A History of Baseball (and hockey, basketball and football) Replay
 

A LOOK BACK AT THE HISTORY OF MAJOR SPORTS IN NORTH AMERICA

Over the weekend I decided to run a classic OOTP sim like I used to. I say classic because now I always include full minors whenever I do a historical replay but for this one I went back to the bare bones format of OOTP early versions and just used the MLB database. I let it quick sim 100 years or so of history and the started looking at the results and I will discuss them here in a thread like the old History of Baseball threads I did in the early days of OOTP.

However, I also like doing multi-sport recaps and have been getting back in to playing FHM as well as recently purchasing the old FastBreak Basketball game. As a result, instead of a History of Baseball we will have a History of Sports thread. In addition to OOTP I simmed out a hockey history with FHM5, simmed out a history of the NBA with FastBreak Pro Basketball and simmed out a history of the NFL using the old ProFootballSimulator program.

Rather than in-depth season-by-season recaps I will be doing this one as a 'birds eye' view with the focus more on the great stories of these sports that a comprehensive tracking of each year.

Before I begin here is some info on each league's setup.

BASEBALL - The easiest one to do. I am using all standard out of the box settings for OOTP with the exception that I am disabling the draft so players are assigned to their original real-life organizations.

HOCKEY - All rookies will be drafted at 17 regardless of when their real life debut was and I will be using the FHM development engine for career arcs rather than the one year recalculate. Want a little variety in my hockey sim. The hockey portion begins with the formation of the NHL in 1917.

BASKETBALL - I had never played Fastbreak before this weekend -GreyDog has it and the college version on sale for $15 each. I needed a new game to play so I picked them both up. I love how is it is to customize both games and a breeze to do a long term NBA historical sim. I am using all the default settings and the NBA will begin in 1946.

FOOTBALL - I dusted off my old Pro Football Simulator game to round out the 4 major sports and played the historical career mode which begins importing real players in 1920. I had to tinker with the league structure and while the team composition is not going to be historically accurate it is fairly close. It also includes a number of fictional players in the early days (1920-50) to fill out the rosters. Not perfect by any means but really stands up well consider it is likely 7 years old now.

I thought about adding Boxing (Title Bout) and golf (Total Pro Golf) but there is too much editing involved to make them work in this kind of a universe. I am using them both in a fictional multisport solo universe I play right now and I have used them in the past for historical but want this to be an out of the box, quick and fairly easy to run universe. OOTP, FHM and FBPB are all hands off. I set the league up and let them room. PFS needed a little editing to move and add franchises but nothing heavy.



I am not sure how much I will write about these leagues here but when I find things I feel are interesting I will post them, in hopes others might enjoy them as well. Since this is a baseball history forum I will focus primarily on MLB but if there is some interest in players or teams from other sports just ask and I will tackle them as well.

As always if you have any questions about my league setups or want to know about any players just let me know. I have simmed the full history in each of the sports. So let's see what happened in this sporting universe:

I will post some of the basic baseball history here and let's start with pennant and World Series winners. It is a long list as I started in 1876 and went thru until 2015.
Here are the winners each year of the sim. No draft, players were assigned to their original franchises so Babe Ruth remained a Red Sox which meant the Yankees did not dominate until much later than the 1920s.

Here is the list of Stanley Cup winners. The league had an amateur draft so players do not end up on the team you would normally associate them with.

Here are the number of Cup wins by franchise. What shocked me the most was the Chicago Blackhawks have yet to win a Stanley Cup despite making the playoffs 57 times and playing so many years in a 6 team league. Their futility will be something worth exploring.

Here are the NBA champions and playoff MVP's. I love the Fast Break basketball let's you print out a text file of pretty much any screen in the game. Makes it very easy for someone doing a dynasty. Game is outdated though- from 2013 I believe) so there is no update beyond the 2014-15 season.

Like with football and hockey this universe has a rookie draft in the NBA game so players rarely end up on the team they are known for in real-life. In this sim Michael Jordan suffered through a career with a mostly weak Clippers team and Magic was a Knick, not a Laker.

Here is the list of Super Bowl results from my sim as well as winners of the NFL and AFL championships in the years prior to the start of the Super Bowl after the 1966 season.

Note, the football game must have a draft so very few players ended up on the team they are known for in real life which really jumbled this universe around. A good thing some might say as the New England Patriots have yet to win a Super Bowl as of the end of the 2012 season.

Dynastys
 

WHAT MAKES A DYNASTY?

In sports, a dynasty is described as a team or individual that dominates their sport or league for an extended period of time. Regardless of the sport, everyone loves to hate a dominant team (unless they are 'Your" team of course.). Real-life we have the Yankees over so many seasons, the Boston Celtics of the late 50s and 60s, the Montreal Canadiens of the fifties and more recently the New England Patriots or Golden State Warriors. This history of sports replay is no different, as there have been a number of teams that truly dominated their sport for an extended period.

BASEBALL DYNASTYS

Let's start with baseball where there were quite a number of dynasty's, but perhaps none as dominant as the turn of the century Philadelphia Athletics, who won 15 straight American League Pennants and 8 World Series titles from 1901-15. An outstanding group of pitchers including Rube Waddell (359-129). Chief Bender (300-195), Eddie Plank (320-136), Eddie Cicotte (192-92) and Addie Joss (296-204), who came over from Cleveland for the final 5 titles, paced the A's. Their offensive leaders included Hall of Famers Shoeless Joe Jackson, Honus Wagner and Eddie Collins.

The A's of that era were overlapped by the New York Giants, who starting in 1911 won 12 National League pennants in a 13 year period but only claimed the World Series title in 4 of those years despite being led by future Hall of Famers Rube Marquard (288-148), Jeff Tesreau (227-122) and Dick Rudolph (167-92).

Led by Hall of Famers Ty Cobb, Harry Heilmann and Lefty Williams the Tigers won 4 straight World Series crowns between 1922 and 1925 but that pales when compared to the Milwaukee Braves 7 straight World Series (and 8 NL Pennants) in a row beginning in 1954. The Braves of this era had Warren Spahn (253-173), Johnny Antonelli (204-133) and Gene Conley (132-76) - who also appears in the basketball portion- on the mound along with hitters Hank Aaron, Eddie Mathews and Nellie Fox. Aaron would go on to hit 691 homeruns in this replay, which is 4th all-time behind ARod (778), McGwire (757) and Barry Bonds (744). Babe Ruth managed just 647 homers mainly because the game used him as a pitcher much more than he pitched in real-life.

