1
Choices were 3:45 pm or 8:30 Thur evening... nothing in between...
Still taking input... anybody can't make it by 3:45 PM PST? ... at least we won't be drafting during the season opener...
AOL GS Sim League Scoring
Justynius did a crackerjack of a job, reconstructing the 1998 Grandstand scoring system from memory... hope he isn't on NZT :- )
..............
When you said, "Shame nobody wrote down that scoring system," I agreed, because it was easily the most playable fantasy game I've seen.
And your phrasing kind of made something go DING in my addled mind...
Went out to the garage and fished out a 1999 Macintosh... in it, I'd saved the 1998 Grandstand points leaders...
Was an interesting experiment trying to reconstruct the points, because GS used to publish those lists with a few columns missing :- ) such as R and GIDP... Hey, Ghost, isn't there an Excel function, or some site on the net, that could take a table like fantasy points leaders, their categories and points, and automatically extract the formula used to find the final column points?
.............
Still, this is within 10% for hitters and within 2% for pitchers, and where it varies it's probably closer to real-life value:
HITTING
+1 1B
+2 2B
+3 3B
+4 HR
+1 R
+1 RBI
+1 BB
-1 K
+1 SB
-1 CS
(Also -1 E, +1 infield assist, I think)
.
And
PITCHING
+10 W
-5 L
+10 QS
+5 CG
+10 SV
-5 BS
+1 IP
+1 K
-1 BB
-1 ER
-0.25 H (that doesn't sound right but it makes the points work)
+3 or +5 HLD
.
This system created nicely proportional impacts on a weekend's matchup - for example, a Felix lockdown would give you 30 or 35 points; a closer save would give you what, 15?, and a nice hold by a Brandon League would give you 7 or 8...
A big game by a hitter might give you 10 points or so...
I'll go put this system up in the SSI Smackdown and you can see what you think of the results.
.
=== SABR Corner, Dept. ===
I would actually defend this system as much more sabermetric than it appears at first glance.
Baseball is about bases gained and bases lost. There is also a thumb on the scale for coordinating those bases to get the 4th base, home plate, so a little bonus for R and RBI is appropriate IMHO.
........
The SB/CS values "should" be +1 and -2, but ..... hold on. Giving "extra" points to SB's encourages you to draft fast players .... and in real life, those fast players give you hidden bases taking first to third, right?
.........
Sportswriters sniff at the concept of "Quality Starts," but MLB managers from McGraw to LaRussa have regarded QS part of the fabric of their strategy.
You get a QS on Friday night, your chances of winning approach 70%, with no other information. I call that a relevant stat.
xFIP does not capture [Quality x Quantity / Single Event-Game I/O Outcome]. QS yields useful information.
.........
Anyway, the game wasn't perfect, but played fast and smooth and the owners had a lot of confidence that UP seasons by MLB players would pay off in Grandstand championships.
.
=== The Weekly Format ===
Hey Justin - we forgot -
Grandstand used to award 3 wins per series, not one: A point for pitching, a point for hitting, and an overall point.
Don't s'pose we can do that?
A big part of the playability was trying to salvage a 1-2 loss on a bad series, or trying for a big 3-0 blasting of your rival when things were rolling.
It also prevented owners from rolling out imbalanced teams.
.........
It also ran matchups from Mon-Thur and Fri-Sun, with the result that you'd have 6 (legitimate) W's and L's per week ... The 1998 regular season had MajorSlug, BABVA and Men Behaving Badly (Justin) all in the 84-51 range.
.
Fun stuff,
Jemanji
Comments
2
Put the above in place with the following tweaks:
+0.5 per DP turned, -0.5 for E ... gives infielders a moderate boost, and correlates somewhat with range and hands are you kidding me? Yahoo gives this credit to 1B's too?; let's try +0.25 for assists ... okay, 0.15 .... grrrrr, 1B's like Cabrera go through the roof. Forget that.
-2 per HR, as Justin's suggestion - a saber concession
Lemme know how it looks ...
3
I forgot about assists! That used to bump up the Alomars and Jeters to around #3 overall material, and ensure the Rey Sanchezes make someone's starting lineup.
I seem to recall the pitching category was HR's allowed and not Hits.
There doesn't appear to be a way in Yahoo to have a win for Hitting, Pitching, and Overall unfortunately.
4
I don't understand why Yahoo is giving 1B credit for DPs when they're on the receiving end, not the starting end. I think that most fantasy scoring engines score a DP only if the player got an assist on it. That sometimes costs a MIF a DP if it's unassisted, but fixes the bigger problem of giving 1B credit. You ought to be able to pick and choose which positions get scored for which fielding stats. OFs should get +2 for every +1 an infielder gets for an assist, for example. And 1B shouldn't get any fielding credit at all unless you can find a way to score 1B unassisted putouts.
