MLB Redux

[Ragin Cajun]

I've set up a historical league starting in 1910. I've used the Lahman db, allowed normal expansion and slotted myself as the commissioner. I'm in the process of simming out probably to the 1950's and then will commense a dynasty showing highpoints from each season and laying out how the league develops.

Trading is allowed, the draft is open so players will not necessarily end up on their "real life" teams.

[Ragin Cajun]

Well a few trials and errors to get started and I think I've got what I wanted.

I'm starting tabula rasa (blank slate) so there are no records. MLB will start in 1910. We are going with a serpentine style draft. I randomized the order six times to get a good mix. There will be a fantasy draft to set the teams to get a good mix. I am allowing revenue sharing to allow some parity to set in. I also like to allow draft picks to be traded...so they will be. I'll update the first round draft picks when done then sim out about a decade to set some records, give an update and then probably set a long sim into the 70's to get more modern day. I'll play that by ear as is goes.

[Ragin Cajun]

January 1, 1910

The initial draft is in the books, here's a look at each teams first round pick:

Philadelphia Phillies: Walter Johnson (SP)
St. Louis Browns: Joe Wood (SP)
Chicago White Sox: Ty Cobb (CF)
St. Louis Cardinals: Ray Collins (SP)
Washington Senators: Willie Mitchell (SP)
Pittsburgh Pirates: Hippo Vaughn (SP)
New York Highlanders: Chief Bender (SP)
Philadelphia Athletics: Jim Scott (SP)
Detroit Tigers: Ray Fisher (MR)
Cleveland Naps: Louis Drucke (SP)
Cincinnati Reds: Russ Ford (SP)
New York Giants: Alex Malloy (SP)
Chicago Cubs: Lefty Tyler (MR)
Boston Red Sox: Nap Rucker (SP)
Boston Doves: Ed Walsh (SP)
Brooklyn Superbas: Tris Speaker (CF)

Picks of Note:
Joe Jackson: 2nd round, pick 9 to Philadelphia Athletics.
Rube Marquard: 2nd round, pick 14 to Chicago White Sox.
Addie Joss: 4th round, pick 12 to Washington Senators.
Christy Mathewson: 4th round, pick 9 to Philadelphia Athletics.
Nap Lajoie: 4th round, pick 7 to Cleveland Naps (go figure)
Cy Young: 5th round, pick 1 to Philadelphia Phillies.

[Ragin Cajun]

Dodgers dominate Series, win 4-1!
Both the Brooklyn Dodgers and the St. Louis Browns dominated their respective leagues as both teams won 90+ games and won their divisions by 9 games. In the series, the Dodgers were the dominant team and won four games to the Browns' one game.

New York Giants are on the Clock!
With the season over, the Giants are officially on the clock with the number one overall pick in the upcoming rookie draft. After finishing the year with an abyssmal 64-90 record, and 26 games out of the pennant race, Giants fans are looking forward to an influx of talent from this years rookie crop. With that pick, the Giants would take pitcher Pete Alexander from Elba, Alabama. Other notable picks were:
Claude Hendrix (SP): Cleveland Naps with the #3 pick.
Vaughn Gregg (SP): Pittsburgh Pirates at #6.

American League Notes:
Batting Champion: Ty Cobb (Chicago White Sox) who hit .387.
Home Run King: Johnny Kling (Detroit Tigers) with 15 long balls.
RBI Machine: Sherry Magee (St. Louis Browns) with 127 RBIs.
Speed Demon: Josh Devore (Chicago White Sox) with 76 stolen bases.
Wins: Christy Mathewson (Philadelphia Athletics) 21 wins.
ERA: Jack Powell (St. Louis Browns): 2.39 ERA
Losses: Chief Bender (New York Highlanders): 18 losses
Saves: Bill Otey (Philadelphia Athletics): 39 saves
Strikeouts: Joe Wood (St. Louis Browns): 129 K's.

National League Notes:
Batting Champion: Tris Speaker (Brooklyn Dodgers) who hit .346.
Home Run King: Larry Doyle (Philadelphia Phillies) with 12 long balls.
RBI Machine: Duffy Lewis (Pittsburgh Pirates) with 93 RBIs.
Speed Demon: Bert Daniels (Cincinnati Reds) with 72 stolen bases.
Wins: Hippo Vaughn (Pittsburgh Pirates) 21 wins.
ERA: Charlie Smith (Brooklyn Dodgers): 1,80 ERA.
Losses: Alex Malloy (New York Giants): 19 losses
Saves: Walt Dickson (Chicago Cubs): 39 saves.
Strikeouts: Sam Frock (Brooklyn Dodgers): 152 K's.

*All settings were set to 1979 too allow equal comparisons over the generations.

