Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 4:55:00 PM (view original):
League 4, Pick #7
1902 Pittsburgh Pirates
Here are the top six picks in league 7:
1 - 1914 Pirates (pedrocerrano)
2 - 1909 Pirates (ronthegenius)
3 - 1989 Pirates (footballmm11)
4 - 1911 Athletics (contrarian23)
5 - 1911 Athletics (Bill_James47)
6 - 1914 Athletics (njbigwig)

Just like in round 1, I was going to wait on the A's. I built seven Pirates rosters, but I did not include 1914 or 1909, which worries me a little (what did I miss)? I did build 1916 and 1908 though. My round 1 Pirates team (1901) finished with 89 wins and that included going 9-18 in their last 27 games. The 1903 Pirates won 90 games in round 1. The main roster difference is that 1902 doesn't have Rube Waddell, but it turns out that he was my worst pitcher anyway. I'll simply use Tannehill and Phillippe more often. '04 Jack Chesbro won the Cy Young in round 1, and I don't expect him to be worse than he was vs the tougher round 1 competition. Also, in round 1, my two Honus Wagners were below average (when compared to the other Wagners), despite playing home games in Palace of the Fans. That should regress to the positive. If 1901 won 89 games and 1903 won 90 games, it feels like my 1902 team is a no-brainer to win at least 90 games with essentially the same roster vs weaker competition.

Current Record: 43-38 .531
Expected Win%: .576
Overall Rank: 59th
League Rank: 5th (but 4th in NL East)
Rank-Offense: 8th
Rank-Pitching: 3rd

Well, pedrocerrano's 1914 Pirates are currently the best team in the entire tournament (58-25), so clearly I screwed up not considering them with one of my early picks (maybe they could have replaced the terrible 1911 Braves pick). Oh well. This 1902 team has the 5th best record in the NL but sadly three of the other four teams in the same division as me. The good news is that my Expected winning% is 2nd best in the NL, but a 5-10 record in 1-run games has kept my W-L record down. I've gone 37 straight games (21 wins) without winning a 1-run game. Meanwhile, kstober's 1921 team is 48-35 despite being outscored on the season (thanks to an 18-7 record in 1-run games). Also annoying is that my team has lost 3 games in the last 6 to teams a combined 47 games below .500. You got to beat the bad teams if you want to compete in a very tough division.

The pitching has been solid, led by '04 Jack Chesbro (17-11, 4.03). What's surprising is how well his twin brother is doing. '02 Chesbro (15-6, 3.59) was hardly used on my round 1 team. My two Chesbros are ranked 2nd and 3rd in Cy Young. Unfortunately, none of the other pitchers are the roster have pitched worth crap. '02 Tannehill, '05 Phillippe, '03 Phillippe and '01 Tannehill have combined for 302 innings (40%), but are 11-22, 6 blown saves and a cumulative ERA of 5.51.

Honus Wagner (x2), Fred Clark (x2), Ginger Beaumont (x2) and Tommy Leach leads the offense and most are hitting fine except '01 Clarke (.257, .311, 367). We've scored fewer runs than most of the other NL teams, but much of that is due to those teams using home parks like Palace of the Fans, Municipal or Kaufman Stadiums. We are playing in the Astrodome. Also, we have an automatic out at catcher (my 4 catchers are hitting .243, .213, .190, .182).

Even without Max Carey, the defensive range has been very good (74+ & 9- plays), fourth best in th league.

Grade: B
Although the record isn't that great, this team has the potential to go on a tear in the second half. We need to get some luck in 1-run games and start turning my expected winning% into actual winning%.

Posted by toysboys on 12/30/2024 1:03:00 PM (view original):
1942 Cardinals, Pick #3

This is the #14 overall pick in the draft and my first. 1912 Cubs would have been my #1 pick overall as well. 1993 Braves would have been my #2 pick as also. Even though I didn't have a Cardinals team in the first round, I could see that 1940, 1941 and 1943 were all taken. So, like the 1912 Cubs and the 1993 Braves, similar teams were taken in round one but were open in round 2. The 1942 Cardinals didn't have Mize like 1941 nor Brecheen like 1943. That's the biggest differences. 1940, 1941 and 1943 were all sub .500 teams in round 1 so maybe this does not bode so well for me. Other teams I considered: 1920 Cubs.

1999 Yankees, pick #10
I didn't like the pitching of the 1920 or 1930's Yankee teams. I could have picked a Giants team, but the pitching was really bad on the Bonds teams that were left and I didn't want to compete with Schwarze or Pedro for those early years. Also, those mid century Giants teams did not fare well in the first round. I did consider the "Bronx is Burning" 1977 or 1978 (which no one took), but knew there was a chance I'd still be stuck with a Babe Ruth team in my division. Ultimately, I decided to go with a solid 1999 team that had both Clemens, Pettitte and Cone. It's a very schwazeish team with lots of switch hitters. I'm very happy with this pick. I also considered: 1929, 1978, 2003 Yankees and 2006 Giants.

1914 White Sox - pick #14
I'm glad to hear that schwarze passed on this team. I couldn't believe they were still available. Their hitting straight up sucks. Fournier is pretty good but the rest of the team is below average. I got Ping Bodie playing 2B with his D/C fielding. But this pitching is better than any staff I had in round one. I got double Ed, double Reb, and double Cicotte. Those 6 should account for the majority of the innings pitched. Teams I also considered: I wanted the 1934 White Sox, but they were nabbed by crazyamos right before my pick. I also was looking at the 1989 and 1990 Cubs to get a double Maddux, but the rest of those teams did not look good.