In six straight of those championship seasons the Milwaukee Braves topped the New York Yankees. The Yankees were a hard-luck team when it came to World Series victories in this sim. The Yankees made the playoffs 43 times between 1882-2015 (starting as the Baltimore Orioles in the late 1800's), which is second only to the Athletics 45 post-season appearances, but New York only won the World Series 7 times. The Bronx Bombers period of American League domination started with 1934 when they won the pennant 20 of the next 29 years but again struggled in October as they only claimed 5 World Series titles.

If there is such a thing as a modern day dynasty - obviously it is so much harder to dominate with 30 teams than 16 - it would be the 2000-2003 Montreal Expos of all teams. The Expos won 4 straight National League pennants and 3 World Series titles in that time and they added a fifth pennant in 2005 after the franchise shifted to Washington. They were so dominant from 1999-2004 that they averaged 108 wins a season during that period. Vlad Guerrero and Larry Walker were the offensive catalysts, while Randy Johnson (364-204, 8 CyYoungs), Javier Vasquez (225-122, 2 CyYoungs) and Carl Pavano (150-129) anchored the rotation. Randy Johnson deserves to be talked about more with the 8 Cy Young Awards, a record 4 no-hitters in his career and he is the only man to strikeout as many as 19 batters in a single game. Also the only pitcher to pitch significantly after 1901 and have more wins than Johnson's 364 is Cy Young, who won 456 games but only 162 of those came after the turn of the century.

HOCKEY DYNASTYS

The NHL had several clubs worthy of being considered a dynasty with the greatest ones being the Toronot St.Patricks/Maple Leafs of the 1920's, the Montreal Canadiens of the 1950s and also the late 1990s, along with the late 60s/early 70s New York Rangers. Montreal is the all-time leader in Cup wins with 21, followed by the Rangers at 16 and Toronto at 14 so let's start with the two Montreal dynasty periods.

The early days in this sim, with a draft instead of assigning players to their original organizations, was not kind to the Montreal Canadiens. Montreal won a Cup in 1920 but celebrated just two more titles before the end of WWII. Everything changed in 1946, a few years after the arrival of Maurice Richard. The Rocket won 4 scoring titles in his career and when he retired at the age of 40 in 1962 he was the NHL's all-time leader in goals (669) and points (1310). Richard's name is etched on the Cup 11 times as he helped Montreal win all but one of the 12 Cups they celebrated in an 18 year span beginning in 1946. The pinnacle was 9 year period starting with 1955 when they won it 7 times in 9 years. If Richard was the heart of the Canadiens then Red Kelly was the soul. The legendary defenseman/center was a big part of all 12 Cup wins during that period and would also win a 13th as part of the start of the Rangers dynasty later in the decade. Kelly amazingly won the Norris Trophy as the league's top defenseman 13 times in his career.

Montreal's other dynasty period was much more recent as the Habs won 5 Cups in a six year span starting with the 1995-96 season. Joe Sakic was the leader of this group, winning 4 Hart Trophy's and claiming the Conn Smythe as playoff MVP in each of the 5 Cup winning years. Sakic would go on to win two more Cups with Washington and the Atlanta Thrashers late in his career. Sakic also remains the NHL's all-time leader in career playoff points with 322 in 268 games. His 268 post-season games are also tops, shattering Gordie Howe's old record of 231.

Toronto hasn't won a Cup since 1954 in this sim so their drought is even longer than the real life wait since 1967 but the franchise was the class of the NHL in it's infancy. Toronto celebrated 10 Cup wins in a 12 year span stretch from 1920-21 to 1931-32. Howie Morenz, who won 6 league MVP awards during that span was a key cog as was goaltender Roy 'Shrimp' Worters, who replaced George Hainsworth as the starter after the first four titles. On defense, Toronto had Hall of Famer Hap Day, who was named the league's top rearguard 7 times in his career and played a starring role in all 10 Cup victories.

Starting with the 1965-66 season, the New York Rangers won 6 Cups over 8 seasons. Their star-studded lineup featured Gordie Howe, Frank Mahovlich, Ken Hodge, Danny Grant and Dennis Hull with Gilles Villemure being joined by first Terry Sawchuk and later Gary Smith in the crease.

A late entry is the 2014-16 Minnesota Wild who won 3 straight Stanley Cups in the midst of 5 straight seasons with at least 112 points. They had the league's best goaltender during that time in Tukka Rask along with Brandon Saad, who averaged 90 points a season during the 3 Cup years.

FOOTBALL DYNASTYS

The most successful franchise in the NFL is also one of it's oldest in the Chicago Bears. Born as the Decatur Staleys in 1920, the Bears played second fiddle in their own town to the Chicago Cardinals in the 1920's but have won 12 NFL titles including the first Super Bowl and 5 Super Bowls in total - 1966, 1977, 1983, 1988 and 1993. Tied for second on the list of titles are the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Baltimore/Indianapolis Colts with 7 each. The Steelers can count 3 Vince Lombardi Trophy's among their seven NFL titles including the 2011 game when their quarterback Eli Manning was named Super Bowl MVP. All seven of the Colts titles came before the Super Bowl began in 1966 with 2 of them while the franchise was based in Canton as the Bulldogs and the other 5 in Baltimore.

The New England Patriots have never won a title, going back to their AFL debut as the Boston Patriots in 1960 but leading the way in terms of futility are the Cleveland/Los Angeles/St Louis Rams. The Rams lost back-to-back Super Bowls in the early 2000s and have not won a championship of anytime since 1932, when the then Cleveland Rams were NFL champions. However, this article is focused on dynasty's not bad franchises so let's start with a quick mention of the Duluth Eskimos. The franchise that eventually evolved to be the San Francisco 49ers won 3 straight NFL titles from 1922-24 and took two more in the same decade after the club shifted to be the Frankford Yellow Jackets.

The Philadelphia Eagles of the 1940s won 4 NFL titles in a 6 year span. The Eagles big star at the time was a back from the University of Miami named John Noppenberg. In real life Noppenberg is in the Miami Hurricanes Hall of Fame and then played a couple of seasons for the Steelers and Lions.

In the Super Bowl era perhaps the New Orleans Saints of the early 1990s are the closest thing to a dynasty. The Saints were very good overall with 6 Super Bowl wins but their glory days stretched from 1989-1995 when they won 3 Super Bowls and appeared in a fourth. The Saints were led by Pro Bowl quarterback Billy Joe Toliver, who was MVP of all 3 Super Bowl wins. Seven time Pro Bowl wideout Andre Reed and linebacker Greg Lloyd, a 10-time Pro Bowler, also played a major role in the Saints success.

