Now that leagues have been scheduled, feel free to share your strategies and thought processes around constructing your rosters.

I'll kick this off. This definitely won't be the most in-depth (and certainly not the most entertaining) summary, so apologies for the disappointment.

$70M – Doc is the Key
South Side Park (III)

I didn’t have a big strategy for this one beyond finding players whose BA and HR/9 normalized better than the actual numbers. And having sufficient PA and IP. I tried the platoon thing, but couldn’t find a comfortable balance, so I will be relying a bit on some bench scrubs.

This team has a lot of thump and walks, with the likes of Joost, Mantle, Schwarber, Buhner, Tettleton and Pagliarulo. I went with good defenders and awful range, with a -3 hits park to minimize balls in play, and neutral on HRs, as I think I’ll hit more than I give up.

On the pitching staff, I went for starters with low BB/9 in Halladay, Key, Greinke, Maddux and Mikolas, and opted for a couple high IP/G relievers in Scherzer and Penny. Doolittle and Timlin round out the pen.

No clue what to expect from this team, but at very least, they should be able to hold their own.

Hitting: 5,392 PA, .238/.352/.442, 228 HR, 779 BB
Pitching: 1,309 IP, 1.12 WHIP, 212 BB, 965 Ks, 110 HR


$80M – Card 20: THAT’S A BINGO!
Astrodome
Years: 1927-1970-1995-1998-2015

I didn’t spend a lot of time trying out different cards. I looked for a card that would give me some good years to use to put together a strong Round 2 team if I get there.

1998 offered some good pitchers for this cap in Moyer, Mussina, and Wells. I splurged a bit for ’15 Scherzer to anchor the staff. Once again, I opted for high IP/G relievers in Kline, Hill, Heredia and Rueter, with Timlin, Jansen and Robertson added in. Another staff that gives up very few walks, in a pitchers park. The pitching should do well. Now, the offense…

I tried to build my lineup to suit the Astrodome, with good BA hitters, lower Ks and some walks. Gehringer, Metzler, Rickey, Speaker and Aparicio fit the mold, with Santo and Eisenrich rounding out the order. I have some strong bench players that will also contribute in Hosey, Mann, Purdy, Newfield and George Thomas.

I feel cautiously optimistic about this team. I think it should at very least contend for a WC spot.

Hitting: 5,189 PA, .308/.383/.442, 533 BB, 273 2B, 110 SB
Pitching: 1,308.2 IP, 1.05 WHIP, 1143 K, 225 BB, 136 HR


$100M – 2015 Reasons to Weep
Dodger Stadium

I probably spent the most time on this theme. I settled on the ’98 Mariners early, as a sub.-500 team with a lot of good talent for this cap. Sadly, I just could not make it work and I tried so many iterations. Weirdly enough, the Mariners only played 161 games in ’98…had they played (and lost) 1 more, I could’ve had a couple teams I really liked.

I finally opted for 2015. I probably spent more on some players than I should’ve at this cap, but at least I know they’ll do well. As you can guess, Kershaw and Greinke anchor the staff, followed by Price and Felix. Verlander and Iwakuma are available for spot starts and long relief. Not sure about my bullpen in this one, so hopefully my starters can carry the bulk of the load. I have Jansen, Yimi Garcia, Carson Smith and Alex Wilson.

The offense features some players I don’t typically use, so I’m not sure what to expect, but they should be decent. There will be some mixing and matching required, but Miggy, Cruz, Cespedes and JD Martinez will be leaned on in the middle of the order, with players like Iglesias, Kinsler, Seager and McCann rounding things out.

I feel good about this team. Probably could’ve distributed my dollars a bit better, but we’ll compete.

Hitting: 6,146 PA, .286/.347/.473, 298 2B, 229 HR, 494 BB
Pitching: 1,426.1 IP, 1.00 WHIP, 1468 Ks, 302 BB, 122 HR


$110M – Heiseys on the Big Rivera
Dodger Stadium

I built a few teams I really liked, so it was hard to decide. Maddux-Howard, Pujols-Moyer and Uribe-Brown fell by the wayside in favour of what I feel like is the most well-rounded team.

Once again, I have ’15 Kershaw and Greinke anchoring my rotation, this time backed by ’17 Scherzer, ’98 Wells and ’06 Mussina. The pen should be strong with 4 Riveras and ’17 Doolittle. I’ll have to manage their PCs carefully though.

This team features a strong mix of offense and defense, starting with Jeter, Bernie, Giambi and ARod at the top of the order, backed up by a mix of Harper, Rendon, O’Neill, Cano and Posada.

At the risk of jinxing myself, I feel VERY good about this team and expect it will be my best one.

2015 Chris Heisey - Zack Greinke, Clayton Kershaw
2017 Chris Heisey - Anthony Rendon, Bryce Harper, Adam Eaton, Max Scherzer, Ryan Doolittle
1998 Mariano Rivera - Paul O'Neill, Homer Bush, David Wells
2001 Mariano Rivera - Jorge Posada, Randy Velarde
2002 Mariano Rivera - Bernie Williams, Jason Giambi, Chris Widger
2006 Mariano Rivera - Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Robinson Cano, Mike Mussina

Hitting: 6,415 PA, .310/.393/.509, 352 2B, 239 HR, 717 BB, 107 SB
Pitching: 1,385 IP, 0.95 WHIP, 1381 K, 262 BB, 121 HR


$120M – Indians Love Naps
League Park (II)

I pretty much knew from the start I was going with Cleveland. I did build teams for every franchise, but none surpassed this one. Cleveland, IMO, has the best mix of talent in the $8-11M range, and given the cap on individual players, they made a lot of sense here.

I’ve got a dominant pitching rotation with Bieber, Kluber, Lee and Bernhard, backed by multi-inning options in Plesac, Harshman, and Tomlin. The pen is even stronger, with Miller, Betancourt, Clippard, Otero and Karsay.

Offensively, I avoided some of the higher power guys to better suit my ballpark (and because I’m sure I’ll be seeing a fair bit of deadball pitching). Lajoie and Speaker lead things off, followed by Belle, Hickman, Jose Ramirez, Mitchell and Boudreau.

I feel comfortable with Indians teams in franchise leagues and they’re usually my go-to. Not sure how confident to be in this theme, but I think my team should have no problem being competitive.

Hitting: 5,609 PA, .338/.414/.524, 367 2B, 124 HR, 529 BB, 367 K
Pitching: 1,453.1 IP, 0.91 WHIP, 1340 Ks, 255 BB, 119 HR


$255M – The B Sharps
Kauffman Stadium

In the league I’m commishing, there were very few Column B teams, which shocked me. And that’s probably a bad sign for me.

I decided right away not to get caught up in high-priced players, or obsessing about using a ton of cap. These leagues are usually a crapshoot anyway, so I came up with the best plan I could: Grab as many elite OAV pitchers as possible, stick them in a hitters park, and then round up as many solid, low-K hitters as possible, with good defense. I’m not sure how the strategy will work, but I definitely executed it well in drafting.

Pedro, Verlander and Santana are my only 200+ IP pitchers, so there will be some regular managing required. Maeda, Chamberlain, Plesac and Sale will get spot starts and pitch in long relief. The pen is rounded out by strong options in Bonham, Nehf, Evan Phillips and Carmen Hill. I have a lot of high IP/G guys available to matchup against HR and non-HR teams.

Offensively, I tried to not to create too many platoon options, but they are there if I need them. Ichiro, Kelley, Thompson, Cuyler, Ewing, Cano, Fonseca, Fernandez and Polanco are the main order, with Seager, Roush, Barberie, Felipe Lopez and Earl Smith on the bench. This team has incredible defense all around, and lots of possibilities for matching up. Again, this will take a lot of regular managing, but I like the roster I’ve constructed.

Hitting: 6,875 PA, .360/.421/.528, 410 2B, 147 3B, 606 BB, 425 K, 297 SB
Pitching: 1,634 IP, 0.83 WHIP, .179 OAV, 1687 K, 310 BB, 143 HR

Box 1 - 2000 Pedro Martinez
Box 2 - 1888 Elton Chamberlain
Box 3 - 1894 Sam Thompson
Box 4 - 1894 Joe Kelley
Box 5 - 2018 Chris Sale
Box 6 - 2019 Justin Verlander
Box 7 - 1919 Art Nehf
Box 8 - 2020 Kenta Maeda
Box 9 - 2004 Ichiro Suzuki
Box 10 - 2004 Johan Santana
Box 11 - 2022 Evan Phillips
Box 12 - 1930 Kiki Cuyler
Box 13 - 1890 Buck Ewing
Box 14 - 2020 Zach Plesac
Box 15 - 2005 Placido Polanco
Box 16 - 1921 Edd Roush
Box 17 - 1987 Tony Fernandez
Box 18 - 2008 Felipe Lopez
Box 19 - 1929 Lew Fonseca
Box 20 - 1924 Earl Smith
Box 21 - 1940 Tiny Bonham
Box 22 - 2015 Corey Seager
Box 23 - 1918 Carmen Hill
Box 24 - 1991 Bret Barbarie
Box 25 - 2006 Robinson Cano
Box 26 - Kauffman Stadium

When I volunteered to help run the tournament this year, I didn’t initially think about how I’d have to build my teams early enough to be able to be one of the commissioners. I had a backup plan to have someone else fill the role, but I managed to get the teams together. What I didn’t have was the extra few weeks of tinkering I inevitably would have used. Whether that’s actually a good thing remains to be seen. I’ve only made it to Round 2 in 3 of the past 5 years, so I probably could benefit from the time. But instead I had to be among the first ready to go, and I can only hope I didn’t make too many dumb mistakes. It certainly won’t be fun if I’m running Round 2 and not participating in it.

Though I contributed to the discussions of the themes, I didn’t have any insight into how best to approach them. Heck, I didn’t even start building any of the teams until a couple days after we posted the themes, and I only discovered belatedly that some would prove a pain in the tuchus. I feel like I researched all of baseball history to try to find good 100M teams. The Bingo cards intimidated me with so many permutations; in fact, I saved that for last and only had time to mess with a couple of them.

