(This theme was created by crazystengel, and he has graciously allowed me to take over Commish duties for Season Two.)
The league is dedicated to the forgotten players who made it to the Big Leagues but did not accumulate enough AB/IP to make it to our database. Let's honor the ghosts who have been flushed out of WIStory!
Here's the idea: Find a player at baseball-reference.com who never got to 50 at-bats or 25 innings in a single season. It's okay if this player played more than one season, so long as he never batted/pitched enough to be in the WIS database. Choose one team that he played on, and twist his teammates into an $80M team. (All pre-1920 players are blacklisted; you are allowed to choose a pre-1920 team, but all the twisted players must come from seasons after 1919.)
Now the kicker: Each owner will receive 60 AAA batters and 20 AAA pitchers, all of them Way Above Average. You will select one of these rookies -- AND ONLY ONE -- and rename him (with your ghost player's name), and call him up. Because this rookie is Way Above Average, and because of our relatively low cap, he will be an impact player in this theme. But choose carefully: this is the only rookie you will have access to all season.
NOTE: If your ghost was a batter in real life, you must call up an AAA batter; if he was a pitcher, you must call up an AAA pitcher. I won't be a stickler for exact positions (C or OF doesn't matter, nor SP or RP), but on the batter/pitcher issue there's no leeway.
ALSO: Your "25th" player (the one you send down to the minors to make room for your ghost) can be either a real life teammate or any 200K player in the database; however, if he is the latter, he must never appear in a game. Use of ineligible players will result in automatic forfeits.
SUMMARY
No: DH, WW, Clones, Trading
1920-2016 players only
$80M Cap
60 AAA batters/20 AAA pitchers -- Auto, Fictitious Names, Way Above Average
Park must be the one your ghost's team played in
Random Alignment
Ghosts/Teams are exclusive
NOTE: The one change I’m going to make from Season One’s rules is that franchises/selected seasons making the playoffs will be blacklisted for all future seasons. (Ex. If you make the playoffs with Ozzie Canseco – 1990 Oakland Athletics, the 1990 Oakland Athletics will be blacklisted for future seasons. A team could, however, choose Ozzie Canseco – 1992 St. Louis Cardinals for the following season.)
By the way, here are the salary ranges for Way Above Average rookies:
BATTERS: $3,875,000 to $9,651,076
STARTING PITCHERS: $3,450,000 to $9,174,893
RELIEF PITCHERS: $2,775,000 to $5,246,064
Rookies will be auto/fictitious names. Using the
AAA thread, you should be able to ID all of them.