CSV Download Files - Missing Variables & Changes - Please Change Back

[Timmeh49]

I know you HQ guys will get this figured out eventually... However, I spent some time trying to deduce what might be messed up.

And as best as I can tell, of the raw stats (PA, AB, R, H, 2B, 3B, HR, R, RBI, BB, K, SB, CS), the only one that is messed up, I think, is AB. In particular, the PA field looks pretty normal. You guys seem to assign players discrete PA totals in multiples of 34 (66 players have 34 PA, 46 have 68 PA, etc.). Using the given AB field, here's a plot of the composite AVG at each PA level in the 2024 file (downloaded earlier today), along with the composite average from the Mar 19, 2022 file for the same series of PA levels.



Weird, right? The players given the least playing time have the highest AVG in the 2024 file, whereas for the 2022 file, AVG increases with PA level. FWIW, other AB-based ratios (CT%, SLG, etc.) show similar trends: the best performers on a rate basis in 2024 are the ones projected for the fewest PA.

Then I thought... what if AB is the messed up field. So I decided to recalculate AB as simply the listed PA minus the listed BB, and then calculate AVG for each PA tier with this new AB definition. It looks alot better.



Again, I have faith you guys will find the errors and fix everything, but it does look to me that the AB numbers are wrong, and then other errors seems to flow from that.

[circle360]

I can tell you there was testing in advance. I did some of it, but two things: 1) you can’t test for every contingency; and 2) sometimes even after the testing, things don’t work the same when you actually roll it out. For the record, I too was frustrated, but I’m also impressed with how things have improved from day-to-day. I’m now able to do pretty much everything albeit sometimes using work arounds. I’m confident pretty much everything will be 100% - well 97% - in the very near future.

Exactly Phil. One other point. The CDG seems to have issues. Which makes sense. There are 26 offensive CATS and 26 Pitching CATS. That's why I asked whistler what CATS he was inputting the other day. To see if one of them was an issue. Which it seemed to be

The more info you give Ray and his team. The better it will be for them.

Not just saying the site is cumbersome now etc.

[PHIL@HQ]

Larry, as subscribers to a premium site is it unreasonable for us to expect the testing to be done before release.
Also, why did it have to release when many of us have begun preparing for early drafts and slow drafts

I can tell you there was testing in advance. I did some of it, but two things: 1) you can’t test for every contingency; and 2) sometimes even after the testing, things don’t work the same when you actually roll it out. For the record, I too was frustrated, but I’m also impressed with how things have improved from day-to-day. I’m now able to do pretty much everything albeit sometimes using work arounds. I’m confident pretty much everything will be 100% - well 97% - in the very near future.

[Timmeh49]

Honest question, why is two separate cells for name better?

Mainly convenience for other things in my spreadsheet. I have a main sheet where I basically paste in the table from the CSV and do calculations of dollar values. But then I have other sheets that summarize the info from the main sheet (e.g. a ranked list of dollar values) where having the last name only is enough. Also, during my draft, once bidding closes, I copy the last name and paste it into my roster sheet. So it is nice to have a cell with only the last name.

Like JonE said, this is minor, and it is easy enough to parse a cell that provides ""Lastname, Firstname" into two separate columns. OTOH, it would be nice if settled format of the CSV file in the new website was identical (or at least close to identical) to the previous version. I understand that the format has to change when new stats are added or obsolete ones are removed. But it would seem desirable to keep the player name display in the CSV unchanged upon migration..

[blueboy714]

(It frankly would be easier if stat websites would always include MLBAMs, but that's not your problem, Ray.)

100% - yes or Baseball Reference ID. I have to combine Chadwick's with various projections to get MLBID, BHQ ID, BIS ID, BBRefID, FanGraph ID, etc. all in one file... and even then there are still issues.

[JonE]

Honest question, why is two separate cells for name better?