5
I can make either time, but wouldn't a lot of people be working at 3:45 PT?
Are divisions necesarry? If we're going to have divisions, I'd rather have two with me, Doc, Justin, Sandy, Coug, and Matt in the same division.
6
I like the system, though it looks like we could still tweak it a bit. I use GIDP as an equalizer for defense+baserunning. A lot of quick players don't have good SB/CS numbers, but they usually don't ground out very much. It helps increase the value of MIs and keep power hitters down a bit.
The value of XBH is a bit high, so maybe increase the value of runs scored instead of PAs.. Also an equalizer for quick MIs that aren't likely to get RBI.
We could adjust pitching W/Ls and QS down if it hurts the offensive numbers too much, although it shouldn't be a problem because runs scored benefit power hitters too..
I think closers are too valuable.. I'm alright with there being inflated value in SVs, but 4 of the top 10 pitchers last year were closers under that system. It turns into a situation where you can nab an elite player mid-season simply because a manager slaps a 'closer' label on a player. SVs being closer to 8 would create a little more balance..
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I know that a lot of you guys like the "closer hunt"...but to me, that ruins the draft. I literally get a sick feeling when I see the "closer run" begin...and there's one in every draft. LOL
I would like to see saves dropped to 8, Hlds upped to 6, GIDPs inserted with a significant negative value and Run value set to 2 instead of 1 (to help table setters and little players gain value and compete)...
8
Someone dropped out..We need one more owner.
9
Kind of a bad thing to do at the last minute...I understand the time change may have messed up some schedules.
BTW, I cannot stand Yahoo's pre-ranking system. I pre-rank by position...not in an overall order...I will not prerank in an overall order because the order changes depending on who's drafted what in which rounds...but Yahoo doesn't allow you to pre-rank by position. And worse...it doesn't allow you to pre-rank more players than your league can draft. I prerank DEEPLY to have contingency plans in case one position gets hit particularly hard in the draft. But I can't do that here either. Which means if we have to move the draft to this weekend, I have no way to pre-rank in a way that I would be comfortable with and would set it to Y! default and enjoy finishing in dead last (probably).
Ugh
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Pat Grenko will be joining us shortly. :-) Doc, we should lock the rosters just in case once he joins..
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Was going to set up the Washington Seligs if we hadn't gotten an owner. Computer draft + league management of the roster in-season. :- ) Was kind of looking forward to it.
But that's fine, Myst it is.
... "Lock the rosters"? Meaning? ... set to 12 teams max?
12
Yahoo has a "finalize team list" feature or something, that prevents owners from joining *or leaving*. Basically, it allows you to hold your current owners hostage. Taro is well aware of this feature because I did it to him for the 20-team league.
13
Love the deadpan.
...........
Did find that 'finalize teams' link. ... if a team or two doesn't show, we'll let the 'bot draft, and either find a replacement owner or run a Washington Seligs operation.
What a realistic sim league that'd be.
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...Justin didn't show but wound up with a good team overall (a little lopsided, but not something he can't fix with a couple of adept trades)...and Sandy's team is alright too even though he was absent...I think all of the owners should be relatively pleased.
15
Yikes, thought we were still on for Saturday! Oh well, you're right - I got autopicked a great team, probably better than if I was actually there
16
Couldn't attend.
One computer.
Wife was doing taxes - not going anywhere NEAR the computer in the scenario.
Besides, I had no chance to do ANY of the stuff I would normally do if actually planning to be competitive - (create spreadsheet with all player stats - plug in league scoring to get 2010, 2009 and 2008 totals for each player - by position, of course. Then manually create a 2011 projection - TOTAL art - no science - based on general feeling of bounce-back, drop-off, change of scenario or PT).
Instead, I eyeballed the default list - juggled a few guys a tiny bit - and tossed out maybe a half dozen codgers I'm convinced were overdue for collapse.
I would've enjoyed doing a live draft - (more talent in reacting to "mass" drafting tendencies than in ranking actual players) - but it just wasn't going to happen, and I didn't have the resources to do a good job had I been there.
Hopefully, I get a team that is at least palatable enough to not be a walk-over.
17
Your roster has some lopsidedness, but so do rosters for guys who drafted live. LOL AL Only certainly challenges you even in a 12-team 20-player league and even if you're rhere to react to the trends in the room.
18
anything with "game" in the headers is firewalled here at work.
