All-Star Formulation

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sixofdiamonds
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All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

A new formula to determine men's and coed league all-stars has been proposed to help determine 2018 all-stars for 2019. This new formula is based on the equation RUNC (runs created) divided by G (Games Played). The original formula, the one the league has been using since 1999, takes into account R%, RBI%, AVG, SLG, and BB%. Please notice the numbers used for the original formula are percentages and not totals.

The men's and coed lists are typically posted by now. I have yet to post them because I want to hear from league members as to which formula they feel is better suited to indicate all-stars. The last thing I want to do is turn all-stars into non-all-stars and vice versa.

I formulated 4 lists- two each for the men's and coed players with 36 or more at-bats. I formulated 2 lists for each league (men's and coed). One list contains the top 100 using the original formula and the other list contains the top 100 using the RUNC/G formula. 88 players in the men's leagues were on each list. 12 were different. 90 players in the coed leagues were on each list. 10 were different.

Below you will find the names of the different players from each list formulated. Only stats from the 2018 calendar year were used in the formulation.

Men's league players included in Formula 1, but not included in Formula 2.
Bill Shallcross
Brennan Rudnick
Brian Kosik
Brian Maguire
Jay Cowan
Justin Glennon
Justin Miller
Nick Perez
Ryan Russell
Ryan Tessler
Shane Galloway
Tom Campbell

Men's league players included in Formula 2, but not included in Formula 1.
Basil Papanicolopoulos
Brian Maguire
Dan Vescovi
Dave Carson
Dave Grube
Jack Stepnowski
Jim Cooker
Jim Walker
Joe Kindt
Mike Brown
Ray Rocks
Troy Radcliff

Coed league players included in Formula 1, but not included in Formula 2.
Axel Alicea
Bill Hare
Dave Buonomo
Ed Sheehan
Glenn Strattis
Greg Hess
Joe Robinson
Joshua Graef
Shawn Pfleger
Tom Rider

Coed league players included in Formula 2, but not included in Formula 1.

Adam Hebert
Craig Richards
Dan Croak
Ed Reynolds
Glen Hipple
Mark Danouski
Matt Bechtel
Mike Cianfichi
Pat Feliciani
Scott Johnston

What I would like 'in-the-know' league members to do is ask themselves which group of men's and coed league players is more indicative of all-star status. Please remain objective. Try not to let the fact that one or more of your teammates may or may not become an all-star affect your decision. If I can compile enough reliable data, league members will make the decision on which formula to use. If I can't compile enough reliable data, we will default to the original formula.

If you don't feel comfortable posting here, feel free to send an email to the league office.

Thank you for your help!
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sixofdiamonds
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

There cannot and will not be separate all-star lists for A and B league players. There is no feasible way to monitor where players are/will be playing from season to season. Also, some players play both A and B at the same time. I am, however, considering making a stipulation in the league rules that states any player on the list that plays ONLY B division would not be considered an A all-star. In the case of a B ONLY all-star, if any A division team asks the B ONLY all-star to play/sub, he would NOT be considered an all-star. If any B team asks the B ONLY all-star to play/sub, he WOULD be considered an all-star.
Joestheman
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by Joestheman »

Ok, I'll bite. I took a closer, simplified look at the men's list. Brian Maguire is a wash since he's on both. Throw him out (sorry Brian), formula 1 is a better list, though not by much. I didn't go player by player for coed, but I'd say the same thing, formula 1.
Geno8121
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by Geno8121 »

Putting a bandaid on a broken system... Les, we should have a round table and really fix and re do this, you know my thoughts.

I love the effort your putting into the league and appreciate it however let's completely fix it.
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sixofdiamonds
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

Excellent!!! Here's your chance to build a better mousetrap, Geno. Put together a round table meeting. Greg T. is very good with numbers. So is J. Toto. I'm sure there are other numbers gurus in the league that would be happy to help. Come up with a process to formulate and maintain a men's and coed list for 2019. Yearly stats are posted online. So is the current all-star status list. If you plan on scouring through the 2018 seasonal stats to determine A and B players, I can make them available as well.