BASKETBALL DYNASTYS

The NBA of this sim is maybe the one exception as it did not provide much in the way of dynasty material. In fact, only one NBA team won more than 2 consecutive league titles. Before we touch on them here are some of the contenders who came close but ultimately I believe fall short of dynasty status.

The 2002-2007 Dallas Mavericks led by Vince Carter and Zydrunas Ilgauskas won back to back titles in 02 and 03 and followed it up with a third championship in 2007 but I believe that is not quite dynasty worthy. Magic Johnson led the Knicks to back-to-back titles beginning in 1981 but that is hardly unique as Kareem did the same with the Bucks in 1972 and 1973 and Oscar Robertson led the 76ers to wins in 1965 and 66.

In fact Robertson's Philadelphia squad won their two titles against what is considered to be the second best team in NBA history. The St Louis Hawks of the 1960s made 8 straight appearances in the NBA finals starting in 1960. That run began with the arrival of Wilt Chamberlain as the first overall pick in the 1959 draft. Chamberlain would win 3 NBA playoff MVPs as he helped the Hawks to titles in 1960,1962 and 1963. The Hawks won the West Division for 8 straight seasons and made the finals in each of them but came up short in their other 5 attempts, including the two straight losses to Robertson's 76ers.

Chamberlain would retire as the NBA's all-time scoring leader with over 34,000 points but now (2015) sits 8th on that list.
Make a note of number 10 on that list as Shaq earned a record 5 NBA championship rings and was also the playoff MVP all 5 times. Drafted first overall after Golden State won the draft lottery in 1992, Shaq would lead the Warriors to 5 titles in a 6 year span starting in 1994 including 4 straight from 1996-99 with 3 of those wins over a Miami Heat lineup led by Dikembe Mutombo, Jason Kidd and Chris Webber. Shaq's career is an interesting one as despite the 5 playoff MVP's, 12 all-star game appearances and 2 all-star game MVP's to go with 7 scoring titles, he never won a regular season league MVP award. In fact he was only first team all-league once in his career as he was overshadowed in individual honours by two other Pacific Division rivals in Sacramento's Hakeem Olajuwon and Michael Jordan of the Clippers. Olajuwon remains the NBA's all-time scoring leader and won 7 MVP awards but only earned a pair of championship rings. Jordan paled in comparison to real-life in this sim, winning two MVP's and just one title on a mostly bad Clippers franchise.

So Shaq did not get the individual honours of the other two, at least during the regular season, but he is arguably the greatest playoff performer in NBA history and the leader of the game's greatest dynasty.



So that is a quick look at the teams in this sim worthy of being considered a dynasty. But the debate will long continue as to which team was the greatest dynasty in the history of sports replay.

My vote. With over half a dozen future Hall of Famers and a 15 year run of supremacy atop the American League I have to go with the Philadelphia Athletics. Although Shaq's Warriors, the Habs of Richard and Kelly and the Warren Spahn led Braves all deserve serious consideration.

amazing stuff as always

Two-Sport Athletes
 

TWO SPORT ATHLETES

Being a multi-sport sim I thought it appropriate I take a look at how some of the top 2-sport athletes performed. We all know about Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders and Brian Jordan playing both sports in the 1990s but there were a lot more that played two professional sports especially in the early days of the NFL and NBA. Among them are Jim Thorpe, who played over 200 MLB games and several years in the NFL in the 1910's and 20s. Likewise, there are a number of former MLB players who also played in the NBA such as Danny Ainge, Gene Conley, Dave DeBusschere, Dick Groat and Frankie Baumholtz. There are fewer who played both professional football and basketball but that list includes legendary quarterback Otto Graham and former Minnesota Vikings coach Bud Grant.

Here is a look at how some of them fared in this replay.

BO JACKSON

Bo knows baseball, well at least he did for a couple of years including a magical 50 homer, 169 rbi's season in 1989, leading the league in both of those categories. Jackson had his struggles as well, leading the AL in strikeouts on 3 occasions and finishing his 9 year career with a .255 lifetime average. He did hit 261 homers, including 5 straight 40-plus homer seasons, and made 3 all-star teams. Jackson also won a World Series with the Royals in 1988 but hit just .109 in the postseason that year and only .161 in 31 career playoff games, helping the Royals to back to back World Series appearances in 1988 (a win over the Mets) and 1989 (a loss to Cincinnati).
In football the Seattle Seahawks selected Bo in the second round of the 1987 draft out of Auburn. He stayed relatively healthy in this sim and played seven seasons for Seattle but was only a full-time starter for one year, gaining 650 yards rushing in 1989. He retired with only 1,937 career yards on 418 carries.

DEION SANDERS

'Prime Time' was anything but in his baseball career. He started in the Yankees organization but spent most of his time there on the reserve roster before being dealt to Kansas City in July of 1991 with Alan Mills for pitcher Kevin Gross. He was a teammate of Bo Jackson's for a couple of seasons and actually replaced Jackson as a starting outfielder in 1994, which was one of just 2 seasons that he was an everyday player. Injuries cost him a bit of time as well and after the Royals decided not to resign him following the 1995 season he bounced around with 4 other organizations to end his career. No individual awards for Deion but he did led the American League in triples with 15 in 1994.
Sanders was a 3 time Pro Bowl cornerback in this sim as he played 16 seasons for Indianapolis after the Colts selected him in the second round of the 1989 draft. He endured a number of injuries with the worst one costing him most of the 1994 seasons but he still managed to start 228 games in his NFL career and have 76 interceptions, 8 of which he returned for touchdowns. He also returned 10 punts for touchdowns which makes him the career leader in this replay.

CHARLIE BERRY

An end from Lafayette, Berry won a pair of NFL titles with the old Frankford Yellow Jackets in 1927 and 1930. Not a star by any means, but he did fashion a decent NFL career as his side job when not playing MLB.
So far Berry is the only player I have found that won both an NFL title and a World Series ring, although he did not see any action in the 1930 World Series with the Washington Senators (perhaps he had already left for football by October). A backup catcher with the Athletics to begin his career, Berry was a throw-in in a deal that sent pitcher Jumbo Brown to Washington in exchange for Firpo Marberry but he did end up being the Senators number one catcher for a couple of seasons.

