Offseason Recap & 1924 Season Preview:
Hall Of Fame Inductees: CF Sam Crawford, P Ralph Caldwell
Sam Crawford, who is also a real world hall of famer, played 24 seasons in my league. He racked up 3653 hits and a career .305 batting average. In my league he beat his real life stats in almost every category. Ralph Caldwell, who pitched 5+ seasons for the Yankees, won 297 games in my league with a career 2.56 ERA. Those numbers were certainly miles better then his real life numbers. The real Lefty Caldwell only played 13 major league games.
Yankees 1923 Award Winners: 3B Rogers Hornsby won his 2nd straight AL MVP. C Bill Warwick won his 1st AL Gold Glove.
Hornsby's MVP was no great surprise. The shock was that none of our infielders won Gold Gloves. The most obvious snub was 2B Dave Bancroft, who put up a career high .988 fielding percentage commiting only 10 errors. The guy who won, former Yankee Stuffy McInnis, had a .977 fielding percentage & 17 errors. Guess the voters got tired of giving the award to Bancroft.
Draft Recap: This was another draft chock full of HoF worthy players. The 1st pick was 16 year old Jimmy Foxx by the White Sox. They're going to be a power in a couple of years as they now have Foxx and Gehrig. Other big names included Al Simmons, Charlie Gehringer, Earle Combs, who were all hall of famers.
The guy that fell to me is also a hall of famer, Cool Papa Bell. The reason he wasn't picked earlier was because the game didn't know how to rate him since there are no stats in the database for Negro League players, just like it didn't know how to rate Mule Suttles.
So like Suttles, who I edited to turn into a power hitter since he reportedly was, I also edited Bell. Cool Papa Bell was reported to be one of the fastest baserunners and base stealers in baseball history, and one of the best contact hitters. So I gave him almost max ratings in those categories. He won't hit for power, and while his range in the outfield will be great because of his speed, he won't be the best outfielder. But if he gets on base, watch out!
Notable Offseason Transactions: In an odd twist of fate, I noticed Babe Ruth signed on with the Red Sox. He still hasn't progressed a digit in quite a few seasons, but I guess history does repeat itself even in OOTP. As for my transactions, I signed a bunch of minor league contracts, and one player ended up making the team. SP Claude Thomas out pitched Red Ruffing to make the major league roster coming out of spring training.
November 8, 1923: Signed 3B Rogers Hornsby to a 5 year extension for a total of $493,000
After I picked up Hornsby's 1923 option, I decided that there was no way I could let him walk after the 1924 season. He'll be my first $100,000 player in 1928.
On a related note, after signing Hornsby to the extension, I had to decide what to do with Travis Jackson. So even though Bill Warwich won the Gold Glove at catcher last year, I wasn't satisfied with his production at the plate. I'm going to try to convert Jackson to catcher. If he fails miserably, I'll probably be forced to trade him, either at the deadline or next offseason.
Strengths: Our infield is the best in baseball. Our pitching is very good. And our lineup is scary good.
Weaknesses: The obvious one will be Travis Jackson trying to learn catcher.
Projected Record: I think our lineup is almost unbeatable. I think we'll break 100 wins for the first time since 1912.
1924 Budget (league rank in parenthesis): $529,462 (#2)
1924 Opening Day Salaries (#5 ranked payroll):
1924 Opening Day Roster:
