Replay League - 100 years of alternate history!

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This continues the story I started here:
https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=305847

and continued here:
https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=318293

of my historical league. Read the old threads for the gory details, but the short version is that Replay League started in 1901, with historically accurate offensive levels, ballparks, and expansion. Player talents were allowed to evolve with the game engine so careers were often different that in reality. Also, I started the league in 2005, with OOTP 5, and so some stats and records are only accurate since 1948 in the game.

I have now advanced to the year 2000, so in honor of the Replay League Centennial, I will recount all of the members of the Hall of Fame, currently at 138 members. If anyone reads this and wants to know about other players, I am happy to give you their story. For example, you won't find Ted Williams or Walter Johnson on this list. You will, however, learn about Vida Blue and Johnny Podgajny.

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Henry Aaron is about the least surprising player possible to start an alphabetical list of HOFers. But before I talk about his Replay League career, and since we just lost him recently, I encourage you to take a look at his Baseball Reference page linked above. I look through the page of every rookie player when I prepare for league drafts, and Aaron's page was the only one that made me stop and stare in awe. The guy was an MVP candidate for 19 consecutive years! He's not the best player in baseball history (Babe Ruth) or even the best player of his era (Willie Mays), and he isn't the most important player in history (Jackie Robinson, or maybe Ruth). But he was historically great at everything, on and off the field. I would claim that nobody in baseball history was both as great as he was on the field, and as important as he was off the field. I am too young to have seen him play, but I think he is my favorite player of all time anyway.

Back to RL...Hank Aaron was actually not that great of a hitter. I mean, he was very good, but he only hit .276 over his career, with 363 HR. He won one batting title and led the league in HR once, with a career-high 33 in 1960. His career OPS+ was 119, so good but not HOF-worthy for a corner OF. He made only 5 all-star games, the last in 1961.

So how is Aaron in the HOF? Defense! He won 12 Gold Gloves in RF, and was 282 runs above average over his career - almost 30 wins just from defense! In his best years he was an MVP candidate, though he never won or deserved to. But most of the time he was a good hitter with great defense, and he played for quite a while. He's not inner circle HOFer, but he's in nonetheless.

Funny story ... he was kind of crummy in 1966, and the Cardinals (his only team to that point) released him. The Angels picked him up, where he had a solid year at age 33. After the season, the Angels traded him back to St. Louis for Ken McBride, an oldish SP. Aaron played 2.5 more solid seasons for the Cardinals before finally getting traded to the White Sox to finish out his career.

[3fbrown]

Tommie Agee was not a great player in real life. Or rather, from what I gather, he was immensely talented but was out of the league at age 31. Maybe injuries were responsible?

In Replay League, Agee had a long career, entirely with the Phillies. He was a good hitter - not great, but good. He started off strong, winning the 1966 Rookie of the Year with an 8 WAR season, and following that up with a 10.6 WAR 1967. That was peak Agee: 137 OPS+, 51 steals, 30 HR, playing every day. Most importantly - historically great defense in CF. Agee was worth 35 runs above average on defense that year, truly one of the great defensive seasons. But actually not his best - in 1970 he was worth more than 40 runs! He was an average hitter that year, and still worth 7 WAR.

Agee aged quickly though. Throughout his twenties he his hitting was between average and very good, and his defense was stellar. He was an MVP candidate, even if OOTP didn't see him as such. He won 6 Gold Gloves and was a 4-time All-Star. In his early thirties his hitting became a bit worse, and his defense went from spectacular to very good. He became a 4 WAR player.

At age 33 his offense became average, and his defense did too. And finally at age 35, his defense plummeted to terrible - he should not have been allowed to play CF.

Other interesting things to note - Agee was durable in his younger years. He stuck out a ton for his era. And he was caught stealing a lot, enough that it cost his team quite a bit over the years. His career rate was just under 60%, which isn't good for someone still #24 all-time in SB.

Like Aaron, Agee is in the HOF because of his defense. Aaron played longer and was a better hitter, but Agee burned brighter, and if I had to choose one, I would probably pick Agee.

