Shisa Weblog

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Borealis
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#61 Post by Borealis »

IDK... This whole dissertation smells a whole lot like suggesting what they might have refered to back in the old MLB days as collusion.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#62 Post by roncollins »

Not at all.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#63 Post by Evas »

Cliff Hangers wrote:Your argument seems to boil down to "it's too complex to figure out the full ramifications of that last parameter, so you can just ignore it and everything will be fine." (yes, ignore than man behind the curtain!)
What I would say is that because PEBA is so big, any one GM does not control enough of the possible transactions to have a meaningful effect on what another GM can or can't do. Because of that you are better off trying to maximize the value you get in any transaction. But if this were a game with many fewer players, I would agree with your stance. In a one on one game, your stance is perfect. I think it gets less perfect for each player you add to a game. By the time you get to 32, I think trying to control things is pretty hard to do. I just don't think that strategy is very helpful in a game this big.
Cliff Hangers wrote:Have you run small-revenue teams before?
As a fan of the Indians, I have run many many seasons of small market baseball. The way I improve those teams was to try add as much value and talent as I could from where ever I could get it. I didn't hesitate to deal with the Yankees if it helped me accomplish my goals.
Cliff Hangers wrote:I mean, these kinds of arguments are the ones that corporate leaders make to suggest across the board raises in a company of 3% are "fair." This is not false. "Fair" is an interesting term. But, while it's one way to be "fair," it also means that the guy making $1,000,000 gets $30,000 more while the guy making $100,000 gets $3,000. So while raises make everyone happy, there's a new $27,000 gap in their standard of living come next year--and only one of them is going to get to go to Disney Land. :)
The guy who got the $3,000 raise is better off than he was before. He is certainly better off than if he stopped there from being any raises at all. Plus like you said before, the guy with more money to start with has a lot more options. He is much more likely to be able to get that 3% some other way. Better to take your gains where you can than to forgo any gains because you didn't think you got enough.

All of your points about higher revenue teams having more options and more ways to leverage assets are 100% correct. I just don't think it changes how teams should try to go about adding value.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#64 Post by roncollins »

When I asked about running a small market team, I meant in an online league against human beings, and specifically in a league that trades draft picks (as a rule of thumb, most of the most heavily weighted deals that sway massively toward big revenue teams include very good draft picks). Playing the AI is different.

I'll not spend much more time chatting about it, as we've pretty much gotten to the nah-uh, period of the argument. My only other comment here is that all of the saviest smaller revenue owners who have commented on this thread have been nodding their heads and saying "yep" and all of the big revenue owner who have commented on this thread are saying "whatchutalkin'bout, Willis?"

:)
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#65 Post by Borealis »

You say 'potato', I say 'potaato', you say 'discount' I say 'gouge the rich', you say 'don't trade with the big boys unless...', I say 'collusion'...
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#66 Post by roncollins »

The concept is neither giving discounts, nor gouging the rich. And in no form whatsoever is it collusion.

All this conversation is about is framing the mental position any small market team needs to keep in mind as they are working to compete consistently, especially when one is dealing early draft picks (which have very, very large value to teams with large revenue streams).
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#67 Post by Morris Ragland »

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Kojuro Ishiyama to Address Plastic Surgery Rumors?
Shiba Taguchi, Ryukyu Sports News Breaking Story

Naha, Japan - July 18, 2022: Shisa outfielder Kojuro Ishiyama has called a press conference to take place before the start of today's game against the Longshoremen. It is widely expected that he will finally address the rumors surrounding his appearance that have been dogging him all season. More as this story develops.

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Re: Shisa Weblog

#68 Post by Borealis »

I've gotta say there's a few members of the Borealis who seem to have the same affliction...
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#69 Post by Morris Ragland »

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Ishiyama Addresses Change in Appearance

Shiba Taguchi, Ryukyu Sports News

Naha, Okinawa - July 18, 2022: Shisa outfielder Kojuro Ishiyama spoke to the press today in an attempt to put to rest rumors that have been circulating regarding his changed appearance this season. “I just want to clear the air today, and hopefully put this whole thing behind me” said Ishiyama (.228/.279/.463, 19 HR, 47 RBI). “During this past winter, after consultations with my personal physician, Dr. Tomohiko Nogushi, and Shisa team trainer, Dr. Nam-sup Chong, I underwent a brief series of cosmetic procedures. These procedures were successful and I recovered from these surgeries in early January. To be frank, I didn't believe at the time that this would be a very big deal, as cosmetic surgery among ball players is no longer that unusual.”