Overall, my biggest fear in this tournament is missing something in the theme that other people figure out and dominate with. Sometimes there’s an insight that eludes me and I feel silly for missing it. It’s less about trying to win than about trying not to stumble.

Buckle up, as I had more time than usual to keep adding to this writeup and included some bonus content and links to videos to keep things interesting. Enjoy!

70M: You’ve Got a Friend

The main question confronting me with this theme was whether or not there’s any use fighting the system. Basically, you have to use a pitching staff that’s at least moderately homer-prone, and you can’t have anyone who hits for average. So what does that leave to your control? On the pitching side, you can try to minimize walks and/or maximize strikeouts since it’s likely people will try to make up for the lack of singles with walks in their hitter choices. You can also try to minimize hits if you want, but the hitters will do a good enough job of that in their own right, so I focused on the low walks primarily in my pitching choices.

On the offensive side, you know power is going to play in this league, but it’s likely a lot of the homers will be solo shots. Stringing together a bunch of hits won’t be all that easy, especially with lead-legged sluggers in the lineup. So I made the decision to expand my run production options by aiming to boost my speed wherever feasible and see if I can run my way to some extra runs while still being able to poke the ball over the wall enough. One hit or walk plus a steal means you only need one more hit for the run, right? Waiting for Earl Weaver’s three-run bombs might not be the optimal strategy here, I think.

I decided to put the team in Exposition Park (-2 for HR) to save some innings and make things harder on owners who went for straight-up power. I also paid more attention than usual to reducing errors rather than maximizing range, because there should be fewer balls in play in this league and I don’t want to give away free baserunners with errors. At this cap, it’s tough to find players who check all these boxes, but I’ve got 4 guys who can hit a good number of homers (2002 Aaron Boone, 2008 Carlos Pena, 1947 Bill Nicholson, and 2004 Mike Cameron) and 5 who can cause a little havoc on the bases (Boone, Cameron, 1982 Julio Cruz, 1978 Toby Harrah, and 2016 Keon Broxton).

Heading my pitching staff are 1960 Bob Friend (hence the team name), 1985 Bret Saberhagen, and 2006 Brandon Webb. I don’t know if I put quite as much thought into fine-tuning this group as I could have, but I looked for low walk rates among pitchers who met the HR/9 threshold but didn’t go way over it. Also, of course, guys whose HR rates normalize way down.

Digression: I couldn’t help but notice that d_rock97 rostered a 200K player in this league who I wish I’d looked for. Not because he’ll make much impact, but for personal reasons. His name is Jake Hager, and he’s a journeyman utilityman who didn’t hit the big leagues until he was 28. He was a 1st-round draft pick out of high school in 2011, and like so many guys like that just didn’t manage to develop into the star they imagined. After nearly 4000 minor-league plate appearances, a .701 OPS starts to look like a pretty good reflection of what kind of hitter you are. Anyway, Jake cracked the majors in 2021 (somehow he was in four organizations that year and got called up by two of them) and then got just enough ABs with Arizona in 2022 to make it into WIS. Why do I care at all? Well, I worked with his father for 7 years and heard an awful lot of stories about how hard it is to make the majors even with 1st-round talent. I know how immensely proud his dad was when Jake finally made The Show. It’s easy to forget there are some great stories surrounding guys who barely got a cup of coffee, and I’m happy I got to know this one.

Musical interlude: James Taylor (when he still had hair) and Carole King (the songwriter) perform the track live on the BBC: https://youtu.be/nEFfzHiEKHY

5,302 PA, .238/.347/.425, 223 2B, 24 3B, 187 HR, 177 SB
1,332 IP, 3.02 ERA, .247 OAV, 1.10 WHIP, 0.65 HR/9
$34.5M hitting/$35.5M pitching

80M: Torey, Torey, Hallelujah

In theory, you could build rosters for this theme all day and night and keep comparing them until you find one you like the best. It was so daunting to me just trying to figure out where to start that I saved this until the end. My approach was first to find a card with four corners or a row with years I knew could form a good 120M pitching staff. Then I tested out building that roster to see if I liked the results. Then I looked at the other two ways of building and tested out both to make an 80M roster from that card. I did this with just two cards, 5 and 8. Both landed solid 120M rosters I could be happy with, and then it was about seeing what I could do about a Round 1 combo. I didn’t really like the rosters I could build with Card 5, which led me to Card 8. Bingo!

The four corners jumped out as very workable for 120M with 1972 and 1985 as strong starting pitching seasons and 1931 and 1951 filled with hitting options. Then for the 80M version, I built a team from the top row which was OK but not my favorite. I then did one using each season once and was able to create a core I liked. Filling in the last 6-7 spots efficiently took many permutations, but I can live with the scrub collection I wound up with.

In my first version of this roster, I used my 2019 spot for a reliever, primarily because I had fairly few modern seasons. I needed to make sure I had a decent bullpen and the options are much thinner the further back you go. Then I remembered that the first rule of Fight Club is to use 2019 Ketel Marte in your 80m league, whereupon I dumped a pretty solid 1994 Gary Sheffield from my outfield and began the shuffle until Marte fit, the bullpen was usable, and the math worked. I think I swapped out 11 players to make it work, but truth be told I like the lineup better with him on top so I’m going to accept conventional wisdom that he needs to be there. I do think most people use him at 2B, but his range really bothers me so I’ve got him in RF instead.

I usually like 1988 Kirk Gibson at this cap, as much for nostalgia as anything, so he brings speed and pop behind Marte. I have ample power throughout the lineup behind them with 1960 Harmon Hillebrew, 2008 Troy Glaus, 2002 Jorge Posada, and 2012 Bryce Harper, plus a middle infield of 2011 Jimmy Rollins and 1992 Robby Thompson.

I looked at all my available seasons for strong pitchers in the target cap range and basically locked those in early. My ace is 1947 Warren Spahn, followed by 1920 Babe Adams and 1982 Joe Niekro. I feel pretty good about that trio. I think I’ve used them all at this cap before. I’ve got 1972 Jim Kaat’s 120 IP as a 4th starter when needed.

Digression: This theme gave me the opportunity to tap into a piece of nostalgia. When I was in high school in West Los Angeles, my friend Marc and I would occasionally go watch UCLA play baseball at Jackie Robinson Stadium. It’s nestled into the VA property right down the street from where I went to school. Our favorite player in those days was a second baseman with the lyrical name Torey Lovullo. Marc’s family was from Detroit, so he was over the moon when the Tigers drafted Torey, and visions of him stepping in to fill the eternal void the Tigers had at third base were frequently discussed. Torey, alas, became a journeyman backup with barely any playing time, but he has shown himself to be a promising manager with an energetic Diamondbacks team that’s likely to be good the next few years (Update: Since I first drafted this, they've overtaken my Dodgers and taken a decent lead in the division, so their time is now). So at any rate, I’ve got 1994 Torey on my roster as a scrub MI reserve, but you’d better be sure I’ll cheer any big hits he might deliver.

Musical interlude: Really, you don’t want to miss this. It’s a super sweaty Elvis live from Honolulu in 1973 in an awesome glitzy jumpsuit and massive diamond rings. https://youtu.be/0FT3SmZ_zx0

5,255 PA, .276/.357/.472, 253 2B, 28 3B, 194 HR, 99 SB
1,364 IP, 2.36 ERA, .229 OAV, 1.05 WHIP, 0.42 HR/9
$38.8M hitting/$41.2M pitching

100M: 96 Tears

I think I looked at every season in MLB history trying to find groups of teams you could build a starting rotation with that met the cumulative record requirement. Ultimately, I wound up with four groups that formed rosters I liked enough: 1964 White Sox/Braves/KC A’s, 1985 Cardinals/Expos/Pirates, 1996 Braves/Marlins/Phillies, and 2015 Dodgers/Nationals/Reds. Then I built all my other teams and finally came back at the end of finalizing everything else to try to pick one of these.

The 1964 collection probably stood the least chance, with a rotation that tailed off a lot after Joe Horlen, but it had good balance offensively and defensively. The 1985 team was my favorite for a long time, with a pile of switch hitters and great speed (Raines/McGee at the top) and the best defense of the four, but the rotation isn’t too deep and the bullpen was by far the weakest of the four. The 2015 team has the best one-two lineup punch with Bryce Harper and Joey Votto and the best top two in the rotation with Greinke and Kershaw. The rest of that rotation wasn’t too shabby either with Scherzer, Cueto, and Strasburg, and the bullpen was solid. However, the offense really paled overall next to the other teams, and I would have been forced to play either Votto or Adrian Gonzalez in the outfield. Offensively and defensively, it rated the lowest of the options. Also 2015 Kershaw just burned me in the last round of thejuice6’s tournament, and I couldn’t pull the trigger.

So, I wound up with the 1996 team mostly by process of elimination. It has a deep lineup headed by Chipper Jones and Gary Sheffield, though alas both of them have terrible gloves. Fred McGriff, Benito Santiago, Marquis Grissom, and Mark Whiten also have good power. Team speed is solid, and a few guys can steal bases effectively. I’ll run out a couple imperfect platoons because it’s tough to get every spot filled the way you’d want it ideally. Quilvio Veras is the much better half of a split with Mickey Morandini at 2B, and Jim Eisenreich will swap out in RF with Whiten.

The rotation of Smoltz-Maddux-Brown-Schilling should be stingy with walks and generally pretty strong. The back of the bullpen is solid enough with Robb Nen and Ricky Bottalico, and I think I’ll drop the 28-inning Rick Helling in at closer.

Digression: I am still not quite over the 1985 NLCS, nor can I say the name Tom Niedenfuer without gagging. Thinking about the ‘85 Cardinals here dredges up memories of those two painful losses in Game 5 and Game 6. Both games were played during the day on weekdays, and I was in high school then. Though memory pulls a few tricks on me, I distinctly remember watching the Ozzie homer that won Game 5 and I’m pretty sure I was in basically the same place to see Clark’s homer in Game 6. I had a Sony Watchman with something like a 2-inch diagonal black-and-white screen, and I remember taking it to school those days. After school, I went straight to the cafeteria to watch what I could of the games while waiting for my carpool ride home. I can still recall the stunned silence after Ozzie’s homer. I’d like to think Denkinger’s call in Game 6 of the World Series was nature’s way of evening things out for the Cardinals. I mean, c’mon: Ozzie hit 28 regular-season HR in 19 seasons and just that one in 42 playoff games. I still can’t believe it, really.

