Table of Contents
Introduction |
Team Listing |
Record Book |
1960 |
1961 | 1962 |
January 1, 1960
In the aftermath of World War II, people wanted two things: normalcy and unity. Old attitudes lingered, to be sure, but years of war had drained collective energies, and folks around the world were looking for an escape. The game of baseball proved to be the answer.
Almost immediately the game exploded in popularity across the globe. It was already America's Pastime, of course, but Europe quickly got on board as well. Popular in Japan and South Korea, the game spread to China, Australia, and New Zealand as well. Dozens of leagues and tournaments began to pop up all over, official and unofficial, formal and informal.
Governments began to take an interest, still looking to flex their muscle but much more eager to do it with a dinger over the fence than a bomb over the border. With the dawning of a new decade, they saw a chance for a new beginning and launched plans to codify the structure of the sport so it could continue to thrive. The high cost of travel was offset by the sport's popularity and governments' willingness to invest.
An agreement was reached in 1956 to bring together many of the major leagues that had sprung up on each continent, and the following years were spent hammering out the details.
What This Will Be
My goal is to tell the story of the World Baseball Alliance in a fun, immersive way. I want the world to feel alive and so this project will involve a good deal of writing. My belief has always been that the history of baseball is best told through stories of the players and moments. There will of course be many straight-stats posts, not unlike poring over baseball-reference or the Sunday newspaper. But I want there to be
context. It's one thing to see that a shortstop named Jay Givens leads the Alliance in WAR (hey, in my universe, they were calculating WAR back in the '60s, okay?). It's another to see that and have an image of Jay Givens in your head and a real sense for his game because you saw what a scout had to say about him and then read a feature story about him in the universe's quarterly baseball magazine.
What's Real, What's Not
All of the player ratings, simulation results, injuries, trades, etc are 100% for real. I do *not* re-sim to get desired results, mess with ratings, force trades or FA signings, or do anything else to falsify outcomes.
I *do* take occasional liberties with things like nicknames, FaceGens, cities of birth, etc. For example, if two players share a last name a home country then I might adjust their birth city so that I can weave a narrative around them being brothers. And if a guy has a terrible mustache, I'll remove it and refresh his FaceGen.
Players' backstories are going to be largely my own creation, but I try to base them around their game-generated personality traits.
Let's Talk Money
My own preference is to play OOTP with finances remaining the same, so that 25,000,000 means the same thing in 1960 that it does in 2010. Now, obviously baseball players were not making that kind of money in the 1960s, which is where our story begins. To that end, all player contracts are represented in
Universal Baseball Currency (UBC) amounts. These numbers remain static over time. The highest paid player in 1960 will make something like 40,000,000. The highest paid player in 2010 will ALSO make something like 40,000,000. Don't get too hung up on it.
Picture it this way: The going rate of a bobblehead is ten marbles. Ten marbles costs me $1. Then, thirty years later, I can still trade ten marbles for a bobblehead. But now ten marbles costs me $5 thanks to inflation. In this OOTP universe, players (more specifically, their baseball services) are the bobbleheads. UBC is the marbles. This is the amount you'll see. The actual dollars and cents are the fictional owner's problems to deal with, we won't concern ourselves with that.
Basic League Structure
Four major leagues were created under the umbrella of the World Baseball Alliance. Each league features 16 teams, with two minor league teams apiece. They are separated into two divisions of eight teams. There is also an affiliated league for each with the identical setup (16 teams, two division, two minor leagues), dubbed the Silver League. The four leagues are:
*North American League
*Caribbean League
*European Premier League
*Australasian League
These are considered the A-level leagues, while the Silver Leagues are B-level.
Promotion and Relegation
At the conclusion of each season, the last-place team in each division at the highest level will be relegated to the corresponding division in the Silver League. The first-place team in each Silver League division is promoted to the higher league. Once promoted, teams must spend at least two seasons in the higher league before being relegated back down. If a promoted team finishes in last place in their first season, then the 7th-place team is relegated in their stead.
Playoffs and World Championship
The 1st and 2nd place teams in each division qualify for the playoffs in their league. These four teams play to decide a champion of the league. The winner from each league advances to the World Series to square off and determine the ultimate champion.
World Baseball Classic
Each March, players represent their home country in the World Baseball Classic. 32 countries are represented, divided into four pools. Every team plays a round-robin within their pool (seven games) and the top two teams from each pool advance to the modified double-elimination playoff. Rounds 1 and 2 are single games, while the final four and championship rounds are best-of-3 series. May the best country win!
Player Acquisition
When a player reaches 16 years old, they are eligible to be signed by an organization, including Silver League teams. Team scouts are only allowed to sign players from their league's region. That is, teams in the North American League cannot sign an amateur player from the Dominican Republic, Italy, or Japan. They can sign at any time.*
*These are scouting discoveries in OOTP. I set discoveries per team up to the highest amount, and restricted the nationalities for each region. So teams in the United States will "discover" players from... the United States. Think of this as the old-timey scout canvassing the country and stumbling upon players. To spice things up a bit, I set the random nationality percentage to 2%, so every so often a scout will discover someone from outside the region. For our purposes, we'll assume the player was born in whatever country he signed from and emigrated to the region.
Many of the best players, though, opt to participate in the scouting combine for their region. By doing this, players cannot sign until July 1 of the current year. Teams are still only allowed to sign amateurs from their own region.*
*As you might have guessed, this is the international amateur pool. Again I've restricted the nationalities, so players from the United States and Canada will populate the "international" pool for the North American League.
Players who don't sign through one of those two avenues must wait until they are 20. At that point they'll be selected by an organization based on prior year records. Once again players are only eligible to be drafted by organizations in their region. The draft takes place on the same day, July 1, that the amateur signing period begins.
*I'll be editing the player creation age so that the draft pool is all 20 year olds and older. Obviously every player will have an American high school or college listed, even those from non-American leagues. We'll be ignoring that 
Of course, many of the smaller leagues that came to be in the last 15 years are still in existence, and each off-season some free agents will pop up from these leagues to try and make it at this level.
Player Movement
For much of the year, players cannot leave their league. Trades between the leagues, even between the A-league and the Silver League in the same region, are prohibited.
Then the off-season comes, and those rules go out the window. Players can be traded from any league to any other league, and free agents are eligible to sign with any league. Maybe a terrific Spanish slugger didn't get a good enough contract offer from his team in the European Premier League and decides to sign with a Canadian team. Or a Dominican team needs a starting pitcher and they see a great prospect on a Silver League team in Australia... no problem, now they can trade for him!
What Else?
Well, there's a lot more but why bore you with spelling out every single procedural detail? I'll be doing a lot of writing in addition to posting screenshots so all will be revealed. Much of the written content will be complete fictional lore but I hope it'll at least be fun to read. If there's anything in particular you're wondering about, ask away!