Enjoying the write-ups so far, and all the different strategies. I will do a few for the teams I think I put more thought into.


$70M - Hippo and his Cubs

I have played a number of 70 mil leagues and I have a few go-to players I really like at this cap. I knew right away that I was going to use the Cubs, and I didn't even attempt any other franchises.

1902 Jack Taylor is my go-to ace at $70 mil. I will make a bold prediction that he will win the Cy Young award in my league because he usually does. I also put an extremely rangey defense behind him, which should help, as he keeps the ball in the ballpark and doesn't walk anyone.

Some other staples I like at 70 mil:
1907 Solly Hofman
1924 Jigger Statz

I also normally do a SB heavy team at 70 mil, but that was kind of difficult in this theme. But I did manage to use 2011 Tony Campana 24/26 SB in 155 PA. However, my absolute favourite player at 70 mil is 1985 Davey Lopes. He was 47/51 SB in 328 PA and he's stolen 80+ bases for me before.

Other than that everyone on my team has extreme range and some at the expense of some truly terrible batting averages (2020 Javiy Baez - .203, 1968 Randy Hundley - ..226).

I am afraid of teams using SB strategies at low cap, so Hundley is there for his A+ arm (50% CS)

My other notable important player is 1919 Hippo Vaughan. He is on my team for similar reasons as Jack Taylor and the 2 of them combine for almost 750 innings that will keep the ball in the park for my fielders to vacuum up.

If my team can get on base, they might win some games. But that is a massive IF.

$80M - Rip, Zip, & FIP

As you can maybe tell from my 70 mil write-up, I prefer to build small-ball teams. This is the type of theme and team build that I really suck at, so I wasn't thrilled to see it. I am trying a very specific strategy on both offense and defense and I do not expect it to work. But I know for certain that I will definitely not win with a power build.

"Rip" - Every team had to meet the homer threshold, so I went with Raleigh at C (60 in 705 PA), 25 Ruth (25 in 449), 92 McGwire (42 in 571), 47 Keller (13 in 204) and 51 Westlake (16 in 202) as my power contingent of players with high normalized homer rates.

"Zip" - My big assumption on offense is that teams will not care about their catcher's arm strength and maybe even like me will use Raleigh. Or maybe I am just forcing my own strategy into a theme where it doesn't belong. So the other half of my offense are all efficient base stealers, some who also hit homers such as 24 Elly DLC ( 25 HR, 67/83 SB), 05 Soriano (36 HR, 30/32). Even Raleigh was 14/18 in steals last season. Altogether I have 246 homers and 299 steals and the actual speed threats steal at an 88% clip. None of these players can play any defense, and that was on purpose due to my pitching strategy for this theme...

"FIP" - Fielding Independent Pitching, or 3 true outcomes. ALL of my pitchers give up homers as we have no choice in that, but my guys also have very high K/9# as well as BB/9# and therefore pretty low OAV# for this cap I think. I see a lot of write-ups so far trying to minimize walks in this theme in order to avoid 3 run homers. My guys will just walk everyone so they can't homer and then hopefully get the strikeouts when it matters. Hoping the power hitters in this league have low contact rates. 3 true outcomes and low OAV also means minimal base hits that aren't homers, so I didn't pay for any range from my hitters. Getting outs via strikeout means fewer outs in the field so less risk of errors, so I didn't pay for fielding either.

I know I'm not good at this kind of theme, but I did put some thought into the build and it makes sense to me. Unlikely to work unless other teams have the type of build I am expecting. All of my players are platoons, so I do have the ability to rest the SB-only guys if someone shows up with an A+ arm.

$100M - 1912 Cubs

I built SO MANY teams, and I'm not sure I picked the right one in the end. The first I planned to use was the 1910 Naps and I was pretty sure of it. Then I started trying more teams and I got hooked. Then I was for sure going with the 1916 Giants, but there were a couple small things that bothered me so I kept going. I liked this Giants idea and was thrilled with the massive OBP team I could build with the 1906 Giants, however the defense really bothered me, and I had someone playing out of position which I hate. Then I built a ton of early Cubs teams. I was thrilled with my build for the 1910 Cubs (The one year they had Ginger Beaumont made for a great OF with Sheckhard and Hofman). Then while exploring baseball reference I learned that Big Jeff Pfeffer is not the same guy as Jeff Pfeffer in WIS. That was a loss of 316 IP and it blew the whole team up. I did like the Cubs though and tried 1906, 1908, 1909, but the twists weren't lining up the way I wanted.

1912 came together because I didn't need to twist any of the infield. Tinkers, Evers, and Zimmerman all had the seasons I wanted the most in 1912, and Mordecai Brown and Reulbach were still on the team. Unfortunately I lost the pitching depth that the early Cubs team had with Overall and Pfeister, 09 Brown/ 05 Reulbach is a great 1/2. Tommy Leach and Cy Williams joined the Cubs in 1912, so I felt like I could build a better offense with this team then some of the early Cubs teams. Only downside is a real weakness at catcher, and also a weakness at the 1902/1922 step, so I had to use a sub-far Frank Chance because he played a C/C/C season at catcher in 1902. In the end I took the build that best fits the way I like to build my teams, but I will wonder what if with the teams I passed on.

Twists:
1 - 1911 Charlie Smith
2 - 1910 Solly Hofman
3 - 1909 Mordecai Brown
4 - 1916 Larry Cheney
5 - 1907 Tommy Leach
6 - 1918 Fred Toney (not the ridiculous one)
7 - 1905 Ed Reulbach
8 - 1904 Frank Schulte
9 - 1921 Cy Williams
10 - 1901 Jimmy Sheckard

Decisions and regrets - I wanted a different Cy Williams. Either 1920 for the A+ range or 23 for the 9 HR#. I maybe could have made 20 work but the cap was tough. I would have had to change 1901 Sheckard to 1903 which I prefer, however I want 01 Sheck to start at 3B and Zimmerman to play 1B (Chance is catcher most of the time). Sheck at 3B is the only way to get all these great OF seasons on the team (Sheckard, Hofman, Cy Williams, Leach). Leach could also play 3B but I'm paying for the range in the OF so I want to use him there. I wanted a better Frank Chance, but couldn't make it work, sacrifices needed to be made.

$110M

I'll be brief here. In my original build, I forgot about the $20 mil minimum per era. I picked some teams without factoring that in, and even when I figured out it was wrong, I was too deep to change things

1920 - 1940 Giants - Picked them because I thought I could build most of the team I wanted with Bill Terry, Frisch, Bancroft, Ott, and Hubbell. I kept them after I rezlied that wasn't possible and only used Frisch and Bancroft. Then used the 80 PA Ott, Ross Youngs at DH snd Gus Mancuso as one half of my catcher platoon.

1941 - 1961 Cardinals - Again I picked this team to have a complete pitching staff of Brecheen, Cooper, Pollet and then I could use Musial as well as many other options. I ended up with only Brecheen at SP, Wally Moon at 1B, and Bill Sami at catcher and some relievers. Maybe I should have explored another team after all the original guys I wanted from the Cards were not an option.

1962 - 1982 Phillies - I picked this team because of all the reliever options (McGraw, Bystrom, Garber, Shantz). Which I needed because I spent all my money on the first 2 eras. So the big change was to pivot to 1972 Carlton, my most expensive player, and kept 3 of the relievers and added Garry Maddox

1983 - 2003 Braves - This was the one team I changed after my screw up. I used Maddux, Andruw Jones, Lofton, Borbon from here.

2004 - 2025 Mets - 2018 Degrom completes the staff with Brecheen, Carlton, Maddux and I added Wright at 3B, Beltran to platoon in OF and some relievers.

Actually pretty happy with how this turned out on the rebuild.

$125M

No comments. Decent hitting team with no power in PNC Park

$140M - Vowel Balls

I put a lot of effort here into the 80 mil team, which I'm really excited about. That probably means I won't get to use them. My likely unpopular opinion is that both of these teams should be in the same round of the WISC. It's not difficult to build a 140 mil alphabet soup team. The skill being tested here is the ability to do both of these caps well with the same guys, and it's possible that the people that do this the best, won't even get a chance to use the 80 mil team. We might be rewarding the teams who say screw it on the 80 , and go all-in on the 140. If they were in the same round, then the teams that did this well would be rewarded for it. I do appreciate the other side which is that the best teams who also did this well will get rewarded in round 2.

Anyway, here is my team by letter. Most players are there because I like a version of them at 80 or know of a way I can use them at 80. I feel I am better at the low caps, not so good at 140.

A - Babe Adams (lots of useful 80 mil seasons)
B - Mordecai Brown
C - Max Carey (Love him at every cap. Didn't get him on all my teams like last year)
D - Taylor Douthit (bench bat at 140, starting OF at 80)
E - Mark Eichhorn
F - Rick Ferrell
G - Victor Gonzalez
H - Solly Hofman
I - Raisel Iglesias
J - Addie Joss (3 options for 80 mil SP seasons. The big one at 140)
K - Willie Keeler (DH at 140, really useful 400K .320 season for 80 at 3B)
L - Nap Lajoie
M - George Myatt (I'm sure everyone used Myatt for M obviously. Originally Mauer, but I love Myatt as platoon SS at 80)
N - Billy North (300K at 140, starter at 80)
O - Bob O'Farrell (O'Farrell and Ferrell catching platoon. Nice)
P - Dode Paskert (140 mil bench bat. Starting 1B at 80)
Q - Dan Quisenberry
R - Edd Roush
S - Tris Speaker (Really needed some high end on my 140, Was the toughest to fit in at 80)
T - Pie Traynor
U - Jim Umbricht (Who? one decent RP season that I used in both)
V - Caesar Valdez
W - Honus Wagner
Y - Rafael Ynoa (Has a great short season at 3B that I used on both teams)
Z - George Zuverink (My 200K mop-up in both)

Love my 80 team. Hopefully my 140 can stay in contention.

