Random Debut 1940-2020 League starting in 1947

[italyprof]

So I finally found the time and interest to start another random debut historical league. I like this one a lot, and have been playing every inning of every game.

I started in 1947, but am using players from 1940-2020. For historical year I chose 1984, which I will stick to going forward, finding 1986 too "hot" as someone else here put it a while back, and my old preferences for 1976 or 78 to quiet. There are a few homers, but maybe an average of one a game, and a stolen base attempt or two every game, as I put stolen base attempts on "normal".

Using real stats, remaining years of career, 3-year recalc., pitchers stamina on career, fielders on 3-year period. I put the talent variation on 50, so a little but close enough to real life.

I moved all the teams into historical ballparks, and changed some of their geographical seats.

My own team is the New Jersey Owls, based in Newark.

We've played the first 6 games, against the Kansas City Monarchs at home and then against the San Francisco Seals in Seals Stadium.

Here are the standings at this point:

[italyprof]

I like my team. Some of you know I loved the 1970s Yankees teams I grew up with. And in the random draft I got a bunch of them. So the lineup is:

Willie Randolph 2B - age 24
Roy White LF - age 25
Ken Singleton RF - 27
Tony Perez 1B - 37
Cal Ripken, Jr. 3B - 37
Thurman Munson C - 21
Curtis Granderson CF - 31
Bucky Dent SS -27

My rotation is:

Whitey Ford - 26
Blue Moon Odom - 23
Al Downing - 26
Ray Culp - 30
Jack McDowell - 22

and my bullpen has two long relievers in Sid Fernandez 32 and Ted Lilly 24 who can spot start, has a middle reliever in Bob Stanley 28, a setup man in Rawly Eastwick 25, and a 30-year old Mariano Rivera !

My bench is pretty good: My backup OFs and key pinch-hitters are Chuck Klein 34, long past his prime but still a dangerous LH batter, Elliott Maddox 22 who can fill in at CF, and had a great 1974 that I still revere, and Danny Cater 28 who can back up 1B too. Bob Uecker (of "Major League" fame) is my backup catcher, and the IF has an aging Freddie Patek who is still a good pinch-runner (he took third base on a single PRing for Klein after a pinch-hit in a game today, scoring a run later), at SS, Fred Stanley who can back up 2B and SS, age 29, and a 23 year old Rich Dauer who can play 2B or 3B.

I think it should be a competitive team and it is also a believable one, one that COULD have been put together by some GM sometime (if these players had all played in the same years) and taken the field, which is important to me.

Anyway, I will keep people posted on how we do, who the league leaders and record-makers are, and the rest going forward.

[HumanRainDelay]

Nice that you have Fred Stanley as Dent's backup just like in RL--defense helps. I hope I have as much energy as Fred when I am 70 years old. He will be 73 this year and still works for the Giants.

[italyprof]

Here is how things stand a little past midway through our first season, 1947.

We are doing better than expected, though early on we had real trouble with our 3-4-5 starters. Traded Culp who got us nowhere, and got Jesse Flores. Had to send Jack McDowell down to the minors, Marty Pattin too. Weirdly, our most effective starter the past couple of months has been a 46-year old Tommy John. We had to move Sid Fernandez to the rotation to take up the slack when Al Downing got injured. He is still on the injured list. But having Lilly and Fernandez in the bullpen as essentially starters, one young, Lilly, one in the twilight of his career but still effective, has been an advantage.

I also got real tired of how often my CF Granderson struck out. I traded him and Rich Dauer for Joe Pepitone, who is currently in CF but will replace the aging Tony Perez as our regular first baseman. We got Daryl Hamilton as a good fielding CF and we also have Elliott Maddox, so CF won't be too big a worry, even if it is not our strongest position. I was sorry to have to give up Dauer, as Ripken is no spring chicken at 3B and Dauer would have replaced him there. But Ripken should be good for one more full time season and is after all Iron Man so to speak.

Yaz, playing for the Milwaukee Blue Jays, leads the majors in home runs with 19, Alonzo leads the AL. Bruce Bochte for Brooklyn, and Bill Buckner for Youngstown are the batting leaders, and Buster Posey for the Baltimore Beavers leads the AL. Baltimore also has Greg Maddux, which as you can see is a great thing to have. Though Milwaukee's Kelvin Escobar is not much inferior.

More to play. Let's see how 1947 ends up. More soon.