Some of my league stat websites list player names as Firstname Lastname, while others list them as Lastname, Firstname. Having the name in two separate cells makes it easier for me to create VLOOKUPs that match HQ projections to downloaded league rosters. If there were two cells I wouldn't have to parse the name cell.

That said, this is a smaller problem than most. TBH, I spend more time going through and fixing the small variances in names (e.g. Joe, not Joey, Wendle; Ronald Acuna, not Ronald Acuna Jr.). Having separate columns wouldn't eliminate that issue.

(It frankly would be easier if stat websites would always include MLBAMs, but that's not your problem, Ray.)

[circle360]

Larry, as subscribers to a premium site is it unreasonable for us to expect the testing to be done before release.
Also, why did it have to release when many of us have begun preparing for early drafts and slow drafts

Bob - as someone that as seen these types of things for work. Stuff pops up after testing. It doesnt go live and everything works perfect. See I made a mistake with our CBS draft. Which you told me minutes after the fact.

Im fairly certain the site got tested beforehand.

Thats how things work.

[bowi8son]

Larry, as subscribers to a premium site is it unreasonable for us to expect the testing to be done before release.
Also, why did it have to release when many of us have begun preparing for early drafts and slow drafts

[circle360]

Here is why I liked getting to Playerlink better before than now. When you went to the home or front page of the website - Playerlink was its own separate tab. You clicked on it and a bunch of letters came up. You went to those letters and found your player. Really easy and convenient because of the separate tab on the home page. You don’t have Playerlink as its separate tab any longer. You have to remember to go to tools and find it there. Once there you have to type the players name in the box. It works fine now but just way more cumbersome with more key strokes than before and not nearly as user friendly because you don’t have a separate tab in the front any longer. Player link is really important and losing its tab on the home page was not a good decision. Just my opinion.

It is way too late now but I also agree with the other people before me that I am surprised that you released this new site with so many bugs in the data and did not get rid of those bugs before testing. I am surprised you released this version with so many changes when the format, data, printing capabilities and everything associated with BHQ made your site the best fantasy baseball site on the planet, Sometimes less is more. It’s unfortunate but I find myself going to other sites to get information that I normally relied heavily on at BHQ. We’ve talked about this in the past and yet it isn’t resolved but the ability to print out your depth chart and CDG in grid form is gone as of now. Did you not think that was important for us? Whether it gets resolved today or in three months doesn’t matter. What matters is we have lost that ability to perform routine functions that we took for granted before and were useful to us. We didn’t ask to lose these functions whether it be for a day or a few weeks or a few months. The bottom line is - for the most part the data is all there except for negative AB or blank players. It is just not as user friendly as before and it isn’t because we were used to the old way. Again just my opinion from a very loyal subscriber of BHQ for many years. I keep asking myself - why did the site need to undergo such a msssive change? I cannot for the life of me figure how our user experience is better today or will be in the future than it was two weeks ago. Just my opinion again and I am certain there will be many who will disagree.

As someone that has had to do customer service with clients

If you post the same complaints all over the forum. That is taking time away from Ray handing off the complaints to his Dept. Since you seem to want answers yesterday.

A bunch of people are in the same boat as you. Its feb 13th. Others arent flipping out etc. If you post the same issue in multiple spots. What does that do? Ray has seen the issue and is trying to deal with the issue in a timely manner. But if you keep on posting. That side tracks him from giving the info to his eam. Since he has to answer your constant questions in multiple spots

Pitcher's and catcher's havent reported yet for spring training. The new site has been up for what 9 days. Every new site has some bugs. Ray and his team are working on the issues.

in other words. I agree with bluester

[RAY@HQ]

Here is why I liked getting to Playerlink better before than now. When you went to the home or front page of the website - Playerlink was its own separate tab. You clicked on it and a bunch of letters came up. You went to those letters and found your player. Really easy and convenient because of the separate tab on the home page. You don’t have Playerlink as its separate tab any longer. You have to remember to go to tools and find it there. Once there you have to type the players name in the box. It works fine now but just way more cumbersome with more key strokes than before and not nearly as user friendly because you don’t have a separate tab in the front any longer. Player link is really important and losing its tab on the home page was not a good decision. Just my opinion.

