RiggoDrill wrote:HARDESTY wrote:...I'm fairly new to this (17 leagues, I think, in about 3 years). Anyone know if the RP overuse a recent development or a longtime problem?
A longtime problem.
The first edition of the online game - the
2001 season - included two spectacular
R2 cards (Mariano Rivera & Keith Foulke)
priced over 10.00M. People complained about the extremely high prices for top relievers, but whoever did the original pricing obviously understood how those cards could be used.
SOMO responded to complaints by significantly dropping salaries for top relievers in the
2002 player set. Libertarian managers responded by regularly cranking
250+ inning seasons from those
R2 cards and have been (in the
20XX) game ever since.
Early editions of
ATG included far fewer top reliever cards, so for a long time, this was not an issue. In recent years, however, the proliferation of top reliever cards in the
ATG game has changed that calculus. Managers have learned that top RP cards with
R3 & R4 endurance ratings can crank out 350+ quality innings, frequently yielding 30-win seasons from the bullpen.
Whether or not you like those aesthetics is a personal judgment. That said, from a salary standpoint, those cards are worth between 15.00 and 18.00M when used that way, thus breaking the salary structure which underlies the competitiveness of the game.
Many people - myself included - have quit the game (at least for a time) in frustration. In particular, new players - who are much less likely to participate in private leagues - will be watching experienced managers beat up on them using this seemingly absurd strategy. IMO, that's a lousy way to sell the game to newbies.
Over the years, SOM has added a lot of great enhancements to the online game, but those are all window dressing compared to this MASSIVE gap.
As a business decision, I would guess the failure to address this issue - for the last 18 years - has cost SOM a lot of money.