1994 Braves - pick # 12
I know that the 1993 Braves are better because they have Chipper and I don't. But we're talking about a team that is almost identical to the first team picked in this league. With luck, I could beat the 1993 Braves, but even if I come in 2nd to them, we could still end up with a .550 record which is good enough to get me to the next round. Other teams I considered: 1971 Tigers which I'm a little surprised went undrafted.

1971 Twins - pick # 22
I don't expect much out of a late pick, but I'm pretty happy with this one. I did see that schwarze's 1970 Twins were doing well in round one and this team is nearly identical minus Luis Tiant, which admittedly is a big piece to be missing. The starting pitching is below average, the bullpen is a bit better. The offense is pretty strong. I also considered 2002 and 2003 Twins to get a double Johan Santana.

Here is my post-mortem analysis. I know the season's not over as we have 4 games left, but not much is going to change between now and then.

1942 Cardinals - .481 win %, .464 exp win %, 4th in RS, 24th in RA
Wow what a miss on the #3 pick in the league. I think I got excited about having a double Musial. He absolutely raked and so did Slaughter, Walker and Kurowski as evidenced by my 4th in RS. Pitching was a huge mess. Warneke was taken out of the rotation after 120 IP, 8.25 ERA and a 1,92 WHIP. Same for Mort Cooper at 213 IP, 7.10 ERA and a 1.99 WHIP. I had guys in the pen such as Pollet and Beazley step in and do a better job, but damage was already been done. Lesson learned, when in doubt, grab pitching instead of hitting.

1999 Yankees - .487 win %, .462 exp win %, 10th in RS, 18th in RA
The hitting was average, about where I thought it would be. There was a lack of power with a lot of older Yankee teams in the league. Tino Martinez was my HR leader with 22 and batted 8th or 9th most of the year as he had the lowest OPS in my lineup. My 05 Clemens really underperformed with a 6.80 ERA and 88 Cone was pulled from the rotation with a 8.15 ERA. Even 99 Cone had a 6.88 ERA but I needed to keep putting him out there because I needed his innings. Rivera 2X was good in the bullpen but Jeff Nelson and Mike Stanton, my Setup A's, had ERAs of almost 9. Sure, I was in Great American Ballpark, but i did expect better from this team.

1914 White Sox - .570 win %, .549 exp win %, 11th in RS, 12th in RA
This team did well all season despite being in a tough division. The other win % in my division are .601, .525 and .500 as of this post. My Ed Walshes don't look good compared to the other Ed Walshes but the other Ed Walshes are in deadball divisions. 17 Cicotte was actually my best pitcher and has the a lower ERA then double-Ed. Mellie Wolfgang was awesome at closer with a 1.05 ERA and converting 42 of 45 saves. 2X Jack Fournier and 2B Buck Weaver were solid. 2X Ping Bodie was mediocre. 2X Braggo Roth was a bust with 1918 having a .218/.283/.261 slash liine. Luckily Shano Collins stepped in with a .274/.289/.385 line and played excellent defense in CF. Lesson learned - having great pitching is important.

1994 Braves - .519 win%, .504 exp win %, 20th in RS, 9th in RA
There's less of a difference between the 94 and 93 Braves than I thought. There is a one game difference between us. However there is bigger difference in expected win % (0.054). Despite playing in Fulton County Stadium, my pitching did better than I thought. Having a double Maddux and his 2.83 and 3.27 ERAs was pretty darn good. The problem was being in a tough division as I'm in last place. I wouldn't even make the next round if it wasn't for contrarian pulling his teams.

1971 Twins - .462 win %, .458 exp win %, 11th in RS, 21st in RA
Though I didn't expect much from a 22nd pick, I was encouraged by scwarze's 1970 Twins in Rd1. Apparently not having Luis Tiant is a big deal because this team struggled, especially with their pitching all season. 66 Jim Kaat had to be pulled from the rotation after posting a 7.49 ERA. 73 Blyleven posted an ERA of 6. Those two were my most expensive pitchers. I should have grabbed the 2002 or 2003 Twins.

I ran out of time during my mid-season analysis and didn't finish it. Well that, and most of my teams started tanking badly so I kind of lost the desire. At the midpoint, my overall winning percentage was around .550 (which equates to 90 wins per team, on average). I am currently at 86 wins per team, which means my 16 teams played at slightly above .500 for the entire second half of the season. Blah.

I will finish what i started though.

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 5:33:00 PM (view original):
League 2, Pick #8
1910 Boston Red Sox
Here are the top seven picks in league 8:
1 - 1959 Dodgers (3dayrotation)
2 - 2017 Dodgers (barracuda3)
3 - 1907 Americans (pedrocerrano)
4 - 1919 Red Sox (Jtpsops)
5 - 1971 Red Sox (kstober)
6 - 2018 Dodgers (footballmm11)
7 - 1916 Robins (glowguy)

Normally, I might jump at a team like 2015 Dodgers here, but as I mentioned earlier, I am avoiding modern teams. I realize that there aren't many usable Dodgers teams from the deadball era, but I have eleven Dodgers rosters built and don't have a strong preference for any of them (I'm hoping maybe to get 1962 with my later pick, since I had success with 1961 in round 1).