OTTO GRAHAM

Taken 2nd overall in the 1946 NFL draft, Graham spent a decade as quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams and appeared in 4 Pro Bowls. The Rams of his era, like for most of the sim, were a bad team and Graham only appeared in 1 playoff game in his NFL career. The NFL sim was a real letdown as I would have liked to see him do a lot better. It was just as disappointing for Graham in basketball as he was an unsigned free agent and never played an NBA game.

GEORGE HALAS

Certainly better known as a coach and owner of the Chicago Bears in real life, but Halas also played briefly in the early days of the NFL and for 12 games with the New York Yankees in 1919. In the sim he had a brief appearances as an end for the Providence Steam Rollers in 1920-21, starting just 2 games and making 15 career catches. In the baseball portion, Halas never made the major leagues but that probably opened the door for him to try his hand at coaching football

CHUCK DRESSEN

Dressen won a pair of gold gloves at third base for the Cincinnati Reds but his major league career was pretty short, just like in real life. The Reds were terrible when he played for them and he didn't get much of an opportunity once he was dealt to the Red Sox 1929. He had a good start to his career, winning a pair of rookie of the month awards in 1925 but he lost the NL rookie of the year to Mandy Brooks of the Cubs.
A backup running back with the Boston Redskins and Canton Bulldogs in my sim, Dressen rushed for 1,659 yards in his career but started just 4 games. He did have a career best 16 combined receiving/rushing TD's in 1924, when he started his 4 games and played quite a bit in the other 8, gaining 873 yards on the ground. He also scored 16 touchdowns that year, including 14 rushing, and finished 7th in the league in total points. It was really his only season of note. He was very sure-handed in football as well, having never fumbled the ball in 178 career carries or 34 receptions.

DANNY AINGE

In real life Ainge left the Toronto Blue Jays for basketball full-time at the age of 22. Likely should have done the same in the sim as you can see from his stats he could not hit in the major leagues. The Jays dealt him to Seattle in 1981 for catcher Johnny Wockenfuss and he would spend a final season in the big leagues with the Yankees after signing as a free agent in 1986. The Mariners had made the World Series in 1985 but Ainge was not on their post-season roster. Seattle lost that year but would win the Series the following season while Ainge got a starting role on a weak Yankees squad.
Ainge had a decent basketball carer but did not get the championships he won in real life with the Celtics. Ainge was selected 3rd overall by Houston in the 1981 draft. He would move on to Seattle as a free agent before being traded to San Antonio where he ended his career. Funny he signs with the Supersonics while he is already a Mariner only to leave for the Yankees and then get traded away a year later by the Supersonics.

FRANKIE BAUMHOLTZ

Outfielder Frank Baumholtz won a pair of Gold Gloves and spent nearly a decade in the National League with the Reds and Phillies. He never made a World Series appearances, in fact he was never really in a pennant race as his teams were generally second division clubs.


Baumholtz was a starter for a couple of seasons at the formation of the NBA.

GENE CONLEY

I would consider Conley to be the most successful of the multi-sport athletes as he won 3 NBA championships to go with 7 World Series rings. He was a 7-time allstar (4 baseball and 3 basketball) and had a 21-win season with the Milwaukee Braves in the middle of their terrific run in the 1950s. He won 132 regular season games and another 5 in World Series play. Standing 6'8" tall, he was a center and a key contributor to a pair of NBA titles with Cincinnati before getting another ring as a spare part for the 1967 Knicks.


I have a few more multi-sport guys I want to touch on but that will be in the next update.

Here are 3 more two-sport athletes I thought deserved mention.

DAVE DEBUSSCHERE

DeBusschere had a pretty solid NBA career in the sim, winning a pair of NBA titles with Philadelphia and being named to the all-star team 3 times in his career. He was the third overall pick of the 1962 NBA draft but did not remain with the Los Angeles Lakers for long as they dealt him to the Baltimore midway thru his second season in a 1-for-1 deal that sent John Havlicek out west. DeBusschere was on the move again a year later when the Bullets dealt him to the Philadelphia 76ers. He teamed with Oscar Robertson in Philadelphia, winning a pair of titles and enjoying the best seasons of his career. He would be dealt yet again in 1972, this time to Atlanta where he would finish out his career except for a couple of games with Golden State at the end of the 1977-78 campaign.


As for baseball, DeBusschere only pitched in 55 career games but he still won a pair of World Series rings with the Chicago White Sox. He did not appear in a World Series game but was on the roster for the White Sox wins in 1963 and 1965. Chicago would win it again in 1966 but by then DeBusschere had left to concentrate on basketball full-time.

STEVE HAMILTON

Hamilton pitched for 12 seasons in the major leagues in this sim and was the American League reliever of the year in 1962, when he saved 17 games for Cleveland. As a rookie he pitched 1 inning of relief in the 1961 series but his Indians lost to Milwaukee at the tail end of the Braves dynasty period. He pitched for Cleveland until being traded to the Yankees midway through the 1968 season in exchange for Frank Tepedino.
Undrafted out of college, Hamilton signed with the St Louis Hawks and spent three seasons as a backup before being waived and signing with Detroit in 1961. He was out of the game for 5 years before resurfacing for one season in the ABA with the Kentucky Colonels. He did win an NBA championship with St Louis in 1960 and saw decent playing time in the postseason that year.

RON REED

Ron Reed had a decent major league career that was very comparable to his real-life stats. He made his major league debut with the Atlanta Braves in 1966 as a 23 year old and pitched his final game at age 40 for the Pittsburgh Pirates. In between he won 139 games while losing 124 with a 3.59 era (real life was 146-140 , 3.46). He spent the bulk of his career in New York after the Yankees traded Steve Whitaker and Tony Soliata for him at the trade deadline in 1958. He missed almost an entire calendar year with an elbow injury in the middle of his time with the Yankees but rebounded at age 32 with probably his best pro season. Later in his career he would move through free agency to California, St Louis, Oakland and Philadelphia. The Phillies dealt him to Pittsburgh in July of 1983 and he pitched out of the pen as the Pirates made it to the World Series. Reed never won a World Series ring but he did make the Series twice - with the 1979 Cardinals as well as 1983 Pirates. He never started a post-season game, going 0-1 with a 6.75 era in 5 relief appearances. Released by Pittsburgh following the 1983 season he signed with the White Sox but was on their reserve roster until being traded to the Yankees in July of 1984 with Darryl Boston in exchange for catcher Mike Heath. His first appearance back in New York would prove to be the last game of his career as he suffered a knee injury that ended his season and may have been a factor in his decision to retire at the age of 41 in 1984.