One quick note - for much of RL history, I would manually edit the master.csv file so that player debuted in the year that they actually got significant playing time. My thinking was that it eliminated cups of coffee, things like that. I don't do that any more, especially because you can't edit that file anymore. But that is why someone like Agee has his actual early years stats in his RL stat line. He didn't appear in RL until 1966.

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The Angels were not a good team in the first three years of their existence. In 1963 they lost 103 and had the first pick in the rookie draft. With that #1 pick they chose Dick Allen.

Like the real Dick Allen, he could rake from day one. He was an all-star in his rookie year, and the next year he was AL MVP. But he wasn't actually that great. Why not? Defense. The Angels put him out in LF, and he was ... well below average to put it nicely. His bat kept him a very valuable player, but not a superstar.

The Angels dealt with this by moving him around. Allen spent three years in LF, but playing gradually more 1B, where he was less bad. Then he was a more-or-less full-time 1B for three years. Then back to LF for four years, 1B for six years. Usually he spent significant time at both positions in any given year. And he was always bad in the field. So despite the excellent offense, he was usually just all-star level, not really MVP material in terms of WAR.

With that said, he did win a second MVP in 1970, thanks to hitting .303-44-126. He was actually a hair above average that year with the glove, and so it turned out to be his best year at 7 WAR. It was also the first division title for California. They went down in the LCS to Baltimore, but then won the division again in 1972. This time they won 100 games, took down the Red Sox for the pennant, but lost to the surprising Padres in the World Series. Allen was his usual amazing self in the postseason that year, but it wasn't enough.

Allen kept hitting but declining defense and injuries started to take their toll in the late 70's. He was traded to Cleveland in 1980, and after two years was sent to the Cubs to finish out his career. His glove was so bad at the end that he was basically replacement level even with a good batting line. Did I mention that there is no DH in the Replay League?

Like the real Allen, hit bat carried him to an an outstanding career, including 10 All-Star games. This Allen had a lower peak but a longer career, and one that is clearly HOF worthy.

[David Watts]

Really enjoying this.

[3fbrown]

Our first pitcher, at least alphabetically, is Bill Bailey. On one hand, Bailey is really cool. His actual career was pretty uninspiring, as he was a well-below-average deadball pitcher, including losing exactly 2/3 of his decisions in his career, and losing 20 in the Federal League in 1915. But in RL, he took some early talent improvements and became very good for many years, well into the live ball era.

On the other hand, there aren't a lot of fun stories to tell about him. He played in the "other" league (I have run the Braves for all of league history) so I never played against him, and I don't think he won any awards. And related to that - I was playing this era circa 2006 or 2008 or something, and using OOTP 5. Between now and then, much of league history was lost while transferring to newer game versions. So I don't know how many all-star games he played in, or how much WAR he accumulated. I'm not even sure if WAR was invented yet when I played these games!

So, while you can look at his stat line below, and it seems pretty straightforward that he earned a place in the HOF, it's also clear that the stats aren't right. He definitely did not allow all 65 of his career HR allowed in 1924 for example. And his ERA+ and WAR totals assume some incorrect level of offense, so those can be ignored. But you definitely can see when he improved his control to be extremely good, which allowed him to become one of the league greats. I don't know who the Browns got when they traded him to Detroit, but he was just getting good, so I imagine they regretted that trade quite a bit.

For what it is worth, I have my own janky version of WAR for pitchers that I use for this league, that I created in Excel way back when, before WAR even existed as a thing. (It's very rough - no ballpark adjustments or anything like that, just comparing ERA to league.) And in my spreadsheet, Bailey ranks as around the 12th best pitcher in league history. He pitched a lot (28th all-time in IP), and walked very few (18th all-time in BB/9 rate). His 41 shutouts are 20th all-time. He's clearly a HOFer from the olden days of the Replay League.

[3fbrown]

Frank Baker was a no doubt HOFer in real life. In Replay League, he is one of the most marginal players to be elected. This is mostly due to position. He was one of the two best 3B in the first 40+ years of league history. So either Frank Baker and the other mysterious 3B would need to be elected, or no 3B would be elected until 1951. That seemed wrong to me, so Baker was elected.

