A Reboot of My Fictional Baseball Universe of 1871: The APBL, NBBO, and Pro/Amateur Split

tm1681 · 06-01-2022, 08:07 PM

This is the story of a pair of leagues that began with logos I was making during down time when I was doing remote work. They are analogues to the National Association of Base Ball Players (NABBP), the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players (NAPBBP), and their resulting split in real life in 1871.

It turned out that there were fatal flaws in my initial NBBO setup over the winter that created major issues when both leagues were up and running, so I started over and re-created the split for OOTP23.

Details of how I decided on names and logos are in this thread. in the Mods forum.

On January 22, 1857 in Manhattan's St. Nicholas Hotel, executives from various baseball clubs in New York City, Brooklyn, and elsewhere in the northeastern United States met to form the first group of organized baseball clubs, the National Base Ball Organization. In that meeting, guidelines for the NBBO's first formal competition were outlined:

Starting in May of 1857, 48 clubs from the northeastern United States would form six "championship" divisions where each club would play the others in their division ten times (two five-game series), for a total of 70 games.
The six divisions were further separated into two leagues: the New York League and the Northeastern League
The winners of each of the three divisions would go to the playoffs, with the team having the best record in each league automatically moving on to the League Championship Series and the other two teams playing a best-of-five series to go to the LCS.
The two league champions would compete for the Tucker-Wheaton Cup, named for the two men who wrote the Knickerbocker Rules for baseball: William Tucker and William Wheaton

The original 48 teams were as follows:

In the early years of the NBBO, even though the oldest clubs were from New York City and Brooklyn it was the clubs outside of New York who proved better, with Northeastern League members winning six of the first ten Tucker-Wheaton Cups. Their champions were varied, with Sons of the Ocean (New Bedford, MA) winning the inaugural Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1857. NEL champions would take the next three, with Granite (Manchester, NH), St. John's (Providence, RI), and Quinnipac (New Haven, CT) winning in '58, '59, & '60. Soon after, the Green Mountain club of Burlington, VT took control of the NEL, winning it three times in five years and taking the Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1863 & 1865.

Over on the New York side, it was all about one team: the Willem von Orange Baseball Club. Even though it didn't have the resources and venue size of the Gotham Club or the Knickerbocker club, the Orange Club won the New York City championship in each of its first nine seasons, going on to win the New York League championship in seven of those nine. However, they could rarely take the final step, only winning the Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1861 & 1864.

Soon after, there were fissures in the amateur league. While most players were given an expense per-diem of $1 or $2 per week during training, star players were given under-the-table payments of as much as $500 per year, essentially making them full-time professionals. Not long after "shamateurism" began, the Orange Club's dominance of the New York League was upended and they went five years without even winning the New York League Championship, with the Knickerbocker club winning four of them.

Still, smaller Northeastern League clubs subsidized by rich owners continued get the best of their NYL counterparts in direct competition, with NEL teams taking the cup in 1867 (Reading v. Excelsior), '68 (Newark v. Gotham), and '69 (Sons of the Ocean v. Atlantic). There were larger clubs in the NEL - Alleghany (Pittsburgh), Shamrock (Boston), Quaker State (Philadelphia) to name a few - but it was these smaller clubs funded either by rich owners or well-to-do patrons and supporters that always managed to frustrate their bigger-city brethren.

Next, the NBBO hits its breaking point in 1870.

tm1681 · 06-02-2022, 08:13 AM

1869-1870: THE NBBO'S "SHAMATEURISM" CRISIS

During the 1870 season, "Shamateurism" brought the NBBO into a full-blown crisis. During the organization's previous thirteen seasons there were always a few teams who were a step above the rest, but in '70 each of the six championships were defined by teams who were clearly better than the rest of the competition. In Brooklyn, Kings County went 49-21 and were about five games clear of any other team. In NYC, the Knickerbocker Club finished 52-18 & Orange went 48-22 while Harlem finished in last place at 22-48. In the Upstate NY championship, the Victory Club won 47/70 games while last-place Binghamton went 20-50. The Northeastern League was more of the same. In the normally cutthroat Coastal championship, Shamrock went 47-23 while the Olympic Club was a shocking 10-60, the worst record in the history of the NBBO. In the Inland championship, Reading was 53-17 - a full eight games better than 2nd place - while last-place Pioneer was 21-49. Finally, in the New England championship Green Mountain was four games in the clear at 44-26 while Granite was the caboose of the train at 25-45.

During the 1870 season it was clear that the usual order of the six championship divisions of the NBBO - mostly tight competitions at the top that sometimes had to be decided with one-game playoffs - had been completely upended by clubs hoarding quality players with under-the-table payments. In particular, Kings County raised eyebrows as they managed to recruit seven-time All Star 2B James Rousey, eight-time All Star CF Herman Farris, and 13-time Orange Club All Star 3B/SS Edward Huntley in a matter of weeks. Kings County GM Alfred Carraway managed to add the trio even though he already had a team containing multiple-time All Stars George Drew (OF), Frederick Madsen (C), and two-way player Delbert Hodges (3B & SP). A club with half a dozen All Stars in a 24-team league looked mighty suspicious, and other clubs who employed the "under-the-table" method were fuming at the brazenness of it while fans of baseball were left wondering if Kings County had bigger plans for the sport itself. It all certainly worked out well, as KC took the Tucker Wheaton Cup in an easy sweep against Green Mountain.

Meanwhile, the Excelsior Club had an issue of its own that was raising eyebrows: that of superstar Konrad Jensen. Continental itself had experienced plenty of success, winning the Brooklyn championship five times and the NYL once, but Providence, RI native Jensen had been recruited by Excelsior in 1858 straight out of high school and was perfectly happy to remain with them even though there were other NYC-area clubs with better facilities, while Providence-based St. John's offered the same. In the 1870 season, Jensen was busy doing just what he'd done in each of the previous three seasons: leading all of the 48-team NBBO in batting average (.422), on-base percentage (.458), slugging percentage (.649), OPS (1.107), OPS+ (222), and total bases (209). He'd become so dominant in his late-20s that fans wondered if he was too good for the league itself.

The real issue with regards to Jensen was an open secret among the other clubs in the NBBO: as Jensen became more and more talented in his mid-20s, Excelsior owner Jeremiah Nelson Tappan secured the funds to pay him no less than $780 in cash each season to stay with Excelsior. This meant that Jensen could focus full-time on honing his already considerable batting skills, and as he became unstoppable his under-the-table pay rose to well over $800 for just three months of baseball each year. Manual laborers averaged a bit over $500 for an entire year's work at the time, so Jensen could easily spend the rest of the nice-weather months perfecting his craft and then work a bit during the winter for some extra spending money.

There was now a clear split between the under-the-table, pay-for-play teams and those who either stuck to amateurism or didn't have the means to slide cash to high quality players. Something had to give, and it did about six weeks after the end of the season.

Next, a pro league is formed...

tm1681 · 06-02-2022, 10:05 AM

OCTOBER 1870: A "GANG OF SEVEN" PAVES THE WAY FOR A PROFESSIONAL LEAGUE

At the start of the NBBO's Fall Meetings at the Astor House Hotel in New York City on October 4th, executives from a group of seven clubs, along with some star players including the aforementioned Konrad Jensen, met to propse what would finally be the end of the era of secret cash deals and fake amateurism with a fully professional league. The seven clubs: Flour City, Kings County, Knickerbocker, Newark, Orange, Quaker State, and Shamrock. The "Gang of Seven" clubs had most of the same things in common: in-division success, at least some post-season success ranging from appearances to championships, and large enough venues to be able to take part in a professional league without needing frequent injections of cash. Howevever, they were hoping for a ten-team league and needed to find three other clubs with somewhat similar attributes willing to make the jump. The candidates they considered:

CHAMPIONS

Sons of the Ocean (New Bedford, MA) - SotO were the 1st NBBO champions, and took the Tucker Wheaton Cup again in 1869. They spent a decade employing the best-hitting 3B in the sport, now 13-time All Star Samuel Kessler. They were also able to develop other multiple-time All Stars such as Andrew Boss (2B), Corey Burnett (3B/RF), and Anthony Gardner (SP). However, the club's two championships came in their only two playoff apperances, and the club had a small fanbase and a stadium that only seated a bit more than 2,000.

Green Mountain B.C. (Burlington, VT) - From the same division as Sons of the Ocean (New England Championship), Green Mountain looked like much the same club on paper. They had two championships, long-employed the sport's best player at one position (11-time All Star SS Anthony Mascherino), and they developed other multiple-time All Stars (LF Raymond Ginn, 1B Howard Barbour, SP Franklin Squires). Their venue also had the same problem in that it sat only around 2,000. However, they had one big advantage on SotO in that they'd won the New England championship seven times instead of two.

Reading Athletic Club (Reading, PA) - Reading took the cup in 1867, had won the Inland championship five times, and had never finished lower than 3rd in Inland since 1858. They also boasted a whopping all-time winning percentage of .624 and finished with a 53-17 record in 1870 as the team featured numerous All Stars and Golden Glove winners. However, their stadium was roughly the same size as that of SotO and Green Mountain, and their ability to recruit players came thanks to cash from rich members of the athletic club that the team was part of. That wouldn't necessarily work in a league where everyone had to be paid a full-time rate.

St. John's B.C. (Providence, RI) - St. John's looked the part of a club that belonged going pro. They had good facilities in a big city, some quality players, a good competitive record (.560 winning percentage all time, 12 straight winning seasons) and a stadium that seated about 10,500. They also won the Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1859. However, they'd only won the New England championship once since then - a division their inherent advantages should have allowed them to dominate.

Victory B.B.C. (Troy, NY) - The "Gang of Seven" was looking to add a 2nd club from upstate New York, and had it been five years earlier the Victory club would have been included with no questions asked. From 1859-63 they won the Upstate New York championship all five times, and took the cup in 1862. However, Victory fell off and they'd frequently hovered around .500 since then, only to bounce back at the perfect time with a 47-23 1870 season that saw them take the Upstate championship again. Problem: they had a small-ish venue (~4,000) that would put them at an income-based disadvantage compared to the other clubs.

SUCCESSFUL CLUBS

Excelsior B.B.C. (Brooklyn, NY) - The Excelsior club had three big things going for it: five 1st-place finishes in the tough Brooklyn championship, an all-time winning percentage of .586 (51-19 in 1867), and baseball's best hitter, Konrad Jensen, as the face of the team. However, they had one small issue and one big issue. Their grounds at Carroll Park only sat about 4,000, much smaller than the clubs already committing to going pro. They were also based in Brooklyn, and the "Gang of Seven" was wary of having four NYC-area clubs in the inaugural season of a ten-team league, as they felt having too many clubs from one city would hurt legitimacy. But...if the sport's best player really didn't want to leave the seasonal baseball club he'd been with for 13 years, why not just bring the whole organization kicking and screaming into the pros?

Atlantic B.B.C. (Brooklyn, NY) - Atlantic was a well-run club that had won the Brooklyn Chapmionship four times, the New York League championship twice, and boasted a .563 all-time winning percentage. However, they'd never had any major stars and they had the same issue as Excelsior in that they'd be a 4th NYC-area club.

Minuteman B.C. (Albany, NY) - Minuteman had won the Upstate NY championship three times and had a decent-sized venue (6,000+), which made them a good candidate for the 2nd upstate New York club. However, their year-to-year form had a tendency to fluctuate and they'd recently made a big mistake in letting 11-time All Star SS Anthony Mascherino go to Quaker State after two seasons, depriving them of a superstar player that the "Gang of Seven" wanted in the league.

BIG CLUBS

Alleghany B.C. (Pittsburgh, PA) - The Alleghany club had been decent (.552 win percentage) but never dominant in an Inland championship they should have been able to take more often but had only won two times. However, in 1868 Pittsburgh Recreation Park was expanded to seat over 17,000 and the team had performed quite well over the past two seasons (40-30, 45-25). While on-field success was lacking, the size of their fanbase was extremely attractive.

American B.C. (Philadelphia, PA) - American had the weakest playing record of any club considered, with a .519 all-time winning percentage and just one playoff appearance. However, in their one playoff appearance they won the Northeastern League championship and they'd spent their 14 NBBO seasons in the hellish Coastal championship - the year they won it was so competitive they needed just a 41-29 record. That said, they had been markedly over .500 in three of the previous four seasons, Glenwood Field sat nearly 15,000, and given the city's size the "Gang of Seven" didn't have any issues adding a 2nd Philadelphia club.

Gotham B.B.C. (New York, NY) - Gotham club executives were among the NBBO's founders, while the club itself predated the organization with its foundation going back to 1852. The Red House at the St. George Cricket Grounds was a fine venue that held nearly 8,000 and the club had 1st-class facilities, but on-field success was lacking. They spent most of the Orange club's dominance of the NYC championship during the NBBO's first decade languishing below .500, and while they did take 1st place with a 46-24 mark in 1868 their record dipped to 40-30 in '69 and then crashed to 28-42 in 1870. They easily had the resources to go pro, but did they have the competence? And again, was a 4th NYC-area club wanted?

Massachusetts Bay B.C. (Boston, MA) - Adding Massachusetts Bay would have meant a 2nd Boston club, but given Boston's size at the time it wouldn't have been a major issue. MB had quality facilities and a stadium that seated just under 9,500. They'd also finished 44-26 in 1870. However, before that they were under .500 as often as they were over it and had won the Coastal Championship once.

Niagara B.B.C. (Buffalo, NY) - Niagara was an odd club. They had never won the Upstate NY championship but had finished 2nd or 3rd no less than eight times in the NBBO's 14 seasons of existence and had a cumulative winning percentage of about .550, with only one losing season to their name. They were almost always "kinda good", and they played in a venue that sat over 11,000. One big point in their favor: ahead of the 1870 season they'd brought in the aforementioned Samuel Kessler after three seasons with Newark.

THE DECISION

In the end, the "Gang of Seven" decided to add the three clubs from outside Brooklyn and New York City that offered not only some big names, but the best chances of professional stability: Alleghany B.C., American B.C., and Niagara B.C. The "Gang of Seven" became ten, and the ten became the American Professional Baseball League.

tm1681 · 06-02-2022, 10:39 AM

PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL (1857-70) IN REVIEW

NBBO FINALISTS & CHAMPIONS – NYL = New York League, NEL = Northeastern League, TWC = Tucker-Wheaton Cup

1857: NYL – Orange BBC (43-27 NYC), NEL – Sons of the Ocean (46-24 NE), TWC – Sons of the Ocean 3-1
1858: NYL – Orange BBC (51-19 NYC), NEL – Granite BC (44-26 NE), TWC – Granite BC 3-0
1859: NYL – Atlantic BBC (45-25 BRK), NEL – St. John’s BC (44-26 NE), TWC – St. John’s 3-0
1860: NYL – Orange BBC (56-14 NYC), NEL – Quinnipiac BC (45-25 NE), TWC – Quinnipiac BC 3-2
1861: NYL – Orange BBC (46-24 NYC), NEL – Green Mountain BC (50-20 NE), TWC – Orange BBC 3-0
1862: NYL – Victory BBC (46-24 UNY), NEL – Quaker State BC (46-24 COA), TWC – Victory BBC 3-1
1863: NYL – Orange BBC (56-14 NYC), NEL – Green Mountain BC (47-23 NE), TWC – Green Mountain BC 3-1
1864: NYL – Orange BBC (42-29 NYC), NEL – American BC (41-29 COA), TWC – Orange BBC 3-2 (2nd title)
1865: NYL – Orange BBC (45-25 NYC), NEL – Green Mountain BC (42-29 NE), TWC – Green Mountain 3-0 (2nd title)
1866: NYL – Flour City BBC (45-25 UNY), NEL – Newark BC (41-29 COA), TWC – Flour City 3-0
1867: NYL – Excelsior BBC (51-19 BRK), NEL – Reading Athletic Club (47-23 INL), TWC – Reading Athletic Club 3-2
1868: NYL – Gotham BBC (46-24 NYC), NEL – Newark BC (47-23 COA), TWC – Newark BC 3-1
1869: NYL – Atlantic BBC (43-27 BRK), NEL – Sons of the Ocean (48-22 NE), TWC – Sons of the Ocean 3-0 (2nd title)
1870: NYL – Kings County BBC (49-21 BRK), NEL – Green Mountain BC (44-26 NE), TWC – Kings County 3-0

Orange BBC absolutely dominated the New York League during its first decade of existence. However, they couldn’t translate that into championships as New England clubs kept finding ways to spoil a presumed Orange victory party at the Tucker-Wheaton Cup.

BEST TEAM OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL

Orange Base Ball Club (New York City Championship)

1857: 43-27, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup
1858: 51-19, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup
1859: 45-25, NYC champs
1860: 56-14, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup
1861: 46-24, NYC & NYL champs, won Tucker-Wheaton Cup
1862: 48-22, NYC champs
1863: 56-14, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup
1864: 42-29, NYC & NYL champs, won Tucker-Wheaton Cup (2nd time)
1865: 45-25, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup
1866: 43-27, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 1 game
1867: 41-29, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 8 games
1868: 44-26, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 2 games
1869: 47-23, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 4 games
[B[1870[/B]: 48-22, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 4 games

PRE-PRO: 655-326 record (.678 WIN%), 9 NYC Championships (5x runners-up), 7 New York League Championships, 2 Tucker-Wheaton Cups (5x runners-up)

Orange BBC was both the most successful, and most snake-bitten, team of the pre-split NBBO. They won the first nine New York City championships and then finished second in each of the next five. However, 4/5 second-place finishes were close and the team had horrible times in the Tucker-Wheaton Cup as well, winning just two out of the seven they went to. With better luck this could have been a team that won no less than 13/14 New York City championships and half (or more) of the awarded Tucker-Wheaton Cups in a 48-team league before the APBL was created. They could have been THE club in early American baseball, but it just wasn’t to be.

TOP BATSMAN OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL

Samuel Kessler – Sons of the Ocean (57-66), Newark (67-69), Niagara (70)

980 G, 1,114 H, .353 AVG, .894 OPS, 169 OPS+, 240 2B, 239 3B, 2,362 TB, 867 RBI, 48.87 WPA (8.07 per 162), 40.2 WAR (6.6 per 162)

2x Tucker-Wheaton Cup winner (1857, 68)
3x Northeastern League Batsman of the Year (1859, 64, 68)
1x Northeastern League Most Valuable Player (1864)
1x Northeastern League Batting Champion (1864: .418)
13x National Base Ball Organization All-Star (1857-61, 62-70)
7x Northeastern League Team of the Year (57-59, 63-65, 68)
6x Northeastern League leader in total bases (1858, 59, 63, 64, 68, 69)
6x Northeastern League leader in triples (1858, 62-65, 68)
5x Northeastern League leader in extra-base hits (1858, 63, 64, 68, 69)
3x Northeastern League leader in OPS (1859, 63, 64)
1x Northeastern League leader in RBIs (1866: 71)
1x Northeastern League leader in runs (1864: 102)

1864: 70 G, .418 AVG (220 OPS+), 102 R, 138 H, 41 XBH, 70 RBI, 206 TB, 29 SB, 4.85 WPA (11.22 per 162), 4.2 WAR (9.7 per 162)

Kessler barely got the nod over Konrad Jensen. Why? Because Jensen was mostly a good-to-very-good hitter until he absolutely took off from 1867-70. Kessler’s consistency, 13 All-Star nods, and pair of Tucker-Wheaton Cups put him over the top. He was one of the driving forces – along with Anthony Mascherino – that put New England baseball on the map when everyone in New York just assumed that the best baseball was played there.

Thomas Maloney of Orange won a pair of MVPs and three Batsman of the Year awards before Kessler had won his second or Jensen his first, but his production in the middle of the 1860s dipped until his OPS was below .800 for a whole season. He still ended up on 10 All-Star teams and 6 editions of the NYL Team of the Year, but his overall numbers ultimately didn't stack up with the other two.

TOP HURLER OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL

Carl Bancroft – Orange BBC (1857-70)

280-130 record, 3.44 ERA (103 ERA+), 3,649.2 IP, 274 CG, 134 BB, 464 K, 57.5 WAR (3.5 per 225 IP)

2x Tucker-Wheaton Cup winner (1861, 64)
3x New York League Hurler of the Year (1858, 60, 62)
10x 20-game winner (1858-63, 65, 66, 69, 70)
9x National Base Ball Organization All-Star (1859-61, 64-66, 67, 69)
4x New York League leader in pitcher WAR (1858, 62, 63, 64)
3x New York League leader in shutouts (1859, 66, 69)
2x New York League leader in strikeouts (1858, 1863)
2x New York League leader in complete games (1858, 60)
1x New York League leader in innings (1862)

1862: 26-6, 3.56 ERA (98 ERA+), 291.0 IP, 23 CG, 14 BB, 38 K, 1.28 WHIP, 4.8 WAR (3.7 per 225 IP)

There’s really no debate: Carl Bancroft was the best pitcher in pre-professional baseball. He went on to win another Hurler of the Year award in the initial seasons in the APBL and retired as the first pitcher ever to win 300+ games (332). Nobody came remotely close to his win total of 280 in the 1857-70 timespan – Josiah Rayburn and Teddy Brinkley were next up at 209 and 208 respectively. If Orange BBC had thought him an ace right from the start of his career, Bancroft could have conceivably won 300+ in the pre-pro days as he didn’t start a single game as a 22-year-old in the NBBO’s inaugural season of 1857.

TOP PLAYER OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL

Edward Huntley – Orange BBC (1858-69) & Kings County (1870)

903 G, 1,480 H, 401 XBH, 1,064 R, .353 AVG, .855 OPS, 152 OPS+, 840 RBI, 543 SB, 238.4 ZR (3B/SS), 50.44 WPA (9.04 per 162), 49.7 WAR (8.9 per 162)

2x Tucker-Wheaton Cup winner (1861, 64)
3x New York League Most Valuable Player (1860, 63, 65)
2x New York League Batsman of the Year (1863, 66)
13x National Base Ball Organization All-Star (1858-70)
9x New York League Team of the Year at 3B or SS (1859-63, 66, 67, 69, 70)
6x New York League Golden Glove at 3B (1858-62, 64)
1x New York League Batting Champion (1865: .392)
7x New York League leader in non-pitcher WAR (1860-63, 65, 66, 69)
3x New York League leader in runs (1863, 65, 66)

1860 (Orange): 70 G, .381 AVG, .895 OPS (166 OPS+), 88 R, 123 H, 75 RBI, 164 TB, 57 SB (5 CS), +30.0 ZR at 3B, 4.74 WPA (10.96 per 162), 4.8 WAR (11.1 per 162)

Huntley was the most well-rounded player in the league, and its most popular given that he was the face of Orange BBC. He played gold-glove third base perennially and switched seamlessly over to shortstop in 1867 after Orange’s starter at the position was signed away. He could do anything and do it well: hit, run, field, steal, move runners, find the gap, cover in the field. He was one of two players to be named league MVP three times (Konrad Jensen) and he’s also notable because he was part of Kings County’s haul of All-Stars before the 1870 season that got a group of clubs to think that maybe it was time for an above-board professional league.

There’s a persuasive argument to be made for Anthony Mascherino, who had more Golden Gloves (8), as many Tucker-Wheaton Cups, (2), and higher overall WAR (51.6) than Huntley, but he did that specializing in one position (SS) while playing for a team that wasn’t as prominent, and his fame was mostly linked to his extraordinary defense (30+ ZR at SS five times in 70-game seasons, won 6 more Gold Gloves in the APBL for a career total of 14).

