EC's South Island League

[Eugene Church]

Will work on the league awards next.

[Eugene Church]

Monday, June 4, 1956

SUPREME LEAGUE PICKS MVP AND GOLD GLOVERS
The Boys of Summer have played their last games of the 1956 Supreme League season... it's time to hand out the "Supremies", the Academy Awards or "Oscars" of the local baseball circuit on South Island... the top prize is the Supreme League Most Valuable Player... this year the honor is bestowed on Bernie Rivet, star shortstop for the pennant-winning Pelham Oaks... Rivet nudged out his Pelham teammate Doug Patterson and Chris Bowler of the Braxton Bruins.

Rivet has a fine season, playing all 10 games... he topped the league with a .465 BA, 20 hits and 13 runs... Rivet numbers included 2 doubles, 1 triple, 2 homers and 11 RBIs... in addition Rivet won a Golden Glove with an errorless season.

Catcher Doug Patterson played a big part of the Pelham success this year, too... in 10 games he batted .372 with 4 homers, 14 ribbies and 13 runs... Patterson was a solid defender, too... he made no errors this season.

First baseman Chris Bowler poled longballs out of the park with great regularity for Braxton... in 10 games he led the Supreme League with 7 roundtrippers, 16 RBIs and 13 runs... Bowler was 5th with a .378 batting average... he also played good defense with a 1.000 fielding average and also made the Golden Glove team... unfortunately, he didn't get much help on the Bruins... Braxton came in last with a very poor 1-9 mark and was relegated to the Secondary League.

The Supreme League also named the top defensemen, the guys with the good hands, quick feet and good gloves.

Supreme League Golden Glove Team:

[Eugene Church]

1956 Supreme League Stars of the Year

[Eugene Church]

Tuesday, June 5, 1956

GRIN HILL'S NELSON ALL SMILES... '56 SECONDARY LEAGUE GOLDEN BAT
The fans of Grin Hill are all smiles today -- so is the 1956 South Island Secondary League top batter -- Lindsey Nelson -- the 26-year-old catcher was honored as the best batter in the league... Nelson outpolled two longballers and top-notch hitters, Steve McDonald of the Billings Rams and Dwayne Wicker of the Littleville Supermen.

Nelson banged out a terrific season and finished near the top of almost all batting categories... he was tops with 20 RBIs, 4 doubles and 6 home runs... this standout swinger has led the league in RBIs both years... Nelson was second in runs with 11 and hits with 17... in 10 games he hit .436 and wound up second... Nelson finished third with a .500 OBP... his Smileys ran a good race and was tied for second place in the Secondary League standings... they were 5-5 for the season... Nelson was also a standout defender and was also named to the Golden Glove squad... he played errorless ball this year.

#2 in the Secondary League Golden Bat race was 31-year-old Billings catcher Steve McDonald... he played all 10 games and led the league with 19 base hits, .475 BA and .543 OBP, ending up with 3 doubles, 5 homers, 10 RBIs and 7 runs scored... however, his Rams did not fare as well as McDonald... they came in dead last in the Secondary League with a mediocre 3-7 mark, 4 games behind league champ Moon Valley.

Coming in third in the SI Secondary League Golden Bat balloting was Littleville's standout shortstop Dwayne Wicker... in 10 games this season the 37-year-old flourished with a .371 BA and led the league with 6 homers... Wicker drove in 14 runs and finished second to Nelson... he also scored 10 times... his Littleville Supermen were tied with 4 other teams for second place at 5-5.

The South Island League Sportswriters also announced the 1956 Golden Glove Team.

[Eugene Church]

1956 Secondary League Stars of the Year

[jg2977]

The Superman uniform is really cool. All it needs is a red cape!

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by jg2977

The Superman uniform is really cool. All it needs is a red cape!

Yep, a cape would really do it.... I think the primary logo has a red cape.

Littleville Supermen is a little bit of a stretch... maybe I should have called them the Smallville Supermen.

I like some of my quaint towns in the South Island League... Grin Hill Smileys may be a wee bit over the line... but I'm having fun with them... they liven up the game recaps a bit.

[Eugene Church]

I have expanded the South Islands League to 12 teams each... there will be 10 new towns and teams... I had so many good logos, jerseys and caps I couldn't fit in using 12 teams, so I am going to expand.

I have already created the teams and rosters... am working on the stadium names now for the new teams.

Once I get all things ready, I will convert to OOTP22, so I can get the improved animations when I play out my games... really excited about the improved animations... I hope they are much better with fewer glitches than OOTP21 animation... I have played a few games and it looks smoother and with fewer glitches in the animation... it is better than OOTP21.