Baker only ever played for Cleveland, and he was generally pretty consistent. I mean that in a good way, kind of. He did have one dominant year, in 1911, when he hit .340 with good (for the deadball era) power. 1909 and 1915 were also very good years. (Remember, this is pre-1948, so the WAR and OPS+ you see on the stat line mean nothing.) Otherwise he was very consistently average to a bit above average on offense and defense. Not very exciting, I know.

I wrestled with his election for quite a while. It wasn't until 1944, when it was clear that he and the other unnamed guy were the best 3B that RL had to offer for many decades, that I finally gave in and put him in. While he still ranks among the worst HOFers, I think he's probably OK. I have maintained a pretty good balance among positions in the HOF, and the 3B bunch is definitely the weakest. There was a nice bunch in the 40's/50's and another in the 70's, but it has never been a strong position.

In fact, now that I am looking at the list of HOF 3B, Baker is the only one that is also in the actual Hall of Fame! Yes, that means no Eddie Mathews or Mike Schmidt or George Brett. One guy is in my HOF at another position, but overall it has been an almost complete change of top 3B from real life. That's cool - I never realized that before!

My HOF is also considerably smaller than the real one, for whatever that is worth, even after removing managers, pioneers, and Negro Leaguers.

[OzzyOz23]

Originally Posted by David Watts

Really enjoying this.

+1. I cosign to this. I am enjoying the deep dives on player careers.

[3fbrown]

Thanks for the feedback! My plan is to keep kicking through the HOFers, but if anyone wants to hear about a particular player, I am happy to oblige.

I should also briefly mention about Baker and 3B ... I think that situation mirrors reality more than I thought. From 1900-1950, who was the best 3B other than Baker? Heinie Groh? I'm not sure, but it wasn't anyone amazing. And Groh played SS in Replay League, so he wasn't even an option here. So this might be fairly realistic after all!

[3fbrown]

Johnny Bench is another non-surprise, as maybe the best catcher in MLB history. This one looks a bit different though.

For starters, one thing that wasn't different was defense. Bench won 7 Gold Gloves and was a very good defensive catcher until the end. Maybe not as amazing as the real Bench, but plenty good anyway.

Replay League Bench also had a nice long career - 19 years, all with Cleveland. Actually, he lasted longer and was more durable than the actual Bench, which is pretty amazing. In fact, his 2593 games at catcher would obliterate the real record of 2427, held by Ivan Rodriguez, who easily leads that category. He only played C his entire career, other than a couple of innings at 2B and SS(?)! He had knees of steel!

His offense was shaped differently though. Although his batting average matches his real-life counterpart fairly closely, my Bench never walked. Only in his later years did he have a few years above 40. As such, his career OBP was .301, which is not very good. On the other hand, he powered up with 474 HR, #9 all-time. Now, this is in part to playing in Cleveland Municipal Stadium his entire career, a very HR-friendly park in the heart of Bench's career. But because he hit those HR in about 25% more games, his power was actually a little worse than the real life Bench, even ignoring the park. In total, my Bench was a worse hitter - he hit HR but was otherwise just OK.

His career shape is also strange. He showed up young and was immediately good. Then age 28-30 his hitting dropped down quite a bit. But in his 30's he stepped it up again and was strong through age 36. Honestly, at 29 years old I thought maybe he was toast, but he pulled through.

In addition to the Gold Gloves, Bench was an All-Star five times. He was never dominant, but really good for a really long time. He ranks maybe 8th or 9th all-time for catcher I would guess. But this position is another strange one, which we will get into with our next HOFer. You can probably guess who that is...

[3fbrown]

I rate Yogi Berra as the best catcher in Replay League history, though without defensive statistics before 1948 that's tough to say with any confidence. But I want to start by examining the history of catchers in RL.

Catching has been a position that tends to be dominated by single outstanding player. I have kept track of the top 5 players at each position throughout league history, so this is pretty easy to tell.