BEST INDIVIDUAL SEASON OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL

Konrad Jensen – Excelsior BBC (1867)

70 G, .451 AVG, 1.127 OPS (222 OPS+), 109 R, 152 H, 49 XBH, 90 RBI, 218 TB, 40 SB (8 CS), 8.05 WPA (18.63 per 162), 4.9 WAR (11.3 per 162)

NBBO All-Star
NYL Batsman of the Year
NYL Most Valuable Player
NYL Team of the Year
NYL Batting Champion
3x NYL Batter of the Month
Led NYL in plate appearances, average, on-base %, slugging %, OPS, hits, total bases, doubles, RBIs, runs, walks, and non-pitcher WAR

This was the season where Jensen went from consistent young star to legend. Average: up 119 (.332 to .451) points from the year before. OPS: up 278 (.849 to 1.127). RBIs: up 33 (58 to 90). Stolen bases: up by about half (26 to 40). This would be the first of four straight seasons in which he led the New York League in AVG, OBP, SLG, OPS, and WPA. He hit over .400 in three of those four seasons, and in the other one he hit .395 with an OPS over 1.000 and had more than 6.1 WPA in 70 games.

ALL PRE-PROFESSIONAL TEAM

C: James Starrett – Quinnipiac (57-66), Minuteman (67), Hilltop (68-69), Merrimack Mills (70) – 8x All-Star, 4x Team of the Year, 21.9 WAR (4.0/162)
1B: DeVos Springer – Reading AC (60-68), Atlantic (69-70) – 7x Team of the Year, 6x All-Star, 1x Batsman of the Year, 21.6 WAR (4.6/162)
2B: Benjamin Chin – Granite (57-61), Merrimack (62), Victory (63-65), Gotham (66-67), Knickerbocker (68-70) – 4x All-Star, 4x Team of the Year, 26.2 WAR (4.4/162)
3B: Samuel Kessler – SotO (57-66), Newark (67-69), Niagara (70) – 13x All-Star, 7x Team of the Year, 3x Batsman of the Year, 1x MVP, 40.2 WAR (6.6/162)
SS: Anthony Mascherino – Green Mountain (57-68), Minuteman (69-70) – 11x All-Star, 8x Golden Glove, 5x Team of the Year, 1x Batsman of the Year, 1x MVP, 51.6 WAR (9.4/162)
LF: Thomas Maloney – Orange (57-70) – 10x All-Star, 6x Team of the Year, 3x Batsman of the Year, 2x MVP, 2x Golden Glove, 34.4 WAR (5.8/162)
CF: Herman Ferris – St. Johns (60-65), Mutual (66-69), Kings County (70) – 8x All-Star, 5x Team of the Year, 1x MVP, 1x Golden Glove 31.3 WAR (6.6/162)
RF: Konrad Jensen – Excelsior (57-70) – 9x All-Star, 7x Team of the Year, 4x Batsman of the Year, 3x MVP, 3x Golden Glove, 37.0 WAR (7.1/162)
UT: Edward Huntley – Orange (57-69) & Brooklyn (70) – 3B/SS – 13x All-Star 9x Team of the Year, 6x Golden Glove, 3x MVP, 2x Batsman of the Year (all NYL), 49.7 WAR (8.9/162)
SP: Carl Bancroft – Orange (57-69) – 280-130, 3.44 ERA (103 ERA+), 9x All-Star, 3x Hurler of the Year, 57.5 WAR (3.5/225 IP)
SP: Theodore Brinkley – Niagara (57-63, 68-70), Minuteman (64-65), American (66-67) – 208-176, 3.00 ERA (115 ERA+), 3x All-Star, 1x Hurler of the Year, 52.2 WAR (3.4/225 IP)
SP: Jonathan Ramsey – Minuteman (60-63), Mutual (64-67), Knickerbocker (68-70) – 198-135, 3.17 ERA (112 ERA+), 5x All-Star, 40.1 WAR (3.1/225 IP)

tm1681 · 06-02-2022, 10:56 AM

An aside, this might seem like a lot of words for a fake game, but it's something I'm doing for the fun of it for myself because I've honestly been working on logos very loosely on and off since about 2014. I'd just never had much time to post here...

1871: THE AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE BEGINS PLAY

With ten clubs ready to go pro, it was now ready to figure out what the United States' first professional baseball league - the APBL - would look like. It was quickly decided that the schedule would be like the NBBO schedule in that each team would play each other team ten times. This would make for a 90-game schedule. Also, since there were only ten teams in a single competition, record alone would determine a champion and there would be no playoffs. As in the NBBO, in the case of two (or more) teams tying for 1st only then would there be a playoff, and it would only be one game.

Discussions on rosters and pay became a bit more involved. Continuing with senior-level rosters of 20 wasn't much of an issue, but club executives wanted ways to keep their reserve players sharp. The NBBO allowed clubs to have a dozen players as "reserves", but the ABPL raised that limit to a full 22 so clubs could sign young players and give them the development time that they needed by playing practice games against each other.

On the issue of pay, at the end of a day of discussion it was agreed that, during the season, players should be paid at least as much as manual laborers were typically given at the time: about $10 a week. Adding three weeks of preseason training to the 90-game schedule meant a 21-week schedule, so the minimum pay for the 1870 season was set at $210. From there, clubs could pay their players whatever they wished, with the only stipulation that it all had to be legitimate and above-board now.

Finally, the issue of freedom of player/staff movement had to be resolved. First, club owners and executives agreed that the amount of time players had spent playing in the NBBO wouldn't count because this was a brand-new kind of league with different standards. Second, it was decided that each player could sign for whoever they wanted after playing in the APBL for four years, just like the length of most apprenticeships. This meant that none of the players starting out in the APBL would have their "Freedom of Agency" until after the 1874 season, but at the same time players were told, in writing, that they could receive contracts up to four years in length based on the quality of their play.

The newly professional clubs also decided, on a bit of a whim, to do something that they thought would help market their teams: adding formal nicknames. The clubs already had informal nicknames given to them by fans or local journalists, so they were merely taking the monikers and making them official. Thus, all ten APBL teams were rebranded...

Along with the new names came new ticket prices. Instead of charging a nickel for amateur games, the clubs figured that fans would be willing to pay a dime to go see professionals that would presumably play the game at a higher standard. Those who wanted to go see the reserves play would get in for free.

Next, the NBBO's response...

tm1681 · 08-03-2022, 09:20 PM

1871: THE NBBO REACTS QUICKLY

On the face of it, one would think that losing ten clubs might be devastating for the NBBO. However, given developments in recent seasons the organization was nothing but happy to see a professional league develop so they could go back to focusing on what they did best: developing regional, amateur baseball. They also hoped that the exit of ten economically powerful clubs would put a damper on the illicit cash arms race that had turned the NBBO's six championships into lop-sided affairs during the 1870 season.

The NBBO's Fall Meetings went on at the same time the "Gang of Seven" chose three other clubs and started the APBL, so executives were quick to invite ten replacement clubs. They were well-known amateur clubs from the coastal and northeastern United States, and they were happy to accept their invitations and take the step up to the highest level of the amateur ranks:

Members of the ten clubs were granted NBBO seniority based on the amount of time they'd been playing for their clubs in order to make things fair, and the ten were direct replacements for the departures in their respective regional championships.

Brooklyn: Star BBC (for Kings County)
New York City: Baltic BBC (for Orange), New York Athletic Club (for Knickerbocker)
Upstate NY: Auburn BBC (for Niagara), Frontier BBC (for Flour City)
Coastal: Diamond State BC (for Newark), Maryland BC (for Shamrock), National BC (for American), Philadelphia Tigers Social Club (for Quaker St.)
Inland: Lancastra Britannia BC (for Alleghany)

From there, the NBBO had one major decision left at the time: what to do about Konrad Jensen, who was still registered to the Excelsior club that was not offered a place in the APBL. In the end, Jensen was given a choice between going pro and joining an APBL club or going home to Providence and playing for St. John's, with no cash changing hands should he remain in the NBBO. No longer would he be paid a New York judge's or doctor's going rate to play baseball as a supposed amateur. Jensen made the obvious choice and went pro, joining the newly rebranded Manhattan Orangemen and immediately becoming the APBL's highest-paid player at just north of $1,300 a season. Corner outfield was a particularly deep spot among the APBL's ten founding clubs but Manhattan just happened to have a hole at RF, where Timothy Bates was a fine defender but a mediocre batsman.

In addition, the NBBO passed a resolution barring APBL players from re-joining the competition via the reasoning that it was highly unlikely a full-time professional would go back to unpaid amateur baseball unless there were under-the-table payments going on.

With everything decided, it was now just a matter of moving on to the baseball itself.

tm1681 · 09-07-2022, 09:04 PM

1871-1880: The First Decade of Pro Baseball and the NBBO Continues on

As the APBL began play in 1871, it was hoping to provide both a higher standard of baseball and a more competitive brand of baseball. On both fronts it succeeded, with the inaugural season's title decided on the final day and less than 20 games separating first place from last place over the 90-game season. The champions, Pennsylvania, finished 55-35 (.611), while 10th-place Philadelphia finished 37-53 (.411).

The highly competitive baseball kept up for the first eight seasons, as six of the league's ten teams won at least one title and two of the remaining four finished in the top three at least once. In only 2/8 seasons did the champion finish 5+ games ahead of second place. In 1874 the title was decided via a one-game playoff. In 1876 the top four teams in the standings finished only three games apart from each other, with champion Brooklyn going 55-35 and 4th-place New York finishing 52-38.

The first eight champions of the APBL:

1871: Pennsylvania Quakers (55-35, 1 game ahead)
1872: Manhattan Orangemen (61-29, 7 games ahead)
1873: Boston Shamrocks (61-29, 3 games ahead)
1874: Boston Shamrocks (53-38, won via one-game playoff v. MNH)
1875: Buffalo Blues (60-30, 9 games ahead)
1876: Brooklyn Kings (55-35, 2 games ahead)
1877: New York Knickerbockers (56-34, 3 games ahead)
1878: New York Knickerbockers (64-26, 3 games ahead)

After 1878, the league had two issues: last-place teams were increasingly non-competitive and fanbases were opining that, while they most certainly enjoyed the professional standard of baseball, they missed the playoff atmosphere that was present at the end of the best teams' seasons in the NBBO.

With that in mind, the APBL decided to split the league into two groups and have the top team from each group play for the newly-created "President's Cup" to crown the APBL champion. However, executives decided that six-team groups would work better than five-team groups, and they looked for two clubs to join the pro ranks.

On that front, the decisions were easy as there were two NBBO clubs clearly a cut above the rest. The Excelsior club, which had been turned away at the founding of the APBL and lost Konrad Jensen as a result, didn't respond by wilting but instead became rampant in the Brooklyn Championship. They won it in 1872, and then five straight times from 1874-78, also winning the Tucker-Wheaton Cup three times during that five-year span. Meanwhile, over in Boston the Massachusetts Bay club responded to the reconfigured Coastal Championship by finishing in the top three eight years in a row, winning it each season from 1875-78 while putting up nearly a .700 winning percentage during that time.

Choosing those two clubs meant more concentration of pro baseball in major markets, but given Excelsior's and Massachusetts Bay's success there weren't any other clubs to realistically consider.

Massachusetts Bay kept their core intact upon moving up to pro baseball, supplementing their roster with pro castoffs. On the other hand, Excelsior completed pro baseball's first trade, sending 23-year-old NBBO All-Star Zenos Diakogeorgiou and $4,000 - enough to sign two five-star players or four good enough to have a chance to make Team of the Year with a fine season - to Philadelphia to bring back prodigal son Konrad Jensen.

The two new groups were composed as such:

Colonial Conference: Buffalo, Boston, Massachusetts Bay, New Jersey, Pittsburgh, Rochester
Metropolitan Conference: Brooklyn, Excelsior, Manhattan, New York, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

The first two seasons of the new format brought some competitive balance back, with no team winning more than 2/3 of their games and no team losing more than 2/3. However, the result was the same both seasons as Brooklyn won the first two President's Cup trophies, first over Rochester in 1879 and then over Boston in 1880.

In the NBBO, the baseball ended up being largely dominated by two teams. While the Northeastern League had a mix of six clubs compete for the Tucker-Wheaton Cup during the 1870s, the New York League wound up being controlled by Excelsior and the New York Athletic club after three other clubs won the NYL title in the first three years of the decade. Excelsior won the NYL title and the cup in 1874, 75, and 78 before moving to the APBL, while NYAC won the NYL in 1877, 79, and 80 while winning the cup twice.

In 1879, as mentioned, the APBL offered Excelsior and Massachusetts Bay the chance to join the league, which both took immediately. The NBBO responded by adding two clubs from the regional ranks: the Marathon club of Brooklyn and the Scarlets of Salem, Massachusetts...

During the decade the NBBO ran into a problem: after telling players that those who went pro were banned from returning to their league, so many players were signing with agents in the hopes of full-time paydays that average NBBO teams found themselves having difficulty filling out their basic 20-man rosters.

So, in 1877 the NBBO converted from an amateur-only model to a semi-professional model and allowed APBL washouts to return to the league. The roster issues that the NBBO was having almost immediately resolved themselves, and teams ended up not spending much more money than they previously were when they were paying players illicitly, since the best players in the sport were now dedicated pros and NBBO clubs no longer had to worry about pushing around bags filled with hundreds of dollars of cash under the tables to to secure player services.

tm1681 · 09-07-2022, 09:09 PM

THE 1870s IN REVIEW

THE CHAMPIONS

AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE

1871: Pennsylvania Quakers (55-35, no playoffs)
1872: Manhattan Orangemen (61-29, no playoffs)
1873: Boston Shamrocks (61-29, no playoffs)
1874: Boston Shamrocks (53-38, no playoffs)
1875: Buffalo Blues (60-30, no playoffs)
1876: Brooklyn Kings (55-35, no playoffs)
1877: New York Knickerbockers (56-34, no playoffs)
1878: New York Knickerbockers (64-26, no playoffs)
1879: Brooklyn Kings (60-30, President’s Cup 4-0 over Rochester)

Champions were varied in the APBL’s first nine seasons, with six different teams winning the title. Brooklyn were the first champions after the league instituted divisions and a playoff in order to cater to fan demands for a climactic series.

NBBO FINALISTS & CHAMPIONS – Tucker-Wheaton Cup winners in italics

1870: NYL – Kings County BBC (49-21 BRK), NEL – Green Mountain BC (44-26 NE)
1871: NYL – Atlantic BBC (53-17 BRK), NEL – Cantabrigians BC (46-24 NE)
1872: NYL – Mutual BBC (47-23 NYC), NEL – Reading Athletic Club (47-23 INL)
1873: NYL – Victory BBC (49-21 UNY), NEL – Philadelphia Tigers Social Club (45-26 COA)
1874: NYL – Excelsior BBC (43-27 BRK), NEL – Cantabrigians BC (50-20 NE)
1875: NYL – Excelsior BBC (51-19 BRK), NEL – Massachusetts Bay BC (50-20 COA)
1876: NYL – Frontier BBC (52-18 UNY), NEL – Wilkes-Barre Coal Barons (45-25 INL)
1877: NYL – NYAC Athletics (44-26 NYC), NEL – Sons of the Ocean (53-17 NE)
1878: NYL – Excelsior Knights (47-23), NEL – Massachusetts Bay Pilgrims (55-15 COA)
1879: NYL – NYAC Athletics (46-24 NYC), NEL – Reading Athletics (44-26 INL)

Excelsior was so dominant over a five-year stretch (1874-78) that the APBL came calling and they got Konrad Jensen back. However, they weren’t the only team to win more than one Tucker-Wheaton Cup as Reading did it twice.

TEAM OF THE DECADE

Brooklyn Kings (American Professional Baseball Association)

1870 NBBO: 49-21, Brooklyn & NYL champs, Tucker-Wheaton Cup winners
1871 APBL: 47-43, 3rd place
1872 APBL: 53-37, 3rd place
1873 APBL: 47-43, 5th place
1874 APBL: 47-43, 5th place
1875 APBL: 51-39, 2nd place
1876 APBL: 55-35, champions
1877 APBL: 53-37, 2nd place
1878 APBL: 61-29, 2nd place
1879 APBL: 60-30, 1st in Metropolitan, won President’s Cup 4-0 over Rochester

1870s: 523-357 (.594), 2x APBL champs, 1x NBBO champs, 5 other top-three finishes

There were other teams to win a pair of APBL titles during the 1870s (Boston, NY Knickerbockers), but only Brooklyn added a Tucker-Wheaton Cup in their final year in the NBBO to take three titles in the 1870s. That, combined with their consistency, put them alone at the top.

PRO BATSMAN & PLAYER OF THE DECADE

Konrad Jensen – Manhattan Orangemen (1871-74), Buffalo Blues (75-76), Phi. Patriots (77-78), Excelsior Knights (79)

800 G, 1,354 H, .394 AVG, .957 OPS (173 OPS+), 1,354 H, 299 XBH, 1,779 TB, 542 RBI, 301 SB, 38.52 WPA (7.80 per 162), 33.7 WAR (6.9 per 162)

2x APBL champion (1872, 75)
5x APBL Batsman of the Year (1874-77, 79)
7x APBL Team of the Year at OF (1873-77, 79)
4x APBL Batting Champion (1874, 76, 77, 79)
7x APBL leader in walks (1871-75, 77, 78, runner up 2x)
7x APBL leader in on-base percentage (1871-74, 76, 77, 79)
4x APBL leader in OPS (1874, 76, 77, 79, runner up once)
4x APBL leader in home runs (1874, 76-78)
3x APBL leader in hits (1874-76)
3x APBL leader in runs (1872-74)
2x APBL leader in non-pitcher WAR (1874, 77, runner up once)
1x APBL leader in total bases (1874: 236, runner up 3x)
1x APBL leader in runs batted in (1874: 78)

1874 (MNH): 91 G, .416 AVG (200 OPS+), 111 R, 169 H, 44 XBH, 78 RBI, 236 TB, 28 SB (4 CS), 5.61 WPA (9.98 per 162), 5.2 WAR (9.2 per 162)

There is simply no debate: Konrad Jensen was both the best hitter and best overall player of the 1870s. He won five APBL Batsman of the Year awards in six seasons, received 6/7 APBL Team of the Year nods in the outfield to end the decade, had an average as high as .448, finished multiple seasons with an OPS over 1.000, and he did this even though he ended the decade by turning 40. Also, in 1976 he successfully stole 92 times in 90 games just to prove to everyone he could steal bunches of bases if he felt like it. He started the decade with the Orangemen after Excelsior didn’t make the APBL cut and moved a couple of times after that, but he ended the decade back home after his old club proved too dominant for the NBBO.

As with the NBBO-only days, there could be an argument for Anthony Mascherino as the legendary shortstop won four titles plus six gold gloves to bring his career total an incredible 14, and he had slightly higher WAR (34.4). However, Jensen’s superior haul of major awards (7x TotY, 5x BotY, 4x batting champ) put him on the throne.

PRO HURLER OF THE DECADE

Fred Peacock – Penn. Quakers (1871-73, 75), Pitt. Industrials (74), NY Knickerbockers (76-77), Brooklyn Kings (78-79)

198-116 record, 3.44 ERA (120 ERA+), 2,866.2 IP, 214 CG, 12 SHO, 233 BB, 430 K, 54.5 WAR (4.3 per 225 IP)

3x APBL champ (1871, 77, 78)
1x APBL Hurler of the Year (1878)
1st-ever pitcher with 30+ wins in a season (1878: 32)
3x APBL leader in wins (1871, 76, 78)
2x APBL leader in WHIP (1872, 78)
2x APBL leader in K/9 (1877, 79)
1x APBL leader in ERA (1878: 2.44)
1x APBL leader in strikeouts (1879: 68)
1x APBL leader in K/BB: (1879: 2.19/1)

1878 (BRK): 32-11, 2.44 ERA (153 ERA+), 369.0 IP, 29 CG, 43 BB, 69 K, 1.19 WHIP, 6.6 WAR (4.0 per 225 IP)

There was no singularly dominant pitcher over the first nine seasons of the APBL. James Maxwell and Clarence Bowden won two Hurler of the Year Awards each, but Maxwell’s career effectively lasted three seasons due to injury and Bowden had some mediocre years after leaving the Orangemen in 1875. Peacock had more wins than any other pro pitcher in the 1870s and adding his historic 1878 on top of that made him the Hurler of the Decade. Peacock would go on to retire after the 1882 season with more combined NBBO & APBL wins than any other pitcher (369 – 234 in the APBL & 135 in the NBBO), and he retired with a career pitching WAR of 92.1.

ALL-DECADE TEAM

C: Bruce Fine – Knickerbockers (71-75), Boston (76-79) – 4x Team of the Year, 2x Golden Glove, 19.4 WAR (4.3/162)
1B: Jens Kristensen – Boston (71-72), Brooklyn (73-74), Penn. (75-77), NJ (78-79) – 2x Team of the Year, 2x Golden Glove, 9.5 WAR (2.0/162)
2B: James McDonald – Pitt. (71-74), Brooklyn (75-77), Rochester (78-79) – 1x champ, 4x Team of the Year, 12.2 WAR (2.4/162)
3B: James Findley – Boston (71-76), Buffalo (77-78) – 2x champ, 1x Batsman of the Year, 3x Team of the Year, 3x RBI leader, 14.5 WAR (3.9/162)
SS: Anthony Mascherino – Penn. (71-74), Brooklyn (75-76), Knickerbockers (77-79) – 4x champ, 6x Golden Glove, 3x Team of the Year, 34.4 WAR (6.9/162)
OF: Charles Brophy – Knickerbockers (74-79) – 2x champ, 2x MVP, 1x Batsman of the Year, 1x Batting champ, 5x Team of the Year, 26.63 WPA (9.84/162), 20.9 WAR (7.7/162)
OF: Tommy Thompson – Pennsylvania (71-79) – 1x champ, 4x Team of the Year, 7x Golden Glove, 21.07 WPA (4.75/162), 21.8 WAR (4.9/162)
OF: Konrad Jensen – Orange (71-74), Buff. (75-76), Phi. (77-78), Excelsior (79) – 2x champ, 5x Batsman of the Year, 4x Batting champ, 7x Team of the Year, 33.7 WAR (6.9/162)
SP: Fred Peacock – Penn. (71-73, 75), Pitt. (74), Knick. (76-77), Brk. (78-79) – 3x champ, 1x Hurler of the Year, 3x win leader, 30-win season, 198-116, 3.44 ERA, 54.5 WAR (4.3/225 IP)
SP: Clarence Bowden – Orange (71-74), Penn. (75), Phi. (76), Brk. (77-79) – 1x champ, 2x Hurler of the Year, 178-135, 3.18 ERA, 54.8 WAR (4.2/225 IP)
SP: Leland Thurston – NJ (71-74), Pitt. (75-76), Phi. (77-79) – 1x champ, 3x strikeout leader, 2x CG leader (32 in ’77), 181-178, 3.54 ERA, 54.5 WAR (3.6/225 IP)

There was a lot of player movement over the first decade of professional baseball, and a lot of the NBBO greats who went pro retired during it. Because of that, some of the positions on the all-decade team (1B, 2B, SP) are weak. Brophy made it even though he played only five full years, because once he settled in with the Knickerbockers after a brief stint in 1874 he became a superstar at the age of 21 (.996 OPS, 171 OPS+).

tm1681 · 09-07-2022, 09:15 PM

1882: THREE NEW LEAGUES!

With baseball spreading across the United States, whose population was rapidly spreading itself, three new leagues popped up in the Midwestern US in 1882.

First up was the Midwestern Baseball Association, a.k.a the MWBA:

The MWBA was to be the Midwest's answer to the American Professional Baseball League, and similarly it was made up of the best existing amateur clubs from large Midwestern metropolitan areas.