Good luck everyone!

Two disclaimers right up front:
1. I built most of these teams a month or more ago so my recollection of what I was thinking (or if I was thinking at all) is spotty at best.
2. Given my track record in the WISC, not sure why you'd be interested in my strategies, except maybe for what not to do.

That said, let's press on.

70 mil - Not in the Cards (279/350/403, 348 SB; 1266 IP @ 1.11 WHIP, .236 OAV)
In the past, I've had success using stolen bases at WISC low caps so might as well go with what you know. From reading above, I see that tridentric (eep!) and redcped (phew) are trying similiar strategies. I forgot that clones were OK so ended up with 74 Brock, 85 Coleman, 88 Ozzie and 04 Womack combining for 314 RL SBs. The challenge, as always, will be if they can actually get on base--especially in Busch II, which I picked to help keep my IPs down and mitigate cheap power teams. 79 Simmons and 11 Berkman to hopefully drive them in. Outside of Ozzie, this team doesn't play much defense though, which is problematic. The pitching is unremarkable, I basically have 7 interchangeable guys with between 138 and 193 IP with 07 Percival as a low IP closer.

80 mil - Great American Slugging Pot (281/390/525, 273 HR; 1371 IP @ 1.03 WHIP, .240 OAV, 127 HR allowed)
So, I helpfully put in the notes that I wanted high walk HR hitters and low walk pitchers with HR/9 between 0.75 and 0.85 and then play in the lowest hitting # park available. That gives me 5 hitters with 80+ RL BB and three with over 100. Hoping for some 3-run HRs. All my pitchers have BB/9 under 1.6 so hopefully that will help keep runners off the bases. Maddux/Nola/Bieber/Webb rotation with Quiz, lower IP Grienke and Cliff Lee in the pen. Also 08 Jack Ryan in case we encounter any Soviet submarines.

100 mil - 96 Braves Seeking Justice (302/366/493, 224 HR; 1493 IP @ 1.07, .227 OAV)
I know this was a difficult theme for some, but this team was maybe the 3rd that I built and I liked it so I stopped looking. Given that I haven't seen anyone else take the Braves AND the fact that my cumulative stats aren't really any better than my 80 mil team makes me think that decision was hasty. I wanted a team that had good core players (since you probably need 10-12 of them)--particularly 2 good starting pitchers. Tried the 2015 Dodgers with Kershaw/Greinke and the 02 Red Sox with Pedro/Lowe but neithe really worked. Then I looked at the 96 Braves with a strong Maddux and Smoltz's best season and it all fell into place. 96 also gets me a strong Chipper season that I can use at SS, a strong Grissom for CF, and a cheap pinch-hitting season for Justice. Neagle and Schmidt made good twists and we ended up with a solid roster--although in true Braves fashion our bullpen is the Achilles heel.

+1: 97 Neagle
-2: 94 Lemke (need a 2b)
-3: 93 McMichael
-4: 92 Glavine
-5: 91 Pendleton (i flip-flopped 91/2 pendleton and 91/92 glavine about 5 times)
+6: 02 Borowski (see above re bullpen)
+7: 03 Schmidt
+8: 04 Lopez
+9: 05 Graffanino (2b vs LHP)
+10 06 Dye (a late addition--had A.Jones in here for most of the build)

110 mil -- Tiny Heinie (WasNYYCWSHouCle) (306/391/520 234 HR ; 1432 @ 0.97 WHIP, .207 OAV)

This one was a pain in the tucchus, although some of my missteps were self-inflicted. For example, if you start in the current day with o16 teams and work your way back, you quickly find that neither the Mets nor the Astros had many usable players in the 1920s. Lesson learned. Also, in an annual tradition, I forgot the DH for a while--although I ended up with a platoon of Enos Slaughter and Buddy Bradford--so you could argue that I'm still forgetting there's a DH. Eventually I got there by STARTING with my expansion team--I liked the Killer B opportunities for the Astros so I took all 3 (yes, I illegally had the 04 Berkman on my roster for a bit). Modern Cleveland gives me 20 Bieber, two great bullpen pieces and 17 Ramirez. 1960s White Sox for pitching (I have a mancrush on 64 Horlen). 40s/50s Yanks for my catcher (Yogi), another good bat in Joe D, the aforementioned Slaughter and 42 Tiny Bonham, who I just can't quit. Old Sens to get my SS (Cronin), one more OF in Manush and my 4th starter in Braxton. Minute Maid Park to help our HRs.

125 mil - Meh. (318/408/556, 288 HR; 1474 IP @ 0.91 WHIP, .198 OAV)

The team name says it all. Looked for good OPS# for hitters and good ERC# for pitchers and ended up with a lot of likely familiar names. Great American to help our power and I did decide late to add Brendan Ryan and KeBryan Hayes to be our late game defensive substitutions (since my starters don't play great defense and we're platooning anyways).

140 mil - Alcatraz (348/428/563, 217 HR, 245 SB; 1444 IP @ 0.88 WHIP, .199 OAV)

Like some others, I did NOT build two simultaneous rosters under the assumption that I won't need the 80 mil version at all. Although I did make the second round in both 2010 and 2018 so if this pattern holds....

Again, built a while ago so not sure why I did what I did but I'm sure it was some combo of OPS# and ERC#. I also looked for guys with lots of seasonal flexibility to give me more options for the hypothetical Round 2. Except for the immortal 1983 Scott Ullger, who will get double duty regardless.

Quote post by odalisgagne on 6/29/2026 10:40:00 AM:
Also 08 Jack Ryan in case we encounter any Soviet submarines.

Well played!!! Brilliant!!!

Any trip in the wayback machine to enjoy Tommy Lasorda's Kingman rant elevates this discourse immensely!

Before I begin, I would like to thank the organizers of this event. I know an awful lot of work must go into this, and it is truly appreciated.
This is my 5th year entering this annual tournament. And I feel I am uniquely positioned to write this for the children or new players out there who someday might aspire to enter a tournament like this. You see, I have no delusions of making it out of the first round. I believe my best finish was in the low 60’s a couple of years ago. Thus, I am a great lesson for new players to study…on what not to do!! Honestly, do the opposite of my thinking and you will be fine. I mean, I try. In my day job I am a successful finance executive who deals with complex algorithms and formulas all day long. I study trends, interpret complex data sets, and I am relied upon for my interpretation of such data by multiple company boards. Yet this set of skills never seems to translate to this tournament!! I have seeked counseling, tried drinking away the pain. Nothing seems to work. A lesser person would throw in the towel. But as I stated when I started this thread, the children need to study my ineptitude. Who am I to cheat the children of this knowledge.

$70M – Below Average Cardinals
I kind of like low budget themes. I tried a few teams and found there were 2 that I really liked. The Cardinals and Athletics. In a low budget theme, I like to focus on pitching first and foremost. Am I able to acquire enough innings without sacrificing WHIP and HR/9. I am using the assumption that spending a bit more on pitching will pay off in the long run in these types of leagues. Both of these teams I found to offer the best solutions to that puzzle.
With two good solutions for the pitching staffs, I turned my attention to position players. I really thought I was going to fall in love with the A’s (I had the Bash Brothers poster in my room as a kid). However I could not find an offense that satisfied my needs of a high OBP and good defense. I did find that mix with the Cardinals. In past years, one of my perceived mistakes was ignoring defense. Or at least its importance in the sim. We will see if defense wins championships. Probably not.
$80M – Pitchers Nightmare
And by pitchers nightmare, I mean I fear for my pitchers. There were two ways to lean into this theme. Go all in on HR’s and pitchers to specialize in strikeouts…or focus on lower HR’s, put the ball in play, and pitchers who fall close to the 0.75 HR/9 metric. For better or worse (probably worse), I chose the latter.
My pitchers keep the ball in the yard as close to the minimum allowed as possible. Will that translate against teams that focused on mega HR offenses and Coors Field? That is the gamble. I did like the low WHIP’s of my entire staff and should have enough innings and swing and miss stuff to survive the onslaught.
For my offense, I focused on OBP and defense. I also tried to focus on guys who put the ball in play. Much like the $70M theme, $80M should level the playing field a bit on how creative managers can be. My defense with this team is excellent. Not allowing extra outs might be a difference maker. With 230 HR’s, I will probably be close to the bottom.

$100M – 2004 Boston Red Sox
Here is where history says I start to fall apart. I looked into no less than 10 teams for this theme. My #1 priority was finding a roster that I could twist the starting rotation into something special. It was because of this that I fell into the 2004 Boston Red Sox. When compared to other teams I attempted, the potential of Martinez, Schilling, and Lowe at or near their best was appealing. (After finalizing this team, loving this team, feeling confident, ect…..I realized there is a real lack of left handed pitching. That could bite me.)
I ended up making 9 twists with this roster. 5 with the pitchers and 4 with the offense. The twist theme enabled me to bring in the top form for Ortiz, Youkills, and Reese. And bring in vintage Martinez, Lowe, Wakefield, Timlin and Arroyo on the pitching side. All just under the $100M limit at $99,972,407.
This team should score on paper. How it will perform against all the deadball era teams, it is too soon to say.

$110M – Det/NYY/Bal/NYM/Stl
I have read all the other threads and many of the other players noting that this was either the most difficult or close to the most difficult team to build. For some reason (and that reason is probably that I am going to get killed again this year), this one came together the quickest for me. Just brainstorming before starting my build, I knew the Tigers had excellent offenses in the 20’s and 30’s. Peak Yankees could be argued between the 40’s and 50’s. The Orioles had one of the best pitching staffs of the 60’s and early 70’s. The Mets in the mid to late 80’s and again in the late 90’s had incredible teams. And the Cardinals were amongst the most talent rich teams in the new millennia.
For some reason, the offense came together pretty quickly. The Tigers provided 3 regulars in Gehringer, Cobb and Greenberg. The Yankees helped fill out my outfield with Dimaggio and Mantle. The Orioles gave me defense in Brooks Robinson. The Mets provided me a starting catcher that plays everyday in Piazza. While the Cardinals added Pujols and Renteria. I spent a bit more for this offense than I normally would. But with the depth, speed, and defense of this lineup, to go along with the strong OBP and slugging, I could not pass it up.
For the rotation, I know this league will eat up innings. The rotation is lead by Chandler, McNally, Gooden and Wainright. I am honestly worried about my bullpen with this team. While all strong performers, I am not sure I acquired enough innings.
All in all, on my first try, this team came together at $109,969,219. Pencils down.