From 1901-1916, Roger Bresnahan was the best catcher in MLB, except for 1903, when Mike Grady snuck ahead of him for one year. An impressive string of dominance! Then nobody really dominated the 20's. In 1931 came Bill Dickey, who was the top catcher every year through 1944, except for 1941 when Babe Phelps edged him out. In both cases, no other catcher was truly great.

In the 1950's it was Berra's turn. He was the best catcher in baseball every year from 1952-1962, except in 1961 when he was injured. He was also the best in his rookie year of 1947. Like Bresnahan and Dickey before him, Berra totally dominated his position in his time.

You can see his stats and see that he was generally great for his entire career. I will note that toward the end he started playing corner OF, and was not a good defender out there. And the one Gold Glove aside, he was a bit below average behind the plate during his career as well. But he played in 11 All Star games and did win a batting title in 1960, his best season.

Berra played a lot, and so totaled 2800 hits, 400 HR, and nearly 1600 RBI. Like Bench, he played a LOT of games at catcher, but neither is the all-time leader in RL. And you would never guess who tops them both!

Unfortunately for him, the Pirates are among the worst franchises in league history. Their 1998 World Series championship was their first since 1903. They did go 83-71 in 1952, just a game back of the pennant winning Cubs. But they only had two other winning seasons during Berra's career, and they finished 7th or 8th as often as not. He didn't have much help in those days. The Pirates were well known for having high draft picks flame out - and they had a lot of high draft picks.

Berra ended his career by getting traded to Baltimore for Bob Aspromonte, but Berra didn't have much left (though he could still hit), and Aspromonte never had much in the first place.

[3fbrown]

Curt Blefary played for my team, the Braves, so I know him pretty well. When I drafted him he looked like he should - not much of a hit tool, but some power and good patience. And very little defense to offer. He could play 1B adequately, but he was pretty bad at corner OF and terrible at C. His rookie year looked like you might expect - patient, with some power but bad defense. Then two things happened.

First, the team moved from Milwaukee to Atlanta, which meant moving from Milwaukee County Stadium to Atlanta Fulton County Stadium. This is a dramatic change in environment. County Stadium was fairly cavernous, while Fulton County Stadium was known as the Launching Pad. Simply by changing cities, everyone's power would look better. This is part of why the real Hank Aaron looks spookily consistent over his career.

Second, Blefary took some major positive talent increases. He kept his patience but increased his hit and power abilities. He became a force at the plate. And between these two changes he immediately became a superstar. Well, at least a traditional hitting superstar. He led the NL in HR and RBI each of the next eight years! During that time he also led the league in runs five times, slugging five times, and OPS four times. He peaked at 60 HR in 1969 and 1970, the first person to reach that benchmark. His defense was never good, and the home park exaggerated his power, but he was legit. He won three straight MVP awards in 1968-1970, and made eight All-Star teams in nine years. He ended up playing about 70% of his career at 1B and most of the rest in RF, and he was bad in both places.

His run of dominance ended when he hit his thirties in 1974. He still had a solid bat, but his defense got even worse, and he started losing playing time to injuries. He was drafted by the Mariners in the 1977 expansion draft, and played out the string in Seattle, pretty well mind you. His 557 HR ranks 5th, and his 1510 RBI are 17th all-time. He was very much the Mark McGwire or Harmon Killebrew of his day - bringing HR and walks and not much else to the table. But he was so good at those two things that he was one of the greats.

[3fbrown]

Ron Blomberg is famous for being the first DH in MLB history. There is no DH in Replay League, so he could not repeat that accomplishment. So instead he became the most feared hitter of the 1970's instead.

Blomberg must have taken some talent improvements early on. Since I use a 1-5 scale, it's often hard to tell, which is kind of the point - handicapping myself a bit. But from Day One he was an offensive force. His rookie season he hit .336 and led the league in hits and doubles. He was rookie of the year in 1971 for the Dodgers, though he had "only" 5 WAR due to crummy defense in RF. He was just getting warmed up.

