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Frozen Stiffer inspired me to return to this subject, as "building a winner" is everyone's top priority, right?

We discussed addressing short-term needs vs long-term goals, otherwise called "mortgaging the future". Now, I'm playing as a team that already had much talent (the 1947 Dodgers). Between April and July the team changed considerably, as I originally went from a philosophy of long-term building to "just win -- NOW." That is now morphing into a balancing act.

For players using fictionals, the balancing act is difficult at best. For guys like me who use real players, yeah, it's a bit easier. However, I'm using finances ON in 1947, so that changes the equation. With a treasury of $1.8 million, $1.5 million is invested in current payroll. This leaves me in a tough spot when the FA period for 1948 begins, apart from the new guys (Antonelli, Ashburn, Campanella, Erskine, Roberts etc ) coming up.

Tough decisions must be made, and one of the toughest is deciding when to let that highly-paid superstar go. The breaking point for POT is tougher to determine now, as the age-curve has been altered in recent iterations of PS.

My first recommendation is patience. I'm a tax auditor, so crunching numbers is second nature. Fortunately, evaluating a given player's talent curve is a snap in PS.

There are many X factors, such as injuries, which can affect a player's performance thereafter, or derail a team speeding towards the pennant.

The ONE thing I will emphasize is depth. NEVER limit yourself to one player in a given position. I don't care if he's Iron Man or Rambo, he needs to have a backup.

Since KG came up with the great idea of discussing strategies and tactics, I wanted to post my original rant so that it's open for discussion:

My team has been suffering as of late. After a serious rebuilding process during a previous off-season, my Key West Rum Runners experienced good success for the next three years, winning the World Series one year, making it to the LCS the next (though they lost), then winning the World Series on the year after that. However, some of those veterans that helped reinforce us are getting old and loosing their luster. At the same time, many of the rookies that made a huge difference are in their sophomore slumps and are not performing as they did earlier (go figure, they sign one big contract and suddenly they're a different player).

We've fallen into a tie for third place in our division lately and though we're about 6 games over .500, our last 20 games have shown a record of 9-11. Injuries, particularly to the rotation, are hurting us and I'm running out of replacements for my wounded starters.

At what point do I start negotiating prospects in retrun for estabilshed veterans that can help the cause? Fortunately, none of the starters are out for longer than a 15-day DL stint, but that doesn't change the fact that I have 4 of them on it! Is it worth making a trade that could have a significant impact on the long-term performance of the team (by removing a potenital prospect from our farm system) in return for aid during a short-term need?

Another thing to consider is how to develop a youngster in the minors. I don't have much experience at this, so I hope the vets will weigh in. Personally, I assign him according to rating/age. After that it gets a bit fuzzy for me. I've been guilty of advancing a player too soon, as I start to use his stats as a guide.

I am now believing that a minor-leaguer shouldn't move up in grade mid-season. Again, the ratings (IF you don't use the incremental in-season changes) need to be evaluated at the end of the season. A guy who jumps 10 points in any rating should maybe be advanced to the next level. Major-league caliber is easy to fathom. At the lower levels it requires more analysis of that POT rating vis a vis actual improvement.

This is where I really miss the presence of scouts, who could prompt you on when to advance a guy from one level to the next.