[VanillaGorilla]

For those of you scoring at home, the 2048 season corresponds with the 1950 RL HOF class. There were no inductions IRL. That means that any inductions in 2048 are First Ballot inductions, a change from the previous HOF exercises. First Ballot entries will enter in their first year on the ballot. Makes perfect sense, but that wasn't happening in the previous two HOF threads. This way is much better.

There were 5 hitters that were inducted by the software using the default settings. At first glance, I thought any, or perhaps all would get in. However, when you have this much hitting at the same time, the players are fighting each other for Black Ink, which is really a needed commodity for a first ballot selection.

19 of the 45 entrants here are members of the RL HOF.

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Bill Skowron was chosen with the second overall pick in the 2027 draft by the Minnesota Twins. In a career that lasted through the 2046 season, Skowron won 2 batting titles, a HR crown, and led the league in RBI twice.

In 2035 he set career highs and led the league in both HR and RBI with 51 and 158. He finished 5th in the batting race with a slash line of 326/387/647 for a npa OPS+ of 173. He also led the league with 207 base hits and took home the Barry Bonds Balko Best Batter Award as new member of the New York Mets.

In 2036 he followed up by again hitting over .300 and cracking 37 HRs and helping to power the Mets, behind HOF pitcher Rube Waddell to a WS win.

In 2041, at the age of 35, he hit .300 on the nose and homered 2 times, driving in 123 for the Baltimore Orioles. The old vet led the O's to a WS win. He led them again in 2042 for the repeat title run. Skowron is the only player to be inducted from those teams, at this point.

In his 19 seasons, Skowron batted over .300 12 times. He collected 2765 career hits (9th, between Hal Chase and Billy Williams) which included 539 HR (15th, 3 fewer than Reggie Jackson and 2 more than Tony Perez) and 529 2B (22nd). He scored 1377 times (between Perez and Chase for 22nd place, again) and collected 1716 RBI (11th, between Perez and Duke Snider) while slashing 310/359/559 (46th/*/47th) for a npa OPS+ of 144.

A 7 time All Star, Skowron won 2 Gold Gloves at 1B. The world lost Moose about a year ago, but he plays on with the growing field of immortals in this little spot of virtual Iowa.

Black Ink: 37 (0)
Gray Ink: 168 (43)
HOFm: 231 (38)
HOFs: 55 (14)

Gorilla Composite: 5.2 (0.8)

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Barry Bonds is the greatest hitter in the history of baseball. Look at the stats. He is. It is for that reason that I have named the MVP in his honor. It is because I have named the MVP after him that I sold corporate sponsorship rights to Balko. For without Barry, there would be no Balko.....or is it the other way around???

Anyway.....how many Barry Bonds Balko Best Batter Awards did Barry Bonds and Balko bag? The answer is 3. That is one fewer than the number of World Series that he won. What a strrrange alternate reality this is.......

The New York Mets had the top pick in the 2020 draft and used it to take Barry. 4 World Championships in Queens show that it was the right pick.

In a most pleasing turn of events, Bonds enters the HOF second to Hank Aaron on the career home run list. What a wonderful world this is!

Bonds played through the 2046 season and hit 851 HRs (Aaron has 932). Bonds was injury prone (or maybe there were just a lot of day games after night games) and in 25 seasons he played in 140 games only three times.

An interesting point is that Bonds did not receive a contract offer in 2045. In 2046, at the age of 45, he played in 150 games. I have noticed this several times in this league. I don't know if it is a selective observation on my part or if a player gets some sort of benefit as far as chronic injury recovery/fatigue reset when he doesn't play at all.

In that 2046 season, Bonds started in Philadelphia and was traded to San Francisco and, rightfully, retired as a Giant. He hit 20 HR an walked 98 times for a slash line of 276/444/468 (npa OPS+ 145).

Bonds won his first MVP in 2026. He had an OPS of 1.227, the best of his career, but he did not have the qualifying PA for this to place him on the all time single season OPS list (this OPS figure would be 7th, All-Time). He hit 42 HR in just 342 AB in 93 games with 98 RBI. He scored 94 times and slashed 345/452/775 for a nap OPS+ of 223.

He followed up with another MVP season in 2027 as this time he made enough PAs to get his OPS for the year (1.173) on the all-time list in the 12th position. He hit 53 HR, 136 RBI, scored 134 times all in 132 games while slashing 328/443/731 (nap OPS+ 213).

In 2028 he hit 50 HR in only 107 games, but did not get an MVP. It would be 10 years before he would win his third Barry Bonds Balko Best Batter Award.

Bonds enters the HOF as the career leader in Games played, 2745 (breaking George Brett's mark), in runs, 2216 (passing Hank Aaron), and in Walks with 1954 (passing Mickey Mantle).

Bonds collected 2984 career hits (4th, between Orlando Cepeda and Chipper Jones), 493 doubles (37th), 56 triples (t-59th, Vic Saier and Hal Chase), and 2115 RBI (2nd, trailing only Hank Aaron, 1 spot ahead of Cepeda). He stole 265 bases (64th) and had a career slash line of 301/419/620 (79th/7th, 1 spot ahead of Dan Brouthers/11th) for a stellar npa OPS+ of 178.

Bonds won WS titles as a Met in 2025, 2032, 2034, and 2036. He reached the post season 13 times and hit 36 HR is 111 games while batting .308. Not too shabby. He also stole 12 post season bases in 14 attempts. In 2034 HOF Rube Waddell joined the Mets. In 2036 classmate Bill Skowron joined Bonds and Waddell for the championship run.

Barry Bonds appeared in 17 All Star games, the most of any HOFer.

Black Ink: 39 (69)
Gray Ink: 217 (289)
HOFm: 315 (340)
HOFs: 55 (76)

Gorilla Composite: 5.2 (8.3)

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Both Bonds and Skowron enter their first OOTP HOF.