He followed up his ROY season by winning the next three NL MVPs. I will not bore you with all his incredible hitting stats - you can see them for yourself below. But 1974 was his career year, in a career full of years few others reach at all. That year he hit .353/.465/.600 with 212 hits, 38 HR, 129 walks, 126 runs scored, and an OPS+ of 216. All of those stats led the NL, as did his 97 RBI and 1.065 OPS. Add in excellent defense at 1B, and it adds up to 11.3 WAR, one of the greatest seasons in RL history, and the most WAR in a season since 1956.

Blomberg cooled off a bit after that season, as if there was any other choice. He had three years at merely an All-Star level, before winning two more MVPs in 1978 and 1979, again leading the league in WAR and OPS and other key hitting stats. After another solid 1980 and an injury-plagued 1981, Blomberg won his last MVP in 1982, a year in which he won his only Gold Glove, though he was an average fielder even at 1B by this point. Injuries were already eating into his playing time, but I guess having an OPS+ of 192 is worth a lot! That was also the only year that his Dodgers made it to the postseason. Sadly, Blomberg missed the NLCS with a virus, and LA was easily taken down by Montreal in 5 games. He would never get to play in a postseason game.

Though it would have been hard to tell, this was the beginning of the end of Blomberg's productive career. Over his career, he played about 60% at 1B and 40% at RF. He had generally been solid in RF and good in 1B, but after 1982 he was bad at both. His hitting and health also declined quickly. 1983 was a decent year, but it was all bat as his glove had faded. He never had another full season of playing, losing time to both injury and ineffectiveness. He was eventually traded to the Astros and then the Phillies, but neither he nor the players he was traded for ever did much.

Blomberg had one of the most potent bats the league has ever seen. His career 175 OPS+ is second (by 2 points) to the all-time leader (who had a much shorter career), though such stats are questionable before 1948. I'm very sure Babe Ruth had a higher OPS+, but even second since 1948 is not bad. And given how long he played, Blomberg may well be the most effective hitter in the second half of the 20th century. His 6 MVPs and 11 All-Star appearances are a testament to those abilities.

[3fbrown]

Vida Blue has a very straightforward case for being an all-time Replay League great. He won four Cy Young awards, was an All-Star 10 times, and from 1975-1984, with the exception of one year where he was hurt, he was worth at least 8 WAR every single year. In addition to being a dominant pitcher, he was a horse, leading the NL in innings pitched six different times, and pitched seven years with at least 290 IP. His career ERA was 2.99, and his 3507 strikeouts is 4th all-time, though Dwight Gooden will pass him in his next start. I believe Vida Blue can claim to have the best pitching career since 1970, at least of retired players.

The one tiny crack in the armor here is that Blue pitched his entire career for Houston, meaning that half of his career innings came in the Astrodome. So while his stats look awesome, they are definitely influenced by the home park, especially that 0.5 HR/9 figure. But even with that taken into account, he was one of the greats.

Blue's Astros made it to the playoffs only once in his career. They won the NL West in 1971, his second year. The Astros swept the Mets in the division series, but Oakland won the World Series 5-4. Blue got four postseason starts, and although he pitched decently in terms of walks and strikeouts, a lot of hits fell in, and he went 1-2 with an ERA over 6.00.

Blue was excellent right up to the end, when injuries took their toll. In 1985 he had a 1.73 ERA in an injury-shortened season. In 1986 his ERA was still under 3.00, at age 36. In 1987 he started to slip, and 1988 was the end for him. He ended up just four wins shy of 300, but he never made it back to the majors, retiring after three years in AAA trying to get back.

After looking at Blue's career, I wonder if anyone will ever win 300 again in my league. Only one man has won 300 since 1959, and that was Johnny Podres, who squeaked by with exactly 300 in 1973. I'll write more about him when his name gets called, but even he is a bit of a special case in some sense. The last guys to win 300 while still being useful pitchers were back in the mid-50's. There is only one active pitcher with more than 175 wins, and he isn't young. Nobody under 30 has 100 wins either. It will be a while!

[3fbrown]

Like a lot of players in Replay League, Frank Bolling spent his entire career with one team. His career was short and filled with injuries, yet it was still both great and interesting.

