April 16, 2024

Top 8 1990 League Update

Standings after 57 games

Pit 37 20 .649  -
Bos 30 27 .526  7
Cin 30 27 .526  7
NYM 28 29 .491  9
LAD 27 30 .474 10
Oak 27 30 .474 10
Tor 26 31 .456 11
CHW 23 34 .404 14

The first half of the season has twenty games to go, and with a seven game lead, the Pirates
are going to be hard to beat. Their most recent four game series had them on the road against
the second place Red Sox and their hot hitting second baseman Jody Reed, who is on a pace to
shatter his real-life doubles total of 46. The Sox took the first game 5-1, then dropped the
next three to find themselves in a second place tie with Cincinnati.

Toronto went into a total skid, dropping ten of eleven at one point before finally picking up
a 7-5 win over the Reds. Kelly Gruber has been stalled at 17 homers, while Fred McGriff hasn't
hit one out since the 40 game stat break. Starter Jimmy Key has had his share of pain, watching
his record drop to 7-5, after starting the season with a hot 7-1, 1.78 record. They'll travel to
Pittsburgh for a four game set beginning with game 66.

Meanwhile, the Dodgers put light hitting speedster Juan Samuel at the top of the order, and began
winning some ball games, pushing their way into a tie for fifth with the struggling Oakland A's.
Fernando Valenzuela began the year as the weak link in their rotation, then showed signs of his
former Cy Young award winning self with a couple of strong outings, culminating in his first
complete game victory of the year; an 8-2 decision over the Reds at Chavez Ravine. Fernando allowed
two earned runs on six hits and struck out seven to improve his record to 3-6. After another win
since then, his record is sitting at 4-6 as he tries to hit .500 on the year.

Full stats will be available for viewing at the end of the first half.

First Time I Rated a Team

Two weeks ago, I finished rating all the teams from 2023 using my "serious"
EI rating spreadsheet which you can download for free here at the website.
The ratings themselves were a snap. What took me a long time was formatting
the ratings to somewhat resemble the text files created by Harrison Newhouse,
and which can still be found at Ron Bernier's Baseball Sims site. A total of two
weeks were needed to complete the task. During all this work, I began to think
back to the first time I ever rated a team for Extra Innings. In 1972, I was given
an issue of Baseball Digest and Street and Smith's Baseball as a gift. Man, I
devoured those magazines. I still have that Baseball Digest (see below), and though
I am a Dodger fan, I was intrigued by the White Sox  of Dick Allen and Wilbur
Wood. In Street and Smith's was the ad for Extra Innings that caught my eye. I
liked that it was advertised as a serious game that came in a binder, and more than
that, the game included the formula to rate any team. Coming from a family that
wasn't exactly swimming in disposable income, the rate 'em yourself feature was
very attractive indeed. Years later, when I was finally able to afford the ten bucks
to buy EI, I dove right in. One of my early projects was something I called the
Historical Rosters Tournament. EI came with a ton of teams, along with the just
completed '77 season, so I selected eight of the old NL teams and seven of the old
AL teams. I then elected to rate the '72 White Sox as the eighth AL team. This was
done in the summer of 1978, and all I had was a pencil, some looseleaf paper, and a
cheap calculator from Radio Shack. I had bought the '73 edition of Street and Smith's
and used the stats I needed from there. It took me about an hour or so, but then I had
my team; and here it is!

I like looking at how I organized things back then. Starting pitchers were given a dot
to the left of their name. Bob Oliver is the only player who has his first name written
out. Their position is listed on the far right, which is almost completely opposite to
how the game company presented them. Apparently I didn't consider at-bats, games
started, or innings pitched as data important enough to list in the ratings. How did they
do in the tournament? I'm glad you asked! They beat the 1911 A's three games to one
in their opening round series, but were bounced out of the tourney by the '71 A's in a
three game sweep. Wood started three games, had two no-decisions, and wound up 0-1,
1.34. Allen went 11 for 26 (.423!) with 4 HR and 7 RBI. 1935 Detroit knocked off the
1929 Cubs four games to three to take the championship.