All things Figment - from the pages of The Figment Sporting Journal - Page 8

Jiggs McGee · 04-22-2021, 10:17 PM

TEN THINGS I THINK WITH JIGGS MCGEE

1- Let's start this edition of 10 Things I Think off with some credit to the Continental Association as they finally beat the stars of the Fed in an All-Star Game after losing the first 3 contests. The final score was 6-4 in favour of the Continental Stars as Philadelphia Sailors first baseman Dick Walker captured the MVP award primarily on the strength of his 2-run double in the top of the first inning that staked the visitors to an early lead, one which they would not relinquish. Brooklyn Kings Harry Barrell and Al Wheeler also had a pair of hits for the winners while Bobby Barrell of the Philadelphia Keystones and newly acquired Washington Eagle Moxie Pidgeon each had a pair of hits for the Federal Association. Another Barrell boy, Brooklyn's Tom took the win while Federal starter Rabbit Day, who like Pidgeon was recently dealt from the defending champion Gothams and now is a Chicago Chief, took the loss. One thing is for sure, the now 4 year old all-star contest is here to stay after a sold out crowd of 47,590 packed Pioneer Stadium to watch the game- said to be the biggest crowd ever to witness a contest in St Louis.

2- Speaking of Day and Pidgeon, both were part of the massive sell-off the New York Gothams undertook over the weekend. The Gothams, who have won the last two Federal Association pennants and 4 in the last 6 years, decided to pack it in this season as they sat two games under .500 and 11 behind the front-running Pittsburgh Miners. New York had a similar collapse in 1932 when they sank to last place after a pair of pennants. They likely won't drop that far this year but they did guarantee themselves a pretty decent draft pick as well as adding some fine prospects in return for the players they moved away. Word is the dealing may not be done as Mahlon Strong (.346,17,58) is on the block. They did find a taker in Washington for fellow corner outfielder Moxie Pidgeon but moving Strong, at least for the price the Gothams likely will demand for him, seems like a tough proposition. There is not a lot of demand for corner outfielders to begin with because of a large surplus in the league, and Detroit has a poor man's version of Strong available in Henry Jones.

Barring an injury before the deadline most of the contenders seem like they already have pretty good options in place. In the CA the Sailors have Lou Williams (.351,1,33) and Bobby Bond (.366,5,37) in the outfield and the previously mentioned all-star game MVP in Dick Walker (.346,8,58) patrolling first base. I suppose they could make room by shifting Williams to centerfield but I am not sure the Sailors want to pay the price it would cost to add Strong. Brooklyn likely has no room to add Strong to an already crowded outfield so that leaves the Foresters as the only CA contender possibly interested.

3- Cleveland is an interesting possibility now that Max Morris is done pretty much for the rest of the year. Strong could play first base unless Charlie Berry gets shifted there from third. In the Fed I think Pittsburgh and St Louis both might have some interest but you likely have to rule the Chicago Chiefs out because they spent a lot of prospect/draft capital in acquiring Rabbit Day and Pete Layton recently.

So the potential suitors for Mahlon Strong are likely only Cleveland, Pittsburgh and St Louis but if one of them does pull the trigger there is a good chance they will look at the older, but much less expensive Henry Jones (.330,9,39), who is having himself a pretty good season with little support in Detroit.

4- Mark my words. Sal Pestilli will be a star in this league, and if given the chance old Jiggs is predicting right here, right now the kid hits at least .300 in the big leagues next season. He is a rare talent and one FABL scouting director confided in me that with his talents "the light of Pestilli's star could be blinding." Pestilli was just the second two-time winner of the Christian Trophy, presented to college baseball's top player, and if everything breaks right he looks like he can win at least that many Whitney Awards before his career is done.

5- In all the Pestilli talk, don't sleep on high school sensation Walt Messer. A 3-time High School All-American who averaged more homers per season than last year's number one pick Red Johnson plus he hit .586 this season and, despite that being the 5th best single season high school batting average ever recorded, it was the worst total of his career. Messer is the only high school player to hit over .600 in a season and he did it twice. Messer hit 38 homers in 72 career high school games while Red Johnson smacked 21 in 41 games. It will be interesting to compare the careers of the two of them going forward. Johnson, by the way, is struggling a bit at Class B after starting the season with 5 homers and a .367 average in 10 games of C ball but he is young and will come around.

6- What are the odds Pestilli and Messer do not go 1-2? Judging by recent history pretty good as teams, especially those in the top five, have a habit of grabbing pitchers but perhaps they shouldn't, at least not this year with a bunch of great position player prospects sitting just below Pestilli and Messer.

7- Since 1932 a total of 11 pitchers have been selected in the top 4 picks, so 11 out of 16 top four selections have been pitchers. Of those 11, four of them :Rufus Barrell II, Dick Higgins, Curly Jones and Lefty Allen have already suffered a serious injury costing them at least 4 months on the sidelines and a fifth, Al Miller has missed a month with an injury. Curly Jones, a first overall pick just 4 years ago, was recently traded for a late second round selection and two mid-level prospects. His stock has clearly dropped. There are worries Higgins and Barrell may see their future potential greatly decreased because of arm troubles. Yes Lefty Allen seems to have emerged unscathed from his injury and Al Miller appears positioned for a bright future with the Chiefs but what about Jones, Hancock and Barrell. What does the future hold for them? And that brings up the question of whether teams should be gambling a top four pick, and the potential future of their franchises on a pitcher when injuries are so prevalent? If Barrell doesn't fully recover from his injury how much will that set an already struggling franchise like Baltimore back? There is talk again this year about pitchers like Johnnie Jones or Bunny Edwards creeping into the top five of the draft when the mock drafts and scouting reports clearly indicate they don't warrant inclusion if everything was equal. Gambling on an arm at the top of the draft seems an awful lot more risky than taking a position player and this year with guys like Pestilli and Messer it seems taking a pitcher ahead of them is chasing fool's gold, especially when most team's picking that high in the draft are in pretty bad shape.

8- Further to injuries being suffered by young pitchers. I believe the death of the feeder league system should change how FABL teams look at pitching. You used to have 3 seasons of stats in feeder games to look at pitchers and that could help determine just how durable a pitcher might or might not be. With draft class generation that is no longer the case. Have you seen a draft pool player's history ever mention an injury? So never mind the absence of defensive stats, the absence of missing injury information might be the biggest thing FABL GM's have to do without when it comes to no feeders.

9- Can things get any worse in Baltimore for the Cannons? They are well on their way to a third straight last place finish, and distantly last, not just a few games out of fourth. In 1930 and 1931 the Cannons had back to back second place finishes but dropped to 6th place in '32 prompting a massive sell-off including moving the games best pitcher Rabbit Day (perhaps the Gothams might take note of this) and the result was a 65 win season in 1933. In 1934 they were 44 games out with a 54-100 season and last year their 65 win campaign left them 31 games behind front-running Cleveland. Now we are in 1936 and the Cannons are historically bad, with a 24-60 record at the all-star break and on pace for not only the worst season in franchise history (1934 also established a low water mark for the club) but if their winning percentage holds it will be the worst season in Continental Association history. You have to go back to the 1883 Baltimore Bannermen of the old Century League to find a worse season.

Code:


WORST WINNING PERCENTAGES IN CA HISTORY
YEAR	TEAM		     PCT
1936* Baltimore Cannons	    .286
1903  Montreal Saints	    .288
1911  Philadelphia Sailors  .299
1932  Toronto Wolves	    .318
*projected

10- Yes injuries have decimated an already weak Cannons roster this year and yes there are supposed to be some outstanding pitching prospects on the way up but truth be told the Cannons minor league system, aside from their AAA club, is also struggling terribly. The Cannons system is ranked number one in the league for prospects with 11 players in the top 100 at the moment but I feel there are some concerns about three of their big four pitchers. The biggest one has already been discussed. Will the shoulder injury suffered by last year's number one overall pick Rufus Barrell II have any long term effects? Rusty Petrick and John Edwards are ranked as the third and fourth best pitching prospects in the league behind only Barrell and Toronto Wolves outstanding rookie Joe Hancock, but I have concerns about the two 20 year old's. They are both with AA Erie, and are each struggling this season. Petrick is 6-11 with a 5.94 era while Edwards is 6-7 with a 5.58 era. They are both young, especially for the AA level and the team is very bad so my fears might be misguided but one look at each of them and you can see how frustrated they both are with the losing atmosphere permeating the Erie clubhouse. Will that have any effect on their long-term development?

The fourth big arm is 23 year old Gus Goulding, the second overall pick in 1934. He was at Erie but was recently moved up to AAA Indianapolis and is pitching well for the Hoosiers, who are the only successful Baltimore farm team this season as they are challenging for the Century League pennant. If all four continue to progress and come close to the great potential seen for them when each was drafted the Cannons will emerge from the other side of this mess in great shape, and as a team to beat. The downside is, at least right now, there seem to be a number of obstacles standing in the way of that happening. In the meantime with the likely second overall pick the Cannons stand to draft a very talented bat this December.

Jiggs McGee · 05-05-2021, 03:11 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

Monday September 14, 1936

This is the debut of which will hopefully be a regular column in the The Figment Sporting Journal. Figment baseball sims one week of game day five days a week (Monday-Friday) so the hope is I can find time to update you daily on the key happenings in the greatest baseball league in the world.

700 FOR MIGHTY MO!

The biggest news this week comes out of Montreal as Max Morris reached the 700 homerun plateau.

The 41 year old Morris, who has won 8 Whitney Awards as MVP, 4 in each league, went down in July with an elbow injury that some feared might end his pursuit of 700 homeruns two shy but Morris returned to the lineup on August 31st and belted homer 699 three days later. Once he got his 700th in Montreal on Wednesday, Might Mo wasted little time adding to his total by smacking another one on Thursday. How dominant is Morris as a home run hitter? Number two on the all-time list is Rankin Kellogg of the Philadelphia Keystones, who sits 260 homers behind Morris. Brooklyn's Al Wheeler recently surpassed former Saints and Keystones great Hal Eason to move into third all-time but Wheeler has just 274 career homers.

Here is a trivia question I am still trying to figure out the answer to.
Prior to Max Morris becoming the homerun king who was the all time leader? I am thinking Morris took over the lead late in the 1921 season which he finished with 126 homers. That would be enough for him to surpass Martin Thomas, who hit 124 between 1886-1904. But looking closer I think the answer could also be Paul Tattersall who also finished 1921 with 126 round-trippers which tied him with Morris at 2 ahead of Martin Thomas. Obviously Morris took off from there but without a league file and box scores from that season we will never know if Tattersall or Morris was the one to first surpass Thomas for the career HR lead or if Tattersall was ahead of Morris at any point early in the 1922 campaign in which Morris hit a single season record 59 while Tattersall belted 36 for Brooklyn.
We do know when Morris hit his then single season record 53 in 1921 the mark he broke was co-held by Tattersall and himself as each swatted 26 in 1920. The previous mark was 23 established by Ed Kurwood of the Keystones in 1917.

PUTTING THE BARRELL ON THE LONGBALL

Speaking of homeruns Bobby Barrell hit 3 more homers last week. Barrell has hit 6 homers in the first two weeks of September to give him 52 on the season. Imagine what he could have done with some support in the Philadelphia lineup but his fellow Keystone Kruncher Rankin Kellogg had a terrible slump to start the season, although Kellogg has been red-hot of late and the 33 year old first baseman hit 10 homers in the past 18 games to raise his season total to 34.

GETTING YOUR MASTERS

Looks like Joe Masters, who led the Chiefs to the 1928 FA pennant is back with Whitney Nine strictly to impart wisdom and provide moral support. Re-signed by the Chiefs in August after being cut by Detroit, Masters has yet to appear in a game for Chicago. Being groomed for a future coaching role perhaps but it would be nice to see the 1928 MVP and FABL single season rbi record holder get at least 1 more at bat as a Chief before his career comes to an end. Masters is hitting just .222 this season with 1 homer and 7 RBIs from his brief stay in Detroit.

BIG MONEY IS BIG ANGRY

As for Detroit, word is Big Money is big time angry after ex-Brooklyn skipper Walt Bailey was signed to take over the reigns of the Chicago Cougars this week. The Detroit owner Eddie 'Big Money" Thompson seemed to be pushing for the Dynamos to sign Bailey as soon as the Brooklyn Kings let him go in May after that club hit a terrible swoon.

According to renowned Detroit World reporter Fast Freddie Farhat Thomson is very close to cleaning house once more in Detroit, just over a year after DD Martin left Cleveland to run the struggling Dynamos franchise. Detroit’s tragic number to wrap up the 1st overall pick in the draft is just 4. Detroit skipper Tom Bray’s tragic number is 7 as far as avoiding Owner Eddie Thompson demand of losing no more than 98 games. The Dynamo’s will have to go 5-6 or better over the last 11. The other half of the equation of scoring 5 runs a game is at 4.4. The team will have to score 62 in its last 11 to reach the mark

KINGS FEELING THE HEAT?

We may just have a pennant race after all as the Curse of Ferdinand Hawkins appears to be on the verge of rearing it's ugly head in Brooklyn once more. The Kings, who have had two successive final week collapses to lose the pennant to Cleveland the past two seasons, are likely feeling the heat again after a 2-5 week that allowed the Foresters to creep within 5 games of the front-running Kings. It makes the 2 games the club's will play at Kings County Ballpark on Tuesday and Wednesday this week extremely important. A Cleveland sweep might just send the Kings into another tailspin and Cleveland back to the World Championship Series.

If the Kings and Chiefs do reach the Series we can expect to see a game one matchup of arguably the 2 best pitchers in the game today. Rabbit Day(189-112) and Tom Barrell (93-38) have faced each other just twice before with Day coming out on top on both occasions.

Their first meeting came in the final month of Barrell's rookie campaign, 1932. Day was masterful for Baltimore on that afternoon, tossing a complete game 3-hitter for his 19th win of the season as the Cannons blanked the Kings 2-0. Barrell was nearly as good, scattering 6 hits over 8 innings but taking the loss to drop to 8-3. The rematch came the following season in July, Day's last year Baltimore before the trade to the Gothams. Neither was as sharp as they were in the initial meeting but both went the distance that day in Baltimore. Barrell had a slow start and was victimized by a pair of first inning errors, including one from his brother Dan that allowed the Cannons to plate 4 runs, all unearned in the opening frame. Tom would settle down after surrendering 4 hits in the first and would allow just 2 more hits the rest of the way but Day allowed just 2 runs, both earned, on 9 Brooklyn hits to get the 4-2 win. In case of another Cleveland comeback I should also mention that Foresters ace Dean Astle has faced Rabbit Day just once in his career, and tossed a complete game shutout to win 4-0. It was May 16, 1933 and Astle pitched an 8-hit shutout in what was his big league debut. So quite a start beating Rabbit Day 4-0 in your first FABL game. That was the only time they met.

Jiggs McGee · 05-06-2021, 12:15 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

Monday September 21, 1936

Two big stories highlight this week in Figment Baseball and both revolve around the most storied franchise, although certainly not the most successful, in the Chicago Chiefs. The big news is the Chiefs clinched their first Federal Association pennant since 1928 and just the second in team history since the formation of FABL.

Everything seems to be peaking at the right time for the Chiefs who have been unstoppable since adding Pete Layton (.377,16,84 with Chicago) and Rabbit Day (15-1, 1.70) in summer trades. In addition to the pennant clinching victory in St Louis on Saturday the Chiefs also had reason to celebrate yesterday as veteran Jim Hampton, who played such a key role on the 1928 pennant winning club by winning his first of two Federal Association batting titles, reached the 2,000 hit mark for his career with a second inning single off of St Louis righthander George Kyle. It came just an inning after Hampton launched a 2-run homer in the Chiefs 12-5 win over the Pioneers for his 1,999th hit. Hampton becomes the 57th player in FABL history to reach 2000 hits. Philadelphia Sailors third baseman John Kincaid should be next to reach that number and likely this week after Kincaid had 10 hits over the 4 game series against Cleveland to increase his career total to 1,997.

Word is another member of the 2,000 hit club will get his swan song the final weekend of the season. The Chiefs have announced that Joe Masters, who is winding down an outstanding career, will get the start at third base Saturday and Sunday when Chicago entertains the St Louis Pioneers. One day Joe Masters might even get the call to join a brand new club that is being created this winter as the grandson of FABL founder William Whitney announced this week.

WHITNEY'S CALL FOR A SHRINE TO RECOGNIZE THE GREATS OF THE GAME

WAKE BROOKLYN WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS

Meanwhile in the Continental Association there is nothing but angst in Brooklyn despite the fact the Kings lead the Continental Association by 4 and a half games. The issue is that lead was 7 games two weeks ago and the Kings, with a history of September collapses, are heading the wrong way yet again with a 9-9 September record after going 69-28 from the day Powell Slocum took over as manager in May until the end of August. Tom Barrell triggered reminders of his awful season finale a year ago with the pennant on the line as he had another rough outing in a crucial game, getting beat up for 8 runs and failing to survive the fifth inning Tuesday in a game with Cleveland that could have been the final nail in the Foresters coffin. Instead the two time defending champion Foresters are still clinging to life, but barely.

However one can't help but get the feeling that the Ghost of Ferdinand Hawkins won’t go quietly. A month ago I would have called the Kings the favorite to win their first World Championship Series but after the Chiefs have won 17 of their last 24 and as dominant as Day and Miller have looked I would be surprised if the CA champ wins more than 1 game. Brooklyn is reeling, what has now become a rite of fall, and we are not yet even sure they will make the postseason. Odds are still very good but only because Sailors and Foresters still have 2 games against each other but somehow, some way all the magic has gone out of Slocum’s messages to the club and the seeds of self doubt, well watered by September’s past, are in full bloom in the Brooklyn clubhouse once again.

PESTILLI REMAINS ATOP MOCK DRAFT

Little has changed at the top of the mock draft since it was released in June in preparation for the December Figment Draft. Narragansett outfielder Sal Pestilli, a two-time winner of the Christian Trophy as College baseball's top player remains at the top followed by High School player of the year Walt Messer, a first baseman from Washington DC.
Here is the latest top ten list.

Code:

 #  NAME    		POS  AGE      SCHOOL			CITY OF BIRTH
 1  Sal Pestilli	CF   20   Narragansett College		Westerly, Rhode Island
 2  Walt Messer		1B   18   McKinley Tech (Washington DC) Eldersburg, MD
 3  Billy Woytek	2B   18   Loyola HS (Los Angeles)	San Diego, CA
 4  Art Jennings	CF   22   Gates University		Burlingame, CA
 5  Terry Richardson	CF   17   Fall Creek HS (WI)		St Paul, MN
 6  Ed Stoddard		RF   19   Pullman HS (Chicago)		Chicago, IL
 7  Denny Andrews       3B   20   Maryland State		Philadelphia, PA
 8  Mike T Taylor	RF   18   University Military HS        Poplarville, MS
 9  Fred Vargas		RF   18   Cass Tech (Detroit)		Warren, MI
10  Bob Edgin		LF   21   Opelika State			Columbus, GA

There is no way all of those corner outfielders will go in the top ten and I would be surprised to see more than 1 of them go in the first round. The league is swimming in quality corner outfielders and will Stoddard, Taylor, Vargas and Edgin all look like solid ballplayers there is just far too big a supply of 1B-corner outfielders in the league right now. There are no pitchers in the top ten and the mock draft lists the top pitcher, high school star Johnnie Jones at 15th overall with Red River State's Bunny Edwards tabbed the top second round choice. In reality both will be gone in the top ten and quite possibly two or three more pitchers as well. In fact rumours persist the Detroit Dynamos are going to use the first overall pick, if they don't trade down, on either Jones or Edwards. A big mistake in my opinion as Sal Pestilli has the makings of a generational talent.

AWARDS WATCH

With just 1 week remaining in the regular season it seems like two top hitter award winners are pretty well decided. There is zero doubt that Philadelphia Keystones slugger Bobby Barrell (.352,53,159) win his second career Whitney Award as the Federal Association's top hitter. The Georgia Jolter also won the award in 1934. Meanwhile, in the Continental Association the smart money is on Brooklyn's Al Wheeler(.358,37,139) to repeat as that loop's Whitney Award winner. Cleveland third baseman Charlie Barry (.376,9,90) has had an outstanding season and will likely win his first batting title with a career year at age 37 but Wheeler is having another monster year at the plate.