Musical interlude: Here’s a creepy version of "96 Tears" by ? and the Mysterians with some Barbie dolls for unknown reasons. But you’ve gotta love the unmistakable organ playing on this track. https://youtu.be/XeolH-kzx4c

6,061 PA, .292/.371/.472, 276 2B, 41 3B, 201 HR, 151 SB
1,432 IP, 2.74 ERA, .222 OAV, 1.04 WHIP, 0.59 HR/9
$50.2M hitting/$49.7M pitching

110M: Here Comes Tim Raines Again

My initial approach to this was to find guys who played with a lot of good starting pitchers and work with those seasons as a kickstart, rather than use a single SP as the rotation or the bulk of it. Well-traveled relievers are a great place to find these possibilities, and I landed on a couple who provided several good options in Don McMahon and Hoyt Wilhelm. McMahon played on some great teams in the 1960s that included the likes of Marichal, McLain, Horlen, and Spahn atop the rotations. Also, he has several good seasons of his own. Wilhelm also bounced around and had a lot of great teammates, and he had even more good seasons to pick from. And that’s without being able to use any from pre-1961.

Wilhelm brought me 1972 Don Sutton, 1969 Phil Niekro, and 1964 Joe Horlen to top my rotation. With the 72 Dodgers, I also could add a lefty reliever in Jim Brewer. From the 64 White Sox, I got the left side of my infield in Ron Hansen and Pete Ward, and from those 69 Braves I got my cleanup hitter in Hank Aaron.

On the hitting side, outfielders are certainly an obvious place to start. Rickey Henderson was the first one I tried, and he wasn’t lacking for options or great teammates. But I liked the 69 Aaron and didn’t want to wind up with too heavily a right-handed lineup. That led me to try Tim Raines instead. I am only using Raines as two of my starting hitters (85 and 87) along with two bench versions just for their teammates (99 and 02). The 99 A’s brought the other half of the infield with Jason Giambi and Randy Velarde, and the 02 Marlins provided half a DH platoon in Cliff Floyd (pairing with 69 Rico Carty). I couldn’t find a way to squeeze a Raines year that came with a good Gary Carter, so my catching platoon is definitely a weak spot but also a money-saver. I think you can get away with one pretty unproductive lineup spot, honestly.

I certainly could have tinkered around with a bunch more combinations and found one I liked better. But time wasn’t exactly my friend, so once I had a squad I liked that had good power, speed, defense, starting and relief pitching, I just went with it.

Digression: What was with Don Sutton’s perm in the 70s? My mom had naturally curly hair that looked like Sutton’s, and as a very young child this made me think Sutton might have been a woman out there on the mound. Not that there would have been anything wrong with that.

Musical interlude: A live version of Eurythmics doing "Here Comes The Rain Again," in case you didn’t get the reference. Fun fact: My first concert was seeing them at the Greek Theater in LA in 1983, with Howard Jones opening. https://youtu.be/OojeUDY3iZE

6,318 PA, .294/.386/.481, 273 2B, 38 3B, 221 HR, 171 SB
1,403 IP, 2.41 ERA, .206 OAV, 1.00 WHIP
$58.6M hitting/$51.3M pitching

120M: Steppin’ Out

I tested out 5 or 6 franchises to build out rosters, or at least most of them, to see who had combinations that worked well within the salary range limitations. I had Dodgers and Red Sox teams I liked well enough, but neither worked out quite as well as the Cleveland group did for me. And you’ve got to know that for me not to use the Dodgers required some good convincing.

I was far from alone in landing on Cleveland, though. We have 8 of them in my league alone. Folks are going to get really sick of Shane Bieber, Corey Kluber, and Bill Bernhard.

I think the key to this league is making good use of the $1M+ backups you have to draft rather than wasting salary on your bench. With Cleveland, I found a way to create a 4-way platoon of left fielders (Bruce Campbell, Joe Wood, Brian Giles, and Bernie Neis) for about $6.7M. Collectively, they’re probably the 3rd or 4th best hitters on the team, too. They’ll mostly bat just behind Tris Speaker and Joe Jackson, who will hopefully spend a lot of time on base. Jackson’s namesake, the 80s musician, is the inspiration for the team name, too.

The lineup includes some high-range middle infielders in ‘03 Nap Lajoie and ‘22 Andres Gimenez, plus a doubles machine in switch-hitting ‘17 Jose Ramirez and a big bat in ‘30 Ed Morgan. It’s a group well-suited for League Park (II) with +2 singles and +3 doubles.

The Cleveland pitching options turned out to be so deep I didn’t even roster Addie Joss ultimately. Of course, you have to take Bernhard, who is simply always good no matter what even if I can’t exactly explain it. Add on 2020 Bieber and 2017 Kluber, and you’ve got a nice rotation shaping up. I went with 1911 Vean Gregg in the 4th spot over Joss to get a lefty in there and because they’re awfully similar statistically anyway with a lower $/IP. The 2020 Zach Plesac is there as a spot starter/long man, too.

I really liked the Cleveland bullpen options, with a quartet of guys with sub 0.80 WHIPs in Emmanuel Clase, Andrew Miller, Rafael Betancourt, and Brad Hand. Plus I could throw in two studly low-inning guys in Jeff Manship and Oliver Perez. Of course, relievers being relievers, no doubt some of them will blow big leads anyway. But I think for the cost it’s as good a pen as you can get in this theme.

Digression: With good justification, schwarze posts a lot of complaints about relievers in this game. I feel like this league will be a good test to see whether there’s any hope of building a really reliable one. I have 6 RP here with WHIPs between 0.69 and 0.77, no ERC# higher than 1.16, and OAV ranging from .155 to .183. On paper, you’d be hard-pressed to line up a pen much better than that, particularly limiting to only one franchise. So how many of those 6 do you think will actually even finish with an ERA above 4? I’d guess at least 3 of them will.

Musical interlude: More 80s music, courtesy of “that” Joe Jackson. https://youtu.be/PJwt2dxx9yg

5,578 PA, .339/.408/.527, 367 2B, 82 3B, 122 HR, 144 SB
1,448 IP, 1.85 ERA, .191 OAV, 0.88 WHIP, 0.47 HR/9

255M: Riding with the King

First off, let’s discuss the payroll question. Is it necessarily either good or bad to carry more or less total salary in this league? Sure, alignment is going to come from salary, but does it matter that much? Is there a distinct advantage to being in the more or less expensive league? Does salary total even correlate to team quality at this level, considering all the possible seasons at our disposal?

My conclusions may yet prove invalid, but I believe it is possible to underspend trying to get into the cheapest division and not build as good a team as others you’ll be facing. I also think it’s possible to overspend and carry a lot of unneeded innings and PA and wind up in an expensive division but not actually be putting your salary on the field. After building a few versions of possible teams, I came away thinking I’d more than likely end up in the lower salaried league but at the higher end of it, but I didn’t choose any players or seasons on the basis of what they cost either. I took the guys I wanted to put the money on the field while also not taking much risk of fatigue either. I do look forward to finding out how well salary correlates to wins. I am always concerned that I missed something obvious, and maybe this was it. Should I have tried to spend more or less intentionally? I didn’t load the bench with extra PA. It would be really easy to spend $200M+ here and not really have a better team, but my gut tells me some of the highest salaried teams might also be ones I wouldn’t want to be in a division with either.

As it turned out, $176M landed me as the 12th-highest salary, just enough to be in the league with the higher-salaried teams. If I’d spent just 500K less, I’d have been the top salary in the other league. I’m more concerned about the owner names in my division (cough, cough, barracuda3, cough, cough) than the amount they spent, though. It’s going to be a big challenge.

Anyway, I started off using Group A building a team around Babe Ruth, assuming that all he brings would be more valuable than anyone else. I wondered if it were even possible to build a really good pitching staff anyway. I think I had a solid one assembled (Greinke, Horlen, Scott, and Schmidt the top SP), but a few of the lineup picks felt like either poor uses of the options in their box or less likely to do all that well in this format.

That got me to tinkering and seeing if I could still build as good an offense without Ruth as I could with him. The answer is yes, in part by solving a different question: Which SP do I take in Box 1? You can make good arguments for any of them, to be sure. But I kept coming back to ol’ Silver King and thinking he needs to be at the top of the list. The innings alone are critical, because he fills half a rotation by himself, leaving me another choice box for a hitting upgrade. All I need are two other SP to either work as a tandem or A/B.

Anyway, once I had a favorite Group A squad built, I had to make a Group B team and compare them. I started off with Cobb in that one and a rotation headed by Koufax-Bieber-Guidry. It was a strong team, but I liked the A Team much better ultimately.