According to sociologist Hiroharu Nagase at Keio University, Ishiyama is correct. “Among affluent members of what North Americans generally refer to as 'Generation Y', surgically altering one's appearance has become almost as commonplace as updating one's wardrobe. As surgical methods continue to improve and also become more affordable, it may become an everyday occurrence. Perhaps what people find most surprising is that this trend affects both females and males alike.” Nagase notes that, while traditional notions of masculinity among older men would rule out such procedures, the younger generation has embraced cosmetic surgery as a way of “keeping their look fresh.” Nagase continues, “we first saw this trend among European soccer players, but it has spanned the globe and caught up with the PEBA. Ishiyama is hardly alone, and many baseball players have undergone plastic surgery lately.”

At his press conference, Ishiyama said that he was pleased with the results of his treatments and emphasized that his procedures were mostly just a story among older baseball fans and that, for people his age, it's not strange at all. “This is another one of those things that the older folks are just going to have to get over,” said the outfielder. “I'm happy with my current look,” he said, “but we'll see what happens down the road. Maybe I'll have some more work done in the future.” Dr. Nagase says that “the jury is still out,” as to whether this rise in cosmetic surgical procedures among elite male athletes is a lasting trend or merely a passing fad.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#70 Post by roncollins »

I nominate this article for "best use of photographic evidence."
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#71 Post by Morris Ragland »

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Red Hook Returns

Shiba Taguchi, Ryukyu Sports News

Naha, Okinawa - August 22, 2022: Shisa first baseman Alex 'Red Hook' Bothwell is in the midst of his second stint with the big league club and he's making the most of it. Last year he struggled after being called up in September, putting up a feeble .098/.159/.098 line, apparently showing the front office that he was not quite ready for PEBA pitching. He returned to AAA Shizuoka with a plan to change his approach at the plate, and has stayed there throughout 2022. His AAA numbers did not show any dramatic improvement, but they also did not take a dip, which is noteworthy since he was in the middle of doing quite a bit of tinkering.

Earlier this month Shisa regular first baseman Dax O'Mannis went down in a game against Lupin with a strained hamstring. The parent club brought in Bothwell out of necessity. Red Hook struggled at first, going 3 for 15 in a four game series at Aurora, but appeared to catch up against Canton, going 5 for 13 with a double and a home run. At home against Rising Sun rivals Lupin and Shin Seiki Red Hook raked, going 12 for 26, with three doubles and three home runs. His slash line after thirteen games sits at .370/.414/.667, the sort of numbers he hasn't put up since a brief stint in short season A two years ago.

With O'Mannis expected to miss another three weeks, Bothwell has the opportunity to make himself a permanent addition to the Shisa lineup with production like this, and at a crucial juncture as Okinawa rather unexpectedly finds itself in the hunt for a wildcard berth.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#72 Post by Morris Ragland »

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Out of the Cellar, Not yet in Contention:
Shisa Year in Review


Shiba Taguchi, Ryukyu Sports News

Naha, Okinawa - October 8, 2022: The Shisa began the season with a payroll that ranked 25th out of the 32 PEBA teams, and less star power than a community theater production of Oklahoma. Expectations for the the team were low. Sixty-four wins and a last place finish in the Rising Sun Division seemed to be the consensus among the prognosticators. All along, however, the Okinawa front office argued that the team was poised to make strides in 2022 and improve upon the previous year's abysmal 61-101 record, which in all honesty should not have been all that difficult. In the end, the work of the Shisa executives yielded mixed results, but the team did win more games than the year prior, posting a 78-84 record on its way to a second place finish in the RSD.

Faced with the need to improve at nearly every position, the club signed eleven new players, most of them via free agency. There were more misses than hits on these new players, but two players played very well, accounting for half of the team's total offensive WAR in 2022. The team's pitching acquisitions barely made a difference at all, however.

Scott Morris, the unassuming Shisa third baseman, became the highest paid player on the roster with a salary of $8.5M when he signed on as a free agent on December 28. Morris, whose best prior season, with the London Underground, saw him post a 106 OPS+ and a 3.8 WAR. Good, but not great, production. But Morris would turn out to be well worth the money. The thirty-two year old Morris (who would turn thirty-three in July) put up a slash line of .290/.389/.458, an OPS+ of 131, and a 5.2 WAR (highest on the team and good for second best in the Sovereign League at his position) in 2022.