The pitching awards might be a little closer, especially in the Federal Association where the choice is between a pair of Chicago Chiefs in veteran Rabbit Day(25-3, 2.43) and rookie Al Miller (21-8, 2.87). Miller has been amazing all season while Day, who already owns a pair of Allen Awards, was excellent as usual before the trade from New York in July, but has been positively otherworldly since coming to the Chiefs and teaming with Miller.

In the Continental Association I would have said Tom Barrell (20-6, 3.48) was a lock for his third consecutive Allan Award but he was upstaged by Cleveland's Dean Astle (20-14, 3.61) in their meeting last week and now it looks like a toss up. Expect both team's second bananas Lyman Weigel (15-7, 2.95) and Mike Murphy (16-8, 3.12) to also receive some consideration but really it is between Barrell and Astle.

QUICK HITS

- Bad news out of Montreal as Earle Whitten suffered his second serious arm injury this season. The 28 year old missed the first 4 months of the year with shoulder woes and now he is back on the sidelines after what is only being described as a serious arm issue. Whitten was 14-12 a year ago for the Saints but struggled after his first injury this season, posting a 2-5 record. The future did look very bright after his best outing of the season last Sunday in which he threw a complete game 5-hitter in a 14-1 lambasting of Toronto. However, on Saturday he didn't get past the second inning before the injury occurred. There are certainly questions following two serious arm injuries in one season as to whether Whitten will make a full recovery. Whitten may well be best remembered for being the pitcher that served up Max Morris' 700th career homerun.

- Rookie lefthander Jack Wood is off to a nice start in Detroit. One of the key pieces the Dynamos received in their big deal with Brooklyn last season that sent Al Wheeler and Frank Vance away, the 23 year old former 3rd round pick out of Henry Hudson University is 3-3 with a 3.83 era in 6 starts for Detroit since being called up in late August.

- Brooklyn's Dan Barrell became the fifth player to hit for the cycle this season when he turned the trick against Montreal last week. Rich Langton of the Chicago Cougars, St Louis' Alex Ingraham, Mahlon Strong of the New York Gothams and Detroit outfielder Irv Brady are the others.

- In their 60 year history the Chicago Chiefs have never won 100 games in a season. They have 99 wins so far this year and 4 attempts remaining to get to the century mark. Regardless of the final total it will be a huge improvement on the 78-76 season they turned in last year.

- Still with numbers, Detroit World scribe Fast Freddie Farhat shares what he sees is a first in FABL history. "Never before (I believe) have 3 teams in one Association ever had 90 wins or more each in a season. This year in the CA, Brooklyn has 94 while Cleveland and Philadelphia both have 90 with a week left in the season. Combine that with the FA's Chicago Chiefs 99 wins and that is a 4th 90+ win team. The Pittsburgh Miners with 1 win next week will make it 5 90+ win teams in 1 season."

progen · 05-06-2021, 03:12 PM

This is an excellent read. Entertaining and like the detail.

Jiggs McGee · 05-07-2021, 01:40 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

Monday September 28, 1936

KINGS FINALLY OVERCOME FORESTERS

After back to back final week of the season collapses that caused Brooklyn to lose the Continental Association pennant to the Cleveland Foresters each of the past two years, the Kings finally get their chance to taste October baseball. It was not so much a stellar finish for the Brooklyn nine as the Kings stumbled down the stretch, winning just 11 of their final 23 games but they were aided by a Kings-like collapse from the Cleveland club. The Foresters, who had come up big when Brooklyn collapsed late in each of the past two seasons, fell apart in the final days of this campaign, dropping 8 of their last 9 decisions and slipping to third in the standings as the rapidly improving Philadelphia Sailors won their last 7 straight including a pair in Cleveland to leapfrog the Foresters.

The upcoming Series meeting will be the first ever between the Brooklyn Kings and Chicago Chiefs, each of whom have rarely tasted victory. Brooklyn's troubles are well documented as the club's collapse each of the past two September's adds to the credibility of the so-called Hawkins Curse placed on the club so many decades ago. The Curse has not been lifted yet, mind you, as the Kings have been to the Series before: in 1912, 1923 and 1927, but lost on each occasion and former Kings star pitcher Ferdinand Hawkins is said to have cursed the club from ever winning a World Championship Series. Hawkins past away last year and had always steadfastly refused to ever confirm or deny what he was reported to have said when the Kings cut him following the 1892 season, the year that FABL was formed.

While the Chiefs have never had to worry about a curse, fans of one of baseball's original franchises - one formed by FABL founder William Whitney himself - have seen little in the way of playoff baseball. They did win a pair of Century League crowns in the late1800's before the dawn of the Federal and Continental Associations but since then they have won the Federal pennant just twice. The first title came in 1917 when they won 92 games and finished 2.5 up on the Pittsburgh Miners before beating Cleveland in 6 games for their first and, to date at least, only World Championship Series victory. Some might draw a few parallels between 1917 squad and this edition of the Chiefs:

- Each had a hotshot rookie pitcher. In 1917 it was 24 year old Bob Wilson who won 20 games and led the league in ERA. This year it is 21 year old Al Miller who won 21 games and would have led the Fed in ERA were it not for the incredible second half teammate Rabbit Day enjoyed.
- Both this year's edition and the 1917 club finished first with Pittsburgh in second and Boston in third place.
- Both finished in the middle of the pack run wise as pitching was the story for both teams. the '17 squad had Wilson (20-11) as well as Denny Wren (24-11) and Marty Jones (22-11) leading the way, while this season's version had Rabbit Day (25-3), Miller (21-8) and Charlie Bingham (19-12).

The Chiefs only other pennant came in 1928 when Joe Masters (.388,56,195) and Jim Hampton (.397,18,117) lifted the club on their backs and carried them to a title. It could have been the middle of a mini-dynasty in Chicago as the Chiefs narrowly missed 3 straight pennants, finishing 2 games out in 1927 as Philadelphia and Detroit tied for the lead forcing a 1-game playoff that the Keystones won, and in 1929 the Chiefs finished second, 2 back of the Dynamos. There have been some lean seasons to start the 1930's but with a storybook 1936 season fans many are thinking the Chiefs are a team of destiny. It could be quite a series if the Kings can get back on track as Brooklyn sends the league's best offense up against FABL's best pitching staff.

The series is a coming home of sorts for 4 Chiefs, who all have ties to the Kings organization. Ron Rattigan and Tom Aiello were both Kings draft picks who were dealt to Chicago in the Milt Fritz trade. Aiello’s father also played briefly for Brooklyn in the teens. Bill White was signed originally by Brooklyn as an undrafted free agent and dealt to the Chiefs for a draft pick in ‘34 while Larry Brown was an out of options casualty the Kings sent to Chicago just prior to the start of the 1935 season. The 27 year old Rattigan (.335,20,101) had a breakout year his second season as a big leaguer while the 25 year old White (.272,4,78) established himself as the Chiefs everyday shortstop. Aiello(.290,1,13), who made his big league debut with 2 games for Brooklyn in 1929, was the Chiefs starting catcher last season but was relegated to a backup role with the acquisition of Tom Bird from Montreal. Brown spent parts of 4 seasons with Brooklyn and won a career high 11 games last season in his debut with Chicago but spent much of this year in the Chiefs pen and finished with a 4-9 record.

GOTHAMS TAKE INVENTORY OF HAUL FROM SUMMER SELL-OFF

Courtesy of the New York World-Telegram

As we watch Rabbit Day win 25 games and cruise into the Series let's take a look at what the New York Gothams received in their tear down. It will be years before we know if it was worth it but here is the haul the Gothams received for gutting a championship club:

Ed Reyes - OF/1B - (23) - Former 1st rd pick and top 100 prospect. Has established himself as a solid .300 hitter and .400 OBP AAA hitter. Hit .375/.423/.708 in a brief ML shot with the Gothams.

Billy Dalton - 3B - (22) - Former 1st rd pick and top 20 prospect. Had a solid season in A ball this year then struggled in a very brief look in AA.

Earl West - 1B/2B/OF - (20) - Former 3rd rd pick and top 200 prospect - Hit .300 at AA this season and held his own at the AAA level in 67 games

Fred Ratcliffe - SP - (22) - 5th rd pick. Had a 3.19 ERA and 1.17 Whip at AA Jersey City, then was 4.60 and 1.02 in two starts AAA. Had been struggling in AA Atlanta before being acquired by the Gothams.

Mule Earl - SP - (23) - Former 6th rd pick. Earl moved towards the top of the Gothams pitching prospects going 4-2 2.24 ERA and 0.88 Whip in 6 starts at single A Albany before injuries shut him down.

Chuck Johnson - 1B - (22) - Slashed .360/.415/.460 at single A as a 21 year old for the Kings and Gothams organizations.

Gary Heuser - SP - (26) - Struggled in the majors this season since coming over from the Chiefs as part of the Day trade. Bone spurs that ended his season are the likely reason.

Dick Canfield - 1B - (22) - A late round pick who never showed up on the prospect lists he hit .360/.418/.602 at AAA this season before going .275/.385/.330 for the Gothams in 130 PAs. The Gothams hope he will show more of his minor league power as a backup to Bud Jameson.

Charlie Wheeler - SP - (22) - Former 1st rd pick and top 100 prospect. He became the Gothams top pitching prospect. Wheeler struggled at AA since coming over to the Gothams.

Dick Gentry - SP - (23) - Former 2nd rd pick. Pitched well at AA and a short stint at AAA before taking a spot in the Gothams rotation for 12 starts (4-5, 5.79)

Howard Brown Jr. - OF - (24) - Former 3rd rd pick and top 100 prospect. Brown slashed .266/.310/.375 at AAA before getting a cup of coffee with the Gothams. Brown is a good defender at all 3 OF positions.

In addition to these players who helped improve the Gothams low ranked minor league system, the team also added 5 draft picks (while losing a 3rd rd) and will be drafting 3 times in round 1 and 3 times in round 2 this December.

KINGS INVITE TOP AREA PROSPECTS TO KINGS COUNTY BUT IS THE MOVE DESIGNED TO REMOVE A CURSE

The Brooklyn Kings might be busy preparing to host the opener of the World Championship Series but their scouting department led by Director John Spears is fully focused on the future, although perhaps Spears has also sprinkled in a hope to aide the present as well. Spears has invited a number of New York area prospects eligible for the December draft to tour Kings County Stadium and play a pick-up game against some Kings prospects and local sandlot players at the Stadium Tuesday, a day before the World Championship Series gets underway between the Kings and the Federal Association pennant winning Chicago Chiefs.

Included in those invited are number one ranked prospect Sal Pestilli of Narragansett College in Rhode Island, who will square off against his older brother Alf, a Kings minor leaguer, in the informal game. Other prospects invited are all players who appeared on the mock draft such as Joe Zell, a New York native who played for Ferguson College in North Carolina and Brooklyn born catcher Bill Wilson who played his high school ball in Philadelphia, but there was one notable exception. The group invited also included lightly regarded catcher Ian Weber of Brooklyn Catholic University.

No big deal you would think right as Weber is a local college product. Well, it isn't a big deal until you also recognize the fact that Weber is the grandson of former Kings hurler and rumoured curse creator Ferdinand Hawkins. The Kings called questions about whether Weber's inclusion was some sort of attempt to appease the spirit of Weber's late grandfather in an effort to remove the curse in advance of the Series opener as "pure hogwash." Brooklyn Scouting Director John Spears towed the company line by elaborating "we don't believe in curses," but he did add at the end of the conversation as he was leaving the room "but if can help us get our first title then why not?"

Brooklyn has never won a World Championship Series and Hawkins is said to have vowed they never would after he was unceremoniously cast aside from the organization in 1892 at the age of 27 after leading the team to two championships in the old Border Association. The 21 year old Weber played 3 seasons at Brooklyn Catholic University, hitting .266 with 11 homers in 166 games. OSA's scouting report in Weber calls him a quality defensive catcher but has a below average bat and his ceiling is a bench role.

COUGARS CLASS OF MINOR LEAGUES

The Chicago Cougars are loaded with young talent so it comes as little surprise the Cougars have the best minor league system in FABL if we strictly look at wins and losses. The Cougars have 13 players listed in the BNN's top 100 prospects led by #4 overall Billy Hunter, a 21 year old shortstop they selected 14th overall out of Cincinnati High School in 1932. Hunter spent most of the season at AA where he helped the Mobile Commodores win a Dixie League pennant before being promoted to AAA Milwaukee late in the year. No Cougar affiliate finished below third in it's league led by AA Mobile and Class B San Jose who each won pennants.

The Philadelphia Sailors finished a close second as they had three pennant winning clubs in AAA San Francisco, AA Providence and Class B Miami. There downfall to surpass the Cougars system was Class C where the Gulfport Sailors finished with a .500 record and were 4th in the Gulf States League.

Here is a look at the cumulative minor league record for each organization and the 1936 Minor League pennant winners.

Code:


                 1936 MINOR LEAGUE CHAMPIONS 
LEVEL  LEAGUE		TEAM			PARENT CLUB
AAA   Great Western 	San Francisco Hawks	Philadelphia Sailors
AAA   Union League	Rochester Rooks		Brooklyn Kings
AAA   Century League    Indianapolis Hoosiers   Baltimore Cannons
AA    Eastern Assn	Providence Sailors	Philadelphia Sailors
AA    Dixie League	Mobile Commodores	Chicago Cougars
AA    Lone Star Assn    Austin Violets		Independent
A     Heartland Lg.     Davenport Dusters	Toronto Wolves
A     Middle Atlantic   Allentown Cokers	Philadelphia Keystones
A     Western League	Des Moines Bears	Independent
B     C-O-W League	San Jose Cougars	Chicago Cougars
B     Southeastern Lg   Miami Sailors		Philadelphia Sailors
C     Gulf States Lg	Hattiesburg Top Hats	Boston Minutemen
C     UMVA		Moline Pioneers		St Louis Pioneers

QUICK HITS

- You have to wonder if this is the end of the line for Ossie Julious' managerial career. The 63 year old is the dean of FABL managers. No one has managed in more games than Julious and his 2,276 career wins and 2,418 career losses are both records. Julious won his only World Championship in 1911 when he was piloting Toronto and he has had some pretty successful seasons early in his stay in Baltimore, where he has skippered the Cannons since 1929 but with 3 straight last place finishes and a record of 239-377 over the past 4 seasons you have to think it is time for the Cannons to bring in a new voice.

-Staying with the Cannons, last year's number one overall pick Rufus Barrell II has finally been given a clean bill of health, although it is obviously too late for him to return to the mound this season. After two dominating seasons at Macon High School in Georgia, Barrell's minor league debut was highly anticipated. Unfortunately it lasted just 3 games before he hurt his shoulder and has been sidelined ever since. Cannons sources say Deuce is as good as new and ready to enjoy a great season next year and certainly the entire league is hoping he makes a full recovery, but shoulders can be a tricky thing with pitchers.

- While we are talking Baltimore pitching did anyone notice the great start another former high first round pick had to begin his big league career? Gus Goulding was taken 2nd overall by the Cannons in 1934 right after the Washington Eagles selected his St Blane College teammate Bobo White with the first pick. White struggled to a 6-15, 6.45 season at AAA this year but Goulding beat his former college teammate to the big leagues, jumping from AA in April to AAA in June and landing in Baltimore in late August. Since joining the Cannons, Goulding won all eight of his starts and boasts a very impressive 2.90 era. Things might be looking up for the Cannons as John Edwards, who was taken third overall in 1933, also looked sharp in his big league debut this month. Like Goulding, Edwards had a teammate drafted adjacent to him but Edwards, who played his high school ball at Hartford HS, has been overshadowed by his former school chum. That player was Al Miller, who was taken 4th overall by the Chiefs. You might have heard of him as all he has done is go 21-8 and help lead the Chiefs to the World Championship Series.

- The 1895 Chicago Cougars Continental Association record 1,002 runs will survive as a late slump caused the Brooklyn Kings to fall 8 runs short of that mark. The Kings total of 994 breaks their own team record of 916 runs scored established last season and becomes the second highest total ever recorded in the CA. The overall FABL record remains 1,033 set by the 1895 New York Gothams.

- Philadelphia Keystones slugger Rankin Kellogg had a bad May (.233/.281/.442, 16 K), but had an OPS above 1.000 every other month and came to the wire like the thoroughbred he is with back-to-back 31 RBI months and 10 HR in September. Final season numbers were solid: .311/.395/.594, 36 HR, 137 RBI. His 86 extra-base hits were the second-most in his career, thanks to his career high in doubles (38). But, it was the first time since 1926, his second season, where he did not finish with 200 hits, and this is also his first season where he did not lead the FABL in HR, RBI, OPS, runs, hits, walks, or any the three slash categories.

- Kellogg's Philadelphia teammate Bobby Barrell had a tremendous season, leading the league in HR (53), RBI (162), SLG (.679), OPS (1.079), and WAR (9.2). He surpassed his previous power high by 19 HR. Barrell also reached 230 hits for third time and finished at 200 hits or above for the fifth time in six seasons. His 53 homers tie Max Morris for 5th on the all-time single-season home run list.

Jiggs McGee · 05-10-2021, 11:44 AM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

October 2, 1936

CHIEFS HAVE KINGS OVER A BARRELL

The Chicago Chiefs continue to look like a team of destiny as FABL's hottest club the past 3 months turned the Brooklyn Kings into the Keystone Kops in their own stadium to start the World Championship Series. First it was Tom Barrell and the Kings defense imploding in the opening inning of Game One allowing Rabbit Day and his charges to cruise to an 8-1 victory in the Series opener and a day later rookie sensation Al Miller kept the Brooklyn bats at bay as the Cougars claimed a 6-2 victory which allows them to head home to Whitney Park with a commanding 2 games to nothing lead in the series.

GAME ONE - NOT BROOKLYN'S DAY

Game One was for all intents and purposes over before Brooklyn even had a chance to come to the plate. Things started very well for Tom Barrell as the hurler, who has come under recent criticism in Brooklyn media for his inability to perform in pressure games, looked dialed in with back to back strike outs of Bob Martin and Jim Hampton to begin the contest. Then Pete Layton, who like Chiefs ace Rabbit Day was a midseason pick up that sent the team on a roll they have not slowed down from, worked Barrell for a walk. Cliff Moss followed with a double to plate Layton and Ron Rattigan, the former Brooklyn draft pick making his first appearance at Kings County Stadium, singled in Moss and it was 2-0 Chicago. That would have been enough for Rabbit Day, who was 15-1 with a 1.69 era since coming to Chicago from the New York Gothams, to work with but Brooklyn decided to gift wrap a couple of more runs as the wheels completely fell off for the Kings. Wheels as in the Wonder Wheel Al Wheeler, who botched a fly ball that would have ended the inning and instead prolonged the suffering for the 31,860 fans on hand as Chiefs outfielder Bennie Griffith would follow with a 2-run single to make the score 4-0. Harry Barrell, who led the majors in errors this season, committed another gaffe before the inning was over but it did no further damage as mercifully Day, the 9th Chief to bat in the inning, became the third strikeout victim of Tom Barrell's.

That was the ball game as Day scattered just 6 hits and the only blemish on his shutout bid was a meaningless lead off homer by Al Wheeler in the ninth inning of Chicago's 8-1 victory.

GAME TWO - IT'S MILLER TIME

It is clear that nothing phases Chicago Chiefs rookie righthander Al Miller. The 'California Kid' burst on to the FABL scene this year with a 21 win season and a 2.87 era, a number only surpassed by his Chicago teammate and soon to be three-time Allen Award winner Rabbit Day. Miller held the Kings once feared, but for the past month quite docile, offense in check for 8 innings with the key moment being an incredible job to get out of a jam in the bottom of the seventh. The score was 3-0 Chicago at the time and the Kings had managed just 4 hits over the first 6 innings and never seriously threatened to score. That changed in the 7th when Elmer Nolde worked Miller for a free pass and moved to third on a double off the bat of John Langille. Harry Barrell drew a walk to load the bases bringing his brother Fred to the plate with no one out and nowhere to put him. Barrell, Chicago fans might recall, was the MVP of the 1931 series when he hit .609 to lead the cross-town Cougars to a World Title, so he had experience with October baseball in the past. Perhaps sensing the rookie Miller was starting to feel the pressure, Fred Barrell went after the first pitch he saw but got under it, lofting a fly ball to short leftfield, not deep enough to bring Nolde home. Next came pinch-hitter Joe Perret, subbing for Brooklyn pitcher Mike Murphy. Miller quickly went down 3-0 in the count but a called strike, a foul ball and another easy pop fly to center field, again not deep enough for Brooklyn to chance sending Nolde from third base, and suddenly there were two out. Miller got Brooklyn lead off hitter Bill May to ground out, ending the inning, the Brooklyn threat and quite possibly any hopes the Kings had of coming back in the series as the Chiefs made a statement in the top of the 8th inning with 3 more runs to go up 6-0 at the time.