My goal for my offense was to find guys whose success could transcend homers for those games we play in Target/Astrodome types, enough speed to be helpful, solid defense wherever possible, and decent fits for one of the parks in Box 26. I didn’t love any of the other parks enough to miss out on a stronger player option, and a +3 doubles Sportsman’s Park suited us well. Here’s a box-by-box breakdown:

1. Silver King, 1888, SP. Though I don’t know how much stock to put in it precisely, I looked at the last 6-7 DEAL drafts just to see how the pitchers were being “ranked” by those owners. Granted I don’t know how those seasons turned out and whether those picks worked out well, but in something like 4 of the past 5 drafts the top overall pick was … Silver King. Ruth was occasionally like 4th even. I’m going to assume the owners who know that league and the rosters they’re likely to end up with (similar to ours here) made King a top choice for good reasons. My favorite thing about him is I can draft top hitters in the next few boxes without needing another SP for a while.
2. Stan Musial, 1948, LF. It’s always good to have some 1.100+ OPS hitters in there. If I’m trying to justify skipping Ruth, I need someone who hits a ton. A few someones, actually. Stan has to be a big Man here.
3. Pete Browning, 1887, CF. It definitely comes recommended to have a .400 hitter with 95 speed atop the lineup. There aren’t many. Playing him in CF worries me a tad because of his propensity for errors.
4. Chuck Klein, 1930, RF. The guy knocked out 112 extra-base hits, but what makes me laugh is he had 14 sacrifice bunts that season, too. I would have loved to ask Earl Weaver his thoughts on that. Anyway, another monster bat. Need a lot of those, though it’s really starting to bother me that I went away from convention and loaded up early at what is usually the deepest position. Maybe I’ll regret that.
5. Larry Walker, 1997, DH. There are some great 3B options in this box as well as the very tempting Gonsolin season, but I can get 3B production elsewhere. I can’t get another guy who slugged .720 and stole 33 bases.
6. Joe Mauer, 2009, C. I could have gone a lot of ways here, including a top shortstop or a better defender in CF like Kauff. But then I’d have to remove Musial, Klein, or Walker, and I wanted all of them. There is no comparable offensive year for a catcher in this group, though, so Mauer won out.
7. Mike Scott, 1986, SP. With the lineup filling out very nicely, I grabbed Scott’s dominant 276 innings here. He’ll either be pitching in a tandem every other day or starting about 45 games. Pairing him with a lefty to catch a few platoons the wrong way seems appealing.
8. Joe Horlen, 1964, SP. I’m still unsure whether to use him as an alternate starter with Scott or to have him in long relief and occasionally working into the tandem when someone needs a rest.
9. Heinie Zimmerman, 1912, 3B. I originally had Adrian Beltre at 3rd and Jason Schmidt in this box, but I had a nagging feeling Beltre would underperform badly in this format due to overreliance on homers. So I swapped the SP and 3B in these two boxes to get a high-average, high-doubles hitter who fits better with my lineup. The downside is Zimmerman is much worse defensively than Beltre, but I think his offensive impact will be worth the difference in errors.
10. Jonathan Papelbon, 2006, RP. There are so many good relievers available in these boxes, so it’s not a big deal to start building the pen deeper into the group. I just know I need to stockpile 6 or 7 of them to take turns disappointing me with late-inning collapses.
11. Sean Doolittle, 2018, RP. His video-game stats earn him the Closer role for now anyway. Let’s see how he fares.
12. Cesar Valdez, 2020, RP. Truthfully, I’d never heard of him. But he has ridiculous 2020 stats, like many other relievers. Including another I’ll take later.
13. Robin Yount, 1982, SS. If you grew up in the 80s as I did, you couldn’t believe there was a shortstop putting up numbers like Yount did. Until Ripken did it the next year. He’ll make a nice No. 8 hitter for me (12yo me would not believe that either).
14. Andrew Bailey, 2009, RP. Another fireman (or arsonist, depending on the day).
15. Arthur Rhodes, 2002, RP. Because I need a couple lefties down there, too.
16. Mark Teixeira, 2008, 1B. I almost took Johnny Mize with Box 14, but I decided that Teixeira’s 234 PA partial could platoon with Joey Votto’s 475 PA season and form a really fantastic 1B instead.
17. Roger Bresnahan, 1912, C. I needed a RH catcher to spell Mauer in some games. He’s not great offensively, but he hits for average and his A+ arm won’t hurt as a defensive replacement either.
18. Pop Corkhill, 1888, OF. Klein and Musial aren’t bad defensively, but you might as well have an A+ range guy for late innings who also hits .380 in case he needs to come up to bat here and there.
19. Blake Snell, 2018, SP. I feel like Snell is a high-value guy hiding down here in Box 19. His walks can be a concern, but I’d use him primarily as something of an opener and then hand the ball to Scott with a couple extra righties likely in the lineup. If he gets lit up, though, he could wind up just a long man.
20. Todd Haney, 1995, 2B. You haven’t met the starting 2B yet, but Haney can hit for him in close late games and be tolerable in the field if needed.
21. Mark Eichhorn, 1986, RP. Basically a long man and innings eater whenever needed, though he’s certainly good enough to pitch in key situations, too. I was going to take a lower-inning guy here, but an extra buffer against fatigue can’t hurt in a league where a lot of these pitchers will get rocked.
22. Joey Votto, 2012, 1B. He crushes a ton of doubles and draws heaps of walks. I’m pretty happy to have him in the middle of the order.
23. Livan Soto, 2022, SS. Another guy you’d never take if salary mattered, but sure why not have a .400 hitter to PH here and there?
24. Dee Gordon, 2015, 2B. Aha, here’s my second baseman hiding near the bottom of the pile. He hit .333, plays A/A+ defense, and has 91 speed. Really, could I ask for more out of a No. 9 hitter?
25. Shawn Armstrong, 2020, RP. (See Valdez, Cesar)
26. Sportsman Park III. It’s +3 for doubles, and everyone except Gordon in my lineup hits a ton of them. At least it’s playing to a strength.

Digression: It’s easy to overlook how impressive Mark Eichhorn’s 1986 season was. It’s worth noting that he was a rookie (finished 3rd in voting behind Jose Canseco and Wally Joyner) who threw 157 innings, all in relief. He racked up 7.3 WAR, and though my search was not exhaustive I could find only one other true reliever with more in a season (1975 Gossage at 8.2, incidentally, not what I would have guessed). For comparison, Roger Clemens won the CYA and MVP in ‘86 with an 8.8 WAR season across 254 innings, and Mike Scott’s outstanding season (also on this roster) was only worth 8.2 in 276 innings. Here’s a fun article from The Ringer about best relief seasons year-by-year, if you need something else to read: https://www.theringer.com/mlb/2021/3/17/22335319/relief-pitcher-championship-belt-mariano-rivera-dennis-eckersley-rollie-fingers

Musical interlude: We’ll go with John Hiatt and Ry Cooder doing the track live. I was a big Hiatt fan there for a good while. Doesn’t get enough love, in my opinion. https://youtu.be/PJwt2dxx9yg

6,589 PA, .365/.430/.596, 426 2B, 92 3B, 245 HR, 283 SB
1,875 IP, 1.78 ERA, .187 OAV, 0.89 WHIP, 0.37 HR/9
$92.4M hitting/$83.5M pitching

I have a feeling we're going to see a few Indians teams with that Bieber/Kluber/Bernhard combo.

Posted by Jtpsops on 6/12/2023 12:31:00 PM (view original):
I have a feeling we're going to see a few Indians teams with that Bieber/Kluber/Bernhard combo.

There are 8 Cleveland teams in my league, and 6 of them have all three of those guys. There's one without Kluber and one without Bernhard. So, in short, yup!

$70m: The Baseball Furies

Yankee Stadium III
.242 AVG, .366 OBP, .454 SLG, 242 HR
1327 IP, .253 OAV, 1.12 WHIP

Named after the baseball gang in The Warriors, this team has two goals on offense: to draw walks and hit home runs. My fielding is mediocre, but defense was secondary here to the offensive goals. And hey, we’re facing batters who can’t hit.

My pitching priority was to suppress homers by selecting low adjusted HR/9 combined with low BB/9. Except for long relief from 1955 George Zuverink, my pitchers are all from the mid-80s or later, which should help the defense some.

Prediction: after reviewing rosters in my immediate league, my pitching OAV is worse than league average, but nobody else went all in on hitter walks/HR and suppressing walks/HRs with their pitching staff like I did. Provided that's a winning strategy, I'll make the playoffs. I think it will be.


$80m: B-Boy Bouillabaisse

League Park II
.293 AVG, .380 OBP, .430 SLG, 101 HR
1372 IP, .234 OAV, 1.04 WHIP

I used card #1 and went the season soup route, using one player from all 25 years. At this low cap it felt easier to find 1 bargain per season than 5. And I chose the first card due to the row containing both 2020 and 2022, which should allow for killer pitching if I make the second round. “Card 1 Soup” sucks as a team name though so I borrowed from the Beastie Boys instead.

On offense this team features high OBP players who hit doubles: Ferris Fain, Ken Singleton, Joe Morgan, Roy Cullenbine. Cullenbine allows me to play in League Park II, amplifying the doubles and suppressing homers. Defense is mixed. Weak range in the outfield, but Carlos Correa brings a .995 fielding percentage to shortstop.

Pitchers are low-BB/9 bargains, some who throw strikeouts (Shane Bieber, Ryan Yarbrough) and some who don’t (Bob Tewksbury, Bill Monbouquette). Minus the mopup, my pitchers span from 1948 to 2022, which was about as modern as I could manage given the theme parameters.

Prediction: I expect a lot of parity in this league. My roster is nothing special, and my hopes for a winning record may depend on whether I chose the right ballpark. With some luck we'll get to 86 wins but I could see us doing worse.


$100m: 2020 Houston Metsox

Citi Field
.292 AVG, .369 OBP, .479 SLG, 216 HR
1508 IP, .207 OAV, 1.05 WHIP

I really only considered 2020 for this theme. Balancing 35 wins against 35 losses in a shortened season seemed easier than potentially working with 90+ losses in a full season. Plus, I recall some video explaining how the 2020 Mets had a wRC+ equivalent to some of history’s greatest teams (’27 Yankees, ’75 Reds) but hit so poorly with RISP they ended up with a losing record. As a Mets fan, all I can say is of course they did! So many ways to lose.

I tried a Braves team, but despite Freeman and Ozuna in the lineup the pitching ended up unusably weak. My White Sox build is better, even though it was hard spending the money efficiently. I drafted surplus innings and plate appearances yet left $1.5 million unspent.

216 HRs (full-season adjusted) sounds like a lot, but it’s not for 2020, and Jose Abreu is my only proper longball threat. So I went with Citi Field, the one HR-suppressing ballpark of my 3 options. Here’s hoping my Metsox have better luck in Queens than the LOLMets typically do.

Prediction: dang, this is the one team I wish I'd spent more time on. Those CLE/MIL teams from 2020 are clearly superior to mine. As there are only 2 in my immediate league, there's still room to sneak into the playoffs, but I'm less excited now than I was when building this team.


$110m: Freddie Got Scherzered

Truist Park
.308 AVG, .399 OBP, .523 SLG, 243 HR
1372 IP, .187 OAV, 0.89 WHIP

The name references the 2001 Tom Green comedy Freddy Got Fingered, a film with an 11% Rotten Tomatoes rating. (Never saw it, but based on vague memories of Green’s MTV show, that score feels generous.) With a team name this stupid, how can I lose?