A back-up his entire career, the Notre Dame graduate won an NBA title with the Knicks in 1967-68. Obviously not real as there is no connection between games but this is a case of the storyline matching up well with signing with the Knicks. Two years later baseball's Atlanta Braves deal him to New York so he can play both sports in Manhattan.

In real life he was drafted by the Kansas City Royals out of high school but chose instead to go to Notre Dame on a basketball scholarship. The Pistons took him in the third round of the 1965 NBA draft and he played in Detroit for two years, before informing his Pistons coach - who happened to be Dave DeBusschere - that he has decided to play baseball fulltime. Reed signed as a free agent with the Braves organization in 1965 and made his real-life debut with the Braves in September of 1966.

299 Career wins
 

TOMMY JOHN AND HOW A FIGHT COST HIM A SHOT AT 300

Here are the list of 300 game winners - excluding the guys who pitched almost exclusively pre-1901. First thing that jumps out is just how good the early Philadelphia Athletics were. Look at the win-loss totals for Rube Waddell, Eddie Plank and Chief Bender. I will write more about them in the future but right now let's look at the bottom of the list and poor Tommy John finishes with 299 career victories.
So I looked at Tommy John's player page to see when he retired and why didn't he stick around for a shot at 300. He was 46 years old in his final season and looking at his last couple of seasons he clearly was out of gas and just hanging around for a shot at 300. The 1986-89 New York Yankees were bad, going 71-91, 69-93, 60-102 and 69-93 so they really had no real need to get rid of John. Funny thing is in 1990, the year after John retired, the Yankees won 96 games made the playoffs for the first time since 1982.

But back to the topic at hand. I know John won 5 games in 1989, to finish one shy of the 300 career mark. I am not sure when he won them as I did not create yearly almanac pages but he was on the Yankees roster as late as August 27th because I saw this entry:

08/27/1989 Suspended 9 games after ejection following a brawl.

So he missed one, possibly two starts, plus may have been in line for a win in the game he was ejected from. So the brawl quite conceivably cost him a shot at 300 victories. He retired that October with a 299-190 record, a little better than the 288-231 real life career mark he posted.

He had a great career, winning two World Series rings with Boston in 1975 and 1978 (no curse of the Bambino in this universe) but 300 wins just sounds so much better than 299. The fight itself may have been a factor but injuries played a bigger role. He missed almost the entire 1975 season with shoulder troubles (Tommy John surgery perhaps?) but did return for the playoffs that year. He won at least 20 games five times in his career and was a key piece in the Red Sox glory years of the 1970s. Boston traded 4 players - Syd O'Brien, Billy Conigliaro, Tony Muser and Luis Alvarado - to acquire John from Cleveland in the winter of 1968-69. Surprisingly, he only made the All-Star team twice in his career. I suppose that is a testament to the large number of great starting pitchers in this era. John was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1995 joining a stellar class that included Mike Schmidt, Nolan Ryan and a pair of his teammates from the Boston World Series winners in Jim Rice and Fred Lynn.

The Triple Crown
 

TRIPLE CROWN

In real life Miguel Cabrera's triple crown in 2012 was just the 15th time since 1901 it had been accomplished and the first since Yaz in 1967. However, in the sim I ran the Triple Crown has become almost commonplace. It has only been accomplished 17 times overall, so certainly well in line with real-life, but since 1978 we have had 6 Triple Crown winners. (Note I simmed to the end of 2015).

It also seems the Cardinals and Red Sox have a stranglehold on the accomplishment. Certainly Stan Musial's 3 straight Triple Crowns is nothing short of amazing but perhaps it is more astounding that Jose Canseco won the triple crown with Boston in 1992. In all, Cardinal players have won the triple crown 6 times and Red Sox have accomplished it 3 times.

Here are the post-1900 Triple Crown winners:

Interesting that Canseco also ended up in Boston here, though a few years early. Was he dealt directly from Oakland to Boston?

The Bash Brothers
 

JOSE CANSECO

Canseco left Oakland and signed with Boston as a free agent following the 1991 season. He would remain a Red Sox until being dealt to Texas for catcher Benito Santiago at the trade deadline. Both were on the downside of their careers at the time of the deal. Canseco would never make it to the World Series but he did play in 25 post-season games, batting just .198 in them with 4 homeruns. He was, of course, the American League Most Valuable Player in his triple crown season and would make 8 all-star game appearances, finishing his career with 2,510 hits including 612 homeruns which places him 14th all-time.
Canseco and his Bash Brother parter Mark McGwire only helped the A's to one division title while they were teammates. It came in 1987, a year that saw McGwire miss half the season with an injury. Oakland would not return to the playoffs until 1992 - the season Canseco bolted for Boston.

Unlike Canseco, McGwire would spend his entire career in green and gold and became the greatest power hitter in league history until ARod passed him in 2015. A two-time MVP and 12 time all-sar, Big Mac hit 757 career homeruns and also holds the single season record when he belted 76 in 1999.

Obviously the steriod era played a major role here and greatly diminished the amazing seasons Jimmie Foxx had in 1932 and 1938 as well as Roger Maris making a run but falling just short of the record with the Braves in 1960.

Below are the career numbers for both McGwire and Canseco. Canseco had his dominant triple crown season of 1992 but McGwire was as good with his record setting 1999 campaign. Also, hard to find a better six year run from a player than what McGwire did between 1995-2001. With McGwire the A's made the playoffs 6 times. They failed to win even a single round in the post-season in the first five but did reach the World Series in 2002, falling in 6 games to Washington. By that point the now 38 year old McGwire was just a spare part, having lost his first base job to free agent pick-up Frank Thomas. McGwire had two pinch-hit appearances that playoff year, a walk and a strikeout, so it is quite possible he never played in a World Series as those pinch-hit trips could have been in a sweep of the Angels or a 4-1 series win over the Yankees in the ALCS. Career post-season numbers for McGwire were a .247 batting average with 6 homers and 16 rbi's in 25 games.

McGwire would retire at the end of the 2003 season and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2009, going in on the same ballot as Jose Canseco and another former teammate from their early days in Oakland by the name of Rickey Henderson.

