1985 Amateur Draft

[Clay]

Processed the trade and forced the pick. Dallas on the board.

[Delandis]

I agree that there should be some variation, but what we are seeing here is ridiculous. I didn't just make up the quote from my scout about Payne, though that option would have been particularly attractive if the scout hadn't actually said it and I'd thought of it, since Spot is already in morning over Tardiff.

There are no examples from MLB in which one scout sees a player as a solid mid-first rounder and another says - "Simply hopeless at the plate. This guy is as close to an automatic out as you can get."

Maybe the fact that this is a carryover league from OOTP 2008 has screwed things up for this first year only, but if this is what we can expect in the future, the game gets an "F", in my opinion, for this change.

I have to disagree.

We have yet to play OOTP 9 multi-player enough to discern any particular pattern(good or bad) from the scouts. IMO, there has been a general consensus about how types of scouts view players. Between 24 scouting staffs, there has been some agreement that certain players will be at least decent. The disagreement is about the ceiling of development which seems appropriate. There few sure things in any sport. I don't think Chicago knew MJ was going to be MJ when it was all said and done. That can go for nearly every star in every league. Then for every MJ there's a like 10 Sam Bowies and this fact is magnified in baseball by like 5 times due to the size of the rosters. I just think you have to give it a chance before you send it down the crapper.

[Jistic]

I just noticed that the Tobs drafted...



Glad to see he put his comedy career on hold to chase his dream.

[Pat]

Glad to see he put his comedy career on hold to chase his dream.

I did a search on his wiki page and saw nothing about baseball.

[Jistic]

I did a search on his wiki page and saw nothing about baseball.

You didn't search the BLB Wiki obviously. It's 1985 in the BLB universe, anything is possible!

[mahoney2]

We have yet to play OOTP 9 multi-player enough to discern any particular pattern(good or bad) from the scouts. IMO, there has been a general consensus about how types of scouts view players. Between 24 scouting staffs, there has been some agreement that certain players will be at least decent. The disagreement is about the ceiling of development which seems appropriate. There few sure things in any sport. I don't think Chicago knew MJ was going to be MJ when it was all said and done. That can go for nearly every star in every league. Then for every MJ there's a like 10 Sam Bowies and this fact is magnified in baseball by like 5 times due to the size of the rosters. I just think you have to give it a chance before you send it down the crapper.

Once again, this is not about who pans out. If you took every MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL team and had them rank the top 30 prospects, you'd have about 20-25 of the same people in every single list. What your saying is like "Look every team passed on Tom Brady 5 times, including the Patriots!" It just does not hold water. I expect half to 75% of the first rounders to flame out anyways, but when you are taking 24 scouts and they can't all judge a guy within 30% of his ratings, something is wrong. I like the variation, but this is a bit too much. Before, we had a few scouts and you could at least base an opinion, but in this thread you have scouts who are 80's in "Scouting Amateurs" and one thinks one is a sure fire hall of famer and the other thinks he's not even worth being on a A team. This just does not happen in real life in any sport.

[Delandis]

Once again, this is not about who pans out. If you took every MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL team and had them rank the top 30 prospects, you'd have about 20-25 of the same people in every single list. What your saying is like "Look every team passed on Tom Brady 5 times, including the Patriots!" It just does not hold water. I expect half to 75% of the first rounders to flame out anyways, but when you are taking 24 scouts and they can't all judge a guy within 30% of his ratings, something is wrong. I like the variation, but this is a bit too much. Before, we had a few scouts and you could at least base an opinion, but in this thread you have scouts who are 80's in "Scouting Amateurs" and one thinks one is a sure fire hall of famer and the other thinks he's not even worth being on a A team. This just does not happen in real life in any sport.

Where do you see extremes like that?

Best Example:

Chet Stephens drafted by Batavia.
Amateur Scout Rating in Parenthesis

Baltimore Scout(65/FA): 5/4/5
Pawtucket(80/FA): 5/4/5
Windy City(75/FT): 5/4/5
Virginia (65/FT): 7/8/8
Washington(80/FT): 4/5/5
California(75/FT): 8/7/8
Syracuse(70/N): 5/5/6

Batavia's scout is 65 and FA but likely saw the same thing that VA and Cali saw. Now I know this is just one guy but this is a perfect example what you say isn't happening. There is some consesus that this guy is going to be at least decent. Obviously Cali, VA, and Batavia all think that he's going to be the truth, but looking at this I would guess that he'll be better than average, but not great. Syracuse's scout is likely dead on. By your own estimation, baseball scouts are comparable to batting averages. The very best scouts are right just 30 to 50% of the time while the lower end scouts are right 15-25% of the time. If that's true I do not see how its unlikely that two good scouts can disagree about the potential of a player. And even so, using Stephens and Hererra as examples, it looks like that's the exception and not the rule.

[Delandis]

To add to this, everyone has different scouting budgets. This too will skew the "reports" you get from your scouting director. I know a lot of people were stuck at 1.5 million where I was able to do 2.5 million. That's 66% budget increase. There are definitely going to be differences in opinions when the budgets there drastic differences in funding.