This build was the second-most time consuming and the one in which I tried out the most rosters. I once again wanted the 2020 Braves, but my original clone combo of Mark Melancon and Cliff Floyd left me pretty unenthused. After exploring different pitching options, I realized Max Scherzer had quite a few dazzling yet affordable seasons as long as I could stomach his high HR/9 rate (and the possibility the SIM suspends him for excess rosin). Scherzer’s 2021 season offered a dilemma: the Dodgers, with numerous useful players? Or the Nationals, with nobody apart from the .465 OBP Juan Soto? Ah, who am I kidding, I never considered the Dodgers.

It took ages to come up with a qualifying team combining Freddie Freeman’s monstrous 2020 Braves season with his decent 2022 Dodgers debut, but I got there eventually. Now I have Freeman and Ozuna alongside solid pitching from the Dodgers (Gonsolin, Kershaw, Evan Phillips). To afford all this, I settled for starting 2022 Will Smith, who smacked the s**t out of Chris Rock at the Oscars posted a .343 OBP and threw out baserunners at an 18% rate. Against a team of Tim Raines clones I’m doomed, but otherwise I have high hopes for this squad.

Prediction: the good news is this team looks really strong. The bad news is I'm in a Group of Death, with 3 other solid builds in my division. I hope this isn't one of those win-95-games-and-miss-the-playoffs scenarios, but it could be.


$120m: These Go To Eleven

Ebbets Field
.336 AVG, .424 OBP, .549 SLG, 222 HR
1401 IP, .186 OAV, 0.86 WHIP

Hopefully the Spinal Tap reference atones somewhat for Freddy Got Fingered. An easy build, except I was initially reluctant to use the Dodgers. Dodger pitching seemed so obviously superior that I guess I figured there had to be a catch?

So I lived with a Red Sox team for a while, assuming a lineup starring Boggs, Teddy Ballgame, and Betts would outhit the Dodgers. I also felt more confident building for Fenway Park than Dodger Stadium.

Then, since I had the time, I built a Dodger squad for comparison, except there was none. The pitching predictably blew the Sox away, even with the $11m salary limit eliminating a number of top seasons like 2015 Greinke. But the hitting was also surprisingly equivalent, thanks in part to Babe Herman’s .393/.455/.678 1930 season. Remembering I could play in Ebbets helped as well, don’t know why that didn’t occur to me initially.

Prediction: this is my best team. Playoffs or bust.


$255m: I Need A Nap

Olympic Stadium
.362 AVG, .450 OBP, .592 SLG, 232 HR
1572 IP, .172 OAV, 0.85 WHIP

I spent the longest on this build. Any time I need a spreadsheet to keep track of my draft I’m in trouble. Well, I also used a spreadsheet to construct the $80m team, but that one had fewer columns.

I had to build teams for both A and B to decide which I liked better. B had better relievers, but the hitters were so much weaker that A seemed the better choice.

The next problem was deciding who to draft first. I thought about Babe Ruth, but the groups were structured to make stacking up on homers difficult. Instead I went with Nap Lajoie’s .426/.463/.643 season, which also proved easier to build around. There’s only a handful of offensively brilliant seasons at second base, whereas I could always grab a great outfielder later in the draft.

From there I alternated between excellent modern starting pitching with big bats at harder-to-fill positions. My starters are Clayton Kershaw, Dinelson Lamet, Trevor Bauer (an awful human with awfully good SIM stats in one pandemic-shortened season) and Mike Scott, while I drafted Wade Boggs and Joe Mauer early for great performances at 3B and C. This strategy meant ignoring my bullpen until box 10, so no Nick Anderson, no Eric Gagne. I’m hoping the likes of Papelbon, Saito, Benoit, and Rich Hill can get the job done.

I got to the bottom of the list a few times and realized I’d screwed up somewhere. Discovering I could run a 1B platoon of Joey Votto and Mark Teixera from very late in the draft helped tremendously, since before that I kept doing things like drafting Carlos Delgado and Joe Cronin and realizing they came from the same group.

I suck at draft leagues and this felt a lot like one, so who knows how this team will do. While I’m impressed with what I found for $110m given the theme requirements, I have no idea if this $170m team is enough to beat other unlimited cap competition. I’m more confident in my hitting than pitching, so I chose a pitcher’s park in Olympic Stadium with +2 doubles to play to Lajoie’s strength.

Prediction: I feel more upbeat about this team now that I’ve reviewed other rosters. My hitting looks good and I'm not seeing vastly superior pitching elsewhere. I think I'll still need a bit of luck at this cap, but this roster's in good shape.

Thanks to the organizers of the league. I know it’s a lot of work and I know I'm not alone when I say that your work is appreciated.

These were some pretty fun and well-thought out theme leagues to create. My favorites in descending order to create were:

$255M Draft ‘Em All - A tricky theme that forces you to make tough choices
$80M Bingo - I like my bingo card
$100M Create a Team - Had fun trying different teams out
$120M One Franchise - A simple but fun idea
$70M Khris Davis - Less interesting but will be interesting how others form their teams
$110M Two Clones & Teammates - I dreaded what looked like a giant research project

$70M - Khiller D

Wanted to go for defense where it counts. I am A+ at 2B and 3B. Also got Gene Tenace A+ arm at C in case anyone tries to run. I am D+ at SS with Yank Robinson but he’s from 1888, so I think he’ll normalize with my modern pitchers. I don’t care about 1B or OF defense as much but they’re average.

On offense I wanted OBP and power since I could utilize the 0.50 HR/9 pitcher rule. Juan Soto, Jack Clark, Jedd Gyorko, Mel Ott and Charlie Duffee should fit that bill. I wanted Yank Robinson for his leadoff skills (.400 obp). I also have some L/R platoons that should work out as well.

Pitching was going to be low strikeout (to save on $), low walk guys who will allow my defense to take care of business. Bob Tewksbury, Gary Nolan, Dick Donovan and Zane Smith fit that bill. The bullpen is more of the same.

Hitters: 5492 PA, .233/.356/.392
Pitchers: 1299 IP 1.07 Whip, 2.60 ERA, 0.614 HR/9
Jack Murphy Stadium

$80M Card #5

I used card #5. Just doing a quick glance I saw it had 2020, a year I like to use right in the middle so I knew it was a contender. Cards I also considered: 2, 13, 17, 18, 24 and 25. I had actually printed all of the bingo cards and circled ones that I liked and crossed out ones I didn’t like. So it was kinda like I really was playing bingo. But my first instinct was correct after I built multiple rosters, #5 was my card. I went with playing all 25 numbers and if I make it to round 2, I’m not sure what I’ll do, but I know 2020 is in the middle so I have 4 options that I’ll likely go with. I also like this theme because it’s hard to min/max when you are constrained to the years on the card.

I like this card because of certain “cookie” players that I like such as:

1998 Mark Loretta
1931 Earl Webb
1992 Dave Winfield
1956 Wally Moon
1971 Ed Kirkpatrick
1989 Scott Fletcher
2020 Kyle Kendricks

Hitters: 5697 PA, .289/.373/.446
Pitchers: 1385 IP 1.10 Whip, 2.74 ERA, 0.67 HR/9
Colt Stadium

$100M 2020 MLW/LAA/CHW

Another theme where my first instinct was to use 2020. But I did try out some other years like 1902 and 2008. I was searching for years where a high priced player was traded mid-season from a loser club to a contender. 1902 didn’t have any bullpen guys which made it tough. 2008 just didn’t feel right even after multiple re-works. So I went with 2020. 2020 also does not have dynamic pricing which is a plus.

I knew the Brewers were going to be there since they were the sub .500 team and they had some great pitchers such as Brandon Woodruff, Corbin Burnes and Devin Williams. Unfortunately, I needed to also roster Christian Yelich and his low batting average. But he does walk and have some power (.205/.356/.430).

The White Sox were a shoo-in with Lucas Giolito, Dallas Keuchel, Tim Anderson, Yasmani Grandal, Eloy Jimenez and Jose Abreu.

The Angels fit nicely with their losing record but some really good players. Mike Trout, Dylan Bundy, Anthony Rendon, David Fletcher fit nicely where I had some of my biggest needs.

It’s not a very balanced team as my pitching is better than my offense. Again, it’s a good theme in that it is hard to min/max with the constraints of the rules of the league. The combined win total of my teams was 90-90 in real life.

Hitting: 5595 PA .275/.360/.499
Pitching: 1406 IP 1.03 Whip, 2.90 ERA, 0.73 HR/9
Miller Park



$110M 4 Rickeys, 2 Smiths

This one I did last because I knew it would be a research project. For my hitter clone, I knew it was most likely that I would use an outfielder. I was really dreading looking into all of the different possibilities and over-analyzing who to use. But then for some reason I thought of Rickey Henderson and how funny it would be to have a bunch of Rickeys on a team talking about themselves in the third-person. He had a really long career and played for a lot of teams so there were a lot of possibilities. He also had a lot of good partial seasons and a $338k season so I could roster 4 of him.

1989 Rickey Henderson - Oakland Athletics

• Terry Steinbach, Dennis Eckersley

1993 Rickey Henderson - Toronto Blue Jays

• John Olerud, Paul Molitor, Roberto Alomar, Tony Fernandez

1997 Rickey Henderson - San Diego Padres

• Tony Gwynn, Ken Caminiti

2003 Rickey Henderson - Los Angeles Dodgers

• Guillermo Mota, Wilson Alvarez

For my pitcher, I used Dave Smith. I knew I wanted that 1981 Astros staff and almost as importantly, the Astrodome. Since I already had Rickey and a bunch of high average/low power hitters like Tony Gwynn and John Olerud, I wanted my park to match my team. Originally, I had Don Sutton as my clone with a 68 Dodgers team, but it was not strong enough. I needed to upgrade a pitcher and so I changed to Dave Smith so I could get Mike Scott. “I’m not superstitious, but I am a little stitious” - Michael Scott.

1981 Dave Smith

• Don Sutton, Bob Knepper, Nolan Ryan

1986 Dave Smith

• Mike Scott

I actually like this team a lot. And I’m going to imagine 4 Rickey Hendersons on the field talking about themselves in the third person all season.