Brooklyn finally got on the scoreboard when Nolde delivered a 2-run double in the bottom of the 8th but it was far too little and far too late to matter. The Series now heads west to the Windy City and I am sure more than one Kings fan feels he has witnessed his last game in Brooklyn for this season.

PIONEERS DISAPPOINTMENT CONTINUES

Detroit World reporter Fast Freddie Farhat had a blunt assessment of the St Louis Pioneers the other day. Farhat was quoted as saying " The Pioneers are probably baseballs biggest disappointment this season." He went on to elaborate: "Part of the issue was (starting pitcher) Sam Sheppard not being able to replicate his fabulous 1935 season. He ended up with 20 wins but just couldn’t quite get back to the 28 win 3.13 ERA of the prior year. Not going to put it all on Sheppard though as others were not quite up to their previous years stuff. Hopefully St Louis can rebound and get over the disappointment of the '36 season. I expected they will get back into the thick of things this next season and be in the running for the FA."

I don't know that it is fair to blame a 20-win pitcher for a team's failings but I have to admit Farhat's comments got me thinking that the Pioneers franchise is one that has certainly underachieved for well over a decade. This was a club that added Max Morris, clearly the greatest player of his generation if not all-time and immediately won a World Championship Series in 1920, Morris' first year wit the club. They would win a second straight Federal Association pennant the following season but have not reached the post-season since - a span of 15 years and counting. Now one player does not make a championship ballclub but Morris in his prime was the best player in the game and you have to wonder how the Pioneers failed to build a pennant winner around him. A combination of bad luck and bad decisions in the middle of the 1920's saw St Louis become one of the worst teams in the league and during a time when a 34 and 35 year old Morris was averaging 49 homers and 139 rbi's a season the Pioneers were a last place ballclub.

Things did back on track the last few seasons in St Louis but perhaps they should have received more when they finally dealt Morris. Trading the game's greatest slugger to the New York Gothams following the 1930 season did land them a very good first baseman in Fred McCormick but the other pieces of the deal have fizzled. Perhaps outfielder Calvin Brown, who hit .342 for the Pioneers last season but lost his starting to job to Art Cascone this year, may still pan out but the bottom line is both the Gothams and Cleveland, Morris' next destination, each won pennants with Max Morris in the lineup, something the Pioneers could not do with Morris in his prime - at least not after 1921.

1936 may just prove to be an anomaly and the Pioneers, with an exciting young club led by Freddie Jones, McCormick and Gail Gifford and young pitcher David Abalo to join Sheppard in the rotation, may just have hit a bit of a bump in the road this season so perhaps for long suffering Pioneer fans 1937 will finally be their year. It will be about time for Pioneers fans as only Boston has gone longer than St Louis without a Federal Association pennant.

MAKING A CASE FOR CLEAVES

Philadelphia Sailors second baseman Jack Cleaves has long been considered one of the best players in the game ever since breaking in as a full-timer at the age of 20 midway through the 1927 season. While Jack is still one of the top infielders in baseball he is likely no longer even the best player in his family. That distinction falls to 22 year old George Cleaves, who made the majors a year ahead of his older brother while still a teenager and is now widely considered to be the best catcher in the game - which is saying a lot considering Cleveland's T.R. Goins (.330,20,104 this past season) has held that distinction for years.

Here is a brief excerpt from a Pittsburgh Press article outlining George's accomplishments this year:

Quote:

George Cleaves finished with a .344/.458/.478 line this year leading the league with 118 walks and in OBP. 15 homers, 25 doubles and 101 RBI's. Had nearly double the ZR rating as the second highest guy and threw out 61% of runners this year, 7 percentage points more than the guy in second. He'll turn 23 in a few weeks.

It appears OSA agrees as the most recent player ranking lists George as not just the best catcher, but also the top position player in all of baseball. Now I am not sure I would go that far as supporters of the likes of Bobby Barrell and Al Wheeler, among others, would have a different opinion. There is however, no disputing George Cleaves talent and the potential he has to perhaps become one of the greatest catchers ever to play the sport.

As for the Cleaves family, they are certainly giving the Barrell's a run for their money and word has it there is a third Cleaves brother on the horizon. Well, half brother, as Roger is just 12 years old and his linage links to both families as George Theobald and Rufus Barrell are his grandfathers. George 'Toothpick' Theobald was a long time catcher just before the turn of the century but is better known as the manager who guided the Boston Minutemen to 3 World Championships and the Detroit Dynamos to one.

DYNAMOS WON'T PASS ON PESTILLI

After a month of attempting to shop the number one pick and spending some time focused on high school pitcher Johnnie Jones and Red River State hurler Bunny Edwards the Detroit Dynamos announced over the weekend that Sal Pestilli is their man. Pestilli, who won two Frank Christian Trophy's as an outfielder at Narragansett, is widely considered to be a future superstar in FABL. Detroit left the door open for a reversal of their decision but only a crack, saying it would take an offer similar to the haul they received a year and a half ago for Al Wheeler to convince the Dynamos to trade down. I am reading that to say that the Dynamos would move the pick to the New York Gothams perhaps, but it would require New York to ship all 3 of it's first rounders and maybe another piece to Detroit in order to consummate the deal.

It is nice to see the Dynamos come to their senses on this one and focus on Pestilli rather than a pitcher. Who knows maybe drafting Pestilli all along was their plan but they wanted to throw up a smoke screen for some reason with the pitcher talk. To this reporter, and several other's familiar with the college game, Pestilli looks like he may be the type who can skip the minors and go straight from the campus to the big leagues just as Freddie Jones and Doug Lightbody did before him. Pestilli draws real-life comparisons to Joe DiMaggio for many reasons. Primarily it is on field potential that sounds a lot like Joltin' Joe but also because of the off-field similarities as both were the middle of three brothers who all excelled in the outfield, each from Italian immigrant families who grew up on the coast. Yes it was different coasts of course and the FABL commissioner has confirmed that no players are direct historical imports of real life players but there is clearly a lot to tie the two of them together. However, we are in the fictional FABL world so if the DiMaggio name means nothing how about this one as a comparison to Sal Pestilli - Bobby Barrell. Pestilli projects to have the same combination of contact and power as the Georgia Jolter along with perhaps more speed that could allow him to prosper as a center fielder instead of moving to a corner as Barrell did.

Jiggs McGee · 05-11-2021, 11:34 AM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

OCTOBER 5, 1936

SWEEP! CHIEFS DOMINANT IN SERIES WIN

The Chicago Chiefs swept the Brooklyn Kings to win just their second World Championship Series and first since 1917. It was a performance so overwhelming that the Kings only lead in the entire series came in the top of the ninth inning of game four but it was quickly nullified when the Chiefs rallied for three runs in the bottom of the ninth to walk-off their season with a 5-4 victory that completed the sweep. Starting June 23rd, or the day after Pete Layton arrived in a trade with the New York Stars, the Chiefs went 64-28 including the four series victories. They were 56-22 since Rabbit Day arrived in a trade with the New York Gothams at the all-star break with Day himself posting a 17-1 record over that time. Day was 2-0 in the World Championship Series but the MVP award went to his catcher instead. Tom Bird, who was acquired from Montreal over the winter, hit .278 with 4 rbi's in the series including a 3 hit performance in game four the culminated in a series ending 2-run walk-off double.

Game Three saw another terrific pitching performance for the Chiefs, this time from Ron Coles, who outdueled Brooklyn ace Tom Barrell by allowing just 7 hits over 8 innings before Charlie Bingham came on to close out the 3-2 victory. Barrell had a very strong game for Brooklyn, surrendering just 5 Chicago hits but, as they did in Game One, errors cost him dearly.

The game was scoreless until the bottom of the third but Brooklyn had their chances before then as they had runners on first and second with no one out in both the second and third innings but in each case a Chicago double play allowed Coles to escape without damage. Coles aided his own cause with a solo homerun to open the scoring. It was just the second homerun Coles had ever hit as a pro - a span of 268 plate appearances. Another Brooklyn error - they committed 11 in the series - led to two more runs and cost them the ballgame.

Game Four was really just a formality as with Rabbit Day on the mound and the Kings bats in an October freeze the outcome of the series was no longer in doubt. Brooklyn did rally with 3 runs in the top of the ninth to take their first lead of the series but proving once more they were a team of destiny the Chiefs easily swatted aside any Brooklyn attempts of prolonging the series by scoring three of their own to add one more chapter to the Curse of Ferdinand Hawkins for the Kings and slay their own ghosts by winning a second World Championship Series for the Whitney family.

JOE FOY - UNLIKELY HERO

From the Chicago Herald-Examiner
One of the great surprises about October baseball is it gives someone unexpected an opportunity to shine on the brightest stage. One of those players this week was Joe Foy of the Chicago Chiefs. The 28-year-old right fielder was 2 for 4 with a home run and 2 runs scored to play a key role in the Chiefs 6-2 win over Brooklyn in Game Two of the Series. Foy was primarily the SS for Fort Wayne this season, but he's a right handed batter with OF experience, and so he was called up at the end of August to be the right-handed half of the RF platoon with Cliff Moss. In Fort Wayne Foy was hitting .352/.384/.504, and in his two weeks in Chicago, he hit .326/.354/.522 with 3 HR. The Chiefs had been looking for a right handed bat to pair with Moss. It's a small sample size, but Foy has earned himself an extended look in 1937.

Foy has had an interesting career to say the least. Originally a shortstop, he was a key member of two College World Championship teams at Opelika State and his .432 batting average in 1929 was the 18th highest ever recorded in the old feeder league system. He was named a second team All-American as a sophomore in 1928 and a first team selection the following season, prompting the Chiefs to select him 14th overall in the 1929 FABL draft. Despite missing a month and a half of his rookie pro season with an injury Foy still hit .307 at AA Memphis that season and by 1931 he was in the big leagues. He spent two seasons as a starter and two others in a platoon role with the Chiefs but despite hitting .339 in 85 games in 1934 he found himself in AAA Fort Wayne for the 1935 season, primarily because of defensive limitations as a shortstop. When he spent most of the season in Fort Wayne again this year it appeared that Foy's days as a big leaguer were nearing their end, but his strong September and now a big showing in Game Two have reopened the doors for the 28 year old.

CANNONS ON THE CLOCK

With Detroit publicly declaring they are going to take Sal Pestilli the focus now shifts to the Baltimore Cannons and the number two pick. Will the Cannons, who are well stocked with young arms from high selections in recent drafts including Rufus "Deuce Barrell" last season, keep the pick or are they inclined to move down a few spots and perhaps add another asset or two? if they elect to keep the pick the perfect selection for Baltimore has to be Walt Messer, a Maryland born boy who dominated in high school ball for nearby McKinley Tech in Washington D.C. Messer, who is ranked second behind Sal Pestilli in the OSA mock draft, is a 3 time High School All-American who won the Adwell Award as the top prep player twice. He likely needs a few years of seasoning in the minors but he gives the Cannons a power bat that could fit in the middle of their lineup for years. There may be some temptation in Baltimore to take a pitcher but the Cannons first pick each of the last three years was used on arms and that strategy is starting to pay off with the recent big league debuts of 1934 pick Gus Goulding (80, 2.90) and 1933 selection Johnny Edwards (2-2, 1.80). Add last year's pick Barrell and 20 year old Rusty Petrick, the 1933 10th overall pick of the Gothams who came to Baltimore in the initial Rabbit Day trade, and the Cannons have plenty of young arms so this is the year to focus on Messer.

MINERS ARE STRONG(ER) IN THE OUTFIELD AFTER DEAL

The Pittsburgh Miners pulled the trigger last night and grabbed one of the few remaining quality pieces the New York Gothams had left from last October's World Championship team with the announcement of a deal to acquire outfielder Mahlon Strong. It cost Pittsburgh a pretty penny for Strong, but when healthy, the 27 year old is one of the best sluggers in the game. He hit 26 homers and batted .345 for the Gothams last season despite missing over a month with a neck injury. My only question for Pittsburgh is why make this trade now and not back in July when the Chiefs were stocking up on Rabbit Day and Pete Layton? Pittsburgh was 4 games ahead of the Chicago Chiefs in mid-July and perhaps the addition of Strong might have been enough to help them hold off the Chiefs down the stretch. Was the Gothams price higher at that point or were the Miners unwilling to spend then what they did 3 months later?

As for the Gothams, the deal was an impressive addition to their arsenal of upcoming draft picks as they picked up the Miners first and fifth round picks in the December draft for Strong as well as a pair of prospects. The deal gives the rebuilding Gothams 4 picks in the first round and a total of 7 of the first 32 selections. New York now has to hope they strike it big with those selections or there may be a long dry spell at the Bigsby Oval, something the club owner will likely not take too kindly too. New York also adds 22 year old outfielder John Phillips and 20 year old pitcher Nate Speer.

Phillips, a 1932 7th round pick out of Hartford High School, made his FABL debut this past season, hitting .324 in 29 games with the Miners after starting the year in AA and and looking very good in a brief stop at AAA St. Paul. OSA feels he has the potential to be an above average corner outfielder some day. Speer was the Miners first round pick in 1933, selected 8th overall out of Dallas High School. He struggled a bit his first two seasons of pro ball but broke out this year, splitting the season between A and AA and compiling a 20-9 record with a 2.82 era. OSA says he has great raw stuff and should develop into a top of the rotation arm.

Tiger Fan · 05-11-2021, 01:21 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

OCTOBER 6, 1936

OH MO! DYNAMOS ADD LEGENDARY SLUGGER

The Detroit Dynamos have given there fans a reason to show up at the ballpark next season as they added the greatest slugger in baseball history to their roster. Max Morris, who suffered a foot injury that cost him half of the season, had his lowest homerun total since 1918 but still managed to surpass the 700 mark for his career. He will be 42 when opening day rolls around again and there is a slight chance Morris may choose to retire instead, taking his 702 career homeruns, three triple crowns, 8 Whitney Awards and 2 World Championship rings, and ride off into the sunset. However, if he does choose to return he will give Detroit fans, who have watched their club go 98-210 over the past two seasons, something to finally cheer for.

Morris will likely not have a great impact on improving that record, at least not on the field but just his presence should help many of the young Dynamos mature as big leaguers. Morris, in all honesty, was merely a throw in the deal that sent outfielder Leon Drake from the south shores of Lake Erie to Lake St Clair. Drake hit .279 with 21 homers and a CA leading 21 triples for Cleveland last season and he will be reunited with his former GM, who left Cleveland for the rebuilding project that is the Dynamos two years ago. In return Cleveland gets Bill Moore, a 25 year old first baseman who once was called the greatest player in College Baseball History but did not make his FABL debut until this past season. He acquainted himself well in the big leagues, batting .327 with 9 homers as a rookie and will be counted on to fill Morris' large shoes at first base with the Foresters. Cleveland also gets a promising but injury prone minor league pitcher in Earle Robinson who was originally selected 5th overall by Brooklyn in the 1933 draft, and a 4th round draft pick.

It was one of two deals announced by the Dynamos who also picked up catcher Clem Bliss from Pittsburgh for a pair of minor leaguers. It was not much of secret recently but the Dynamos also made official they will be taking Sal Pestilli with the number one pick in this December's draft. The final piece of news out of Detroit is that the Dynamos are about to fire beleaguered manager Tom Bray. They have not made the name of his replacement public yet but inside sources confirm it will be a legend in the sport.

WHAT WENT WRONG IN BROOKLYN THIS TIME?

Another season ends in disappointment for the Brooklyn Kings but at least this time there was some cause for celebration. After blowing two straight pennant races to the Cleveland Foresters the Kings finally got over the hump this time around and claimed their first Continental Association pennant since 1927. However the club remains the only FABL team never to win a World Championship Series as the Kings were swept by the red-hot Chicago Chiefs and are now 0 for 4 attempts to win a World Title while owning a dismal 3-16 record in post-season play.

You can't blame this loss on the Curse of Ferdinand Hawkins, although I am certain his presence still lingers in the halls of Kings County Stadium over a year after his death and 45 years after Hawkins supposedly doomed the Kings to never winning a World Championship Series after he was released by the club following the inaugural season of FABL in 1892. The September failures of the past three years certainly seem otherworldly in Brooklyn when you consider the collapses the Kings had each season.

1934- Brooklyn won a team record 97 games but with 6 to play they lead the second place Cleveland Foresters by 2.5 games only to drop 4 of their final 6 and lose the pennant by a single game.

1935- A 95 win season ends in bitter disappointment as the Kings lost 4 of their last 7 contests including the final two on the season ending weekend. The last game is known as the Barrell debacle when Tom Barrell, despite being on the verge of his second straight Allen Award, comes up with one of his worst outings of the season with the pennant on the line and gets blown out in a season ending loss to the New York Stars that allows Cleveland to again win the pennant by a single game.

1936- This season the Kings again set a franchise record for victories with 98 but they were below .500 after the beginning of September posting a 13-16 record including the 4 series defeats. Brooklyn was lucky to hold off the hard-charging Philadelphia Sailors to finally win the pennant, and the door was certainly open for Cleveland to make another comeback win but they stumbled down the stretch as well for a change.

There are slumps that every ballclub goes through but Brooklyn seems to be hit with them at the most inopportune time. It's almost like this team is....well, cursed.

The players have to shoulder much of the blame for failing to perform in a key situation once again, but they are not the only guilty party in this case. Kings management is also heavily to blame. One can trace this lost opportunity to the middle of July when the Kings management team failed to go all-in and try to pry Rabbit Day from the Gothams, who were selling off everything that wasn't bolted down. How different might things be for Brooklyn if the Kings had offered New York say Bob Cummings, their first round pick and a young prospect or two for the two-time (and soon to be three time) Allen Award winning pitcher. All Day did was go 17-1 down the stretch as Chicago became the hottest team since, well since Brooklyn in the first half of the season, and embarrassed the Brooklyn hitters in the World Championship Series. As a team the Kings hit .187 in the Series. This was the best offense in baseball that scored nearly 1,000 runs this season, averaging 6.5 runs per game but they could only score 5 times in the first 3 games of the Series combined. Add in 11 errors in the Series and you don't have a winning recipe especially when Chicago is sending Rabbit Day and Al Miller to the mound for 3 of the 4 games.

So you can blame it on the Curse if you like, or bad luck as the Brooklyn bats all cooled off at the same time but you and I know better. This season was lost the day the Brooklyn Kings management team got gun shy and backed off on a major deal for Rabbit Day. They pulled the trigger on such a deal the previous season to land Al Wheeler and Frank Vance and it got them nothing so I am sure that was a factor. They also learned before the deal was done that their competition for Day was not the Cleveland Foresters, so the Kings brain trust breathed a sigh of relief and decided to stand pat with the team they had and keep the few prospects remaining after two years of stocking up on veterans. The safe move if you will. Well the safe move is why Brooklyn is not celebrating a championship today, the curse has nothing to do with it.

Jiggs McGee · 05-12-2021, 10:31 AM

LOOK BACK AT THE 1926 FABL DRAFT

Each year just before the FABL draft I have been doing annual recaps where I look back at the draft class from 10 years prior so with the 1936 draft fast approaching let's grade our clubs on how they did back in 1926. The 1926 draft was just the second for the human GM's and it was thought of at the time and certainly has proven to be a much weaker class then we had in 1925 which gave us among others Al Wheeler, Bud Jameson, Bill Ashbaugh, Doug Lightbody and Jack Cleaves. If there is one name that stands out from the 1926 class it is Karl Stevens and he stands out for all the wrong reasons. So looking back a decade later, how did we do with the first draft pick each of us made?

1- KARL STEVENS OF CLEVELAND FORESTERS

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. This is probably all that needs to be said about Stevens. Here is a list of every position player selected first overall in the history of the FABL draft and their career major league games played:

The only positive thing we can say about Cleveland's choice is at least it was a bad draft year and you will see Stevens was not the only bust.

