i'm trying out some stuff at the NT lvl to try and figure out some more things concerning the 2-3 zone.
As for LI and MTM the ultimate tactic, i didn't say it was the ultimate tactic. But i have always said that building a LI team costs less and is done faster than an outside team.
i'm only going to consider the attacking part: (and i'm just explaining at a really simplistic lvl, while using the same SF on both teams. so i'm assuming i got a balanced SF)
for an inside attacking team, i'd need:
player JS/Jr/OD/Ha/Dr/Pa IS/ID/RB/SB
PG: x/x/15/15/15/15 x/x/x/x
SG: 15/10/15/15/15/12 x/x/x/x
SF: 14/9/12/15/15/10 13/12/10/9
PF: 10/x/7/x/x/x 14/14/13/10
C: x/x/x/x/x/x 16/16/15/12
for an outside team attacking team:
PG: 15/10/15/15/15/12 x/x/x/x
SG: 15/12/15/14/14/9 x/x/x/x
SF: 14/9/12/15/15/10 13/12/10/9
PF: 12/8/7/10/10/8 x/14/13/10
C: 10/7/x/8/8/8 x/16/15/12
as you'll see, i use the same defensif skills everywhere ( OD, ID, RB and SB) for all players. i'm using the same balanced SF in both tactics.
However, just look at the players. making a PG, SG, PF and C for the inside tactic is much easier than making one for the outside tactic. Training inside players takes less time than training outside players.
Now due to the economical salaries, you want to have as high secundairies as possible. training IS on guards is much easier ( your guard play's C, has a nasty match-up advantage against opposing big and the defensif adjustments just skip on spot, meaning your PG ( or SG) defends one of the guard spots, your SG defends opposing SF, your SF defends opposing PF, your PF defends opposing C and the guard who play's C on your team defends the other of the 2 guard spots.)
in such a line up, you'll have not to many TO's, players are more or less on the right spots. and you got a massive advantage on offense with the bad match-up for your guard against opposing C.
Now, let's just say i want to train my bigs on outside skills: Js can be done on SF/PF, DR can be done on SF/PF. however, PA, HA and JR can only be done on PG/SG spots. So in that event, you need to have a big play at a guard spot. On offense he's got less driving than his defender opposing him. Less PA. Less JS, less JR. That means that he can't contribuate offensifly, and all of your players play out of position. your C can't drive past his defender to get inside and take an inside shot, he can't pass, can't shoot. in other words, he's dead weight on the attack and is likely to turn your ball over. you can say that you got a PF with Js play C, but you still need to get the ball to him and each time your big who's play at the guard position gets the ball, he risks losing it.
So training bigs out of position is much Harder. If we consider the fact that guards for inside tactics are trained faster than guards for outside tactics and the bigs are also trained faster, then it's pretty easy to figure out why everyone play's inside. add to that the fact that playing inside, you got a rebounding advantage, and it's a no brainer why everyone is making players to play inside.
Also, to defend outside, the guards only need OD (pretty easy to train). JS/JR has to go to a very high lvl for it to be effective against a high OD. If the devs want to rebalance things, they have to make it more interesting for managers to train outside players. For instance, lower salary on the JS/Jr would be a start. or players demanding more salary for all their secundairies.
Cause right now, if you build a PG: x/x/18/17/17/16 16/x/x/x and play LI, then he'll drive inside and take inside shots if he can't get good driving shots against a weak ID on his direct defender ( assuming you are playing MTM), meaning the defender is likely to foul or the attack will score. He can pass, and he's good enough to defend. Cause for the IS 16, your PGs Salary doesn't increase by a single $. however, JS on bigs, that does increase their salary...