Hitters: 6208 PA, .308/.397/.473
Pitchers: 1498 IP, 1.02 Whip, 2.23 ERA, 0.39 HR/9
Astrodome

$120M We’ve Got Busch

My first instinct was to use the Cardinals. I liked the idea that they had a lot of really good 19th century and deadball hitters that I could use in this theme. I actually never built any other franchise so I finished this team pretty quickly. That might have been a mistake but I was mostly happy with this team. With the $1M minimum, I was also able to make the most of platoons.

Lineup:

1900 John McGraw / 2002 Scott Rolen
1899 Jesse Burkett
2001 JD Drew / 1931 Taylor Douthit
1890 Chief Roseman / 1997 Mark McGwire
1889 Jocko Miligan / 1934 Bill Delancey
1887 Bob Caruthers / 1930 Ray Blades
1920 Rogers Hornsby
2001 Placido Polanco

WhatI failed to see however, was that the Cardinals pitching is actually pretty mediocre. I had built a pitching staff using their best guys and I was not happy with it. I was trying to avoid using Elton Chamberlain because of the dynamic pricing, but I had to put him in there, or I wouldn’t have been able to hit the cap. After doing this writeup, I feel like I may not have drafted enough innings.

SP 1942 Mort Cooper
SP 1948 Harry Brecheen
SP 2009 Chris Carpenter
SP 1888 Elton Chamberlain
SP 1943 Howie Pollet
Bullpen: 1963 Bobby Shantz, 1964 Barney Schultz, 1960 Lindy McDaniel, 2022 Ryan Helsey, 2004 Kiko Calero, 2002 Jason Isringhausen

Hitters: 5487 PA, .345/.429/.520
Pitchers: 1422 IP, 0.95 Whip, 2.00 ERA
Busch Stadium II

$255M “A” Lot of Money

I first started with Group B. I had put a lot of time into it, trying to make the most out of every dollar and being as efficient as possible. I think I got to about $140M. It had 6300 PA and 1500 IP. It was a solid roster.

But wait….what the heck am I doing trying to be efficient?? I should be doing the exact opposite! This is WISC, I am trying to win 1st place in the league, not 1st place in my division. My $140M roster might win……. if everything goes right. But as we all know, that does not happen. I need backups in case a player underperforms. Dynamic pricing….pfft. Doesn’t matter. But I still needed to make tough choices as each box had tough choices to make. So I figured I should be going with Group A and grabbing Silver King and Ed Seward to drop me from the traditional 4 starting pitchers to 2. This would allow me to get better hitters in the slots where I would normally be drafting a starting pitcher. Sure, Ed Walsh and Addie Joss are better pound-for-pound over King. But then that means instead of having to grab Claude Hendrix or Eddie Cicotte in box 2, I could grab Lou Boudreau - the best SS possible. I took Ed Seward in box 3 to complete my pitching staff. No he’s not as good as Babe Adams, but again, I only need 2 SPs and there really weren’t any great SPs in the lower boxes for this cap level. In my opinion, getting modern pitchers like Pedro, Bieber, Kershaw, and Maeda is folly since you’ll have to draft 4 or 5 of them and miss out on better hitters.

Box 1 - Silver King - He’s not the best SP here, but his innings are invaluable.
Box 2 - Lou Boudreau - A-/A defense, batting 2nd. A key player.
Box 3 - Ed Seward - needed my #2 starter and he has the innings to make it a 2 man rotation.
Box 4 - Eddie Collins - top 2B, good defender
Box 5 - Jose Bautista - superb D at 3B. Good hitter, but his HR won’t translate in this league.
Box 6 - Tony Gwynn - best pure hitter here, .394 average.
Box 7 - Craig Kimbrel - top tier closer, don’t need the other SP options here
Box 8 - Sammy Sosa - his HR won’t translate, but still a top hitter
Box 9 - Jake Northrop - because I don’t need these hitters or SP.
Box 10 - Derrek Lee - Probably should have got Giambi or Olerud in box 7 instead.
Box 11 - Bryce Harper - liked him more than Miguel Cabrera
Box 12 - Mike Napoli - ridiculous stats for half a C. I’m going to need 2 of then anyway
Box 13 - Cisco Carlos - the famous WIS cookie. Don’t need the hitters or SP.
Box 14 - Andrew Bailey - Didn’t need anyone else here.
Box 15 - Ralph Kiner - Thought he was misplaced being down here so low, great hitter.
Box 16 - Jeff Kent - backup at 2B and 1B
Box 17 - Lenny Dykstra - backup in the OF, will also pinch run
Box 18 - Willie Hernandez - my setup B. Has higher IP/G than the closer types.
Box 19 - Reb Rusell - Long relief/swing starter. Had to go down this far to find a SP I liked.
Box 20 - Dave Righetti - another long reliever/starter. Backup in case I need it. Great HR/9.
Box 21 - Javy Lopez - best hitting C. Not too worried about opponents stealing bases.
Box 22 - Memorial Colisuem - wanted a hitters park because I have the IP and the HR guys.
Box 23 - Cecil Travis - backup at 3b/SS
Box 24 - Terry Shumpert - Can backup anywhere except 1B
Box 25 - Francisco Rodiguez - solid reliever, don’t need the other options
Box 26 - Andrew Chafin - solid reliever, don’t need the other options, don’t like those parks

I don’t like pitchers < 1 IP/G because i feel they tire too quickly. So I avoided them. For backups like Kent and Travis, positional versatility was important. SP will have a high pull setting since I have 9 RPs. And since I have deadball SP, getting good defenders, especially in the IF was important. Group B has more of the deadball hitters that I like as group A was more HR modern hitters. I feel that is by design. Wil be interesting to see how many took group A vs group B. And also which player from each box was selected the most.

I ended up with about $212M in salary. I know I will be placed in the most expensive division. But that’s ok. I’m here to win it all.

Hitters: 8791 PA, .337/.427/.589
Pitchers: 2308 IP, 0.93 Whip, 1.86 ERA
Memorial Coliseum

Normally, I spend quite a bit of time build WIS Championship rosters, but I've sat out the last few years and haven't had the same zeal that I used to have. So I apologize if my writeups aren't as detailed as they have been in the past.

70M - Natural Born Killers
Bennett Park
I didn't really have a specific strategy when I started building this roster. In fact, once I had a complete roster, I pretty much didn't tinker and stuck with it. I dislike low cap leagues and rarely play in them To me, success in low cap leagues is highly dependent on drafting the correct number of innings. Too many, and your talent isn't good enough. Too few and fall go into fatigue hell. I wish WIS would change their sim engine so that 1450 innings is required for every cap level, regardless of ballpark, DH, etc. This shouldn't be an unknown variable.

Anyway, I ended up rostering a ton of HRs and a ton of walks. In fact, my team has 243 HRs and 837 walks. I tried to stay as close to .247 as possible, so my team batting average is actually .244 and none of my regulars have a batting average below .241. My roster includes '19 Grandal, '62 Cash, '01 B.Lowe, '59 Killebrew, '52 Joost, '16 B.Harper, '88 J.Clark and a three-man platoon of '71 Singleton/'08 Dunn/'69 B.Brooks. The defense is terrible of course, b/c I'm not spending extra $$$ on A fielders.
Batting Totals: 5166 PA, .244 / .374 / .466 ($34.5 million)

For my pitching, I went with 1308 innings, consisting of a 3-man rotation with a shared 4th SP ('84 Blyleven, '92 Mussina, '92 Tewksbury plus '88 T.Burns/'05 Wang). That's 938 innings for the five SPs. The bullpen consists of 6 pitchers totaling (non-scrub) 369 innings with five of the six pitchers having whips in the 1.03 to 1.10 range.
Pitching Totals: 1308 IP, 2.75 ERA, .238 OAV, 1.10 WHIP, 1.98 BB/9, 0.62 HR/9 ($34.4 million)

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80M - BINGO - Card 19
AT&T Park
I built this roster very early and then forgot about it. I used card 22 because I wanted 2019 Ketel Marte on the team. I even built a round 2 team. Weeks later, I went back and looked at the team and I didn't like it. I spent too much for hitting and the pitching was terrible. The defense was terrible. I started over, and chose a different Bingo Card, without Marte. I only built a partial round 2 team with this new card... I will figure it out if I advance.

There was no way I had the time or desire to try a bunch of different cards. So I basically thought about a player or two I wanted to roster (at an 80M cap) and found a card that worked. I started with '56 Wally Moon. His A+++ range at 1B and .390 obp is a steal for $4.7 million. Using card 19, I found a bunch of switch hitters I could use, including '91 Bobby Bonilla, '99 Jose Offerman, '06 Carlos Gullen and '02 Jorge Posada. Everybody knows I love switch-hitters. (If you hadn't figured out yet, I am using all 25 squares). The rest of the lineup includes '30 Harry Heilmann, '62 George Altman and a platoon of '94 Rusty Greer and '17 Daniel Nava, with '29 Ken Williams also filling in.
Batting Totals: 5277 PA, .306 / .394 / .492 ($40.9 million)

For my pitching, I have a four-man rotation of '72 Kline, '87 Reuschel, '11 Halladay and '81 K.Forsch. That's 935 innings. The bullpen consists of 8 pitchers totaling 403 (non-scrub) innings with five of the six pitchers having whips in the 1.04 to 1.12 range. I'm playing in AT&T to help extend my innings.
Pitching Totals: 1348 IP, 2.56 ERA, .236 OAV, 1.07 WHIP, 1.76 BB/9, 0.41 HR/9 ($38.4 million)

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100M - Naps, Browns & Cardinals of 1906
Sportsman Park II

I built about 5-6 different rosters, but as one would expect, every roster had flaws. My second favorite was a team with the 1964 White Sox as the main cog. I really wanted to build a team using the 1981 Astros, but I could not get the pieces to fit right. Despite having too many extra ABs, I went back to my 1906 team mainly because of the low HR/9 allowed by the pitchers. I expect most folks will use more modern day teams with HRs, so I might as well suppress their advantage as best I can. The offense of this team is pretty punchless. Nap Lajoie and George Stone are great and Elmer Flick is decent, but after that, it drops off quickly. This offense is worse than my $80M team.
Batting Totals: 6155 PA, .305 / .359 / .405 ($55.9 million)

