Through 1983, Fidrych's numbers in this sim are similar to the real-life stats of Mike Caldwell and Scott McGregor.
I don't know if it's even possible to re-do Mark Fidrych's career without some serious ratings-tweaking; I've tried, and there's just no way you start with a raw Fidrych in 1974 or '75 and come up with 19-9, 159 ERA+, 9.6 WAR (!!) in the majors in '76. It can't be done.
And even then, Bird wasn't just one of the best pitchers in baseball, he was a cultural phenomenon, on the cover of the Rolling Stone, a legit superstar. And the main reason a 11-year-old kid in suburban Detroit (me) became a baseball fan in the first place.
We will not see his like again.
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"We're all behind our baseball team..."
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