The inaugural season was a competitive affair, with three teams - St. Louis, Louisville, & Lake Michigan - in the title hunt until the final week. In the end St. Louis won the first MWBA championship with a 55-35 record. Bringing up the rear was Chicago at 34-56.

The MWBA’s initial Batsman of the Year was Jacob Milburn (STL – 90 G, .418 AVG, 1.077 OPS, 99 RBI), its inaugural Pitcher of the Year was Charlie Higgins (STL – 27-9, 3.91 ERA, 25 CG, 7.5 WAR), and its first MVP was Obelix Papatamelis (LOU – 90 G, .375 AVG, .998 OPS, 72 RBI, 6.30 WPA).

The first MWBA Team of the Year (League leader in Italics):

P: Charlie Higgins (STL) – 27-9, 3.91 ERA (104 ERA+), 345.2 IP, 25 CG, 58 BB, 37 K, 7.5 WAR, MWBA champ
C: Tobias Nielsen (LOU) - .312 AVG, .769 OPS (116 OPS+), 62 RBI, 43.2% CS, 3.06 CERA, 1.7 WAR
1B: Julian Gregory (CHI) - .344 AVG, .864 OPS (142 OPS+), 54 RBI, 34 XBH, 2.5 WAR
2B: Bryan Lawson (STL) - .359 AVG, .847 OPS (138 OPS+), 90 RBI, 173 TB, 1.1 WAR, MWBA champ
3B: Franklin Rader (MIS) - .362 AVG, .849 OPS (139 OPS+), 69 RBI, 175 TB, 3.1 WAR, Golden Glove
SS: George Shay (CIN) - .332 AVG, .801 OPS (125 OPS+), 68 RBI, 30 XBH, 171 TB, 26.2 ZR at SS, 4.4 WAR
OF: Obelix Papatamelis (LOU) - .375 AVG, .998 OPS (180 OPS+), 72 RBI, 34 SB, 464 PA, 130 R, 50 BB, 6.30 WPA, 4.0 WAR
OF: Burl Chance (LM) - .329 AVG, .826 OPS (131 OPS+), 70 RBI, 30 XBH, 132 TB, 3.50 WPA, 1.7 WAR
OF: Jacob Milburn (STL) – .418 AVG, 1.077 OPS, 201 OPS+, 173 H, 29 3B, 55 XBH, 99 RBI, 5.46 WPA, 3.1 WAR, MWBA champ

In addition to the MWBA, there were two semi-professional leagues that also began play…

tm1681 · 12-26-2022, 10:59 PM

The second league to set up shop was the Great Lakes Baseball Conference, a.k.a the GLBC:

The GLBC didn't cast as wide of a geographical net as the MWBA at the start, limiting itself to Midwestern states that bordered the Great Lakes and cities within those states that were as close as possible to the lakes themselves. The league was nowhere near ambitious as the long-established NBBO, having just 10 teams compared to their 48.

In the GLBC's inaugural season, Saginaw was the clear #1 as they had the league title wrapped up with a week to spare. From there they coasted to a 58-32 record and held the top spot by three games over Toledo. At the other end of the spectrum, the Wolves of Grand Rapids had a very regrettable pro debut, finishing in last place by ten full games at 28-62.

Thomas Mack of Toledo (.365 AVG, .902 OPS, 79 RBI, 199 TB in 90 games) was the league’s first Batsman of the Year, while Robert Beeson (27-15, 24 CG, 24 BB, 55 K, 9.0 WAR), also of Toledo, was the GLBC’s inaugural Pitcher of the Year. Duluth RF George Wise (6.37 WPA in 88 games) was the competition’s first MVP.

tm1681 · 12-27-2022, 05:24 PM

The other semi-pro league was the Baseball League of the American Prairie, commonly shortened to the Prairie League or the PL:

The PL covered a larger area than the other two leagues, allowing applicants from the Dakotas and Kansas all the way east to southern Illinois. However, in the end they settled on ten teams with the league largely confined to four states, as Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, and Nebraska combined to have nine of the ten entrants.

During the first year of the Prairie League, it was basically St. Paul as the frontrunner and nine other teams fighting for second place. The North Stars finished an incredible 64-26, winning the title by ten games. The rest of the league was a bit of a palindrome, with records ranging from 54-36 to (Omaha) to 36-54 (Des Moines).

The Prairie League’s first Batsman of the Year was Kansas City second baseman Henry Garvin (.387 AVG, 1.070 OPS, 114 R, 158 H, 257 TB, 86 RBI - all lead league), while old hand Duane Foster of St. Paul (39 y/o, 31-13, 48 GS, 390.2 IP, 29 CG, 5.4 WAR) was its first Pitcher of the Year and Garvin doubled up on the major awards as he was also the league’s inaugural MVP (7.90 WPA in 90 games).

tm1681 · 12-27-2022, 05:53 PM

KING KONRAD PUTS DOWN HIS BAT

After the APBL’s 1883 season, Konrad Jensen, now a 43-year-old, 26-year veteran of both pre-professional and professional baseball, decided it was time to call an end to his extraordinary career. He hadn’t declined significantly - .362/.411/.581 for a .992 OPS in his final season – but he felt after slightly more than a quarter century’s worth of summers playing the game regularly it was time to do something else. He immediately signed a lucrative contract to become the Hitting Coach of the Excelsior Knights.

How good was his career? Well, take a look…

NOTE: For some reason, along the way I had to restore a backup and in the process I lost all the Black/Gray ink prior to the 1881 season, thus the highlighting is gone.

The honors he racked up during his career?

1st player to reach 3,000 career hits (3,311 for career)
2nd non-pitcher to cross 80 WAR (81.9 for career)
16x Team of the Year (Silver Slugger) at OF (7x NYL, 9x APBL)
10x Batsman of the Year (MVP) (4x NYL, 6x APBL)
10x Batting Champion (5x NYL, 5x APBL)
9x New York League (NBBO) All-Star (1860-64, 67-70)
2x APBL championship winner (1872, 1875)
3x New York League (NBBO) Most Valuable Player (Custom – based on WPA) (1867, 68, 70)
2x New York League (NBBO) Triple Crown winner (1869, 1870)
15x League leader in OBP (5x NYL, 10x APBL)
12x League leader in Walks (3x NYL, 9x APBL – never led league in IBB)
11x League leader in Runs Created (5x NYL, 6x APBL)
10x League leader in OPS (4x NYL, 6x APBL)
5x League leader in AVG, OBP, and SLG simultaneously (4x NYL, 1x APBL)
4x League leader in RBI (2x NYL, 2x APBL)
4x League leader in position player WAR (2x NBBO, 2x APBL)

1858-70 (Excelsior, NYL): 178 OPS+
1867 (Excelsior, NYL): 8.05 WPA in 70 games
1867-70 (Excelsior, NYL): .428 AVG, .447 OBP, .634 SLG, 1.081 OPS, 215 OPS+
1871-83 (3 teams, APBL): .390 AVG, .442 OBP, .528 SLG, .970 OPS, 170 OPS+
1876 (Buffalo, APBL): .448 AVG, .498 OBP, .546 SLG, 1.044 OPS

Here’s how good he still was at the age of thirty-nine:

And here’s how good the game engine still had him at the age of 39:

NOTE: I had hitting batter aging speed set to .850 so players would start to fall off around age 35 because of the shorter seasons, so this was still a large deviation. I also had the amateur draft ticked off, and with the different way the game engine generates random free agents instead of amateur draft pool players, it would seem on the face of it that outlier players like this are more likely to appear…

As a columnist from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle put it, “Of all the men and women in all of human history who have ever tried their hand at anything, a scarce few have been better at their selected field of work than Konrad Jensen was at the game of base ball.”

tm1681 · 12-31-2022, 08:53 AM

THE RISE OF THE MIDWESTERN BASEBALL ASSOCIATION

When the Midwestern Baseball Association (MWBA) began play in 1882, it was not intended to be a thorn in the side of the already-established professional league, the APBL. It was created to give the Midwestern United States its own fully-professional baseball league, with standards to match and salaries that came close to that of the “Grand Circuit”

Things were calm for the first four years of the two leagues’ co-existence, as there was relatively little player movement while the four-year countdown before the first MWBA free agent class was taking place. The APBL brass hadn't said much about the other pro league, so it was assumed that the APBL front offices had seen their junior upstarts as inferior and unworthy of attention. In the winter of 1885 that changed quickly as notable MWBA stars entering their first taste of free agency were snapped up by MWBA clubs offering better salaries:

Halvard Westegren, 1885 Team of the Year at C, moved from St. Louis to the New York Athletics
George Shay, SS of the year all four MWBA seasons, moved from Cincinnati to the Athletics
Henry Oliver, 2x 20-game winner, moved from Lake Michigan to New Jersey
Charles Fried, Indianapolis’ best hitter and key infielder, signed with Excelsior
Frank O’Meara, 1885 20-game winner, moved from Milwaukee to Manhattan
Charles Beals, Detroit’s ace, was signed by APBL champions Brooklyn
Key Cincinnati starter Joseph Bryant signed for New Jersey

This all caught the collective MWBA brass completely off-guard. The APBL was mostly mum about the new league, so surely they saw the players as inferior? At the annual end-of-season meetings in October of 1886, a plan of action was discussed. There were two courses the league could have taken: take steps to keep players from moving to the other league, or get revenge on the APBL by bringing in some of their best players. The MWBA chose the latter, and how!

Just two weeks after the meetings were over, Detroit shocked the eastern baseball establishment by signing professional baseball’s now most famous player, Alva Burgess, from the Boston Shamrocks by offering him a 33% raise from what the dominant team of the APBL was paying him. In Burgess’ 11 years with Boston he’d won three APBL pennants, two Batsman of the Year awards, two MVPs, eight Team of the Year nods, and was widely seen as the best overall player in the league.

One week later, Boston was poached a second time when Louisville swooped in and offered 31-game-winner Frank Singleton a whopping 60% raise on his Shamrocks pay packet. Singleton was a seven-year vet who’d split his time between Brooklyn and Boston, and in that short time had won a whopping 163 games opposed to just 81 losses. He’d led the APBL in wins three straight seasons, won multiple titles, and was the ace of Boston’s feared pitching staff.

And just like that, the APBL’s best pitcher and best hitter had both switched leagues before winter had even set in. The events were an embarrassment for the APBL due to not only the nature of having lost both their Batsman and Pitcher of the Year in the space of a week, but Boston was the league’s marquee team, having finished 1886 with a record of 88-24 while easily earning a place in the championship series. The era of open competition between the two leagues for talent was now on.

Not only was the competition for talent on, but now that the MWBA showed they could compete financially people were starting to think that maybe the baseball talent in the Midwest was just as good. Indeed, the MWBA’s marquee players were as good as anything the APBL put on the field.

At the start of the MWBA, rumors told of an incredibly talented 22-year-old from Rushville, IL named Jacob Milburn that was supposedly every bit as talented as Konrad Jensen…

He joined the amateur St. Louis Baseball Club out of high school in 1878, and over the rest of the 1880s he proceeded to do this to the MWBA:

If you’re keeping track, that’s Milburn leading the MWBA in hits, average, OBP, slugging, and obviously OPS in all the league’s first seven seasons. Not surprisingly, he was MWBA Batsman of the Year all seven times as well. Milburn was a credible fielder on top of that, but not as good as Jensen.

A closer look at him reveals that he’s another one of the outliers generated by the game engine that happens when you tick the amateur draft off.

As the MWBA had a marquee batter, they quickly found out they had a marquee pitcher as well: German-born Hans Ehle, better known as “Der Kaiser”...

Ehle was not a MWBA original. He started 1882 in the GLBC with the Columbus Capitols, having joined them right as he was graduating high school. He was regarded as a pitcher with impressive potential and looked decent in his first season. However, as he transitioned into adulthood and his frame filled out, his pitching gained velocity (1882: 82-84, 1884: 88-90) and as the rules of baseball allowed pitchers to start throwing overhanded in 1884 he really took off:

That ridiculous third season led to him being purchased by Milwaukee – where else would a German go but Wisconsin – for $4,000. As pitchers worked to maximize the effect of the new rules removing restraints on pitching styles, it led to an immediate spike in strikeouts all over baseball and Ehle’s dominance went from noticeable to terrifying:

As you can see, he’s probably another 1800s outlier generated by the game…

With players like the above on the MWBL’s side, it was no longer 100% certain that the APBL had the best players in baseball, and that could only make things more interesting going into the 1890s.

tm1681 · 12-31-2022, 09:13 AM

THE SOUTHEAST GETS A LEAGUE OF ITS OWN

With the Northeast and Midwest now covered by professional baseball, the growing amateur and semi-pro game in the Southeastern United States decided it was time to turn professional as well. In the winter of 1884, leaders from six of the best amateur clubs in the southeast got together to form the Southeastern & Atlantic League of Baseball, which quickly became known as the SEAL. The clubs involved, and the new names they took:

Armory Baseball Club, which became the Charleston Battery
Atlanta Baseball Club, which became the Atlanta Flames
Cumberland Baseball Club, which became the Nashville Bobcats
Mississippi River B.C., which became the Memphis Showboats
Savannah Baseball Club, which became the Savannah Schooners
Tobacco Growers Guild of Richmond, which became the Richmond Rollers

Their identities:

The SEAL league was going to have the same roster rules and regulations as the two existing professional leagues, but its aims were a bit smaller. The southeast had smaller metro areas and thus smaller markets, meaning that it couldn’t match the kind of pay the APBL and MWBA offered – about 2/3 of the APBL and maybe 3/4 of the MWBA.

In the meantime, what it could be was a professional league that let players in the Southeast United States become full-time baseball pros while allowing overlooked players in the other two pro leagues a chance to become everyday starters or perhaps even stars in a new home. And unlike the other two leagues, the SEAL played its ball in pitcher-friendly environments that led to batting average, power output, and ERAs that were noticeably lower than elsewhere.

The inaugural season of the SEAL was tighter than any pennant chase baseball had seen up to that point, with five of the league’s six teams finishing within two games of eventual champions Richmond:

As you can see, there was a four-way tie for second place that league executives didn’t anticipate at all, so they had to come up with a tiebreaker in which the teams were placed on the standings based on their season-long run differential. Charleston finished second because theirs was a +24, Memphis in third at +16, Nashville in fourth thanks to a +7, and Savannah was the only one of the four 52-48 teams with a negative RD so they finished in fifth.

The SEAL’s first Batsman of the Year was Nashville’s Henry Duncan (5.0 WAR, 155 OPS+, led league in runs, hits, total bases, triples), who also was its MVP (4.5 WPA in 100 games). The first Pitcher of the Year was champion Richmond’s ace Charles Davis even though he managed to both win and lose 20 games (25-20), but he was clearly the league’s best pitcher (2.20 ERA, 385 IP, 32 CG, 186 K, 12.3 WAR – all led league).

tm1681 · 01-01-2023, 11:24 AM

THE END OF THE NBBO SIGNALS A NEW BEGINNING

As the 1880s progressed, the NBBO was running into a problem. Owing to the Northeastern United States’, as well as that of the USA in general, quickly-growing population, more cities and towns expressed the desire to have ball clubs that were a step up from the amateur ranks, and they had enough people going to games to make it happen.

Toward the end of the decade NBBO executives realized that the above meant the 48-team, 2-league format it had run since 1857 wasn’t going to be feasible for much longer. There were at least two towns in New York that wanted in, and enough in New England that the region could conceivably be split off into its own league. It was then that NBBO commissioner Al Spalding had an idea: have New York City, the Northeast, and New England each be separate, but associated, competitions and turn the NBBO into more of an organizational governing body.

During 1888’s NBBO Winter Meetings, it was agreed that the NBBO would split into three competitions starting in the new decade:

The New York Metropolitan League (NYL), covering the New York City teams
The Northeastern League (NEL), covering Upstate New York, Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania
The New England Baseball Association (NEBA), covering Massachusetts & greater New England

The three competitions could then add new entrants as they wished, which would allow for more baseball in more cities to be played further into the year at a higher-than-amateur standard.

The NBBO received a bigger boost when meetings with the other two notable semi-professional competitions, the Great Lakes Baseball Conference (GLBC) and the Baseball League of the American Prairie (PL), proved fruitful and both agreed to move under the NBBO umbrella for 1890. This meant that 1890s would see the National Base Ball Organization turn from a competition into an entire organizing body for the non-professional sport in the United States, and should other semi-pro leagues pop up they would likely join as well.

The last year of the NBBO’s single competition was a closely-contested one, for the most part. In the New York League, Eckford (53-31) won the Brooklyn championship by 3 games over Nassau County, Yonkers (53-31) won the New York City championship by 2 games over Manhattan, and Binghamton (50-34) won the Upstate New York championship by 2 games as well, besting Utica. In the Northeastern League, Olympic B.C. (52-32) took the Coastal championship by 4 games over Philadelphia and Sons of the Ocean (56-28) also took their regional championship, New England, by 4 over the Cantabrigians.

However, the Lancaster Dukes won the Inland Championship by no less than 16 games thanks to a record of 61-23 and the best lineup in the league, and it looked to many like they would be the final NBBO champions. Instead, they were taken down 3-1 in the Northeastern League Championship Series by Sons of the Ocean in a stunner, and it was the Sons of the Ocean who would be crowned the NBBO’s last victors after besting Eckford of Greenpoint in the Tucker-Wheaton Cup, winning it for the fourth time. This was perhaps a fitting end to the NBBO given that SotO were the NBBO’s first champions back in 1857.

The final list of NBBO finalists & champions (Tucker-Wheaton Cup winners in italics):

PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL

1857: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Sons of the Ocean
1858: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Granite BC
1859: NYL – Atlantic BBC, NEL – St. John’s BC
1860: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Quinnipiac BC
1861: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC
1862: NYL – Victory BBC, NEL – Quaker State BC
1863: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC
1864: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – American BC
1865: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC
1866: NYL – Flour City BBC, NEL – Newark BBC
1867: NYL – Excelsior BBC, NEL – Reading Athletic Club
1868: NYL – Gotham BBC, NEL – Newark BBC
1869: NYL – Atlantic BBC, NEL – Sons of the Ocean
1870: NYL – Kings County BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC

POST-APBL SPLIT

1871: NYL – Atlantic BBC, NEL – Cantabrigians BC
1872: NYL – Mutual BBC, NEL – Reading Athletic Club
1873: NYL – Victory BBC, NEL – Philadelphia Tigers Social Club
1874: NYL – Excelsior BBC, NEL – Cantabrigians BC
1875: NYL – Excelsior BBC, NEL – Massachusetts Bay BC
1876: NYL – Frontier BBC, NEL – Wilkes-Barre Coal Barons
1877: NYL – NYAC Athletics, NEL – Sons of the Ocean
1878: NYL – Excelsior Knights, NEL – Massachusetts Bay Pilgrims
1879: NYL – NYAC Athletics, NEL – Reading Athletics
1880: NYL – NYAC Athletics, NEL – Sons of the Ocean
1881: NYL – Manhattan Orangemen, NEL – Jersey City Longshoremen
1882: NYL – Empire BBC, NEL – Wilkes-Barre Coal Barons
1883: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Reading Athletics
1884: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Fall River Marksmen
1885: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Reading Athletics
1886: NYL – Nassau County BBC, NEL – Sons of the Ocean
1887: NYL – Frontier BBC, NEL – Olympic BBC
1888: NYL – Binghamton Blue Jays, NEL – Lancaster Dukes
1889: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Sons of the Ocean

All totaled, there were 33 Tucker-Wheaton Cups awarded. 18 went to clubs in the Northeastern League, 15 went to clubs in the New York League, and Sons of the Ocean won it more times (4) than anyone else. Orange BBC/Manhattan Orangemen appeared in the Tucker Wheaton Cup more often than any other club at nine times, but unfortunately for them they only won a third of the times they made it to the TWC.

With five semi-pro leagues on the books for 1890 a fair playoff system wouldn’t be feasible, but it wouldn’t surprise if the Tucker-Wheaton Cup was revived before long…

tm1681 · 01-01-2023, 11:58 AM

THE 1880s IN REVIEW

THE CHAMPIONS

AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE

1880: Brooklyn Kings (52-38, President’s Cup 4-2 over Boston)
1881: Boston Shamrocks (58-32, President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn)
1882: Boston Shamrocks (53-37, President’s Cup 4-2 over NY Athletics)
1883: Brooklyn Kings (59-31, President’s Cup 4-0 over Massachusetts Bay)
1884: Boston Shamrocks (73-39, President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn)
1885: Brooklyn Kings (79-33, President’s Cup 4-1 over Boston)
1886: Manhattan Knickerbockers (76-36, President’s Cup 4-1 over Boston)
1887: Boston Shamrocks (92-20, President’s Cup 4-1 over New Jersey)
1888: Manhattan Knickerbockers (75-37, President’s Cup 4-1 over Boston)
1889: Manhattan Knickerbockers (74-38, President’s Cup 4-2 over Rochester)

Three teams dominated the APBL in the 80s: Boston, Brooklyn, and Manhattan. The Knickerbockers took a back seat after winning the last two non-playoff titles (1877, 78), but by the end of the decade they were firmly back on top as Boston was faltering and Brooklyn wasn’t quite great enough.

MIDWESTERN BASEBALL ASSOCIATION

1882: St. Louis Saints (55-35, no playoffs)
1883: Louisville Sluggers (64-26)
1884: St. Louis Saints (59-31)
1885: St. Louis Saints (65-43)
1886: Cincinnati Royals (70-38)
1887: Detroit Robins (66-42)
1888: Detroit Robins (75-33)
1889: Detroit Robins (80-28)

Early on, it was looking like the inaugural decade of the MWBA would belong to St. Louis as they finished 1st, 1st, 2nd (62-28), and 1st over the league’s first four seasons thanks to the unstoppable Jacob Milburn. However, they fell to third (57-51) in 1886 and once Detroit signed Alva Burgess the Saints didn't have a chance.

SOUTHEASTERN & ATLANTIC LEAGUE
1885: Richmond Rollers (54-46, no playoffs)
1886: Richmond Rollers (64-36)
1887: Richmond Rollers (60-40)
1888: Atlanta Flames (60-40)
1889: Atlanta Flames (65-35)

In the first three seasons of the SEAL it was all Richmond, as their outstanding pitching trumped the rest of the league. However, by the end of the decade Atlanta, through the signing and development of outstanding young talent, had caught and passed their northern foes to become the league’s dominant side.

NON-PROFESSIONAL CHAMPIONS

1880: NYAC (NBBO)
1881: Manhattan (NBBO)
1882: Empire (NBBO), Saginaw (GLBC), St. Paul (PL)
1883: Eckford (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), St. Paul (PL)
1884: Fall River (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Kansas City (PL)
1885: Eckford (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Dubuque (PL)
1886: Sons of the Ocean (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Omaha (PL)
1887: Olympic (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Kansas City (PL)
1888: Lancaster (NBBO), Duluth (GLBC), Kansas City (PL)
1889: Sons of the Ocean (NBBO), Peoria (GLBC), St. Paul (PL)

Sons of the Ocean ended the NBBO the same way they started it back in 1857: by winning the Tucker-Wheaton Cup. Meanwhile, Toledo’s iron grip on the GLBC was finally broken by the end of the decade and clubs in the emerging markets of Kansas City and St. Paul dominated the Prairie League.

