[ArquimedezPozo]

Hitters
RF Raul Romero, Los Angeles Angels, 2019
Romero has a strong case as the greatest player of the first 30 years of NABF history. His career 103.3 WAR is the best of any player, a true five-tool star with 283 career home runs, top 5 records in doubles, triples, and stolen bases, three Gold Gloves, and two MVPs 12 years apart. But his 2019 may be his most complete all-around season: Romero won the third of his Gold Gloves that year while leading the league in OBP (.417), stolen bases (54), walks (108), runs (120), and WAR (8.3) while leading the Angels to their second best season, a 96 win Championship campaign in which they bested the Brooklyn Dodgers in a thrilling seven game set. Romero collected ten hits including a triple, hitting .333/.429/.400 in the series, his second ring with LA.

LF Steve Mauck, Baltimore Terrapins, 2024
Mauck’s third full season in Baltimore will never be forgotten by anyone who experienced it firsthand. Muck shared a team with all-time greats - Betz, Padgett, Martinez, Molina - yet somehow stood head and shoulders above them as he chased impossible records all season - not quite reaching them, but in failing still putting together one of the three or four greatest offensive seasons to that point in NABF History. It’s easy to forget knowing where he ended, but the chase that captured fans’ imaginations at first was his pursuit of, first, .400 - Mauck maintained an average above that number almost into June - before attention turned to the home run chase. Mauck eclipsed New Orleans Zephyrs slugger Pedro Quiroz’s 57 - set the season before - with a full week to play, and pulled within one of Eric Bryant’s 60 for Kansas City in 2008 with five games left… and then stalled. A long fly on the season’s final day caught breath around the stadium, but it fell short. A groan, though, was followed the next moment by thunderous applause for Mauck: not only were his 59 home runs the new D3 standard (a record that stands to this day) but he batted .344/.435/.708, his SLG and OPS both still the highest in D3 history, and the .344 enough to net him the batting title. His 142 RBI also led the league, giving him the Triple Crown, and only his teammate Padgett’s total from the season before denied him that all-time D3 record as well. He won the MVP unanimously, and battered Sacramento in the Division Championship Series, hitting .409/.480/.636. It was the finest season in one of the finest careers in the history of the Federation.

1B Zach Markiewicz, San Francisco Seals, 2021
Markiewicz is a controversial player in discussions of all-time talent, but no one debates his exceptional 2021, a season capped by a monster performance - 2 homers, 12 RBI, .450/.532/.800 line and the Series MVP - to give his Seals their first and only Championship. Markiewicz was a huge reason they were there in the first place, too, winning the Triple Crown with a 59 homer, 152 RBI, .323/.440/.701 season from first base. Markiewicz played every game of the Seals’ season, leading D2 in Plate Appearances along with virtually everything else, and won the MVP easily. His 9 WAR in 2021 is his highest total by a good margin, though, coming at the center of a relatively short peak. Still, if any season can put a player over the bar into discussion of all-time greats, this is a good one to choose.

2B Doug Padgett, Baltimore Terrapins, 2023
Padgett was entering the final portion of his incredible career in 2023, the first season in which he gave up his role as a starter to focus exclusively on offense after missing most of 2022 to injury. The results were extraordinary: 9.6 WAR splitting time between 2B and 1B, while launching 36 homers and setting a D3 single-season Batting Average record of .370, just decimal points under Max Hinkle’s all-time NABF mark. He led the league in all slash categories, with a .427/.628 OBP/SLG to go along with his average, and 36 homers to lead the Division. The campaign won him the MVP, and helped deliver Baltimore the first of their five straight 100 win seasons. Both Padgett and the Terrapins underperformed in a losing effort against eventual D3 Champion Seattle, but especially given the successes in the future, it’s easy to overlook that and simply stand in awe of Padgett’s season.

1B Craig Vest, Ft. Worth Cats, 2022
Among the three or four greatest offensive players in NABF history, Vest was at his best in 2022, putting up 7.6 WAR (a career high) while leading D1 in WAR, BA (.331), OBP (.414), doubles (55) and Runs Created (143.1) to go along with his customary first place ranking in steals (86, one shy of his career best). Vest is the greatest base stealer in NABF history and the only with more than 1000 career swipes, but he was never better than in 2022, matching those 86 with only nine times caught. Perhaps the greatest moment of his season, though, came when he hit for the cycle for the only time in his career, in late September against the Seals, sealing a victory that helped ensure the Angels 5th place over San Francisco amid fears of coming relegation.

