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A friend posted something from something called Somworld. It has a Mets slant. Is it pertinent to the main baseball page?
"Spitballing #2
Winning With Pitching
September 25, 2018
Many Strat-O-Matic baseball games are decided in the late innings. The starters get you to the fifth or sixth, then it's up to the bullpen to close it out or seal the deal.
Handling pitchers in Strat has changed over the past decade. Whereas you saw rosters with (18 hitters, 12 pitchers) a decade ago now you see teams with (14 hitters, 16 pitchers) or even (13 hitters, 17 pitchers). One reason is it’s harder getting the GS and IP totals from 10 to 15 years ago.
2007
38 pitchers at 200+ IP
Average pitcher – 66 IP
2017
15 pitchers at 200+ IP
Average pitcher – 59 IP
What else do we know? Bullpens are still unpredictable from season to season. The Indians and Dodgers had the number 2 and 3 bullpens for the 2017 season. They currently rank number 27 and 16 for the 2018 season. Restocking the bullpen is an annual feature for Strat managers when around comes draft day.
The bullpen is usually an easy fix in Strat. Gather three to four picks in rounds three or four and you can cobble something worthwhile together. The 2018 draft was a little more interesting given the higher number of unbalanced relievers or cards with high 7 to 8 HR units on them. Those cards are problematic for medium and high-leverage situations. One wrong roll of the 4-5, 4-9, or 5-9 pitcher column and the lead might be gone.’
You need 6 or 7 RP cards in the bullpen. The strength of the rotation will be a key factor in ascertaining "how much" you need in the bullpen. The real question in this matter is the IP total. As baseball becomes more and more specialized, and as we see teams plucking young players out of the minors for limited or emergency use, it gets harder and harder to have the 60+ IP cards. That is an important strategy consideration: "How many innings will I get out of this card?" Every draft has 200 to 250 player debuts. There are lot of cards that comes into draft leagues. Some of them have low IP totals for many seasons before you finally get something of value. That’s why relievers are best viewed as current value propositions.
The Somworld theory on pitchers is that low OB/TB scores, with K units, represents the best source of value. That said, moderate OB cards can work in many bullpen situations if there are limited TB and/or HR units. Nothing will kill a lead or ruin team fortunes faster than RP cards with straight HR or high BP units. The Armando Benitez cards from 10 years ago are a good example. The stats on paper looked phenomenal but Benitez had a problem with the long ball. It killed the Strat card. The same thing is true of Huston Street. Take off the HR units and his cards would be a completely different subject.
There are many ways to organize the bullpen.
1. Closer
2. Set Up (2) (LH-RH)
3. Seventh Inning
4. Sixth inning.
5. Long Relief
6. Lefty Specialist
Never skimp or ignore the LH specialist RP card. There will be a day and time when you bring in the lefty specialist. Hopefully it is in the playoffs when you have runners on base. You get the out and that’s the reason you drafted the card back in January or February. The RH columns may stink up the bullpen but there will be a point in the season or playoffs, even for 1 hitter, where you need the card with "nothing" on the LH side. You always need to have at least 1 LH card for those critical situations.
The real bullpen composition key, however, is not only the roles but the balance ratings. Theoretically, the balance should be an average of 0 or at least 1L or 1R. Having a bullpen with the 5R, 1L, 2R, 2L, 1L, and 1R looks like a balanced group. It's good to have the 9L or 9R for a one-off hitter (in theory) but you'd like to have as many cards between the 2L and 2R range as possible. This range means you probably must make fewer moves in the last few innings.
Injuries are probably more of an issue with starters. As mentioned, these guys are not pitching the same number of innings, so you probably need 8 or 9 SP cards just for depth on the roster. But you can go back to the New York Mets and see the devastation that happens with injuries.
