In the article, The Evolution of Pitching Roles, we discussed how the role of starting pitchers has changed over the years. We did a simulation by pairing 10 starters, two per game, to see the impact on starter and bullpen innings. The results indicated it could be a viable approach. Of course, the idea that a team could have 10 legitimate starters makes that a non-starter.
This article will revisit the basic idea. A thousand simulations of a 162 game season (i.e., 162,000 games) were run with the assumption of 7 available starters. The basic idea is that the starters are managed as a FIFO stack. A list of 7 pitchers is maintained, along with when they are available to pitch, assuming 4 days of rest since the last time they pitched. This restriction of 4 rest days is why this simulation is of 1000 iterations of 162 game seasons, instead of just simulating games. The previous study had 5 pairs to 2 starters, so there was not an issue with the number of days of rest.
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We recently upgraded our comment system to improve reliability, performance, and long-term control, and we’re currently running both systems during the transition. This shift moves us away from an external service to a system we run and control directly—meaning we own the content and can continue improving it over time. We’ve also reduced the comment refresh delay from about 30 seconds to 10 seconds, making it much closer to real-time.
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If you’d like a full side-by-side comparison of the platforms and the reasons behind this decision, please refer to the chart below. This change is being made with the long-term benefit of the entire community in mind.