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Originally Posted by BirdWatcher
Something I'm curious about: there are certainly some extreme statistical accomplishments in this league but it doesn't seem that they are necessarily tilted in one direction. In other words, even though I am seeing plenty of hitters hitting over .400 and/or slugging at least 40 HR's, if not 50+, there are also league leading ERA's in the low 2's.
So it makes me wonder if this is a league where the gap between the superstars and the average players is just quite large? After the league leaders do the numbers decline precipitously?
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Great question!
So let's break this down category by category, as it does vary greatly.
ERA: ERA tends to be fairly consistent, with standout years for certain pitchers.
Compare 2043 and 2044 for example. 2043 is much more indicative of how the ERA tables typically look year to year. However, 2044 is one example of dominant pitching and the talent gap that does occur.
HRs: Home runs tend to have a range of 10-20? So you'll have your top hitter for the year hitting 50+ and maybe the 7th best hitting just under 40.
AVG: This is the big one. You get rare years where everyone bunches up around the .390 mark but when you get a generational hitter like Keesha DeWilliams or Elena Cortez, then they can be far and beyond the next best player. There were seasons were DeWilliams was nearly .100 better than the next best hitter.
So in short, it really depends on the category. Superstar hitters will often eclipse their competition year in, year out while superstar pitchers tend to break the mould of fairly similar leaderboards.