Season 32 (2050) Discussion Thread

[BigRed75]

Well, the Beltways achieved a positive outcome on their Cecil Travis bid, and with the SS comes the eighth card necessary to obtain Goose Goslin.

He's going to replace Brady Anderson at CF. He'll be playing out of position, but so is half the team. What's one more?

[Renfro]

Originally Posted by HelpDodgers

(note: if you get the chance, and you don't know of Bostock, check wikipedia. Died too young. One of the first big $ free agents)

Wow ... Bostock tried to return some of his salary after going .150 for the month of April ... and when management refused, Bostock said he would donate that part of his salary to charity. Incredible.

Thanks for clueing me in on this.

[sharknut]

I moved my perfect Koufax to closer, has anyone else used him at that spot?

[Renfro]

Originally Posted by BigRed75

Well, the Beltways achieved a positive outcome on their Cecil Travis bid, and with the SS comes the eighth card necessary to obtain Goose Goslin.

Let us now how the SE Goslin experiments pans out. I had him as a DH/OF for a criminally short 67 PAs last season and he performed horribly: .186 / .242 / .254 but the jury is still out. For now, SE Tony Oliva took his place and is serviceable in his 4th OF role. In 68 PAs Versus R he's slashing .269 / .279 / .388.

[Caedus]

Which Robinson should I pick for my 3B on my defense and pitching focused-Tahiti?

PEAK 97 Brooks Robinson or PEAK 100 Jackie Robinson?

Both can be had for around 100K (well, some people are pricing Brooks this way). Brooks is a better defender and has a bit more power, but Jackie has all around better batting stats. Once I sell SE Eric Davis I'll have enough to buy either of them for around 105K, but I definitely don't have the points to go for someone more expensive.

Originally Posted by Renfro

Let us now how the SE Goslin experiments pans out. I had him as a DH/OF for a criminally short 67 PAs last season and he performed horribly: .186 / .242 / .254 but the jury is still out. For now, SE Tony Oliva took his place and is serviceable in his 4th OF role. In 68 PAs Versus R he's slashing .269 / .279 / .388.

SE Goslin hit at replacement level for me for about 10 seasons in perfect. He had a couple outlier seasons above .900 OPS but for the most part was in the low 700s.

[JasonC23]

Originally Posted by waittilnextyear

And then the Frogs ended the night on an active 8-game winning streak punctuated with a one-run road victory over the vaunted Singapore Sluggers.

I'm sorry, waittilnextyear; I don't mean to critique another poster's sentence structure or grammar or anything, but I've read this sentence 5 times now and I still cannot comprehend what you're saying here. I see the words "victory" and "Singapore Sluggers," which I've seen used in the same sentence many, many, many times before, but one of the words between them is completely throwing me: "over." As often happens when it comes to the Sluggers, I'm at a loss.

[sharknut]

Originally Posted by sharknut

Of my 3 teams, I am most interested in how the Broncos do in Perfect 423, they avoided relegation via the tiebreaker last year.

In my division is a team just promoted from Diamond and 3 other teams who averaged 66 wins in Perfect last year. Wonder if all 5 of us will be below .500.

So far:

37-37
37-37
36-37
33-40
30-43

barnburner!

[bailey]

After yesterday's debacle, the Magpies were due for a positive regression to the mean and so it was. From 15-12 to 24-4. From 800 PP earned to 12210 earned. Featuring:



and a 78 pitch perfect game.

[Catchthedamnball]

At the halfway point, the Mashers are 34-46. Still a handful of games above relegation; there is hope yet.

At the very least, Garry Maddox might win the batting title and Tom Seaver is holding his own with a 3.36 ERA.

[Westheim]

To my utmost astonishment, the Raccoons are 47-34 at the halfway point, 1 1/2 back in the division and in possession of the first wild card. What??

The Accountants have rallied to be semi-decent and just above .500, but the Rebs are hopeless again this year, tied for last place.

[CrazyWR]

Suns are rolling at this point, third in the division but 5.5 games up as the 2nd WC (5 back of 2nd in the division and the 1st WC). Why do we always get put in these super fun divisions? On a more positive note, CC Sabathia actually decided to show up this season, has an ERA under 4 so far after posting an era somewhere closer to 6 in the first half of both of the prior two seasons.

EDIT: looks like the team I run with my dad the Doctrine (I run pitching) is in the same league with your Raccoons. had to switch out both my closer and setup guy last night since Kuo was over 8 and Burgmeier was over 6, we'll see how that goes but still holding down first place for now (thanks starters).