TEAM OF THE DECADE

The Boston Shamrocks (American Professional Baseball League)

1880: 59-31, Lost President’s Cup 4-2 vs Brooklyn
1881: 58-32, Won President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn
1882: 53-37, Won President’s Cup 4-2 over NY Athletics
1883: 50-40, 2nd place in APBL Metropolitan Conference
1884: 73-39, Won President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn
1885: 80-32, Lost President’s Cup 4-1 vs Brooklyn
1886: 88-24, Lost President’s Cup 4-1 vs Manhattan
1887: 92-20, Won President’s Cup 4-1 over New Jersey
1888: 82-30, Lost President’s Cup 4-1 vs Manhattan
1889: 70-42, 2nd place in APBL Metropolitan Conference

1880s: 705-327 record (.683), 8 President’s Cup appearances, 4 APBL Championships

The 1880s was Boston’s decade. Even though none went seven games, they had some epic confrontations with Brooklyn in the President’s Cup and in the end their record and title haul was simply superior to that of any other pro team. At the height of their powers, they not only had pro baseball’s best starting rotation but they also had baseball’s most feared position player trio in the outfield “Hydra” of Anderson “The Wild Horse” Belknap, Alva “The Cheetah” Burgess, and Isaiah “The Locomotive” Duffy, all of whom would have an 80/80 on range at their positions had such scouting grades existed back then. Boston had the best winning percentage, the most titles, and easily more President’s Cup appearances than any other APBL team since they won the Colonial Conference in 8/10 seasons.

The Brooklyn Kings were outstanding for most of the decade, making the PC five times and winning it three. However, by the end of the decade they’d fallen behind the Knickerbockers and in 1888 they slipped as far down as sixth place (49-63) in the Metropolitan Conference.

In the early days of the MWBA it looked like St. Louis would put up a record that could match Boston’s, winning three of the first four titles and finishing second in the other season even though they went 62-28. However, once Detroit signed Alva Burgess the balance of power in the league immediately shifted and the Saints fell off quickly.

BATSMAN OF THE DECADE

Jacob Milburn – St. Louis Saints (1882-89)

1,421 H, .413 AVG, 1.041 OPS, 194 OPS+, 221 2B, 141 3B, 1,964 TB, 37.8 WAR in 808 games (7.7 per 162)

8x MWBA Team of the Year at OF (1882-89)
7x MWBA Batsman of the Year (1882-88)
3x MWBA Most Valuable Player (1882, 84, 86)
3x MWBA Champion (1882, 84, 85)
7x MWBA Batting Champion (1882-88)
7x MWBA Leader in hits, OBP, SLG, & OPS (1882-88)
7x MWBA Leader in total bases (1882-88)
3x MWBA Leader in runs, doubles, & triples
1x MWBA Leader in RBI (1882)

1886: 106 starts, .432 AVG, .505 OBP, 1.059 OPS, 213 OPS+, 111 R, 187 H, 240 TB, 69 RBI, 41 SB, 6.67 WPA (10.19 per 162), 6.5 WAR (10.0 per 162)

No debate. None. As dominant as Konrad Jensen was in the late 1860s and throughout the 70s, Jacob Milburn was arguably even more dominant over the first eight seasons of the MWBA. He hit more than .400 seven times. He led the league in AVG, OBP, and OPS seven times. He led the league in hits and total bases seven times. His OPS was over 1.000 six times, and his OPS+ was over 200 five times.

Milburn came into professional baseball at the age of 22 hitting like Jensen did when he hit his final stage of development as a 27-year-old for Excelsior, and Milburn was doing it at a higher level of play.

HURLER OF THE DECADE

Henry Polley – Boston Shamrocks (1881-89)

209-96 record, 2.59 ERA, 151 ERA+, 2,801.2 IP, 243 CG, 14 SHO, 475 BB, 1,226 K, 75.5 WAR (6.1 per 225 IP)

4x APBL Champion (1881, 82, 84, 87)
1x APBL Hurler of the Year (1888)
2x APBL Leader in wins (1886, 88)
2x APBL Leader in ERA (1882, 88)
2x APBL Leader in pitcher WAR (1888, 89)
8x 20-game winner (1881-82, 84-89)

1888: 28-11, 2.32 ERA (166 ERA+), 333.1 IP, 30 CG, 3 SHO, 49 BB, 185 K, 1.14 WHIP, 9.9 WAR (6.7 per 225 IP)

Polley entered pro baseball as a 25-year-old rookie for Boston in 1881 and proceeded to go 26-14 with a 2.77 ERA. He was almost uniformly excellent after, even if that only earned him one Hurler of the Year award. Teammate Martin Nielson won the award three times, but he was more inconsistent with a slightly worse record and notably lower WAR even though the two had similar statistics for the decade. Polley was Boston’s ace the entire time, which made his 209-96 record that much more impressive.

Arthur Meyer had a playing record that came close, but he didn’t really get going until joining Brooklyn in 1885 after four okay years with Massachusetts Bay. He actually won more games than Polley, but a couple of seasons with sub-500 records and ERAs over 4.00 with the other Boston team really hurt his resumé.

On talent and recent record alone, Hans Ehle is the winner. He topped every other pro pitcher of the decade in Hurler of the Year awards (4), ERA (1.74), ERA+ (213), strikeouts (1,650), and WAR (81.0), but he did that playing just five seasons of pro baseball after spending 1882-84 as a semi-pro with Columbus. That’s remarkable, but it also meant he wasn’t the Pitcher of the (entire) Decade. Given the way things are going he’s almost certain to be the #1 pitcher of the 1890s.

PLAYER OF THE DECADE

Alva Burgess – Boston Shamrocks (APBL – 1880-86) & Detroit Robins (MWBA – 1887-89)

1,000 G, 1,638 H, 1,114 R, .369 AVG, .888 OPS, 149 OPS+, 682 RBI, 842 SB, 50.0 WAR (8.1 per 162)

6x Champion (3x APBL, 3x MWBA)
4x Most Valuable Player (3x APBL, 1x MWBA)
2x APBL Batsman of the Year (1880, 86)
1x APBL Batting Champion (1886 – also led in SLG & OPS)
7x Team of the Year (5x APBL, 2x MWBA)
2x Golden Glove (1x APBL, 1x MWBA)
10x League stolen base leader (7x APBL, 3x MWBA)
5x League leader in runs (3x APBL, 2x MWBA)
4x APBL leader in total bases (1880, 82, 85, 86)
4x League leader in non-pitcher WAR (2x APBL, 2x MWBA)
4x APBL leader in hits (1880, 82, 84, 86)

1886 (Boston): 106 games, .382 AVG, .890 OPS, 168 OPS+, 171 H, 84 RBI, 102 SB, 6.70 WPA (10.23 per 162), 8.2 WAR (12.5 per 162)

Alva Burgess was baseball’s biggest winner in the 1880s with six titles, and thus its brightest star. His combination of batting, speed, and range in center field made him the scariest player in the APBL for Boston, and that carried over when he joined Detroit after arguably the best season by a position player in APBL history in 1886. He led his league in stolen bases every season of the decade, averaging 84 per year. He was a player who could hit for average, find the gap, steal at will, cover massive amounts of ground in center field, and do every little thing possible to move his team closer to a win. Boston fell off their first-place perch just a couple of years after he left, and it’s also no coincidence that Detroit immediately moved up from a mediocre team, typically in the middle of the MWBA standings, to instant title-winners after he shocked the APBL by signing for the Robins in October of 1886.

There could be an argument for shortstop Edward Fitzsimmons, who won four APBL titles, eight Golden Gloves, seven Team of the Year nods, and an MVP while finishing higher on WAR than Burgess (51.1, 8.3/162), but Burgess’ extra titles and the massive impact his crossing over into the MWBA had were too much.

NON-PROFESSIONAL PLAYER OF THE DECADE

Earl Clements – Toledo Mud Hens (GLBC – 1882-89)

1,058 hits, .353 AVG, .880 OPS (159 OPS+), 267 XBH, 478 RBI, 268.4 ZR (SS), 1.235 EFF (SS), 47.0 WAR in 705 games (10.8 per 162)

5x GLBC Champion (1883-87)
2x GLBC Batsman of the Year (1885, 89)
2x GLBC MVP (1886, 89)
7x GLBC Golden Glove at SS (1882-88)
6x GLBC leader in non-pitcher WAR (1882, 1884-87, 89)
2x GLBC leader in hits (1885, 89)
2x GLBC leader in total bases (1885, 89)
1x GLBC Batting Champion (1889 – also led in OBP & SLG)

1887: 90 games, .380 AVG, .937 OPS, 178 OPS+, 148 H, 26 2B, 61 RBI, 31.2 ZR at SS, 3.09 WPA (5.5 per 162), 7.0 WAR (12.6 per 162)

Clements is someone who probably would have been a four-star player in the APBL or MWBA. However, the Wisconsin native loved Toledo and Toledo loved him back – he didn’t seem to care that he only made about half of what players with similar talent did in the three pro leagues. He led a dynasty in Toledo via impeccable defense and batting that was easily the best at his position in the Great Lakes Baseball Conference. Not a single player in the NBBO or Prairie League came remotely close to Clements in terms of titles won, accomplishments, or simple WAR. He was easily the best semi-pro baseball player in the United States over the timeframe.

His 1889 season (.408 AVG, 1.010 OPS, 190 OPS+) was even better than 1887 season from the batter’s box, but he was so unbelievable on defense in ’87 that the latter season came out on top by almost a full point of WAR.

ALL-DECADE TEAM

C: Frederick Kearney – 1882-89 w/Lake Michigan (MWBA), Rochester (APBL) – 6x Team of the Year, 28.3 WAR (6.0/162)
1B: Lee Douglass – 1882-89 w/ New Jersey & Brooklyn (APBL), Cleveland (MWBA) – 6x Golden Glove, 1x Batsman of the Year & MVP, 22.9 WAR (4.5/162G)
2B: Joseph Welling – 1880-89 w/Orangemen, Brooklyn & Washington (APBL) – 2x champ, 4x Team of the Year, 28.0 WAR (4.5/162G)
3B: Franklin Rader – 1882-89 w/ Missouri (MWBA) – 5x Team of the Year, 1x Golden Glove, 25.7 WAR (5.2/162)
SS: Edward Fitzsimmons – 1880-89 w/ Brooklyn & Boston (MWBA) – 4x champ, 8x Golden Glove, 7x Team of the Year, 1x MVP, 51.1 WAR (8.3/162)
LF: Jacob Milburn – 1882-89 w/ St. Louis (MWBA) – 3x champ, 7x Batsman of the Year, 3x MVP, 8x Team of the Year, 37.8 WAR (7.7/162)
CF: Alva Burgess – 1880-89 w/ Boston (APBL), Detroit (MWBA) – 6x champ, 4x MVP, 2x Batsman of the Year, 7x Team of the Year, 50.0 WAR (8.1/162)
RF: Isaiah Duffy – 1880-89 w/ Boston (APBL) – 3x champ, 3x Batsman of the Year, 10x Golden Glove, 4x Team of the Year, 42.0 WAR (6.9/162)
SP: Henry Polley – 1881-89 w/Boston (APBL) – 209-96, 4x champ, 8x 20-game winner, 1x Hurler of the Year, 75.5 WAR (6.1/225 IP)
SP: Arthur Meyer – 1880-89 w/ Mass. Bay & Brooklyn (APBL) – 215-133, 1x champ, 8x 20-game winner, 1x Hurler of the Year, 71.5 WAR (5.1/225 IP)
SP: Hans Ehle – 1885-89 w/Milwaukee (MWBA) – 124-58, 4x Hurler of the Year, 5x 20-game winner, 81.0 WAR (11.2/225 IP)

tm1681 · 01-01-2023, 12:23 PM

CHANGES TO THE BASEBALL LANDSCAPE

As planned, baseball went into the decade of the 1890s featuring significant changes. The NBBO was now a governing body overseeing three new competitions – the New York League, the Northeastern League, & the New England Baseball Association – while brining two existing ones – the Great Lakes Baseball Conference & the Prairie League – into the fold, which put all the semi-pro clubs under one umbrella.

However, that was far from the end of the changes facing baseball at the start of the final decade of the 19th Century.

In the Prairie League, four clubs – Kansas City, Minneapolis, Omaha, & St. Paul – saw their markets become too big for semi-pro status and the Midwestern Baseball Association came calling. As a result, the MWBA grew to 14 teams for the 1890 season while the PL found four clubs – the Council Bluffs Unions, Davenport Riversiders, Kansas Blue Stockings, & Southern Missouri Ozarks – to replace the departees.

With the MWBA (14 teams) now almost as big as the APBL (16 teams) and widely seen as nearly equal in quality, the two leagues decided to form a loose association which would henceforth be dedicated to professional leagues of the highest quality: the American Baseball Association. The open competition between the two for talent would still be there, but now there was mutual understanding and less hostility.

The Southeastern & Atlantic League remained an independent professional league, but after five years of slow growth it added two new clubs to bring its total to eight. One club came from the GLBC: the Evansville Angels, a team situated in far southern Indiana that was closer to some of the SEAL teams than many GLBC counterparts. The other was a high-profile amateur club from Chesapeake, Virginia: Lords of the Old Dominion, which became the Old Dominion Lords.

The GLBC found an easy replacement for Evansville, as former NBBO members the Erie Lakers were situated right along the Great Lake they were named after and were thus a natural fit for the GLBC instead of the Northeastern League. The other nine teams remained, meaning the league stayed at ten teams.

In addition to the five new clubs mentioned above – Council Bluffs, Davenport, Kansas, Southern Missouri, & Old Dominion – there were other clubs to make the move up from amateur ball. The NEL saw the Niagara Falls Rapids and Schenectady Bolts join to bring the league to 20 teams. The NEBA added three new clubs – the Brass City Watchmakers, Bridgeport Ironmen, & Pawtucket Foxes – so the greater New England half of the league could have as many teams as the Massachusetts half (8), giving the NEBA 16 teams going into its inaugural season.

Meanwhile, the New York League had the easiest time setting up shop, as all 16 members of the old Brooklyn and New York championships in the NBBO simply moved over and sorted out what the schedule would be.

In addition to the new leagues and new teams, seasons would now be longer. Beginning in 1890 the semi-professional leagues would have seasons ranging from 108-114 games, up from 84 in the NBBO and 90 in the GLBC/PL. In the pro ranks, the SEAL increased its schedule to 126 games (from 100), the MWBA went to 130 (from 108), and the APBL added enough games to have the longest season of the three pro leagues at 132 games (from 112).

This was how the baseball landscape looked going into the 1890s:

NATIONAL BASEBALL ASSOCIATIONS

AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE (APBL)

MIDWESTERN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE (MWBA)

SOUTHEASTERN & ATLANTIC LEAGUE OF BASEBALL (SEAL)

NEW YORK METROPOLITAN BASEBALL LEAGUE (NYL)

NORTHEASTERN LEAGUE OF BASEBALL CLUBS (NEL)

NEW ENGLAND BASEBALL ASSOCIATION (NEBA)

GREAT LAKES BASEBALL CONFERENCE (GLBC)

BASEBALL LEAGUE OF THE AMERICAN PRAIRIE (PL)

On top of the new look to the baseball landscape, there were changes on the field as well.

During the 1880s the number of balls needed for a walk kept creeping down from seven, to six, then to five, then to the final amount of four – that still stands today – before the 1889 season. That, combined with the pitching area being tinkered with dulled the mid-80s dominance the best pitchers enjoyed after overhand throwing motions were allowed for the first time.

Also, during the decade alterations were made to bat specifications – size, flatness, substances, etc. – and in the process these regulation changes helped turn the massive hitters’ paradises like The Elysian Fields, where center field was 500+ feet from home plate and both foul poles were 375+, into parks that now favored the pitcher. This meant that while walks were going up and strikeouts were going back down, the days of league batting leaders regularly hitting over .400 and fast gap hitters racking up 30 triples in 100-110 games were over. The enormous stadiums meant pitchers still didn’t have to worry about home runs, as rare as they already were, but it meant that 15-12 slugfests in the oldest APBL parks were going to be a far less common sight.

As the new decade dawned, the state of baseball in the USA was looking very good, and no doubt it wouldn’t be long before more leagues emerged, perhaps even ones in other countries.

tm1681 · 01-05-2023, 06:53 PM

1891: HISTORY IS MADE IN MULTIPLE WAYS

After one year of baseball’s new-look setup there were no major off-the-field shakeups ahead of the 1891 professional and semi-pro seasons. However, the action on the field would more than make up for the relative quiet off of it, as history of both the spectacular and unique kind was made across the sport during the year.

JACOB MILBURN DETHRONES THE KING

As mentioned, ahead of the 1890s various changes were made to the rules and regulations of baseball that simultaneously granted hitters minor advantages (four balls for a walk) while tamping down their raw batting and gap power (bat size, shape, etc). Jacob Milburn again won MWBA Batsman of the Year in 1890, but for the first time he won it with a batting average under .400 and he did so with an OPS under 1.000 – the changes had their desired effect. In fact, his 1890 season was a full point of WAR better (5.5) than his 1887 in which he won BotY with a .409 AVG and 1.032 OPS (4.4 WAR).

Over the winter Milburn made some tweaks to his hitting approach, and he felt going into 1891 that he could crack .400 again. What he didn’t know was that he would have the single best batting season in the history of the sport.

Here was what Milburn did against the rest of the MWBA in 1891:

Over 128 games Milburn led the 14-team league in:

Runs – 119 (1st by 19)
Hits – 209 (1st by 35)
Total Bases – 294 (1st by 56)
Doubles – 30 (1st by 2)
Triples – 26 (1st by 7)
Walks – 58 (tied for 1st)
Average - .438 (1st by 52 points)
On-base % - .505 (1st by 67 points)
OPS – 1.122 (1st by 196 points)
OPS Plus – 204 (1st by 48 points)
WPA – 7.33 (9.28 per 162, 1st by 1.47)
WAR – 9.2 (11.6 per 162, 1st by 3.1)

His 9.0 offensive WAR was the single highest ever recorded in a season in any league, and as seen above he led the league in some categories by amounts never seen before. This was especially true of his 196-point OPS margin over second place. He did this in a MWBA where batting average was 5-10 points lower and OPS 20-25 points lower than two years ago, before the new regulations were put in place.

Milburn hit quite well over the first two months of the season, comfortably 400+ at the end of June. However, what followed was the single-best month of batting anyone had ever laid eyes on:

3.30 WPA and 3.7 WAR over the 28 games Milburn played in July would translate to 19.09 WPA and 21.4 WAR over a modern 162-game schedule. From there, he coasted a bit and “only” hit .365 (.961 OPS) in the season’s final month to finish with a season that would surely be written about forever.

HANS EHLE GOES THE LIMIT FOR MILWAUKEE

Milwaukee Bavarians pitcher Hans Ehle, the most dominant ace in the sport, added a new accomplishment to his name in the 1891 season: he became the first pitcher ever to finish 40 complete games in consecutive seasons, ones in which Milwaukee won its first MWBA title and then lost the first edition of the Lincoln Memorial Cup in seven games to Cleveland.

The Bavarians went into the 90s having finished runners up in the MWBA three times, and they asked Ehle how much further he could push his pitching arm in order to put the team over the top. He obliged, throwing nearly 800 innings over 1890-91, and as the coaching staff hoped it led to championship baseball.

Ehle’s 1891 (MWBA leader in italics):

30-15, 2 SVs, 1.63 ERA, 392 IP, 40 CG, 38 BB, 301 K, 209 ERA+, 16.9 WAR (9.7 per 225 IP)

Somehow 16.9 WAR was only the third-best single season total of his career to that point, but the result was another Hurler of the Year Award – his sixth in seven pro seasons.

PETTER LUND BECOMES THE FIRST NON-PITCHER WITH 10+ WAR IN A SEASON

In the semi-pro ranks, the Reading Athletics’ 22-year-old star center fielder Petter Lund went into 1891 already as the league’s best player. He’d hit .315 the year before (.864 OPS, 159 OPS+) and stole 71 bases while playing Golden Glove outfield defense, leading to a league-high WAR of 7.3.

What Lund did for Reading in 1891 was to take his already considerable talent to a level never seen in the semi-pro ranks. Over 110 games he led the Northeastern League in hits (146), average (.350), and OPS (.990, 176 OPS+), while stealing no less than 90 bases (18 CS) and playing more Golden Glove defense at CF. The result: 5.8 offensive WAR and 4.2 from other areas for a total of 10.0 (14.7 per 162), making him the first non-pitcher in baseball history to earn a double-digit WAR in a single season.

The fact that he had only just turned 22 before the start of the season made the accomplishment all the more incredible, and no doubt a team - or multiple - from the APBL or the MWBA would come steaming in on a train to Reading with a bag of cash and a contract offer in short order.

KNICKERBOCKERS GET APBL’S #1 RECORD & PRESIDENT’S CUP WITH NO TEAM OF THE YEAR (SILVER SLUGGER) MEMBERS

1891 wouldn’t see any truly historic individual performances in the APBL. Lindsey Christianson of Philadelphia was the Batting Champion at .349. Nobody drove in 100 runs or hit more than a handful of home runs. No starter had an ERA under 2.00. Jakob Hogh (Buffalo) and Jurgen Schultz (Pennsylvania) both won just over 30 games, but given the new length of the APBL season (132 G) it was expected that at least one pitcher a year would win 30+ since teams still had three-man starting rotations.

Along the same lines, the New York Knickerbockers made history with a team full of players who performed in a similar vein, becoming the first team in baseball history to have either their league’s best record or win their league’s championship series while having zero players make the league’s official Team of the Year, and they did both.

NYK was an APBL-best 80-52 with a starting lineup full of position players that ranged from 1.5-4.5 WAR. Nobody hit better than .315, and they were 4th in runs scored while just 10th out of 16 teams in batting average. Their pitching staff was 3rd in ERA, 4th in WAR, and just 9th in strikeouts. All three members of the rotation won 20+ games, but their best performer was about four points of WAR off Pitcher of the Year Hogh of Buffalo.

So, how did the Knickerbockers find success? They were top-three in the APBL in runs allowed thanks to a defense that was top-three in fielding percentage and errors while easily being in the top half in Zone Rating. Their pitchers also allowed the fewest walks in the league, and those factors led the team to be extremely successful in close games, culminating in their 4-2 President’s Cup series win over the Buffalo Blues. Team legend Charles Brophy drove in a dozen runs over the six games to win President's Cup MVP.

SYRACUSE GOES 89-25 WITHOUT A SINGLE PLAYER HITTING .300

Back in the semi-pro ranks, the Syracuse Emeralds of the Northeastern League made some odd team history of their own in 1891.

The Emeralds finished the regular season with the NEL’s best record by eleven games, going 89-25 (.781) and finishing no less than twenty-three games in the clear in the New York Conference. Yet, they did this without having a single regular position player hit .300 or better, which was the first time a league champion or division/conference winner had done so. They finished 5th out of 20 NEL teams in runs scored, average, and OPS, but the best hitter in their lineup topped out at .293 (CF Ilario Cercignani) and only two others hit above .260.

Even with that seeming lack of offensive punch, Syracuse won 78 percent of their games before the Adams Trophy series because they were easily the best or near-best in the NEL numerous other areas:

#1 in runs against (385, 3.37 p/g)
#1 in starters’ ERA (2.43)
#1 in non-starters’ ERA (1.53)
#1 in FIP (2.35)
#1 in pitching WAR (28.8, 40.9/162)
#1 in strikeouts (700, 6.14 p/g)
#1 in errors (206, 1.81 p/g)
#2 in Zone Rating (+85.2)
#2 in Def. Efficiency (.695)

However, in the Adams Cup finals they were up against the aforementioned Petter Lund and the 78-36 Reading Athletics, where Syracuse’s relative lack of attack finally did them in. They were swept 3-0 while being outscored 16-9, and what had been a historic season ended with a trip at the final hurdle.

