2065 Tycobbian Union MVP Photos

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Tuesday, November 3, 2065

SUPER SKIPPERS SELECTED FOR IPA 2065 SEASON
There wasn't a lot of debate about the best managers in the Islandian Pro Alliance this season... it was pretty clear-cut in both leagues... Garry August of the Colfax Black Sox and Lorne Evans of the Southport Sun Sox were just about unanimous selections this year... neither had much competition in the voting... August was picked as the 2065 Ruthlandian Union Manager of the Year and Evans was chosen the 2065 Tycobbian Union Manager of the Year.

What an anomaly is Garry August... he is no athlete... never played any sport on an organized team, yet August is a very successful manager at the professional level... he was a high school coach in Colfax... August won multiple state championships in a baseball, basketball and football... the current Colfax general manager Mitch Fullerton hired him as a bench coach in the late '50s and appointed him skipper in 2062... August has won pennants twice in his four seasons and twice reached the IPA Pro Cup Finals... last year the Black Sox slumped to 77-77, but they were rejuvenated this year, improving to 92-62 and winning the Ruthlandian West title.

This the fourth time in his legendary career that Lorne Evans has been named the skipper of the year...he is tied with Matty Christianson, Vanya Vasylenko and Billy Christianson for the most best-manager awards... Evans also was honored in 2047, 2055 and 2058... Southport suffered through a down season last year, falling to third place and winding up with a 79-75 mark... but the Sun Sox rebounded this season with a 95-58 record, good enough to win the Tycobbian South pennant... not only is Evans a Hall of Fame player, but he is also a standout skipper.

The two managers of the year met in this year's Pro Cup Finals and Evans got the best of August... his Southport Sun Sox outshined the Colfax Black Sox four games to one and captured the IPA Pro Cup.

Only two other managers got any votes in this year's best manager poll... that was LaGrange's John Rodgers in the Ruthlandian Union and Tuckanarra's Quinn Starr in the Tycobbian Union... Rodgers took the Gators from 81-73 and 4th place in '64 to 95-59 and the RU North pennant in '65... in stark contrast to August, Rodgers starred in the IPA for 17 seasons with mainly with LaGrange and a couple of years with Marston and Southport at the end of his career... he was a 5-time All-Star shortstop and twice a Gold Glover... Rodgers was a lifetime .293 hitter with 343 homers and 1337 RBIs.

Quinn Starr guided the Tuckanarra Tiger Cats to the TU East title this year with a 94-60 mark and also in 2064 when they were 89-65... Starr was one of the legendary triplet brothers that starred with the Tucks in the 20s and 30s... he was 219-164 in his 15-year career with a strong 2.97 ERA... Quinn was a three-time All-Star and a Gold Glover... along with his siblings, Glynn Starr and Lynn Starr, they led the then-Tuckanarra Blue Jays to 5 pennants and 2 Pro Cups.

Well, that's all y'all... the 2065 Islandian Pro Alliance season is history.

Will get busy getting the rosters ready for the coming 2066 season.

May rebrand a few teams and get their logos and jerseys updated... and I need to make sure I get some talent in the in-coming rookie class... the 2065 rookie class was very sparse.

I am going to download the final patch of OOTP21... I'm about 2-3 patches behind... they seemed to be having too many problems with the recent patches, so I held off on installing them.

They say that the animation has been made smoother and better in recent patches... hope this is true... I thoroughly enjoy playing out game using the 3D animation... the animation has come a very long way since it was first introduced.

Today was a good day for the IPA... 473 viewers.

Much appreciate all of you.

I just noticed that over 500,000 have checked in over the years.

I think Dark Horse and jg2977 are mainly responsible for the numbers.;)

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Have begun work on the 2066 season... did 8 of the 64 team rosters... added four free agents to each team and pruned out the untalented players on the reserve rosters... but most of the new rookies are put on the reserve roster and apparently don't have the talent to make the regular roster... this means rookies will be sparse again in the new season.