Ralph kiner
 

RALPH KINER

One of the guys who's career I always enjoy looking at is Ralph Kiner. Not sure exactly why but I guess it traces back to a big sim he had when I did a history of baseball in the OOTP3 or 4 timeframe. Whenever I do a non-draft sim he ends up on a terrible Pirates time (which of course they were in real life in that era) and this sim was no different. He made his debut in 1946 and for each of his first 6 seasons they finished dead last in the National League including 4 100+ loss seaons. In his final two seasons in Pittsburgh, the Pirates finished 6th and 7th.

In real-life Kiner was out of major league baseball by 1956 but in the sim he was dealt from the Pirates to Detroit in exchange for Hal Woodshick and Duke Maas. He saw limited action over six years with Detroit but did stick around long enough to pass the 1000 run mark but never did see the post-season as the closest any of his Tiger teams came was a pair of third place finishes.

Kiner's 385 career homers and 1,563 hits compare nicely to real-life numbers. Despite being on such a bad team he won the National League MVP in 1950, was a 6-time all-star and led the NL in homeruns on 4 occasions. His 58 homers in 1950 was at the time 1 shy of Chuck Klein's 1930 National League record and 5 off of Jimmie Foxx's major league mark of 63 set in 1932.

Somehow, despite Kiner leading the National League in both homeruns and rbi's in 1946, he failed to win the rookie of the year award that season. Instead it went to 3B Grady Hatton (.325/.436/.487 15,83) of Cincinnati instead.

Always love these multi-sport dynasties, TF. Shaq-led Warriors dynasty in the 90's is awesome. Who were the other regulars on the team? Must have been decent, that Heat squad is a nice Big 3.

If you get some time would love to hear about your fictional universe as well and at least what that looks like/how you run it. You are the sports text sim guru for sure. OOTP is easy to customize but some of the stuff you've put together over the years on these other, less user-friendly games is impressive.

Thanks. Will get to a Warriors update shortly but as for my fictional universe here is a bit of info.

It is the one I am playing the most right now, although I am enjoying my first online OOTP league as well. The fictional universe was the inspiration to do this quick sim historical one as it is structured much the same way only it goes at a slower pace and obviously has no real players.

It started with a modified version my fictional player/ historical team quickstart I shared here.

A short answer on league structure is it began in 1901 and is fictional players but historical teams, or at least loosely based on historical teams. In addition to baseball, it includes college football and basketball, Hockey, Golf and I am slowly catching up to the rest of the sports timeline with boxing. I am presently in 1917 and in the next couple of years I plan to add professional football and basketball to the universe. With each of the games I have modded things to have realistic player names (using the 1900-50 OOTP first name mod) and teams so that College Basketball and Football power schools are closer to what they were in real life and conferences are as accurate as I can make them for the era given each game's limitations.

In addition to my role as commissioner overseeing everything and making some edits when needed as I go along, I am 'playing' as the Athletic Director of a college. As the AD, I help run my college baseball team in the OOTP NCAA feeder league and also do most of the recruiting and coach hiring for my school's basketball and football teams. I have considered making the minor tour in the golf game I use be a "College" tour but there really wouldn't be anything for me to do as the AD in it so for now I focus on being involved in the actual running a team in just those 3 sports. I let MLB, the minor leagues and independent leagues in my baseball world just run on their own and the same for hockey and golf.

As mentioned I am up to 1917 in all of those sports but a short time ago I added boxing (was finally able to get a download of TBCB3 which I had found my old license for. 2.5 is less buggy but I can't find my license for it). TBCB has no real career mode so it is much more hands on to create and maintain a universe. I am using the HW division only to keep things simple and built some history for my fictional fighters but am only in 1903. The plan is to have enough guys with enough bouts to stage an elimination tournament with the top 4 or 8 to crown my first champ in 1905. Then it will be just a case of catching up to the other sports. It is, as I mentioned, real slow going and TBCB3 is buggy, so I might yet abandon it.

I have thought about doing a dynasty report on this league but with entirely fictional players it is a little tougher to have name recognition, especially with so many different sports leagues.

GOLDEN STATE WARRIORS OF THE 90s

EDIT -Off the top I will say I did not expect this to be so long but I really got interested in seeing how the Warriors did each season.


I don't know a lot about basketball history as I have never been more than a casual fan but I will say I am eager to learn more now that I a bought the two old Fast Break games. GreyDog has them on for $15 each. I only wish I discovered them years ago as I love how easy they are to mod for the way I like to play and the pro game has a built in database just like OOTP to easily sim basketball history and I saved the html file output each year to give me a full almanac type history.

The 90s is probably the era I know the least about the NBA as I did follow it a little bit as a kid in the 1970s and have done some older historical sim replays in the past so I know a few of the names from the early days beyond the obvious ones. What I am saying is outside the big name guys I am not certain who else was good in this era.

I do know in the sim the Warriors had some lean years in the late 80s. They reached the league finals in 1983-84 and the Western Conference FInals in 1985-86 with some names I do remember in Adrian Dantly, Bernard King, Sidney Moncrief and Benoit Benjamin leading the way but by 1987-88 they were an 18-64 team - worst in the NBA. They won the draft lottery and took Mitch Redmond first overall but were still 5th in the Pacific Division, 12 games under .500 that season. (I notice the 1988-89 expansion Miami Heat went 3-79 so that is maybe worth looking at as I don't remember any other team anywhere near that bad in this sim.)

The Warriors had the #9 pick in the 1989 draft and added Vlade Divac. The starting lineup for 1989-90 was Divac, Cadilac Anderson, Rodney McCray,Mitch Redmond and Sidney Moncrief with Maurice Cheeks and Trent Tucker also get a lot of minutes. It was another last place finish in the Pacific Division at 34-48. The Heat won 27 games by the way.

1990-91 was a 31-51 season for the Warriors and again they were last in the Pacific. Their new rookie was Kendall Gill, taken 2nd overall after the Timberwolves took Gary Payton but last year's first round pick Divac was traded early in the season to the Suns for Rex Chapman. Cadillac Anderson was the only returning starter as Dennis Rodman came over as a free agent signing, Chapman and Kenny Smith were added in trades to go with the rookie Gill, who eventually would play a big role on the title teams. Veteran free agent signing Andrew Toney was the first guy off the bench.

1991-92 was another bottom of the Pacific Division finish for the Warriors with a 30-52 record. Rodman, Gill, Chapman and Smith all returned along with 6th man Toney. TIm Kempton (who I have never heard of) was a free agent pickup from Atlanta and apparently the best option at center after Cadillac Anderson left and signed with the Hawks. Golden State drafted Kenny Anderson 3rd overall (behind Mutumbo to Miami and Steve Smith to Boston) but he only averaged 12 minutes a game as a rookie.


