For years I’ve been playing around looking at baseball-reference and its precursors, compiling lists and lineups of each franchise’s best teams etc. I’ve had a plan on paper for a 162 game season and playoffs featuring each franchise’s best team, but while this seems easy for some teams it is not easy for others.
So why not have a 4 team playoff for each franchise to determine who represents in to the regular season?
Time period is 1982-1991, because that’s an era I kind of grew up with and there are no jarring inconsistencies in terms of strategy and player usage across those years. 81 was a mess because of the strike, so I started with 82. I ended with 91 because that was the last “real” world series in some ways.
I spent MANY hours doing this in ootp 9, I have 10 but haven’t even fired it up yet, I hope the process is easier. I had to import each team (4 per franchise) one at a time. I also had to go put the right guys on the roster and fix all the stupid career-based hitting, pitching, defensive and speed ratings because I want to capture each team in a vacuum, as it was that season.
In other words, 87 Matt Nokes should be a beast and not a crummy reserve. Similarly, guys who were lights-out in 200 Abs will not be in the starting lineup even if they’re a superior tactical choice to whoever got the lion’s share of playing time that season. For the playoffs, team rosters will play with who they had at the end of the season. This is a big advantage for some teams and a big disadvantage for others, who sold stars for prospects once they realized they were going to finish in 3rd place that year. For the regular season I’ll try to move players around to match their real-life trade dates.
Seeding was done by reviewing real record, playoff qualifying, Pythagorean record, and my own biases. Here are the seeds:
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AL WEST
#1 - CAL 82 CHW 83 KC 85 MIN 91 OAK 88 SEA 91 TEX 86
#2 - CAL 86 CHW 90 KC 82 MIN 87 OAK 90 SEA 87 TEX 91
#3 - CAL 89 CHW 82 KC 84 MIN 88 OAK 89 SEA 89 TEX 83
#4 - CAL 85 CHW 91 KC 89 MIN 84 OAK 87 SEA 90 TEX 90
AL EAST
#1 - BAL 83 BOS 86 CLE 86 DET 84 MIL 82 NYY 85 TOR 85
#2 - BAL 82 BOS 88 CLE 84 DET 87 MIL 87 NYY 86 TOR 87
#3 - BAL 85 BOS 90 CLE 90 DET 83 MIL 83 NYY 83 TOR 89
#4 - BAL 89 BOS 82 CLE 88 DET 86 MIL 88 NYY 87 TOR 90
NL WEST
#1 - ATL 91 CIN 90 HOU 86 LA 85 SD 84 SF 89
#2 - ATL 82 CIN 88 HOU 89 LA 88 SD 89 SF 87
#3 - ATL 83 CIN 85 HOU 83 LA 83 SD 85 SF 86
#4 - ATL 84 CIN 87 HOU 85 LA 91 SD 82 SF 88
NL EAST
#1 - CHC 84 MON 82 NYM 86 PHI 83 PIT 91 STL 85
#2 - CHC 89 MON 90 NYM 88 PHI 86 PIT 90 STL 82
#3 - CHC 83 MON 87 NYM 85 PHI 82 PIT 88 STL 87
#4 - CHC 88 MON 88 NYM 87 PHI 84 PIT 82 STL 89