1910 Highlights:
- Tillie Shafer of the Cardinals becomes the first pro baseball player to have six hits in a single game when he went 6-6 with 1 HR and 4 RBI against the Phillies.
- Dode Paskert (Boston Rustlers) and Art Griggs (Philadelphia Athletics) both hit for the cycle with 5 hit performanaces.
- Six pitchers recorded 20+ win campaigns.
- Bobby Byrne of the Highlanders set the bar with a 29 game hitting streak this season.
- Three players sign contract extentions paying them in excess of $3 million dollars per season. Nap Lojoie of the Cleveland Naps becomes the highest paid athlete in baseball when he signed a two year deal totalling $6,778,800.

[Ragin Cajun]

Four years into the league, I'm simming to get a bit of history, I'll try to recap some of the big events periodically.

- The Brooklyn club from the National League is the dominant team in the NL but falls short in the Series. Brooklyn, be it the Superbas or the Dodgers, have been to four straight World Series after claiming the NL Pennant. However, they have lost three in a row to the AL Champs where parity reigns and four different teams have won the pennant. The Highlanders, the Athletics and the Yankees have won the last three World Series including this years.
- Tris Speaker set the single season batting number, hitting .398. Ty Cobb currently leads the league with a .375 career average.
- Larry Doyle passes Jimmy Walsh for the single season home run mark with 18 during the 1913 season. Walsh is still the career leader with 45, two in front of Doyle.
- Josh Devore stole 101 bases in the 1911 season, Cobb fell one short with 100 on the button in the '13 season. Cobb has three of the top five seasons thusfar.
- Ed Walsh won 28 games and is tied for the best season by a pitcher with Frank Lange and Sam Frock. Frock has 95 career wins, closing in to be the first pitcher to record 100 wins.
- Frank Lange strikes out 186 batters in the 1911 campaign, Sam Frock finished one behind that season with 185 K's.
- Ty Cobb has won three straight Outstanding Hitter Awards in the AL.
- Tris Speaker, Mr. Irrelevant and picked last in the first round of the inaugural draft, has won all four Outstanding Hitter Awards in the NL, the most dominant position player in the game today.
- Otto Knabe has won all four Gold Gloves for AL Secondbasemen. Harry Lord duplicated the feat in the NL at 3B. The only two players to win all four years.
- Syd Smith and Art Wilson both record six hit games in the 1912 season, bringing the total of six hit games to three.
- 1912 season sees five batters hit for the cycle including Ty Cobb doing it twice.
- The new hitting streak record reaches 37 games, by Duffy Lewis of the Pirates, during the 1911 season, breaking the mark of 34 games set by Frank Baker earlier in the '11 season.

[Ragin Cajun]

The American League has continued to dominate the early going of the leagues history, claiming eleven World Series championships to only three for the National League. The focus of the AL world continues to lie in New York with the Brooklyn club (Superbas, Dodgers, Robins) winning 11 pennants out of 14 years, the Giants won two and the Cincinnati Reds finally broke the streak at 13 years by winning the NL pennant in 1923. The Robins did win two championships in 1918-19. The Yankees have won two championships, the Senators also have two rings but the Chicago White Sox have been the dominant franchise in baseball winning four championships in five tries; their sole losing series coming in 1919 against the Brooklyn Robins (1919 again for the Sox?).

American League Review
Ty Cobb has won eight Batter of the Year awards, his last coming in 1920.

Claude Hendrix has become the dominant pitcher of the era in the Al, winning his first Cy Young in 1915, and then winning the award three more times including back to back again in 1922-23.

Several rookies that won RoY honors that you may recognize are George Sisler (1915) and Frankie Frisch (1919).

National League Review
Tris Speaker would go on to win five straight Batter of the Year awards in the NL but Rogers Hornsby has been the most dominant player in baseball winning an amazing eight consecutive honors with that streak still intact.

Claude Hendrix has been around the league but no less dominant in the NL as he was in the AL. In addition to the four Cy Youngs he won in the AL, he won two more in the NL in 1919 and 1921 win Cincinnati giving him a total of six Cys.

Babe Ruth has been relegated to the minors as a pitcher. After going 38-52 in three seasons with Pittsburgh, we was traded to St. Louis (AL) in '21 and relegated to the minor leagues since that time. He has great potential as a hitter but has a ways to go to develop those skills to break into the major leagues as a position player.


Hall of Fame
The Hall opened it's doors after the 1920 season, and to date has welcomed it's first four members to baseball immortaility. All four are pitchers and the first Hall of Famer honor went to Addie Joss who retired with a career mark of 215-166. He won two Gold Glove awards, earned his 200th career win on 9/27/1919 before retiring after the 1920 season. Two players joined Joss after the 1921 season with Orval Overall (221-145) and Frank "Seagan" Lange (250-149) being inducted. The fourth member to grace the Hall was Chief Bender (224-206) who came in after the most recent season, 1923. Bender retired as the sixth winningest pitcher of all time, Lange was tops on the list when he left the game and is now third all time. Orvall is currently 9th all time and Joss has since fallen out of the top ten with the passing of time.


Earl Sheely became only the second player in major league history to record 7 hits in a single game when he went 7 for 7 this past season. The other player was Aaron Ward who also went 7 for 7 back in the 1919 season.