I learned that ronthegenius selected the exact same team, but of course, he did a better job of building the roster. He's got much better pitching and I have slightly better offense. We're in the same league, but in a different division (thank God). As is the case with most deadball teams, my pitching is almost all starting pitchers (my four best pitchers are starters totaling 1140 innings) with a handful of weaker guys filling out the rotation. Will need to manage this closely.
Pitching Totals: 1434 IP, 2.02 ERA, .218 OAV, 1.02 WHIP, 2.16 BB/9, 0.08 HR/9 ($42.3 million)

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110M - Maddux & Raines
Olympic Stadium

This was the first team I built, but I tried a number of different combinations. I really wanted to enter a Pete Rose team, but I needed anout $10M more in cap room to make a team I liked. I tried Pedro Martinez, Randy Johnson, Clayton Kershaw, Kevin Brown and Bret Saberhagen. I was very close to finializing a Pete Rose / Bret Saberhagen team, in order to play in Kaufman Stadium. But I wanted 1999 Pedro and Nomar and just couldn't fit under the cap. So I went back to this team. The nice thing about Raines is that he has so many usable seasons that I was able to fill in the missing parts fairly easily. I ended up using '82 Raines starting at 2B and '85, '87 and '92 Raines starting in the OF with '97 and '98 Raines platooning at DH. That opens up six teams to use. From just my Tim Raines seasons, I was able to add '98 Jorge Posada (C platoon), '92 Frank Thomas (1B), '98 Homer Bush (PH) plus starting pitcher '85 Bryn Smith and relievers '98 Mariano Rivera, '87 Tim Burke, '92 Roberto Hernandez, '92 Terry Leach and '87 Pascual Perez. That's most of my team.
Batting Totals: 6197 PA, .307 / .396 / .466 ($57.7 million)

I only used four Greg Maddux seasons (three SPs), including 96, '97 and '98, plus the short-inning '06 as a reliever. Bryn Smith is my fourth SP and is much cheaper than '96 Smoltz (I never have any luck with Smoltz anyway). Maddux teammates that are rostered include '96 Chipper Jones (3B), '96 Tyler Houston (C platoon), '06 Toby Hall (C platoon), '06 Dioner Navarro (C platoon), '97 Jeff Blauser (SS) and '96 Pedro Borbon (RP).
Pitching Totals: 1432 IP, 2.36 ERA, .224 OAV, 1.00 WHIP, 1.54 BB/9, 0.43 HR/9 ($52.2 million)

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120M - A Giant Pile of Crap
AT&T Park

I built 4-5 teams, including Cardinals, White Sox, Red Sox, Phillies, Dodgers and Giants. I guess I made a mistake not trying the popular Indians. I was going to go with the White Sox but decided at the last minute to switch to my Giants team. The main reason is because this Giants offense isn't HR-dependent (the Sox was) and I have a feeling there will be a lot of dead-ball pitchers to face. The eight main position players include 1B '85 Roger Conner, 2B '24 Frankie Frisch, 3B '97 Bill Joyce, SS '97 George Davis, OFs '03 Roger Bresnahan, '11 Carlos Beltran and '12 Melky Cabrera. I also have a 4-man catching platoon of '24 Hank Gowdy, '41 Gabby Hartnett, '11 Art Wilson and '27 Jack Cummings. '22 Casey Stengel, '85 Ron Roenicke and '93 Willie Keeler supplement the missing PAs in the OF as my three starters are in the 500-600 PA range.
Batting Totals: 5680 PA, .333 / .409 / .488 ($57.6 million)

On the pitching side, one of the keys in this theme is to find guys in the $1.0 to $1.5 million salary cap range that can pitch at the $120 million cap level. This team has three of those guys that I rostered, including '10 Ramon Ramirez, '73 Don McMahon and '13 Red Ames. I also have a $2.1M guy with '88 Bill George. My three main SPs are '36 Carl Hubbell, '69 Juan Marichal and '03 Jason Schmidt. But the main strength of this team is the great shorter-inning SPs from the 1910's, including '18 Fred Toney, '16 Ferdie Schupp and '19 Art Nehf. In addition, no Giants team would be complete without '50 Jim Hearn. (I can hear the snickering already). This team should be among the leaders in pitching.
Pitching Totals: 1308 IP, 2.75 ERA, .238 OAV, 1.10 WHIP, 1.98 BB/9, 0.62 HR/9 ($34.4 million)

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255M - Babe Ruth, Team Captain
Sportsman Park II

I changed my mind so many times with this team, I can't even remember what my initial roster looked like. I can tell you that I only built a Group A roster. I just thought that "A" had better players. Ruth is a better hitter than anybody in Group B. Silver King, Greg Maddux better than any pitchers in B. Rogers, Hornsby, Nap Lajoie... better than any infielders in Group B. Anyway, I actually started building my roster from the bottom up. My thought process was that if I can find some usable starting batters at the bottom, I could upgrade pitching as I got near the top. One of the key decision points was to use Tony Phillips (Box 25) as my starting 2B. His .443 OBP should translate fine and his defense is good. I really liked Joey Votto (Box 22) and his partial '12 season (.474 obp) is sharing the DH spot with Roy Cullenbine (Box 15, .477 obp). Can you tell I love OBP? My starting catcher is Fred Carroll (Box 16, .486 obp). Bobby Murcer (.427) seems like a really good bargain at Box 23. My SS Joe Cronin comes from box 12 while Ken Caminiti comes from Box 11. Note that I have my C, 2B, 3B, SS, OF, DH and haven't touched the top 10 boxes yet. For the rest of my starting lineup, I thought Ruth was the most impactful player (Box 1), and I also added Roger Connor (Box 2) and Benny Kauff (Box 6). Although I wasn't trying to have a high salary, i did spend to add some depth, so adding '72 Johnny Bench (Box 9) and '08 Chipper Jones (Box 5) put my team into the NL East.
Batting Totals: 7680 PA, .341 / .446 / .559 ($116.9 million)

On the pitching side, I decided that Ed Seward (Box 3) was of great value since he can pitch every other game and isn't that much worse than Silver King. I went deadball with my other two SPs as well, Orval Overall (Box 7) and Howie Camnitz (Box 17). That's 1200 innings of low-HR starting pitching. The bullpen is anchored by '03 Eric Gagne (Box 4) plus the usual cast of RP cookies including Cisco Carlos, Rollie Fingers, Wade Davis, Andrew Bailey, Joakim Soria and Cy Morgan.
Pitching Totals: 1862 IP, 1.65 ERA, .191 OAV, 0.94 WHIP, 2.29 BB/9, 0.10 HR/9 ($82.7 million)

Fantastic writeup by redcped. I hope everybody get s chance to read it, and to listen to the tunes.

Posted by schwarze on 6/12/2023 5:03:00 PM (view original):
Fantastic writeup by redcped. I hope everybody get s chance to read it, and to listen to the tunes.

Many thanks for the shoutout. I consider the music the highlight, of course.

Looking at my entire league, there are only 8 non-scrub hitters from the 19th century ... as many as boogerlips' starting lineup. One player matches, 1892 Gore. Considering you won this thing last year, I'm thinking you know something everyone in our league didn't. We'll see how it works, I guess.

I am pretty sure I have played in every one of these WISC championships. I may even be in the record books for something. If so, it would most likely be for the widest range of outcomes: My best finish was 7th place in 2005. My lowest was 92nd place. I have not made the second round for a really long time.

Some of these themes jumped right out at me and I didn't think I would need much research to narrow my prospects down.

Clones - Kershaw and maybe someone like Sheffield or Manny.
Single Franchise - Dodgers always look good. Maybe have to investigate the Yanks or Giants or my favorite team growing up, the Pirates.
Bingo and the 255mm DEAL columns should probably become obvious fairly quickly.
70mm will definitely be "come up with some parameters (highest OBP, pitchers with between .50 and .60 HR/9 are the most likely) and slap it together.
100mm Build a Team would require some more thorough analysis (maybe)

Starting with the Clones. Looking at Kershaw and Sheffield. Team is coming together nicely. I get to 2016 Kershaw and obviously look at Rich Hill. Then I start thinking "hmmm, what about Glenallen Hill". I start looking at him and think about scrapping the Kershaw/Sheffield team and using the 2 Hills. I could call the team Over the Hills and Far Away. When I looked that song up on Wikipedia, I see that Houses of the Holy was recorded in 1973 making this the 50th and Golden Anniversary. I have used 50th anniversaries of musical events as themes before. 1969 and 1971 come to mind. Then I research what other music came out in 1973 and it was a veritable gold mine.

You know me, I don't need any encouragement to go off on a tangent so below are the results.

Footnote: the Hills did not make the Clone team. No Led Zeppelin either.

70mm - *Tubular Bells

Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield came out in May 1973 and was the first album ever released by Virgin Records. The haunting opening theme was used in the soundtrack of 1973's #1 hit film, The Exorcist, later that year and the exposure drove the album up the charts and launched Richard Branson's career.

The cast:

7 Bells - OF Beau Bell, 3b Buddy Bell, OF Derek Bell, SP Gary Bell, OF Gus Bell, RP Heath Bell
Brian Oldfield - scrub catcher
Jeff Branson - IF
To fit with the theme of the film as spot starters we added Preacher Roe and Bubba Church
To fit with the iconic poster of the film we add long reliever Dennis Lamp
The remaining 13 players should actually perform pretty decently in this league:
C - Yasmani Grandal, Ellie Rodriguez
1b - Mickey Mantle
IF - Jose Oquendo, Dick Schofield, Pumpsie Green
OF - Cal Abrams, George Gore (half-credit for film genre), Rickey Henderson
SP - Frank Sullivan, Bob Tewksbury
RP - Kirk Reuter, Carl Hubbell (half-credit for Bell as last syllable).

Watching this team spiral downward is guaranteed to make my head spin. Playing in Pacific Bell Park, of course.

80 mm - *Twenty-One

In 1973, the Eagles released their second album, Desperado, which is easily my personal favorite of their entire catalog. One of my not-so-favorite songs from this classic is entitled "Twenty-One" but it fits this theme perfectly. I immediately locked in on box number 21 and pretty much the first thing I noticed was that 2021 and 1921 were side by side on the top row. So five players from each of the following years: 1921, 1969, 1976, 1988, and 2021 it shall be.