33-49, last place in the division and 7th worst in the NBA in 1992-93 but the future arrived as Golden State won the draft lottery at the end of the 90-91 season and got Shaq. Second team all-rookie team, O'Neal averaged 19.8 points and 8.1 boards in his rookie season. Alonzo Mourning of the Hornets was first team all-rookie. Rodman is still around as are Gill, Toney and Kenny Smtih to join Shaq in the starting five. Kenny Anderson is first off the bench.

Everything clicks in Shaq's second pro season as the 1993-94 Warrioers improve to 54-28 and win the Pacific Division. They take the Lakers in the opening round of the playoffs in the max 5 games before beating Portland 4-1 in the second round. The Clippers prove too much for Golden State in the Western Conference finals, beating the Warriors in 6 with Divac playing a big role as sidekick for a guy by the name of Michael Jordan. Jordan's crew could not beat Orlando in the finals as David Robinson, Cedric Ceballos and Nick Anderson were too much for them. As for the Warriors, the starting five remain basically the same with Shaq, Rodman, Gill and Kenny Smith but Kenny Anderson is now getting more minutes than Andrew Toney. Free agent pickup Charles Oakley is getting plenty of minutes as is rookie Vin Baker. The Warriors actually drafted JR Rider 8th overall but in late November dealt him to the Clippers for rookie Baker, who they had selected 10th overall. Shaq is all-league 2nd Team behind Olajawon of the Kings and finishes 6th in scoring with 23.4 points. Jordan's 31.2 led the way just ahead of Olajawon.

1994-95 gives Golden State it's first title since 1970. At 52-30, they finish second in the Pacific, 4 games back of Jordan's Clippers before sweeping the Timberwolves in the opening round of the playoffs. Next up is Utah led by Reggie Miller and Dell Curry but it is an easy 5 game series win for Shaq and company. San Antonio, with Ron Harper, Joe Dumars and Mark Jackson take a 3 games to one lead in the Western Conference Final before the Warriors respond with 3 straight wins including a 100-80 Game Seven that saw Shaq get 42 points. Knocking off the defending champion Magic in 5 games to win the title was easy in comparison. Shaq, with 26.3 ppg and 9.7 rebounds, is named the Series MVP. During the season he scored 23.1 and was joined by Vin Baker (14.2 ppg), Kendall Gill (20.4), Kenny Smith (17.5) and Kenny Anderson (14.8) in the starting lineup. Rodman still was there as a bench player along with Mark West and free agent pickup Tim Hardaway.

53-29 gives Golden State the best record in the Pacific Division and second only to Minnesota in the Western Conference in 1995-96 but there is no repeat champion this time. Golden State faces Utah once more in the Western Conference final. It again goes 7 but the Jazz win both Games six and seven to pull out the victory and go on to beat Charlotte for the NBA title. Shaq was all-star game MVP but again a second team all-NBA selection behind Olajawon. The starters remain Shaq (26.8ppg), Vin Baker (13.4), Gill (18.8) and the Kenny's in Smith (15.2) and Anderson (15.7). Free agent signing Antonio Davis eats into minutes once held by an aging Rodman, and Robert Pack another free agent pickup, also sees significant playing time.

1996-97 begins the run of four straight titles with Shaq earning playoff MVP in each of the 4. This is the first of 3 wins over the Heat in the finals and the beginning of a great rivalry between Shaq and Mutombo. The cast is the same this year with Shaq, Baker, Gill, Smith and Anderson as the starters. Antonio Davis and Robert Pack both play alot as does another free agent pickup in BJ Armstrong, who was signed away from the Clippers.

In 1997-98 the Pacers beat the Heat in the Eastern Final while the Warriors needed a 97-95 win in Game Seven to knock off Phoenix, which finished 1 game ahead of them in the regular season, to win the West. The Warriors beat Indiana, led by Steve Nash, Shawn Bradley and Sean Elliott in 6 games to win their second straight title and 3rd in 4 years. Shaq led the league in both regular season and playoff scoring but was still overshadowed by Olajawon for regular season MVP. Vin Baker left for the 76ers as a free agent so Clarence Weatherspoon took his place in the starting lineup after being acquired in a trade with Vancover. Antonio Davis, Kendall Gill, Robert Pack and Kenny Anderson all played about the same minutes as Gill missed 20 games with an injury. Clifford Rozier, who was picked up on waivers a year ago, saw some minutes to spell Shaq at center while Brian Davis, James Collins and BJ Armstrong all came off the bench.

It was a pretty easy ride through the playoffs in 1998-99, at least until the finals which once again saw the Warriors against Mutumbo, Jason Kidd and the Heat. Down 3 games to two the Warriors rallied to win including a dominating 101-70 blowout in Game Seven that saw Golden State outscore Miami 21-7 in the first quarter. Gill had 24 points while Shaq added 21 to go with 13 rebounds as he won his third straight MVP award to go with another regular season scoring title. He even beat out Olajawon for first team All-NBA but lost the regular season MVP to Kidd. Gill was all-league 3rd team in one of the few awards won by a Golden State player other than O'Neal during this dynasty. Weatherspoon replaced Antonio Davis in the starting lineup but Davis still got minures. Other than that it remain Gill, Anderson and Robert Pack as the starters with James Collins, Brian Davis and free agent signings Cherokee Parks and Bobby Hurley coming off the bench.

When the Warriors finished at 48-34 and a distant second behind Phoenix (65-17) in the Pacific Division it was assumed that Golden State's dynasty would end with 4 titles in 5 years but Shaq and company had other ideas. It was easy enough to beat Denver in the first round of the playoffs but round two saw the Vancouver Grizzlies go up 3 games to two in round two. Enter Shaq. He scores 44 points on Tim Duncan and Vancouver in a 121-112 win to even the series and then adds 41 and 15 boards in a 115-98 win on the road in Game Seven. Next up is Phoenix in the Conference Finals and again the Warriors go down 3-2 but win Game Six by two points to force another game seven. Golden State prevails 89-87 in the deciding game as Shaq gets 25 points and 10 rebounds to setup yet another meeting with Miami in the Finals. That series is a short one in comparison for the Warriors, as they only need 6 games to get their 4th straight ring and 5th in 6 years. It's another regular season scoring title for O'Neal but he is again 2nd team All-NBA as Vancouver's Tim Duncan takes first team and league MVP. Kendall Gill makes the all-defensive 2nd team. It is again the same core group as Shaq, Antonio Davis, Clarence Weatherspoon, Gill, Kenny Anderson and Robert Pack get most of the minutes. Michael Adams, Oliver Miller, Clifford Rozier and Brian Davis also playing time.

