I got an email this week telling me that some pitchers in Baseball Mogul 2021 were losing one or more of their pitches in the off-season. For example, if you start in 1998, Jeff Suppan has 5 pitches. But then this happens at the beginning of 2002:

His cutter disappears, his sinker becomes a slider, and his "four-seamer" becomes a generic "fastball". It turns out that this bug is a side effect of the way we collected pitch data over the years.

In 2016, we added a file called PItch_Type_Frequency.csv, with pitchF/X data going back to the 2002 season. Now, instead of hand-editing each new pitcher's repertoire, I could just update one file. And because I viewed actual pitchF/X data as "better" than the hand-edited file, I told Baseball Mogul to overwrite the data in PitchRatings.csv with data from Pitch_Type_Frequency.csv whenever possible. And this is how Jeff Suppan's pitch repertoire got f---ed up between the 2001 and 2002 season.

It turns out that the hand-edited data had some advantages, such as including 37 different pitch types instead of the 7 tracked by pitchF/X. So I fixed this problem in Version 24.11 by telling Baseball Mogul to prioritize data from the hand-edited file when possible — and to not overwrite a pitcher's pitch repertoire in the middle of their career.

Baseball Mogul is a multi-season General Manager simulator in which player talent is calculated from overall career stats. An example can be seen below. Although Dwight Gooden pitched poorly in 1994, his ratings at the beginning of the season are quite high — because of his performance in the rest of his career.

As mentioned above, Replay Mode is designed for single-season historical replays. Playing multiple seasons can cause problems — primarily because teams will no longer have enough playing time at every position. I could have limited Replay Mode to a single season, but I left it open so that I can continue to test and get feedback. If you are using Replay Mode in a multi-season sim, please let me know how I can improve this feature going forward. (For example, I could add a feature that forced team trades to match historical trades if there is enough interest.)

Thanks!

Q: How do I create a league with my favorite players from baseball history?

A: Baseball Mogul already has a feature that does something like this, called "All-Time All-Stars". To create a league with the best players from each of the 30 major league franchises:

1) Run Baseball Mogul.
2) Click "Start a New Game of Baseball Mogul".
3) Click "Custom".
4) Click "All-Time All-Stars".

This will create a baseball universe with 30 teams, each populated with the franchise's best players (at the beginning of their best season).

Q: But I want to choose the players in the league.

A: Baseball Mogul has multiple ways to do this. But the easiest is probably to edit the text file that is used by the "All-Time All-Stars" feature.

1) From the Baseball Mogul Help Menu, choose "Open Baseball Mogul Folder".
2) Go into the "Input" folder and then into the "Players" folder.
3) Open "All-Time All-Stars.csv". (Recommended: Make a backup copy first)
4) Delete the rows for any players you don't want to include.
5) Add rows for any players you want to add. You will need to know the player's "Register ID":

You can find this by visiting the player's Baseball-Reference page and clicking on "Minor Lg Stats" — the player's ID can be found in the URL. 

4) Delete the rows for any players you don't want to include.
5) Add rows for any players you want to add.​

For Step 5 above, you will need to know the player's 12-character "Register ID". You can find this by visiting the player's Baseball-Reference page and clicking on "Minor Lg Stats" — the player's ID can be found in the URL:​

Alternatively, you can download the Player Register from the Baseball Databank (this file is also found in Baseball Mogul's "Database" folder).

​The player's "Register ID" is in the column labeled "key_bbref_minors":

6) Save "All-Time All-Stars".
7) Start a new game using the "All-Time All-Stars" option.

Q: Also, I only want to include players from the 16 pre-expansion teams.

A: Follow the steps above to select your favorite players from each franchise. For post-expansion teams like the Arizona Diamondbacks (ARI), leave that part of the file as is. After you start a new game, you can go to the League Editor and delete the teams you don't want included. This will also delete the players on those teams.

​CALIFORNIA — Sports Mogul Inc. announced today that they will be changing the name of their "Football Mogul" simulation game to "Handegg Mogul". The new name reflects the company's dedication to ever more authenticity and accuracy in their sports-themed computer games.

“At a time when 13% of Americans believe the earth is flat, we think it's important to stress truth and honesty in our products,” said Clay Dreslough, President of Sports Mogul Inc. “And the truth is that 'American Football' is a lie. It's a game played with your hands and an egg. It should be called 'American Handegg'.”

Handegg Mogul 22 will be the world's first professional handegg simulator. It will also feature more accurate statistical categories, and a long-awaited conversion to the metric system. “'Yards Rushing' is an inaccurate term,” Dreslough added. “It refers to the distance carrying the egg beyond the line of scrimmage. Therefore, the statistic will be renamed 'Metres Achieved Carrying Egg'."

For example, instead of showing Emmitt Smith atop the All-Time Leaders with 18,355 career Rushing Yards, Handegg Mogul 22 will show him with 16,783.812 Metres Achieved Carrying Egg (abbreviated 'MACE'). Jerry Rice leads the All-Time Receiving Leaders with 20,935.188 Metres Achieved Catching Egg (also abbreviated 'MACE').

​In addition to more intuitive stats like 'MATETBLOS' (Metres Achieved Tackling Egg Thrower Behind Line of Scrimmage), the positions will also get new names such as Egg Hiker (EH), Egg Carrier (EC), Left Egg Protector (LEP) and Egg Thrower (ET). Finally, the Goal Line will be renamed the 'Goal Plane'.