Part 2
$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
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
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
How it went: 2nd place, .542 win %, .566 exp %, 15th in RS, 2nd in RA
The strategy mostly worked. Two of my Rickeys were ok, but my 97 Rickey had a slash line of .196/.341/.230. Also, Roberto Alomar, not Rickey Henderson led me team in SB with 74. I was ranked 3rd in SB with 263 with a 82% success rate. The Astrodome helped out my pitching staff which was already good at limiting HRs which was ranked 2nd in HRA. Eck was an excellent closer with a 0.59 whip and 1.32 ERA.
$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
How it went: 3rd place, .542 win %, .535 exp %, 15th RS, 6th RA
I was in a tough division. I was worried about contrarian23's team, but he's in 4th place. It's adsmith182 and billyb1173 who are in first and second place. John McGraw was a disappointment with a .218/.353/.278 line. My 1st base platoon stunk with Mark McGwire/Chief Roseman and their .257/.329/.329 and .187/.310/.389 lines respectively. Jocko Milligan came out of nowhere to lead my team in HRs with 21. I thought my pitching would be worse but I think I got exactly the right amount of innings as everyone is at 100%, but only recover to that level on the day they pitch. My bullpen was surprisingly good as my worst reliever had a 4.32 ERA.
$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
How it ended up: 1st place (tied), .535 win %, .558 exp %, 10th in RS, 5th in RA.
I'd say my strategy worked. I was not so happy in the first half however as my team underperformed and was ranked high on the "unlucky" list. Silver King pitched as expected - 4.85 ERA. But I got lucky in that I got the best Ed Seward in the league - 4.55 ERA. I had 6 setup men and 3 were good and 3 were bad. But because of the way I built my team, I could marginalize the bad ones. So my good ones had ERAs of 2.95, 1.80 and 2.65. The bad ones had ERAs of 6.21, 10.13 and 6.66. Kimbrel was great as the closer with his 1.86 ERA and closing 24 of 25 save ops. All of my RP were set to 99% rest so I was able to get them at their best. On the hitting side, I never really needed the backups. I was disappointed with Lou Boudreau - 734 OPS, but then I realized that all the Boudreaus in the league were like that. Bryce Harper was my best hitter at .290/.412/.473 and Sosa also did well with his .297/.392/..498 slash line. Even Derek Lee surprised we with a .295/.353/.440 line. Catcher platoon was also solid. Javy Lopez has a .986 OPS vs LHP.
With the exception of my $80M team, my teams are pretty consistent. There is only a 3 win difference between them. If I had not tried an untested strategy on my $80M team, they might be there too. I don't know if I'll make round 2, so if I don't it's been fun. If I do, I look forward to being destroyed by everyone else.
8/4/2023 3:12 PM (edited)