06-02-2022, 10:05 AM	#3
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	OCTOBER 1870: A "GANG OF SEVEN" PAVES THE WAY FOR A PROFESSIONAL LEAGUE At the start of the NBBO's Fall Meetings at the Astor House Hotel in New York City on October 4th, executives from a group of seven clubs, along with some star players including the aforementioned Konrad Jensen, met to propse what would finally be the end of the era of secret cash deals and fake amateurism with a fully professional league. The seven clubs: Flour City, Kings County, Knickerbocker, Newark, Orange, Quaker State, and Shamrock. The "Gang of Seven" clubs had most of the same things in common: in-division success, at least some post-season success ranging from appearances to championships, and large enough venues to be able to take part in a professional league without needing frequent injections of cash. Howevever, they were hoping for a ten-team league and needed to find three other clubs with somewhat similar attributes willing to make the jump. The candidates they considered: CHAMPIONS Sons of the Ocean (New Bedford, MA) - SotO were the 1st NBBO champions, and took the Tucker Wheaton Cup again in 1869. They spent a decade employing the best-hitting 3B in the sport, now 13-time All Star Samuel Kessler. They were also able to develop other multiple-time All Stars such as Andrew Boss (2B), Corey Burnett (3B/RF), and Anthony Gardner (SP). However, the club's two championships came in their only two playoff apperances, and the club had a small fanbase and a stadium that only seated a bit more than 2,000. Green Mountain B.C. (Burlington, VT) - From the same division as Sons of the Ocean (New England Championship), Green Mountain looked like much the same club on paper. They had two championships, long-employed the sport's best player at one position (11-time All Star SS Anthony Mascherino), and they developed other multiple-time All Stars (LF Raymond Ginn, 1B Howard Barbour, SP Franklin Squires). Their venue also had the same problem in that it sat only around 2,000. However, they had one big advantage on SotO in that they'd won the New England championship seven times instead of two. Reading Athletic Club (Reading, PA) - Reading took the cup in 1867, had won the Inland championship five times, and had never finished lower than 3rd in Inland since 1858. They also boasted a whopping all-time winning percentage of .624 and finished with a 53-17 record in 1870 as the team featured numerous All Stars and Golden Glove winners. However, their stadium was roughly the same size as that of SotO and Green Mountain, and their ability to recruit players came thanks to cash from rich members of the athletic club that the team was part of. That wouldn't necessarily work in a league where everyone had to be paid a full-time rate. St. John's B.C. (Providence, RI) - St. John's looked the part of a club that belonged going pro. They had good facilities in a big city, some quality players, a good competitive record (.560 winning percentage all time, 12 straight winning seasons) and a stadium that seated about 10,500. They also won the Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1859. However, they'd only won the New England championship once since then - a division their inherent advantages should have allowed them to dominate. Victory B.B.C. (Troy, NY) - The "Gang of Seven" was looking to add a 2nd club from upstate New York, and had it been five years earlier the Victory club would have been included with no questions asked. From 1859-63 they won the Upstate New York championship all five times, and took the cup in 1862. However, Victory fell off and they'd frequently hovered around .500 since then, only to bounce back at the perfect time with a 47-23 1870 season that saw them take the Upstate championship again. Problem: they had a small-ish venue (~4,000) that would put them at an income-based disadvantage compared to the other clubs. SUCCESSFUL CLUBS Excelsior B.B.C. (Brooklyn, NY) - The Excelsior club had three big things going for it: five 1st-place finishes in the tough Brooklyn championship, an all-time winning percentage of .586 (51-19 in 1867), and baseball's best hitter, Konrad Jensen, as the face of the team. However, they had one small issue and one big issue. Their grounds at Carroll Park only sat about 4,000, much smaller than the clubs already committing to going pro. They were also based in Brooklyn, and the "Gang of Seven" was wary of having four NYC-area clubs in the inaugural season of a ten-team league, as they felt having too many clubs from one city would hurt legitimacy. But...if the sport's best player really didn't want to leave the seasonal baseball club he'd been with for 13 years, why not just bring the whole organization kicking and screaming into the pros? Atlantic B.B.C. (Brooklyn, NY) - Atlantic was a well-run club that had won the Brooklyn Chapmionship four times, the New York League championship twice, and boasted a .563 all-time winning percentage. However, they'd never had any major stars and they had the same issue as Excelsior in that they'd be a 4th NYC-area club. Minuteman B.C. (Albany, NY) - Minuteman had won the Upstate NY championship three times and had a decent-sized venue (6,000+), which made them a good candidate for the 2nd upstate New York club. However, their year-to-year form had a tendency to fluctuate and they'd recently made a big mistake in letting 11-time All Star SS Anthony Mascherino go to Quaker State after two seasons, depriving them of a superstar player that the "Gang of Seven" wanted in the league. BIG CLUBS Alleghany B.C. (Pittsburgh, PA) - The Alleghany club had been decent (.552 win percentage) but never dominant in an Inland championship they should have been able to take more often but had only won two times. However, in 1868 Pittsburgh Recreation Park was expanded to seat over 17,000 and the team had performed quite well over the past two seasons (40-30, 45-25). While on-field success was lacking, the size of their fanbase was extremely attractive. American B.C. (Philadelphia, PA) - American had the weakest playing record of any club considered, with a .519 all-time winning percentage and just one playoff appearance. However, in their one playoff appearance they won the Northeastern League championship and they'd spent their 14 NBBO seasons in the hellish Coastal championship - the year they won it was so competitive they needed just a 41-29 record. That said, they had been markedly over .500 in three of the previous four seasons, Glenwood Field sat nearly 15,000, and given the city's size the "Gang of Seven" didn't have any issues adding a 2nd Philadelphia club. Gotham B.B.C. (New York, NY) - Gotham club executives were among the NBBO's founders, while the club itself predated the organization with its foundation going back to 1852. The Red House at the St. George Cricket Grounds was a fine venue that held nearly 8,000 and the club had 1st-class facilities, but on-field success was lacking. They spent most of the Orange club's dominance of the NYC championship during the NBBO's first decade languishing below .500, and while they did take 1st place with a 46-24 mark in 1868 their record dipped to 40-30 in '69 and then crashed to 28-42 in 1870. They easily had the resources to go pro, but did they have the competence? And again, was a 4th NYC-area club wanted? Massachusetts Bay B.C. (Boston, MA) - Adding Massachusetts Bay would have meant a 2nd Boston club, but given Boston's size at the time it wouldn't have been a major issue. MB had quality facilities and a stadium that seated just under 9,500. They'd also finished 44-26 in 1870. However, before that they were under .500 as often as they were over it and had won the Coastal Championship once. Niagara B.B.C. (Buffalo, NY) - Niagara was an odd club. They had never won the Upstate NY championship but had finished 2nd or 3rd no less than eight times in the NBBO's 14 seasons of existence and had a cumulative winning percentage of about .550, with only one losing season to their name. They were almost always "kinda good", and they played in a venue that sat over 11,000. One big point in their favor: ahead of the 1870 season they'd brought in the aforementioned Samuel Kessler after three seasons with Newark. THE DECISION In the end, the "Gang of Seven" decided to add the three clubs from outside Brooklyn and New York City that offered not only some big names, but the best chances of professional stability: Alleghany B.C., American B.C., and Niagara B.C. The "Gang of Seven" became ten, and the ten became the American Professional Baseball League. Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:24 AM.

06-02-2022, 10:39 AM	#4
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL (1857-70) IN REVIEW NBBO FINALISTS & CHAMPIONS – NYL = New York League, NEL = Northeastern League, TWC = Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1857: NYL – Orange BBC (43-27 NYC), NEL – Sons of the Ocean (46-24 NE), TWC – Sons of the Ocean 3-1 1858: NYL – Orange BBC (51-19 NYC), NEL – Granite BC (44-26 NE), TWC – Granite BC 3-0 1859: NYL – Atlantic BBC (45-25 BRK), NEL – St. John’s BC (44-26 NE), TWC – St. John’s 3-0 1860: NYL – Orange BBC (56-14 NYC), NEL – Quinnipiac BC (45-25 NE), TWC – Quinnipiac BC 3-2 1861: NYL – Orange BBC (46-24 NYC), NEL – Green Mountain BC (50-20 NE), TWC – Orange BBC 3-0 1862: NYL – Victory BBC (46-24 UNY), NEL – Quaker State BC (46-24 COA), TWC – Victory BBC 3-1 1863: NYL – Orange BBC (56-14 NYC), NEL – Green Mountain BC (47-23 NE), TWC – Green Mountain BC 3-1 1864: NYL – Orange BBC (42-29 NYC), NEL – American BC (41-29 COA), TWC – Orange BBC 3-2 (2nd title) 1865: NYL – Orange BBC (45-25 NYC), NEL – Green Mountain BC (42-29 NE), TWC – Green Mountain 3-0 (2nd title) 1866: NYL – Flour City BBC (45-25 UNY), NEL – Newark BC (41-29 COA), TWC – Flour City 3-0 1867: NYL – Excelsior BBC (51-19 BRK), NEL – Reading Athletic Club (47-23 INL), TWC – Reading Athletic Club 3-2 1868: NYL – Gotham BBC (46-24 NYC), NEL – Newark BC (47-23 COA), TWC – Newark BC 3-1 1869: NYL – Atlantic BBC (43-27 BRK), NEL – Sons of the Ocean (48-22 NE), TWC – Sons of the Ocean 3-0 (2nd title) 1870: NYL – Kings County BBC (49-21 BRK), NEL – Green Mountain BC (44-26 NE), TWC – Kings County 3-0 Orange BBC absolutely dominated the New York League during its first decade of existence. However, they couldn’t translate that into championships as New England clubs kept finding ways to spoil a presumed Orange victory party at the Tucker-Wheaton Cup. BEST TEAM OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL Orange Base Ball Club (New York City Championship) 1857: 43-27, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1858: 51-19, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1859: 45-25, NYC champs 1860: 56-14, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1861: 46-24, NYC & NYL champs, won Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1862: 48-22, NYC champs 1863: 56-14, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1864: 42-29, NYC & NYL champs, won Tucker-Wheaton Cup (2nd time) 1865: 45-25, NYC & NYL champs, lost Tucker-Wheaton Cup 1866: 43-27, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 1 game 1867: 41-29, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 8 games 1868: 44-26, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 2 games 1869: 47-23, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 4 games [B[1870[/B]: 48-22, 2nd place in NYC Championship by 4 games PRE-PRO: 655-326 record (.678 WIN%), 9 NYC Championships (5x runners-up), 7 New York League Championships, 2 Tucker-Wheaton Cups (5x runners-up) Orange BBC was both the most successful, and most snake-bitten, team of the pre-split NBBO. They won the first nine New York City championships and then finished second in each of the next five. However, 4/5 second-place finishes were close and the team had horrible times in the Tucker-Wheaton Cup as well, winning just two out of the seven they went to. With better luck this could have been a team that won no less than 13/14 New York City championships and half (or more) of the awarded Tucker-Wheaton Cups in a 48-team league before the APBL was created. They could have been THE club in early American baseball, but it just wasn’t to be. TOP BATSMAN OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL Samuel Kessler – Sons of the Ocean (57-66), Newark (67-69), Niagara (70) 980 G, 1,114 H, .353 AVG, .894 OPS, 169 OPS+, 240 2B, 239 3B, 2,362 TB, 867 RBI, 48.87 WPA (8.07 per 162), 40.2 WAR (6.6 per 162) 2x Tucker-Wheaton Cup winner (1857, 68) 3x Northeastern League Batsman of the Year (1859, 64, 68) 1x Northeastern League Most Valuable Player (1864) 1x Northeastern League Batting Champion (1864: .418) 13x National Base Ball Organization All-Star (1857-61, 62-70) 7x Northeastern League Team of the Year (57-59, 63-65, 68) 6x Northeastern League leader in total bases (1858, 59, 63, 64, 68, 69) 6x Northeastern League leader in triples (1858, 62-65, 68) 5x Northeastern League leader in extra-base hits (1858, 63, 64, 68, 69) 3x Northeastern League leader in OPS (1859, 63, 64) 1x Northeastern League leader in RBIs (1866: 71) 1x Northeastern League leader in runs (1864: 102) 1864: 70 G, .418 AVG (220 OPS+), 102 R, 138 H, 41 XBH, 70 RBI, 206 TB, 29 SB, 4.85 WPA (11.22 per 162), 4.2 WAR (9.7 per 162) Kessler barely got the nod over Konrad Jensen. Why? Because Jensen was mostly a good-to-very-good hitter until he absolutely took off from 1867-70. Kessler’s consistency, 13 All-Star nods, and pair of Tucker-Wheaton Cups put him over the top. He was one of the driving forces – along with Anthony Mascherino – that put New England baseball on the map when everyone in New York just assumed that the best baseball was played there. Thomas Maloney of Orange won a pair of MVPs and three Batsman of the Year awards before Kessler had won his second or Jensen his first, but his production in the middle of the 1860s dipped until his OPS was below .800 for a whole season. He still ended up on 10 All-Star teams and 6 editions of the NYL Team of the Year, but his overall numbers ultimately didn't stack up with the other two. TOP HURLER OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL Carl Bancroft – Orange BBC (1857-70) 280-130 record, 3.44 ERA (103 ERA+), 3,649.2 IP, 274 CG, 134 BB, 464 K, 57.5 WAR (3.5 per 225 IP) 2x Tucker-Wheaton Cup winner (1861, 64) 3x New York League Hurler of the Year (1858, 60, 62) 10x 20-game winner (1858-63, 65, 66, 69, 70) 9x National Base Ball Organization All-Star (1859-61, 64-66, 67, 69) 4x New York League leader in pitcher WAR (1858, 62, 63, 64) 3x New York League leader in shutouts (1859, 66, 69) 2x New York League leader in strikeouts (1858, 1863) 2x New York League leader in complete games (1858, 60) 1x New York League leader in innings (1862) 1862: 26-6, 3.56 ERA (98 ERA+), 291.0 IP, 23 CG, 14 BB, 38 K, 1.28 WHIP, 4.8 WAR (3.7 per 225 IP) There’s really no debate: Carl Bancroft was the best pitcher in pre-professional baseball. He went on to win another Hurler of the Year award in the initial seasons in the APBL and retired as the first pitcher ever to win 300+ games (332). Nobody came remotely close to his win total of 280 in the 1857-70 timespan – Josiah Rayburn and Teddy Brinkley were next up at 209 and 208 respectively. If Orange BBC had thought him an ace right from the start of his career, Bancroft could have conceivably won 300+ in the pre-pro days as he didn’t start a single game as a 22-year-old in the NBBO’s inaugural season of 1857. TOP PLAYER OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL Edward Huntley – Orange BBC (1858-69) & Kings County (1870) 903 G, 1,480 H, 401 XBH, 1,064 R, .353 AVG, .855 OPS, 152 OPS+, 840 RBI, 543 SB, 238.4 ZR (3B/SS), 50.44 WPA (9.04 per 162), 49.7 WAR (8.9 per 162) 2x Tucker-Wheaton Cup winner (1861, 64) 3x New York League Most Valuable Player (1860, 63, 65) 2x New York League Batsman of the Year (1863, 66) 13x National Base Ball Organization All-Star (1858-70) 9x New York League Team of the Year at 3B or SS (1859-63, 66, 67, 69, 70) 6x New York League Golden Glove at 3B (1858-62, 64) 1x New York League Batting Champion (1865: .392) 7x New York League leader in non-pitcher WAR (1860-63, 65, 66, 69) 3x New York League leader in runs (1863, 65, 66) 1860 (Orange): 70 G, .381 AVG, .895 OPS (166 OPS+), 88 R, 123 H, 75 RBI, 164 TB, 57 SB (5 CS), +30.0 ZR at 3B, 4.74 WPA (10.96 per 162), 4.8 WAR (11.1 per 162) Huntley was the most well-rounded player in the league, and its most popular given that he was the face of Orange BBC. He played gold-glove third base perennially and switched seamlessly over to shortstop in 1867 after Orange’s starter at the position was signed away. He could do anything and do it well: hit, run, field, steal, move runners, find the gap, cover in the field. He was one of two players to be named league MVP three times (Konrad Jensen) and he’s also notable because he was part of Kings County’s haul of All-Stars before the 1870 season that got a group of clubs to think that maybe it was time for an above-board professional league. There’s a persuasive argument to be made for Anthony Mascherino, who had more Golden Gloves (8), as many Tucker-Wheaton Cups, (2), and higher overall WAR (51.6) than Huntley, but he did that specializing in one position (SS) while playing for a team that wasn’t as prominent, and his fame was mostly linked to his extraordinary defense (30+ ZR at SS five times in 70-game seasons, won 6 more Gold Gloves in the APBL for a career total of 14). BEST INDIVIDUAL SEASON OF PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL Konrad Jensen – Excelsior BBC (1867) 70 G, .451 AVG, 1.127 OPS (222 OPS+), 109 R, 152 H, 49 XBH, 90 RBI, 218 TB, 40 SB (8 CS), 8.05 WPA (18.63 per 162), 4.9 WAR (11.3 per 162) NBBO All-Star NYL Batsman of the Year NYL Most Valuable Player NYL Team of the Year NYL Batting Champion 3x NYL Batter of the Month Led NYL in plate appearances, average, on-base %, slugging %, OPS, hits, total bases, doubles, RBIs, runs, walks, and non-pitcher WAR This was the season where Jensen went from consistent young star to legend. Average: up 119 (.332 to .451) points from the year before. OPS: up 278 (.849 to 1.127). RBIs: up 33 (58 to 90). Stolen bases: up by about half (26 to 40). This would be the first of four straight seasons in which he led the New York League in AVG, OBP, SLG, OPS, and WPA. He hit over .400 in three of those four seasons, and in the other one he hit .395 with an OPS over 1.000 and had more than 6.1 WPA in 70 games. ALL PRE-PROFESSIONAL TEAM C: James Starrett – Quinnipiac (57-66), Minuteman (67), Hilltop (68-69), Merrimack Mills (70) – 8x All-Star, 4x Team of the Year, 21.9 WAR (4.0/162) 1B: DeVos Springer – Reading AC (60-68), Atlantic (69-70) – 7x Team of the Year, 6x All-Star, 1x Batsman of the Year, 21.6 WAR (4.6/162) 2B: Benjamin Chin – Granite (57-61), Merrimack (62), Victory (63-65), Gotham (66-67), Knickerbocker (68-70) – 4x All-Star, 4x Team of the Year, 26.2 WAR (4.4/162) 3B: Samuel Kessler – SotO (57-66), Newark (67-69), Niagara (70) – 13x All-Star, 7x Team of the Year, 3x Batsman of the Year, 1x MVP, 40.2 WAR (6.6/162) SS: Anthony Mascherino – Green Mountain (57-68), Minuteman (69-70) – 11x All-Star, 8x Golden Glove, 5x Team of the Year, 1x Batsman of the Year, 1x MVP, 51.6 WAR (9.4/162) LF: Thomas Maloney – Orange (57-70) – 10x All-Star, 6x Team of the Year, 3x Batsman of the Year, 2x MVP, 2x Golden Glove, 34.4 WAR (5.8/162) CF: Herman Ferris – St. Johns (60-65), Mutual (66-69), Kings County (70) – 8x All-Star, 5x Team of the Year, 1x MVP, 1x Golden Glove 31.3 WAR (6.6/162) RF: Konrad Jensen – Excelsior (57-70) – 9x All-Star, 7x Team of the Year, 4x Batsman of the Year, 3x MVP, 3x Golden Glove, 37.0 WAR (7.1/162) UT: Edward Huntley – Orange (57-69) & Brooklyn (70) – 3B/SS – 13x All-Star 9x Team of the Year, 6x Golden Glove, 3x MVP, 2x Batsman of the Year (all NYL), 49.7 WAR (8.9/162) SP: Carl Bancroft – Orange (57-69) – 280-130, 3.44 ERA (103 ERA+), 9x All-Star, 3x Hurler of the Year, 57.5 WAR (3.5/225 IP) SP: Theodore Brinkley – Niagara (57-63, 68-70), Minuteman (64-65), American (66-67) – 208-176, 3.00 ERA (115 ERA+), 3x All-Star, 1x Hurler of the Year, 52.2 WAR (3.4/225 IP) SP: Jonathan Ramsey – Minuteman (60-63), Mutual (64-67), Knickerbocker (68-70) – 198-135, 3.17 ERA (112 ERA+), 5x All-Star, 40.1 WAR (3.1/225 IP) Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:28 AM.

06-02-2022, 10:56 AM	#5
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	An aside, this might seem like a lot of words for a fake game, but it's something I'm doing for the fun of it for myself because I've honestly been working on logos very loosely on and off since about 2014. I'd just never had much time to post here... 1871: THE AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE BEGINS PLAY With ten clubs ready to go pro, it was now ready to figure out what the United States' first professional baseball league - the APBL - would look like. It was quickly decided that the schedule would be like the NBBO schedule in that each team would play each other team ten times. This would make for a 90-game schedule. Also, since there were only ten teams in a single competition, record alone would determine a champion and there would be no playoffs. As in the NBBO, in the case of two (or more) teams tying for 1st only then would there be a playoff, and it would only be one game. Discussions on rosters and pay became a bit more involved. Continuing with senior-level rosters of 20 wasn't much of an issue, but club executives wanted ways to keep their reserve players sharp. The NBBO allowed clubs to have a dozen players as "reserves", but the ABPL raised that limit to a full 22 so clubs could sign young players and give them the development time that they needed by playing practice games against each other. On the issue of pay, at the end of a day of discussion it was agreed that, during the season, players should be paid at least as much as manual laborers were typically given at the time: about $10 a week. Adding three weeks of preseason training to the 90-game schedule meant a 21-week schedule, so the minimum pay for the 1870 season was set at $210. From there, clubs could pay their players whatever they wished, with the only stipulation that it all had to be legitimate and above-board now. Finally, the issue of freedom of player/staff movement had to be resolved. First, club owners and executives agreed that the amount of time players had spent playing in the NBBO wouldn't count because this was a brand-new kind of league with different standards. Second, it was decided that each player could sign for whoever they wanted after playing in the APBL for four years, just like the length of most apprenticeships. This meant that none of the players starting out in the APBL would have their "Freedom of Agency" until after the 1874 season, but at the same time players were told, in writing, that they could receive contracts up to four years in length based on the quality of their play. The newly professional clubs also decided, on a bit of a whim, to do something that they thought would help market their teams: adding formal nicknames. The clubs already had informal nicknames given to them by fans or local journalists, so they were merely taking the monikers and making them official. Thus, all ten APBL teams were rebranded... Along with the new names came new ticket prices. Instead of charging a nickel for amateur games, the clubs figured that fans would be willing to pay a dime to go see professionals that would presumably play the game at a higher standard. Those who wanted to go see the reserves play would get in for free. Next, the NBBO's response... Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:33 AM.