Anyway, the Red Sox seasons that I was considering here were 1910 or one of the Ruth-based Red Sox teams (1916-18). I had a lot of success with 1915 Red Sox in round 1, but that team had great pitching and more importantly, had both Babe Ruth and Tris Speaker. The 1916-18 Red Sox teams have Ruth but no other good hitters. Of course, you could argue that the 1910 Red Sox have Tris Speaker and no other good hitters and there is some truth to that. I really love the 1910 pitching though, with Ed Cicotte, Frank Smith and Joe Wood. Even lefties Ray Collins and Ed Karger may have some value vs any lefty-dominant teams. The Babe Ruths should crush some of the modern teams although I would expect a high intentional-walk rate (at least for the 2nd Ruth in the batting order). But my deadball pitching should keep Ruth from going off too much, where as my Speaker should do pretty well against the Ruth teams' deadball pitching. In retrospect, this may have been the wrong choice, and I'll surely finish no better than 2nd in the division (to pedrocerrano's 1907 team). We'll be on the conservative side and predict 85 wins.

Current Record: 69-88 .439
Expected Win%: .460
Overall Rank: 159th
League Rank: Last
Rank-Offense: Last
Rank-Pitching: 1st

This may have been the worst team I ever selected in any of thejuice6 tournaments. What a disaster. My two Speakers were as good as I had hoped. But every other hitter was terrible. Among regulars, the third best RC/27 on my team was '20 Harry Hooper's 3.89. I had nobody not named Speaker it over .250. Pitching ranked #1 but my offense was so bad (675 runs), that the 2nd worst offense (788 runs), was closer to 2nd best (883 runs) than to worst.

And frankly, my pitching wasn't even that great. I benched '12 Joe Wood (10-16, 4.85 ERA) and '19 Ed Cicotte (10-16, 3.94) sometime after the midpoint of the season. Even stud '17 Cicotte ended 11-21, 3.29.

Grade: F

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 5:55:00 PM (view original):
League 5, Pick #11
1962 Chicago White Sox
Here are the White Sox seasons selected before my turn in league 5 (I already have my Cubs team):
1920 White Sox (pedrocerrano)
1912 White Sox (contrarian23)
1905 White Sox (kstober)
2021 White Sox (emanes10)
1995 White Sox (footballmm11)

Ugh. I hate this pick. I used 1963 White Sox in round 1 and that team won 90 games. I built rosters for 1962, 1965, 1966, 1968 and they all have the same thing in common. Great pitching, bad hitting. I strongly considered 1914 here (Ed Walsh, Ed Cicotte, Reb Russell) and I probably should have taken them. The reason I didn't take them is because I didn't want to be in the same division as 1920 and 1912. Also, 1914 doesn't have much hitting either. I wanted to trade down, but got no interest. It was about 3 pm on Christmas day and I didn't want to delay the draft any longer, so I *settled* on 1962 because they had the best hitting of the 1960's teams. They also have the worst pitching (no Wilhelm, no Locker, no McMahon, no Cisco). Hell, they don't even have the great defense some of those other teams have (no Hansen A+ at SS, no Ward A+ at 3B). Sigh..

The best hitters on this team are Joe Cunningham, Floyd Robinson, Nellie Fox and Charlie Maxwell. Since they are all lefties, we will be playing in Robison Field. Lefties Gary Peters, Juan Pizarro and Herb Score are happy about that. The only saving grace is that we ended up in the weaker AL West (along with 1974, 1995 and 2021). This team will be lucky to win 81 games and is more likely to win 75. I should have taken 1914.

Current Record: 68-89 .433
Expected Win%: .404
Overall Rank: 166th
League Rank: 10th
Rank-Offense: 10th
Rank-Pitching: 9th

Why oh why did I pass on 1914 (90-68)? This team's offense is very similar to my Red Sox' offense, except no Tris Speakers. The only reason this team isn't last in offense is because 1905 and 1908 exist. But those two teams allowed 200 fewer runs than 1962. '1964 Joe Horlen is supposed to be the team's best starting pitcher. He turned out to be the worst overall pitcher on the team (10-18, 5.00 ERA). I mean WTF? The offense didn't have a single player with 90+ RBIs (thru 157 games). I have no idea why Nellie Fox never seems to hit about .230 in any of these leagues. I would think I woul dhave learned my lesson from Fox in round 1.

I knew this team would suck... it just sucked a little more than I thought. If '64 Horlen could be a little better, I would've hit 75 wins.

Grade: D-

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 6:26:00 PM (view original):
League 3, Pick #11
1907 Cleveland Naps
Here are the teams selected before my turn in league 3:
1 - 2004 Cardinals (footballmm11)
2 - 1919 Indians (crazyamos)
3 - 1942 Cardinals (toysboys)
4 - 1913 Naps (pedrocerrano)
5 - 2006 Cardinals (chewy3344)
6 - 1934 Cardinals (calhoop)
7 - 1950 Cardinals (gworear)
8 - 1998 Cleveland Indians (footballmm11)
9 - 1921 Cardinals (kstober)
10 - 1904 Naps (contrarian23)

I never considered taking a Cardinals team here. I had 1913, 1904 or 1907 as the Indians teams I was hoping to get, and since two of those teams are off the board and I didn't want to get stuck with a 1940's or 1950's Indians team, this pick was a no-brainer. I posted this pick just 11 minutes after 1904 was posted - no second guessing here. Lajoie, Flick, Bradley lead the offense while Addie Joss, Bill Bernhard and Earl Moore will do most of the pitching. Tough division with 1904, 1906 and 1908, but at least we avoid pedrocerrano's 1913 team. Poor emanes10 - his 1948 team is stuck in the Central with 1913, 1914 & 1919. Prediction: 88 wins.

Current Record: 86-71 .548
Expected Win%: .556
Overall Rank: 39th
League Rank: 4th (2nd in AL East)
Rank-Offense: 6th
Rank-Pitching: 2nd

I feel pretty good about this pick. The other two teams I had high on my list were 1904 (93 wins) and 1913 (85 wins). This team won't make the playoffs but it will finish among my top 8 teams and has a shot at 90 wins.