You and your committee will need to get a move on as managers need the all-star lists so they can put their teams together for 2019. I can give you until the 15th of February. Good luck and have fun with it.
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by Geno8121 »

I'm an expert in satire. I prefer to be paid for my work, however I'd have no issue helping or giving input. Thanks for the generous offer.

Giving an opinion.

Side note - All Star lists for Men is counterproductive in any B LEAGUE, the only time it would be a huge issue is if a group of A players wanted to play Sunday Mens at LUKENS park instead of the Quarry and clean up a division. (Unlikely that ever happens but you gotta prepare right?)

The thing that baffles me is when a B league coed team comes up to A and has to sit an All Star because of restrictions from B leaguers hitting pop ups out of Hatfield.

I've said this a number of times, I'm the perfect example of the rule. My Mens A League stats hover around 480-530, in B league I'm a player of the year candidate. It's a DIFFERENT playing field, it's like measuring 18 year olds in a 15 and under league.

No All Star List for B.

All Star list for A and base it strictly off A league play. Use the new structure that heavily incorporates slugging percentage, extra base hits etc..

:) hope everyone is having a splendid Winter
K Rock
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by K Rock »

formula 1 looks like the better list but I can only speak from a coed perspective.
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sixofdiamonds
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

Gene, your passion for softball is admirable. If you weren't so passionate, you wouldn't give a damn. I know you care and I know you only want to make the league better. I respect that in you. I will now offer you my opinion.
"All Star lists for Men is counterproductive in any B LEAGUE, the only time it would be a huge issue is if a group of A players wanted to play Sunday Mens at LUKENS park instead of the Quarry and clean up a division. (Unlikely that ever happens but you gotta prepare right?"
The reality here is the all-star list in the men's league impacted a total of 3 A league teams last year. In all 4 men's leagues only 3 A teams throughout the entire year had to contend with reaching the all-star limit of 7- JPH, Vertex, and The Commission and each had to deal with it for only 1 season. No B league team came close to reaching the all-star max. I'm not sure how having a B league all-star list is counterproductive.

Men's B league all-stars are necessary, not only to govern the B league balance of power, but to monitor the better B league players that decide to play coed. Without all-star restrictions, coercive managers would steal the better B players from the weaker B teams and dominate the B league. Or, coed managers would grab B league studs and stack their coed teams with non-all-stars, effectively circumventing the coed all-star governor.

I've seen it time and again in leagues I've played in over my softball career. Big fish, small pond syndrome. The small fish get pounded week in and week out. In no time, the pond shrinks to only a few big fish; or the pond becomes very unbalanced and not a lot of fun to swim in. One only needs to look at area leagues to see the exact scenario taking place. In fact, you could see it working first-hand right here at home. The 2018 Sunday Coed A league had shrunk to 3 very powerful teams. As hard as I tried, I couldn't cajole any B league teams to move up. When asked, they would look at me like I had 2 heads. As a result, the Sunday Coed A Division is no more. The all-star restriction can only do so much. Managers need to help by using common sense when building their teams. Is it better to win 25-2 every week for a t-shirt or is it more fun to play in competitive and exciting games week in and week out?
"The thing that baffles me is when a B league coed team comes up to A and has to sit an All Star because of restrictions from B leaguers hitting pop ups out of Hatfield."
In my opinion, that happens in only the rarest of cases. In theory, B teams resist the A league like the plague, regardless of how good they may be on paper. And even if they were good enough during one particular season, players leave, rosters change, and it turns into a mess. As you well know, players pay money to play and the biggest complaint from B leaguers is they don’t want to pay good money to get beat up every week. I completely and entirely understand that. It’s a dilemma- one I’ve been wrestling with for almost 20 years and there really is no cut and dried solution. I wish there was, but there’s no universal fix. I have to bob and weave season to season, year to year to make the majority as happy as I can. The new scheduling format with 2 evenly divided leagues has helped in both the Sunday and Monday Coed leagues. The only other coed league with divisions is the Wednesday Coed league and those divisions haven't changed much in quite some time.
"I've said this a number of times, I'm the perfect example of the rule. My Mens A League stats hover around 480-530, in B league I'm a player of the year candidate. It's a DIFFERENT playing field, it's like measuring 18 year olds in a 15 and under league."
Gene, the last time you played men's A league ball was 2014. Your A league lifetime average/slugging percentages are 548/929. Your B league average and slugging percentages since then are 574/954. Your career RUNS/RBI percentages in the A league are 40/52. Your B league RUNS/RBIS percentages from 2015-2018 are 43/53. While your B league numbers are higher, the difference is negligible. Your personal stats argument holds very little water.
"No All Star List for B."
I am going to give the same consideration to the B league as I do the A league. I will not abandon the lesser B league teams under any circumstances. Just because they are in the B league, it doesn’t make them any less important. I can’t (and won’t) in good conscience, not protect the lesser B teams against other B teams stacking against them. They deserve to face the same balanced competition via an all-star governor as the A league.
"All Star list for A and base it strictly off A league play. Use the new structure that heavily incorporates slugging percentage, extra base hits etc."
You've got that backwards, Gene. The old structure, the one I've been using since 1999, is the one that incorporates R%, RBI%, AVG, SLG, and BB%. The proposed new one bases all-stars strictly off RUNC/G.