I created 60% average players and 40% good players... created just 9 star player, one in each position (pitcher, catcher, first baseman)... and added 1 random legend player... not sure how often I should add a legend player... will have to take it easy... don't want to create too many legends.

Looking at the player ratings of the current rosters and compared them to the newly-created rookies... the current player ratings are much superior to the rookie ratings.

You mentioned that some teams might be getting new nicknames. Have you decided which ones?

The Fort Benton Defenders will become the Fort Benton Generals... golem64 has already rebranded them with new logos, jerseys and caps.

And the Blue Lake Schooners will become the Blue Lake Blue Caps... Blue Lake is a university town... Tycobbian State University is there and one of the main industries in the town... the name Blue Caps will be to honor the graduates of the school and the importance of the school to the town's economy.

I think Lawn Loaf is going to rebrand the Blue Caps and hopefully use the cap image I found (see screenshot)... that's a mortarboard worn at college graduations.

As far as how many Legend stars I will create... I think I will limit a legend creation free agent to just once a decade or so... I don't want to overdo it.

Anyone know how often we get a legend in baseball?

Updated 8 more team rosters... 16 of 64 team done.

Cool, I already have Fort Benton as the Generals in my IPA. As for Blue Lake I'll probably keep them as the Schooners. I've been on four Royal Caribbean cruises and one of my favorite hangout places on the ship was the Schooner Bar.

Whatever way you want to go is fine with me, jg2977.

It's your league.

20 of the 64 teams' rosters have been updated.

It will probably take me a week or so to finish all of them.

24 of the team rosters have been update with rookies.

40 more teams to go.

What constitutes a legend is subjective. My guess would be 15 or 20 years.

You could study the debuts of Ruth to Gehrig to DiMaggio to Mantle...

Or Griffey to Pujols to Trout...

Good advice... I am going to add a legend very sparingly... I think every 20 years would be a good number.

Sorry, been busy doing the North Island and South Island tiebreaker games... also have begun creating new CDs for my music collection... I have collected about 425 new songs the past year and need to get them on CDs so I can enjoy them.

My current CD collection number 317 eighty-minute CDs... my entire library numbers 7500 songs in pristine condition... I program my CDs like a radio station would do it... I mix and blend rock, folk, pop, Big Band, soul, country, gospel and on occasion, a little bit of Broadway hits, blue grass and jazz on each one... you'll hear anything from the Rolling Stones, Deep Purple, Allman Brothers, Eagles, Marshall Tucker Band, Beatles, Bee Gees, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly to the Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul and Mary to Neil Diamond, Bobby Vee, Elvis, Carpenters, Johnny Mathis, James Taylor, Carole King, Barbra Streisand, Andy Williams, Ames Brothers, Four Lads, Perry Como to Jo Stafford, Pied Pipers, Vera Lynn, Kay Kyser, Andrews Sisters, Bing Crosby, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey, Glenn Miller to Fats Domino, Little Richard, Otis Redding, Four Tops, Supremes, Temptations, Sam and Dave, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Coasters, Etta James to George Jones, Eddie Rabbitt, Kenny Rodgers, Alabama, Conway Twitty, Keith Whitley, Blake Shelton, Reba McEntire, Charley Pride, Eddy Raven, Randy Travis, Oak Ridge Boys, Larry Gatlin and the the Gatlin Brothers, Dolly Parton, George Strait, Hank Williams, Hank Williams, Jr., Merle Haggard, Buck Owens, Ricky Skaggs, Eddy Arnold, Lefty Frizzell, Faron Young to the Cathedrals, the Gaithers, the Gaither Vocal Band, Gold City, Jeff and Sheri Easter to B. B. King, Dave Brubeck, Kenny Ball and the Jazzmen, Mr. Acker Bilk, Pete Fountain, Chris Barber, Ramsey Lewis Trio, Young-Holt Unlimited... plus great instrumentals from Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, the Ventures, Champs, Percy Faith, Bert Kaempfert, Chantays, Bill Black's Combo, Booker T and the MGs, Vangelis, Duane Eddy, Floyd Cramer, Lawrence Welk, Hugh Masekela and Van McCoy.