08-03-2022, 09:20 PM	#6
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	1871: THE NBBO REACTS QUICKLY On the face of it, one would think that losing ten clubs might be devastating for the NBBO. However, given developments in recent seasons the organization was nothing but happy to see a professional league develop so they could go back to focusing on what they did best: developing regional, amateur baseball. They also hoped that the exit of ten economically powerful clubs would put a damper on the illicit cash arms race that had turned the NBBO's six championships into lop-sided affairs during the 1870 season. The NBBO's Fall Meetings went on at the same time the "Gang of Seven" chose three other clubs and started the APBL, so executives were quick to invite ten replacement clubs. They were well-known amateur clubs from the coastal and northeastern United States, and they were happy to accept their invitations and take the step up to the highest level of the amateur ranks: Members of the ten clubs were granted NBBO seniority based on the amount of time they'd been playing for their clubs in order to make things fair, and the ten were direct replacements for the departures in their respective regional championships. Brooklyn: Star BBC (for Kings County) New York City: Baltic BBC (for Orange), New York Athletic Club (for Knickerbocker) Upstate NY: Auburn BBC (for Niagara), Frontier BBC (for Flour City) Coastal: Diamond State BC (for Newark), Maryland BC (for Shamrock), National BC (for American), Philadelphia Tigers Social Club (for Quaker St.) Inland: Lancastra Britannia BC (for Alleghany) From there, the NBBO had one major decision left at the time: what to do about Konrad Jensen, who was still registered to the Excelsior club that was not offered a place in the APBL. In the end, Jensen was given a choice between going pro and joining an APBL club or going home to Providence and playing for St. John's, with no cash changing hands should he remain in the NBBO. No longer would he be paid a New York judge's or doctor's going rate to play baseball as a supposed amateur. Jensen made the obvious choice and went pro, joining the newly rebranded Manhattan Orangemen and immediately becoming the APBL's highest-paid player at just north of $1,300 a season. Corner outfield was a particularly deep spot among the APBL's ten founding clubs but Manhattan just happened to have a hole at RF, where Timothy Bates was a fine defender but a mediocre batsman. In addition, the NBBO passed a resolution barring APBL players from re-joining the competition via the reasoning that it was highly unlikely a full-time professional would go back to unpaid amateur baseball unless there were under-the-table payments going on. With everything decided, it was now just a matter of moving on to the baseball itself. Last edited by tm1681; 12-31-2022 at 09:17 AM.

09-07-2022, 09:04 PM	#7
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	1871-1880: The First Decade of Pro Baseball and the NBBO Continues on As the APBL began play in 1871, it was hoping to provide both a higher standard of baseball and a more competitive brand of baseball. On both fronts it succeeded, with the inaugural season's title decided on the final day and less than 20 games separating first place from last place over the 90-game season. The champions, Pennsylvania, finished 55-35 (.611), while 10th-place Philadelphia finished 37-53 (.411). The highly competitive baseball kept up for the first eight seasons, as six of the league's ten teams won at least one title and two of the remaining four finished in the top three at least once. In only 2/8 seasons did the champion finish 5+ games ahead of second place. In 1874 the title was decided via a one-game playoff. In 1876 the top four teams in the standings finished only three games apart from each other, with champion Brooklyn going 55-35 and 4th-place New York finishing 52-38. The first eight champions of the APBL: 1871: Pennsylvania Quakers (55-35, 1 game ahead) 1872: Manhattan Orangemen (61-29, 7 games ahead) 1873: Boston Shamrocks (61-29, 3 games ahead) 1874: Boston Shamrocks (53-38, won via one-game playoff v. MNH) 1875: Buffalo Blues (60-30, 9 games ahead) 1876: Brooklyn Kings (55-35, 2 games ahead) 1877: New York Knickerbockers (56-34, 3 games ahead) 1878: New York Knickerbockers (64-26, 3 games ahead) After 1878, the league had two issues: last-place teams were increasingly non-competitive and fanbases were opining that, while they most certainly enjoyed the professional standard of baseball, they missed the playoff atmosphere that was present at the end of the best teams' seasons in the NBBO. With that in mind, the APBL decided to split the league into two groups and have the top team from each group play for the newly-created "President's Cup" to crown the APBL champion. However, executives decided that six-team groups would work better than five-team groups, and they looked for two clubs to join the pro ranks. On that front, the decisions were easy as there were two NBBO clubs clearly a cut above the rest. The Excelsior club, which had been turned away at the founding of the APBL and lost Konrad Jensen as a result, didn't respond by wilting but instead became rampant in the Brooklyn Championship. They won it in 1872, and then five straight times from 1874-78, also winning the Tucker-Wheaton Cup three times during that five-year span. Meanwhile, over in Boston the Massachusetts Bay club responded to the reconfigured Coastal Championship by finishing in the top three eight years in a row, winning it each season from 1875-78 while putting up nearly a .700 winning percentage during that time. Choosing those two clubs meant more concentration of pro baseball in major markets, but given Excelsior's and Massachusetts Bay's success there weren't any other clubs to realistically consider. Massachusetts Bay kept their core intact upon moving up to pro baseball, supplementing their roster with pro castoffs. On the other hand, Excelsior completed pro baseball's first trade, sending 23-year-old NBBO All-Star Zenos Diakogeorgiou and $4,000 - enough to sign two five-star players or four good enough to have a chance to make Team of the Year with a fine season - to Philadelphia to bring back prodigal son Konrad Jensen. The two new groups were composed as such: Colonial Conference: Buffalo, Boston, Massachusetts Bay, New Jersey, Pittsburgh, Rochester Metropolitan Conference: Brooklyn, Excelsior, Manhattan, New York, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia The first two seasons of the new format brought some competitive balance back, with no team winning more than 2/3 of their games and no team losing more than 2/3. However, the result was the same both seasons as Brooklyn won the first two President's Cup trophies, first over Rochester in 1879 and then over Boston in 1880. In the NBBO, the baseball ended up being largely dominated by two teams. While the Northeastern League had a mix of six clubs compete for the Tucker-Wheaton Cup during the 1870s, the New York League wound up being controlled by Excelsior and the New York Athletic club after three other clubs won the NYL title in the first three years of the decade. Excelsior won the NYL title and the cup in 1874, 75, and 78 before moving to the APBL, while NYAC won the NYL in 1877, 79, and 80 while winning the cup twice. In 1879, as mentioned, the APBL offered Excelsior and Massachusetts Bay the chance to join the league, which both took immediately. The NBBO responded by adding two clubs from the regional ranks: the Marathon club of Brooklyn and the Scarlets of Salem, Massachusetts... During the decade the NBBO ran into a problem: after telling players that those who went pro were banned from returning to their league, so many players were signing with agents in the hopes of full-time paydays that average NBBO teams found themselves having difficulty filling out their basic 20-man rosters. So, in 1877 the NBBO converted from an amateur-only model to a semi-professional model and allowed APBL washouts to return to the league. The roster issues that the NBBO was having almost immediately resolved themselves, and teams ended up not spending much more money than they previously were when they were paying players illicitly, since the best players in the sport were now dedicated pros and NBBO clubs no longer had to worry about pushing around bags filled with hundreds of dollars of cash under the tables to to secure player services. Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:42 AM.

06-01-2022, 08:07 PM	#1
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	A Reboot of My Fictional Baseball Universe of 1871: The APBL, NBBO, and Pro/Amateur Split This is the story of a pair of leagues that began with logos I was making during down time when I was doing remote work. They are analogues to the National Association of Base Ball Players (NABBP), the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players (NAPBBP), and their resulting split in real life in 1871. It turned out that there were fatal flaws in my initial NBBO setup over the winter that created major issues when both leagues were up and running, so I started over and re-created the split for OOTP23. Details of how I decided on names and logos are in this thread. in the Mods forum. On January 22, 1857 in Manhattan's St. Nicholas Hotel, executives from various baseball clubs in New York City, Brooklyn, and elsewhere in the northeastern United States met to form the first group of organized baseball clubs, the National Base Ball Organization. In that meeting, guidelines for the NBBO's first formal competition were outlined: Starting in May of 1857, 48 clubs from the northeastern United States would form six "championship" divisions where each club would play the others in their division ten times (two five-game series), for a total of 70 games. The six divisions were further separated into two leagues: the New York League and the Northeastern League The winners of each of the three divisions would go to the playoffs, with the team having the best record in each league automatically moving on to the League Championship Series and the other two teams playing a best-of-five series to go to the LCS. The two league champions would compete for the Tucker-Wheaton Cup, named for the two men who wrote the Knickerbocker Rules for baseball: William Tucker and William Wheaton The original 48 teams were as follows: In the early years of the NBBO, even though the oldest clubs were from New York City and Brooklyn it was the clubs outside of New York who proved better, with Northeastern League members winning six of the first ten Tucker-Wheaton Cups. Their champions were varied, with Sons of the Ocean (New Bedford, MA) winning the inaugural Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1857. NEL champions would take the next three, with Granite (Manchester, NH), St. John's (Providence, RI), and Quinnipac (New Haven, CT) winning in '58, '59, & '60. Soon after, the Green Mountain club of Burlington, VT took control of the NEL, winning it three times in five years and taking the Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1863 & 1865. Over on the New York side, it was all about one team: the Willem von Orange Baseball Club. Even though it didn't have the resources and venue size of the Gotham Club or the Knickerbocker club, the Orange Club won the New York City championship in each of its first nine seasons, going on to win the New York League championship in seven of those nine. However, they could rarely take the final step, only winning the Tucker Wheaton Cup in 1861 & 1864. Soon after, there were fissures in the amateur league. While most players were given an expense per-diem of $1 or $2 per week during training, star players were given under-the-table payments of as much as $500 per year, essentially making them full-time professionals. Not long after "shamateurism" began, the Orange Club's dominance of the New York League was upended and they went five years without even winning the New York League Championship, with the Knickerbocker club winning four of them. Still, smaller Northeastern League clubs subsidized by rich owners continued get the best of their NYL counterparts in direct competition, with NEL teams taking the cup in 1867 (Reading v. Excelsior), '68 (Newark v. Gotham), and '69 (Sons of the Ocean v. Atlantic). There were larger clubs in the NEL - Alleghany (Pittsburgh), Shamrock (Boston), Quaker State (Philadelphia) to name a few - but it was these smaller clubs funded either by rich owners or well-to-do patrons and supporters that always managed to frustrate their bigger-city brethren. Next, the NBBO hits its breaking point in 1870. Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:16 AM.

06-02-2022, 08:13 AM	#2
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	1869-1870: THE NBBO'S "SHAMATEURISM" CRISIS During the 1870 season, "Shamateurism" brought the NBBO into a full-blown crisis. During the organization's previous thirteen seasons there were always a few teams who were a step above the rest, but in '70 each of the six championships were defined by teams who were clearly better than the rest of the competition. In Brooklyn, Kings County went 49-21 and were about five games clear of any other team. In NYC, the Knickerbocker Club finished 52-18 & Orange went 48-22 while Harlem finished in last place at 22-48. In the Upstate NY championship, the Victory Club won 47/70 games while last-place Binghamton went 20-50. The Northeastern League was more of the same. In the normally cutthroat Coastal championship, Shamrock went 47-23 while the Olympic Club was a shocking 10-60, the worst record in the history of the NBBO. In the Inland championship, Reading was 53-17 - a full eight games better than 2nd place - while last-place Pioneer was 21-49. Finally, in the New England championship Green Mountain was four games in the clear at 44-26 while Granite was the caboose of the train at 25-45. During the 1870 season it was clear that the usual order of the six championship divisions of the NBBO - mostly tight competitions at the top that sometimes had to be decided with one-game playoffs - had been completely upended by clubs hoarding quality players with under-the-table payments. In particular, Kings County raised eyebrows as they managed to recruit seven-time All Star 2B James Rousey, eight-time All Star CF Herman Farris, and 13-time Orange Club All Star 3B/SS Edward Huntley in a matter of weeks. Kings County GM Alfred Carraway managed to add the trio even though he already had a team containing multiple-time All Stars George Drew (OF), Frederick Madsen (C), and two-way player Delbert Hodges (3B & SP). A club with half a dozen All Stars in a 24-team league looked mighty suspicious, and other clubs who employed the "under-the-table" method were fuming at the brazenness of it while fans of baseball were left wondering if Kings County had bigger plans for the sport itself. It all certainly worked out well, as KC took the Tucker Wheaton Cup in an easy sweep against Green Mountain. Meanwhile, the Excelsior Club had an issue of its own that was raising eyebrows: that of superstar Konrad Jensen. Continental itself had experienced plenty of success, winning the Brooklyn championship five times and the NYL once, but Providence, RI native Jensen had been recruited by Excelsior in 1858 straight out of high school and was perfectly happy to remain with them even though there were other NYC-area clubs with better facilities, while Providence-based St. John's offered the same. In the 1870 season, Jensen was busy doing just what he'd done in each of the previous three seasons: leading all of the 48-team NBBO in batting average (.422), on-base percentage (.458), slugging percentage (.649), OPS (1.107), OPS+ (222), and total bases (209). He'd become so dominant in his late-20s that fans wondered if he was too good for the league itself. The real issue with regards to Jensen was an open secret among the other clubs in the NBBO: as Jensen became more and more talented in his mid-20s, Excelsior owner Jeremiah Nelson Tappan secured the funds to pay him no less than $780 in cash each season to stay with Excelsior. This meant that Jensen could focus full-time on honing his already considerable batting skills, and as he became unstoppable his under-the-table pay rose to well over $800 for just three months of baseball each year. Manual laborers averaged a bit over $500 for an entire year's work at the time, so Jensen could easily spend the rest of the nice-weather months perfecting his craft and then work a bit during the winter for some extra spending money. There was now a clear split between the under-the-table, pay-for-play teams and those who either stuck to amateurism or didn't have the means to slide cash to high quality players. Something had to give, and it did about six weeks after the end of the season. Next, a pro league is formed... Last edited by tm1681; 12-27-2022 at 05:56 PM.

09-07-2022, 09:09 PM	#8
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	THE 1870s IN REVIEW THE CHAMPIONS AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE 1871: Pennsylvania Quakers (55-35, no playoffs) 1872: Manhattan Orangemen (61-29, no playoffs) 1873: Boston Shamrocks (61-29, no playoffs) 1874: Boston Shamrocks (53-38, no playoffs) 1875: Buffalo Blues (60-30, no playoffs) 1876: Brooklyn Kings (55-35, no playoffs) 1877: New York Knickerbockers (56-34, no playoffs) 1878: New York Knickerbockers (64-26, no playoffs) 1879: Brooklyn Kings (60-30, President’s Cup 4-0 over Rochester) Champions were varied in the APBL’s first nine seasons, with six different teams winning the title. Brooklyn were the first champions after the league instituted divisions and a playoff in order to cater to fan demands for a climactic series. NBBO FINALISTS & CHAMPIONS – Tucker-Wheaton Cup winners in italics 1870: NYL – Kings County BBC (49-21 BRK), NEL – Green Mountain BC (44-26 NE) 1871: NYL – Atlantic BBC (53-17 BRK), NEL – Cantabrigians BC (46-24 NE) 1872: NYL – Mutual BBC (47-23 NYC), NEL – Reading Athletic Club (47-23 INL) 1873: NYL – Victory BBC (49-21 UNY), NEL – Philadelphia Tigers Social Club (45-26 COA) 1874: NYL – Excelsior BBC (43-27 BRK), NEL – Cantabrigians BC (50-20 NE) 1875: NYL – Excelsior BBC (51-19 BRK), NEL – Massachusetts Bay BC (50-20 COA) 1876: NYL – Frontier BBC (52-18 UNY), NEL – Wilkes-Barre Coal Barons (45-25 INL) 1877: NYL – NYAC Athletics (44-26 NYC), NEL – Sons of the Ocean (53-17 NE) 1878: NYL – Excelsior Knights (47-23), NEL – Massachusetts Bay Pilgrims (55-15 COA) 1879: NYL – NYAC Athletics (46-24 NYC), NEL – Reading Athletics (44-26 INL) Excelsior was so dominant over a five-year stretch (1874-78) that the APBL came calling and they got Konrad Jensen back. However, they weren’t the only team to win more than one Tucker-Wheaton Cup as Reading did it twice. TEAM OF THE DECADE Brooklyn Kings (American Professional Baseball Association) 1870 NBBO: 49-21, Brooklyn & NYL champs, Tucker-Wheaton Cup winners 1871 APBL: 47-43, 3rd place 1872 APBL: 53-37, 3rd place 1873 APBL: 47-43, 5th place 1874 APBL: 47-43, 5th place 1875 APBL: 51-39, 2nd place 1876 APBL: 55-35, champions 1877 APBL: 53-37, 2nd place 1878 APBL: 61-29, 2nd place 1879 APBL: 60-30, 1st in Metropolitan, won President’s Cup 4-0 over Rochester 1870s: 523-357 (.594), 2x APBL champs, 1x NBBO champs, 5 other top-three finishes There were other teams to win a pair of APBL titles during the 1870s (Boston, NY Knickerbockers), but only Brooklyn added a Tucker-Wheaton Cup in their final year in the NBBO to take three titles in the 1870s. That, combined with their consistency, put them alone at the top. PRO BATSMAN & PLAYER OF THE DECADE Konrad Jensen – Manhattan Orangemen (1871-74), Buffalo Blues (75-76), Phi. Patriots (77-78), Excelsior Knights (79) 800 G, 1,354 H, .394 AVG, .957 OPS (173 OPS+), 1,354 H, 299 XBH, 1,779 TB, 542 RBI, 301 SB, 38.52 WPA (7.80 per 162), 33.7 WAR (6.9 per 162) 2x APBL champion (1872, 75) 5x APBL Batsman of the Year (1874-77, 79) 7x APBL Team of the Year at OF (1873-77, 79) 4x APBL Batting Champion (1874, 76, 77, 79) 7x APBL leader in walks (1871-75, 77, 78, runner up 2x) 7x APBL leader in on-base percentage (1871-74, 76, 77, 79) 4x APBL leader in OPS (1874, 76, 77, 79, runner up once) 4x APBL leader in home runs (1874, 76-78) 3x APBL leader in hits (1874-76) 3x APBL leader in runs (1872-74) 2x APBL leader in non-pitcher WAR (1874, 77, runner up once) 1x APBL leader in total bases (1874: 236, runner up 3x) 1x APBL leader in runs batted in (1874: 78) 1874 (MNH): 91 G, .416 AVG (200 OPS+), 111 R, 169 H, 44 XBH, 78 RBI, 236 TB, 28 SB (4 CS), 5.61 WPA (9.98 per 162), 5.2 WAR (9.2 per 162) There is simply no debate: Konrad Jensen was both the best hitter and best overall player of the 1870s. He won five APBL Batsman of the Year awards in six seasons, received 6/7 APBL Team of the Year nods in the outfield to end the decade, had an average as high as .448, finished multiple seasons with an OPS over 1.000, and he did this even though he ended the decade by turning 40. Also, in 1976 he successfully stole 92 times in 90 games just to prove to everyone he could steal bunches of bases if he felt like it. He started the decade with the Orangemen after Excelsior didn’t make the APBL cut and moved a couple of times after that, but he ended the decade back home after his old club proved too dominant for the NBBO. As with the NBBO-only days, there could be an argument for Anthony Mascherino as the legendary shortstop won four titles plus six gold gloves to bring his career total an incredible 14, and he had slightly higher WAR (34.4). However, Jensen’s superior haul of major awards (7x TotY, 5x BotY, 4x batting champ) put him on the throne. PRO HURLER OF THE DECADE Fred Peacock – Penn. Quakers (1871-73, 75), Pitt. Industrials (74), NY Knickerbockers (76-77), Brooklyn Kings (78-79) 198-116 record, 3.44 ERA (120 ERA+), 2,866.2 IP, 214 CG, 12 SHO, 233 BB, 430 K, 54.5 WAR (4.3 per 225 IP) 3x APBL champ (1871, 77, 78) 1x APBL Hurler of the Year (1878) 1st-ever pitcher with 30+ wins in a season (1878: 32) 3x APBL leader in wins (1871, 76, 78) 2x APBL leader in WHIP (1872, 78) 2x APBL leader in K/9 (1877, 79) 1x APBL leader in ERA (1878: 2.44) 1x APBL leader in strikeouts (1879: 68) 1x APBL leader in K/BB: (1879: 2.19/1) 1878 (BRK): 32-11, 2.44 ERA (153 ERA+), 369.0 IP, 29 CG, 43 BB, 69 K, 1.19 WHIP, 6.6 WAR (4.0 per 225 IP) There was no singularly dominant pitcher over the first nine seasons of the APBL. James Maxwell and Clarence Bowden won two Hurler of the Year Awards each, but Maxwell’s career effectively lasted three seasons due to injury and Bowden had some mediocre years after leaving the Orangemen in 1875. Peacock had more wins than any other pro pitcher in the 1870s and adding his historic 1878 on top of that made him the Hurler of the Decade. Peacock would go on to retire after the 1882 season with more combined NBBO & APBL wins than any other pitcher (369 – 234 in the APBL & 135 in the NBBO), and he retired with a career pitching WAR of 92.1. ALL-DECADE TEAM C: Bruce Fine – Knickerbockers (71-75), Boston (76-79) – 4x Team of the Year, 2x Golden Glove, 19.4 WAR (4.3/162) 1B: Jens Kristensen – Boston (71-72), Brooklyn (73-74), Penn. (75-77), NJ (78-79) – 2x Team of the Year, 2x Golden Glove, 9.5 WAR (2.0/162) 2B: James McDonald – Pitt. (71-74), Brooklyn (75-77), Rochester (78-79) – 1x champ, 4x Team of the Year, 12.2 WAR (2.4/162) 3B: James Findley – Boston (71-76), Buffalo (77-78) – 2x champ, 1x Batsman of the Year, 3x Team of the Year, 3x RBI leader, 14.5 WAR (3.9/162) SS: Anthony Mascherino – Penn. (71-74), Brooklyn (75-76), Knickerbockers (77-79) – 4x champ, 6x Golden Glove, 3x Team of the Year, 34.4 WAR (6.9/162) OF: Charles Brophy – Knickerbockers (74-79) – 2x champ, 2x MVP, 1x Batsman of the Year, 1x Batting champ, 5x Team of the Year, 26.63 WPA (9.84/162), 20.9 WAR (7.7/162) OF: Tommy Thompson – Pennsylvania (71-79) – 1x champ, 4x Team of the Year, 7x Golden Glove, 21.07 WPA (4.75/162), 21.8 WAR (4.9/162) OF: Konrad Jensen – Orange (71-74), Buff. (75-76), Phi. (77-78), Excelsior (79) – 2x champ, 5x Batsman of the Year, 4x Batting champ, 7x Team of the Year, 33.7 WAR (6.9/162) SP: Fred Peacock – Penn. (71-73, 75), Pitt. (74), Knick. (76-77), Brk. (78-79) – 3x champ, 1x Hurler of the Year, 3x win leader, 30-win season, 198-116, 3.44 ERA, 54.5 WAR (4.3/225 IP) SP: Clarence Bowden – Orange (71-74), Penn. (75), Phi. (76), Brk. (77-79) – 1x champ, 2x Hurler of the Year, 178-135, 3.18 ERA, 54.8 WAR (4.2/225 IP) SP: Leland Thurston – NJ (71-74), Pitt. (75-76), Phi. (77-79) – 1x champ, 3x strikeout leader, 2x CG leader (32 in ’77), 181-178, 3.54 ERA, 54.5 WAR (3.6/225 IP) There was a lot of player movement over the first decade of professional baseball, and a lot of the NBBO greats who went pro retired during it. Because of that, some of the positions on the all-decade team (1B, 2B, SP) are weak. Brophy made it even though he played only five full years, because once he settled in with the Knickerbockers after a brief stint in 1874 he became a superstar at the age of 21 (.996 OPS, 171 OPS+). Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:50 AM.