It was center fielder Mario Martínez who proved to be the biggest feather in the cap of the Shisa front office. Signing for a modest $1M, Martínez would appear in 156 games for Okinawa and post a slash line of .274/.330/.458 and a 5.2 WAR (highest on the team and highest among Sovereign League center fielders). His 25 home runs in 2022 were a career high for Mario. Not only was Martínez effective at the plate, he had the second best ZR (+18) among Sovereign League center fielders. It was the best defensive season of his career by far.

At the beginning of the season, we speculated that Rule 5 pick Salvador Rodríguez could potentially be an emerging star in the Okinawa outfield. While his 26 home runs were second best on the team, his slash line on the year was .237/.302/.467, and his lackluster defense in left field held him to a WAR of 0.9 on the season. Replacement level, more or less.

Okinawa had modest success with its two first basemen signings. Dax O'Mannis and El Chupacabra (Octávio Pexego) played at first and DH throughout the season. O'Mannis would end up missing roughly two months to injuries and would appear in only 119 games, which of course hampered his production (2.2 WAR). Pexego, thirty-nine years old and with almost no defensive value, was used mostly as a DH (but he still managed to play four games at short, as a joke, we guess), and put up a WAR of 1.8.

The real story at first base would turn out to be Red Hook, Alex Bothwell, the twenty-three year old slugger that the team brought up from AAA after O'Mannis went down. In the forty-one games that he would start, Shisa fans would be treated to an all-star level performance (.317/.372/.610). Bothwell would hit a home run in every 12.6 at-bats in those games, and appears to be on track to take over at first full time in 2023.

The performance of the Shisa starting rotation needed to improve in 2022, and it did, but this improvement had little to do with the team's attempts to bolster the rotation. Okinawa starters posted a 4.70 ERA in 2022, 'good' for twelfth best in the SL. The three pitchers the team brought in to help (Chris Graves, Livewire Hendricks, and Alex Stinnett) collectively put up a not very helpful ERA of 5.03. On July 29th, Stinnett, the only one of the three performing at a decent level (4.02 ERA through 21 starts) suffered a torn labrum in his throwing shoulder and was done for the year.

Most of the marginal improvement in the performance of the rotation could be accounted for by players the team already had on hand. Isei Yamaguchi began the season in the bullpen so that he could acclimate himself to pitching at the big league level. The team soon made him a starter when the rotation it had put in place began to fall to pieces, and he did well, putting up a 3.51 ERA in 29 starts and 34 appearances, but his FIP of 4.37 does raise questions about whether this performance can be repeated in 2023. Tsuginori Honma also had some significant improvement in his game, lowering his ERA from 5.35 in 2021 to 4.07 in 2022.

The Shisa led the SL in home runs, with 208, and were seventh in runs scored, with 766. They were ninth in team ERA at 4.41, and were tenth in runs allowed with 758. The team fell short of their pythagorean expectation of 82-80, finishing with a losing record (78-84). Seeing Duluth claim the last playoff spot with an 81-81 record, the Shisa front office can only wonder what might have been.

Financially, the team saw its revenue increase by roughly $24.5M ($127,639,028 in 2022 versus $103,157,617), an increase of 23.7%. Attendance increased by 464,160 (3,317,774 in 2022 versus 2,853,614 in 2021), and increase of 16.3%.

Okinawa Shisa Minor League Player of the Year

Center fielder Dave MacIntosh, United States, AA Kumamoto. .294/.313/.449, 111 OPS+, 2.9 WAR.

Okinawa Shisa Rookie of the Year

First baseman Alex 'Red Hook' Bothwell, United States. .317/.372/.610, 163 OPS+, 1.4 WAR.

Okinawa Shisa Reliever of the Year

LHP Willie Owens, United States. 1.93 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, 221 ERA+, 1.3 WAR.

Okinawa Shisa Starting Pitcher of the Year

RHP Isei Yamaguchi, Japan. 3.51 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 121 ERA+, 2.5 WAR.

Okinawa Shisa Position Player of the Year

Third baseman Scott Morris, United States. .290/.389/.458, 131 OPS+, 5.2 WAR.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#73 Post by roncollins »

Outstanding overview.
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#74 Post by Bill »

I liked reading the overview, mostly because it seemed like reading a 2021 synopsis of the Duluth Warriors! Forgot how many former Warriors had migrated to the Shisa last off season. We had similar success with Martinez in the first half last year, but he really tailed off toward the end of the season to be almost unusable (as did the rest of the team). Pleasant surprise that he found his stroke again.

Good season for Okinawa :clap:
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Re: Shisa Weblog

#75 Post by Morris Ragland »

Seriously, who set the facegen to "Gonzo"?
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