$125M – Average Players Only
Interesting theme. I will say my gut instinct (and the one I went with) was to focus on pitching. I did spend more on that side of the team for this build. Starting Pitchers that provide innings, low OAV, and WHIP between $4M and $6M are not very common. But to make my team, they had to do 2 of the 3 well. This led to some interesting characters in this 6 man rotation. 4 of the 6 starters are deadball pitchers who gave me some innings while keeping the ball in the park. deGrom and Kershaw each had years that sacrificed innings (less than 200) yet provided stellar WHIP and OAV.
One thing I will say is that there will be some stacked bullpens in this league.
My offense one again focused on defense, OBP and speed. Cobb, McGee, Mauer, Gwynn, and Arod were easy choices for me.
I like this team. Thus this one will probably be my worst.

$140M – Everyone but the X’s
As the worlds only diehard Marlins fan, I wanted to include Xavier Edwards….just to include the X’s. But could not do so.
I will almost certainly not be around for round 2. That is not a defeatist attitude. I strive to learn from my mistakes and improve damn it!!!……however I am a realist. And history has not lied yet.
Hence I did not really consider the $80M rebuild of this them very long. Did I look at what it would comprise of? Sure. But that mess is for another day.
This theme gave me an opportunity to have some fun and select some of my favorite players of all time. McGwire, Bonds, Cobb, Williams…sure. Come aboard. Koufax, Hershiser, Eckersley, the late Jose Fernandez…there is a place for you as well. At $140M every roster will be stacked to some degree. I again tried to focus on speed, defense and OBP on offense. Keeping the ball in the yard, low WHIP and low walks for the pitching staff.

Final Thoughts
This is my first and probably last roster construction writeup. I truly enjoy playing this silly game with you all. This group of people has always been a lot of fun. Good luck….and maybe I can prove that miracles happen.

I'm enjoying everyone's writeups. Keep 'em coming!

Enjoying these writeups. For newer players, these are very helpful for future roster construction. The other thing that helps are the spreadsheets that come out (hopefully this year!). The thing I love about this tourney is all the different opinions when it comes to constructing a team, and I learn something new every year despite my 20+ years on this site. (apologize for the formatting as I wrote this is google docs and I'm cutting and pasting)

110M PIT / NYY / BAL / STL / HOU
The first decision is which expansion team do I want from column E. I knew the Astros were likely the best choice for rows 3 and 5 with the Mets being a good choice for row 4. Upon further inspection, row 5 is a slam dunk with Gattis being perhaps the biggest bargain in the game. His offense won’t translate well at this cap, but his defense is dirt cheap. Add in 22 Verlander as my ace and three bullpen arms 25 Okert, 18 McHugh, and one of my long relief favorites 16 Devenski and this was an easy decision. $20M

Row 1 all comes down to one player I know I wanted: 20 Babe Adams. I also grabbed leadoff switch-hitter 25 Carey, bullpen arms 27 Miljus, and 31 Harris. 40 Brubaker fills in as a scrub infielder. $20M

Now I need hitters and I have a preference for switch hitters, but I also need another top-notch starting pitcher. Row 2 Yankees fit this bill. 42 Bonham is another underpriced top performer who will be my 3rd starter. 58 Mantle will start in RF and bat 2nd. I originally had the combined 42 Cullenbine at 3B, but found an upgrade later. I ended up taking his partial season instead. I also had 61 Maris as my DH, but ended up dropping him later as well. 59 Shantz is solid in the pen and 51 Martin is a versatile bench scrub. $21M

I need more switch hitters and the last two picks fell into place at the same time. The 62-82 Orioles have a lot of switch hitters. Ended up taking 82 Murray, 77 Singleton and originally had 68 Buford pencilled in there as well. I swapped him out for 67 Robinson since I had the extra cash and I could forego defense for offense since I am using him in the DH spot. 65 Lau is a perfect backup to Gattis and 69 Hall is a solid addition to the pen. $21M

I need infielders and the 83-03 Cardinals have exactly what I need. 86 Smith and 89 Oquendo are both defensive stalwarts and switch hitters. I’ve learned from previous leagues that I’ve slept too much on defense so I won’t make that mistake this year. 02 Isringhausen is my closer and 90 Tudor is my 4th starter/swingman. Lastly, I found out that by using a cheaper version of Cullenbine and Mantle, I could upgrade my 3B to 01 Pujols, a massive upgrade. I ended up spending the most amount of money on this group, about $27M.

I do feel good about this team. It didn’t take me as long as I thought as the pieces tended to fall in place pretty well.

Hitters: 6052 PA, .306/.396/.496
Pitchers: 1434 IP, 0.95 Whip, .215 Oav, 2.15 ERA, 0.40 HR/9
Yankee Stadium I

125 Panda and the Foxx
Due to the limitations of the theme, this team came together the fastest. No special formula here: going with left/right platoons and switch hitters when possible. Also, defensive range when possible.

For my pitchers, I have a traditional 5 man rotation but 4 long relievers who will act as a roving band of tandem B’s. Notably, all of my Long relievers have more IP and and lower IP/G than the 5 starters. I have three elite setup men to finish off the 7-9th innings for me.

C 89 Jocko Milligan / 28 Jimmie Foxx
1B 46 Johnny Mize
2B 99 Nap Lajoie / 05 Placido Polanco
3B 11 Pablo Sandoval / 28 Jimmie Foxx
SS 13 Hanley Ramirez / 20 Miguel Rojas
LF 60 Ted Williams / 49 Joe Dimaggio
CF 73 Reggie Smith / 09 Carlos Beltran
RF 18 Babe Ruth
SP 25 Trevor Rogers
SP 50 Jim Hearn
SP 20 Tony Gonsolin
SP 43 Howie Pollet
SP 08 Elmer Steele
Long 64 Bob Lee
Long 17 Fred Anderson
Long 65 Hoyt Wilhelm
Long 16 Joe Benz
Setup 20 Devin Williams
Setup 24 Emmanuel Clase
Setup 20 Liam Hendriks

Hitters: 5333 PA, .329/411/.557
Pitchers: 1435 IP, 0.88 Whip, .185 OAV,1.67 ERA, 0.30 HR/9
Busch Stadium

100 1914 Red Sox
I was on the theme league creation committee. I approved this theme. And I still misunderstood the rules. I originally had created a 1919 Giants team. It had sat in the league for about a month until roster checks and I got the dreaded, “not compliant” sitemail. After tinkering with the 1919 Giants using the correct parameters, I did not like the team as much (though I see there is at least one other 1919 Giants team). Weeks ago, I had asked a prominent WIS owner why he was conspicuously absent from the tourney. I’ll leave his name anonymous in case he does not want to be identified. He told me that he actually created one team for the tourney: this league, and he used the 1914 Red Sox. My team was already created and I was happy with it, so I thought nothing of it at the time. However, when I got the “not compliant” sitemail, the next team I tried out were the 1914 Red Sox. It was better than my 1919 Giants team and it came together very quickly.

I do have a few misgivings. First is that I have to roster seven 300K players including three mop up pitchers. So my team is not very deep. I’m also very left-handed in both my lineup and pitching staff. Lastly, I don’t like playing in hitters parks. But this pitching staff is ridiculous and will absolutely destroy home run teams.

+1 1915 Joe Wood
-2 1912 Dick Hoblitzel
-3 1911 Vean Gregg
-4 1910 Ray Collins
+5 1919 Babe Ruth
+6 1920 Larry Gardner
+7 1921 Everett Scott
+8 1922 Hal Janvrin (pretty good scrub)
+9 1923 Tris Speaker
+10 1924 Harry Hooper

Batting: 5499 PA, .301/.378/.445
Pitching: 1445 IP, 1.02 whip, .212 Oav, 1.67 ERA, 0.11 HR/9
Fenway Park

70 A Pirates’ Life for Me!
My search started by trying to find pitching “bargains” in the $26k-27k/IP range and then created a spreadsheet sorted by franchise. Then I’d adjust my search to the $25k & $28k range and then continually expand in both directions. I had come up with 7 Pirate deals, even though I didn’t use them all. And for those of you wondering, I came up with 4 Yankees, 4 Cubs and 5 White Sox as the next best teams. I actually never created rosters for the other teams as the first one I created was for the Pirates and liked what I came up with.

05 Sam Leever
09 Deacon Phillippe - one of the pitching bargains I could find
15 Babe Adams - wanted to get the 1920 version, but too expensive.
19 Frank Miller - one of the pitching bargains
21 Max Carey - my one splurge, but will leadoff and has great range
26 Carmen Hill
33 Earl Grace
38 Heinie Manush
45 Boom-Boom Beck - one of the pitching bargains
47 Gene Woodling
52 Clem Koshorek - great defensive range, will bat last
60 Clem Labine
65 Donn Clendenon - great range, good hitter, good bargain, will bat 2nd
68 Roy Face - one of the bargains
75 Richie Zisk - he gets on base, good hitter, will bat 4th.
76 Kent Tekulve
84 Jim Morrison - will he break on through to the other side, or light my fire?
90 Randy Tomlin
93 Orlando Merced - no defense but will hit and he’s a switch hitter
99 Pat Meares
03 Craig Wilson - mispriced catcher bargain
09 Ronny Cedeno
15 Neil Walker - switch hitter
16 Jung Ho Kang - switch hitting platoon player, will bat 3rd
21 Richard Rodriguez - my best relief pitcher

On the offensive side, I tried to get as many switch hitters as I could. I do have one left/right platoon at C. Most of my innings are deadball. That should suppress opposing HRs. But I have very few strikeouts, so the defense will have to be tight. Normally I’d draft <1300 IP for a 70M league, but that’s with a pitchers park. Since Exposition is neutral, I drafted more innings.

