We are now starting Season 3 of the Moonlight Ghosts League, named in honor of perhaps the most famous “Ghost” in baseball history… Archibald “Moonlight” Graham. 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 (1920-2015) that he played on, then twist his teammates from that season into a $90M team. All pre-1920 player seasons are blacklisted.
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: Regardless of whether your Ghost was a batter or pitcher in real life, you may choose either one--a batter or a pitcher, to replace him. (This is a change from Season 2.)
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: WW, Clones, Trading
1920-2018 players only (GHOSTS must come from 1920-2015)
$90M Cap
60 AAA batters/20 AAA pitchers -- Auto, Fictitious Names, Way Above Average
No DH
Park must be the one your Ghost's team played in during the selected season
League/Division Alignment - Chronological, with the 12 teams in the AL being the 12 most recent teams.
Ghosts/Teams are exclusive. First come, first served. Reply below and I will add you to the list.
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.)
You may have two teams in this league, as long as one is in the AL and one is in the NL. If you choose to have two teams, please wait to select the Ghost of your second team until after the league is at least half full.
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.
Judging from past seasons, a ghost batter is more likely to be an impact player than is a ghost pitcher (and relievers are more likely to be impact players than are starters).
BLACKLISTED TEAMS
1941 St. Louis Cardinals (Johnny Grodzicki)
1942 New York Yankees (Eddie Kearse)
1943 St. Louis Cardinals (Sam Narron)
1956 Brooklyn Dodgers (Chuck Templeton)
1964 Chicago White Sox (Fritz Ackley)
1967 Chicago White Sox (Cotton Nash)
1969 Baltimore Orioles (Mike Adamson)
1975 Oakland Athletics (Herb Washington)
1983 Philadelphia Phillies (Tony Ghelfi)
1987 Cincinnati Reds (Leo Garcia) – SEASON TWO CHAMPS
1988 Cincinnati Reds (Van Snider)
1988 St. Louis Cardinals (Gibson Alba)
1999 Atlanta Braves (Darin Ebert)
2000 New York Yankees (Ben Ford)
2005 New York Yankees (Kevin Reese) -- SEASON ONE CHAMPS
2014 Boston Red Sox (Alex Hassan)
I will send out the league number through sitemail once the league is at least half full.
Season 3 Teams (Ghost)
farleyfustle -- 1925 St. Louis Browns (Brad Springer)
eman7400 -- 1933 New York Giants (Joe Malay)
sevenfifty5 -- 1943 Brooklyn Dodgers (Chris Haughey)
0soup4U -- 1952 New York Yankees (Kal Segrist)
bradsher -- 1957 Los Angeles Dodgers (Rene Valdes)
midknight — 1966 New York Yankees (John Miller)
darthdurron -- 1967 San Francisco Giants (Nestor Chavez)
liambrady -- 1970 Minnesota Twins (Tom Tischinski)
hebdomad -- 1972 Baltimore Orioles (Sergio Robles)
summerfield -- 1977 Cincinnati Reds (Angel Torres)
jfranco77 -- 1982 New York Yankees (Mike Patterson)
mars2010 -- 1983 Kansas City Royals (Cliff Pastornicky)
apurvadesai -- 1986 Cincinnati Reds (Mike Smith)
gwhouse --1986 San Francisco Giants (Rick Lancelloti)
ddodge02 -- 1990 St. Louis Cardinals (Stan Clarke)
datatrek -- 1993 Toronto Blue Jays (Domingo Martinez)
mjkrunner -- 1998 Toronto Blue Jays (Ben VanRyn)
toddcommish -- 1998 Boston Red Sox (Brian Barkley)
CRTYonker -- 2001 St. Louis Cardinals (Stubby Clapp)
dlchow — 2002 Los Angeles Dodgers (Chin-Feng Chen)
specsman -- 2006 New York Mets (Henry Owens)
fatguyrd -- 2010 Philadelphia Phillies (Drew Carpenter)
ezcash1 -- 2014 Los Angeles Dodgers (Red Patterson)
royhobbs09 -- 2015 Chicago Cubs (Dallas Beeler)
6/12/2019 7:06 PM (edited)