[Pat]

Baltimore Scout(65/FA): 5/4/5
Pawtucket(80/FA): 5/4/5
Windy City(75/FT): 5/4/5
Virginia (65/FT): 7/8/8
Washington(80/FT): 4/5/5
California(75/FT): 8/7/8
Syracuse(70/N): 5/5/6

Also don't forget that our scouting is only single digits.

Those scouts that have him rated 5/4/5, could actually be something like 58/48/58.

[Riverman]

I think two better examples than Stephens are Pepe Rodriquez at 5 and Jared Williamson at 10. Pat's 80 scout has neither of these guys in his top 60 players. I had Williamson at 7-5-5 (Pat 4-3-4) and would have gone with either him or Herrera if I had had the top pick. My scout says of Williamson "as close to a can't miss prospect as you can get". There is no way there would be that much variation of opinion IRL. You can check it out the next time MLB drafts if you want.

Wtih regard to the scouting budgets that we just set, those don't apply to this draft class. Everyone had a budget of $2.5 million when this class was generated. Also, you don't have to have any scouting budget at all IRL to get a good read on who the best players are, just pay attention to publically available information and you will know.

[Delandis]

But isn't the OSA the OOTP model for "publically available" information?

OSA may not be wrong, you know. The "publically available" info doesn't have Williamson in the Top 60 either. Your scout could just be wrong. You have to choose whether to put faith in your scout or go with the "publically available," info.

I just don't see a scouting staff, real or virtual, agreeing on who the Top 60 are top to bottom. Especially, if you are looking at a sucess rate between 25% to 50%. It looks like OOTP has hidden any virtual tell that you drafted well. THAT"S a good model of real life scouting and drafting.

[Riverman]

I don't disagree at all that my scout could be wrong. I am only saying that real scouts don't have as much disagreement as we are seeing here.

[Delandis]

You old guys are just resistant to change.

Being new to the series, I'm think that I'm more open than you guys are. I think you guys are just used to having 4 or 5 different scouts to look at a player and make a better decision, which in turn, made drafting "feel" like less of a crapshoot. However, your scouts could have and likely were, wrong as often as they are now. I just, personally, like the idea of not having to micromanage scouting. I'm not trying to tell anyone what they should or shouldn't like, just stating my feelings on it.

[Carlos]

I don't think it's that anyone really hates the new system. The one scouting director of an entire scouting team that you supply a budget for is the more realistic model and I think mostly everyone agrees.

The issue is that there is no clear indication of which player is assumed great and which isn't.

We all know that the MLB Draft is also a crapshoot. Why did Joba Chamberlain not get picked in the Top 10 if everyone knew he had a 98 mph fastball and a plus slider and plus curveball? That's that guy that happens to fall a bit in the first round because that's what happens.

That's one scout saying Joba is a potential 7-7-6 and another saying he's a 7-5-4. It can happen because Joba wasn't exactly lights out in Nebraska.

But, when you take a player like BJ Upton or Joe Mauer everyone knew they would be great ballplayers. Everyone. There is not one scout that said, "Joe Mauer can't hit the barnside of a barn. If he's in your lineup, you better look for an upgrade soon."

That's the issue with the scouting system in OOTP.

There should be a consensus number one pick or at least five guys that everyone knows is going to be good. Maybe that player isn't as good. Things do happen. But, scouts all see the same thing and if a guy hit .460 with 15 homeruns and 70 RBI in his sophomore year in college, every scout is going to love the kid.

Right now, it assumes that this does not happen and that's not realistic.

It's ok when at number 10 I choose a guy like Williamson, a player my scouts found to be in the top 5 of starting pitchers in the draft, and there are some other scouts across the league that think that Williamson is only a top 20. But, when Clay is talking about him being in the top 60, or another saying he wasn't even in the top 60, I mean, wow, that's a huge difference.

My scout had this guy in the Top 5 and for other people there were 55+ pitchers better than him? No one scout could be that wrong or that right.

If Williamson is amazing, then I think it's unfair to a guy like Clay. He passes up on that pitcher because his scout says he's absolute garbage. While my scout just magically saw that he was a good player?

Or if it's the other way around, I wasted a top 10 pick because my scout wasn't realistic enough to see that there were 55 guys better than him?

5, 10, maybe 15 guys better is realistic. But 55? That difference is alarming. That's not realistic. That's just randomness for randomness sake.

Keep in mind that I'm not saying that a guy drafted in the 12th round shouldn't suddenly become a star. I'm not saying that at all. There are diamonds in the rough just as there were players that never reach their potential. But, in all walks of life, in every sport known to man, there is no such thing as a guy that is clearly a 12th round pick being chosen in the 1st round or vice versa because one scout was a super genius or a super idiot.

The disparity is to wide. It needs to be made closer. I'm not saying perfectly close, but closer.

[Delandis]

So at what point is it "realistic" for scouts to have different large differences in opinions? End of the 1st round? 2nd round? 5th round? 10th round?

There is a benchmark for who "should" be chosen in the top 5-20. That is the OSA. I think that its up to you to draft based on who "should" be chosen there and others who your scout says is awesome.