Pitch Count Craziness!

[Qbrick808]

Anyone ever see anything even remotely like this?

I was playing an ALDS Game 3 in Postseason Mode against the Tigers and I’ve been working on my ability to take more pitches and force pitchers to throw me better strikes.

When I saw that Detroit’s starter in the game – David Pauley – had a Pitch Count Cap of just 58-70 pitches, I saw this as an opportunity to really make a strong effort to get an opposing SP out of the game very early.

My approach was working well and after I scored five runs in the 2^nd inning, Pauley was over 50 pitches; I thought he was done for the day, or at the very least, I’d knock him out in the 3^rd.

Pauley stayed in the game and I continued my patient method; I was drawing walks, but after that 5-run outburst, I stopped scoring for a while (mostly due to getting caught stealing a few times).

Once Pauley was well over the pitch count cap allotted to him, I wanted nothing else but to get him pulled, but Jimmy Leyland kept sending this guy out there inning after inning.

When I dented the scoreboard again in the 7^th inning, increasing my lead by two to 7-0, I thought for sure Pauley was done, but no! I started thinking about Al Leiter’s 1989 start where he was left in to throw 162 pitches and subsequently lost three years of his career to various surgeries and attempted recoveries. Even Steve Phillips and John Kruk made comments about how this was very surprising that Leyland was taking such an unnecessary risk with this guy’s arm and career, especially given that he had a fully ready bullpen just sitting and watching.

When the 8^th inning ended, I was sure Pauley would be removed, but shockingly he came out to start the 9^th with over 150 pitches already thrown! In the 9^th he was very wild; he hit a batter, walked a couple, and even walked in a run to make it 8-0, but Leyland never even made so much as a trip to the mound.

In the end, David Pauley got the complete game loss going 9 full while allowing only 7 hits, but walking me 12 times (none intentional) as well as hitting a batter, and surrendering 8 runs (6 earned). He did strikeout 12, but I’d have to say that a good half of those came towards the end as my desire to get him out by taking close pitches continued to increase.

THE MAN THREW 180 PITCHES IN THE GAME (93 strikes & 87 balls) even though they had given him a pitch count cap of just 58-70!

I’m totally baffled… I’ve never seen anything even close to this bizarre in an MLB 2K11 game (concerning managerial decisions and similar stuff) and I’ve played several hundred. By the way, if you’re wondering about the settings, there was nothing about this which was set up to manipulate it; I’ve been using the Legend level these days and that was how this game was played.

I’m attaching some screenshots of the box score to this post.

[Hollywood70]

I have never seen that. Very odd. If anything, the AI usually pulls the plug pretty quickly on pituchers that reach their limits. Maybe Leyland just hates Pauley :p

[DetroitStyle]

I've seen this, but not to that degree. The pitch count logic this year is really messed up. Starters will usually stay for 4-6 innings but then relievers go forever. Remember, the game sees David Pauley as a reliever not a starter (because he's not a starter anyway). So that might explain it. Make sure you have the latest (and only) patch, it might have fixed it a little but not much...

[Qbrick808]

I've seen this, but not to that degree. The pitch count logic this year is really messed up. Starters will usually stay for 4-6 innings but then relievers go forever. Remember, the game sees David Pauley as a reliever not a starter (because he's not a starter anyway). So that might explain it. Make sure you have the latest (and only) patch, it might have fixed it a little but not much...

I've already got the patch so it wasn't related to that.

I know what you mean about relievers on some occasions, but that might be a 3 inning guy going 5 or 6 (a 45 pitch guy throwing 80).

The fact that ANY pitcher was left in to throw 180 pitches in any circumstance is just so bizarre (without even mentioning the fact that he had given up 5 runs early and allowed 12 walks).