'08 Addie Joss is 2nd in the AL in ERA (23-11, 3.06) and 3rd in the Cy Young race. '02 Bill Bernard (18-24, 25/36 saves, 3.71) pitched mostly in relief and is 9th in the AL in ERA. '03 Joss (20-19, 4.19) has been mostly respectable, albeit inconsistent. '03 Earl Moore (4.44) is the only other pitcher on the staff with an ERA under 5. Offensively, the team was led by the Nap Lajoie x 2, who ended up with exact same OPS (.893). '01 Lajoie .364, .411, .482 and. '10 Lajoie .358, .406, .487. Both Elmer Flicks hit over .300 while Bill Bradley has over 120 RBIs.

Grade: A

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 7:40:00 PM (view original):
League 6, Pick #13
1909 Detroit Tigers
Here are the Tigers seasons selected before my turn in league 6 (I already have my Braves team):
1946 Tigers (Jtpsops)
1961 Tigers (SteveIzzy)
2007 Tigers (barracuda3)
1988 Tigers (Bill_James47)
2015 Tigers (kstober)
1919 Tigers (chewy3344)

I only built five Tigers rosters although one roster has two other adjacent years that are similar so I really have seven years to choose from. Two of these seasons were selected before my turn (1919 and 2007). My choice was pretty locked in all along. 1909, 1910 and 1911 (all with similar rosters) are the only available deadball teams that I built so I decided on 1909. I've used the 1909 Tigers in other juice tournaments and they've done quite well for me. I have the three Eds pitching (Summers, Willett, Killian) along with Bill Donovan and George Mullin. None are great deadball pitchers, but they won't allow HRs. The offense has Ty Cobb, Sam Crawford, Jim Delahanty and Donnie Donie Bush (I just realized I've been spelling his name wrong). I know, I know... it's not that great of an offense. The defense is strong though and we'll be facing some pretty bad pitching from the 1920's and 1930's Tigers teams. I think we have a shot in the division though. Ironically, nobody took 1910 or 1911 so maybe my 1909 choice wasn't that good. Prediction: 85 wins.

Current Record: 86-71 .548
Expected Win%: .523
Overall Rank: 44th
League Rank: 2nd (1st in AL East)
Rank-Offense: 5th
Rank-Pitching: 7th

This team has been on the lucky side, with a 21-14 record in 1-run games, which explains why my actual win% > exp win%. The offense is led by '17 Ty Cobb (.423, .468, .625, 160 RBIs) who is 2nd in the AL MVP race. '11 Cobb has also been very good (.399, .443, 579). '11 Sam Crawford (.359, .412, .517, 131 RBs) has been great. Of course, playing home games at the Palace of the Fans helps the offense. The 116 triples hit leads the lead.

The pitching has been significantly helped by the team's awesome range. We have 175 + plays and only 13 - plays, 6 of those by pitcher Bill Donovan). Here are the range numbers of my starters: '08 McIntyre (RF) 34, '09 Crawford (1B) 29, '11 Cobb (CF) 24, '09 Bush (SS) 24, '09 Moriarty (3B) 23, '17 Cobb (LF) 22, '11 J.Delahanty (2B) 8.

The pitching is led by '08 Bill Donovan (16-8, 22/24 saves, 4.40 ERA), who is 2nd in AL Cy Young. '09 Ed Summers is my best SP (24-9, 5.40 ERA). No other pitcher has an ERA below 5.50.

Grade: B+

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 8:08:00 PM (view original):
Here is where am I at so far... ten teams down, six to go. I am due up for a Yankees pick in League 1, but there are multiple years I would be happy with and don't want to pick a Yankees team yet plus I badly wanted to move up in the A's draft (in League 4). I noticed that emanes10 is due up in League 4. I also notice that he has a later pick in League 1 - in fact, our pick differences are the exact same number of spots... so I offer him a trade. He moves from 19 to 14 in league 1 and I move from 21 to 16 in league 4. He accepts.

schwarze League 1, Pick 2 --> 1905 Giants
schwarze League 1, Pick 14 --> traded down to pick 19
schwarze League 2, Pick 8 --> 1910 Red Sox
schwarze League 2, Pick 19
schwarze League 3, Pick 11 --> 1907 Naps
schwarze League 3, Pick 22
schwarze League 4, Pick 7 --> 1902 Pirates
schwarze League 4, Pick 21 --> traded up to pick 16
schwarze League 5, Pick 1 --> 1912 Cubs
schwarze League 5, Pick 11 --> 1962 White Sox
schwarze League 6, Pick 2 --> 1911 Braves
schwarze League 6, Pick 13 --> 1909 Tigers
schwarze League 7, Pick 2 --> 1912 Phillies
schwarze League 7, Pick 18
schwarze League 8, Pick 5 --> 1921 Senators
schwarze League 8, Pick 21

League 4, Pick #16
1913 Philadelphia Athletics
Here are the Athletics seasons selected before my turn in league 4 (I already had my Pirates team):
1911 Philadelphia Athletics (contrarian23)
1910 Philadelphia Athletics (Bill_James47)
1914 Philadelphia Athletics (njbigwig)
1926 Philadelphia Athletics (mllama54)
1988 Oakland Athletics (calhoop)
1971 Oakland Athletics (farleyfustle)
1973 Oakland Athletics (pedrocerrano)
1986 Oakland Athletics (ff09)
1969 Oakland Athletics (footballmm11)

Here is why I made the trade. There was a huge run on A's teams. Nine of the top fifteen picks were A's. I was really hoping to get 1971 or 1973 (I almost took 1971 at the end of the A's draft in round 1). I had built nine A's teams and seven were taken already. There was only one deadball team left available that was on my original list and I wanted it, even though I knew I'd get stuck in the same division as the top three A's teams selected (1910, 1911, 1914). Ironically, no A's teams were taken between pick 16 and pick 22, so there was a pretty good chance I'd get 1913 had I not made the trade. But that's ok, I didn't lose out on any of the Yankees teams I wanted. 1913 has basically the same roster as 1914, which went third among A's teams. This is going to be similar to the Pirates and Cubs leagues from round 1, where all four NL East teams could be over .500. So it comes down to luck in 1-run games. I don't usually do well in 1-run games, so I will predict fourth place in the division, with 83 wins.

