 AM (edited)

skunk206

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Posted by contrarian23 on 2/16/2013 9:07:00 PM (view original):
Bump for:
(a) relevance
(b) an update as to how Sparky chooses between 2 pitchers with the same setting (appears to be based on OAV#)
(c) to thank sincerely the kind soul who deemed it necessary to negative-rate all of my recent posts. So clever of you. Your generosity, maturity, and contributions to the site are an inspiration to all of us.

(b) has always appeared to me to be OAV, not OAV#

2/19/2013 12:08 AM

contrarian23

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Corrected.

3/7/2013 6:10 AM

contrarian23

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bump.... I've seen too many complaints recently about Sparky's use of the mop up.

If your mop up pitcher was brought into the game in a situation that you do not believe warranted it, it is ALWAYS because no other option was available to him at the time.

Specifically, it is very likely that one of the following was true:
-- Your other pitchers were fatigued below their autorest (this is most often the case...and when you look AFTER the game, the pitcher you think should have been used may now be at 100%, but before the game - which of course you can no longer see - he was at 94, and you set his autorest to 95)
-- Your other rested pitchers were set to come in later in the game (if you set "inning available" = 7 and it's the 6th inning, then you have effectively told Sparky to use the mop up rather than this pitcher)
-- Your other rested pitchers were already used in the game (surprisingly common....user whines "why didn't Sparky use Eckersley" and what do you know, Eckersley was already used earlier in the game)
-- Your pitcher was ejected (yup, it happens)
-- Your pitcher was pinch hit for
-- Your pitcher reached his pitch count
-- You just brought up the pitcher from AAA or from the waiver wire or via trade and forgot to check his relief box
-- Etc, etc, etc.

The point is, there is always a reason, based on YOUR settings. It's not a glitch.

8/4/2015 10:35 AM

winnetka1

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Thanks for the bump. I needed to read this.

9/12/2015 4:46 PM

contrarian23

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For those who may be seeing this for the first time...these are the most important sentences in the original series of posts:

In summary, Sparky will manage according to your instructions EXACTLY as you have provided them to him. He is not going to override them, no matter how much you may want him to, or how much you think “common sense” should dictate otherwise, unless he has no other options.

This is the most important point in this entire thread: Sparky’s use of the bullpen is extremely logical. By “logical” I don’t necessarily mean that every decision Sparky makes is exactly the way I would make it, or you would make it, or a real manager would make it. By “logical” I mean that WIS has programmed him with very specific rules about which pitchers to use, in which order of priority, based on inning and score differential AND YOUR SETTINGS. There are – as far as I know – absolutely no documented glitches in this part of the algorithm. There is no line of code that says “bring the mop up in the late innings of a tie game, even if other better (and fully rested) pitchers are available.” So, if you find that in fact Sparky did bring in a mop up in that situation, it’s always because he had no other options available based on the instructions you gave him.

I see this happen in almost every league I am in...someone at some point will complain "SIM brings in mop up in crucial situation instead of guy I think he should have used instead." I even see, surprisingly, very experienced owners ***** about this from time to time. When this happens, it is 100% due to your settings, not due to any glitch in the system, and certainly not due to WIS's algorithm randomly deciding to screw your team over.

3/14/2016 3:10 PM

d_rock97

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I've complained about that before, then I realized that I had accidentally set all my pitchers to come in in the 9th inning.

3/14/2016 10:09 PM

crimsonblue

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Also on the 'team center' page, there is a tiny thing called 'edit user settings' Where you can construct your usage ratios. My experience here is that 90% of the people here have never ever adjusted this.

3/15/2016 1:11 AM

contrarian23

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crimson, I believe that all those settings do is influence how the WIS engine sets your recommended pitch counts. If the default value for closer usage is 35%, then WIS assumes that the closer will be used in roughly 1/3 of your games...this is how they figure out what pitch count to recommend for your closer. I do not believe those settings influence, for example, how often Sparky uses any particular pitcher.