[Magus978]

It's been a terrible slog for the pack-only Metuchen Mariners, who have turned in a 16-36 record over their last 52 games to put their playoff aspirations in real peril. Guess if RNGjesus wants you to fail, you're going to fail and there's nothing you can do about it.

[FancySkunk]

All-Star Break update:

The Little League Champs enter the break 57-40, within striking distance of the division (3.5 GB) and holding a small lead on the second wildcard (+2).

• The offense has been lead by second-time all star Hugh Duffy who's posted a .330/.372/.538 triple slash to go alongside his 13 homeruns, 59 RBI, and 22 steals. All told he's been good for 2.5 WAR through the season thusfar.
• The pitching meanwhile is being lead by Smoky Joe Wood, in his first season with the club. He's earned all-star honors with an 11-3 record, 2.06 ERA (#2 in the conference), and 3.5 WAR.
• The bullpen meanwhile has been good as usual, but I have to shout out Kirby Yates, who has given up one run all season for a ridiculous 0.25 ERA.

The pitching staff has been heavily retooled over the last couple seasons, with a big mid-season pickup in the form of the 95 Satchel Paige, who despite the low stamina, will be the new #1 starter in the rotation.

[BigRed75]

The Quendas are in a comfortable position, with a 62-34 record and 11-game lead. Surprisingly, the team only had one All-Star, with Juan Soto getting the nod. Newest pitching acquistion Casey Mize, who joined the team last month, is 6-1 in his first seven starts with a 3.46 ERA, and a 40/9 K/BB ratio, so a solid start to his Quendas career (Wes Ferrell, so good for us last season, was bumped from the rotation after a disappointing start to the season).

Pete Alonso and Soto are having a real ding-dong battle for the team lead in homers. Alonso currently leads, 16 to 15. But its Jesus Armando Sanchez who leads the team in RBIs with 56 - and with 12 homers, a hot streak could see him get into contention, too.

Remember how I was complaining about Luis Urias was doing even worse than Garrett Hampson? And how I was contemplating benching him and either brining back Hampson or maybe Nick Madrigal? Well, Urias is now slashing .318/.403/.434 and will take over the team lead in batting once he accumulates enough plate appearances. Glad I didn't pull that trigger!

Meanwhile, over in the DMV, the Beltways are hanging out in 4th place, six games under .500, 8 1/2 out, and they got two All-Star nods! Must have been a down year for catchers in G354 because Chris Hoiles, with his modest stats, got the nod. So did Brooks Robinson. It's the 5th All-Star appearance for my 95 Brooksie and the 11th(!) for Hoiles, who has been in the game since the beginning and with my team for 19 seasons.

That's all well and good, but you want to know how Walter Johnson is doing, right? Well the answer is...kinda underwhelming. He's 5-2 in ten starts, with a 3.59 ERA and 122 ERA+ but a .357 BABIP shows some bad luck, and an absolutely filthy 63/5 KK/B ratio is what you would expect to see from the Big Train. When you dig deeper, it's not too bad at all, but still kinda funny that Walter's surface numbers aren't as good as Casey Mize's

Goose Goslin is hitting .308/.420/.480 in 35 games. And the team is 13th in defensive efficiency and 14th in zone rating, which is exactly what you'd expect from a team with so many people playing out of position. But hey, we're only tied for 9th in errors...

[Renfro]

The Wey-Yu Xenomorphs cooled down considerably leading into the All-Star break, posting a losing record in June after going 39-13 in April and May. We fielded 4 All-Stars: Peak Mark McGwire (currently in a home run battle with Live Trout), SE Lefty Gomez (12-4 and leading the league with a 1.84 ERA), and my catcher platoon: 86 Smoky Burgess, and 92 Yadier Molina. I had pulled Molina in one of the Diamond Packs awarded by completing the Negro League mission back in June. And I had pulled McGwire in the Diamond Pack awarded when I finished the Toronto mission in September.

Anyway, here's the Burgess and Molina offensive stats comparison:

[Westheim]

Rebels keep lingering around the relegation zone in Diamond, 44-61, with no sign of improvement on the horizon. Keston Hiura (at DH!) hits .309 with 15 homers. He is by far the most effective general in the army here, with everybody else having gone more or less lost in the woods with their division.

There is things to like about the Accountants and things definitely needing a closer look in terms of extraordinary depreciation. They are up to 56-52 after sitting ten games under .500 in early May. Six games back in the division, a wild card spot is definitely possible. But the rotation is creaky, and I can't find a leadoff batter worthy of a bonus here. The only guy with a BABIP over .335 seems to be Freddie Freeman, who is not what I have in mind in the #1 spot.