2- WALT PALMER P PITTSBURGH MINERS

One could say this was the pick that started the trend of FABL teams reaching for pitchers, although to be fair it probably began the previous year when Toronto traded up to select Eddie Quinn second overall. Another point in the Miners favour is the fact that Palmer had an amazing college career at Bayou State, posting a 29-8 record and a 2.48 era and helped his school to a National Title in 1925. Palmer was not a bad pick, just a pick saddled with a number of bad injuries that destroyed his career really before it could get started. Palmer missed 2 months his rookie pro season with elbow soreness and that started a trend that saw him suffer serious injuries each of his first five seasons. He would go 7-18 with a 5.10 era in 43 appearances with the Miners before they finally gave up and released him in 1933. They hung on to him that long likely because he showed the occasional flash of the skill he had in college such as tossing a 10-strikeout no-hitter in a AAA game in 1932 but in true Walt Palmer fashion he hurt his back 3 weeks later and missed over a month. Palmer is still active today and bouncing around the Lone Star League as a spare part.

3- FRED BARRELL C CHICAGO COUGARS

With a redo the catcher from Georgia Baptist would likely be the number one pick. Barrell is now 31 years old and a key piece of the Brooklyn Kings pennant winning club. He spent 3 and a half seasons in Chicago and was dominant in leading the Cougars to the 1931 World Championship Series, hitting .609 and being named Series MVP. Barrell was traded to Brooklyn along with his brother Tom and Mike Murphy in the deal that brought Tommy Wilcox and catcher Mike Taylor to the Windy City. He has played 966 FABL games and has 1,063 hits and a .297 career batting average to go along with 2 all-star game appearances.

4- LARRY BROWN P DETROIT DYNAMOS

It has been a long road to the big leagues for Larry Brown but he seems to have finally found a home in the Chicago Chiefs bullpen. Selected out of Oakland High School Brown went 20-11 at Class B in his second year of pro ball prompting the Brooklyn Kings to send catcher Dave Armstrong to Detroit for him. He would have some decent years in the minors for the Kings but struggled often when called up to the big club. He finally ran out of minor league options so he was sent to the Chiefs prior to opening day 1935 where he has had some modest success. Brown is 22-23 with 10 saves in his career. Detroit can't be too disappointed about the pick as Armstrong had several solid years with the Dynamos but their second round pick that year, pitcher Sam Sheppard, is enjoying much greater success although it did not come in Detroit as Sheppard was lost to St Louis in the 1931 Rule V draft. Sheppard won an Allen Award in 1935 after a 28-7 season and won 20 games again this year.

5- LEE GRIFFIN OF MONTREAL SAINTS

Griffin had strong career at Grafton but his numbers were down in his draft year. He did show some power in AAA but struggled to keep his average up and it was even more obvious in Montreal, where he hit just .223 in 233 big league games before the Saints cut him loose in 1933. He ended his career last year with a stop in the independent Western Baseball League.

6- GEORGE JOHNSON P CHICAGO CHIEFS

Owns probably the most common name in FABL and don't confuse him with pitcher George A Johnson or third baseman George X Johnson. This George Johnson is 14-16 in 80 FABL appearances with Brooklyn, the Philadelphia Sailors and for the last 3 seasons the Chicago Cougars.

7- ART HART 3B BALTIMORE CANNONS

Hart hit .403 with 16 homers for Opelika State in his draft year and would go on to hit 87 homers in 413 AAA games but bat just .228. He hit just .201 in 55 games with the Cannons and now at 31 is unemployed after being released last winter.

8- REX KAISER OF BOSTON MINUTEMEN

Another one of those guys who really did very little in his career but at least at 28 and having spent each of the past two seasons as the 5th or 6th outfielder in Boston he still has a career. Hit .252 in 44 games this past season and is a .249 hitter in 141 career games. Nothing more than a spare part but with the quality of this draft class that makes him not too bad a selection.

9- EVERETT JUERGENS OF PHILADELPHIA SAILORS

Juergens had a 28 game hitting streak when he batted .323 as a sophomore at Sadler College but after slashing just .227/.272/.318 as a junior you have to wonder what the Sailors saw in him at the time. He spent the next 6 years in the Sailors system but never advanced past A ball before being released in 1933 at age 27. Signed with Austin of the Lone State League and has spent the past four seasons with the Violets as a decent AA outfielder.

10- FRANK CRAWFORD P PHILADELPHIA KEYSTONES

Crawford proved to be the best of the first round pitchers taken as he has spent the past 6 seasons in the Keystones rotation, compiling a 61-50 record. There were a number of other good pitchers selected after him such as second rounders Del Lyons, Sam Sheppard and Gene Stevens and later picks Earle Whitten, Les Zoller and Ben Turner but this draft certainly lacked star power on the mound so Crawford becomes a very good pick under the circumstances.

11- FRANK HUDDLESTON SS TORONTO WOLVES

Of the 11 position players taken in the first round, Huddleston is one of just 3 to play in more than 300 big league games. Not the most gifted offensively but he has hit .252 in 785 games for the Wolves, Huddleston's biggest strength is his work in the field making him a solid big league shortstop.

12- BILL WHITTING OF WASHINGTON EAGLES

Bill Who? It was a poor class so you can't blame Washington for taking a chance on Whitting but he becomes another of the many outfielders from this class who did nothing. Whiting only played everyday for one season at Brooklyn State, but he did hit .344 for the Bears that season with 15 doubles. He didn't have much longball power and the game was shifting so corner outfielders without power would begin to have very little value. He spent most of his time in the Eagles system in AAA and did hit 23 homers and bat .302 at that level in 1931 but he was 26 years old at the time. Played a grand total of 8 big league games and went 1-for-6 at the plate. He has been a reserve outfielder for Galveston of the independent Lone Star League the past 3 seasons.

13- MIKE WILLIAMS OF CLEVELAND FORESTERS

Well all I can say about Williams is at least he lasted longer with the Foresters than #1 overall pick Karl Stevens. He had an up and down college career but put up some good numbers at AAA Cincinnati over the next couple of seasons prompting the Foresters to give him a shot in 1930. Williams started 73 games in the Cleveland outfield that season and hit a respectable .275 with 12 homers. It was the pinnacle of his career as the following season he was in the starting lineup for the entire year but hit just .239. The numbers got worse the next two seasons and now he appears to be nothing more than an after thought in Cleveland - just a player to fill a vacancy on a minor league level if there is a shortage of prospects. He is 31 and still in the Foresters system so who knows, maybe he will get another chance but with a .241 batting average in 276 games with the big club chances seem remote.

14- JACK ROGERS 3B ST LOUIS PIONEERS

Originally a 5th round pick of the Philadelphia Sailors in 1923, Rogers elected to attend College of San Diego instead where a strong junior year led to the Pioneers selecting him. He made his big league debut in St Louis in 1930, hitting just .240 but he belted 10 homers in 77 games for a last place club. He was waived by two teams over the next 6 months and eventually the Chicago Cougars claimed him. Rogers appeared in 8 games in 1931 for Chicago and 20 the following season before being cut loose again. He is now in the Western Baseball League after a big league career that lasted 105 gams and saw him hit .227.

15- GEORGE WILLIAMS P NEW YORK STARS

It was a long route to the majors for Williams but he finally cracked the Stars roster in 1935, going 6-7 in 35 appearances including 23 starts. He was 6-9 this season and appears to have settled in as a swingman for New York but it will likely be a challenge to keep his roster spot as the club improves. A high school draft pick, Williams spent 7 years in the minors before finally getting his chance in New York at the age of 27.

16- WOODY ARMSTRONG SS-3B CLEVELAND FORESTERS

What a terrible break for the Foresters to have three first round picks but have them be in what was just an awful year for top end talent. Imagine what the Foresters could have built with 3 first round picks in the 1925 draft? While they missed on the first two, Armstrong was a solid selection, although they did deal him to Montreal just a few months into his rookie pro season. Armstrong was selected to play in the first all-star game in 1933 but missed the game with an injury, something that plagued him throughout his career. He spent 7 and a half seasons in Montreal before being traded to the Chicago Cougars midway through the 1934 season. After another injury this past May the Cougars released him and he is presently playing in Newark, Detroit's AAA affiliate. His 847 major league games are third behind only a pair of catchers in this draft class (Fred Barrell and 6th rounder Jim Pool) and Armstrong has 795 hits and a .259 career average.

SUMMARY

A very weak crop but there was some talent that slipped through the cracks like 6th rounder Jim Pool or 10th round selection Bobby Allen or in the auto draft portion we have 11th round selection Ed Stewart or 16th round pick Walt Layton, who both have surpassed the 500 career FABL game plateau. In a redraft Fred Barrell, Huddleston, Armstrong and Crawford would really be the only first round selections who delivered much value. It is hard to give any team a failing grade as this draft class as a whole really rates as one of the worst I have seen.

Jiggs McGee · 05-13-2021, 08:34 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

October 15, 1936

FABL HANDS OUT HARDWARE

It was nothing new for each of the FABL awards recipients as all four winners have claimed the hardware before. There was also little surprise as the voters recognized each winner in a landslide victory. As expected Rabbit Day capped a dominant season with his 3rd Allen Award as the top pitcher in the Federal Association. The 32 year old won the Fed pitching triple crown this season as he led the loop in wins (25), era (2.41) and strikeouts (156) to claim his third career Allan Award. His previous two came with Baltimore making him the only pitcher who has won an Allan Award in each association. Day was dealt from the New York Gothams to the Chicago Chiefs in June and proceeded to go 17-1 as a Chief including two wins in the World Championship Series that Chicago swept Brooklyn in. Day's 109 points included 15 first place votes to finish far ahead of his teammate and rookie sensation Al Miller (21-8). Ed Wood (22-11) of Boston finished third with Washington's Bill Anderson (22-14), who received the other first place vote likely from the Washington reporter, coming in fourth.

Tom Barrell of the Brooklyn Kings won an unprecedented third straight Allan Award as the top pitcher in the Continental Association. Barrell was tied for the league lead in wins with a 21-6 record while leading both leagues with 158 strikeouts. He claimed 14 of the 16 first place votes with Cleveland's Dean Astle (21-15), who finished second and Brooklyn's Mike Murphy (17-8), who came in fourth, getting one first place vote apiece. The Philadelphia Sailors Merritt Thomas (20-6), a former rule V draft pickup, failed to earn a first place vote but did finish third in the balloting.

The Continental Association Whitney Award winner is Brooklyn's Al Wheeler for the second consecutive season. It is the 4th such honour for Wheeler, who also won a pair of Whitney's with Detroit of the Federal Association. Wheeler joins his manager Powell Slocum and former New York Gotham Ed Ziehl as the only 4 time Whitney Award winners, of course that pales when compared to the record 8 Whitney Awards Max Morris has claimed. Wheeler led the CA in homers (38) and RBI's (145) but was denied his second straight triple crown as he finished second to Cleveland's Charlie Barry with a .359 batting average. Wheeler received 14 of the 16 first place votes with Cleveland teammates Dan Fowler (.312,33,121) and T.R. Goins (.330,20,104), who finished second and third, earned one first place ballot each.

Bobby Barrell of the Philadelphia Keystones was the only unanimous winner as the Georgia Jolter joined Max Morris and Joe Masters as the only players to ever hit 50 or more homeruns in a season. Barrell (.353,53,162) also posted the 7th highest RBI total in FABL history to claim his second Federal Association Whitney Award. Pittsburgh catcher George Cleaves (.344,15,101) finished second in the balloting with Bob Martin (.355,8,100) of the Chiefs, Barrell's Keystone teammate Rankin Kellogg (.311,36,137) and Chicago's Ron Rattigan (.335,20,101) rounding out the top five.

KEYSTONES BID FAREWELL TO ROSS

Courtesy of the Philadelphia Record

Hat tip to Bill Ross, who has announced his retirement. Ross will forever be revered by the Keystone faithful for his performance in Game 7 of the 1933 World's Championship Series as the winning pitcher in the deciding game to deliver a title to Philadelphia and as a two-time champion with the Keystones. His 5-1, 2.09 ERA in the postseason was an exclamation point to a 17-year FABL career, in which Ross won 230 games including 15 games nine times.

Ross was acquired by the Keystones in a trade with the Chicago Cougars before the 1927 season with one ring in his pocket as a member of the 1922 champion Cougar squad. The winning mentality made its way on the train from Chicago to Philadelphia, as Ross helped push the Keystones to a 86-69 record and to winning their first title in 35 years. Ross started and won in Game 1 of a series Philadelphia won in five games. His 119 regular season wins as a Keystone place him sixth on the franchise's all-time list and his 34.4 WAR put him second among all Keystone pitchers.

Others to announce their retirement this week included Roy Calfee, Joe Masters and manager James Gentry. Calfee spent 13 and a half of his 15 big league seasons with Detroit before finishing his career with the Pittsburgh Miners. He posted a career record of 169-135 and won back to back Allen Awards in 1928 and 1929. The '29 season, in which he helped lead the Dynamos to a World Championship was his greatest season as Calfee posted a 26-8 record before winning two more games in the Series. Masters ended his career on a winning note as a member of the World Champion Chicago Chiefs although he did not play in the Series. He will be best remembered for his 1928 season where he broke a 33 year old record by driving in 195 runs while smacking 56 homers and batting .388 to win the Whitney Award as the top hitter in the Federal Association. It was the best of his 13 year run with the Chiefs before being dealt to the cross-town Chicago Cougars in 1934. He finished up his career in Detroit this season before returning to the Chiefs for a final farewell, appearing in the final two games of the season. Masters ends his career with 265 homeruns and 2,425 hits. The 66 year old Gentry only had a cup of coffee as a player but enjoyed a long managerial career that saw him win 6 league championships in the minor leagues before briefly managing the Montreal Saints in 1934. After being led go by the Saints he signed with the Chicago Chiefs and spent the past two and half years with them, culminating in a club record 101 win season and their first World Championship Series victory since 1917.

OTHER NOTES

-The Toronto Wolves officially have a new owner as financier and investment magnate Bernie Millard has finalized a deal to purchase the FABL club from David J. Welcombe. League owners approved the sale last week and Millard becomes the third owner for Toronto in the past five years. Bert Thomas owned the club for 27 years until he was forced to sell it in 1929 after running into financial difficulties due to the Great Stock Market Crash. Welcombe assumed the reigns prior to the 1930

The Wolves are fresh off a 4th-place finish this season. They compiled a 77-77 mark in the Continental Association. Millard boasted to the press corps, "All my life, everything I've touched has turned to gold. I expect the Wolves to be the best baseball organization in the league and will work tirelessly toward that end."

This season was a marked improvement for the Wolves as they reached the .500 mark for the first time since coming within a game of the Continental Association pennant in 1927 when they compiled a 82-72 record. Toronto has not finished first in the CA since 1911. Here is the Wolves recent history during the time Welcombe owned the club. It is surprising that the 55 year old Toronto native would sell the team just as the club appears to be turning the corner.

- Apparently there is some second guessing going on in the Detroit Dynamos scouting office. Dynamos Scouting Director Fred Davis has been canvassing for the club to consider drafting high school first baseman Walt Messer instead of Narragansett College outfielder Sal Pestilli first overall. The move makes little sense as the Dynamos already have a highly touted young first baseman in Red Johnson, who was selected second overall last year and Messer, unlike Pestilli who is thought to be close to being big league ready, would certainly require some seasoning in the minors which would not sit well with Detroit Owner Eddie 'Big Money' Thompson. Thompson has put his GM on the hot seat and was a key factor in the club's decision to fire manager Tom Bray last week and replace him with Max Morris, who will act as a player-manager for the club. The expectation here is if Davis continues to push for Messer he will likely find himself joining Bray on the unemployment line as Thompson and his GM seem to be 100% settled on selecting the two-time Christian Trophy winning outfielder.

-The Chicago Chiefs have reportedly narrowed their search for a new manager down to three candidates. As mentioned above 66 year old James Gentry decided to retire as skipper after leading the Chiefs to a World Championship earlier this month. No word on who the candidates are yet, but the club is believed to have started the interviewing process and among those speculated to be under consideration is bench coach Joe Ward. The 47 year old Ward has ties to the Chiefs GM as he managed Montreal for 6 plus seasons while both were with the Saints. There is a good chance the Chiefs may go outside the organization which opens the possibility of Ossie Julious ending up in Chicago, however a source close to the teams rules out Julious as a candidate for the Chiefs job.

The 63 year old Julious, who recently surpassed George Theobald as the winningest manager in FABL history, is now a free agent after Baltimore elected not to renew his contract. Julious had spent the past 8 seasons as the Cannons bench boss and prior to that was with Toronto from 1906 until joining the Cannons for the 1928 season. My guess is Ossie will not go quietly into retirement and will be pounding the pavement looking for a new gig. If he is successful it may well be in AA or AAA and he will have to bide his time there until a big league club gets restless and fires their manager at some point next season. Julious had spent the past 31 seasons in a big league dugout but with the Chiefs not considering him that leaves only the Philadelphia Keystones as a possible destination.

Still in the middle of a complete rebuild but finally some positive signs are showing, the Baltimore Cannons have hired John Lawrence from Class C in Boston's system to take over to replace Julious next year. The 55 year old Lawrence spent a decade as the Cincinnati High School head coach in the old feeder league system before landing in Hattiesburg 3 years ago. He piloted the Top Hats to a Gulf States League title last year. It seems like quite a reach for the Cannons signing a manager who has no experience beyond class C and also never played in the major leagues but perhaps the former minor league pitcher is just a stopgap option to help the Cannons young arms develop.

The Philadelphia Keystones are also looking for a new manager after Ted Specter's contract was not renewed following a disappointing 64-90 season. Specter had been the Keystones manager for 3 seasons. One team that is definitely not on the search for a new manager is the Brooklyn Kings who this week signed Powell Slocum to a 4-year extension.

Code:

 
HIGHEST PAID MANAGERS
Dick Pozza	Montreal	$28,954
Jim Wilson	Cleveland	$10,000
Ed Ziehl	NY Gothams	 $9,384
Dan Andrew	Pittsburgh	 $9,356*
Bill Craigen	NY Stars	 $8,808
walt Bailey	Chi Cougars	 $8,214
Powell Slocum	Brooklyn	 $7,552*
Hank Leitke	Toronto		 $7,500

*recently signed extension

ayaghmour2 · 05-14-2021, 12:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jiggs McGee

Ross started and won in Game 1 of a series Philadelphia won in five games.

Not sure if this was a different year, but Ross started and won game 7 against his former team when the Keystones won in 1933

gstatman · 05-14-2021, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ayaghmour2

Not sure if this was a different year, but Ross started and won game 7 against his former team when the Keystones won in 1933

It was a different year. The Keystones won the title in 1927, Ross's first year in Philadelphia, and he went 1-1 in the Series (won game 1, lost game 4). Ross started the deciding seventh game in 1933 and won. Ross had three rings overall after winning it all with the Cougars in 1922.

Tiger Fan · 05-14-2021, 04:53 PM

I will alert the sports editor of The Philadelphia Record to print a retraction.

gstatman · 05-15-2021, 02:11 PM

You'll have to excuse the writers over at the Philly Record. It's the tabloid paper in town. The Philadelphia Inquisitor is the paper for the discerning reader!

Jiggs McGee · 05-15-2021, 09:26 PM

THIS WEEK IN FABL BASEBALL
DRAFT DAY!

This has traditionally been the most exciting day in Figment Baseball but the draft as we know will be changing going forward. To start with this will be the final off-season draft as FABL has decided to move it's annual player selection day to the middle of June, which fits better with the college and high school seasons finishing up right about that time. To accommodate this the lowest minor league level which is usually heavily stocked with the most recent draft picks, will delay the start of it's season until shortly after the draft is completed. The other big news is a major change to the format necessitated by the Mock Draft in the game. It has been determined and is clear to see in any solo testing that the mock draft is far too accurately predicting who has the best potential. That might work fine in a league with full ratings visible but it is a death knell to the enjoyment playing stats only brings the league members. As a result it has been determined a lottery system will determine the future destination of players ranked in the first two rounds of the mock draft and normal drafting will resume with round three. Ideally, the OOTP development team listens to our request to make the mock draft an option you could toggle on or off, similar to scouting or storylines.