Hitting: 5265 PA, .284/.357/.434
Pitching: 1317 IP, 1.06 Whip, .240 Oav, 2.68 ERA, 0.28/HR9
Exposition Park III

140 Adams to Zaun
I started by creating a spreadsheet listing A to Z. Then populated it by searching players from each letter that I was most likely to use for the 140 league, including sub $300k scrubs. Since 140 is such a high cap, I knew the $ level that I needed to search for hitters and pitchers. I’d make the 80 roster later as that would be easier. Some letters had seven players. X had none. And some letters had only one that I liked such as Dinelson Lamet (for Petco Park), Tom Niedenfuer, Steve Ontiveos, Clayton Kershaw and Brandon Inge (good scrub). So then I had to work backwards from there, filling positions from the other letters. Took me less time than I thought when I figured out a good system.

24 Babe Adams
20 Shane Bieber
90 Roger Connor
02 Ed Delahanty
91 Mark Eichorn
28 Jimmie Foxx
20 Tony Gonsolin
20 Rogers Hornsby
13 Brandon Inge
13 Joe Jackson
16 Clayton Kershaw
20 Dinelson Lamet
99 Pedro Martinez
83 Tom Niedenfuer
85 Steve Ontiveros
01 Joel Pineiro
00 Joe Quinn
17 Jose Ramirez
16 Tris Speaker
98 Sam Thompson
03 Ugeth Urbina
22 Justin Verlander
09 Honus Wagner
24 Ross Youngs
97 Greg Zaun

Once the roster was done, I went about to make a 80M roster using the same players. It did require some changes and using a $200k Dinelson Lamet. I am mostly happy with how the 80M roster looks even if Steve Ontiveros and Joel Pineiro are my two best starters, LOL.

Hitting: 6276 PA, .349/.429/.531
Pitching: 1468 IP, 0.86 Whip, .184 Oav, 1.87 ERA, 0.51/HR/9
Petco Park

80 Me Love You Long Ball
For pitching, I just tried to find the best pitchers for relative value while keeping an eye on HR/9#. I didn’t need to toe the 0.75 HR/9 line. I figured 1353 innings would be about the right number of innings to draft. I tried to use the most neutral park available. Even though there are more HR, I don’t think it will necessarily be a higher-scoring league than most.

05 Pedro Martinez
12 Jared Weaver
19 Zack Greinke
83 Joe Price
63 Hal Brown

My bullpen are guys are more of the same while keeping the IP/G to >1.3 so I can get 15-20 pitches per outing. 58 Bob Porterfield, 77 Clay Carroll, 08 Cory Wade, 24 Jakob Junis, 97 Antonio Osuna, 88 Craig McMurtry and 22 Jhoan Duran as my closer.

As for my offense, I didn’t try to lean into the home runs. As for my selection process? Well, it’s just a batch of shameless cookies. I had to get a couple of guys like Dwayne Murphy and Nelson Velazquez to get me above the 200 HR requirement. Otherwise, these names will look familiar.

C 16 Evan Gattis
1B 93 Roger Connor
2B 21 Whit Merrifield
SS 88 Jerry Denny
3B 18 Jose Ramirez
LF 19 Ketel Marte
CF 83 Dwayne Murphy
RF 17 Marwin Gonzalez

Batting: 5551 PA, .277/.349/.474, 208 HR
Pitching: 1353 IP, 1.01 Whip, .219 Oav, 2.76 ERA, 0.85 HR/9
Great American Ballpark

70m - Giants Through the Ages

I did all the pre-work for this theme, but in the end I only had time to build the Giants, so hopefully I picked the right one! I started with looking at the infield positions to try to identify franchises that had good options at all 4. I was primarily looking for good range and speed, ideally switch hitters or lefties to get the platoon advantage as often as possible. Then I tried doing the same for pitching - figured out the general $/IP range I'd be looking at and the guys who looked best in that range. I didn't necessarily need deadballers since I was probably going to have high range, bad glove infielders. Since it's a lower cap, I really didn't want to waste any money on 200k guys who wouldn't play much, so I wanted everyone to contribute.

Teams like the Yankees and Dodgers weren't great fits since their deadball years didn't have many good players - or even into the 20s for the Dodgers. The Giants had Frisch, Bancroft, McGann and Buck Herzog, and even though it ate away at most of their deadball years, they also had decent pitching options past the 20s (Burkett and Swift, Logan Webb, Hubbell) and the ability to play in AT&T Park which suited their players well. One thing they did NOT have was guys who could steal bases well, which is unfortunate since it's a staple of lower cap teams. When it came time to build out the team, I added '71 Ken Henderson and Fred Lewis who can steal some bags and hit some triples. Interestingly, I ended up booting Frisch for Bancroft at 2B, so I've got cloned Bancrofts up the middle - 1920 at SS and 1923 at 2B.

This team ended up a little weird, as lower cap teams often do. I've only got about 640 PAs at catcher and other than Herzog, that's the position with the best coverage. I don't really remember if I was planning to play guys down to 95% or if it just ended up that way. I've got a 5-man rotation (Logan Webb, Dummy Taylor, Kelly Downs, Burkett and Hubbell) that has 964 IP, which is a lot for this cap, so I think I'll be rotating these guys through the bullpen on their throw days.

I never got around to building out the Reds (probably would have been my second choice) or messing with this one too much, other than fixing the rotation when I picked Swift and Burkett from the same 5-year period. Even for a 70m cap they look underwhelming to me now, but hopefully the range and speed and switch hitting gives them a reasonable floor so they won't be terrible.

80m - Homers at the Bat

Well, at least I had a definite plan for this team. Now we'll play the games and see if it's a good one. I loaded up the pitching staff with modern guys for 2 reasons - one, they can get a much better HR/9+ for a raw HR/9 of 0.75, and two, I've got some truly terrible fielders who can use all the help they can get. My 5-man rotation is Hunter Brown, Charlie Morton, Julio Urias, Chris Bassitt and Hyun-Jin Ryu. Kevin Brown '04 is here as a swingman who can make some spot starts if needed. KB and Brandon Morrow are the only pitchers on my staff who ever had a price adjustment. Most of my pitchers are over 150 for their HR/9+ and have HR/9# numbers in the 0.5-0.6 range. Will it matter? I'm not sure. We're playing in Yankee III to get as many homers as possible. It's the only +1B park in my division (we've got a Kingdome, a GABP and a Sicks) which doesn't surprise me. I've also got a bullpen full of guys with high IP/G just in case keeping the ball in the park is an early symptom of in-game fatigue.

On offense I wanted to try to load up on hitters whose power would normalize well - ie, NOT guys from the 90s and 2000s. My 2 favorites are here - Tilly Walker and Gavvy Cravath - as well as Mel Ott and Hank Greenberg. I'm trying out 1893 Jack Clements (4.52 HR/100 raw, 6 HR/100#) behind the plate, though I'm less sure of him. There really aren't many old-timey guys who can hit bombs and play up the middle, so I'm rolling with '88 Strawberry in CF, '91 HoJo at SS and 2025 Jazz at 2B. Those guys can also run a little bit so if everyone else has noodle-armed catchers like I do, maybe we'll get some steals.

If nothing else, this team should be fun!

100m - A Dozen Years of 2021 Dodgers

I suspect this will be one of many 2021 Dodgers teams. First thing I did was check my notes. Last year we had a "twist the same team to 80m and 120m" league. The usual suspects - 2021 Dodgers, 95/98/99 Indians, 2010 Mariners, 97/98 Mariners, 1906-09 Cubs, 1914 Boston, 27/28 A's, 30s Yankees with Grove/Ruth/Gehrig, 00/06 Yankees... In my 80m league the 09 As beat the 2021 Dodgers, and then at 120, the Twisted 1910 Cubs outplayed the 1913 Pittsburgh Pirates.

I looked at the 09 A's and didn't think they were a good fit. I played around with some of those deadball Cubs teams but they all needed the same years. I did NOT build the team I should have tried - the 27 Yankees, being a pretty good team on their own, would probably look good if you just made Ruth and Gehrig a little cheaper. I did look at the 28 Yankees with Coveleski but couldn't find enough twists to get him back to 1917. The other team I got close with was the 2009 Yankees, but I couldn't get into the rotation. Needless to say, I loved this theme and I wish I had another month to build teams for it.

But I decided to settle down with the 2021 Dodgers and see if I could get comfortable. Like the 27 Yankees, they're pretty good on their own, but have some chances to tweak them. Interestingly, once I switched Cody Bellinger to 2019, I realized I only had one player who was twisted forward (22 Gonsolin) and everyone else went back. These are the twists I ended up with:

1 - 20/22	Gonsolin
2 - 19/23	Belli
3 - 18/24	Bauer
4 - 17/25	Kersh
5 - 2016	Betts
6 - 2015	Pollock
7 - 2014	CT3
8 - 2013	N Jones
9 - 2012	Kenley
10 - 2011	N Feliz
11 - 2010	Albert

Jones, Kenley and Feliz were really just fillers to get Albert back to 2010. A guy like Kenley really is a gem for this kind of league, because you can just twist him to whatever season you need him. This team isn't perfect - I couldn't really solve shortstop since every twist I wanted for Seager went to someone else, so I'm just using his 409 PA from 2021 and platooning with Chris Taylor, and I couldn't find a better solution for 3B than just leaving JT alone. I've got 6 starters (924 IP without Gonsolin, 1054 with him) and nobody who's ideal as a closer. My biggest worry is that I've got 2016 Betts and 2015 Pollock batting 1-2 and I'm worried their OBPs will be too low. But I love the pitching despite its flaws and I hope they'll carry us through.