The real Frank Bolling was a decent 2B for Detroit and Milwaukee with a career centered around 1960. In RL, he took across-the-board talent improvements to his hitting after a pretty unimpressive rookie season in Cincinnati in 1954. He never again had fewer than 4 WAR in a season, had a .400 OBP almost every year, hit as many as 30 HR, led the league in walks five times, won three Gold Gloves, made 10 All-Star teams, and won two MVP awards. His career slash line was .310/.418/.481, good for a 154 OPS+, which is amazing for a good defensive 2B of that era. He averaged 8.0 WAR per 162 games!

Bolling won the NL MVP in 1958 and 1959. In 1958 he hit .359/.454/.589 (all marks that led his league), good for an OPS+ of 193. He also led the league in hits, doubles, and walks. This, plus the best defense in the NL, added up to 11.2 WAR. 1959 was very similar, leading the league in hits, walks, runs, OBP, SLG, and OPS, and earning 10.7 WAR. These are easily the best two seasons for a second baseman since 1948, and possibly ever, depending on how good Rogers Hornsby was at defense in his prime. Fun fact, the third best season by a 2B since 1948 was...Frank Bolling in 1963! Speaking of which...

Bolling always had trouble with injuries, and near the end of the 1961 season he fractured his skull. This could have been career-ending, and he missed all of 1962 recovering. Typically if a player is out that long they lose talent, and often never make it back. But Bolling returned in 1963 as good as ever, earning 8.5 WAR in his comeback season. After three more dominant seasons, he hurt his shoulder in 1967, and he could not recover from that injury. He played only 13 seasons, but compiled 89 WAR in total. That is the most from a second baseman since 1948, and only one other person is even within 30 WAR of that total. Bolling was a rare offensive force in the middle infield.

[3fbrown]

The story of Lou Boudreau will not be a grand tale of thrills and excitement. He was a really good shortstop.

Boudreau played his entire career for the (my) Boston/Milwaukee Braves/Bees. He was my leadoff hitter for most of those years because while his power was limited, he had strong on-base skills. Despite that, he never actually scored 100 runs in a season, though he scored 90+ seven times, and led the league at least once.

Boudreau had, as far as I can tell, one dominant season. He had 8.6 WAR in 1952 (at age 34!) in easily his best year. But every year he played a lot, got on base a lot, and played very good defense at SS. He was an All-Star four times and won two Gold Gloves. But since the first 60% of his career came before 1948, we are missing some information.

So I can go with my own notes. I have Boudreau ranking as the best shortstop in MLB five times, and the 2nd-best SS four more times. But his era had few great shortstops, so that may overrate him a tiny bit.

The real Boudreau had a shorter but more impactful career. Overall I would guess the real and RL Boudreaus were equally valuable, in those slightly different ways, and both are clearly qualified but lower tier HOFers. He is definitely the best shortstop in Braves history!

[3fbrown]

Gene Brabender was not a great pitcher in real life. He had control problems, and is probably best known for playing for the Seattle Pilots near the end of his five-year career, and thus appearing in Jim Bouton's book Ball Four. This Gene Brabender improved steadily in his early years and never looked back.

Brabender was drafted in the 3rd round of the 1966 draft by Detroit. The Tigers released him before the season, and he was eventually signed by the Twins. His rookie year in the Twin Cities was very good, but he mostly pitched out of the bullpen. Despite the 2.16 ERA, the Twins released him after the season, and he signed with the Washington Senators - the second version that is. He would never relieve again.

His first season in Washington he displayed one of his defining skills - pitching a lot. He started 38 games, and he wouldn't start fewer until 1974, averaging 40 starts over those seven seasons. His ERA was 3.24 in that first Senators season, but it was 1967, so that was just barely above average. But in 1968 he would demonstrate his other defining feature - pinpoint control. In 1968 he brought his walks down to 1.9 BB/9, and he would finish his career with 2.1 walks per nine.