Pitchers
SP David Miramontes, Atlanta Crackers, 2019
By 2019, Miramontes was 38 years old, in his second season with his fifth and last team. He was widely regarded as one of the most consistent and solid, if not truly great, pitchers in the NABF, but had won three Pitcher of the Year awards earlier in his career and was a two-time D1 Champion. Certainly no one expected that he was about to have the best four year stretch of his entire career, or that he would see a jump in his K rate, a drop in his walk rate, and the best stretch of groundout rates of his career. The change had begun in his final season with Montreal, as he saw a reduction in his walk rate and got even more groundouts than usual. But once he signed on with Atlanta, things really began to change, culminating in an 8 WAR 2019 in which he struck out more than 200 batters for the first time (231), and allowed just six homers all season. He was overlooked in Pitcher of the Year voting, but incredibly would win his fourth two years later, at age 41, as he continued a career renaissance that would vault him into the upper echelon of all-time NABF hurlers.

SP Jim Betz, Baltimore Terrapins, 2024
Another pitcher with a late-career renaissance, Betz was already one of the most dominant arms in NABF history when he arrived in Baltimore from Tijuana via offseason trade before the 2023 campaign. Betz was just coming off a down season, and going into his age 34 season there was reason to believe he was headed into the twilight. But in 2024, with the tutelage of a Terrapins coaching staff that had already done wonders with Danny Rsaza, Betz honed his command with some mechanical tweaks and had a resurgent 2024, going 19-2 with a D3 best 2.44 ERA and 0.90 WHIP. His 6.6 WAR and 1.5 BB/9 - the lowest of his career - also led the Division, earning Betz his second Pitcher of the Year award and helping Baltimore reach its best season yet, ultimately winning his first championship.

SP Jeremiah Harris, Memphis Blues, 2024
Jeremiah Harris was a solid journeyman with only one great season to his name, and it came along when Memphis needed it most. Harris dominated D4 in 2024, with 234 innings of 2.15 ERA, 2.74 FIP ball, striking out 241 while holding down a Division-best 0.96 WHIP and 6.9 WAR. It earned him the Pitcher of the Year, and more importantly was the biggest factor in Memphis’ 91-63, D4 East title that secured them promotion to Division 3. Though Memphis lost the Championship to San Diego in seven, Harris’ season is still the best by WAR of any pitching season in Memphis franchise history. Harris suffered a series of injuries after that season, perhaps brought on by overwork, and astonishingly was out of baseball by 2028, but Memphis fans will long remember his finest hour.

SP Oliver Chase, Montreal Expos, 2023
This is Chase’s second appearance on this list, 13 years removed from his first. That alone should give you a sense of his place in NABF pitching history. 2023 was his final productive year, at age 36 and at the end of a Montreal contract that never quite reached the value team owners had been looking for. But it did in 2023, as Chase was Pitcher of the month three times en route to a 6.2 WAR, 3.06 FIP season. Lacking the fiery stuff that had defined his earlier career, he now relied on guile and control, walking just 1.6 batters per nine, which helped to give him a league-lowest 1.12 WHIP. Chase missed out on what would have been his 6th Pitcher of the Year, but the five he does have is still the most in NABF history.

SP Armando Silva, Cincinnati Tigers, 2021
The man they called the Sheriff saved his best work in Cincinnati for his contract year, though fans had trouble noticing it at first: though Silva put up 6.6 WAR in 2021, he suffered a losing 8-11 record, a 3.77 ERA that, while above league average, was hardly extraordinary, and seemingly not much else, on the surface. What he did have, however, was a 2.36 FIP and a league-leading 63 FIP-, a career-best 4.8 K/BB, and a career-high 206 strikeouts, the only time he ever broke 200. Silva was coming off a D4 Pitcher of the Year trophy, but should have been in the conversation for two straight; instead, he signed on for a modest raise with the Tijuana Potros, where he spent his last five seasons - in the end a good solid pitcher with two great seasons, only one of which was recognized for what it was.

Two-Way Players
LF/SP Nick Goodwin, Detroit Stars, 2021
Goodwin’s 2021 would have been outstanding even if he’d never stood on the pitcher’s mound: the Detroit LF had his best season with the bat in 2021 to help the Stars to their second consecutive championship. Goodwin launched a career-high 39 homers to go along with a .308/.387/.618 line, in just 145 games. He set career bests in virtually every offensive category and was among the Division leaders in most as well, though he didn’t lead in any except offensive WAR (7.8). But, of course, he did set foot on the mound, and while he hardly competed for Pitcher of the Year he gave Detroit valuable innings at right around league average, adding another 2 WAR from the mound for 9.8 overall, the highest total of any year of his historic career.

Next: The 2025 Division Championships