Dalefan1 - we have all been through this.First of all, are you referring to the pitcher's WHIP his real-life playing year, or his normalize WHIP - WHIP# or his WHIP+ ?
The latter tells you how his WHIP compared to his league average that year and the former to how he would be expected to perform against an average opponent adjusted relative to all of baseball history.
Also, remember that here that same pitcher faces Babe Ruth 1929, Cy Williams 1923, Sisler, Boggs, Brett, Howard Johnson 1989 etc. etc. every start. When he pitched, maybe Horace Clark or Bud Harrelson were more likely batters. That will do wonders for pitching stats.
So almost no pitcher, even the best, match their historical performance. Addie Joss '08 is pretty likely to have an ERA here under 3.00 but not always under 2.00. Same for Pedro, or Bob Gibson etc.
But check out the Progressive Leagues. It is more like real life baseball and the players performances are more likely to be closer to what they did when they played. See the Progressive Classifieds for some that are looking for owners to take over teams. You might have more fun there. I have just started in some Progs. and already swear by them. Plus, everyone has a spell of losing years and needing to rebuild. So you feel a little less pressure to succeed. I see you made the playoffs. Great. Don't devalue that: it is hard to accomplish here. And your record if you compare it then to say the real world Cubs, or Padres, or Royals etc. doesn't look bad at all. At least that is what I tell myself.
A friend who recruited me to a progressive league told me when I complained about how bad the team I took over was "It is normal - every team has holes in its lineup and roster in progressives, just like the depth or lack thereof of real teams."
I hated to tell him I am a Yankees fan. Our idea of having holes is to have Soriano and Robertson if Rivera gets hurt and to have to rely only on Chad Curtis, Shane Spencer, Daryl Strawberry, Chili Davis and Ricky Ledee to cover LF because you don't have a Bernie Williams or Paul O'Neill to put there !
Seriously. If you want to keep playing in the OLs keep working at it and do the homework. If you want baseball where the low ERA or WHIP of a good pitcher might mean they are valuable, go with the progressive leagues.