Pre-Injury Matt Harvey was one of the top SP cards in Strat draft leagues. He came back and had a fine 2015 NL championship season. Then it’s been a rough stretch for Strat owners, enough so where you just want to cut the cord back to the free agent pool. Noah Syndergaard has been one of the best pitchers in baseball in terms of combining dominance and control. He throws hard and he also hits his location. That’s a rare feat in the game. He’s also made it to 30 starts once in four seasons. Is there a durability question or a run of bad luck? What happens for the Strat owners is that you need an additional SP card or arm to make it through the season. Steven Matz is another guy who missed a lot of games. He’s about 30 starts behind in usage for his 4 Strat games. Jacob DeGrom missed a little time in 2016 but he’s the only consistent pitcher for the Mets. Plus, he’s hit 200+ innings for two straight seasons. That gives DeGrom considerable draft league value. Zack Wheeler is the fifth guy in this group. He throws hard, has good control, and he keeps the ball down. That’s something that helps with the Strat card. His injuries to the degree he based missed most of the 2015 to 2017 seasons.
Looking at this over several seasons, the Mets have/had a fantastic rotation. They have five players capable of posting a number one or two starter cards in Strat leagues. If you total up the injuries in recent seasons we’re looking at 5 or 6 missing years of 30+ starts. What is worse, sometimes these guys came back and ending up having very tough stretches of results (Harvey, Matz).
In Strat, we literally have no choice but to load up on pitchers. Six or seven RH pitchers. At least two LH pitchers. Strat managers are mixed on the use of LH SP cards. Some can’t get enough of them. Others avoid them like the plague. Our general though if you have a LH SP card with under 25 OB, 32 TB, 3 HR, then they should work out fine in the medium and larger leagues. At the very least, you always encounter a few teams with poor LH lineup options. These are the times when those cards come in as handy. The 8 and 12-team affairs are usually turkey shoots. You weed out the mediocre and poor cards and you have teams with no holes in the lineup and a solid rotation top to bottom.
Even if a pitcher has a bad card (Sonny Gray, 2018) you keep him around for a while in the hope that he reverts to previous form. Very few SP cards maintain their value over multiple sets. Having 8 SP cards means you’ll have a greater opportunity for having 4 to 5 useable cards heading into the draft. It is very rare that the 5 SP cards you have in one set will be the same 5 SP cards that you have in the next one. Pitchers have a shelf life. The arm has so many pitches in it. Everyone would like a Greg Maddux or Nolan Ryan in terms of durability. Sometimes you get a Tim Lincecum and it’s a limited number of elite cards.
One of the “rules†at the start of SOMWORLD is that rookie pitchers take a lot of time to develop. That’s not necessarily true in this day in age. Sometimes it’s correcting an issue. Go back to thoughts on Blake Snell in 2016 and 2017. He’s throwing too many pitches, missing the strike zone, and he’s not going deep in games. The Blake Snell in 2017 suddenly found his command. His walk rate dropped from 5.2 in 2016 to 3.1 in 2018. It’s no wonder he’s having a much better season. It doesn’t hurt that his pitches are sharper. We’ve watched him make Adrian Beltre look foolish on a high fastball and then coming back and killing him with a curve. Snell is just 25 and he now has his control. His Strat value has gone through the roof.
The good SP cards don't take a tremendous amount of time to develop. They're usually good from the start or they need a small number of seasons to make the necessary adjustments and additions to their pitch quality or consistency. Three to four years into the career you're going to see what you're going to see. In other words, the developmental time for good pitchers is not very long. Jack Flaherty and Walker Buehler are two recent examples. The rookie seasons established them as prime pitchers.
Josh Hader and Edwin Diaz are under 24 and they represent two of the best relievers in baseball. Buehler, Flaherty, Snell, Lance McCuellers, Jose Barrios, Jamie Barria, Aaron Nola, Luis Severino, Syndergaard are under 25. These guys have the potential for throwing out “ace†cards for at least the next 5 to 7 seasons if they stay healthy.
New Drafting Rules
1. Obtain position player cards with a high probability of AB accumulation. Position players usually operate within a specific range of high and low results. Make sure these players have the potential for multiple seasons of contributions.
2. Fill in needed bullpen spots with an eye to balanced cards with low HR/TB totals.
3. Draft at least 2 to 3 rookie SP cards in any draft. You never know when one of them with correct or improve in some area and then they’ll have a breakout season.
Do number 1, then it is much easier to do numbers 2 and 3. The rebuild is much quicker. So is your stay at the top of the league."
Later
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