Bill Burns (Pitt) became the first pitcher to record a no hitter back in October 1914 against Cincinnati. Dave Davenport repeated the feat in 1915 for New York, against Burns' team, Pittsburgh. Bill Steen became only the third pitcher to twirl a no hitter and one upped the other two by recording a perfect game, allowing no walks and striking out three for Boston against Cincinnati.

Happy Felsch went on a 43 game hitting streak back in 1916 to set the standard for success at the plate and is, to date, the only player to hit in more than 40 straight games.

Two players eclipsed the .400 batting mark, and both did it in the 1919 season. Ty Cobb hit .426 and Harry Heilmann hit .403 that year. Heilmann also hit .398 in '23. Nobody else has come closer than Tris Speaker's .397 average in 1912 showing that .400 is a difficult plateau to scale.

Jack Tobin set the HR mark as the first man to belt 20 or more homers in the 1914 season. George Sisler did him one better in 1918 with 22 and that record would fall one more time to the current Home Run King, Rogers Hornsby, who smacked 23 in the 1921 season. Hornsby is also the career home run king with 132 home runs over his 8 year career. The closest to him is Heinie Zimmerman with 108. Sherry Magee is the only other batter to hit 100 or more and he finished his career with 101. Several players have a shot to join the 100 home run club next season, led by Frank Baker who has 99 and Jack Tobin with 98.

The single season record for wins is 28. Five pitchers have achieved this mark, most recently was Frank Lange and Claude Hendrix, both in 1916. Sam Frock is the winningest pitcher of all time with 275 wins through the '23 season. Claude Hendrix is right behind him with 261 wins in one less season.

Claude Hendrix is also the most dominant strikeout artist in baseball, with four of the top five single season marks including the #1 spot, with 239 K's in 1918. He also holds the career mark with 2,415, one of only two pitchers to eclipse 2,000 career strikeouts. The other is Sam Frock with 2,107.

[Ragin Cajun]

After never making it beyond AA ball after a short stint in the bigs, George Herman "Babe" Ruth decided to call it a career after the 1924 season and found work back on the docks of Baltimore. This past offseason, perhaps missing the freedom that baseball gave him, the Bambino refocused on his game which is no longer pitching but hitting. His renewed dedication and some heavy lifting on the docks appears to have paid off as he has declared himself a free agent and appears to be garnering interest from several clubs. We'll have to wait and see where he ends up and what he can do with a miraculous second chance.

[Ragin Cajun]

Early in the 1926 offseason, Babe Ruth has signed a two year deal worth $151,500 with the St. Louis Browns. In 214 career games, Ruth has hit .202 with no home runs. At the age of 30, a comeback is questionable but if anyone can do it, it's The Babe.

[Ragin Cajun]

For those following Ruth's short career thusfar, he had a decent first season back in the bigs. He had 302 at bats, recorded 25 home runs and 86 RBI while batting .262. Not the numbers from real life, but for a player that was retired from the game twelve months ago, certainly not bad at all.

[Ragin Cajun]

The 1920's are now in the rear view mirror and the 1930's open up before us. Since Cincinnati ended the Brooklyn/New York run of NL pennants in 1923, a NY club has only won two pennants. The hottest team of the last five years in the NL has been the Chicago Cubs with two pennants ('27, '29) but no NL team has broken into the World Series winners column since the Brooklyn Robins back in 1919. The Philadelphia A's won back to back titles in 1923-24 and then the Washington Senators three-peated from '25 to '28. The Boston Red Sox became the latest team to win back to back crowns in '28 and '29 and after two decades of play the AL has won an amazing 17 championships to only three for the NL.


In 1928, Al Simmons added his name to the .400 club when he hit .413 in 1928. Ty Cobb still leads the way with his .426 average in 1919. The career batting leader is Babe Herman with a career mark of .370 since coming into the league in 1926. Tris Speaker, at eight place with a .350 average, is the highest rated non-active player followed by Cobb at .347.


1927 saw The Babe sock 35 home runs to become the single season home run champ. This past year saw Jimmie Foxx eclipse that mark with 38 long balls to set a new standard for power hitters. Al Simmons has eclipsed 30 home runs twice. The career mark currently belongs to Rogers Hornsby with 264 ding-dongs. The closest to him is Jack Tobin with 142. Babe Ruth has hit 118 in his short time back in the bigs to appear at #8 on the career list.


Claude Hendrix and Frank Lange hold the league mark for wins with 28, Lange hitting that mark twice. Hendrix holds the career win mark with 357 before retiring in 1927. Carl Weilman is still active and #2 on that list with 319 wins, the only two pitchers to reach that milestone. Eppa Rixey and Willie Mitchell both have a chance to hit 300 in the upcoming season.


Hendrix still holds the single season strikeout mark and became the first pitcher to eclipse 3,000 K's with 3,253 during his 17 year career.


**and I have to end this dynasty here due to a bug from the last patch that caused Ruth's pitching numbers to be duplicated for the years before he retired.

[Powderguy]

The dynasty was so young, cut down in its prime.