Updating the initial report, upon a full review, the playoff suspensions must stand. As our first test case(s) using the new system, it's important to maintain a firm precedent, and to maintain established boundaries. In a way, I'm a little relieved that it involves two limited-use (but effective) relievers, which will hopefully lessen the impact by either team. It's also obvious that there was absolutely no malicious intent by either manager; it's more like a case of HAL happening to good people—an occurrence that I expect to be repeated often as all the season's penalties are rolled out soon.
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(ORIGINAL POST)
I'm going to modify the review protocol slightly from what was announced earlier to relieve everyone of the time and burden of self- and peer-reviews. Instead, I'm going to flag any player that hits the 113% threshold and review the cases individually to see if a penalty is warranted. No change to enforcement, but there is going to be some slight wiggle room depending on several factors, including overall availability, impact on fairness, and overall team compliance.
PLAYOFF RAMIFICATIONS
Two players will be suspended for the playoffs:
RCH reliever Danny Coulombe (121%)
SHE reliever Luis Guerrero (140%)
A complete list of players and impacted draft choices will be released next week, but please understand that all players at 113% usage or above are at risk.
There is a setting to help control usage in the game. The most strict would cause other issues so maybe the middle setting would help. We would need to add the 10% to the players at the beginning of the season then set to
"TRY TO LIMIT OVERUSAGE This option offers a balanced approach somewhat of a compromise between the other two settings. It will do a reasonable job at balancing the desire for accurate player usage and a competitive computer manager."
yeah! What he said!
It's a tough gig creating rules to govern fairness while also trying to accommodate 'what if' scenarios. I stand with the the decision wherever it lands.
First of all, I totally get it. Rules are rules.
One thing worth flagging: small-usage relievers can get chewed up really fast by HAL.
For example, Coulombe threw 12 innings over the entire month of August, then 8 innings in the first week of September. Checking usage weekly means that swing burned through his season before I could catch it.
I’m not disputing the penalty. But it does highlight a tricky edge case. A small-usage reliever can jump from about 90% to 120% in a single week, not because of absentee management or intent to overuse, but simply because HAL rides him with multiple outings. A guy can look safe one week and end up suspended or costing draft picks the next. Maybe in the future we could think about a small adjustment for cases where a player jumps well past 110% in a single week, since that feels more like HAL’s randomness than owner intent.