Not boasting, but EC can really mix music together so that it will flow from one genre to another without jolting your senses... as a radio program director and disc jockey for 32 years, my great strength was programming... my weakness was marketing... I never agreed with radio programming consultants that "less music is more"... sadly, they were right... and they would beat me in the ratings... the fewer songs you play the bigger your audience... just play the same old huge hits over and over and over and over ad nauseum and you will win... WYNK in Baton Rouge used to play the same 300 golden oldie songs... power golds (the best and most popular songs... the songs that were picked by focus groups) would play every 30 hours... and they did it very successfully for years... EC loves variety... I only want to hear a song once or twice a year... when a song comes on that you have not heard in years, it really sounds good to me... I think people get burned out on hearing the same songs over and over on a regular basis... but you do make money doing it.

There is not much better in my life than sitting in my music listening room (actually it's HER bedroom... she won't let me listen in the living room)... I sit in the sweet spot between two wonderful Klipsch Heresy III speakers (about 10 feet apart) and a Polk subwoofer, close my eyes while sitting in a comfortable lazyboy chair, relax and relive my life musically for 80 minutes... I am blessed with a wonderful 250 watt per channel, 2-channel Anthem amplifier, too... and play it on an Onkyo CD player... yeah, EC lives a blessed life.

Sorry, I have really been neglectful of the IPA recently... I will get busy on the Islandian Pro Alliance today...will do 16 teams before I do anything else.

That's great that you're so into music. One of my favorite pastimes is playing OOTP while listening to music. I'm a fan of most styles, whether it's classical, jazz, classic rock or modern rock,showtunes, and country from time to time. I have two spectacular headphones, a Sennheiser HD800 and a Focal Elear, and I listen through a Marantz HD-DAC1 headphone amp. I need to upgrade the rest of my stereo system. I have a pair of Acoustic Energy speakers from about 25 years ago. They're all right, but a little bit outdated. I'm a trombonist as well, and I've really enjoyed playing in local big bands and orchestras as well as playing in community theatre orchestras for musical productions. Unfortunately with this pandemic all musical theatre was cancelled and I had only two big band concerts this past summer.

Looking forward to following your next IPA season! It should be a good one!

My goodness, jg2977, you are certainly a talented guy... I would love to be able to play a piano or a guitar... it must really be great to be able to play like you do.

Who is the best trombonist?... Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey... or someone else from the later years?

Actually, Miller and Dorsey are the only two I know well... I think I have one song with Trombone Shorty playing on it... it's an album cut by the Zac Brown Band.
Was Kai Winding a good one?... he had a number one song on the pop charts in the early 60s... "More"... I think Kai Winding was a jazz trombonist.

Glenn Miller is my favorite Big Band... Moonlight Serenade, Chattanoogo Choo Choo, String of Pearls, Stardust, In the Mood.

I also really like Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys... songs like San Antonio Rose... South of the Border... and Across the Alley from the Alamo... a western swing band in the 30s and 40s... Bob Wills mixed country music and Big Band music and created a wonderful dance band.

Before the pandemic, I played music at Nursing Homes... I did it for the last four years... I have a nice Peavey PA System... twice a week I would play for an hour and a half... would also dance with them even those most were in wheelchairs... Blueberry Hill by Fats Domino was the most popular song I played... Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain... You Are My Sunshine... Jambalaya... Everybody Loves Somebody Sometime... they loved the great old songs... Glenn Miller had the first hit of Blueberry Hill in the early 40s... Gene Autry also did it in the late 30s.

You know, if I had my life to live over again, I would have liked to be an audio engineer that mixes the audio tracks in a recording studio... or perhaps, a country record producer in Nashville.

I was always good at picking hit songs when I was in radio... I think I have a good ear for what the masses like.