2000-01 is the beginning of the end for the dynasty as the Warriors win the Pacific and have the third best record in the West but Shaq suffers a season-ending injury on March 14th. Without him, Golden State falls to Seattle in the opening round of the playoffs. Without Shaq the Warriors are 9-15 including playoffs. With him they were 45-17. The rest of the starting lineup was the same as last year.

2001-02 Shaq is back and has a great start to the season but misses 20 games in February and March with another injury. When he was healthy he put up big numbers, leading the league with 31.6 ppg and is third with 12.3 rpg but without him the Warriors were just plain bad. The team falls apart and misses the playoffs with a 32-50 record. Gill, Antonio Davis and Weatherspoon return but newcomers Aaron McKie, John Crotty, Jumaine Jones, Keon CLark, Pat Garrity and Jerome James must not be able to pick up the slack.

THE QUARTERBACKS

I was poking around my football sim history and thought I would take a look at the top quarterbacks over 93 years (1920-2012). I stopped at the end of the 2012 season because PFS is an older game and, while it does provide historical player data from 1920, the game was released in 2013 or so. One thing of note I should have tweaked the game's run/pass ratio as the numbers are quite skewed overall but everyone was playing on the same field, so to speak. What that means is that rushing yardage is very high and passing yards are low. To illustrate that here are the top 10 rushers in real NFL history as of 2012 and the top five in my sim:

https://i.imgur.com/g2QlfN1.jpg

And here are the top 10 quarterbacks in terms of passing yards. Rushing attempts and pass attempts are off to the same degree so yards per carry and passes per attempt are pretty good, it's just the run/pass ratio is off. But it was a quick sim and I ignored all that stuff so I will take what I get. A quick glance at the lists and it is, for the most part, the guys you would expect to be at the top of the leaderboard.

https://i.imgur.com/YrugrEM.jpg



Let's take a quick look at some of the QB's starting with Joe Montana. In real life Joe was 13th in passing yards after the 2012 season. In the sim he retired in 1992 after spending a career with Tampa (I had finances turned off so there was next to no player movement in PFS) where he made 9 Pro Bowl appearances and led the Bucs to 3 Super Bowls, but only won 1 of them - in 1984 when he was named Super Bowl MVP. A great QB in the sim, Montana finished 4th all-time with 270 touchdown passes (He threw 273 in real-life), but he never won an MVP award which I think is due in part to the game being skewed towards running backs.

It was very difficult to find a QB who led his team to multiple Super Bowls or NFL Championships and I think that was because of the overall parity in the league. Only 4 quarterbacks led their team to 3 titles with just one of them - Billy Joe Toliver - winning 3 Super Bowls. I believe Leon and Major were fictional players created to fill out rosters by the game while Masterson played 7 seasons for the Bears in real life.
So Toliver is the Tom Brady of this sim when it comes to winning Super Bowls. He was selected 14th overall by the Saints in 1989 and spent a decade as their starting QB before finishing his career with 1 year in Atlanta as a backup. Toliver made 6 Pro Bowl appearances and started 20 playoff games. The only QB to start more postseason games was Dan Fouts, who won 2 Super Bowls during his decade with the Chicago Bears.

Speaking of Brady, he is, as you would expect, still active at age 36 in this sim and has been the starting QB for the Atlanta Falcons since they selected him 1st overall in the 2000 draft. Brady has had a very good career so far, but not an all-time great type of career. He has 2 Pro Bowls to his name and is 26th all-time with 231 career touchdown passes. He is also 13th overall in career passing yardage, and second only to Peyton Manning among active players. Brady has not won a Super Bowl, at least not yet, but narrowly missed in the 2008 game wen his Falcons lost 19-13 in overtime to Tennessee. Manning is now at the end of his career, but he did a get a Super Bowl ring, although it came in 2011 when he was holding a clipboard as the back-up to, of all people, his brother Eli in Pittsburgh. It was Peyton's only season with the Steelers after over a decade with the Cardinals, who selected him 5th overall in 1998. Payton is now a backup with the Bears but likely will retire at the end of this season while Eli is still the Steelers QB.

If I am picking the best quarterback of all-time it may well have to be Y.A. Tittle. The former LSU star spent 15 seasons with the Washington Redskins and made 9 Pro Bowl appearances, won 3 NFL MVP awards and a NFL Championship in 1960. He is the career record holder for touchdown passes with 312 and the highest pre-1980's guy in total passing yardage. Some other pre-1980 guys who had great careers include Ken Anderson, Fran Tarkenton, Bobby Layne and Len Dawson.

I wish I could find a better career based football sim for historical play. The only one that goes back to the 1950s and earlier that I can find is Second and Ten but it is just a single season replay. Hopefully the OOTP version of FOF allows us historical play.

I always love your all-sport reports, great to see this.

What happened to Walter Johnson? I noticed he didn't get to 300 wins.

Thank you, much appreciated.

Walter Johnson had a Hall of Fame career, but not quite as good as in real life. He spent his entire career with the Senators, debuting as a 19 year old in 1907 when he went 18-3, led the AL with a 1.15 era and was named Rookie of the Year. He retired at age 35 in 1923, 5 years earlier than in real life, and finished with a 289-214 career record. He had a few injuries of longer duration in his career, but most occurred in late August or September so did not cost him as much time as they could have. The one exception was an April, 1909 back injury that limited to just 5 starts in his age 21 season.

The big difference in his sim record vs real life is he did not have the huge run from 1910 to 1919 where in real life he averaged 27.5 wins a season for 10 years. In the sim he average 19.7 wins a season over the same time period. Add the lost 80 wins there to the 68 wins he picked up in real life after his retirement in the sim and you have the difference between his sim 289-214 record and real life 417-279 mark.

His strikeout totals also paled in comparison to real life, where Johnson fanned 3,509 batters. In the sim he had 2,720 strikeouts but pitched about 1,400 innings less than he in real life.

Johnson never pitched a postseason game as the Senators did not win an American League pennant until 5 years after his retirement. He did win 3 Cy Young Awards, was a 10 time all-star and in his rookie season he pitched a no-hitter against the New York Highlanders. He was a near unanimous first ballot Hall of Famer, appearing on 99.7% of the ballots.