So big changes ahead for the draft starting in June but let's not overlook all the excitement as the 1936 draft begins. The opening pick was well known as, despite some late wavering by some of their scouts, the Detroit Dynamos had long ago decided that Sal Pestilli would go number one. Pestilli, who's older brother Alf was a fourth round pick in 1934, won a pair of Christian Trophy's as the college baseball player of the year. That is a honour that has only been accomplished once before as Bill Moore was the player of the year in both 1931 and 1932. Moore will not become a teammate of Pestilli's however, as he was recently traded from Detroit to Cleveland in the deal that brought Max Morris and Leon Drake to the Dynamos.

Pestilli becomes the second player ever selected first overall by Detroit and like 1925 first overall pick Al Wheeler, he is an outfielder. Seven times in total an outfielder has gone first overall, but Pestilli is the first since Montreal took Cliff Moss in 1927.

As for Sal, Pestilli's .3801 is the highest career college batting average in history (including feeders). Pestilli also rankes 7th alltime in career hits by a college player with 260. The leader is Walt Mullen, who had 281 for Sadler between 1930-33. Pestilli's RBI total of 171 also puts him comfortably in the top ten. Here are the top 10 in career batting average, hits and rbi's.

There was not a flurry of draft day trades but some deals were made with the biggest one being the New York Gothams sending the fifth and 13th picks to Baltimore for the second overall selection. It had been long speculated that the Cannons were set to draft Maryland native Walt Messer with the pick but the rebuilding Cannons decided two later first round selections were preferable to the 2 time Adwell Trophy Award winner who grew up not far from Baltimore's Banner Field and attended many Cannons games as a child.

"It was a little disappointing," admitted Messer after hearing about the trade, "but it will be a thrill to try and one day play for such a successful franchise as the Gothams."

The move reportedly backfired slightly on the Cannons as they are said to have had their sights firmly set on California high school second baseman Billy Woytek but the Philadelphia Keystones snapped him up at #3 leaving the Cannons with a pair of outfielders for their two picks in Gates University centerfielder Al Jennings, who was ranked 4th in the mock draft, and Mike T. Taylor, a high school corner outfielder from University Military Academy in Mobile, Alabama.

Unlike each of the previous four years, when pitchers went number one, the first hurler of the 1936 draft did not hear his name called until the fourth selection when the New York Stars selected highly touted St Paul, Minnesota high school lefthander Johnnie Jones. In all, six pitchers were selected in the first round, along with 5 outfielders and five infielders. The biggest surprise of the opening round was Toronto's decision to draft third baseman Joe Kleinman out of Coastal New Jersey College with the 10th pick. Kleinman is an exceptional defender but there are concerns about whether he can hit enough as a pro to play regularly, which caused him to not appear in the mock draft.

Like the Gothams and Cannons, the Toronto Wolves had a pair of first round picks with their second one coming from a draft day trade with the Brooklyn Kings. The deal sent 20 year old minor league pitcher Jack Goff, who was 13-7 at Class A this season and ranked #80 on the top prospect lists to Brooklyn for the 16th and final pick of the opening round. The Kings had been after Goff ever since Toronto selected him in the second round of the 1934 draft. Goff is the son of former Kings pitcher and current bench coach Danny Goff. With the pick Toronto selected pitcher Jim Morrison, a 21 year old who was 8-4 for Indiana A&M this season. Morrison, who relies primarily on a sharp curve ball, has the makings of a future ace according to OSA.

Here is the first round of the 1936 draft.

OTHER NOTES

While the primary focus was squarely on the draft there is some non-draft news out of Detroit. The winningest manager in FABL history has landed a new job after his contract was not renewed by Baltimore. Ossie Julious, who has managed in more FABL games than anyone in history has found new employment sitting next to Dynamo player/manager Max Morris as the Dynamo’s new bench coach. Detroit World columnist Fast Freddie Farhat broke the news stating "the feeling was that Morris would benefit from the veteran Julious sitting next to him."

I can't imagine a better spot for the game's greatest power hitter to fine tune his managerial skills. Not only will he have Julious to lean on for advice, but also George Theobald. Theobald has won 8 pennants as a manager, more than anyone else in the game, and is second to Julious in both wins and total games managed. Theobald is not on the bench in Detroit, but is with the organization as a special advisor to the club and you can be sure that Morris will be bending his ear for some pointers.

Jiggs McGee · 05-18-2021, 11:33 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

December 9, 1936

POST-DRAFT EDITION

The last December draft in Figment baseball has been completed. The good news for those teams who did not feel as happy as they hoped with their haul this time around is they will get to do it all over again in six month as the league transitions to a June draft.

Here are some of my thoughts after observing the 1936 draft and then we will hear from some local newspapers on drafts for their individual clubs.

BEST DRAFT CLASS - Hands down it is the New York Gothams but when you consider it felt like they owned half the picks in the first 3 rounds they better have come away with a big haul. The Gothams might have gutted a championship club last summer but they used many of the proceeds from that fire sale to restock their cupboard. The biggest move of the draft was the Gothams trading the 5th and 13th picks of the first round to move up to number two and select high school phenom Walt Messer. Messer, who many feel could one day be as good as Keystone superstar Rankin Kellogg, was just one of 3 first round picks the Gothams ended up with. New York not only picked up the second best position player available but they also got the second best pitcher, at least according to the mock draft, when they landed 20 year old lefthander Bunny Edwards, who was 20-5 over 3 seasons at Red River State, with the 7th pick. Add in Fred Vargas and Ed Stoddard, a pair of corner outfielders both ranked in the top ten of the mock, and the Gothams draft was a homerun.

MOST QUESTIONABLE FIRST ROUND SELECTION- The Toronto Wolves left a lot of GM's asking their scouting directors if they missed something after Toronto grabbed third baseman Joe Kleinman 10th overall. Kleinman, who played at Coastal New Jersey College, was not listed in OSA's five round mock draft. He was very consistent over his three seasons of college ball with the Seahawks, hitting .303 over 165 games. He is an outstanding defensive third baseman who could possibly handle a shift to second or perhaps even shortstop, but the question is will he be consistent enough at the plate. The Wolves might know something the rest of the league doesn't but right now it feels like Kleinman was a big reach. Toronto did end up with a pair of first rounders after dealing minor leaguer Jack Goff to Brooklyn in exchange for the 16th overall selection. It was used on Jim Morrison, a high ceiling 21 year old lefthander who won 21 games the past 3 seasons for Indiana A&M. He is a groundball pitcher with 5 offerings including a terrific curve ball and OSA feels he has a golden arm and should be a top of the rotation pitcher.

TEAMMATES DRAFTED: The top pair of drafted college teammates this year were Jake Creel and Joe Zell, double-play partners from Ferguson College in Greenville, North Carolina. Each was listed as a first round prospect in the mock draft but only Creel, at 12 to Cleveland, was taken in the first. Zell was the 18th pick as Baltimore grabbed him with the second selection of round two. Zell started 181 games over three seasons and boasts a .277 batting average. He was ranked 11th in the mock draft, two spots ahead of Creel, who played two seasons for the Wildcats and hit .271. Ferguson has done a pretty good job producing middle infielders as shortstop Bill Smith was a fifth round pick of Montreal in 1934 and is coming off a decent season at Class B Mobile while last year Ferguson alum Larry Bartlett was taken by St Louis in the 15th round. The second baseman hit .311 this past season as a rookie pro at Class A Hartford.

Two high schools also had middle infield duo drafted. The Henry Snyder Tigers in Jersey City, New Jersey saw second baseman Ted Brown selected by Montreal in the third round while his doubleplay partner Lee Scott went one round later to the Chicago Cougars. Brown hit .547 with 4 homeruns 26 games as a senior and has committed to Chesapeake State while shortstop Scott hit .455 with 3 homers. Scott will go to Oklahoma City State if the Cougars do not convince him to turn pro. The Cougars also grabbed half of the Milligan College High School duo as they selected Eddie Curtis from the Memphis, Tennessee school in the 7th round. Milligan's Tommy Mickens went 15 picks earlier to the New York Stars. Curtis, a shortstop nicknamed 'Slick Eddie' , is a three year starter with a .503 batting average while second baseman Mickens also started for three seasons and has a .440 career high school batting average.

WHAT THE LOCAL REPORTS ARE SAYING:

Various comments on the draft courtesy of hometown news sources

NEW YORK GOTHAMS - New York is abuzz with the news they club drafted both the number 2 ranked hitter and second ranked pitcher this week. The Gothams obviously have a lot of new players in their system with all of the extra picks and they have high expectations for their early picks but they also hope the sheer volume of middle round picks will yield a few gems and make their minor league system much stronger. Getting both Messer and Edwards is huge. Plus Vargas and Stoddard were pretty highly thought of corner outfielders by the mock. The Gothams scouting team had the four them ranked 3, 5, 7, 10 on their draft board.

PHILADELPHIA KEYSTONES (excerpt from an interview with Keystones Scouting Director Harry Dunn as published in the Philadelphia Inquisitor)- The Keystones had a very high pick for the first time in a while and needed to hit on it. We have a propensity for adding pitchers to the organization, so Dunn was resisting the urge. The scouting team was very high on Bunny Edwards and the only available player above him on his list was Billy Woytek. Philadelphia had taken a second baseman first overall right before the human GM-era, Howie Shifflett, and the returns on that pick have been okay (not a home run, more of a double). I was a little reticent to use the pick on a second baseman, but he reportedly has the tools and my top prospect at second base, Marshall Strickland, took a slight step back, so he might not be a future stalwart for the Keystones that I thought he would be at that position. Austin Moore came on, but Woytek is a player that might eclipse both after his first minor league season.

Beyond Woytek, the Keystones were happy to nab Hank Beckman, as he was the last in the tier on my list. Hans Wright may be the first prospect to find himself in a post-Kellogg Keystones lineup. Frank Bennet is a player who can play all three outfield positions, as well as both corner infield spots.

The Keystones also dealt for Pete Asher from the Cougars for a 7th-rounder. Asher will put some pressure on Bob Cleveland at short and Shifflett and Cy Cox at second base in Spring Training. He'll definitely have an inside track on making the club, but the question is whether he will make the club at the expense of either Cleveland, Shifflett, Cox or Steve Summers.

No local picks in the first 9 picks, which the Keystones usually like to have at least one from the Delaware Valley.

BOSTON MINUTEMEN(from an article in the Boston Record) - Boston was picking from the 11th position for most of the draft. When you are in that spot you really have to play the wait and see game. A lot of guys that we coveted were simply taken before it was Boston's turn to select. Our first pick of the day was 3B Denny Andrews. Andrews, who was the 5th rated prospect on scout Johnny Robards list, and 7th on the OSA Mock List, fell all the way to Boston thanks to a run on pitchers. Andrews has shown hints of having the raw power that organizations covet out of a corner infield spot. If anyone remembers the Minutemen took Mack Sutton who also plays 3B with their first pick from last years draft. The organization does not let things like that bother them as competition breeds greatness and trade chips.

Without a second round pick the Minutemen sat pat until they picked twice in the 3rd round. Cal Howe is a college outfielder with a very high upside according to OSA. He doesn't have the raw power that Boston was looking for but he was great at getting on base in three college seasons. the second 3rd round pick was C Bob Artesan out of Midvale HS in Utah. The idea here is that Artesan can be paired with another 1st round pick from a year ago in Bill Van Ness (Boston's top prospect as of this writing) to form a formidable 1-2 punch behind the dish. 4th round selection Si "the Rock of Rochester" Crocker showcased one of the best power bats in all of the HS prospects available. If Crocker can hit for any average at all his power will make him a player of note in the Boston organization.

In rounds 5-8 Boston did their own run on starting arms. Generally speaking, Boston like to draft pitchers that have more than three pitches in their arsenal. However Boston had to deviate slightly from that plan based on some favorable scouting report for 6th round selection Joe Sargent who OSA feels can develop into a mid-rotation piece. Aside from Sargent, 5th round selection Johnny Coon, 7th round selection Tom Martin and 8th round choice Edsel Jones all feature a variety of offerings. Last season Boston was very good (or lucky) with all of their mid round pitching selections as the C level Hattiesburg staff dominated posting a team SP ERA of 2.54 and leading the Hatters to 103 victories on the season. The whole pitching staff will be promoted so replacements were needed. With the last two picks of the day Boston went with Jim Hill who could play 5 different positions giving whatever manager gets him some options and Jim Kline a slick fielding SS that will need the bat to develop if he is going to hang around for more than a year.

MONTREAL SAINTS (courtesy of the Montreal Star quotes from Saints scouting director Fred Rowe) - I love drafting in Figment- mainly because of the variance for folks based on scouts and not having those stars. Sure, there is a good deal of similarity in that who did not have Pestilli #1 or at lest top 3 and a few others at the top, but then from there it gets interesting fast. For instance, at 8 in the draft, Montréal was able to draft our scout's picks 10, 12, 16, 20, and 24 and we are real happy with Doyle in the first round.

Doyle would be pitcher Wally Doyle, who was the fourth pitcher selected in the draft at 8th overall. The 18 year old lefthander was 9-1 for Waco High School in Texas this season and his 29 career high school wins ties him for the fifth most all-time. OSA feels Doyle could easily front a team's rotation and he has great raw stuff but needs work on his command.

CHICAGO CHIEFS- (from the Chicago Daily News) With no first round pick due to the trade that brought Rabbit Day and a World Championship to Whitney Park the Chiefs primary focus was collecting a bunch of high school arms with their mid-round selections. The organization likes to lean towards ground ball pitchers and they added Bob Ferraiuolo (round 3), Jim Fitts (round 7), George Scruggs (round 8), Nelson Bailey (round 9) and Jim Taylor (round 10). The 3rd rounder, Ferraiuolo is a sidearm pitcher out of Grafton University but like the others specializes in ground balls. Bailey is a local kid who was 8-3 for Lake Zurich in his only season of high school ball.

BROOKLYN KINGS(press release from Kings Scouting Director John Spears)- We feel trading our first round pick for Jack Goff was a nice safe option. The son of former Kings pitching legend and current bench coach Danny Goff, Jack is just 20 years old and has two injury free minor league seasons under his belt as a top 100 prospect. We might have got a higher ceiling guy such as Jim Morrison that Toronto took with the pick had we kept it, but that comes with perhaps more risk as well. Not picking until the 5th round doesn’t give us much to choose from so we gambled on Manny Franco maybe putting things together at one point and reclaiming the ability that earned him High school All American status as a junior before regressing this past season. Franco is also a local kid, having pitched for Old Westbury High on Long Island. Other than that we obviously didn’t get much. Maybe Roger Landry’s cousin develops and hopefully the curse is lifted with our selection of Ferdinand Hawkins grandson Ian Weber in the 9th round.

OTHER NOTES

CHIEFS FIND THEIR MAN

The Chicago Chiefs have announced that bench coach Joe Ward has been named as the new manager, with Dolph Geis being added as the bench coach. Prior to being brought in as the bench coach in Chicago last season, Ward had spent 7 seasons as the manager in Montreal, compiling a 481-532 record. Geis--a former Pittsburgh outfielder--spent 1936 managing Salem in the COW League. The job with the World Champions became open when 66 year old James Gentry decided to retire as skipper and go out as a winner.

Rumour has it Ward was not their first choice as the Chiefs had unsuccessfully tried to lure coaches from several other organizations but, surprisingly, none jumped at the opportunity to take over a championship team. One of those said to be under consideration was Brooklyn Kings pitching coach Bill Libby, but he reportedly turned down the offer because he had recently signed a 3 year extension with the Kings.

Jiggs McGee · 05-24-2021, 02:56 PM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

March 8, 1937

HALL OF FAME ANNOUNCES ORIGINAL INDUCTEES

While everyone might have a personal favourite or two they believe warrant inclusion it is hard to dispute the case for any of the five who will comprise the first class. Here is a look at each of them.

ALLAN ALLEN (1890-1909 Cougars, Toronto, Cleveland)
Double Al is the greatest pitcher of all-time, so good that the trophy awarded to the top pitcher in each circuit every season is named after him. Had the award been around when he was a player Allen may well have won over a dozen of them. He won a record 514 games in his career and is the all-time leader in a number of categories including games and innings pitched.

MAX MORRIS 1914-present Cleveland, St Louis, Gothams, Detroit
Might Mo revolutionized the game and to his credit he is the only active player inducted in to the Hall. He is best known for his power, as his 702 homeruns and counting are 259 more than the second player on the list. Morris is also one of only three players (fellow 1937 HOF class members Powell Slocum and John Dibblee are the others) to surpass the 3,500 hit plateau. He owns a record 8 Whitney Awards as the league's top hitter and now, after an off-season trade to Detroit, will try his hand at managing while also finishing out his playing career with the Dynamos.

CHARLIE SIS 1903-1921 St Louis, Toronto

Only Double Al won more than the 395 victories Sis posted over his stellar career. He is the all-time leader in career strikeouts and one of just 2 pitchers to top the 3,000 mark. Sis' 94 shutouts are also a FABL record

POWELL SLOCUM 1905-1925 Baltimore, Brooklyn

The career batting average and hits leader won 15 batting titles and 4 Whitney Awards in his career. His .435 average in 1913 is the highest single season total in FABL history and he has more career singles (3194) than all but 7 players have hits in their career. He has had two stints as a manager with Brooklyn and led the Kings to the Continental Association pennant this past season.

JOHN WAGGONER 1897-1914 Stars, Gothams

His 194.4 is the highest career WAR in FABL history and Waggoner is 7th all-time with 3,207 hits. He never won a batting title or led his association in a triple crown category but he led in doubles 4 times, stolen bases twice and triples once and was a key member of 3 World Championship New York Stars teams in the first decade of this century.

SO WHO IS NEXT?

The Hall has confirmed that 4 players will be added next season as well as a manager and a builder. The builder will quite clearly be league founder William Whitney but the names of the other inductees will cause some speculation. This reporter expects the manager will be George Theobald, who led Boston and Detroit to a total of 8 Federal Association pennants and 4 World Championship Series victories. The other possible candidate is Ossie Julious, who recently passed Theobald to become the all-time leader in games managed and career victories. Julious won his only World Championship with Toronto in 1911 on a team that featured Hall of Famer Charlie Sis. He also managed Baltimore before leaving the Cannons this season to take a job as the bench coach (with Hall of Famer Max Morris as a first year manager) in Detroit. Theobald is also a part of the Dynamos organization as a consultant to owner Eddie "Big Money" Thompson.

The players under consideration for the second group of inductees are said to Ed Ziehl, John Dibblee, Jack Arabian, Zebulon Banks, Woody Trease, Mike Marner, Calvin Kidd and Joe Ward. The expectation is the voting will be open to members of the media beginning with the class prior to the 1939 season.

LordTC · 05-24-2021, 03:22 PM

Really enjoyed this. Thanks for putting the work in.

Jiggs McGee · 05-25-2021, 01:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LordTC

Really enjoyed this. Thanks for putting the work in.

Thank you for following along.

Jiggs McGee · 05-25-2021, 02:01 AM

THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL

Spring Training 1937

The Figment Sporting Journal printing press is battling with a hard drive issue and the periodical is forced to rely on an outdated laptop system but we are on the eve of spring training so we should take a look at each team and it's top prospects to watch. First up is the Federal Association.

CHICAGO CHIEFS

1936 finish 1st (101-53) and World Championship Series winners
Everything went right a year ago for the Chiefs as they established a franchise record for victories and won their first World Championship Series since 1917. The Chiefs are expected to make no key changes, at least to start the season, so the question is whether or not Rabbit Day and Al Miller have enough magic to carry the team to a second straight title.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: Pitcher Bob Walls. 1932 first round pick is now 25 but made his big league debut last season and was 14-12 3.44 in his second season at the AAA level.

PITTSBURGH MINERS

1936 finish 2nd (93-61)
The Miners made the biggest news over the winter, at least in terms of big league additions, by the decision to trade for outfielder Mahlon Strong. Strong hit .345 with 26 homers for the New York Gothams last year despite missing a month with a neck injury. Even without Strong the Miners led the Federal Association in runs per game a year ago so the big question For Miners fans is will his addition be enough to propel Pittsburgh to it's first pennant since 1924?
There are some concerns about Lefty Allen, who went 17-11 in his first full season in the majors last year. Word is some in the Miners scouting department are worried Allen may have lost a little over the winter after a late season arm injury.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: Lew Seals, a 23 year old out of Bluegrass State who was taken 7th overall in 1934 is the Miners top prospect but he is a natural corner outfielder and his path is blocked by Strong and Joe Owens. However, Seals has been playing some centerfield in the minors but the guess is he will need a season or two more in the minors before he is ready for a big league test. Seals hit just .264 in A ball this past season.