Really looking forward to the expanded Supreme League and the Secondary League... I will probably promote and relegate 2 teams each season...I can't play an 11-game season... that is not even home-and-away... I may make it a 12-game season and have two arch-rivals play twice a season instead on one time.

[jg2977]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

I have expanded the South Islands League to 12 teams each... there will be 10 new towns and teams... I had so many good logos, jerseys and caps I couldn't fit in using 12 teams, so I am going to expand.

I have already created the teams and rosters... am working on the stadium names now for the new teams.

Once I get all things ready, I will convert to OOTP22, so I can get the improved animations when I play out my games... really excited about the improved animations... I hope they are much better with fewer glitches than OOTP21 animation... I have played a few games and it looks smoother and with fewer glitches in the animation... it is better than OOTP21.

Really looking forward to the expanded Supreme League and the Secondary League... I will probably promote and relegate 2 teams each season...I can't play an 11-game season... that is not even home-and-away... I may make it a 12-game season and have two arch-rivals play twice a season instead on one time.

Looking forward to seeing who the new teams will be.

It would be fun to play out every game in a small promotion-relegation league with a short season. I'll have to create one of my own soon. It seems like it would be pretty easy to do. I would just have to create my own schedule where there's one game for each team per week, that would be the toughest part.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by jg2977

Looking forward to seeing who the new teams will be.

It would be fun to play out every game in a small promotion-relegation league with a short season. I'll have to create one of my own soon. It seems like it would be pretty easy to do. I would just have to create my own schedule where there's one game for each team per week, that would be the toughest part.

It is really enjoyable for me to play out each batter in each game... I really like the short season and the small league.

Creating your own schedule for a short season is not hard to do... just be sure to get the schedule editor to give you a report showing exactly who will play who and how many times at home and away... it will give you a report showing if it is correct.

I may see if I can get one of the schedule creators to do one for me... that way I would just have to install their schedule each year... not sure if promotion/relegation can be used as the teams would be different each season.... but I'm sure they would know if it would be possible

[jg2977]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

It is really enjoyable for me to play out each batter in each game... I really like the short season and the small league.

Creating your own schedule for a short season is not hard to do... just be sure to get the schedule editor to give you a report showing exactly who will play who and how many times at home and away... it will give you a report showing if it is correct.

I may see if I can get one of the schedule creators to do one for me... that way I would just have to install their schedule each year... not sure if promotion/relegation can be used as the teams would be different each season.... but I'm sure they would know if it would be possible

Let me know what you find out about creating a schedule. I want to be able to do that in the easiest way possible.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by jg2977

Let me know what you find out about creating a schedule. I want to be able to do that in the easiest way possible.

Yep, don't we all want the easy way.

I just finished the spring training schedule for the South Island Leagues... took me about 2 hours.

But the hard part will be to do the regular season schedule and try to get 6 homes games and 6 away games for each team.

I have 12 teams in each league... I would have to do a 22-game season to get home and away for each team... but I don't want to play that many games.

I will just add a 12th game and try to have each team have 6 home games and 6 away games... each team will play one team twice so I can have a balanced home and away number for each team.
The home team has a little advantage built into the game... in MLB on the average home teams win 55% of the time... Markus put it in years ago into the game.

[Eugene Church]

Converted the South Island Leagues to OOTP22... let's hope all is well and everything will work OK... hope the stats will stay similar to what they were in OOTP21.

Have added 12 new teams... season three is ready to go once I do the league schedules.

I will post the new teams complete with their logos, jerseys and caps... I think they all look pretty good... basically, low, knuckler, txranger and Lawn Loaf did them.

[Eugene Church]

Just finished the Supreme League schedule... took about 3 hours... not too bad... I did get a good schedule... each team plays 6 home games and 6 away games.

[Eugene Church]

Just finished spring training... will now cut the roster down to the active rosters.

[Eugene Church]

Cutting down the active roster to 15 takes a lot of time.
Slow going... I have completed the 12 Supreme League teams.
Will try to finish the Secondary League on Wednesday.
Hope to be playing games soon.

I played out one game in the IPA -- the league All-Star Game.
The animation is much, much smoother than in OOTP21... I really like it.
But I noticed there were no foul outs in the All-Star Game.
Hope they have fixed the weird flight of the foul outs.
No outfielders ran through the fence chasing the ball.

Yep, I know this is a very, very small sample... but so far, so good.

[jg2977]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

Cutting down the active roster to 15 takes a lot of time.
Slow going... I have completed the 12 Supreme League teams.
Will try to finish the Secondary League on Wednesday.
Hope to be playing games soon.