110m - Giant Brave Philly A-Astros

None of the 4 teams I built for this league were actually compliant because I am a moron and just picked any old team instead of one from each column. Why? I have no idea. (Cards-Phils-Reds-BoSox-Dodgers ... Giants-Cards-Reds-Phillies-Guardians ... Giants-Phils-A's-Cards-Astros). I realize I named this team out of order ... Giants 20-40, Phils 41-61, A's 62-82, Braves 83-03, Astros 04-25.

So I cobbled together this entry on very short notice after I realized my idiocy. Meaning they'll either be atrocious or win 104 games. I wasn't starting from nothing - I've got most of the same Giants and Astros that I had used in the earlier iterations. I started this theme similar to the way I started the 70m one - looked at/wrote down all the various players who would fit into each bucket and tried to figure out which puzzle pieces worked well together.

The Giants have the inevitable Frisch/Bancroft tandem, and can add Bill Terry to the mix. The Astros have too many SPs to use them all (Cole, Verlander, Hunter Brown, Clemens, Cristian Javier). The A's had Rickey and Mitchell Page who can run. The Phillies had Schoolboy Rowe and Harry Walker. That left the 83-03 era with Column C. I mostly needed 3B, another SP who could fit into a 5-man, and another bat, so I've got Smoltz in his 187ip season, Terry Pendleton as an A+ range guy and Chipper as my DH. Will this work? I have no idea.

125m - Panda-monium on the Animal Farm

What is this team? What makes them different than all the other (likely very similar) teams? I guess that's why we play the games.

I started with the pitching. I figured I was going to end up with 12 pitchers and 13 hitters (2C-6IF-5OF) so I had to make a staff out of that. I just drafted 9 SP-level guys, 5 RH and 4 LH, and figure I'll make tandems out of them and swap guys in and out when they get tired. (RH squad: Hearn, Gonsolin, Zach Plesac, Strider, Eovaldi ... LH squad: Kershaw, Pollet, Liriano, Trevor Rogers) with Clase and Liam Hendriks as the ace relievers and the 108-IP Rivera rounding things out.

I'm not actually convinced I've got enough PAs on offense. But I've got a lot of guys with position flexibility so I'm hoping I can make it work. Dickey and Kendall are catching. Votto/Matt Williams and Pablo Sandoval are a trio at 1B/3B. Hanley and Lajoie are anchoring SS/2B, with George Grantham doing 2B/OF and Miguel Rojas manning SS and utility infield. Reggie Smith and Joe Dimaggio have got CF, with Ted Williams and Bob Caruthers as the primary guys in the corners. Extra PAs from Grantham and Reggie will cover their shortages (I hope). We're playing in PNC Park which is my favorite stadium in real life, so at least we've got that going for us, which is nice.

140m - Your Words Just Alphabetize Me (Accidentally Ohtani)

My original team name was too long to fit, but the Ohtani part is a big part of the story.

I went and dug up my teams from last time we did this (was either 2013 or 2014 and they were 70m/110m, so they were not great comps, plus no alphabet requirement.) Anyway, the fact that it can be the same season makes things moderately easier for the bench, instead of having to do different seasons and find guys with 2 useful bench seasons. It also helps with the alphabet requirements, since if I just want to make QUIZY guys bench players both times if it makes things easier.

The number of hitters and pitchers who are even really useful at 140m is pretty small. When you take the number of them that can also be useful at 80m, even in a different role, you're getting a pretty small pool. That's before you even add in the alphabet requirement. So I'll be curious to see if we end up with a lot of similar players here.

I started with the rotation - Kershaw, Greinke, Arrieta, Verlander, Bauer. Then both JV and Bauer combined forces and became Bill Bernhard. The infield is built around Roger Connor (finally!), Lajoie, Yount and Terry Pendleton. The outfield is Rickey, Speaker and Delahanty, with Buck Ewing behind the dish. I used the remaining letters to fill out the bullpen and the bench - Jenks, Isringhausen, Zaun, Foulke, Jose Uribe, Jack Quinn... all the guys you'd expect. Trevor Rogers' 25 season is a bullpen piece in 140m and the 5th starter at 80m.

So then I had a problem.. I was a little short on innings at 80m but I didn't really want to add another pitcher to my 140m team. I was trying to find a guy like Reb Russell or Joe Wood who could hit for the 140m team. Oooooooh, you know who's like that? Staring me right in the face is the face of baseball in 2026... ladies and gentlemen ... SHOHEI OHTANI! So I reworked the 140m team to have Ohtani 2024 at DH and the 52ip 2018 version on the 80m team.

This is what the final accounting looks like:

A	Arrieta
B	Bernhard
C	Connor
D	Delahanty
E	Ewing
F	Foulke
G	Greinke
H	R Henderson
I	Izzy
J	Jenks
K	Kershaw
L	Lajoie
M	S Marte
N	Nunamaker
O	Ohtani
P	Pendleton
Q	J QUinn
R	T Rogers
S	Speaker
T	Trienen
U	Jose Uribe
V	L Varland
W	Walsh
Y	Yount
Z	Zaun

I’ll kick this off by saying I don’t feel nearly as good about my builds as I did last year, so kudos on the theme creators – these were tough. Also, anyone apologizing to commissioners for roster errors: we had to build teams as well, so believe me, we understand.

$70M – Red Menace
Riverfront Stadium

I was determined to build a team with every franchise so I didn’t leave anything on the table. However, that still didn’t really yield any options I felt great about. Eventually, I settled on the Reds. This is probably the franchise I’ve used the least in franchise themes/progs across my two decades on this site. I just don’t have a great feel for them.

They do offer affordable innings, especially at lower caps, and have some pitchers who can hit, which I tried to capitalize on in this league. It was a positive for me last year, so I tried to stick with that approach again. ’03 Noodles Hahn, ’12 George Suggs, ’33 Paul Derringer and ’27 Eppa Rixey make up the rotation. ’64 Bill Henry and ’86 Rob Murphy will be my stoppers, with a bunch of middling-but-decent Setup B options.

I gambled a bit on offense. I didn’t think many would draft a lot of homer suppressing pitching, so I went with ’06 Adam Dunn, ’99 Greg Vaughn, ’56 Wally Post, and ’20 Eugenio Suarez, who bring combined 159 HR between them. We are multifaceted though, with 675+ walks, and high % steals from Vaughn, ’79 Joe Morgan and ’02 Barry Larkin.

All in all, I’m hopeful this team can be competitive, but I’m sure others with a better feel for these caps will have constructed far better teams.

Offense: .241/.337/.423, 200 HR, 684 walks, 87/105 SB
Pitching: 1,455.2 IP, 1.20 WHIP, only 19 HRs allowed (fingers crossed)

PREDICTION: 81-81

$80M – Chicks Dig the Long Ball
Tiger Stadium

My initial instinct was to get just over 200 HR, and then spend the money beefing up elsewhere. However, EVERY team is going to be giving up HR, mine included, so the wise strategy seems to be to go all-in on the long ball. And this offense brings 259 of them.

First and foremost, I went with Tiger Stadium. I considered Kingdom, but that + doubles rating wasn’t for me. I want to minimize XBH, and hopefully keep any opposing homers solo. I also did my best to load up on walks and high % steals. My roster is flexible, with a mix of SH, LH and RH, and 4 of my hitters boast double digit SB with minimal CS. This lineup is going to take A LOT of micromanaging, as no one has more than 595 PA. The likes of ’77 Reggie Jackson, ’25 Cal Raleigh, ’24 Anthony Santander, ’85 Darrell Evens and ’18 Joey Gallo will hopefully be able to bring the thunder with regularity.

On the pitching side, the strategy seemed obvious: 0.75 RL HR/9, and then lowest #HR/9 from that group. I actually really like this pitching staff. I splurged on ’25 Tarik Skubal, followed by ’09 Justin Verlander, ’19 Hyun-Jin Ryu, ’99 Shane Reynolds and ’20 Zack Greinke. The bullpen boasts a lot of Ks and low OAV guys, including some who can go multiple innings: ’20 Birch Smith, ’20 Trevor Rosenthal, ’19 Felipe Vazquez, and ’18 Taylor Cole.

I find these homer leagues to be very volatile and unpredictable, so it’s hard to know how to feel about any team, but I do like the pitching staff I’ve assembled and should have enough thump to make them winners.

Offense: .242/.342/.457, 259 HR, 749 BB, 75/97 SB
Pitching: 1,495 IP, 1.07 WHIP, 136 RL HR allowed

PREDICTION: 87-75

$100M – Dodging ’21 Trollies in the Rain
Dodger Stadium

Based on my roster reviews, this is going to be the most popular choice. I REALLY wanted the ’05 Yankees, but just could not make it work. Leiter and Pavano were needed to make a reasonable rotation, but they each really only had one good season and that severely limited my other options. I just could not find a balance I wanted. So, back to the ’21 Dodgers.

A lot of great flexibility on this team. I knew if I was using this team, I was taking ’20 Trevor Bauer. I noticed a few others who went with the ’21 Dodgers did not, which makes me a bit happy. ’11 Clayton Kershaw, ’21 Walker Buehler, ’12 David Price and ’21 Julio Urias round out the rotation. The bullpen is studly, with ’21 Max Scherzer, ’13 Kenley Jansen, ’16 Nate Jones, ’09 Neftali Feliz, ’21 Blake Treinen and ’24 Dennis Santana.