BOSTON MINUTEMEN

1936 finish 3rd (82-72)
The Minutemen had high hopes entering the 1936 season but they were quickly derailed by several injuries to key young talent. One of those was Dick Higgins who, at age 23, was enjoying a very strong start to the season before blowing out his elbow. The bad news for Boston is Higgins, who went down in mid-June last season, will miss camp and is not expected to be ready to return until at least June. The good news is 23 year old first baseman Bob Donoghue has been cleared to return to action and all eyes will be on "Mr. Clout" to see if he is fully recovered from the foot injury that cost him most of last season. Prior to the injury Donoghue was hitting .358 with 5 homers through the first 17 games of the season.
PROSPECT TO WATCH- SS Lew McClendon. The Minutemen need an upgrade on John Wood at shortstop and the 20 year old McClendon may be ready this year. Originally a 2nd round pick of Pittsburgh in 1934 out of Nicholls High School in New Orleans, McClendon spent most of last season at AA but a good camp might allow him to start the season in Boston.

ST LOUIS PIONEERS

1936 finish 4th (80-74)
The Pioneers seem loaded with talent led by Sam Sheppard (20-13) and David Abalo (17-10) on the mound and infielders Frank McCormick (.351,16,109) and Freddie Jones (.354,3,64). Certainly the multiple injuries to Jones last season were a big reason the Pioneers went from back to back second place finishes to the middle of the pack. There is more talent coming this season as a pair of top ten prospects in Al Tucker and Heinie Zimmer seem set to make their big league debuts.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: Tucker and Zimmer. Tucker is a 24 year old outfielder who missed a month last season with hamstring troubles but still hit .303 for AAA Oakland. Zimmer is a 22 year old catcher who came to St Louis from Montreal along with Tucker in the deal that sent Tom Bird to the Saints. Tucker, originally a second round pick of the Gothams out of Nashville High School in 1932, made the big jump all the way from Class B to AAA a year ago and hit .341 for Oakland. It may be tricky finding each of them a place to play as Tucker will have to try and wrestle a spot from either Art Cascone (.274,7,85) or Alex Ingraham (.285,13,97) while Zimmer must contend with starting catcher Jack Flint (.322,2,63)

WASHINGTON EAGLES

1936 finish 5th (72-82)
It is clear where Washington needs to improve. Only Pittsburgh scored more than the 6.1 runs per game the Eagles amassed last season but nobody in the Fed allowed more runs that the Eagles conceded. With a full season of Moxie Pidgeon, who was part of the Gothams fire sale, along with the likes of Andy Carter, Sam Brown, Harry Shumate, Mel Carroll, Jim Beard and hopefully a healthy Wally Flowers offense will once again not be a problem in the nation's capital. On the mound the Eagles need 28 year old Bill Anderson (22-14) to prove his first season since coming over from Toronto was not a fluke. 29 year old Karl Johnson (18-16) also had a strong year winning a career high number of games but beyond those two there are some concerns.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: At 26 he is a little old to be considered a prospect but 1932 5th overall draft pick George Gilliard looked good in 3 big league outings last season. Unfortunately they were sandwiched around a pair of injuries that cost the former Henry Hudson Explorer over 3 months of the season. Maybe Gilliard will be the additional starting pitcher they need or perhaps it might be 1934 first overall pick Bobo White, despite the fact the former St Blane College star looked overmatched in AAA a year ago, or 1933 second round pick Ike Keller, who received a taste of big league life in 8 appearances out of the Eagles pen a year ago, might be the answer. Whoever it is, the Eagles will need someone to step up if they are going to take the next step as a franchise and contend for a pennant in 1936.

NEW YORK GOTHAMS

1936 finish 6th (69-85)
The Gothams fall from a championship team to the second division was self-orchestrated with a mass trade-off of talent in June that culminated with the decision to ship slugger Mahlon Strong to Pittsburgh immediately after the season. Most of the big names are gone but the Gothams are suddenly loaded with minor league talent led by high school sensation Walt Messer, who was drafted second overall in December. Messer is a long ways away from being ready for the Bright Lights of New York, just as the Gothams are a ways away from contention but it will be interesting to watch their rebuilding process.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: There will be plenty of them in the low minors including Messer but of those closer to the big leagues Howard Brown Jr and Billy Dalton are worth keeping an eye on. Brown Jr made his Gotham debut last season and will likely be given every opportunity to be a starter in the New York outfield. He was acquired from Boston in the deal that sent catcher John Wicklund to the Minutemen after being a 1934 third round pick out of Ohio Poly. Dalton is a 22 year old third baseman who came over from the Chicago Chiefs in the Rabbit Day deal. The 1935 10th overall draft pick out of Perry State College spent most of the season in Class A last year. He has loads of potential but his path is presently blocked by Johnny McDowell.

PHILADELPHIA KEYSTONES

1936 finish 7th (64-90)
Any team with Bobby Barrell, Rankin Kellogg and Rip Cirry should not finish seventh but the Kellogg had a terrible start last season and the Keystones never could get untracked despite a career year from Barrell (.353,53,162). Barrell is just 26 and it's scary to think he is just reaching his prime. Kellogg will be 34 this season but if his second half last season is any indication he will continue to be a force. The big concern in Philadelphia remains pitching. Ed Baker is a solid front to the rotation but Art Myers and Frank Crawford each had down years a season ago. The Keystones desperately need 24 year old George M Brooks, who was 8-9 with a 5.48 era as a rookie last year, to have a break out season or someone like AAA pitchers Gene White or Jim Whiteley to emerge, otherwise they will have a tough time keeping up with the elite club's in the Fed.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: White and/or Whiteley need to come up big at camp in order to give the Keystones another dependable starter. Lloyd Stevens is possibly the best of the Philadelphia pitching prospects but the 21 year old, who was taken in the third round of the 1934 draft out of Suffolk High School in Virginia, has yet to pitch above Class B. He is quite a story as he was a third baseman in high school ball but converted to a pitcher by the Keystones in 1935.

DETROIT DYNAMOS

1936 finish 8th (55-99)
Things are looking up in Detroit and there certainly is a buzz in the city after the Dynamos made a couple of big off-season moves. The most notable was trading for home run king Max Morris and installing him in the manager's seat as well as on the field. What can't be overlooked is Detroit also acquired Leon Drake who was a 20-20-20 guy in Cleveland a year ago with 20 doubles, 21 triples and 21 homers for the Foresters. Despite all of the excitement around the pair of former Foresters the most anticipated debut in Detroit may well be that of Sal Pestilli. The first overall draft pick, winner of 2 Christian Trophy's as College Baseball's Player of the Year, will be bidding to become the first draftee to go straight from the campus to the big leagues since Freddie Jones did it in 1932. The Dynamos are saying all the right things at the moment such as "Pestilli will start in AAA Newark unless he proves he belongs in the big leagues with a strong spring," but you have to believe the Detroit management team will be under a lot of heat from owner Eddie Thompson to have Pestilli in the opening day lineup.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: Obviously Pestilli is the big one but pitchers Ray McCarthy and Jack Wood should also get plenty of attention in the spring. McCarthy, who was acquired from independent El Paso of the Lone Star League a year ago, was expected to be in Detroit for most of last season but he blew out his arm in his AAA debut and missed the rest of the year. Early indications are he is fully recovered from the injury. The 24 year old Wood did make his Detroit debut last season, going 3-4 after starting the year in Newark. He was originally a 3rd round pick of Brooklyn out of Henry Hudson University before coming to Detroit in trade that sent Al Wheeler and Frank Vance to the Kings.

CONTINENTAL ASSOCIATION SPRING PREVIEW

BROOKLYN KINGS

1936 finish 1st (98-56)
After a pair of second place finishes the Kings finally got over one hump last season and claimed their first pennant since 1927 but were then swept by the Chicago Chiefs in the World Championship Series. Brooklyn is loaded with talent and there will be very few changes, if any, from last seasons pennant winner. The only focus in spring will be on keeping everyone healthy.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: While everyone will be focused on Sal Pestilli in Detroit, his older brother Alf rose quickly through the Kings system and will be making a bid to crack the 23 man roster. Pestilli hit 43 homers as a rookie pro in Class C in 1935 and followed that up by hitting .320 with 18 homers between stops in A, AA and AAA last year.

PHILADELPHIA SAILORS

1936 finish 2nd (95-59)
The Sailors are back. After winning 3 straight pennants and a pair of World Championships between 1928-30 the club took a slight step back the first half of this decade but they exploded into the race with a 95 win season last year after back to back 78-76 campaigns. The Sailors have a lot of young talent close to major league ready and a pair of established stars in Jack Cleaves and John Kincaid. The Sailors always seem to find a breakout pitcher or two and last year it was Merritt Thomas, a 28 year old who doubled his previous career high by winning 20 games and being a perfect compliment to the always dependable William Jones atop the Philadelphia rotation. A lot went right for the Sailors last season with Bobby Bond, Lou Williams and Dick Walker all enjoying seasons above their career norms but the Sailors look like a team that will contend again this season.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: The Sailors have a bunch of infielders on the verge of making their mark in FABL led by Rip Lee, Bob Smith, Gil London and Marion Boismenu. Any one of them might be the Sailors breakout star this year but judging by their history it will likely be a pitcher no one expected to have such an impact.

CLEVELAND FORESTERS

1936 finish 3rd (91-63)
The Foresters may have angered some of their fan base by parting ways with Hall of Fame slugger Max Morris for the second time in team history but the move made sense as they acquired first baseman Bill Moore from Detroit in return. Moore, who was named the greatest college baseball player of the first quarter century of the sport a few years back, looks to be finally living up to his potential after hitting .327 as a rookie with the Dynamos. Most of the stars that led Cleveland to back to back pennants in 1934-35 return including Charlie Berry, T.R. Goins, Dan Fowler and George Dawson. It will be interesting to see if 32 year old Lyman Weigal can duplicate the success he had last year when he won 15 games just 2 years after being waived twice.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: He looks like a good one but the Foresters may have a tough time finding a spot for Hank Stratton to play, at least in the near future. The 22 year old third baseman was acquired from the Chicago Cougars in a draft day deal and he is expected to eventually be the replacement for 38 year old Charlie Barry, but Barry is coming off a season in which hit hit a career best .368 and won his first batting title. Stratton hit .353 in AA last season and you have to think if he has a great camp it will be difficult for the Foresters to send him to AAA Cincinnati.

TORONTO WOLVES

1936 finish 4th (77-77)
It's a long ways down from the big three in the CA to fourth place and that might still be the case this year but there is a lot to like about the Toronto Wolves future. It has been an awful long time since a 'lot to like' and 'Toronto Wolves' have appeared in the same sentence as this club has not finished above .500 since 1927. However there is a lot of young talent led by 1933 first overall draft pick Joe Hancock, who won 15 games as a 23 year old rookie last season. Another former first rounder in 27 year old Chuck Cole won 21 games and give Toronto it's first pair of decent starters since perhaps Charlie Sis and Jack Long in the late teens. Now, neither Hancock or Cole will be confused for the Hall of Famer Sis, but both are very solid pitchers and there is more on the way. Buddy Long, a 7th round pick out of Syracuse High School in 1932, has looked very good in the past two seasons at AA and AAA. Long may just break camp with the big club this season and some scouts feel he is a future ace. Further down the pipeline are 1935 third overall pick George Garrison and this season's 16th overall Jim Morrison. Those three combine with Hancock to give Toronto a prospect list of pitchers that rivals that of Baltimore.
PROSPECT TO WATCH- We focused on the pitchers already so let's talk about centerfielder Levi Redding. The 26 year old hit .319 in a small sample of big league games last summer and looks like an ideal leadoff man after hitting .316 with 28 stolen bases in AAA Buffalo.

MONTREAL SAINTS

1936 finish 5th (75-79)
The Saints have some talent led by dependable 27 year old third baseman Hank Barnett, doubles machine Vic Crawford and young catcher Adam Mullins but the fear is they may be trapped in the middle of the pack, both now and in the future. Montreal does not have the horses to compete with the big three in the CA right now and the thinking is they lack the wealth of prospects that the Cougars, Toronto and Baltimore possess for the future. There may well be a changing of the guard in a few seasons when the pitching of the Cougars, Toronto and Baltimore lifts them into contention just as age slows down Cleveland and Brooklyn. Montreal does not seem to possess the same wealth of prospects so there is a good chance the Saints, while never a bad team will also not become a great team either.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: Montreal's best prospects, especially those that are close to the big leagues, are outfielders. Ideally 23 year old Red Bond is healthy all season and he can play everyday in right field. Bond hit .362 in 83 games last season but the 1931 second round pick out of Toledo High School missed nearly 3 months with a variety of injuries. A healthy Bond and a full season for 1934 first round pick Adam Mullins, who missed the final two months of the season with a broken hand, will go a long ways towards helping the Saints creep a little closer to the elite clubs in the CA this season.

CHICAGO COUGARS

1936 finish 6th (63-91)
Cougars owner Ben Hunter has put a lot of pressure on his management team with the expectation his club will win the pennant this season. That unfortunately for Chicago fans seems completely unrealistic but fear not as multiple titles might not be that far away for the club with the richest collection of minor league depth in either league. There is a lot of talent on the big club as well, but likely not enough to contend this year. Chicago did add veteran righthander Oscar Morse as a waiver pickup from the Philadelphia Sailors and he is expected to join Dave Rankin and Milt Fritz in the rotation. First baseman Ray Ford and outfielder Leo Mitchell were two of the prospects who debuted last season and there are a lot more on the way.
PROSPECTS TO WATCH: There are a lot with shortstop Billy Hunter possibly the closest. Hunter, the Cougars first rounder in 1932 out of Cincinnati High School, spent most of last season in AA and is said to be ready for the big leagues. He may have to shift to second base to start his career with Ollie Page likely returning as the Cougars everyday shortstop. There are a number of other prospects who may spend some time in Chicago this season including catcher Harry Mead, centerfielder Carlos Montes and pitchers Harry Parker, Karl Wallace, Pug Bryan and Joe Foote.

NEW YORK STARS

1936 finish 7th (62-92)
The Stars 1936 season was their lowest win total since 1919 and their two straight second division finishes the past two seasons (they were 5th in 1935) is the first time that has happened to New York since 1920-21. Their pitching was middle of the pack last season but only Baltimore scored less runs in the CA than New York did. The Stars are also a fairly old team with 6 of their 8 starters from last season at least 30 years old and the other two were 29 and 28 respectively. The pitching staff was a little younger but it is clear the Stars have hit a time when they need to retool.
PROSPECT TO WATCH: 26 year old outfielder Art McMahon has oozed potential since being selected 8th overall out of Waco High School in 1930 and he has had a pretty good combination of batting average and speed throughout his minor league career but never got a chance in the New York outfield until a brief stint last season. He struggled in an 11 game audition but perhaps this is the year he finally breaks out.

BALTIMORE CANNONS

1936 finish 8th (55-99)
It has been an awful decade so far for the Cannons, who have gone 310-460 (.402) since the start of the 1932 season and played just .387 ball the past four seasons. Three straight last place finishes have given the Cannons plenty of high draft picks and they started to pay off last season with the debut of pitchers Gus Goulding and John Edwards. The offense remains a major concern and there will be a ton of pressure on Goulding and Edwards every time they take the mound. This team is bad and there is no way to deny it. However, the future might finally be starting to arrive so things may get much brighter in a hurry. However, that won't happen this year.
PROSPECTS TO WATCH: Edwards was 2-2 with a 1.80 era as a September call-up while Goulding was a perfect 8-0 since his promotion. The question is are the two former first round picks for real and if so just how good will this rotation become once Rufus Barrell II joins them?