09-07-2022, 09:15 PM	#9
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	1882: THREE NEW LEAGUES! With baseball spreading across the United States, whose population was rapidly spreading itself, three new leagues popped up in the Midwestern US in 1882. First up was the Midwestern Baseball Association, a.k.a the MWBA: The MWBA was to be the Midwest's answer to the American Professional Baseball League, and similarly it was made up of the best existing amateur clubs from large Midwestern metropolitan areas. The inaugural season was a competitive affair, with three teams - St. Louis, Louisville, & Lake Michigan - in the title hunt until the final week. In the end St. Louis won the first MWBA championship with a 55-35 record. Bringing up the rear was Chicago at 34-56. The MWBA’s initial Batsman of the Year was Jacob Milburn (STL – 90 G, .418 AVG, 1.077 OPS, 99 RBI), its inaugural Pitcher of the Year was Charlie Higgins (STL – 27-9, 3.91 ERA, 25 CG, 7.5 WAR), and its first MVP was Obelix Papatamelis (LOU – 90 G, .375 AVG, .998 OPS, 72 RBI, 6.30 WPA). The first MWBA Team of the Year (League leader in Italics): P: Charlie Higgins (STL) – 27-9, 3.91 ERA (104 ERA+), 345.2 IP, 25 CG, 58 BB, 37 K, 7.5 WAR, MWBA champ C: Tobias Nielsen (LOU) - .312 AVG, .769 OPS (116 OPS+), 62 RBI, 43.2% CS, 3.06 CERA, 1.7 WAR 1B: Julian Gregory (CHI) - .344 AVG, .864 OPS (142 OPS+), 54 RBI, 34 XBH, 2.5 WAR 2B: Bryan Lawson (STL) - .359 AVG, .847 OPS (138 OPS+), 90 RBI, 173 TB, 1.1 WAR, MWBA champ 3B: Franklin Rader (MIS) - .362 AVG, .849 OPS (139 OPS+), 69 RBI, 175 TB, 3.1 WAR, Golden Glove SS: George Shay (CIN) - .332 AVG, .801 OPS (125 OPS+), 68 RBI, 30 XBH, 171 TB, 26.2 ZR at SS, 4.4 WAR OF: Obelix Papatamelis (LOU) - .375 AVG, .998 OPS (180 OPS+), 72 RBI, 34 SB, 464 PA, 130 R, 50 BB, 6.30 WPA, 4.0 WAR OF: Burl Chance (LM) - .329 AVG, .826 OPS (131 OPS+), 70 RBI, 30 XBH, 132 TB, 3.50 WPA, 1.7 WAR OF: Jacob Milburn (STL) – .418 AVG, 1.077 OPS, 201 OPS+, 173 H, 29 3B, 55 XBH, 99 RBI, 5.46 WPA, 3.1 WAR, MWBA champ In addition to the MWBA, there were two semi-professional leagues that also began play… Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:53 AM.

12-26-2022, 10:59 PM	#10
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	The second league to set up shop was the Great Lakes Baseball Conference, a.k.a the GLBC: The GLBC didn't cast as wide of a geographical net as the MWBA at the start, limiting itself to Midwestern states that bordered the Great Lakes and cities within those states that were as close as possible to the lakes themselves. The league was nowhere near ambitious as the long-established NBBO, having just 10 teams compared to their 48. In the GLBC's inaugural season, Saginaw was the clear #1 as they had the league title wrapped up with a week to spare. From there they coasted to a 58-32 record and held the top spot by three games over Toledo. At the other end of the spectrum, the Wolves of Grand Rapids had a very regrettable pro debut, finishing in last place by ten full games at 28-62. Thomas Mack of Toledo (.365 AVG, .902 OPS, 79 RBI, 199 TB in 90 games) was the league’s first Batsman of the Year, while Robert Beeson (27-15, 24 CG, 24 BB, 55 K, 9.0 WAR), also of Toledo, was the GLBC’s inaugural Pitcher of the Year. Duluth RF George Wise (6.37 WPA in 88 games) was the competition’s first MVP. Last edited by tm1681; 12-31-2022 at 08:39 AM.

12-27-2022, 05:24 PM	#11
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	The other semi-pro league was the Baseball League of the American Prairie, commonly shortened to the Prairie League or the PL: The PL covered a larger area than the other two leagues, allowing applicants from the Dakotas and Kansas all the way east to southern Illinois. However, in the end they settled on ten teams with the league largely confined to four states, as Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, and Nebraska combined to have nine of the ten entrants. During the first year of the Prairie League, it was basically St. Paul as the frontrunner and nine other teams fighting for second place. The North Stars finished an incredible 64-26, winning the title by ten games. The rest of the league was a bit of a palindrome, with records ranging from 54-36 to (Omaha) to 36-54 (Des Moines). The Prairie League’s first Batsman of the Year was Kansas City second baseman Henry Garvin (.387 AVG, 1.070 OPS, 114 R, 158 H, 257 TB, 86 RBI - all lead league), while old hand Duane Foster of St. Paul (39 y/o, 31-13, 48 GS, 390.2 IP, 29 CG, 5.4 WAR) was its first Pitcher of the Year and Garvin doubled up on the major awards as he was also the league’s inaugural MVP (7.90 WPA in 90 games). Last edited by tm1681; 12-31-2022 at 09:25 AM.

12-27-2022, 05:53 PM	#12
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	KING KONRAD PUTS DOWN HIS BAT After the APBL’s 1883 season, Konrad Jensen, now a 43-year-old, 26-year veteran of both pre-professional and professional baseball, decided it was time to call an end to his extraordinary career. He hadn’t declined significantly - .362/.411/.581 for a .992 OPS in his final season – but he felt after slightly more than a quarter century’s worth of summers playing the game regularly it was time to do something else. He immediately signed a lucrative contract to become the Hitting Coach of the Excelsior Knights. How good was his career? Well, take a look… NOTE: For some reason, along the way I had to restore a backup and in the process I lost all the Black/Gray ink prior to the 1881 season, thus the highlighting is gone. The honors he racked up during his career? 1st player to reach 3,000 career hits (3,311 for career) 2nd non-pitcher to cross 80 WAR (81.9 for career) 16x Team of the Year (Silver Slugger) at OF (7x NYL, 9x APBL) 10x Batsman of the Year (MVP) (4x NYL, 6x APBL) 10x Batting Champion (5x NYL, 5x APBL) 9x New York League (NBBO) All-Star (1860-64, 67-70) 2x APBL championship winner (1872, 1875) 3x New York League (NBBO) Most Valuable Player (Custom – based on WPA) (1867, 68, 70) 2x New York League (NBBO) Triple Crown winner (1869, 1870) 15x League leader in OBP (5x NYL, 10x APBL) 12x League leader in Walks (3x NYL, 9x APBL – never led league in IBB) 11x League leader in Runs Created (5x NYL, 6x APBL) 10x League leader in OPS (4x NYL, 6x APBL) 5x League leader in AVG, OBP, and SLG simultaneously (4x NYL, 1x APBL) 4x League leader in RBI (2x NYL, 2x APBL) 4x League leader in position player WAR (2x NBBO, 2x APBL) 1858-70 (Excelsior, NYL): 178 OPS+ 1867 (Excelsior, NYL): 8.05 WPA in 70 games 1867-70 (Excelsior, NYL): .428 AVG, .447 OBP, .634 SLG, 1.081 OPS, 215 OPS+ 1871-83 (3 teams, APBL): .390 AVG, .442 OBP, .528 SLG, .970 OPS, 170 OPS+ 1876 (Buffalo, APBL): .448 AVG, .498 OBP, .546 SLG, 1.044 OPS Here’s how good he still was at the age of thirty-nine: And here’s how good the game engine still had him at the age of 39: NOTE: I had hitting batter aging speed set to .850 so players would start to fall off around age 35 because of the shorter seasons, so this was still a large deviation. I also had the amateur draft ticked off, and with the different way the game engine generates random free agents instead of amateur draft pool players, it would seem on the face of it that outlier players like this are more likely to appear… As a columnist from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle put it, “Of all the men and women in all of human history who have ever tried their hand at anything, a scarce few have been better at their selected field of work than Konrad Jensen was at the game of base ball.” Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 10:57 AM.

12-31-2022, 08:53 AM	#13
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	THE RISE OF THE MIDWESTERN BASEBALL ASSOCIATION When the Midwestern Baseball Association (MWBA) began play in 1882, it was not intended to be a thorn in the side of the already-established professional league, the APBL. It was created to give the Midwestern United States its own fully-professional baseball league, with standards to match and salaries that came close to that of the “Grand Circuit” Things were calm for the first four years of the two leagues’ co-existence, as there was relatively little player movement while the four-year countdown before the first MWBA free agent class was taking place. The APBL brass hadn't said much about the other pro league, so it was assumed that the APBL front offices had seen their junior upstarts as inferior and unworthy of attention. In the winter of 1885 that changed quickly as notable MWBA stars entering their first taste of free agency were snapped up by MWBA clubs offering better salaries: Halvard Westegren, 1885 Team of the Year at C, moved from St. Louis to the New York Athletics George Shay, SS of the year all four MWBA seasons, moved from Cincinnati to the Athletics Henry Oliver, 2x 20-game winner, moved from Lake Michigan to New Jersey Charles Fried, Indianapolis’ best hitter and key infielder, signed with Excelsior Frank O’Meara, 1885 20-game winner, moved from Milwaukee to Manhattan Charles Beals, Detroit’s ace, was signed by APBL champions Brooklyn Key Cincinnati starter Joseph Bryant signed for New Jersey This all caught the collective MWBA brass completely off-guard. The APBL was mostly mum about the new league, so surely they saw the players as inferior? At the annual end-of-season meetings in October of 1886, a plan of action was discussed. There were two courses the league could have taken: take steps to keep players from moving to the other league, or get revenge on the APBL by bringing in some of their best players. The MWBA chose the latter, and how! Just two weeks after the meetings were over, Detroit shocked the eastern baseball establishment by signing professional baseball’s now most famous player, Alva Burgess, from the Boston Shamrocks by offering him a 33% raise from what the dominant team of the APBL was paying him. In Burgess’ 11 years with Boston he’d won three APBL pennants, two Batsman of the Year awards, two MVPs, eight Team of the Year nods, and was widely seen as the best overall player in the league. One week later, Boston was poached a second time when Louisville swooped in and offered 31-game-winner Frank Singleton a whopping 60% raise on his Shamrocks pay packet. Singleton was a seven-year vet who’d split his time between Brooklyn and Boston, and in that short time had won a whopping 163 games opposed to just 81 losses. He’d led the APBL in wins three straight seasons, won multiple titles, and was the ace of Boston’s feared pitching staff. And just like that, the APBL’s best pitcher and best hitter had both switched leagues before winter had even set in. The events were an embarrassment for the APBL due to not only the nature of having lost both their Batsman and Pitcher of the Year in the space of a week, but Boston was the league’s marquee team, having finished 1886 with a record of 88-24 while easily earning a place in the championship series. The era of open competition between the two leagues for talent was now on. Not only was the competition for talent on, but now that the MWBA showed they could compete financially people were starting to think that maybe the baseball talent in the Midwest was just as good. Indeed, the MWBA’s marquee players were as good as anything the APBL put on the field. At the start of the MWBA, rumors told of an incredibly talented 22-year-old from Rushville, IL named Jacob Milburn that was supposedly every bit as talented as Konrad Jensen… He joined the amateur St. Louis Baseball Club out of high school in 1878, and over the rest of the 1880s he proceeded to do this to the MWBA: If you’re keeping track, that’s Milburn leading the MWBA in hits, average, OBP, slugging, and obviously OPS in all the league’s first seven seasons. Not surprisingly, he was MWBA Batsman of the Year all seven times as well. Milburn was a credible fielder on top of that, but not as good as Jensen. A closer look at him reveals that he’s another one of the outliers generated by the game engine that happens when you tick the amateur draft off. As the MWBA had a marquee batter, they quickly found out they had a marquee pitcher as well: German-born Hans Ehle, better known as “Der Kaiser”... Ehle was not a MWBA original. He started 1882 in the GLBC with the Columbus Capitols, having joined them right as he was graduating high school. He was regarded as a pitcher with impressive potential and looked decent in his first season. However, as he transitioned into adulthood and his frame filled out, his pitching gained velocity (1882: 82-84, 1884: 88-90) and as the rules of baseball allowed pitchers to start throwing overhanded in 1884 he really took off: That ridiculous third season led to him being purchased by Milwaukee – where else would a German go but Wisconsin – for $4,000. As pitchers worked to maximize the effect of the new rules removing restraints on pitching styles, it led to an immediate spike in strikeouts all over baseball and Ehle’s dominance went from noticeable to terrifying: As you can see, he’s probably another 1800s outlier generated by the game… With players like the above on the MWBL’s side, it was no longer 100% certain that the APBL had the best players in baseball, and that could only make things more interesting going into the 1890s. Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 11:05 AM.

12-31-2022, 09:13 AM	#14
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	THE SOUTHEAST GETS A LEAGUE OF ITS OWN With the Northeast and Midwest now covered by professional baseball, the growing amateur and semi-pro game in the Southeastern United States decided it was time to turn professional as well. In the winter of 1884, leaders from six of the best amateur clubs in the southeast got together to form the Southeastern & Atlantic League of Baseball, which quickly became known as the SEAL. The clubs involved, and the new names they took: Armory Baseball Club, which became the Charleston Battery Atlanta Baseball Club, which became the Atlanta Flames Cumberland Baseball Club, which became the Nashville Bobcats Mississippi River B.C., which became the Memphis Showboats Savannah Baseball Club, which became the Savannah Schooners Tobacco Growers Guild of Richmond, which became the Richmond Rollers Their identities: The SEAL league was going to have the same roster rules and regulations as the two existing professional leagues, but its aims were a bit smaller. The southeast had smaller metro areas and thus smaller markets, meaning that it couldn’t match the kind of pay the APBL and MWBA offered – about 2/3 of the APBL and maybe 3/4 of the MWBA. In the meantime, what it could be was a professional league that let players in the Southeast United States become full-time baseball pros while allowing overlooked players in the other two pro leagues a chance to become everyday starters or perhaps even stars in a new home. And unlike the other two leagues, the SEAL played its ball in pitcher-friendly environments that led to batting average, power output, and ERAs that were noticeably lower than elsewhere. The inaugural season of the SEAL was tighter than any pennant chase baseball had seen up to that point, with five of the league’s six teams finishing within two games of eventual champions Richmond: As you can see, there was a four-way tie for second place that league executives didn’t anticipate at all, so they had to come up with a tiebreaker in which the teams were placed on the standings based on their season-long run differential. Charleston finished second because theirs was a +24, Memphis in third at +16, Nashville in fourth thanks to a +7, and Savannah was the only one of the four 52-48 teams with a negative RD so they finished in fifth. The SEAL’s first Batsman of the Year was Nashville’s Henry Duncan (5.0 WAR, 155 OPS+, led league in runs, hits, total bases, triples), who also was its MVP (4.5 WPA in 100 games). The first Pitcher of the Year was champion Richmond’s ace Charles Davis even though he managed to both win and lose 20 games (25-20), but he was clearly the league’s best pitcher (2.20 ERA, 385 IP, 32 CG, 186 K, 12.3 WAR – all led league). Last edited by tm1681; 12-31-2022 at 09:29 AM.

01-01-2023, 11:24 AM	#15
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	THE END OF THE NBBO SIGNALS A NEW BEGINNING As the 1880s progressed, the NBBO was running into a problem. Owing to the Northeastern United States’, as well as that of the USA in general, quickly-growing population, more cities and towns expressed the desire to have ball clubs that were a step up from the amateur ranks, and they had enough people going to games to make it happen. Toward the end of the decade NBBO executives realized that the above meant the 48-team, 2-league format it had run since 1857 wasn’t going to be feasible for much longer. There were at least two towns in New York that wanted in, and enough in New England that the region could conceivably be split off into its own league. It was then that NBBO commissioner Al Spalding had an idea: have New York City, the Northeast, and New England each be separate, but associated, competitions and turn the NBBO into more of an organizational governing body. During 1888’s NBBO Winter Meetings, it was agreed that the NBBO would split into three competitions starting in the new decade: The New York Metropolitan League (NYL), covering the New York City teams The Northeastern League (NEL), covering Upstate New York, Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania The New England Baseball Association (NEBA), covering Massachusetts & greater New England The three competitions could then add new entrants as they wished, which would allow for more baseball in more cities to be played further into the year at a higher-than-amateur standard. The NBBO received a bigger boost when meetings with the other two notable semi-professional competitions, the Great Lakes Baseball Conference (GLBC) and the Baseball League of the American Prairie (PL), proved fruitful and both agreed to move under the NBBO umbrella for 1890. This meant that 1890s would see the National Base Ball Organization turn from a competition into an entire organizing body for the non-professional sport in the United States, and should other semi-pro leagues pop up they would likely join as well. The last year of the NBBO’s single competition was a closely-contested one, for the most part. In the New York League, Eckford (53-31) won the Brooklyn championship by 3 games over Nassau County, Yonkers (53-31) won the New York City championship by 2 games over Manhattan, and Binghamton (50-34) won the Upstate New York championship by 2 games as well, besting Utica. In the Northeastern League, Olympic B.C. (52-32) took the Coastal championship by 4 games over Philadelphia and Sons of the Ocean (56-28) also took their regional championship, New England, by 4 over the Cantabrigians. However, the Lancaster Dukes won the Inland Championship by no less than 16 games thanks to a record of 61-23 and the best lineup in the league, and it looked to many like they would be the final NBBO champions. Instead, they were taken down 3-1 in the Northeastern League Championship Series by Sons of the Ocean in a stunner, and it was the Sons of the Ocean who would be crowned the NBBO’s last victors after besting Eckford of Greenpoint in the Tucker-Wheaton Cup, winning it for the fourth time. This was perhaps a fitting end to the NBBO given that SotO were the NBBO’s first champions back in 1857. The final list of NBBO finalists & champions (Tucker-Wheaton Cup winners in italics): PRE-PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL 1857: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Sons of the Ocean 1858: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Granite BC 1859: NYL – Atlantic BBC, NEL – St. John’s BC 1860: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Quinnipiac BC 1861: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC 1862: NYL – Victory BBC, NEL – Quaker State BC 1863: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC 1864: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – American BC 1865: NYL – Orange BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC 1866: NYL – Flour City BBC, NEL – Newark BBC 1867: NYL – Excelsior BBC, NEL – Reading Athletic Club 1868: NYL – Gotham BBC, NEL – Newark BBC 1869: NYL – Atlantic BBC, NEL – Sons of the Ocean 1870: NYL – Kings County BBC, NEL – Green Mountain BC POST-APBL SPLIT 1871: NYL – Atlantic BBC, NEL – Cantabrigians BC 1872: NYL – Mutual BBC, NEL – Reading Athletic Club 1873: NYL – Victory BBC, NEL – Philadelphia Tigers Social Club 1874: NYL – Excelsior BBC, NEL – Cantabrigians BC 1875: NYL – Excelsior BBC, NEL – Massachusetts Bay BC 1876: NYL – Frontier BBC, NEL – Wilkes-Barre Coal Barons 1877: NYL – NYAC Athletics, NEL – Sons of the Ocean 1878: NYL – Excelsior Knights, NEL – Massachusetts Bay Pilgrims 1879: NYL – NYAC Athletics, NEL – Reading Athletics 1880: NYL – NYAC Athletics, NEL – Sons of the Ocean 1881: NYL – Manhattan Orangemen, NEL – Jersey City Longshoremen 1882: NYL – Empire BBC, NEL – Wilkes-Barre Coal Barons 1883: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Reading Athletics 1884: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Fall River Marksmen 1885: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Reading Athletics 1886: NYL – Nassau County BBC, NEL – Sons of the Ocean 1887: NYL – Frontier BBC, NEL – Olympic BBC 1888: NYL – Binghamton Blue Jays, NEL – Lancaster Dukes 1889: NYL – Eckford of Greenpoint, NEL – Sons of the Ocean All totaled, there were 33 Tucker-Wheaton Cups awarded. 18 went to clubs in the Northeastern League, 15 went to clubs in the New York League, and Sons of the Ocean won it more times (4) than anyone else. Orange BBC/Manhattan Orangemen appeared in the Tucker Wheaton Cup more often than any other club at nine times, but unfortunately for them they only won a third of the times they made it to the TWC. With five semi-pro leagues on the books for 1890 a fair playoff system wouldn’t be feasible, but it wouldn’t surprise if the Tucker-Wheaton Cup was revived before long… Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 11:35 AM.