Current Record: 92-65 .586
Expected Win%: .5592
Overall Rank: 16th
League Rank: 2nd (2nd in AL East)
Rank-Offense: 5th
Rank-Pitching: 1st

This trade worked out great for both me and emanes10. The Yankees team he selected (2003) is 86-71 and my A's team is my 2nd best team, and until a recent 4-10 run, was a Top 8 team overall. I knew the AL East would be tough and that kind of came to fruition with 3 strong teams (1911 has 96 wins, 1910 has 83 wins). '10 Jack Coombs (30-14, 3.85) is the leading Cy Young candidate in the AL. '09 Chief Bender (13-11, 19/24 saves, 2.95) leads the league in ERA. '08 Eddie Plank (17-10, 3.35) is 2nd in the AL in ERA. Coombs is 5th. Even '15 Eddie Plank (16-15, 4.11) is 13th. Awesome pitching.

The offense isn't anything special ('13 Frank Baker leads my team with 100 RBIs). But I have a bunch of guys hitting between .275 and .295. THe team has had average luck (23-24 in 1-run games) so overall, much better than I anticipated.

Grade: A

Posted by schwarze on 12/31/2024 8:09:00 AM (view original):
League 7, Pick #18
1975 Baltimore Orioles
Here are the Browns/Orioles seasons selected before my turn in league 7 (I already have my Phillies team):
1999 Orioles (footballmm11)
1972 Orioles (cstrohmier)
2010 Orioles (Jtpsops)
1974 Orioles (redcped)
1908 Browns (kstober)
1921 Browns (firesalt)
1922 Browns (mllama54)
1907 Browns (ejstockman)

I only built one Browns team - 1921... great offense... terrible pitching. They were gone before my turn anyway. I knew I was going to wait on this franchise since there isn't a great deadball team and there are multiple choices from the 1960's to 1970's I would be fine with. I also really liked 1996. When my turn came, I finally narrowed down my two choices between 1975 and 1996. I love Eddie Murray, Roberto Alomar, Bobby Bonilla (all switch hitters) plus Ripken, Palmeiro, B.Anderson and Hoiles - this team is going to lead the A.L. in scoring. Mike Mussina isn't a terrible SP3 or SP4, but I just couldn't stomach him being my SP1 and SP2. David Wells as an SP3? Scott Erickson as SP4? Ewww. Then I see the modern RPs with 1 IP/G and I decide to pass on them. I go with 1975 - Palmer and Cuellar provide 1030 SP innings. The offense has got Ken Singleton, who I love. The weak spot is 1B where Don Baylor will play, although I may expirement with Brooks Robinson or Doug DeCinces playing out of position. This team has great defense at 2B, 3B, SS, LF, CF (Grich, Belanger, DeCinces, Blair, Bumbry). I am excited to get such a solid team this late in the draft. Prediction: 86 wins.

Current Record: 88-69 .561
Expected Win%: .539
Overall Rank: 33rd
League Rank: 4th (3rd in AL Central)
Rank-Offense: 3rd
Rank-Pitching: 9th

This team has been better than expected. The offense and pitching ranks are highly dependent on the home ballpark (Hilltop Park). The team ERA is 3.49 on the road and 5.95 at home. The OPS is .814 at home and .726 on the road. I ended up using Brooks Robinson at 1B and he's been fine (0 errors, 6 - plays). The other key positions (Grich 2B, Belanger, SS, DeCinces 3B, Bumbry CF, Blair LF) have combined for 100 + plays.

I don't have any individual player competing for MVP, but seven of the eight regular batters have an OPS between .773 and .856. The pitching has been the same. no stars but the four SPs have ERAs between 4.20 and 5.07 and the six main RPs have ERAs between 3.92 and 5.13.

This team was batting 1999 for the #1 overall seed in the AL before the most recent 1-5 run. Now, they are one game out of the playoffs with 3 games to play.

Grade: A-

Well my write-ups would indicate I really overestimated the quality of some of my teams (or my own management capabilities).

League 6, Pick 3: 1946 Detroit Tigers (Advancing)
Prediction: 92-70
Actual: 87-75
Not a bad finish, but I did expect more from this team. Unfortunately, I shared a division with two Cobb teams, which I was hoping would not be the case. I struggled with some of them, as I suspected might be the case. Not too disappointed with this finish though.

League 2, Pick 4: 1919 Boston Red Sox (Advancing)
Prediction: 88-74
Actual: 84-78
As expected, my two Ruths and my defense carried this team. I was second among Sox teams in + plays and net + plays. My Ruths both OPS'd over 1.000, while the next highest on my team was at .823. Pleased with this finish.

League 4, Pick 9: 1933 Pittsburgh Pirates
Prediction: 87-75
Actual: 58-104
What a disaster. I didn't expect to dominate, but I figured this division would be more of a crapshoot than it was. My offense was great on paper, as was my defense. My pitching was solid, though not spectacular. I certainly expected to be able to pull off a .500 finish. Clearly I was way off.

