I've been looking for a format for a league that uses more, different players, and I don't remember this one being tried before.
Each owner will be assigned a random year between 1857 and 2000, and build a $100M team from players born in that year. So, everyone's got their own different player pool to choose from. They're not all equal, but with the salary cap, if you draw a tougher year, you just look for more cookie players and hope to pull off an upset. Building your team will take a bit of research, but you don't have to wait on other owners, so hopefully we should get going fairly quickly.
Other rules:
No AAA, no trades, no WW - you play with your own 25 unique players.
Yes to DH, because there are plenty of hitters, and you're bound to be overstocked at some position
Injuries ON.
For home field, everyone should select a MANAGER that was born in your given year [they are conveniently listed at the bottom of your birth year page on Baseball Reference], and choose a stadium where he managed. If there was NO manager born in your designated year, select any player born that year as your manager [whether he's a player-manager or not], and use a stadium where he played.
I chose 1857-2000 because that's 144 years, and if this is popular, I'd hope to use every one of them over six seasons, plus a Tournament of Champions at the end for the final four playoff teams from each league. Not sure how many will participate in all six seasons - there's no obligation to do so - but if you do, we will include you in the ToC, even if it's with a team that someone else guided to the playoffs.
Instead of the draw being completely random each season, we'll group them by birth year, so that the ToC isn't dominated by one era of the game. The groups:
Group A: 1857-1880 birth years
Group B: 1881-1904
Group C: 1905-1928
Group D: 1929-1952
Group E: 1953-1976
Group F: 1977-2000
But we'll do these six randomly. Whoever signs up first should generate a random season for MY team [anywhere between 1857-2000], and then I will generate the seasons for everyone who signs up, based on which group my team falls into.
Want a sample of what happens? Here's my own birth year [1961]
www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/1961-births.shtml
C: Bob Melvin, Mark Salas
1B: Don Mattingly, Andrews Galarraga, Glenn Davis. [that's why we have a DH]
2B: Curt Wilkerson, Rafael Belliard
SS: Greg Gagne, Spike Owen
3B: Steve Buechele, Jack Howell, Jim Presley
OF: John Kruk, Vince Coleman, Mike Aldrete
SP: Jimmy Key, Tim Belcher, Storm Davis, Scott Garrelts, Steve Ontiveros
RP; Rick Aguilera, Mike Henneman, Billy Taylor
Okay, I probably wouldn't win anything with those guys, but who knows? Every team will have some stars, and every team will have a hole or two to fill. Young teams can load up on bullpen arms. Let's give it a try.
Who wants to assign me a year and get this going?
4/26/2025 4:06 PM (edited)