01-01-2023, 11:58 AM	#16
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	THE 1880s IN REVIEW THE CHAMPIONS AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE 1880: Brooklyn Kings (52-38, President’s Cup 4-2 over Boston) 1881: Boston Shamrocks (58-32, President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn) 1882: Boston Shamrocks (53-37, President’s Cup 4-2 over NY Athletics) 1883: Brooklyn Kings (59-31, President’s Cup 4-0 over Massachusetts Bay) 1884: Boston Shamrocks (73-39, President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn) 1885: Brooklyn Kings (79-33, President’s Cup 4-1 over Boston) 1886: Manhattan Knickerbockers (76-36, President’s Cup 4-1 over Boston) 1887: Boston Shamrocks (92-20, President’s Cup 4-1 over New Jersey) 1888: Manhattan Knickerbockers (75-37, President’s Cup 4-1 over Boston) 1889: Manhattan Knickerbockers (74-38, President’s Cup 4-2 over Rochester) Three teams dominated the APBL in the 80s: Boston, Brooklyn, and Manhattan. The Knickerbockers took a back seat after winning the last two non-playoff titles (1877, 78), but by the end of the decade they were firmly back on top as Boston was faltering and Brooklyn wasn’t quite great enough. MIDWESTERN BASEBALL ASSOCIATION 1882: St. Louis Saints (55-35, no playoffs) 1883: Louisville Sluggers (64-26) 1884: St. Louis Saints (59-31) 1885: St. Louis Saints (65-43) 1886: Cincinnati Royals (70-38) 1887: Detroit Robins (66-42) 1888: Detroit Robins (75-33) 1889: Detroit Robins (80-28) Early on, it was looking like the inaugural decade of the MWBA would belong to St. Louis as they finished 1st, 1st, 2nd (62-28), and 1st over the league’s first four seasons thanks to the unstoppable Jacob Milburn. However, they fell to third (57-51) in 1886 and once Detroit signed Alva Burgess the Saints didn't have a chance. SOUTHEASTERN & ATLANTIC LEAGUE 1885: Richmond Rollers (54-46, no playoffs) 1886: Richmond Rollers (64-36) 1887: Richmond Rollers (60-40) 1888: Atlanta Flames (60-40) 1889: Atlanta Flames (65-35) In the first three seasons of the SEAL it was all Richmond, as their outstanding pitching trumped the rest of the league. However, by the end of the decade Atlanta, through the signing and development of outstanding young talent, had caught and passed their northern foes to become the league’s dominant side. NON-PROFESSIONAL CHAMPIONS 1880: NYAC (NBBO) 1881: Manhattan (NBBO) 1882: Empire (NBBO), Saginaw (GLBC), St. Paul (PL) 1883: Eckford (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), St. Paul (PL) 1884: Fall River (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Kansas City (PL) 1885: Eckford (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Dubuque (PL) 1886: Sons of the Ocean (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Omaha (PL) 1887: Olympic (NBBO), Toledo (GLBC), Kansas City (PL) 1888: Lancaster (NBBO), Duluth (GLBC), Kansas City (PL) 1889: Sons of the Ocean (NBBO), Peoria (GLBC), St. Paul (PL) Sons of the Ocean ended the NBBO the same way they started it back in 1857: by winning the Tucker-Wheaton Cup. Meanwhile, Toledo’s iron grip on the GLBC was finally broken by the end of the decade and clubs in the emerging markets of Kansas City and St. Paul dominated the Prairie League. TEAM OF THE DECADE The Boston Shamrocks (American Professional Baseball League) 1880: 59-31, Lost President’s Cup 4-2 vs Brooklyn 1881: 58-32, Won President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn 1882: 53-37, Won President’s Cup 4-2 over NY Athletics 1883: 50-40, 2nd place in APBL Metropolitan Conference 1884: 73-39, Won President’s Cup 4-2 over Brooklyn 1885: 80-32, Lost President’s Cup 4-1 vs Brooklyn 1886: 88-24, Lost President’s Cup 4-1 vs Manhattan 1887: 92-20, Won President’s Cup 4-1 over New Jersey 1888: 82-30, Lost President’s Cup 4-1 vs Manhattan 1889: 70-42, 2nd place in APBL Metropolitan Conference 1880s: 705-327 record (.683), 8 President’s Cup appearances, 4 APBL Championships The 1880s was Boston’s decade. Even though none went seven games, they had some epic confrontations with Brooklyn in the President’s Cup and in the end their record and title haul was simply superior to that of any other pro team. At the height of their powers, they not only had pro baseball’s best starting rotation but they also had baseball’s most feared position player trio in the outfield “Hydra” of Anderson “The Wild Horse” Belknap, Alva “The Cheetah” Burgess, and Isaiah “The Locomotive” Duffy, all of whom would have an 80/80 on range at their positions had such scouting grades existed back then. Boston had the best winning percentage, the most titles, and easily more President’s Cup appearances than any other APBL team since they won the Colonial Conference in 8/10 seasons. The Brooklyn Kings were outstanding for most of the decade, making the PC five times and winning it three. However, by the end of the decade they’d fallen behind the Knickerbockers and in 1888 they slipped as far down as sixth place (49-63) in the Metropolitan Conference. In the early days of the MWBA it looked like St. Louis would put up a record that could match Boston’s, winning three of the first four titles and finishing second in the other season even though they went 62-28. However, once Detroit signed Alva Burgess the balance of power in the league immediately shifted and the Saints fell off quickly. BATSMAN OF THE DECADE Jacob Milburn – St. Louis Saints (1882-89) 1,421 H, .413 AVG, 1.041 OPS, 194 OPS+, 221 2B, 141 3B, 1,964 TB, 37.8 WAR in 808 games (7.7 per 162) 8x MWBA Team of the Year at OF (1882-89) 7x MWBA Batsman of the Year (1882-88) 3x MWBA Most Valuable Player (1882, 84, 86) 3x MWBA Champion (1882, 84, 85) 7x MWBA Batting Champion (1882-88) 7x MWBA Leader in hits, OBP, SLG, & OPS (1882-88) 7x MWBA Leader in total bases (1882-88) 3x MWBA Leader in runs, doubles, & triples 1x MWBA Leader in RBI (1882) 1886: 106 starts, .432 AVG, .505 OBP, 1.059 OPS, 213 OPS+, 111 R, 187 H, 240 TB, 69 RBI, 41 SB, 6.67 WPA (10.19 per 162), 6.5 WAR (10.0 per 162) No debate. None. As dominant as Konrad Jensen was in the late 1860s and throughout the 70s, Jacob Milburn was arguably even more dominant over the first eight seasons of the MWBA. He hit more than .400 seven times. He led the league in AVG, OBP, and OPS seven times. He led the league in hits and total bases seven times. His OPS was over 1.000 six times, and his OPS+ was over 200 five times. Milburn came into professional baseball at the age of 22 hitting like Jensen did when he hit his final stage of development as a 27-year-old for Excelsior, and Milburn was doing it at a higher level of play. HURLER OF THE DECADE Henry Polley – Boston Shamrocks (1881-89) 209-96 record, 2.59 ERA, 151 ERA+, 2,801.2 IP, 243 CG, 14 SHO, 475 BB, 1,226 K, 75.5 WAR (6.1 per 225 IP) 4x APBL Champion (1881, 82, 84, 87) 1x APBL Hurler of the Year (1888) 2x APBL Leader in wins (1886, 88) 2x APBL Leader in ERA (1882, 88) 2x APBL Leader in pitcher WAR (1888, 89) 8x 20-game winner (1881-82, 84-89) 1888: 28-11, 2.32 ERA (166 ERA+), 333.1 IP, 30 CG, 3 SHO, 49 BB, 185 K, 1.14 WHIP, 9.9 WAR (6.7 per 225 IP) Polley entered pro baseball as a 25-year-old rookie for Boston in 1881 and proceeded to go 26-14 with a 2.77 ERA. He was almost uniformly excellent after, even if that only earned him one Hurler of the Year award. Teammate Martin Nielson won the award three times, but he was more inconsistent with a slightly worse record and notably lower WAR even though the two had similar statistics for the decade. Polley was Boston’s ace the entire time, which made his 209-96 record that much more impressive. Arthur Meyer had a playing record that came close, but he didn’t really get going until joining Brooklyn in 1885 after four okay years with Massachusetts Bay. He actually won more games than Polley, but a couple of seasons with sub-500 records and ERAs over 4.00 with the other Boston team really hurt his resumé. On talent and recent record alone, Hans Ehle is the winner. He topped every other pro pitcher of the decade in Hurler of the Year awards (4), ERA (1.74), ERA+ (213), strikeouts (1,650), and WAR (81.0), but he did that playing just five seasons of pro baseball after spending 1882-84 as a semi-pro with Columbus. That’s remarkable, but it also meant he wasn’t the Pitcher of the (entire) Decade. Given the way things are going he’s almost certain to be the #1 pitcher of the 1890s. PLAYER OF THE DECADE Alva Burgess – Boston Shamrocks (APBL – 1880-86) & Detroit Robins (MWBA – 1887-89) 1,000 G, 1,638 H, 1,114 R, .369 AVG, .888 OPS, 149 OPS+, 682 RBI, 842 SB, 50.0 WAR (8.1 per 162) 6x Champion (3x APBL, 3x MWBA) 4x Most Valuable Player (3x APBL, 1x MWBA) 2x APBL Batsman of the Year (1880, 86) 1x APBL Batting Champion (1886 – also led in SLG & OPS) 7x Team of the Year (5x APBL, 2x MWBA) 2x Golden Glove (1x APBL, 1x MWBA) 10x League stolen base leader (7x APBL, 3x MWBA) 5x League leader in runs (3x APBL, 2x MWBA) 4x APBL leader in total bases (1880, 82, 85, 86) 4x League leader in non-pitcher WAR (2x APBL, 2x MWBA) 4x APBL leader in hits (1880, 82, 84, 86) 1886 (Boston): 106 games, .382 AVG, .890 OPS, 168 OPS+, 171 H, 84 RBI, 102 SB, 6.70 WPA (10.23 per 162), 8.2 WAR (12.5 per 162) Alva Burgess was baseball’s biggest winner in the 1880s with six titles, and thus its brightest star. His combination of batting, speed, and range in center field made him the scariest player in the APBL for Boston, and that carried over when he joined Detroit after arguably the best season by a position player in APBL history in 1886. He led his league in stolen bases every season of the decade, averaging 84 per year. He was a player who could hit for average, find the gap, steal at will, cover massive amounts of ground in center field, and do every little thing possible to move his team closer to a win. Boston fell off their first-place perch just a couple of years after he left, and it’s also no coincidence that Detroit immediately moved up from a mediocre team, typically in the middle of the MWBA standings, to instant title-winners after he shocked the APBL by signing for the Robins in October of 1886. There could be an argument for shortstop Edward Fitzsimmons, who won four APBL titles, eight Golden Gloves, seven Team of the Year nods, and an MVP while finishing higher on WAR than Burgess (51.1, 8.3/162), but Burgess’ extra titles and the massive impact his crossing over into the MWBA had were too much. NON-PROFESSIONAL PLAYER OF THE DECADE Earl Clements – Toledo Mud Hens (GLBC – 1882-89) 1,058 hits, .353 AVG, .880 OPS (159 OPS+), 267 XBH, 478 RBI, 268.4 ZR (SS), 1.235 EFF (SS), 47.0 WAR in 705 games (10.8 per 162) 5x GLBC Champion (1883-87) 2x GLBC Batsman of the Year (1885, 89) 2x GLBC MVP (1886, 89) 7x GLBC Golden Glove at SS (1882-88) 6x GLBC leader in non-pitcher WAR (1882, 1884-87, 89) 2x GLBC leader in hits (1885, 89) 2x GLBC leader in total bases (1885, 89) 1x GLBC Batting Champion (1889 – also led in OBP & SLG) 1887: 90 games, .380 AVG, .937 OPS, 178 OPS+, 148 H, 26 2B, 61 RBI, 31.2 ZR at SS, 3.09 WPA (5.5 per 162), 7.0 WAR (12.6 per 162) Clements is someone who probably would have been a four-star player in the APBL or MWBA. However, the Wisconsin native loved Toledo and Toledo loved him back – he didn’t seem to care that he only made about half of what players with similar talent did in the three pro leagues. He led a dynasty in Toledo via impeccable defense and batting that was easily the best at his position in the Great Lakes Baseball Conference. Not a single player in the NBBO or Prairie League came remotely close to Clements in terms of titles won, accomplishments, or simple WAR. He was easily the best semi-pro baseball player in the United States over the timeframe. His 1889 season (.408 AVG, 1.010 OPS, 190 OPS+) was even better than 1887 season from the batter’s box, but he was so unbelievable on defense in ’87 that the latter season came out on top by almost a full point of WAR. ALL-DECADE TEAM C: Frederick Kearney – 1882-89 w/Lake Michigan (MWBA), Rochester (APBL) – 6x Team of the Year, 28.3 WAR (6.0/162) 1B: Lee Douglass – 1882-89 w/ New Jersey & Brooklyn (APBL), Cleveland (MWBA) – 6x Golden Glove, 1x Batsman of the Year & MVP, 22.9 WAR (4.5/162G) 2B: Joseph Welling – 1880-89 w/Orangemen, Brooklyn & Washington (APBL) – 2x champ, 4x Team of the Year, 28.0 WAR (4.5/162G) 3B: Franklin Rader – 1882-89 w/ Missouri (MWBA) – 5x Team of the Year, 1x Golden Glove, 25.7 WAR (5.2/162) SS: Edward Fitzsimmons – 1880-89 w/ Brooklyn & Boston (MWBA) – 4x champ, 8x Golden Glove, 7x Team of the Year, 1x MVP, 51.1 WAR (8.3/162) LF: Jacob Milburn – 1882-89 w/ St. Louis (MWBA) – 3x champ, 7x Batsman of the Year, 3x MVP, 8x Team of the Year, 37.8 WAR (7.7/162) CF: Alva Burgess – 1880-89 w/ Boston (APBL), Detroit (MWBA) – 6x champ, 4x MVP, 2x Batsman of the Year, 7x Team of the Year, 50.0 WAR (8.1/162) RF: Isaiah Duffy – 1880-89 w/ Boston (APBL) – 3x champ, 3x Batsman of the Year, 10x Golden Glove, 4x Team of the Year, 42.0 WAR (6.9/162) SP: Henry Polley – 1881-89 w/Boston (APBL) – 209-96, 4x champ, 8x 20-game winner, 1x Hurler of the Year, 75.5 WAR (6.1/225 IP) SP: Arthur Meyer – 1880-89 w/ Mass. Bay & Brooklyn (APBL) – 215-133, 1x champ, 8x 20-game winner, 1x Hurler of the Year, 71.5 WAR (5.1/225 IP) SP: Hans Ehle – 1885-89 w/Milwaukee (MWBA) – 124-58, 4x Hurler of the Year, 5x 20-game winner, 81.0 WAR (11.2/225 IP) Last edited by tm1681; 01-01-2023 at 12:07 PM.

01-01-2023, 12:23 PM	#17
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	CHANGES TO THE BASEBALL LANDSCAPE As planned, baseball went into the decade of the 1890s featuring significant changes. The NBBO was now a governing body overseeing three new competitions – the New York League, the Northeastern League, & the New England Baseball Association – while brining two existing ones – the Great Lakes Baseball Conference & the Prairie League – into the fold, which put all the semi-pro clubs under one umbrella. However, that was far from the end of the changes facing baseball at the start of the final decade of the 19th Century. In the Prairie League, four clubs – Kansas City, Minneapolis, Omaha, & St. Paul – saw their markets become too big for semi-pro status and the Midwestern Baseball Association came calling. As a result, the MWBA grew to 14 teams for the 1890 season while the PL found four clubs – the Council Bluffs Unions, Davenport Riversiders, Kansas Blue Stockings, & Southern Missouri Ozarks – to replace the departees. With the MWBA (14 teams) now almost as big as the APBL (16 teams) and widely seen as nearly equal in quality, the two leagues decided to form a loose association which would henceforth be dedicated to professional leagues of the highest quality: the American Baseball Association. The open competition between the two for talent would still be there, but now there was mutual understanding and less hostility. The Southeastern & Atlantic League remained an independent professional league, but after five years of slow growth it added two new clubs to bring its total to eight. One club came from the GLBC: the Evansville Angels, a team situated in far southern Indiana that was closer to some of the SEAL teams than many GLBC counterparts. The other was a high-profile amateur club from Chesapeake, Virginia: Lords of the Old Dominion, which became the Old Dominion Lords. The GLBC found an easy replacement for Evansville, as former NBBO members the Erie Lakers were situated right along the Great Lake they were named after and were thus a natural fit for the GLBC instead of the Northeastern League. The other nine teams remained, meaning the league stayed at ten teams. In addition to the five new clubs mentioned above – Council Bluffs, Davenport, Kansas, Southern Missouri, & Old Dominion – there were other clubs to make the move up from amateur ball. The NEL saw the Niagara Falls Rapids and Schenectady Bolts join to bring the league to 20 teams. The NEBA added three new clubs – the Brass City Watchmakers, Bridgeport Ironmen, & Pawtucket Foxes – so the greater New England half of the league could have as many teams as the Massachusetts half (8), giving the NEBA 16 teams going into its inaugural season. Meanwhile, the New York League had the easiest time setting up shop, as all 16 members of the old Brooklyn and New York championships in the NBBO simply moved over and sorted out what the schedule would be. In addition to the new leagues and new teams, seasons would now be longer. Beginning in 1890 the semi-professional leagues would have seasons ranging from 108-114 games, up from 84 in the NBBO and 90 in the GLBC/PL. In the pro ranks, the SEAL increased its schedule to 126 games (from 100), the MWBA went to 130 (from 108), and the APBL added enough games to have the longest season of the three pro leagues at 132 games (from 112). This was how the baseball landscape looked going into the 1890s: NATIONAL BASEBALL ASSOCIATIONS AMERICAN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE (APBL) MIDWESTERN PROFESSIONAL BASEBALL LEAGUE (MWBA) SOUTHEASTERN & ATLANTIC LEAGUE OF BASEBALL (SEAL) NEW YORK METROPOLITAN BASEBALL LEAGUE (NYL) NORTHEASTERN LEAGUE OF BASEBALL CLUBS (NEL) NEW ENGLAND BASEBALL ASSOCIATION (NEBA) GREAT LAKES BASEBALL CONFERENCE (GLBC) BASEBALL LEAGUE OF THE AMERICAN PRAIRIE (PL) On top of the new look to the baseball landscape, there were changes on the field as well. During the 1880s the number of balls needed for a walk kept creeping down from seven, to six, then to five, then to the final amount of four – that still stands today – before the 1889 season. That, combined with the pitching area being tinkered with dulled the mid-80s dominance the best pitchers enjoyed after overhand throwing motions were allowed for the first time. Also, during the decade alterations were made to bat specifications – size, flatness, substances, etc. – and in the process these regulation changes helped turn the massive hitters’ paradises like The Elysian Fields, where center field was 500+ feet from home plate and both foul poles were 375+, into parks that now favored the pitcher. This meant that while walks were going up and strikeouts were going back down, the days of league batting leaders regularly hitting over .400 and fast gap hitters racking up 30 triples in 100-110 games were over. The enormous stadiums meant pitchers still didn’t have to worry about home runs, as rare as they already were, but it meant that 15-12 slugfests in the oldest APBL parks were going to be a far less common sight. As the new decade dawned, the state of baseball in the USA was looking very good, and no doubt it wouldn’t be long before more leagues emerged, perhaps even ones in other countries.

01-05-2023, 06:53 PM	#18
tm1681 All Star Starter Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 1,396	1891: HISTORY IS MADE IN MULTIPLE WAYS After one year of baseball’s new-look setup there were no major off-the-field shakeups ahead of the 1891 professional and semi-pro seasons. However, the action on the field would more than make up for the relative quiet off of it, as history of both the spectacular and unique kind was made across the sport during the year. JACOB MILBURN DETHRONES THE KING As mentioned, ahead of the 1890s various changes were made to the rules and regulations of baseball that simultaneously granted hitters minor advantages (four balls for a walk) while tamping down their raw batting and gap power (bat size, shape, etc). Jacob Milburn again won MWBA Batsman of the Year in 1890, but for the first time he won it with a batting average under .400 and he did so with an OPS under 1.000 – the changes had their desired effect. In fact, his 1890 season was a full point of WAR better (5.5) than his 1887 in which he won BotY with a .409 AVG and 1.032 OPS (4.4 WAR). Over the winter Milburn made some tweaks to his hitting approach, and he felt going into 1891 that he could crack .400 again. What he didn’t know was that he would have the single best batting season in the history of the sport. Here was what Milburn did against the rest of the MWBA in 1891: Over 128 games Milburn led the 14-team league in: Runs – 119 (1st by 19) Hits – 209 (1st by 35) Total Bases – 294 (1st by 56) Doubles – 30 (1st by 2) Triples – 26 (1st by 7) Walks – 58 (tied for 1st) Average - .438 (1st by 52 points) On-base % - .505 (1st by 67 points) OPS – 1.122 (1st by 196 points) OPS Plus – 204 (1st by 48 points) WPA – 7.33 (9.28 per 162, 1st by 1.47) WAR – 9.2 (11.6 per 162, 1st by 3.1) His 9.0 offensive WAR was the single highest ever recorded in a season in any league, and as seen above he led the league in some categories by amounts never seen before. This was especially true of his 196-point OPS margin over second place. He did this in a MWBA where batting average was 5-10 points lower and OPS 20-25 points lower than two years ago, before the new regulations were put in place. Milburn hit quite well over the first two months of the season, comfortably 400+ at the end of June. However, what followed was the single-best month of batting anyone had ever laid eyes on: 3.30 WPA and 3.7 WAR over the 28 games Milburn played in July would translate to 19.09 WPA and 21.4 WAR over a modern 162-game schedule. From there, he coasted a bit and “only” hit .365 (.961 OPS) in the season’s final month to finish with a season that would surely be written about forever. HANS EHLE GOES THE LIMIT FOR MILWAUKEE Milwaukee Bavarians pitcher Hans Ehle, the most dominant ace in the sport, added a new accomplishment to his name in the 1891 season: he became the first pitcher ever to finish 40 complete games in consecutive seasons, ones in which Milwaukee won its first MWBA title and then lost the first edition of the Lincoln Memorial Cup in seven games to Cleveland. The Bavarians went into the 90s having finished runners up in the MWBA three times, and they asked Ehle how much further he could push his pitching arm in order to put the team over the top. He obliged, throwing nearly 800 innings over 1890-91, and as the coaching staff hoped it led to championship baseball. Ehle’s 1891 (MWBA leader in italics): 30-15, 2 SVs, *1.63 ERA, 392 IP, 40 CG, 38 BB, 301 K, 209 ERA+, 16.9 WAR* (9.7 per 225 IP) Somehow 16.9 WAR was only the third-best single season total of his career to that point, but the result was another Hurler of the Year Award – his sixth in seven pro seasons. PETTER LUND BECOMES THE FIRST NON-PITCHER WITH 10+ WAR IN A SEASON In the semi-pro ranks, the Reading Athletics’ 22-year-old star center fielder Petter Lund went into 1891 already as the league’s best player. He’d hit .315 the year before (.864 OPS, 159 OPS+) and stole 71 bases while playing Golden Glove outfield defense, leading to a league-high WAR of 7.3. What Lund did for Reading in 1891 was to take his already considerable talent to a level never seen in the semi-pro ranks. Over 110 games he led the Northeastern League in hits (146), average (.350), and OPS (.990, 176 OPS+), while stealing no less than 90 bases (18 CS) and playing more Golden Glove defense at CF. The result: 5.8 offensive WAR and 4.2 from other areas for a total of 10.0 (14.7 per 162), making him the first non-pitcher in baseball history to earn a double-digit WAR in a single season. The fact that he had only just turned 22 before the start of the season made the accomplishment all the more incredible, and no doubt a team - or multiple - from the APBL or the MWBA would come steaming in on a train to Reading with a bag of cash and a contract offer in short order. KNICKERBOCKERS GET APBL’S #1 RECORD & PRESIDENT’S CUP WITH NO TEAM OF THE YEAR (SILVER SLUGGER) MEMBERS 1891 wouldn’t see any truly historic individual performances in the APBL. Lindsey Christianson of Philadelphia was the Batting Champion at .349. Nobody drove in 100 runs or hit more than a handful of home runs. No starter had an ERA under 2.00. Jakob Hogh (Buffalo) and Jurgen Schultz (Pennsylvania) both won just over 30 games, but given the new length of the APBL season (132 G) it was expected that at least one pitcher a year would win 30+ since teams still had three-man starting rotations. Along the same lines, the New York Knickerbockers made history with a team full of players who performed in a similar vein, becoming the first team in baseball history to have either their league’s best record or win their league’s championship series while having zero players make the league’s official Team of the Year, and they did both. NYK was an APBL-best 80-52 with a starting lineup full of position players that ranged from 1.5-4.5 WAR. Nobody hit better than .315, and they were 4th in runs scored while just 10th out of 16 teams in batting average. Their pitching staff was 3rd in ERA, 4th in WAR, and just 9th in strikeouts. All three members of the rotation won 20+ games, but their best performer was about four points of WAR off Pitcher of the Year Hogh of Buffalo. So, how did the Knickerbockers find success? They were top-three in the APBL in runs allowed thanks to a defense that was top-three in fielding percentage and errors while easily being in the top half in Zone Rating. Their pitchers also allowed the fewest walks in the league, and those factors led the team to be extremely successful in close games, culminating in their 4-2 President’s Cup series win over the Buffalo Blues. Team legend Charles Brophy drove in a dozen runs over the six games to win President's Cup MVP. SYRACUSE GOES 89-25 WITHOUT A SINGLE PLAYER HITTING .300 Back in the semi-pro ranks, the Syracuse Emeralds of the Northeastern League made some odd team history of their own in 1891. The Emeralds finished the regular season with the NEL’s best record by eleven games, going 89-25 (.781) and finishing no less than twenty-three games in the clear in the New York Conference. Yet, they did this without having a single regular position player hit .300 or better, which was the first time a league champion or division/conference winner had done so. They finished 5th out of 20 NEL teams in runs scored, average, and OPS, but the best hitter in their lineup topped out at .293 (CF Ilario Cercignani) and only two others hit above .260. Even with that seeming lack of offensive punch, Syracuse won 78 percent of their games before the Adams Trophy series because they were easily the best or near-best in the NEL numerous other areas: #1 in runs against (385, 3.37 p/g) #1 in starters’ ERA (2.43) #1 in non-starters’ ERA (1.53) #1 in FIP (2.35) #1 in pitching WAR (28.8, 40.9/162) #1 in strikeouts (700, 6.14 p/g) #1 in errors (206, 1.81 p/g) #2 in Zone Rating (+85.2) #2 in Def. Efficiency (.695) However, in the Adams Cup finals they were up against the aforementioned Petter Lund and the 78-36 Reading Athletics, where Syracuse’s relative lack of attack finally did them in. They were swept 3-0 while being outscored 16-9, and what had been a historic season ended with a trip at the final hurdle. Last edited by tm1681; 01-07-2023 at 02:05 PM.