I understand what you're saying, Gene. I get it. You feel slighted because you're an all-star in the B league and you don't think it's fair because you feel you don't compare to the likes of the A league best. This may be true, but the all-star list contains 100 names. Obviously, the players listed 1-10 will be a lot better than those listed 91-100. So yes, there is a discrepency in talent from top to bottom, but this is not unfair. It just is.



What I hear most often at the field, even more so than "Hello", is "Les, ya know what you should do...". Some of the league member vanilla ideas (generic and unassuming) are good ones and put into action. Others are contentious, impactful and self-serving and could negatively impact different groups of league members. Even still, if I believe the idea/change is worth it, I will put it in and deal with the repercussions.

For every league action there is a league member reaction. You fix one issue and another one crops up as a result. You close one loophole and another opens. You make one group happy and another becomes disgruntled. This is the primary reason impactful change on team structure and formation is difficult and must be handled gingerly. We currently have a semblance of happiness league wide. The last thing I want to do is rock the league boat.

While not perfect, I believe in my heart the current all-star formulation process is not broken and for the most part it works. Every so often it will affect a marginal player on a really good team (collateral damage) or a B leaguer playing A league ball- not the end of the world. Anyway, the marginal player affected does have the option of either staying with the stacked team that produced his 'fake' all-star status or leave the team and free himself of the all-star burden.

Every league member and manager that weighed in about the posted list of all-stars has leaned toward the list produced by Formula 1 as the formula they feel contains players more deserving of all-star status. Formula 1 is the original formula which takes into account R%, RBI%, AVG, SLG, and BB%. Formula 2 (RUNC/G) is not bad and we could use it without too much issue, but for what reason? Why make the change?

Could the process get better? Sure it can. We could track and separate the A and B players, but in my opinion separating A and B all-stars will have only a marginal impact on anything. We could develop a formula to assign players a certain number value based on their ability, but now we turn the process from objective to subjective. We could put players on the list from season to season and take them off from season to season, but that would be extremely labor intensive and it would open players up to the possibility of sandbagging for a season to lose the all-star label.

In my opinion, none of the proposed changes warrant spending league member money. In fact, I think it would be a total waste of valuable resources.

Sorry for the long-winded post. I am trying to explain myself to as many league members as I possibly can and that takes a lot of words.
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

As promised...

Any men's league player listed as an all-star whose all-star status was derived STRICTLY from B league numbers shall NOT be considered an all-star in the men's A league. Any coed league player listed as an all-star whose all-star status was derived STRICTLY from B league numbers shall NOT be considered an all-star in the coed A league. This will NOT HOLD TRUE for men's B league all-stars playing in the coed league. Any men's B league all-star shall be considered a coed all-star in any coed league.
wdshipe
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by wdshipe »

Les, I appreciate that you asked the league for input on this. I hope that the feedback you received was useful.