Thanks, we agree with all of this, and I think this will get improved very soon. But just to draw a distinction, this complaint is about getting to Playerlink, rather than Playerlink itself. If we fixed this, with, say, a separate Playerlink search box on the home page (like the old site), and a search box IN Playerlink so you can hop player-to-player in one hop, I think that would address this issue.

As far as the structure of Playerlink itself, the most common complaint I've heard is the Content tab replacing the News tab, which we're also working on improving.

Again, this new site isn't an end point. Lots of stuff is easily tweaked. We'll get there... I've got a stack of fixes in my inbox this morning already, haven't had a chance to look at them yet. I'll update here a little later.

[bluester]

Snider - Just one guy's opinion but your complaints about the new HQ format seem to be all over a number of Forum threads and come across just a tad on the entitled side. I'm sure Ray and team are doing the best that they can on a difficult project and if their efforts are as troublesome to you as you suggest I'm sure there are other places that could better pass your muster.

[Snider]

Here is why I liked getting to Playerlink better before than now. When you went to the home or front page of the website - Playerlink was its own separate tab. You clicked on it and a bunch of letters came up. You went to those letters and found your player. Really easy and convenient because of the separate tab on the home page. You don’t have Playerlink as its separate tab any longer. You have to remember to go to tools and find it there. Once there you have to type the players name in the box. It works fine now but just way more cumbersome with more key strokes than before and not nearly as user friendly because you don’t have a separate tab in the front any longer. Player link is really important and losing its tab on the home page was not a good decision. Just my opinion.

It is way too late now but I also agree with the other people before me that I am surprised that you released this new site with so many bugs in the data and did not get rid of those bugs before testing. I am surprised you released this version with so many changes when the format, data, printing capabilities and everything associated with BHQ made your site the best fantasy baseball site on the planet, Sometimes less is more. It’s unfortunate but I find myself going to other sites to get information that I normally relied heavily on at BHQ. We’ve talked about this in the past and yet it isn’t resolved but the ability to print out your depth chart and CDG in grid form is gone as of now. Did you not think that was important for us? Whether it gets resolved today or in three months doesn’t matter. What matters is we have lost that ability to perform routine functions that we took for granted before and were useful to us. We didn’t ask to lose these functions whether it be for a day or a few weeks or a few months. The bottom line is - for the most part the data is all there except for negative AB or blank players. It is just not as user friendly as before and it isn’t because we were used to the old way. Again just my opinion from a very loyal subscriber of BHQ for many years. I keep asking myself - why did the site need to undergo such a msssive change? I cannot for the life of me figure how our user experience is better today or will be in the future than it was two weeks ago. Just my opinion again and I am certain there will be many who will disagree.

[RAY@HQ]

IMO - If you have the format as last name, first name then it works fine ... at least for me. That can be easily split based on the comma. You can't do that with first last name due to multiple spaces.

Agreed

[blueboy714]

Honest question, why is two separate cells for name better?

The other items here should be cleaned up shortly.

IMO - If you have the format as last name, first name then it works fine ... at least for me. That can be easily split based on the comma. You can't do that with first last name due to multiple spaces.

[RAY@HQ]

Yes, this is nice, thanks. A few comments...

• Would it be possible to simply do it like past years and have a last name column and a first name column? Yes, it is easy enough for me to parse "Last, First" into separate columns myself, but having them come in as separate columns would be nicer.
• The pitcher file still has players as Firstname Lastname (so, for example, "Gerrit Cole", not "Cole, Gerrit")
• Minor issue: If I go to to the 2024 Hitter Projections web page and click on the little CSV icon at the top right of the table, the CSV download still has the player name in the "First Last" format.

Honest question, why is two separate cells for name better?

The other items here should be cleaned up shortly.