1968 was Brabender's age 26 season, so he was not young. But he would pitch no fewer than 215 innings in any season until he was 41 years old! You can see his career stat line below, and he showed that consistency for a lot of years - pitching a lot of innings and walking very few batters. He was good at other things too, but especially those two things. He was great through 1974 earning 7+ WAR nearly every year. He won the 1972 AL Cy Young Award, but honestly, that year doesn't look much different than any other nearby season.

1972 was the year that his Senators moved to Texas and became the Rangers. But his time in Texas was brief, as he was traded to the Brewers before the 1975 season. Around the same time as his move to Milwaukee, he started giving up more HRs, and became a good instead of great pitcher. After three good years with the Brewers, he was traded to the Mariners, and after one mediocre year in Seattle, he was sent along to Montreal. There his decline began in earnest. Over the course of six seasons, Brabender went from good to OK to below average. Of course, he was 42 at the end of that stretch, so it's no surprise. At that point, the Giants decided they needed his services, and gave up Kevin McReynolds no less! Brabender managed nearly 200 innings in SF, but they were not good innings, and he called it quits after 1985.

The rest of the story is a bit of a mixed bag. He did make it to the postseason four times, including three of his six years in Montreal. Although he did win a championship in 1982 with the Expos, he never really helped his teams in the postseason, going a combined 1-8 with an ERA over 5.00. On the upside, he managed to win a Gold Glove in that magical 1982 season, at age 40!

Brabender ended up in the top 20 pitchers in inning pitched all-time, and most of the guys ahead of him pitched in the dead ball era. He started 631 games ,6th in league history. His 286 career wins are 15th all-time. WAR totals are messed up before 1948, but since that time his 87 WAR are 5th all-time. Jim Bouton described Brabender as looking like he wanted to crush your spleen. This Brabender crushed spleens for 20 years, and went straight to the Hall of Fame.

[3fbrown]

As mentioned before, Roger Bresnahan is one of the Big 3 catchers. He utterly dominated the first 16 years of the 20 century at his position.

Bresnahan's story is pretty simple. He played in the deadball era, and hit for a relatively good average. He also walked a LOT. Unfortunately I can't tell who led the league back then, but he would have been among the league leaders in most years. As such, he had a great OBP; his career OBP was above .400, which is terrific for any era, and the best of any catcher in league history. He scored a lot of runs, and stole a few bases too. His power on the other hand ... I mean, he hit some doubles and triples, but he had 13 career HR. Unfortunately I have no idea how good his defense was. From his stat lines I can infer that he was very durable. It looks like he only missed time in 1911, but he made up for it by getting on base nearly half the time!

As mentioned in the Yogi Berra writeup, excepting 1903, Bresnahan was the best catcher in baseball every year from 1901-1916. And even in 1903 he was a close second behind a career year from slugger Mike Grady. I have no record of WAR or All-Star games, but surely he must have collected a lot of both. Bresnahan is an iconic player in RL, an inner circle HOFer.

[3fbrown]

Here is an example of the circumstances of a player's debut changing the course of their career, both in real life and in Replay League. The real Tommy Brown debuted with the Dodgers in 1944 at age 16, when most of the regular players were off fulfilling their military obligations during WWII. He was a utility player, playing all around the infield and outfield, but more at shortstop than any other position. Also, he was terrible, with a career WAR of -2.

Replay League's Tommy Brown thus also debuted at age 16, drafted by the New York Giants. He was a utility man (boy?) through his teenage years, but had some talent increases and developed into a productive starter by age 20. Since he was still so young, he had plenty of time to have a long and valuable career.

This Tommy Brown played all over the infield, playing over 600 each at 2B, SS, and 1B, and another 300+ at 3B. About 2/3 of his career innings came in the middle infield. He was a good defender at 2B, winning a Gold Glove in 1955, but below average at SS. Not surprisingly he was excellent at 1B when he played there.

For his first four years as a regular, Brown was solid. He hit well, but his defense was still raw, so his overall value was still as an average to above-average starter. But in 1952 Brown took a big step forward. That year he led the NL with 38 HR and 110 RBI, not to mention also leading in slugging and OPS. He started 152 games spread out between SS, 2B, and 1B that year, becoming the rare utility man to win the MVP. That began a string of five years where Brown was a leading hitter. His 1955 season was even stronger on offense, but he had a few injuries that cut into his playing time - otherwise he probably would have won his second MVP that year. That was the only time he ever had significant injury problems.