My take on this all of this, some of which I have already shared with Les:

- Out of a list of 100 players for men's and a list of 100 for coed, the fact that there is 90% congruence in both cases provides some confidence that moving to the newly proposed formula from the former (if that's what we end up doing) wouldn't shake things up too much overall.

- I'm not familiar enough to weigh in on the men's lists above, but I can speak to the coed lists of 10 players above. The couple of opinions posted here said that formula 1 indicated a slightly better group of players, but I arrived at formula 2, and only barely. The fact that we arrived at different conclusions also speaks to the parity between the two lists. To me that indicates that there is no wrong choice.

- Tracking and separating A and B players is complicated. You've got to know on which team a player played from season to season, and in which division that team played. I know in Monday/Wednesday coed in recent years, some of the teams, including my own, have bounced back and forth between the top and lower divisions. Furthermore, again using Monday/Wednesday coed as an example, in most cases all teams have played a few games against teams from the other division over the course of a given season. There will need to be definitions of "A league numbers" and "B league numbers", and I'll bet that some league members will be confused. Leagues without divisions (e.g., Tuesday Men's, Friday Men's, Friday Coed) will need to be defined as either A or B leagues. The all-star list will be more complicated itself - maybe there will be a sub-list, or maybe the list will be annotated to indicate a player's "B all-star only" status - again, I can see confusion arising. It's a credit to Les that he is willing to try this out given the extra effort, and despite the fact that this may not have much of an effect on anything (in my own opinion).

Nevertheless, I would welcome the opportunity to serve as a coed sub for an A division team if I am designated an all-star for 2019 and if my 2018 numbers are deemed to have been derived from B division play only. (Perhaps unlikely since I played for Carroll's Jewelers in Summer 2018, a season that we spent in the A division.) We'll see how it shakes out!
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sixofdiamonds
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

It is my hope to have the men's and coed league all-star lists posted next week. The top 100 men's and coed players from 2018 will be on the list.

Special thanks to Greg Thompson, Bill Shipe, and Ryan Russell for their invaluable help in bringing the new formula to fruition.
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sixofdiamonds
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

To keep the list formulation process simple and transparent, we will use the RUNC (runs created) divided by G (games played) formula.

Men's and coed all-star restricted lists can be accessed from the Important Announcements forum atop the league message board or you can access the current and cumulative lists below.

If a player is listed on the all-star cumulative list (current status), that player made all-star last year or in a year prior to last year. If last year (2018 All-Stars for 2019), that player is not eligible to come off the list. If in a prior year and the player had enough at-bats to qualify (36 or more) without becoming an all-star, that player is eligible to be petitioned off the list.

Men's Cumulative List
Players on this list may or may not be eligible for release this year.
http://www.cuttingedgesports.net/statis ... ns2019.htm
Men's 2018 All-Stars for 2019
Players on this list are not eligible for release this year.
http://www.cuttingedgesports.net/statis ... or2019.htm

Coed Cumulative List
Players on this list may or may not be eligible for release this year.
http://www.cuttingedgesports.net/statis ... ed2019.htm
Coed 2018 All-Stars for 2019
Players on this list are not eligible for release this year.
http://www.cuttingedgesports.net/statis ... or2019.htm
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sixofdiamonds
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Re: All-Star Formulation

Post by sixofdiamonds »

Please not the following all-star rule changes as they relate to A and B division players.

Any men's league player listed as an all-star whose all-star status was derived strictly from B league numbers shall NOT be considered an all-star in the men's A league. Any coed league player listed as an all-star whose all-star status was derived strictly from B league numbers shall NOT be considered an all-star in the coed A league. This will NOT HOLD TRUE for men's B league all-stars playing in the coed league. Any men's B league all-star shall be considered a coed all-star in any coed league.
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