The Raccoons meanwhile had a losing July but at 60-47 still are extremely solid in Perfect while holding on to the first wild card like a creamy donut found in the trash, eager to nomming the damn thing whole. It sure helps that there is no crazy team in their subleague (while CrazyWR's *is* in their subleague, and the 95-12 Washington Explorers are in the other subleague).

Critters aren't facing the Explorers in the regular season, and have yet to play the Lake Monroe Doctrine, but have already taken the season series, 4-2, against the Fort Smith Freaks (atabakin) in the third division in their subleague.

...and somehow they do all of that with only two pitchers with an ERA better than four (Big Walt, Nathan) and three batters with an OPS+ better than 107: Brouthers (.307 with 8 HR) and (92) Clemente and (96) Ott, who have 28 HR and 105 RBI between them while being more or less in a platoon and usually don't amount to 502 PA (but they are not just sharing one lineup spot; depending on handedness of the opposing pitcher, they might indeed both be in the lineup in the corners).

The Coons' only playoff run in Perfect came five years ago (89-73, WC), did not yield a postseason win, and was afterwards met with swift relegation.

The Brooks Robinson thing at short now has him at a 74 defensive rating; he has cost almost a full win on defense while training up all year, but what concerns me more is his cotton candy bat, .239 with 12 homers. But I am manning up right now and will replace David Wright with Frank Thomas at DH. Not that Wright is *bad*, but Thomas might well be better. And if that doesn't work, I still have a Goose Goslin from the Senators missions that also can't reasonably be played in the outfield…

[emilempenza]

Not gonna lie, my all-Rays second team pitching staff is having a pretty good time in it's second season. Probably best to not discuss the hitters however...

[Argonaut]

The Little Rock Crayons have had a bit of a crazy year. Started out terribly out of the gate, with a .375 win percentage in April. Were in the relegation zone as late as June. And now all of a sudden sit in the wildcard spot.

The secret was a stretch of 17 straight days with a game. All my players were yellow and dead tired. Somehow they won 11 in a row during this stretch. Before that the team was leading categories like OBP and wOBA, but still had a losing record.

[Catchthedamnball]

As late August rolls by, the Mashers are laboring in the NC Central cellar at 53-70. Despite the continued brilliance of Garry Maddox, we lead the conference in errors with 78, and are close to the bottom of the league in most other metric as well. We're 4th in stolen bases, baserunning, and HRs, so I guess that counts for something. Funny how I've somehow managed to combine the two aspects of smallball and sabermetrics that aren't synergistic.

Tom Seaver has a 3.90 ERA. That's the best mark on the staff. McCullers, Rick Rhoden, and Carrasco are in the 4s; poor (83) Dave Stieb is 5-14 with a 6.29 ERA. He must've gotten burnt out after his previous postseason heroics.

In the bullpen it's not going much better. (83) Tug McGraw pitched his way out of his 8th-inning job with a 7 ERA; long-man Marcus Stroman isn't much better at 6.05. The startling results come from Trevor Rosenthal and Hansel Robles, who have ERAs in the 2s. I guess by now I should have expected this from Robles, who's done well for me in Gold; his stuff and control are pretty good for a silver card. I'm convinced, however, that Rosenthal's performance is a fluke or a function of how other teams in the league are constructed.

Amid an anemic offense, there are a few gems. Garry Maddox is currently tied for the league lead in BA, and Ken Griffey is somehow overcoming my righty-favoring park factors to lead the league in HR. If those two continue their pace then the PP from those achievements would go a long way to salvage this season.
Rocky Colavito is still chugging along, slashing .271/.365/.471. I don't know if I'll have the time left before OOTP 21 comes out to fashion a well-thought-out, complementary squad that can hold its own in PL, but he's definitely earned himself a role in that plan.

On the other hand, I'm getting really sick of this 91 Miguel Tejada. He hasn't even had a season above .700 since he's joined the team-- even in his debut season in Silver. Nor does he play the defense to justify continuing to start him. The only thing preventing me from auctioning or quickselling him is that I got him from a collection mission; I don't like seeing all those locked historical players when the mission reward is gone.

I cracked 12 packs today after selling a card on the AH. My top pull? Live Ryan Pressly. I haven't kept track of how many packs I've opened to this date, but the number is getting ever larger and I have yet to pull anything better than a live diamond.

[bailey]

Originally Posted by Catchthedamnball

On the other hand, I'm getting really sick of this 91 Miguel Tejada. He hasn't even had a season above .700 since he's joined the team-- even in his debut season in Silver.

You must be referring to fielding percentage. That is bad, very bad.