Offense was tricky, as I was not willing to part with ’19 Cody Bellinger, which definitely complicated things. Ultimately I went with ’17 Steven Souza and ’21 Chris Taylor, and moved Mookie Betts (2014) and Corey Seager (2015) to the bench. Bellinger and ’10 Albert Pujols anchor the lineup, with ’21 Max Muncy and ’21 Trea Turner providing some additional slugging. ’21 Will Smith and ’21 Justin Turner round out the lot. This offense is very well balanced, with a TON of homers, lots of walks and a lot of high % SB.

I made some offensive sacrifices to get under the cap, but I think I still have more than enough firepower with the pitching staff I drafted. I’m cautiously optimistic about this team.

Offense: .281/.373/.517, 271 HR, 684 BB, 107/130 SB
Pitching: 1,481.2 IP, 0.95 WHIP

PREDICTION: 90-72

$110M – 5 x 5: A Mathematician’s Journey
Riverfront Stadium

I hated this theme, purely because of the relatively unlimited options that I couldn’t stop obsessing over. I used the Expos in an early draft and was so excited, only to discover they were not available. I wish Column E had allowed for all the expansion teams, but I digress.

Selections:

Column A – Dodgers (Row 5): ’19 Cody Bellinger, ’07 Russell Martin, ’05 Willy Aybar, ’22 Tony Gonsolin, ’20 Victor Gonzalez
Column B – Cardinals (Row 2): ’54 Solly Hemus, ’47 Whitey Kurowski, ’56 Red Schoendienst, ’45 Art Rebel, ’48 Harry Brecheen)
Column C – Pirates (Row 1): ’23 Max Carey, ’35 Cy Blanton, ’31 Bill Harris, ’27 Johnny Miljus, ’34 Burleigh Grimes
Column D – Reds (Row 4): ’00 Ken Griffey Jr., ’98 Barry Larkin, ’86 Eric Davis, ’00 Gabe White, ’86 Rob Murphy
Column E – Astros (Row 3): ’69 Jim Wynn, ’63 Turk Farrell, ’82 Don Sutton, ’65 Robin Roberts, ’64 Claude Raymond

Given all the possibilities, it’s really hard to gauge how successful this team will be. As with my previous entries this year, I focused on a balanced offense and HR prevention, once again using a HR park as I feel like HR advantage will prevail.

Offense: .296/.398/.499, 222 HR, 845 BB, 239/297 SB
Pitching: 1,533.1 IP, 1.02 WHIP, 52 RL homers allowed

PREDICTION: 86-76

$125M – Looney Platoons
Busch Stadium

This was a fun one. I went for a strong mix of SH, LH and RH and ended up with about 1/3 of each. I opted for two switch hitters in ’31 Lu Blue and ’18 Jose Ramirez with a full slate of PA to top the order and give me some stability before getting into platoons and micromanaging. Once again, this offense has…you guessed it…a great mix of HR, BB and SB. I should be well positioned to match up well as needed, provided I can stay on top of things.

On the pitching side, I tried not to waste too much money on unnecessary innings, and stayed closer to $4M than $6M where I could. ’22 Babe Adams, ’20 Tony Gonsolin, ’14 Wade Davis and ’20 Liam Hendriks will pitch exclusively out of the pen. Other than that, it’ll be tandems, featuring the likes of ’01 Pedro Martinez, ’17 Clayton Kershaw, ’43 Howie Pollet, ’20 Zach Plesac, ’25 Trevor Rogers (as an O’s fan, I never thought I’d be using this guy willingly in a WISC), ’25 Nathan Eovaldi, ’08 CC Sabathia and ’50 Jim Hearn.

I feel like this team will do well provided I can check in on my matchups regularly.

Offense: .308/.406/.519, 236 HR, 874 BB, 220/257 SB
Pitching: 1,516.1 IP, 0.92 WHIP

PREDICTION 88-74

$140M – Letters from Home
Turner Field

Like many, I built both rosters together, starting with my $80M, as I knew I’d have more flexibility to create my $140M roster once I nailed down the lower one.
Selections:

A – Pete Alexander
B – Kevin Brown
C – Harry Coveleski
D – George Dumont
E – Dennis Eckersley
F – Doug Fister
G – Zack Greinke
H – Rogers Hornsby
I – Jose Iglesias
J – Chipper Jones
K – Clayton Kershaw
L – Barry Larkin
M – Tommy Milone
N – Gift Ngoepe
O – Mel Ott
P – Albert Pujols
Q – Jamie Quick
R – Billy Rogell
S – Tris Speaker
T – Mike Timlin
U – Chase Utley
V – Arky Vaughan
W – Butch Wynegar
X – Made you look
Y – Cy Young
Z – Ben Zobrist

Fun roster to build and a good mix of players. I feel this will be my best team.

Offense: .339/.424/.531, 179 HR, 390 2B, 768 BB, 120/200 SB
Pitching: 1,541.2 IP, 0.89 WHIP, 52 RL HR allowed

PREDICTION: 92-70

This is the best day of the tournament for me - the day before the games start. My teams are built and so far nothing has gone wrong. I doubt I'll be able to say as much tomorrow. I've been in every one of these tourneys so far and my expectations have really changed. At the outset I really wanted to excel. Now, not so much. Its fun building the teams and that's about it for me. My excuse used to be that I didn't have the time to devote to competing at a high level because of job and family responsibilities. Now everyone's grown and moved out and I'm retired with oodles of time on my hands. So its clear to me that my real problem is that I'm lazy. I marvel at all the work some of you guys put in researching and building these teams. I assure you all that I did not.

Unless otherwise specified, team statistics are normalized and do not include $300K scrubs.

$70 Million Franchise Team - My only experience at this cap comes in this tourney, so it is usually a challenge. Over the years, I've developed one strategy, the stolen base combined with an offense-suppressing stadium. For some reason I started tinkering with trying something else. So I half built a Pirates team and a Dodgers team. About half way through I lost interest and decided to build the other teams and come back to this one. After I came back to it, my first impulse was to use the A's. I knew that I could fit Bill Bernard and another deadball starter under the cap. Plus, I knew the A's of the 70s-90s had speedsters like Henderson, Page, North and Lopes. So I set out to build something and when I finished I was reasonably satisfied. I like my offense and I've got decent range and fielding (Schang brings an A+ arm). My one concern was that I was very light on available IP, even for a team playing in the Oakland Coliseum. After I entered it, I was even more concerned. I only have 7 non-scrub pitchers. So this could be a fatigue disaster, or it could be ok. We'll see.

Offense: .281/.369/ .438 /.807 156/171 SB
Pitching: 1258 IP + 111 mop up IP ERC 2.70 OAV .236 WHIP 1.11 BB 2.25

Also, I forgot or didn't notice that clones were allowed. By the time I realized it, I was about to enter the team. I briefly explored restructuring to add clones but decided that it probably doesn't make much difference so I left it. See.... lazy. My mom would be ashamed.

$80M HRs - These days I mostly play progressives so I'm not really up on the latest build strategies for open leagues. It probably would have helped if I were. In the past when I built open league teams I seldom even considered HR. I built around OBP and doubles. Old habits die hard. I basically did that here too. I ended up with almost exactly 200 HR for the team and even as I filled out my offense, I strongly suspected that was a grave mistake. But I did it anyway... What can I say, "if you can't listen, you've got to feel." Well, feeling starts tomorrow. I ended up with 4 guys averaging 35 HR, 2 at around 20 and the last 2 at around 10. I have Raines and Henderson to get thrown out on the bases and pretty good IF defense (along with Gary Sanchez's A+ arm)

For pitching I stayed mostly with modern guys who seldom walked anyone. I put this whole mess in GAB in Cincy. Given the offense-forward nature of the theme, I stacked up a lot of IP just to be safe. Overall, this may not be a complete disaster but if not, it won't be my fault. I did my best to f--- it up.

Offense: .277/.375/ .466 /.841 94/111 SB
Pitching: 1448 IP ERC 2.58 OAV .237 WHIP 1.06 BB 1.52

$100M Twist League - As many others have noted, this was a problem. I tackled it first because I expected it to be a problem. I'm surprised at the number of deadball and deadball adjacent teams. Not because it isn't a good idea, but because I didn't even consider it... Hence the surprise. I considered a couple of Dodger's teams (2021 and 2008) before settling on the 2019 Astros. The Dodgers teams had about a dozen twists whereas the Astros had only 8. At some point with the Dodger teams I just felt that I didn't like them. Too many holes and too few superstar players that I wanted to fit under the cap. When I first saw the Astros I really liked how they looked. The team was just good top to bottom. It might have done okay here with zero twists. So once I found it, the team was pretty easy to build. On the pitching side, I kept Verlander, Cole, Urquidy, Pressley. Osuna, Harris and McHugh. I twisted Greinke (4), Valdez (1), Miley (7), Devenski (3) and Joe Smith (8). Its very solid and has ample IP.

On offense, Gurriel, Bregman, Brantley, Springer, Chirinos, Maldonado, Diaz and Straw are 2019 holdovers. I twisted Altuve (2), Correa (6) and Yordan Alvarez (5). My bats are solid except for half the catching platoon (including some good bats on the bench). The defense is surprisingly good (it surprised me anyway) except no A+ arm at catcher. So bring your track shoes boys.

Offense: .289/.371/ .464 /.835
Pitching: 1514 IP ERC 2.20 OAV .212 WHIP 1.00 BB 2.04

$110M Franchise Bingo - This one was also a bear to build. I did it second, so I could get the hardest teams out of the way first. I fumbled around a lot before I tried to build a team. When I did, it was pretty good for a first try but it didn't comply with the rules. So rather than petitioning for a rules change, I tried again. This time, I followed all the rules, which is the best compliment I can give this team. My teams were Athletics (1920-40); Twins/Senators (1941-61); Astros (1962-82); Indians (1983-2003) and LAD (2004-25). My offense is a good mix of some power and some SB threats with good OBP throughout. The defense is quite good. On the pitching side the top of the rotation and the top of the bullpen are very good. I'm please with how this worked out. Here are my main choices (scrubs are not listed). Athletics (Grove, Foxx and B. Johnson); Twins/Senators (Wolff, Niggeling, M.Vernon, Cullenbine); Astros (Sutton, Sambito, Wynn and Staub); Indians (R.Alomar, Vizquel, Lofton) and LAD (Scherzer, Kershaw and Lowe). The only choice I really debated long and hard was between Lofton and Manny. In the end, Lofton's SB and defense won out but I'm still not sure it was the right way to go but its too late to do anything about it now.