So, who gets the roster spots?

1) Roberto Clemente is the definitive #21 so the 1969 version is our charter member
2) Since this is an Eagles album we have to lock in "The Grey Eagle", Tris Speaker. 1921 version, of course
3) The concept of the album revolves around the history of the Dalton gang of bank robbers. In order to afford the aforementioned studs, we have to rob from somewhere so cheap and ineffective 1969 Dalton Jones rides with us. That is the only Dalton that fits with these seasons, by the way.
4) On the subject of stealing, I never knew that the given name of the greatest base stealer of all time was Rickey Nelson Henley Henderson (he added the Mister later on). No other Henleys work for these years, as well
5) No Freys, Leadons or Meisners work for these years either so we squeeze in 1988 MIke Felder, although Don did not join the band until the next record.
6) George Newcomb aka "Bitter Creek" was a member of the Dalton gang but was among those not present in Coffeyville. "Bitter Creek" is one of my favorite songs on the album. With other surviving former members, he formed a new gang to become known as The Wild Bunch. 2021 pitcher Sean Newcomb has a 7.52 BB/9 stat in 2021 so he more than qualifies as a member of our Wild Bunch staff.
*** Note to stadium PA announcer - all of the following players must be introduced with an imitation of Don Henley's droning voice in the melody of Des-per-A-do. Rounding out the roster they are:
7) 1976 Nolan Ryan (iconic Wild Bunch member)
8) 1976 JR Richard (iconic Wild Bunch member)
9) 1988 Randy Johnson (iconic Wild Bunch member)
10 1988 Lance McCullers (5.09 BB/9) and his son
11) 2021 Lance McCullers, Jr (4.21 BB/9) add a little family tie which is common in gangs of the Old West
12) 1921 Eddie Collins (just the year before, in 1920, he played with the most notorious outlaws in the history of the sport)
13) 1921 Ed Konetchy starts at 1b
14) 1921 Ernie Johnson starts at SS
15) 1976 Richie Hebner starts at 3b
16) 1976 Darrell Porter starts at C
17) 1969 Mickey Lolich is in the starting rotation
18) 2021 Clayton Kershaw is my the first man out of the bullpen (and will frequently have to rescue our "Out of Control" starting staff)
19) 2021 Garret Whitlock is our setup man
20) 1976 Larry Gura is our closer (good luck with that)
21) 1988 Donnell Nixon is our primary pinch-hitter. (1973 was a pretty notable year for criminal behavior of another Nixon)
22) 1976 Cookie Rojas platoons at 3b
23) 1921 Larry Woodall - good hitting backup catcher
24) 2021 Riley Adams - high OBP backup catcher
25) 1969 Jim Campanis- super weak backup catcher #3 but he played on the 1969 Royals and allows up to play in Municipal Stadium which is as close to Coffeyville as we can get.

A reporter asks "What about round 2?". We turn the mic over to Jim Mora.

100mm - *Me and Chipper, Chipper Jones"

One hit wonder Billy Paul's only Claim to fame "Me and Mrs. Jones" was finishing up a 3-week run as the number one single when 1973 arrived. Although relinquishing that title the week of 1/6/73 the song lingered in the top 5 the entire month of January. Actually, this is the only team of the six that I built regardless of a musical influence and tried to reverse engineer the process and the weak correlation shows.

My original concept was to honor Innervisions, the great album by Stevie Wonder. The track Golden Lady would reprise the 50th-anniversary overall theme and lend itself to using Lady Baldwin as a central figure. Well, it was easy to find 3 teams in both 1885 and 1886 that would work as far as the total winning percentage being .500 or lower but all of these teams had totally unmanageable pitching, some really poor hitting spots, and predictably poor overall fielding. As the team submission deadline approached I bailed on Lady Baldwin and slapped together this team.

I started with the 1996 Marlins (2 games under .500). Added the Braves (30 games over) and checked to see which third team would be usable. This turned out to be the Phillies at 28 under which had some usable pieces.
Pretty happy with the way the team came together and we may have a thing goin' on.

Marlins: Kevin Brown (SP), Al Leiter (SP), Gary Sheffield (OF), Edgar Renteria (SS), Quilvio Veras and Luis Castillo (2b), Robb Nen (RP) and Rick Helling (RP), Kurt Abbott (IF)

Braves: Greg Maddux (SP), John Smoltz (SP), Fred McGriff (1b), Chipper Jones (3b), Ryan Klesko (OF). Tyler Houston (backup C), Pedro Borbon (RP), David Justice (late inning OF)

Phillies: Curt Schilling (SP), Greg Jefferies (1b playing CF), Benito Santiago (C), Ricky Botallico (RP), Sid Fernandez (RP), Jim Eisenreich (OF), Lenny Dykstra (late inning OF), Kevin Sefcik (IF)

One coincidence, is that Me and Mrs. Jones was released on the Philadelphia International label so we are playing at the Vet.

110 mm - *La Stella Blue

Any musical history exercise would have to include the Grateful Dead if they fit the criteria and they do. In 1973 they released Wake of the Flood, which added several more concert staples to the touring repertoire. Going through the various song titles I paused at Stella Blue. I consulted Baseball Reference to see if there had been anyone named Stella to match with Vida Blue and got introduced to current 10-year veteran infielder Tommy La Stella, who I had never heard of. I really like the way this roster came together:

1969 Vida Blue (Oakland) - Reggie Jackson
1970 Vida Blue (Oakland) - *bench 1
1971 Vida Blue (Oakland) - *bench 3
1972 Vida Blue (Oakland) - Catfish Hunter, Gene Tenace, *bench2
2015 Tommy La Stella (Cubs) - Jake Arrieta
2016 Tommy La Stella (Cubs) - Kyle Hendricks, Kris Bryant, Aroldis Chapman
2019 Tommy La Stella
2020 Tommy La Stella (Angels) - Mike Trout, David Fletcher, Anthony Rendon, Mike Mayers
2021 Tommy La Stella (Giants) - Brandon Crawford, Buster Posey

the * bench players above are a side tribute to the #1 single hit for the year 1973. Tony, Orlando and Don (1970 LaRussa, 1972 Cepeda and 1971 Mincher) Tie a Yellow Ribbon Around the Oakland Bench.

Eerie side note. I started working on this team around May 5 and finished up on May 6 or 7. I found out a day or so later that Vida had passed away on the 6th. RIP.

120 mm - *Dark Side of the Moon Cardinals

"Dark Side of the Moon" by Pink Floyd is the longest-charting album in the history of the Billboard Top 200, expected to hit the 1000-week mark in September of this year. Obviously, no musical tribute to 1973 would be complete without honoring this masterpiece and this was the perfect theme for that.

The first 2 players that come to mind are Alvin Dark and Wally Moon, and both were featured as Cardinals in the 1958 Topps series. Since it was the only franchise that they both played for, the Cardinals are my only choice.

The offense was pretty easy and an abundance of hits is fitting:

C) 1889 Jocko Milligan and 1934 Bill Delancey (had to have at least one player from the Gas House Gang)
1b) 1887 Bob Caruthers
2b) 1923 Rogers Hornsby and 2008 Felipe Lopez
3b) 1900 John McGraw and 1945 Debs Garms
SS) 1996 Ozzie Smith (absolutely had to have the Wizard of Oz - synching the video to the Floyd audio) and 1958 Al Dark
OF) 1946 Stan Musial, 2003 Albert Pujols, 1930 Ray Blades, 1958 Wally Moon and
1885 Tip O'Neill (because another T. O'Neal won an Academy Award for Paper Moon in 1973)

Pitching features an abundance of hits as well:

SP1 and SP2) 1908 Bugs Raymond and 1904 Kid Nichols (the closest I could get to reference the hit tune "Money")
SP3A) and SP3B) 2014 Adam Wainwright and 2009 Chris Carpenter
LR) 1950 Jim Hearn, 1943 Howie Pollet, 1943 Harry Brecheen
Setup) 1963 Bobby Shantz and 1981 Andy Rincon
Closers) 1993 Paul Kilgus and 2002 Jason Isringhausen

255mm - Goats Head Soup

This idea came to me very late in the process but the resulting team turned out to be my favorite build. Goats Head Soup by the Rolling Stones was released in 1973 and is generally considered lackluster compared to the preceding several releases. More importantly, however, we all know the "soup" theme concept in WIS. All 25 roster spots need to be filled by players with different first letters of their last names or different franchises or different seasons. Or multiple criteria. I was able to create a team using all three of the above with one poetic license exception.

The roster:

player team season box # a roberto alomar guardians/indians 2001 9 b kevin brown marlins 1996 3 c jeff cirillo brewers 1998 20 d joey devine athletics 2008 10 e darin erstad angels 2000 13 f duke farrell reds boston (aa) 1891 22 g ron guidry yankees 1978 5 h felix hernandez mariners 2014 14 i jason isringhausen mets 1995 24 j randy johnson d'backs 2004 4 k king kelly cubs/white stockings 1886 1 l mark loretta astros 2002 21 m eddie mathews braves 1953 16 n art nehf giants 1919 7 o dave orr metropolitans (aa) 1885 19 p placido polanco phillies 2005 15 q jack quinn white sox 1918 18 r hardy richardson wolverines 1888 23 s george stone orioles/browns 1906 11 t john tudor cardinals 1985 8 u koji uehara rangers 2012 6 v arky vaughan pirates 1935 2 w dick wakefield tigers 1944 17 x exhibition stadium blue jays 25 y carl yastrzemski red sox 1967 12 z zack wheat dodgers/robins 1924 26

Notes:

We had to use Column B because there was no "I" player or "Q" player in Column A.
There were no "Z" players in column B but Zack Wheat was the absolute Omega Man aka Mr Irrelevant on the entire list and he is Zack so he works.
Extra credit for sneaking in Exhibition Stadium to qualify for the impossible "X"
Since it is a Stones album, George Stone had to make the team.
Was not able to get JR Richard in but came close to representing Keith with Hardy Richardson

calhoop, this is insane! I can't believe you built your 255M team like that. I will be rooting for you.