I played out one game in the IPA -- the league All-Star Game.
The animation is much, much smoother than in OOTP21... I really like it.
But I noticed there were no foul outs in the All-Star Game.
Hope they have fixed the weird flight of the foul outs.
No outfielders ran through the fence chasing the ball.

Yep, I know this is a very, very small sample... but so far, so good.

I get foul ball outs all the time. Some of them look normal, others still take a weird trajectory. One thing that bothers me is that many times a fielder drops a ball in foul territory and it results in an error.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by jg2977

I get foul ball outs all the time. Some of them look normal, others still take a weird trajectory. One thing that bothers me is that many times a fielder drops a ball in foul territory and it results in an error.

Yes, I have seen the dropped foul balls in OOTP21... that does happen.

Are you saying it happens too much?

It only happens occasionally in my leagues... seems to be a normal amount.

I wish outfielders would stop playing diving to catch the ball so much... they must do it 10 times a game... there are also too many great plays in the game... it doesn't happen but 1-2 times a game in real life... and maybe not even that much.

My wife and I keep a detailed scorebook at games and we mark standout plays with an asterisk *... there are not a lot of asterisks in our scorebook... web gems get one *... a superb play or throw gets **.

When the MLB network recaps games each evening... they show the perfect plays or as ESPN used to call them "web gems" on Baseball Tonight... there are usually only 5 or so each program... and that covers 15 games most days.

Still the animation and game is gorgeous... Markus and the crew have created an absolutely marvelous game.

[jg2977]

Originally Posted by Eugene Church

Yes, I have seen the dropped foul balls in OOTP21... that does happen.

Are you saying it happens too much?

It only happens occasionally in my leagues... seems to be a normal amount.

I wish outfielders would stop playing diving to catch the ball so much... they must do it 10 times a game... there are also too many great plays in the game... it doesn't happen but 1-2 times a game in real life... and maybe not even that much.

My wife and I keep a detailed scorebook at games and we mark standout plays with an asterisk *... there are not a lot of asterisks in our scorebook... web gems get one *... a superb play or throw gets **.

When the MLB network recaps games each evening... they show the perfect plays or as ESPN used to call them "web gems" on Baseball Tonight... there are usually only 5 or so each program... and that covers 15 games most days.

Still the animation and game is gorgeous... Markus and the crew have created an absolutely marvelous game.

Yes, I think that there are too many foul balls that are called for errors. In my opinion they shouldn't even count it as an error because the ball it technically out of play. If dropped the batter doesn't reach base, he continues the at-bat.

This year they focused a lot on the 3D stadiums, which are done beautifully. Have you seen the 10 Korean stadiums that they have included in the game? Those are gorgeous too, and I use them for some of my IPA franchises, as well as my NHL dynasty. (I think if I reduce the amount of playoff teams from 24 to 16 I'll enjoy the NHL better.)

A few people speculate that for OOTP23 they will focus on improving the 3D animations and gameplay. I really hope so. But as it is right now, I have a blast playing this game.

[Eugene Church]

MY LIFE IN 1956
EC's in a Fix in '56

Methinks it is time to catch up on sports in 1956.

It was a good season for my beloved Mobile Bears and New Orleans Pelicans... the Bears came in tied for third with Birmingham and beat them 8-2 in a playoff game to determine seeding... the Pels finished 5th, but were in the hunt for a spot in the postseason playoffs... Mobile was beaten 4 games to 3 by second place Memphis in the first round... the Bears were up 2-0 and 3-2 but just couldn't put the Chickasaws away... and pennant winner Atlanta swept Birmingham in 4 games.

Atlanta whipped Memphis 4 games to 3 to win the SA playoffs and qualitied for the Dixie Series against the Texas League champion for the Double A title... the Houston Buffaloes defeated the Crackers in 6 games.

Mobile got good performances from first baseman Gordy Coleman (future Cincinnati Red) and pitchers Bill Dailey (future Minnesota Twin) and Gene Lary... Coleman was 4th in batting with a .318 BA and second in RBIs with 117... Dailey led the league with a 3.18 ERA, winding up 15-7... and Lary was 19-7 and led the league in innings pitched 195.

First baseman Al Grunwald and outfielders Johnny Powers (future Pittsburgh Pirate) and Emil Panko have fine seasons for New Orleans... Grunwald was second in batting in the Southern Association with a .331 mark... Powers won the home-run crown with 39... Panko was second with 33... I think the Pelicans suffered from a lack of pitching this year... they could hit.