Back when I was good at Fantasy Baseball - (mixed points league - 12-team, 25-player - but scoring oddly close to the current format) - I won an "experts" league twice. Each year, I did a post-draft review, and in year 3 and 4, (IMO), every person in the league had gotten stronger.
I basically broke the league from standard "follow the parade" runs on positions - and "self-fulfilling prophecy" edicts that turned even seasoned buffs into drafting automatons.
IMO, the published analyses of "snake drafting" (at least those I've read), are sorely lacking in tactical thinking.
19
Its suprising how it worked out.
It turns out only Justin and Sandy missed the draft and Justin still has one of the best rosters.
Sandy has a good enough base to really turn the team around with some moves.
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The computers weren't very strong, but they did avoid blunders, so could beat the average non-tournament player...
In the second half of the draft, the computers were grabbing the value players that might have otherwise slid to the greedy maw of Dr. D ...
In rounds 12-18, nearly every player Justin's bot grabbed, was on my speed dial ... Escobar and Pierzynski were SS and C needs of mine; Slowey and Baker were Shandlerian starting pitchers, etc.
Glad that Justin rubber-stamps his approval onto his roster - since he takes ownership of the roster as one he judges to be a good one, we can still compete with him this year :- )
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The bot gave him Lackey, Penny, Webb, AJ Burnett .. then Cust...
Didn't do him quite as well as Justin got in rounds 14-20 ... must have been because the evolving player pool did not shape to fit the needs of his roster in the endgame...
So Justin can thank the Serendipity, Baby ... old in-joke that maybe Justin will want to reconsider naming his stadium by...
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3rd - Verlander
4th - Markakis (a cleanup hitter in this system)
8th - Span (lot of people needed a CF by that time)
9th - Escobar (I was getting stressed about MI in those rounds :- ) )
17th - Nova IN THE 17TH? GRRRrrrrrrrr...
Can honestly say there were only 2-3 guys who were taken late and (because of the speed of the draft) I went "What? He was still in the pool?" ... of which Nova was the most egregious...
Good drafting champ...
23
Hi Jemanji,
I was very excited to see that some people were still discussing the Grandstand Fantasy games. I was the creator of the baseball game you were been trying to piece together online. I was one of the founders of The Grandstand and when we sold to AOL I became their employee. You may have dealt with me, but more likly GSFS John (Da Commish)?
These posts brought back such great memories. We spent many nights piecing together what the game should look like and act like - keeping just one thing in mind - member experience. Did the game look like you were entering a something more than just a numbers game? We had the nice front page and wanted people to select their lineup by choosing their staters listed on a playing field - not a blank white page. We wanted wins and losses - so every series starts you off fresh. Most of all, we wanted a point system that made sense. We wanted there to be a reason to have a slick fielding SS - maybe he is a weak bat but his true value might be equal to someone batting 50 pts higher.
When I left AOL they brought in new people that bought in to this idea that eyeballs meant more than real cash. They wanted to create a generic game and sell a sponsor to Sears - the deal fell through. And it got worse from there....oh well.
THANK YOU for remembering this game. I loved building it as a fan and for our members - I am so happy you enjoyed it and still do.
Scott Axelrod
ScottAxelrod579@gmail.com
Stag5@aol.com - but I never use that anymore :)
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Your game design was just wonderful. In every category -- GUI, scoring system, season management, everything -- it was slick, addictive, easy to play and yet substantial.
How many players did you have at the peak of the GS system?
Would be terrific if there were any way to launch a v2.0 of your game. I'll bet you could get quite a business rolling.
....
Anyway, thanks for the fond memories. I made a lot of friends over that game.
- Jeff
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Jeff, I don't remember how many players we had at its peak. The Grandstand itself had over 1MM members each month.
The industry is now so scaled, watered down and impossible to market to over the big boys. It takes the old-school, hard core players like yourself to appreciate a game that is built for member experience.
I miss the good old days too. Remember though, the best games are about the members that play in it - not the game itself. I', sure your leagues today are fantastic :)
ScottAxelrod579@gmail.com
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GSFS Commish here... amazing what Google will dredge up when you go searching for some nostalgia, isn't it?
The Grandstand had over 1mm members in the community. We had roughly 35k players per year in GSFS Baseball.
Dividing each week into two "series" made sure people thought a lot about draft strategy, rathre than just grabbing the best player available. Players could stack hitters or pitchers, but you had to make sure you were targeting the Overall as well if you wanted to come out of the series with at least a 2-1 record.
Working with Scott, Jason, Kevin, Amy and Jimmy on the Grandstand was one of the best experiences of my life. I *believe* we created the first live online fantasy draft tool with chat in the industry.