League 7, Pick 9: 2010 Baltimore Orioles
Prediction: 83-79
Actual: 69-93
Another disappointment. I really thought this team would hold their own against other modern teams. Two Arrietas, Millwood and a stud bullpen, plus strong D throughout and decent hitters. Obviously didn't have a good gauge on the competition I'd be facing.

League 1, Pick 15: 1909 New York Giants
Prediction: 78-82
Actual: 81-81
Better than I expected, but still disappointing. My biggest blunder was using Palace of the Fans. I wanted to take advantage of my defense, but in reality, I should've tried to maximize on my Mathewson innings with a pitchers park. Chalk it up to a painful lesson.

League 3, Pick 20: 1925 St. Louis Cardinals
Prediction: 86-76
Actual: 79-83
This team held their own for a while, leading the division 2/3 of the way through the season, but we couldn't continue to tread water. We dropped all the way to last in a winnable division. This truly was a crapshoot division and we couldn't quite do enough.

League 5, Pick 21: 1908 Chicago White Sox (Advancing)
Prediction 81-81
Actual: 88-74
This team put together an insane second half after a disappointing first (which is foreign to me in this game). This team gave me a glimpse of what my Mathewson team could've been, as I was smart enough to put my Walshes in the Astrodome to get max value. Ironically, this staff was much deeper than my Giants staff, so they probably could've withstood a hitters park.

League 8, Pick 23: 1929 Washington Senators
Prediction: 85-77
Actual: 80-82
A truly schizophrenic team. We get off to a horrid start and I couldn't quite figure out where I went wrong (though taking Palace of the Fans my have bitten me again). They went on a tear and had a 5 game division lead and were 8 games over .500 with ~20 to play, before limping badly to the finish. A gutwrenching finish after a torrid stretch to get us into contention. To not even advance to the next round after that sucks.

League 6, Pick 24: 2022 Atlanta Braves
Prediction: 88-74
Actual: 74-88
Not sure what to say here. This was a modern team that I knew would need extra managing. We held our own and were near the top of the division for 2/3 of the season, and just couldn't sustain it. Relatively balanced division so I'm surprised I fell off so much, but c'est la vie.

Seeing the variations in what seem like mostly similar rosters in various leagues makes me wonder again about manager settings.

Are the better owners just that good on maximizing on the subtle differences between rosters, or are they that much better with their settings and managing their teams throughout the season? Seems it's clearly a bit of both, but I remain curious if there are settings that consistently work well for the top owners, or if they each have something unique that works for them.

Posted by crazyamos on 1/3/2025 2:22:00 PM (view original):
Round 2 write-ups

1919 Cleveland - Pick 2
I only entered three teams in Round 1. All advanced, and a late season winning streak got us a top 16 pick in this round. Having not done any real research, not expecting a top 16 pick, I was overwhelmed by the choices. I narrowed my search to teams in the 1910s or 1920s, who would have the possibility of great offense and great pitching. I was attracted to the possibility of running two Tris Speakers, with a decent supporting cast of hitters around them, and the excellent pitching staff that two Stan Coveleskis, two Joe Woods, and two Ray Caldwells will give me. I hope these guys will win 90 and advance, although I wouldn't be surprised if they don't.
Tris Speaker was a racist, a bigot, a fighter, and a gambler. He was also unbelievably fast, an extraordinary hitter, and the kind of guy who plays my favorite baseball - flashy and strong defense, great speed, and power to the gaps. I'll enjoy watching Speaker's exploits in the box scores even if the rest of the hitting lets me down.
Offense: .331/.412/.484
Pitching: .210/1.02/.09, 1.82 ERA

1934 Chicago White Sox - Pick 14
I did almost no research into Chicago franchises. I built a 1969 Cubs team I really liked - and that nobody picked, but didn't think that the Billy Williams, Ernie Banks, and Ron Santo power seasons would play well enough. I also built a 1914 White Sox team with absurdly good pitching and lousy hitting. I almost drafted them but wanted better bats. (Funnily, the owner who drafted right after me wanted the club I took and then immediately selected the 1914 franchise I thought about taking. We'll see who made the better choice!) The team I selected has excellent offense, for a franchise not known for its great bats. Two Al Simmons, Luke Appling, two Zeke Bonuras, Jimmy ***** and the gang can hit a lot, and have strong team defense. The pitching is pretty bad compared to the earlier teams, but Ted Lyons, Whit Wyatt, Monty Stratton and friends are good for a 20s-50s team. The 1920 White Sox are in our division and will be way better than us. Really curious how we fare compared to the 1914 squad. This team will be lucky to go .500 and advance. Could win under 80 games, though.

Offense: .341/.409/.510
Pitching: .231/1.11, 0.24, 2.48 ERA

1937 New York Yankees - Pick 8
Having just played a Ruth/Gehrig team from the early 1920s, I was underwhelmed by Carl Mays' pitching and wanted something different. I looked long and hard at the 1999 Yankees, but didn't think they would compete as well as the Gehrig/DiMaggio squads of the late 30s. The talent pool of the 1937 and 1938 squads is almost identical, except the early team gets Lazerri as a 2B and the later team Gordon. I liked the 1937 team better, and barracuda took the 1938 team just ahead of me anyway. This team is the best of my three, but the Yankees competition is stiffer than that in the Cleveland league.

I'll be disappointed if these guys don't win 90 and advance, but it's entirely possible they won't.
Offense: .345/.435/.595
Pitching: .214/1.12/0.29, 2.16 ERA.

All three of my teams advanced again.

1919 Cleveland exceeded expectations. I predicted 90 wins. They won 101, good for 4th overall in all the leagues and a top 8 pick. 1912 Speaker won league MVP and 1912 Smokey Joe Wood own the Cy Young!