Offense: .310/.405/ .472 /.877
Pitching: 1530 IP ERC 2.13 OAV .217 WHIP 1.00 BB 1.85

$125M Salary Equality - I didn't spend a lot of time on this one. At the outset, I decided to have a staff of starting pitchers with a couple of relievers. I ended up with 9 SP (all with at least 125 IP) and two relievers (Tim Burke and Bruce Sutter). Most of the pitchers cost about $35,000 per IP except for the relievers and Tony Gonsolin who were much more. My nine SP are Prim, Stratton, Donovan, Rowe, Benz, Sabathia, Shore, Pollet and Gonsolin. I'll go with a 6 man rotation and rotate guys back and forth from the rotation to the pen.

On offense, I've got a handful of 500 PA guys but mostly platoons. My catchers are Foxx and Dickey, 1B Morneau and McGwire, MIF Gimenez, Bancroft, Lajoie and Scutaro, 3B M.Williams and Boggs and OF Henderson, Dykstra, Ted Williams and Randy Winn. Between the regulars and the bench I have A+ range at every position and a catcher with an A+ arm.

Offense: .327/.415/ .538 /.953
Pitching: 1541 IP ERC 1.87 OAV .213 WHIP 0.97 BB 1.75

I put them in a neutral part (Olympic Stad) and I'm looking forward to see how they do. Despite my confessed shortcomings, I really like this team. Unfortunately historically that doesn't mean much.

$140M A to Z - This one was another quick build. I kept track of the letters I used when I rostered a guy and the unassigned letters I had left. It got a little tricky trying to fill out the bench but that's about it. In past years, I'd have built the $80M roster alongside this one but honestly I didn't see the point. I'm not likely to make round two and even if I do, there's a reasonable chance I'll drop out and let someone else advance in my place. The round 2 themes always seem very time consuming to me and, as I think I mentioned, I'm kinda lazy. In any event, I did pick players I thought could make an $80M roster so I should be able to do it if I have to. My SP are W. Johnson, Maddux, Willis, Eovaldi, D. Alexander and Skubal. My RP are Thornton, Nathan, Groom and Quiz. We're playing in the Polo Grds (V) so I think they'll hold up, but we'll see.

On offense, I have lots of the usual suspects with some lesser used options required because of the theme. My OF is Yelich, Ruth and Delahanty. MIF of Hornsby and Larkin. Boggs and Freeman are on the corners. Darrell Porter and his A+ arm handle the catching. Roy Cullenbine DHs. Good strong contact, good OBA and slightly above average defense.

Offense: .334/.439/ .556 /.994
Pitching: 1578 IP ERC 1.81 OAV .205 WHIP 0.96 BB 1.95

Overall, all of these themes were fun to put together. So thanks to everyone who's effort and work made it possible. Know that one fairly lazy guy really appreciates you doing it.

Last year I broke my long standing tradition of honoring the 50th anniversary of some great musical moments as team building inspirations. So, instead of paying homage to the 1975 Year in Music we chose the classic book title 1984 instead. A lot of good that did since I once again failed to reach the second round. However to paraphrase Orwell “He who controls the past (failures) controls the future (disappointments).
Let’s consider returning to our regularly scheduled format and see what 1976 has to offer.
Does not take much to get cosmic confirmation. I hear a Dreamy voice that was recorded in 1976 that simply states. “Now here you go again…” That settles it.

70mm *Boston – Morgan a Feeling

Had to go with the Red Sox in this theme. The band Boston’s 1976 debut album was huge. Not a lot of band or song references except for my two first chronological picks Tom Scholz used a (Norwood) Gibson guitar to record the main solo in the hit single “More than a Felling” aka (Cy) Morgan a Feeling. I did manage to get some big names into the lineup. Ted Williams, Jimmie Foxx and Babe Ruth all made the cut so play-by-play will be fun to read.

80mm *Kingfish

When the Grateful Dead took a hiatus from touring after 1973, all of the members found other side projects to keep them busy. Bob Weir had been playing with a group called Kingfish and they released their first album in 1976. There are several players on this roster chosen with this band or just Weir in general in mind. Some are pretty obscure which is how we like it. Several “King” references as well. We did Phish last tournament so no gratuitious fish names this time around except for the team captain.
Tim Salmon’s nickname is Kingfish so he is team captain.
King Kelly – Matthew Kelly was pretty much the band co-leader. The King reference was a given
Dave Kingman, Jeff King and Mike Kingery are obvious.
Charlie “King Kong” Keller and the “Sultan of Swat” make the lineup
The first track on the album is Lazy Lightning so Louisiana Lightning Ron Guidry is the opening day SP
Years before, Weir released his first “solo” album that used his nickname Ace for the title. Hello Ace Parker
Weir also participated in a couple of other side projects. There were no real matches for RatDog so we settle for Mad Dog, Greg Maddux. There was also The Wolf Brothers, so Randy Wolf joins the staff.
The first time I ever saw Kingfish was at Winterland at the Bob Fried Memorial Boogie 6/17/1975. Have to have Max Fried on the staff as well.
Three years later, we saw the Dead at Winterland on 10/17/1978 for the first show they played anywhere after the gig they did at the Great Pyramids in Egypt. The band kept us in the audience waiting forever before coming onto the stage. The reason: they were watching the Yankees beat the Dodgers in the final game of the WS on TV backstage. In that game, Reggie Jackson homered off of Bob Welch, both of whom make an appearance on this roster as well.
We also tossed in some covers that Bob sang frequently while with the Dead. (Mel) Queen Jane Approximately by Bob Dylan. (Chris) Sampson and Delilah by PPM. The most common Dead cover of all was Me and My Uncle which was written by John (Tony) Phillips. Lastly, Walkin Blues was another regular tune. Opening line Is “Woke up this morning, felt around for my shoes”. Shades of Shoeless Joe Jackson.
We honor the television character George “Kingfish” Stevens, the leader of the Mystic Knights of the Sea lodge from the Amos and Andy show. RC Stevens is as close as we could get.
Lastly, circling back to nicknames, I just finished autobiography Bill Graham Presents. Totally worthwhile read. He was given the nickname “Uncle Bobo” as a birthday gift by Bobby from the stage at a show. He could not stand it but we welcome Bobo Osborn as a tribute.

Playing in the Kingdome, of course

100mm **25#Chicago 1906#24

The first two weeks of 1976, Chicago’s Greatest Hits was the #1 album on the chart.
Our team
25 players
06 Cubs
24^th place projected
I am pretty familiar with these early 20^th century Cubs players. 1906 had several usable seasons and the twistable usual suspects seem to flow nicely within this challenging format. We used:

Eight 1906 Cubs seasons:
Frank Chance, Harry Steinfeldt, Johnny Kling, Pat Moran, Mordecai Brown, Ed Reulbach, Jack Pfiester, Bob Wicker

Twists:

1. 1907 Carl Lundgren
2. 1908 Doc Gessler
3. 1909 Orval Overall
4. 1902 Jimmy Slagle
5. 1901 Jimmy Sheckard
6. 1912 Johnny Evers
7. 1913 Joe Tinker
8. 1898 Jack Taylor

That leaves 9 spots to fill with sub-$300k players. I love taking full advantage of this feature and was able to get creative. There were 7 members of the original Chicago Transit Authority so they are all represented:
Peter (Cetera) Moylan
Robert (Lamm) Andino
Lee (Loughnane) Gooch
Terry (Kath) Harmon
Danny (Seraphine) Jansen
Walter (Parazaider) Morris
James (Pankow) Mouton
The final two spots:
Boots (Feeling Stronger Every) Day
Chan-Ho (Saturday in the) Park

110mm - ** Switchblade

A super challenging and fun theme. I wanted to try to build this teams without a song title straight jacket and gravitated to trying to fit in as many switch hitters as possible. Things worked out pretty well in that regard. 14 position players – 14 switch-hitters. We used:
1920-40 Giants – 23 Bancroft, 25 Frisch, 38 Koenig, 34 Hubbell and 22 V Barnes
1941-61 Cardinals – 53 Schoendienst, 43 Brecheen, 43 Pollet, 52 Stu Miller, 60 Lindy McDaniel
1962-82 Orioles – 71 Buford, 77 Singleton, 82 Murray, 76 Holdsworth, 69 Dick Hall
1983-2003 Astros – 01 Berkman, 99 Everett, 85 Alan Ashby, 83 Mumphrey, 2002 Dotel
2004-2025 Tigers – 11 V Martinez, 08 Ramon Santiago, 17 Candelario, 13 Scherzer, 25 Skubal
I like the team but now I need to try to reverse engineer the team name. Much to my surprise, the Jefferson Starship release the album Spitfire which included the Grace Slick composition “Switchblade”, of which I was totally unaware. With all the Airplane family lineup changes in the early 70s I did not pay a lot of attention to this new stuff. Probably the most surprising thing for me while doing this research is that this album was as successful as it was reaching number 3 on the charts.

And as an added bonus, how could the Starship team play anywhere besides the Astrodome? It fits.

125mm **Hotel RTG

We were given documentation as to which committee member gave us this Egalitarian Pandemonium puzzle.

Welcome to the Hotel ronthegenius
What a clever theme
For my basement team.

1976 was probably the peak year for the Eagles commercially. Their Greatest Hits album released in February became one of the biggest selling albums of all time. Then in December they released Hotel California with a newly retooled lineup adding Joe Walsh . It was also a monster seller with an all-time classic title track.