04-22-2021, 10:17 PM	#141
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	July 13, 1936 Ten Things I Think TEN THINGS I THINK WITH JIGGS MCGEE 1- Let's start this edition of 10 Things I Think off with some credit to the Continental Association as they finally beat the stars of the Fed in an All-Star Game after losing the first 3 contests. The final score was 6-4 in favour of the Continental Stars as Philadelphia Sailors first baseman Dick Walker captured the MVP award primarily on the strength of his 2-run double in the top of the first inning that staked the visitors to an early lead, one which they would not relinquish. Brooklyn Kings Harry Barrell and Al Wheeler also had a pair of hits for the winners while Bobby Barrell of the Philadelphia Keystones and newly acquired Washington Eagle Moxie Pidgeon each had a pair of hits for the Federal Association. Another Barrell boy, Brooklyn's Tom took the win while Federal starter Rabbit Day, who like Pidgeon was recently dealt from the defending champion Gothams and now is a Chicago Chief, took the loss. One thing is for sure, the now 4 year old all-star contest is here to stay after a sold out crowd of 47,590 packed Pioneer Stadium to watch the game- said to be the biggest crowd ever to witness a contest in St Louis. 2- Speaking of Day and Pidgeon, both were part of the massive sell-off the New York Gothams undertook over the weekend. The Gothams, who have won the last two Federal Association pennants and 4 in the last 6 years, decided to pack it in this season as they sat two games under .500 and 11 behind the front-running Pittsburgh Miners. New York had a similar collapse in 1932 when they sank to last place after a pair of pennants. They likely won't drop that far this year but they did guarantee themselves a pretty decent draft pick as well as adding some fine prospects in return for the players they moved away. Word is the dealing may not be done as Mahlon Strong (.346,17,58) is on the block. They did find a taker in Washington for fellow corner outfielder Moxie Pidgeon but moving Strong, at least for the price the Gothams likely will demand for him, seems like a tough proposition. There is not a lot of demand for corner outfielders to begin with because of a large surplus in the league, and Detroit has a poor man's version of Strong available in Henry Jones. Barring an injury before the deadline most of the contenders seem like they already have pretty good options in place. In the CA the Sailors have Lou Williams (.351,1,33) and Bobby Bond (.366,5,37) in the outfield and the previously mentioned all-star game MVP in Dick Walker (.346,8,58) patrolling first base. I suppose they could make room by shifting Williams to centerfield but I am not sure the Sailors want to pay the price it would cost to add Strong. Brooklyn likely has no room to add Strong to an already crowded outfield so that leaves the Foresters as the only CA contender possibly interested. 3- Cleveland is an interesting possibility now that Max Morris is done pretty much for the rest of the year. Strong could play first base unless Charlie Berry gets shifted there from third. In the Fed I think Pittsburgh and St Louis both might have some interest but you likely have to rule the Chicago Chiefs out because they spent a lot of prospect/draft capital in acquiring Rabbit Day and Pete Layton recently. So the potential suitors for Mahlon Strong are likely only Cleveland, Pittsburgh and St Louis but if one of them does pull the trigger there is a good chance they will look at the older, but much less expensive Henry Jones (.330,9,39), who is having himself a pretty good season with little support in Detroit. 4- Mark my words. Sal Pestilli will be a star in this league, and if given the chance old Jiggs is predicting right here, right now the kid hits at least .300 in the big leagues next season. He is a rare talent and one FABL scouting director confided in me that with his talents "the light of Pestilli's star could be blinding." Pestilli was just the second two-time winner of the Christian Trophy, presented to college baseball's top player, and if everything breaks right he looks like he can win at least that many Whitney Awards before his career is done. 5- In all the Pestilli talk, don't sleep on high school sensation Walt Messer. A 3-time High School All-American who averaged more homers per season than last year's number one pick Red Johnson plus he hit .586 this season and, despite that being the 5th best single season high school batting average ever recorded, it was the worst total of his career. Messer is the only high school player to hit over .600 in a season and he did it twice. Messer hit 38 homers in 72 career high school games while Red Johnson smacked 21 in 41 games. It will be interesting to compare the careers of the two of them going forward. Johnson, by the way, is struggling a bit at Class B after starting the season with 5 homers and a .367 average in 10 games of C ball but he is young and will come around. 6- What are the odds Pestilli and Messer do not go 1-2? Judging by recent history pretty good as teams, especially those in the top five, have a habit of grabbing pitchers but perhaps they shouldn't, at least not this year with a bunch of great position player prospects sitting just below Pestilli and Messer. 7- Since 1932 a total of 11 pitchers have been selected in the top 4 picks, so 11 out of 16 top four selections have been pitchers. Of those 11, four of them :Rufus Barrell II, Dick Higgins, Curly Jones and Lefty Allen have already suffered a serious injury costing them at least 4 months on the sidelines and a fifth, Al Miller has missed a month with an injury. Curly Jones, a first overall pick just 4 years ago, was recently traded for a late second round selection and two mid-level prospects. His stock has clearly dropped. There are worries Higgins and Barrell may see their future potential greatly decreased because of arm troubles. Yes Lefty Allen seems to have emerged unscathed from his injury and Al Miller appears positioned for a bright future with the Chiefs but what about Jones, Hancock and Barrell. What does the future hold for them? And that brings up the question of whether teams should be gambling a top four pick, and the potential future of their franchises on a pitcher when injuries are so prevalent? If Barrell doesn't fully recover from his injury how much will that set an already struggling franchise like Baltimore back? There is talk again this year about pitchers like Johnnie Jones or Bunny Edwards creeping into the top five of the draft when the mock drafts and scouting reports clearly indicate they don't warrant inclusion if everything was equal. Gambling on an arm at the top of the draft seems an awful lot more risky than taking a position player and this year with guys like Pestilli and Messer it seems taking a pitcher ahead of them is chasing fool's gold, especially when most team's picking that high in the draft are in pretty bad shape. 8- Further to injuries being suffered by young pitchers. I believe the death of the feeder league system should change how FABL teams look at pitching. You used to have 3 seasons of stats in feeder games to look at pitchers and that could help determine just how durable a pitcher might or might not be. With draft class generation that is no longer the case. Have you seen a draft pool player's history ever mention an injury? So never mind the absence of defensive stats, the absence of missing injury information might be the biggest thing FABL GM's have to do without when it comes to no feeders. 9- Can things get any worse in Baltimore for the Cannons? They are well on their way to a third straight last place finish, and distantly last, not just a few games out of fourth. In 1930 and 1931 the Cannons had back to back second place finishes but dropped to 6th place in '32 prompting a massive sell-off including moving the games best pitcher Rabbit Day (perhaps the Gothams might take note of this) and the result was a 65 win season in 1933. In 1934 they were 44 games out with a 54-100 season and last year their 65 win campaign left them 31 games behind front-running Cleveland. Now we are in 1936 and the Cannons are historically bad, with a 24-60 record at the all-star break and on pace for not only the worst season in franchise history (1934 also established a low water mark for the club) but if their winning percentage holds it will be the worst season in Continental Association history. You have to go back to the 1883 Baltimore Bannermen of the old Century League to find a worse season. Code: WORST WINNING PERCENTAGES IN CA HISTORY YEAR TEAM PCT 1936* Baltimore Cannons .286 1903 Montreal Saints .288 1911 Philadelphia Sailors .299 1932 Toronto Wolves .318 projected 10-* Yes injuries have decimated an already weak Cannons roster this year and yes there are supposed to be some outstanding pitching prospects on the way up but truth be told the Cannons minor league system, aside from their AAA club, is also struggling terribly. The Cannons system is ranked number one in the league for prospects with 11 players in the top 100 at the moment but I feel there are some concerns about three of their big four pitchers. The biggest one has already been discussed. Will the shoulder injury suffered by last year's number one overall pick Rufus Barrell II have any long term effects? Rusty Petrick and John Edwards are ranked as the third and fourth best pitching prospects in the league behind only Barrell and Toronto Wolves outstanding rookie Joe Hancock, but I have concerns about the two 20 year old's. They are both with AA Erie, and are each struggling this season. Petrick is 6-11 with a 5.94 era while Edwards is 6-7 with a 5.58 era. They are both young, especially for the AA level and the team is very bad so my fears might be misguided but one look at each of them and you can see how frustrated they both are with the losing atmosphere permeating the Erie clubhouse. Will that have any effect on their long-term development? The fourth big arm is 23 year old Gus Goulding, the second overall pick in 1934. He was at Erie but was recently moved up to AAA Indianapolis and is pitching well for the Hoosiers, who are the only successful Baltimore farm team this season as they are challenging for the Century League pennant. If all four continue to progress and come close to the great potential seen for them when each was drafted the Cannons will emerge from the other side of this mess in great shape, and as a team to beat. The downside is, at least right now, there seem to be a number of obstacles standing in the way of that happening. In the meantime with the likely second overall pick the Cannons stand to draft a very talented bat this December. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-05-2021, 03:11 PM	#142
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	September 14, 1936 THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL Monday September 14, 1936 This is the debut of which will hopefully be a regular column in the The Figment Sporting Journal. Figment baseball sims one week of game day five days a week (Monday-Friday) so the hope is I can find time to update you daily on the key happenings in the greatest baseball league in the world. 700 FOR MIGHTY MO! The biggest news this week comes out of Montreal as Max Morris reached the 700 homerun plateau. The 41 year old Morris, who has won 8 Whitney Awards as MVP, 4 in each league, went down in July with an elbow injury that some feared might end his pursuit of 700 homeruns two shy but Morris returned to the lineup on August 31st and belted homer 699 three days later. Once he got his 700th in Montreal on Wednesday, Might Mo wasted little time adding to his total by smacking another one on Thursday. How dominant is Morris as a home run hitter? Number two on the all-time list is Rankin Kellogg of the Philadelphia Keystones, who sits 260 homers behind Morris. Brooklyn's Al Wheeler recently surpassed former Saints and Keystones great Hal Eason to move into third all-time but Wheeler has just 274 career homers. Here is a trivia question I am still trying to figure out the answer to. Prior to Max Morris becoming the homerun king who was the all time leader? I am thinking Morris took over the lead late in the 1921 season which he finished with 126 homers. That would be enough for him to surpass Martin Thomas, who hit 124 between 1886-1904. But looking closer I think the answer could also be Paul Tattersall who also finished 1921 with 126 round-trippers which tied him with Morris at 2 ahead of Martin Thomas. Obviously Morris took off from there but without a league file and box scores from that season we will never know if Tattersall or Morris was the one to first surpass Thomas for the career HR lead or if Tattersall was ahead of Morris at any point early in the 1922 campaign in which Morris hit a single season record 59 while Tattersall belted 36 for Brooklyn. We do know when Morris hit his then single season record 53 in 1921 the mark he broke was co-held by Tattersall and himself as each swatted 26 in 1920. The previous mark was 23 established by Ed Kurwood of the Keystones in 1917. PUTTING THE BARRELL ON THE LONGBALL Speaking of homeruns Bobby Barrell hit 3 more homers last week. Barrell has hit 6 homers in the first two weeks of September to give him 52 on the season. Imagine what he could have done with some support in the Philadelphia lineup but his fellow Keystone Kruncher Rankin Kellogg had a terrible slump to start the season, although Kellogg has been red-hot of late and the 33 year old first baseman hit 10 homers in the past 18 games to raise his season total to 34. GETTING YOUR MASTERS Looks like Joe Masters, who led the Chiefs to the 1928 FA pennant is back with Whitney Nine strictly to impart wisdom and provide moral support. Re-signed by the Chiefs in August after being cut by Detroit, Masters has yet to appear in a game for Chicago. Being groomed for a future coaching role perhaps but it would be nice to see the 1928 MVP and FABL single season rbi record holder get at least 1 more at bat as a Chief before his career comes to an end. Masters is hitting just .222 this season with 1 homer and 7 RBIs from his brief stay in Detroit. BIG MONEY IS BIG ANGRY As for Detroit, word is Big Money is big time angry after ex-Brooklyn skipper Walt Bailey was signed to take over the reigns of the Chicago Cougars this week. The Detroit owner Eddie 'Big Money" Thompson seemed to be pushing for the Dynamos to sign Bailey as soon as the Brooklyn Kings let him go in May after that club hit a terrible swoon. According to renowned Detroit World reporter Fast Freddie Farhat Thomson is very close to cleaning house once more in Detroit, just over a year after DD Martin left Cleveland to run the struggling Dynamos franchise. Detroit’s tragic number to wrap up the 1st overall pick in the draft is just 4. Detroit skipper Tom Bray’s tragic number is 7 as far as avoiding Owner Eddie Thompson demand of losing no more than 98 games. The Dynamo’s will have to go 5-6 or better over the last 11. The other half of the equation of scoring 5 runs a game is at 4.4. The team will have to score 62 in its last 11 to reach the mark KINGS FEELING THE HEAT? We may just have a pennant race after all as the Curse of Ferdinand Hawkins appears to be on the verge of rearing it's ugly head in Brooklyn once more. The Kings, who have had two successive final week collapses to lose the pennant to Cleveland the past two seasons, are likely feeling the heat again after a 2-5 week that allowed the Foresters to creep within 5 games of the front-running Kings. It makes the 2 games the club's will play at Kings County Ballpark on Tuesday and Wednesday this week extremely important. A Cleveland sweep might just send the Kings into another tailspin and Cleveland back to the World Championship Series. If the Kings and Chiefs do reach the Series we can expect to see a game one matchup of arguably the 2 best pitchers in the game today. Rabbit Day(189-112) and Tom Barrell (93-38) have faced each other just twice before with Day coming out on top on both occasions. Their first meeting came in the final month of Barrell's rookie campaign, 1932. Day was masterful for Baltimore on that afternoon, tossing a complete game 3-hitter for his 19th win of the season as the Cannons blanked the Kings 2-0. Barrell was nearly as good, scattering 6 hits over 8 innings but taking the loss to drop to 8-3. The rematch came the following season in July, Day's last year Baltimore before the trade to the Gothams. Neither was as sharp as they were in the initial meeting but both went the distance that day in Baltimore. Barrell had a slow start and was victimized by a pair of first inning errors, including one from his brother Dan that allowed the Cannons to plate 4 runs, all unearned in the opening frame. Tom would settle down after surrendering 4 hits in the first and would allow just 2 more hits the rest of the way but Day allowed just 2 runs, both earned, on 9 Brooklyn hits to get the 4-2 win. In case of another Cleveland comeback I should also mention that Foresters ace Dean Astle has faced Rabbit Day just once in his career, and tossed a complete game shutout to win 4-0. It was May 16, 1933 and Astle pitched an 8-hit shutout in what was his big league debut. So quite a start beating Rabbit Day 4-0 in your first FABL game. That was the only time they met. Attached Images __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-06-2021, 12:15 PM	#143
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	September 21, 1936 THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL Monday September 21, 1936 Two big stories highlight this week in Figment Baseball and both revolve around the most storied franchise, although certainly not the most successful, in the Chicago Chiefs. The big news is the Chiefs clinched their first Federal Association pennant since 1928 and just the second in team history since the formation of FABL. Everything seems to be peaking at the right time for the Chiefs who have been unstoppable since adding Pete Layton (.377,16,84 with Chicago) and Rabbit Day (15-1, 1.70) in summer trades. In addition to the pennant clinching victory in St Louis on Saturday the Chiefs also had reason to celebrate yesterday as veteran Jim Hampton, who played such a key role on the 1928 pennant winning club by winning his first of two Federal Association batting titles, reached the 2,000 hit mark for his career with a second inning single off of St Louis righthander George Kyle. It came just an inning after Hampton launched a 2-run homer in the Chiefs 12-5 win over the Pioneers for his 1,999th hit. Hampton becomes the 57th player in FABL history to reach 2000 hits. Philadelphia Sailors third baseman John Kincaid should be next to reach that number and likely this week after Kincaid had 10 hits over the 4 game series against Cleveland to increase his career total to 1,997. Word is another member of the 2,000 hit club will get his swan song the final weekend of the season. The Chiefs have announced that Joe Masters, who is winding down an outstanding career, will get the start at third base Saturday and Sunday when Chicago entertains the St Louis Pioneers. One day Joe Masters might even get the call to join a brand new club that is being created this winter as the grandson of FABL founder William Whitney announced this week. WHITNEY'S CALL FOR A SHRINE TO RECOGNIZE THE GREATS OF THE GAME WAKE BROOKLYN WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS Meanwhile in the Continental Association there is nothing but angst in Brooklyn despite the fact the Kings lead the Continental Association by 4 and a half games. The issue is that lead was 7 games two weeks ago and the Kings, with a history of September collapses, are heading the wrong way yet again with a 9-9 September record after going 69-28 from the day Powell Slocum took over as manager in May until the end of August. Tom Barrell triggered reminders of his awful season finale a year ago with the pennant on the line as he had another rough outing in a crucial game, getting beat up for 8 runs and failing to survive the fifth inning Tuesday in a game with Cleveland that could have been the final nail in the Foresters coffin. Instead the two time defending champion Foresters are still clinging to life, but barely. However one can't help but get the feeling that the Ghost of Ferdinand Hawkins won’t go quietly. A month ago I would have called the Kings the favorite to win their first World Championship Series but after the Chiefs have won 17 of their last 24 and as dominant as Day and Miller have looked I would be surprised if the CA champ wins more than 1 game. Brooklyn is reeling, what has now become a rite of fall, and we are not yet even sure they will make the postseason. Odds are still very good but only because Sailors and Foresters still have 2 games against each other but somehow, some way all the magic has gone out of Slocum’s messages to the club and the seeds of self doubt, well watered by September’s past, are in full bloom in the Brooklyn clubhouse once again. PESTILLI REMAINS ATOP MOCK DRAFT Little has changed at the top of the mock draft since it was released in June in preparation for the December Figment Draft. Narragansett outfielder Sal Pestilli, a two-time winner of the Christian Trophy as College baseball's top player remains at the top followed by High School player of the year Walt Messer, a first baseman from Washington DC. Here is the latest top ten list. Code: # NAME POS AGE SCHOOL CITY OF BIRTH 1 Sal Pestilli CF 20 Narragansett College Westerly, Rhode Island 2 Walt Messer 1B 18 McKinley Tech (Washington DC) Eldersburg, MD 3 Billy Woytek 2B 18 Loyola HS (Los Angeles) San Diego, CA 4 Art Jennings CF 22 Gates University Burlingame, CA 5 Terry Richardson CF 17 Fall Creek HS (WI) St Paul, MN 6 Ed Stoddard RF 19 Pullman HS (Chicago) Chicago, IL 7 Denny Andrews 3B 20 Maryland State Philadelphia, PA 8 Mike T Taylor RF 18 University Military HS Poplarville, MS 9 Fred Vargas RF 18 Cass Tech (Detroit) Warren, MI 10 Bob Edgin LF 21 Opelika State Columbus, GA There is no way all of those corner outfielders will go in the top ten and I would be surprised to see more than 1 of them go in the first round. The league is swimming in quality corner outfielders and will Stoddard, Taylor, Vargas and Edgin all look like solid ballplayers there is just far too big a supply of 1B-corner outfielders in the league right now. There are no pitchers in the top ten and the mock draft lists the top pitcher, high school star Johnnie Jones at 15th overall with Red River State's Bunny Edwards tabbed the top second round choice. In reality both will be gone in the top ten and quite possibly two or three more pitchers as well. In fact rumours persist the Detroit Dynamos are going to use the first overall pick, if they don't trade down, on either Jones or Edwards. A big mistake in my opinion as Sal Pestilli has the makings of a generational talent. AWARDS WATCH With just 1 week remaining in the regular season it seems like two top hitter award winners are pretty well decided. There is zero doubt that Philadelphia Keystones slugger Bobby Barrell (.352,53,159) win his second career Whitney Award as the Federal Association's top hitter. The Georgia Jolter also won the award in 1934. Meanwhile, in the Continental Association the smart money is on Brooklyn's Al Wheeler(.358,37,139) to repeat as that loop's Whitney Award winner. Cleveland third baseman Charlie Barry (.376,9,90) has had an outstanding season and will likely win his first batting title with a career year at age 37 but Wheeler is having another monster year at the plate. The pitching awards might be a little closer, especially in the Federal Association where the choice is between a pair of Chicago Chiefs in veteran Rabbit Day(25-3, 2.43) and rookie Al Miller (21-8, 2.87). Miller has been amazing all season while Day, who already owns a pair of Allen Awards, was excellent as usual before the trade from New York in July, but has been positively otherworldly since coming to the Chiefs and teaming with Miller. In the Continental Association I would have said Tom Barrell (20-6, 3.48) was a lock for his third consecutive Allan Award but he was upstaged by Cleveland's Dean Astle (20-14, 3.61) in their meeting last week and now it looks like a toss up. Expect both team's second bananas Lyman Weigel (15-7, 2.95) and Mike Murphy (16-8, 3.12) to also receive some consideration but really it is between Barrell and Astle. QUICK HITS - Bad news out of Montreal as Earle Whitten suffered his second serious arm injury this season. The 28 year old missed the first 4 months of the year with shoulder woes and now he is back on the sidelines after what is only being described as a serious arm issue. Whitten was 14-12 a year ago for the Saints but struggled after his first injury this season, posting a 2-5 record. The future did look very bright after his best outing of the season last Sunday in which he threw a complete game 5-hitter in a 14-1 lambasting of Toronto. However, on Saturday he didn't get past the second inning before the injury occurred. There are certainly questions following two serious arm injuries in one season as to whether Whitten will make a full recovery. Whitten may well be best remembered for being the pitcher that served up Max Morris' 700th career homerun. - Rookie lefthander Jack Wood is off to a nice start in Detroit. One of the key pieces the Dynamos received in their big deal with Brooklyn last season that sent Al Wheeler and Frank Vance away, the 23 year old former 3rd round pick out of Henry Hudson University is 3-3 with a 3.83 era in 6 starts for Detroit since being called up in late August. - Brooklyn's Dan Barrell became the fifth player to hit for the cycle this season when he turned the trick against Montreal last week. Rich Langton of the Chicago Cougars, St Louis' Alex Ingraham, Mahlon Strong of the New York Gothams and Detroit outfielder Irv Brady are the others. - In their 60 year history the Chicago Chiefs have never won 100 games in a season. They have 99 wins so far this year and 4 attempts remaining to get to the century mark. Regardless of the final total it will be a huge improvement on the 78-76 season they turned in last year. - Still with numbers, Detroit World scribe Fast Freddie Farhat shares what he sees is a first in FABL history. "Never before (I believe) have 3 teams in one Association ever had 90 wins or more each in a season. This year in the CA, Brooklyn has 94 while Cleveland and Philadelphia both have 90 with a week left in the season. Combine that with the FA's Chicago Chiefs 99 wins and that is a 4th 90+ win team. The Pittsburgh Miners with 1 win next week will make it 5 90+ win teams in 1 season." __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-07-2021, 01:40 PM	#145
