Before you consider launching a replay, you need to answer three tough questions:
- Do I really want to invest a lot of time, energy, administrative skills, and energy into what will be, at times, a laborious enterprise?
- Do I actually possess the necessary time and motivation to conduct a replay?
- Do I possess the necessary administrative and organizational skills (or believe I am willing to learn them) to get the most out of a replay?
Fall short on any one of these three questions and the chances are almost certain that your replay will run out of gas about halfway through and wind up on the shelf gathering dust, never to be completed, and leaving you feeling frustrated and forever asking “I wonder how it would have turned out?”
Of all the qualities necessary to stage a replay, two stand above the rest: available time and patience.
Replays are a big commitment. When you factor in real life, replays inevitably are protracted. And, while replays are great fun, they do not pay the mortgage and seize quality time you could be spending with your spouse, children, relatives, and friends.
You must have the necessary time and motivation to play the games.
The time you want to spend on your replay will compete with earning a living, raising your kids, shopping, taking time out for vacations and holidays, chores like yard work and house repairs, unexpected flare-ups like a leak in the bathroom or a broken carburetor in the car, and participant sports like golf or bowling.
So, what’s the solution? Stay within your limits. Take on too much and it will be too much. Take on only as much of a replay that you can handle.
Next: How much time does it take to do a replay?
Hi Rod,
Good stuff!
I will add that once you start, you can set your own pace that is comfortable for you. It’s not a race to the finish. I’m sure Chuck will chime in at some point but I know it took him 8 years to finish his 1959 replay but it got done. As far as I know, it was just as fun at year 8 as it was in year 1.
thanks!
Tom
Hello Rod,
Thanks for the important article. Initially administration was the hard part. I started out with a pretty primitive stat sheet, with just the bare basics.
Over the years I had not improved it much on my own, as unfortunately a combination of not being the greatest mathematician and excel formula worker I had been struggling with the stats for more detail.
Fortunately thanks to Dom in NY through the between the lines part of the APBA site I was able to get a much more detailed spreadsheet.
That said I initially hated doing stats, and would play a “schedule month” then do the stats. Unfortunately it would then take me almost a real month to do the stats as I would be burned out and bored.
I find it better just to do the stats right after the game as one game of stats does not take me more than 5 minutes to update, then save.
Looking forward to the other segments!
Scott:
I can send you some template stat sheets I’ve used for the past decade, plus a scanned copy of the Fast-Tab Recordkeeper, which is the only way I’ve ever found to really keep up with the stats without having to work too hard at it.
RC