I started playing around with a universe that only included seasons on California based teams. I pretty much kept the roster build pretty simple within this one parameter but could not resist a tip of the hat to “Life in the Fast Lane”. Rickey Henderson and Maury Wills lead off using their 100+ stolen base seasons. Finally, not to totally overlook the “pandemonium” designation, we have Joe Panek at 2b.

The stadium requirement created a dilemma. There are no stadiums on the approved list that are in the state of California. What to do.
From 1942-57 the Philadelphia Eagles played in Shibe Park/Connie Mack Stadium. Shibe Park it shall be. Problem solved.

140mm **deGrom remains the Same

In 1976, Led Zeppelin put out the concert movie “The Song Remains the Same”. Going down the alphabet, some pieces started to come together. This is what happened:

babe adams
tiny bonham		on drums
eddie collins
jacob degrom		degrom version will remain the same next round
charlie english		english band
jimmie foxx
bob gibson		as in (EDS-1275)
dick hall (moby)		moby's real name is richard hall
jose iglesias
chipper jones		on bass
clayton kershaw
torey lovullo		there wont be a whole lotta lovullo on the field
mickey mantle
jake northrop		Jake Holmes wrote Dazed and Confused
bob o'farrell
phil plantier		on vocals
jack quinn
tim raines		rain song - side 1, track 1
matt stairs		because stirnweiss to heaven doesn’t cut it
john tudor		henry VIII lineage
ramon urias
omar vizquel
ted williams		jimmy page and ted williams. dopplegangers
rudy york		recorded in nyc
bill zepp		of course

So what do we do if we make the 2nd round? 2018 de Grom remains the same. No idea about the other 24.

As a final note, sincerest thanks and congratulations to the everyone in the committee. Outstanding job with these themes!

Thank you also to the commissioners. A lot of roster checking and we appreciate it.

It is hard not to love that someone takes an already challenging set of themes and adds a significant handicap just to make them more fun ... and still does pretty well! Calhoop, your creativity tops the charts. Wishing you many hits in the Long Run.

Calhoop is the GOAT

Thank you both, redcped and toysboys. It is going to be a fun tournament.

70M - Yankeelanders - Hilltop Park

I went around and around on this one. I narrowed my strategy down pretty quickly while looking at the ballparks. I also narrowed it down to the Yankees and Cleveland. But I kept trying other franchises right up until the end. And there were 2 different Cleveland teams (one led by 1902 Bill Bernard, which just didn’t have enough pitching after Bill) and one other Yankee build in the mix.

I decided I wanted to go against the low cap grain and have a team that was going to hit. A lot. Hence, Hilltop. I went with high AVG# and high XBH# with little or no regard for OBP#. The goal is to outscore my opponents.

For pitching, it was a matter of finding the balance between innings and quality (WHIP# and OAV#). Shawkey should be an ace at 70M and the rest hopefully will slow the opponents down just enough. Is 1397 innings enough in Hilltop? That might be the biggest question. I kind of like this team, but I felt throughout the process that there was always a better one and I just couldn’t nail it down.

This is obviously a risk. At one point I almost chickened out and put the team in Yankee Stadium II. But in order for someone like me to have a shot at advancing in this tournament, I almost certainly need to hit an inside straight or three.

80M - It is high, it is far, it is GONE! - Sicks Stadium

I initially thought about building a more balanced team with XBH and good range (Merrifield, etc)) type players. But where is the fun in that? After looking at the ballparks I decided to go all in on homers. I originally was going to use Tiger Stadium but moved to Sicks pretty quickly. Sicks should boost HRs while limiting hits overall (-2).

On offense, I wanted guys who walked and hit homers. Think of a team full of Adam Dunns. 4 guys have 40+ HRs, with 2 more 35+. The team total is 301. At one point I had 325 but I got scared I didn’t have enough innings and tweaked. The OBP is .391.

For pitching, the opposite. I want to limit HRs as much as possible and not walk anybody. All pitchers have a hr/9+ of 110 or more. Any everyone has a BB/9# less than 2. That’s it. Not real original. Bombs away, I guess. My team name is a nod to the recently passed John Sterling, although I think I need to put Bombs Away, I Guess in the hopper.

100M - 2005 Yankees - Yankee Stadium II

I am always happy to see twists in the WISC. Twists are by far both my favorite and most played leagues. Of course, this one was very different. As I play many twist leagues and a variety of caps, I have a pretty good catalogue of teams. My first two thoughts for this cap were the 2005 Yankees and 1993 Mets. Shoutout to ronthegenius for his suggestion to load the historical team into the draft center. This is something I would not typically do with a twist team and it was tremendously helpful here.

I started with the Yanks. I was pleasantly surprised right off the bat with the number of usable players already on the team. I ended up keeping 6, but there were at least 2 others I would have kept if needed. Knowing this team and the twist years pretty well, I got to work. It really helps that players like Jeter, Bernie, Sheffield, Kevin Brown, and Mussina all have multiple usable seasons. At different points in my process there were 3 different Browns and 4 different Mussinas. 92 Mussina allowed me to bring in 91 Mike Stanton and stretch the string to 14 years. I painstakingly went through the process of putting the rest of the players in. I finally had a string that worked…and it was slightly over the cap. I made a couple of tweaks and everything looked good, except I had no player for 1999 (# 6). I tried all the scrubs but none of their seasons worked. Thank goodness for Gary Sheffield. I was going to use his 05 season, but when I checked I was thrilled his 99 season is slightly better for slightly less salary. Also, the <300K exception came in helpful as I didn’t have a backup catcher and was able to build one. Team done. I went through the motions of loading the Mets into the draft center and noticed right away the lack of 93 options and called it a day. There are probably better options but I like this team and I was exhausted by the process.

110M - Franchise Errors, I mean Eras - Target Field

Combos:

C1 - Pirates (1920-1940)

B2 - Cardinals (1941-1961)

A3 - Dodgers (1962-1982)

E4 - Mets (1983-2003)

D5 - Twins (2004-2025)

When I start building teams, particularly puzzle teams like this, I start with SP and also the backbone of the team (C, 2B, SS). I started by making a list of pitchers at the $/ip that I thought were the best value, then sorted it by both value and year. This brought me 1920 Babe Adams and 2005 Johan Santana. Adams brings along Arky Vaughn to play SS, Paul Waner in the OF, and a couple of scrubs. Santana brought Mauer, his backup Ryan Jeffers, Arraez to play 1B, and Duran for the bullpen. (sidenote: maybe I’m the only one, but it’s always tricky to me finding my backup C in leagues like this that have narrow player pools that shrink as you go. Finding one here right off the bat was nice.) I was now looking for my 2B. Also, the values provided by Adams and Santana allowed me to expand my criteria for SP, being able to afford 2 stud aces.

I originally looked at the Cardinals because Mort Cooper made my value list. I ended up not using him, but I found my 2B in Red Schoendist. The Cards also have a strong contingent of OFs in this era, and Ken Boyer at 3B with a number of good seasons. I ended up being able to use Musial in the OF. Because of the value starters I had so far, I was now looking for 2 stud pitchers at the top of my rotation. One of my favorites is 72 Don Sutton. The Dodgers have a number of good bullpen arms in this era (Sosa, Brewer) and a good hit/no field Tommy Davis to be my DH. For the final group I narrowed it down to the Mets and Astros. Doc Gooden or Mike Scott. All things being equal, I probably would have selected Scott and the Astros, but I felt the Mets were a better match for the remaining spots. Again, this came together in more or less one shot and I left it alone.

125M - Pandemonium in Piscataway - Nats Park

This one seemed easy enough on the surface and was the first team I started working on. I’ve played in many 6 million dollar man leagues. The trick here was about maximizing value, and by that I mean limiting wasted IP and PA as much as possible. Groundbreaking insight, I know.

For the pitching staff, tandems seemed the way to go. 6 starters between 145 and 175 IP. In the bullpen, rather than low IP, I went with higher IP, with 5 relievers between 68 and 125IP. I think the staff is fine but while I do use tandems often, once in a while I do underestimate the number of innings and it kills me. I have 1471 here. I hope that’s enough.

The offense was trickier. I am more than happy to use platoons, but there are a limited number of lesser PA platoon guys in the salary range. It was fun getting to use a bunch of players I would never normally use due to their terrible value otherwise - Ke’Bryan Hayes, Marco Scuttaro, Jocko Milligan, and 08 Manny. There is still some waste, as I couldn’t find enough of these lower PA guys I was happy with to use as platoon players. Of all the leagues this one might be the one I am most interested in reading the strategies and seeing the other teams. It feels like there will be a lot of similarity but it also feels like I’m missing something.

140M - Now I Know My ABCs - Polo grounds

Normally when there are these dual Rd1&Rd2 teams, I rarely build the second team unless we’ve had to for verification. I’ve never been particularly close to Rd2. This time I did build the teams in tandem, mostly because 2 years ago I had a team that was ridiculously bad (like 30 wins) and it threw off the competitive balance of the league. While I clearly have no issue being bad, I don’t want to be so bad it affects an entire league. So in the unlikely event I make Rd2, my 80M team will just be normal bad.

I normally play in the 70-100M range, so I have a pretty good sense of the types of players to use at 80M. From there it was a matter of seeing who from that group had seasons that translated to 140M. Then of course, there was the alphabet. I followed by general strategy of high AVG#, high XBH# players in +3 2B park. With the exception of C, most of the lineup is made up of hitters who will be more or less full time in both versions. I solved the DH issue with Rogers Hornsby, who has a bunch of high $ seasons for 140M and a bunch of very low $ seasons for the bench at 80M.

The pitching staff was definitely skewed towards 140M, led by 95 Maddux, who I rarely, if ever, get to use. I kinda like the 140M team, for whatever that’s worth. The 80M team…is done. I do have 6 players who I’m using the same version on both teams, so that’s probably not a good sign.