1934 White Sox also did alright. I thought they'd be lucky to win 81 games and advance. They won 86. My two Al Simmons are the only hitters who performed well. Luke Appling was a disappointment. Pitching was decent. Both Whit Wyatts were fine. 37 Monty Stratton really shined in the bullpen.

The 1937 Yankees were a disappointment. I hoped they'd win 90 and advance. They did advance but only won 84 games, a while 12 games behind a very similar 1938 club. The difference still confuses me. Oh, well.

Posted by schwarze on 12/31/2024 8:11:00 AM (view original):
League 2, Pick #19
1941 Brooklyn Dodgers
Here are the Dodgers seasons selected before my turn in league 2 (I already have my Red Sox team):
1959 Dodgers (3dayrotation)
2017 Dodgers (barracuda3)
2018 Dodgers (footballmm11)
1916 Robins (glowguy)
1962 Dodgers (nocomm999)
2015 Dodgers (Bill_James47)
1932 Dodgers (contrarian23)
1968 Dodgers (DarthDurron)
1958 Dodgers (calhoop)
2023 Dodgers (redcped)

Well, clearly I had no chance to get 1962 (nice pick nocomm999). I had plenty of Dodgers rosters built so I had a decent selection, even picking this late. I considered 1964, but no Duke Snider meant that Frank Howard was the team's best power hitter. He was so bad for my 1961 Dodgers team in round 1 that I benched him very early in the season. I built a 2019 roster that looks good on paper, but way too modern for my taste. I had a 1979 team built with lots of SPs (Sutton, Reuss, Messersmith, Rau, Welch, Hooton) but the offense was too right-handed (Ferguson, Garvey, Lopes, Guerrero, Russell, Baker). I had an 1989 team built with some great pitching (Hershiser, Tudor, Valenzuela, Howell, Wetteland) but the offense had to start Willy Randolph, Lenny Harris and Jose Vizcaino. Ugh...

I finally settled on a team that I had built in round 1. 1941 has awesome hitting - I can't even use all the great hitters since I have too many 1B/OF/DH types with Camilli, P.Waner, Reiser, Medwick and Galan). The pitching features Whit Wyatt, Freddie Fitzsimmons and Curt Davis. Frankly, the pitching is bad. I decided to play in Palace of the Fans for a couple of reasons. (1) Let's try to get the opponent's (better) SP knocked out of the game early where we know the bullpen will blow eventually up. And (2) my very strong defense will have an opportunity to make more plus plays: maybe the opponent's lesser defense will extend big innings. I'm not expecting a great W-L record, but this team is in a weak NL East (1916, 1932, 1941, 1943) so 82 wins could be enough to take the division. I will predict 78 wins.

Current Record: 79-83 .488
Expected Win%: .502
Overall Rank: 112th
League Rank: 7th (but 1st in NL East)
Rank-Offense: 2nd
Rank-Pitching: 10th

Of course, 1962 was a good pick as they won the Central (88-74). But given the options I had, 1941 was a fine pick and the season kind of went exactly how I expected it. The NL East was atrocious as the other three teams lost 90, 94 & 97 games. I did end up outscoring my opponents and was a bit unlucky in 1-run games (17-20). Playing in the Palace certainly helped my teams batting stats. The team was led by '27 Paul Waner (.360 .409, .519, 133 RBIs, 5th in MVP). '36 Medwick (.340, .369, .511), '41 Reiser (.330, .375, .502) and '28 Waner (.329, .383, .456) gave me four batters in the top 8 batting averages in the NL.

As expected, my team had great defensive range. Ib fact, they led the league in range (135 + plays vs 13 - plays). I guess this helped my pitching, but you wouldn't know from looking at the horrible pitching stats. My supposed ace, '41 Whit Wyatt (16-18, 5.05) was a huge disappointment and wasn't much better than the crappy SPs that I used. I do wonder how this team would've fared had I put them in a pitcher's park.

All in all, the team finished about what I expected, winning a terrible division with a below-500 record.

Grade; C+

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 9:20:00 PM (view original):
League 1, Pick #21
1966 New York Yankees
Here are the Yankees seasons selected before my turn in league 1 (I already have my Giants team):
2007 Yankees (jfranco77)
1938 Yankees (barracuda3)
2019 Yankees (calhoop)
1937 Yankees (crazyamos)
1922 Yankees (redcped)
1999 Yankees (toysboys)
1921 Yankees (Taxman2008)
1929 Yankees (footballmm11)
2003 Yankees (emanes10)
1927 Yankees (danidon)

Like the Dodgers, I had built a bunch of Yankees teams, many of which got taken - none of them jumped out as a must have. Before I made the trade and was on the clock, I was debating between 1925, 1940 & 1966. After the trade, I was still debating between 1925, 1940 & 1966.

My knee-jerk reaction was to go after one of the few Ruth-Gehrig teams still available and grab 1925. But the pitching is terrible. Garland Braxton is decent but unlike my mediocre 1933 round 1 team, there is no Lefty Gomez, no Wilcy Moore, no Johnny Allen and no Red Ruffing. No thanks. 1940 has some great pitching, with Spud Chandler, Lefty Gomez and Tony Bonham. Also Red Ruffing, Johnny Allen and Marius Russo. Offensively, they have Joe DiMaggio, Charlie Keller, Red Rolfe and Bill Dickey. The main reason I passed was the weakness at 1B (Babe Dahlgen). Frankie Crosetti is pretty weak offensively at SS. I ended up going with 1966 due to the strength of the lefty pitching, which will come in handy facing all the Ruth teams.. Fritz Peterson, Whitey Ford, Al Downing, Ken Holtzman, relievers Bill Henry and Steve Hamilton - all lefties. Bob Friend, Stan Bahnsen, Hal Reniff and Dooley Womack are my righties. What about the offense? How about Mantle, Mantle, Murcer & Maris. Elston Howard catching, Roy White at 1B. Horace Clark at 2B. Tom Tresh covers 3B and SS. By the way, this team has *six* switch hitters in the starting lineup! I can't believe this is the only Mickey Mantle team in the league. Despite picking 11th, I think this team can advance to round 3. Prediciton: 86 wins.

