My Journey of Assigning TPE

How should I assign my TPE?

It's the age-old question that every new player must ask themself when making their player for the first time. They ask again and again after working so hard to complete tasks to get even more TPE.  And yet, they are often faced with the same dilemma each time. Should I upgrade my weaknesses to make me a more balanced player? Or should I upgrade my strengths to make me even more dominant? Or should it be somewhere in between? Let's explore my thought process.

Link to my player page: [S0] Austin Schwartz - P

Base Attributes

Stamina: Every good pitcher needs stamina. Obviously, the more pitches you throw the better, but at a certain point you're going to tire and your stuff will be less effective. While this isn't the days of starting pitcher workhorses pitching every other day, there's nothing wrong with being able to throw a couple of innings if needed instead of just one. I'm not entirely sure if I aim to be a starter or reliever yet, but bringing my stamina up to 40 for one TPE each seemed like a smart move.

Velocity: As a power pitcher, velocity is simultaneously the most important but also one of the more expensive attributes to upgrade. 88 might blow away high school hitters but it's nothing for a big-leaguer or even a single-A scrub. My plan here is to start with a strong foundation elsewhere, and slowly build up velocity over time as a real 18-19-year-old player might do.  

Arm Slot: I figured this wouldn't matter too much, but it would be unrealistic for a power-pitching lefty to also throw sidearm. And if there were, he would either be the most coveted prospect in the game or set the record for most TJ surgeries in a career.

Movement (L/R): Most hitters these days can handle some heat if the ball travels in a straight line since all you have to do is start your swing a little earlier. But a ball that moves? That can be tough to hit. If I had gone as a sidearmer I may have been more tempted to go to build more of a LOOGY with a focus on Left-handed stats, but for now I'm taking a more balanced approach. Beyond 40, when upgrades start getting more expensive, I may look to upgrade one side or the other.

Control (L/R): The upside is more limited here as a power pitcher, but I felt this was absolutely necessary for me to get up to par. From my personal experience, a hard thrower with electric stuff who just can't get the ball over the plate is one of the more frustrating things to watch in baseball today, so I set out to avoid that. At the same time, power pitchers usually have the stuff to avoid giving up damage if they leave the ball over the plate. After a few more upgrades, I'll likely remove the focus on control, but I felt it was important for me to have at least mediocre command abilities. Hopefully, it'll put me over the hump rather than being a AAAA player who can never find his footing due to wildness.

Pitches

Fastball: This was the one place that I spent more than 1 TPE per upgrade point, for good reason. A fastball is the heart of any pitcher's repertoire, and I wanted to make that clear from the start. I'm not entirely sure what the specific pitch rating will control, but I knew I needed to get my primary pitch rating up to par if I had any shot of making it big.

Curveball: Many hard throwers today employ more of a fastball-slider combination, and by upping velocity a hard curve may very well turn into more of a slider. But my big problem with sliders is that they remain on the same plane of the bat, meaning even the very best sliders will still induce weak contact rather than swinging strikes. The hope here is that a curve with more downward action will increase the strikeout rate and/or make it easier to avoid the barrel of the bat. In my experience lefties are also known more for big looping curves (Kershaw, Zito, Koufax, etc) making it seem more appropriate for me to go this route.

Changeup: I didn't have any TPE left over to upgrade either of my secondary pitches, but I'm not too worried as I see myself as a potential reliever candidate. Depending on how I progress moving forward I may upgrade the changeup some more to serve as a viable third pitch if I ever am needed in a starting role. For now, though, my third pitch is really just there to throw batters off every once in a while. It'll probably be last on my priority list of upgrades if I ever get around to it.

Conclusion: As a power pitcher I feel that my TPE choices mostly made sense, but I also made some choices to upgrade some weaknesses that typically plague many hard throwers. Hopefully this gives me a solid base moving forward, but I will try to specialize more once I gain more TPE. The risk with try to stay a balanced pitcher is that you may just remain mediocre in all categories, which puts you in prime position to be a middle reliever or backend starter that rarely gets put in high-stakes situations. On the flip side, focusing too much on one or two attributes may give you more promising potential but may expose your weaknesses more easily. At the end of the day the choice is up to the player but the ideal way to distribute points is probably somewhere in the middle.

Let me know what you think!