The Giants were up and down during his time with them, but they did win back-to-back pennants in 1954-55, thanks to good all-around performances from Brown and Bobby Thomson, and strong pitching from Early Wynn and Stu Miller. Brown contributed quite a bit to both World Series appearances, both seven game affairs (out of nine). In 1954 he hit an empty .357 (which is still quite good), but his team lost to the Eddie Mathews-led White Sox. In 1955 he only hit .240, but with four HR and five walks, leading to 10 RBI and seven runs scored. Combined with Thomson's three HR and 13(!) walks, the Giants took down the slugging Red Sox, taking advantage of their weak (and apparently wild) pitching. While the Red Sox would make several more appearances in the Fall Classic in the late 50's, the Giants would not see the postseason again for two decades.

In 1957-59, now entering his thirties, Brown started to slow down, and was back to being a good but not great player. 1959 was the last of his eight All-Star Game appearances. The Giants, now having moved to San Francisco, were embarking on a total roster overhaul for 1960, so it made sense to move Brown. Now largely playing 1B, he was sent to Cleveland to make room for the newly acquired Norm Cash, fresh off his rookie season.

In Cleveland Brown's offense tanked even though he was only 32 years old. After two lousy years he had a nice comeback season in 1962, to be above average one last time. That 1962 Cleveland team won the AL pennant thanks to nine position players with more than 2 WAR, and upset the juggernaut Milwaukee Braves in the World Series. Brown came off the bench in the series and did not contribute significantly to the win. That was an unexpected World Series victory, as the Braves won 109 games and were in the midst of five straight pennants. This would be the only year from 1961-65 that the Braves did not win the championship.

After 1962, Tommy Brown played three more years in Cleveland as a backup infielder, retiring after 21 years in 1965. His overall career is one of a strong power hitter (three years with more than 40 HR) with a lousy eye and decent defense all around the infield. His positional flexibility was utilized heavily during his career, as he only ever had 100 starts at one position three times in his career, despite starting 100 games total every season from 1948-1962. His 456 HR are tied with Willie Stargell for 11th all-time, though he hit fewer than half that many doubles. He is in the top 50 for career hits, runs, RBI, games played, and total bases. He also stole 250 bases and went 20-20 four times.

I can think of no real life equivalent of this Tommy Brown. There are occasionally guys that play all over the place, but usually they end up settling at one position. And none have the batting profile - big HR power but very little patience - that Brown showed. He's like George Bell with the ability to play good defense all around the infield and outfield. That's a pretty valuable player!

[3fbrown]

This is the Giants OF George Burns, not the other one. Because the career Clevelander (in Replay League) played before 1948, we only have raw hitting stats to go with here.

Our man Burns started off as a decent dead ball left fielder, nothing special. For five years he was a solid player, making three appearances in the top five LF in MLB, but never threatening the top guys like Ty Cobb and Max Carey.

Then in 1918 the ball became live, and so did Burns. In his first five years his highest batting average was .287. After 1918, his lowest batting average was .314, and he twice hit above .390! He had decent power, and stole a lot of bases at a high rate - his 731 SB is currently 5th all-time. He also had great patience, averaging about 100 walks and regularly having OBPs above .440. His career .420 OBP is 9th all-time, but with four of the eight guys ahead of him still active, he could actually rise up in the standings in the next few years as easily as fall.

For the eight years 1918-1925, Burns was clearly the best LF in baseball, and probably the 2nd best OF overall, about 20 miles behind one Mr. Ruth. He won the 1922 AL MVP, when he hit .391 with 110 walks, 56 extra base hits, and 56 steals.

I don't have any fielding information or reliable WAR totals for Burns. But my personal rankings have him comfortably in the top seven LF of all time. But due to lacking more information, he could rank anywhere from #3-7. Regardless, he was a dominant hitter in his day, and an easy HOF decision.