Current Record: 79-83 .488
Expected Win%: .474
Overall Rank: 118th
League Rank: 8th (last in AL Central)
Rank-Offense: 11th
Rank-Pitching: 4th

It's hard to complain about the trade I made. I may have taken the '66 Yankees anyway, and my '13 Athletics were great. This team was doing well for most of the season, but much of that was due to luck (finished 23-18 in 1-run games). Not long ago, they were among my top 8 teams. They were sitting at 65-55 before going on a 13-29 stretch, including 2-11, to end the season. I blame myself. I drafted multiple LH and RH starting pitchers with the intention of micro-managing which teams I used LH and RH against. But I went on vacation and kind of stopped doing that, and it showed in the results. Oh well, live and learn.

The offense was led by my two Mickey Mantles, of course, '56 Mantle (.327, .417, .518, 117 RBIs) was the team's HR leader with 30, but '57 Mantle (.337, .476, .489, 110 RBs) only managed 11 HRs (less than a third of his real life 36). Notice how few RBIs my two Mantles had. That's because the rest of the offense kind of sucked. I knew Robison Field would hurt the offense. I wish it had helped the pitching.

I used 6 different SPs and their ERAs were 5.52, 5.59, 5.59, 5.84, 6.08 & 6.10. When you have the league's 2nd worst offense and you have no good SPs, it makes it hard to win. I'd like to say that the bullpen was good b/c the ERAs were mostly lower than the SPs, but we blew 20 saves (33/53) so nothing was really good on the pitching side. We only finished 4th in the AL because the 1920's and 1930's pitching was so bad.

Picking this late though, one can't expect to be much better than a .500 team, and regardless how we got there, that's what this team was.

Grade: C

Posted by schwarze on 12/29/2024 9:39:00 PM (view original):
League 3, Pick #22
1982 St. Louis Cardinals
Here are the Cardinals seasons selected before my turn in league 3 (I already had my Indians team):
2004 St. Louis Cardinals (footballmm11)
1942 St. Louis Cardinals (toysboys)
2006 St. Louis Cardinals (chewy3344)
1934 St. Louis Cardinals (calhoop)
1950 St. Louis Cardinals (gworear)
1921 St. Louis Cardinals (kstober)
1964 St. Louis Cardinals (mllama54)
2009 St. Louis Cardinals (DarthDurron)
1969 St. Louis Cardinals (3dayrotation)
1925 St. Louis Cardinals (Jtpsops)

Damn... I really was hoping 1969 would make it to me. I really wanted the Gibson/Carlton combo. When it finally got to me, my choices were 1949, 1981 and 1982. Actually 1981 and 1982 are similar, with the main difference being Templeton vs Ozzie Smith at SS... so it was really 1949 vs 1982. 1949 has some nice pieces with Red Schoendienst playing 2B and 3B, Stan Musial and Enos Slaughter covering 1B and OF. The pitching staff has Brecheen, Pollet, Wilks, Munger, Brazle, Hearn, Lanier, Staley... basically 3 SPs with 200+ IPs and a bunch of guys with 116-132 IPs. This seemed like a managerial pain in the butt. I decided on 1982, but I'm not really happy about it. Andujar, Kaat, B.Forsch are SPs with Sutter, A.Rincon, Bair, Littell as RPs. The offense has D.Porter, K.Hernandez, Herr, Smith, Oberkfell, McGee, G.Hendrick, L.Smith. This is a great $100M roster, but a terrible unlimited cap roster. Will will be ranked last in offense and near the bottom in pitching. Is it too late to change to 1949? Prediction 69 wins.

Current Record: 84-78 .519
Expected Win%: .537
Overall Rank: 68th
League Rank: 3rd (but 2-seed as NL Central winner)
Rank-Offense: 8th
Rank-Pitching: 4th

Ironically, the team I wanted (1969) went 76-86. After starting off very slow, this team performed *way* better than expected. All the switch hitters did perfectly fine ('85 McGee .315 avg, '90 McGee .330, '85 Herr .299, '83 Herr .303, '87 O.Smith .289). Ironically, my best real life *non* switch-hitting hitters sucked. '70 Tenace (.992 ops real life vs .580 sim), '89 L.Smith (.948 vs .691), '79 Hernandez (.930 vs .716), '79 Porter (.905 vs .642) and both George Hendricks also sucked.

Three of my four starting pitchers weren't very good ('66 Kaat 11-20, 5.48, '84 Andujar 13-17, 6.57, '81 B.Forsch 12-15, 4.85). Only '82 Andujar (14-12, 4.39) was resepctable. The bullpen carried the team (not something I expected to ever say). Every single RP had an ERA better than my best SP. '77 Sutter 2.42), '79 Sutter (3.44), '81 Rincon (3.42), '80 Rincon (2.30), '79 Littell (4.04), '82 Bair (3.51), '72 Kaat (4.11) combined to go 34-14 with 32/45 in saves. Based on my history with RPs, I would never have expected that.

It's always nice to be wrong on the side of the team being better than expected.

Grade: B+