Since I always manually set my own pitch counts anyway, I have never bothered to change those settings.

If you have a different understanding, can you post how you think it works?

3/15/2016 4:39 AM

crimsonblue

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Posted by contrarian23 on 3/15/2016 4:39:00 AM (view original):
crimson, I believe that all those settings do is influence how the WIS engine sets your recommended pitch counts. If the default value for closer usage is 35%, then WIS assumes that the closer will be used in roughly 1/3 of your games...this is how they figure out what pitch count to recommend for your closer. I do not believe those settings influence, for example, how often Sparky uses any particular pitcher.

Since I always manually set my own pitch counts anyway, I have never bothered to change those settings.

If you have a different understanding, can you post how you think it works?

I was a little vague and unspecific. That's my understanding of the section you mention as well. To echo your point, my main point was about the 'Default Autorest values' section. Many don't make adjustments and expect pitchers to enter a game well below these preset values.

3/15/2016 9:06 AM

combalt

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I'm going to post a support ticket, and box score here as contrarian requested. This is a case of 'sparky' using the MOP when he shouldn't have as confirmed in the support ticket.

In the 9th inning of this game. Clay Bryant who is a set as MOP was brought in to pitch in the 9th inning with the lead even though the 'use mop up only when losing' WAS checked and the 'use closer only in save situation' WAS NOT checked.

Link to box score
https://www.whatifsports.com/slb/Boxscore.aspx?gid=27303295&pid=1&pbp=0&tf=10

Here is the support ticket I submitted and the response:

10/2/2016 4:10 AM	combalt
Please see the 9th inning of this game. Clay Bryant who is a set as MOP was brough in to pitch in the 9th inning even though the 'use mop up only when losing' IS checked and the 'use closer only in save situation' is NOT checked. Seems like Dizzy Dean should have come in to pitch in the 9th inning there based on my settings. Thoughts? Explanations? Thanks
10/3/2016 10:06 AM	Customer Support
Hi Com, We will review this to see why the Sim brought in a mopup when you had the lead instead of your closer. Thanks.
10/10/2016 2:53 PM	Customer Support
For this game, the only option the manager had (due to pitcher roles and auto rest settings) was to bring in a Mopup pitcher or closer. Currently, the "Use Closer in Save Situations Only" setting doesn't focus on the non-save situation if ahead by more than 4 runs but more of the "tie game" situation (i.e. tied 4-4 in 9th). This is a good example for it to be a bit more than that. We will investigating this logic further and most likely make an adjustment. Thanks for bringing this to our attention.
10/13/2016 4:20 AM	combalt
Thanks for the response. Are you guys ok if I post our exchange in the forum so others are aware of the issue in one of the appropriate threads in the forum? Marty
10/14/2016 9:36 AM	Customer Support
Sure. Thanks!

10/22/2016 2:35 AM (edited)

doctorcc

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1) is there any actual reason so many posts here have low ratings? This seems quite useful to me.

2) anyone have any actual success with RHS/LHS? If sparky considers matchups in choosing the next pitcher this role isn't especially necessary, is it? Every time I've tried pitchers in this role they hardly ever get used.

4/19/2017 4:17 PM

uncleal

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Posted by doctorcc on 4/19/2017 4:17:00 PM (view original):
1) is there any actual reason so many posts here have low ratings? This seems quite useful to me.

2) anyone have any actual success with RHS/LHS? If sparky considers matchups in choosing the next pitcher this role isn't especially necessary, is it? Every time I've tried pitchers in this role they hardly ever get used.

1) A lot of people will troll and will downvote good posts for no real reason. It's part of why I set my threshold to -5 -- I see all posts no matter how bad the "rating" is.

2) RHS/LHS are more of a way to use the 25-35 IP pitchers that can't really be used for a more challenging role than anything else. I also notice they rarely get into a game. I never use them unless, as mentioned, I have a reason to get one of these low-inning pitchers and need to leverage them as a setup-type RP -- which is extremely rare.

4/19/2017 6:34 PM

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