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	1936 Regular Season comes to an end THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL Monday September 28, 1936 KINGS FINALLY OVERCOME FORESTERS After back to back final week of the season collapses that caused Brooklyn to lose the Continental Association pennant to the Cleveland Foresters each of the past two years, the Kings finally get their chance to taste October baseball. It was not so much a stellar finish for the Brooklyn nine as the Kings stumbled down the stretch, winning just 11 of their final 23 games but they were aided by a Kings-like collapse from the Cleveland club. The Foresters, who had come up big when Brooklyn collapsed late in each of the past two seasons, fell apart in the final days of this campaign, dropping 8 of their last 9 decisions and slipping to third in the standings as the rapidly improving Philadelphia Sailors won their last 7 straight including a pair in Cleveland to leapfrog the Foresters. The upcoming Series meeting will be the first ever between the Brooklyn Kings and Chicago Chiefs, each of whom have rarely tasted victory. Brooklyn's troubles are well documented as the club's collapse each of the past two September's adds to the credibility of the so-called Hawkins Curse placed on the club so many decades ago. The Curse has not been lifted yet, mind you, as the Kings have been to the Series before: in 1912, 1923 and 1927, but lost on each occasion and former Kings star pitcher Ferdinand Hawkins is said to have cursed the club from ever winning a World Championship Series. Hawkins past away last year and had always steadfastly refused to ever confirm or deny what he was reported to have said when the Kings cut him following the 1892 season, the year that FABL was formed. While the Chiefs have never had to worry about a curse, fans of one of baseball's original franchises - one formed by FABL founder William Whitney himself - have seen little in the way of playoff baseball. They did win a pair of Century League crowns in the late1800's before the dawn of the Federal and Continental Associations but since then they have won the Federal pennant just twice. The first title came in 1917 when they won 92 games and finished 2.5 up on the Pittsburgh Miners before beating Cleveland in 6 games for their first and, to date at least, only World Championship Series victory. Some might draw a few parallels between 1917 squad and this edition of the Chiefs: - Each had a hotshot rookie pitcher. In 1917 it was 24 year old Bob Wilson who won 20 games and led the league in ERA. This year it is 21 year old Al Miller who won 21 games and would have led the Fed in ERA were it not for the incredible second half teammate Rabbit Day enjoyed. - Both this year's edition and the 1917 club finished first with Pittsburgh in second and Boston in third place. - Both finished in the middle of the pack run wise as pitching was the story for both teams. the '17 squad had Wilson (20-11) as well as Denny Wren (24-11) and Marty Jones (22-11) leading the way, while this season's version had Rabbit Day (25-3), Miller (21-8) and Charlie Bingham (19-12). The Chiefs only other pennant came in 1928 when Joe Masters (.388,56,195) and Jim Hampton (.397,18,117) lifted the club on their backs and carried them to a title. It could have been the middle of a mini-dynasty in Chicago as the Chiefs narrowly missed 3 straight pennants, finishing 2 games out in 1927 as Philadelphia and Detroit tied for the lead forcing a 1-game playoff that the Keystones won, and in 1929 the Chiefs finished second, 2 back of the Dynamos. There have been some lean seasons to start the 1930's but with a storybook 1936 season fans many are thinking the Chiefs are a team of destiny. It could be quite a series if the Kings can get back on track as Brooklyn sends the league's best offense up against FABL's best pitching staff. The series is a coming home of sorts for 4 Chiefs, who all have ties to the Kings organization. Ron Rattigan and Tom Aiello were both Kings draft picks who were dealt to Chicago in the Milt Fritz trade. Aiello’s father also played briefly for Brooklyn in the teens. Bill White was signed originally by Brooklyn as an undrafted free agent and dealt to the Chiefs for a draft pick in ‘34 while Larry Brown was an out of options casualty the Kings sent to Chicago just prior to the start of the 1935 season. The 27 year old Rattigan (.335,20,101) had a breakout year his second season as a big leaguer while the 25 year old White (.272,4,78) established himself as the Chiefs everyday shortstop. Aiello(.290,1,13), who made his big league debut with 2 games for Brooklyn in 1929, was the Chiefs starting catcher last season but was relegated to a backup role with the acquisition of Tom Bird from Montreal. Brown spent parts of 4 seasons with Brooklyn and won a career high 11 games last season in his debut with Chicago but spent much of this year in the Chiefs pen and finished with a 4-9 record. GOTHAMS TAKE INVENTORY OF HAUL FROM SUMMER SELL-OFF Courtesy of the New York World-Telegram As we watch Rabbit Day win 25 games and cruise into the Series let's take a look at what the New York Gothams received in their tear down. It will be years before we know if it was worth it but here is the haul the Gothams received for gutting a championship club: Ed Reyes - OF/1B - (23) - Former 1st rd pick and top 100 prospect. Has established himself as a solid .300 hitter and .400 OBP AAA hitter. Hit .375/.423/.708 in a brief ML shot with the Gothams. Billy Dalton - 3B - (22) - Former 1st rd pick and top 20 prospect. Had a solid season in A ball this year then struggled in a very brief look in AA. Earl West - 1B/2B/OF - (20) - Former 3rd rd pick and top 200 prospect - Hit .300 at AA this season and held his own at the AAA level in 67 games Fred Ratcliffe - SP - (22) - 5th rd pick. Had a 3.19 ERA and 1.17 Whip at AA Jersey City, then was 4.60 and 1.02 in two starts AAA. Had been struggling in AA Atlanta before being acquired by the Gothams. Mule Earl - SP - (23) - Former 6th rd pick. Earl moved towards the top of the Gothams pitching prospects going 4-2 2.24 ERA and 0.88 Whip in 6 starts at single A Albany before injuries shut him down. Chuck Johnson - 1B - (22) - Slashed .360/.415/.460 at single A as a 21 year old for the Kings and Gothams organizations. Gary Heuser - SP - (26) - Struggled in the majors this season since coming over from the Chiefs as part of the Day trade. Bone spurs that ended his season are the likely reason. Dick Canfield - 1B - (22) - A late round pick who never showed up on the prospect lists he hit .360/.418/.602 at AAA this season before going .275/.385/.330 for the Gothams in 130 PAs. The Gothams hope he will show more of his minor league power as a backup to Bud Jameson. Charlie Wheeler - SP - (22) - Former 1st rd pick and top 100 prospect. He became the Gothams top pitching prospect. Wheeler struggled at AA since coming over to the Gothams. Dick Gentry - SP - (23) - Former 2nd rd pick. Pitched well at AA and a short stint at AAA before taking a spot in the Gothams rotation for 12 starts (4-5, 5.79) Howard Brown Jr. - OF - (24) - Former 3rd rd pick and top 100 prospect. Brown slashed .266/.310/.375 at AAA before getting a cup of coffee with the Gothams. Brown is a good defender at all 3 OF positions. In addition to these players who helped improve the Gothams low ranked minor league system, the team also added 5 draft picks (while losing a 3rd rd) and will be drafting 3 times in round 1 and 3 times in round 2 this December. KINGS INVITE TOP AREA PROSPECTS TO KINGS COUNTY BUT IS THE MOVE DESIGNED TO REMOVE A CURSE The Brooklyn Kings might be busy preparing to host the opener of the World Championship Series but their scouting department led by Director John Spears is fully focused on the future, although perhaps Spears has also sprinkled in a hope to aide the present as well. Spears has invited a number of New York area prospects eligible for the December draft to tour Kings County Stadium and play a pick-up game against some Kings prospects and local sandlot players at the Stadium Tuesday, a day before the World Championship Series gets underway between the Kings and the Federal Association pennant winning Chicago Chiefs. Included in those invited are number one ranked prospect Sal Pestilli of Narragansett College in Rhode Island, who will square off against his older brother Alf, a Kings minor leaguer, in the informal game. Other prospects invited are all players who appeared on the mock draft such as Joe Zell, a New York native who played for Ferguson College in North Carolina and Brooklyn born catcher Bill Wilson who played his high school ball in Philadelphia, but there was one notable exception. The group invited also included lightly regarded catcher Ian Weber of Brooklyn Catholic University. No big deal you would think right as Weber is a local college product. Well, it isn't a big deal until you also recognize the fact that Weber is the grandson of former Kings hurler and rumoured curse creator Ferdinand Hawkins. The Kings called questions about whether Weber's inclusion was some sort of attempt to appease the spirit of Weber's late grandfather in an effort to remove the curse in advance of the Series opener as "pure hogwash." Brooklyn Scouting Director John Spears towed the company line by elaborating "we don't believe in curses," but he did add at the end of the conversation as he was leaving the room "but if can help us get our first title then why not?" Brooklyn has never won a World Championship Series and Hawkins is said to have vowed they never would after he was unceremoniously cast aside from the organization in 1892 at the age of 27 after leading the team to two championships in the old Border Association. The 21 year old Weber played 3 seasons at Brooklyn Catholic University, hitting .266 with 11 homers in 166 games. OSA's scouting report in Weber calls him a quality defensive catcher but has a below average bat and his ceiling is a bench role. COUGARS CLASS OF MINOR LEAGUES The Chicago Cougars are loaded with young talent so it comes as little surprise the Cougars have the best minor league system in FABL if we strictly look at wins and losses. The Cougars have 13 players listed in the BNN's top 100 prospects led by #4 overall Billy Hunter, a 21 year old shortstop they selected 14th overall out of Cincinnati High School in 1932. Hunter spent most of the season at AA where he helped the Mobile Commodores win a Dixie League pennant before being promoted to AAA Milwaukee late in the year. No Cougar affiliate finished below third in it's league led by AA Mobile and Class B San Jose who each won pennants. The Philadelphia Sailors finished a close second as they had three pennant winning clubs in AAA San Francisco, AA Providence and Class B Miami. There downfall to surpass the Cougars system was Class C where the Gulfport Sailors finished with a .500 record and were 4th in the Gulf States League. Here is a look at the cumulative minor league record for each organization and the 1936 Minor League pennant winners. Code: 1936 MINOR LEAGUE CHAMPIONS LEVEL LEAGUE TEAM PARENT CLUB AAA Great Western San Francisco Hawks Philadelphia Sailors AAA Union League Rochester Rooks Brooklyn Kings AAA Century League Indianapolis Hoosiers Baltimore Cannons AA Eastern Assn Providence Sailors Philadelphia Sailors AA Dixie League Mobile Commodores Chicago Cougars AA Lone Star Assn Austin Violets Independent A Heartland Lg. Davenport Dusters Toronto Wolves A Middle Atlantic Allentown Cokers Philadelphia Keystones A Western League Des Moines Bears Independent B C-O-W League San Jose Cougars Chicago Cougars B Southeastern Lg Miami Sailors Philadelphia Sailors C Gulf States Lg Hattiesburg Top Hats Boston Minutemen C UMVA Moline Pioneers St Louis Pioneers QUICK HITS - You have to wonder if this is the end of the line for Ossie Julious' managerial career. The 63 year old is the dean of FABL managers. No one has managed in more games than Julious and his 2,276 career wins and 2,418 career losses are both records. Julious won his only World Championship in 1911 when he was piloting Toronto and he has had some pretty successful seasons early in his stay in Baltimore, where he has skippered the Cannons since 1929 but with 3 straight last place finishes and a record of 239-377 over the past 4 seasons you have to think it is time for the Cannons to bring in a new voice. -Staying with the Cannons, last year's number one overall pick Rufus Barrell II has finally been given a clean bill of health, although it is obviously too late for him to return to the mound this season. After two dominating seasons at Macon High School in Georgia, Barrell's minor league debut was highly anticipated. Unfortunately it lasted just 3 games before he hurt his shoulder and has been sidelined ever since. Cannons sources say Deuce is as good as new and ready to enjoy a great season next year and certainly the entire league is hoping he makes a full recovery, but shoulders can be a tricky thing with pitchers. - While we are talking Baltimore pitching did anyone notice the great start another former high first round pick had to begin his big league career? Gus Goulding was taken 2nd overall by the Cannons in 1934 right after the Washington Eagles selected his St Blane College teammate Bobo White with the first pick. White struggled to a 6-15, 6.45 season at AAA this year but Goulding beat his former college teammate to the big leagues, jumping from AA in April to AAA in June and landing in Baltimore in late August. Since joining the Cannons, Goulding won all eight of his starts and boasts a very impressive 2.90 era. Things might be looking up for the Cannons as John Edwards, who was taken third overall in 1933, also looked sharp in his big league debut this month. Like Goulding, Edwards had a teammate drafted adjacent to him but Edwards, who played his high school ball at Hartford HS, has been overshadowed by his former school chum. That player was Al Miller, who was taken 4th overall by the Chiefs. You might have heard of him as all he has done is go 21-8 and help lead the Chiefs to the World Championship Series. - The 1895 Chicago Cougars Continental Association record 1,002 runs will survive as a late slump caused the Brooklyn Kings to fall 8 runs short of that mark. The Kings total of 994 breaks their own team record of 916 runs scored established last season and becomes the second highest total ever recorded in the CA. The overall FABL record remains 1,033 set by the 1895 New York Gothams. - Philadelphia Keystones slugger Rankin Kellogg had a bad May (.233/.281/.442, 16 K), but had an OPS above 1.000 every other month and came to the wire like the thoroughbred he is with back-to-back 31 RBI months and 10 HR in September. Final season numbers were solid: .311/.395/.594, 36 HR, 137 RBI. His 86 extra-base hits were the second-most in his career, thanks to his career high in doubles (38). But, it was the first time since 1926, his second season, where he did not finish with 200 hits, and this is also his first season where he did not lead the FABL in HR, RBI, OPS, runs, hits, walks, or any the three slash categories. - Kellogg's Philadelphia teammate Bobby Barrell had a tremendous season, leading the league in HR (53), RBI (162), SLG (.679), OPS (1.079), and WAR (9.2). He surpassed his previous power high by 19 HR. Barrell also reached 230 hits for third time and finished at 200 hits or above for the fifth time in six seasons. His 53 homers tie Max Morris for 5th on the all-time single-season home run list. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-11-2021, 11:34 AM	#147
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	October 5, 1936 Chiefs are World Champions! THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL OCTOBER 5, 1936 SWEEP! CHIEFS DOMINANT IN SERIES WIN The Chicago Chiefs swept the Brooklyn Kings to win just their second World Championship Series and first since 1917. It was a performance so overwhelming that the Kings only lead in the entire series came in the top of the ninth inning of game four but it was quickly nullified when the Chiefs rallied for three runs in the bottom of the ninth to walk-off their season with a 5-4 victory that completed the sweep. Starting June 23rd, or the day after Pete Layton arrived in a trade with the New York Stars, the Chiefs went 64-28 including the four series victories. They were 56-22 since Rabbit Day arrived in a trade with the New York Gothams at the all-star break with Day himself posting a 17-1 record over that time. Day was 2-0 in the World Championship Series but the MVP award went to his catcher instead. Tom Bird, who was acquired from Montreal over the winter, hit .278 with 4 rbi's in the series including a 3 hit performance in game four the culminated in a series ending 2-run walk-off double. Game Three saw another terrific pitching performance for the Chiefs, this time from Ron Coles, who outdueled Brooklyn ace Tom Barrell by allowing just 7 hits over 8 innings before Charlie Bingham came on to close out the 3-2 victory. Barrell had a very strong game for Brooklyn, surrendering just 5 Chicago hits but, as they did in Game One, errors cost him dearly. The game was scoreless until the bottom of the third but Brooklyn had their chances before then as they had runners on first and second with no one out in both the second and third innings but in each case a Chicago double play allowed Coles to escape without damage. Coles aided his own cause with a solo homerun to open the scoring. It was just the second homerun Coles had ever hit as a pro - a span of 268 plate appearances. Another Brooklyn error - they committed 11 in the series - led to two more runs and cost them the ballgame. Game Four was really just a formality as with Rabbit Day on the mound and the Kings bats in an October freeze the outcome of the series was no longer in doubt. Brooklyn did rally with 3 runs in the top of the ninth to take their first lead of the series but proving once more they were a team of destiny the Chiefs easily swatted aside any Brooklyn attempts of prolonging the series by scoring three of their own to add one more chapter to the Curse of Ferdinand Hawkins for the Kings and slay their own ghosts by winning a second World Championship Series for the Whitney family. JOE FOY - UNLIKELY HERO From the Chicago Herald-Examiner One of the great surprises about October baseball is it gives someone unexpected an opportunity to shine on the brightest stage. One of those players this week was Joe Foy of the Chicago Chiefs. The 28-year-old right fielder was 2 for 4 with a home run and 2 runs scored to play a key role in the Chiefs 6-2 win over Brooklyn in Game Two of the Series. Foy was primarily the SS for Fort Wayne this season, but he's a right handed batter with OF experience, and so he was called up at the end of August to be the right-handed half of the RF platoon with Cliff Moss. In Fort Wayne Foy was hitting .352/.384/.504, and in his two weeks in Chicago, he hit .326/.354/.522 with 3 HR. The Chiefs had been looking for a right handed bat to pair with Moss. It's a small sample size, but Foy has earned himself an extended look in 1937. Foy has had an interesting career to say the least. Originally a shortstop, he was a key member of two College World Championship teams at Opelika State and his .432 batting average in 1929 was the 18th highest ever recorded in the old feeder league system. He was named a second team All-American as a sophomore in 1928 and a first team selection the following season, prompting the Chiefs to select him 14th overall in the 1929 FABL draft. Despite missing a month and a half of his rookie pro season with an injury Foy still hit .307 at AA Memphis that season and by 1931 he was in the big leagues. He spent two seasons as a starter and two others in a platoon role with the Chiefs but despite hitting .339 in 85 games in 1934 he found himself in AAA Fort Wayne for the 1935 season, primarily because of defensive limitations as a shortstop. When he spent most of the season in Fort Wayne again this year it appeared that Foy's days as a big leaguer were nearing their end, but his strong September and now a big showing in Game Two have reopened the doors for the 28 year old. CANNONS ON THE CLOCK With Detroit publicly declaring they are going to take Sal Pestilli the focus now shifts to the Baltimore Cannons and the number two pick. Will the Cannons, who are well stocked with young arms from high selections in recent drafts including Rufus "Deuce Barrell" last season, keep the pick or are they inclined to move down a few spots and perhaps add another asset or two? if they elect to keep the pick the perfect selection for Baltimore has to be Walt Messer, a Maryland born boy who dominated in high school ball for nearby McKinley Tech in Washington D.C. Messer, who is ranked second behind Sal Pestilli in the OSA mock draft, is a 3 time High School All-American who won the Adwell Award as the top prep player twice. He likely needs a few years of seasoning in the minors but he gives the Cannons a power bat that could fit in the middle of their lineup for years. There may be some temptation in Baltimore to take a pitcher but the Cannons first pick each of the last three years was used on arms and that strategy is starting to pay off with the recent big league debuts of 1934 pick Gus Goulding (80, 2.90) and 1933 selection Johnny Edwards (2-2, 1.80). Add last year's pick Barrell and 20 year old Rusty Petrick, the 1933 10th overall pick of the Gothams who came to Baltimore in the initial Rabbit Day trade, and the Cannons have plenty of young arms so this is the year to focus on Messer. MINERS ARE STRONG(ER) IN THE OUTFIELD AFTER DEAL The Pittsburgh Miners pulled the trigger last night and grabbed one of the few remaining quality pieces the New York Gothams had left from last October's World Championship team with the announcement of a deal to acquire outfielder Mahlon Strong. It cost Pittsburgh a pretty penny for Strong, but when healthy, the 27 year old is one of the best sluggers in the game. He hit 26 homers and batted .345 for the Gothams last season despite missing over a month with a neck injury. My only question for Pittsburgh is why make this trade now and not back in July when the Chiefs were stocking up on Rabbit Day and Pete Layton? Pittsburgh was 4 games ahead of the Chicago Chiefs in mid-July and perhaps the addition of Strong might have been enough to help them hold off the Chiefs down the stretch. Was the Gothams price higher at that point or were the Miners unwilling to spend then what they did 3 months later? As for the Gothams, the deal was an impressive addition to their arsenal of upcoming draft picks as they picked up the Miners first and fifth round picks in the December draft for Strong as well as a pair of prospects. The deal gives the rebuilding Gothams 4 picks in the first round and a total of 7 of the first 32 selections. New York now has to hope they strike it big with those selections or there may be a long dry spell at the Bigsby Oval, something the club owner will likely not take too kindly too. New York also adds 22 year old outfielder John Phillips and 20 year old pitcher Nate Speer. Phillips, a 1932 7th round pick out of Hartford High School, made his FABL debut this past season, hitting .324 in 29 games with the Miners after starting the year in AA and and looking very good in a brief stop at AAA St. Paul. OSA feels he has the potential to be an above average corner outfielder some day. Speer was the Miners first round pick in 1933, selected 8th overall out of Dallas High School. He struggled a bit his first two seasons of pro ball but broke out this year, splitting the season between A and AA and compiling a 20-9 record with a 2.82 era. OSA says he has great raw stuff and should develop into a top of the rotation arm. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-06-2021, 03:12 PM	#144
progen All Star Starter Join Date: Mar 2002 Posts: 1,530 Infractions: 0/1 (1)	This is an excellent read. Entertaining and like the detail.

05-11-2021, 01:21 PM	#148
Tiger Fan Hall Of Famer Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Ontario Canada Posts: 9,712	October 6, 1936 THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL OCTOBER 6, 1936 OH MO! DYNAMOS ADD LEGENDARY SLUGGER The Detroit Dynamos have given there fans a reason to show up at the ballpark next season as they added the greatest slugger in baseball history to their roster. Max Morris, who suffered a foot injury that cost him half of the season, had his lowest homerun total since 1918 but still managed to surpass the 700 mark for his career. He will be 42 when opening day rolls around again and there is a slight chance Morris may choose to retire instead, taking his 702 career homeruns, three triple crowns, 8 Whitney Awards and 2 World Championship rings, and ride off into the sunset. However, if he does choose to return he will give Detroit fans, who have watched their club go 98-210 over the past two seasons, something to finally cheer for. Morris will likely not have a great impact on improving that record, at least not on the field but just his presence should help many of the young Dynamos mature as big leaguers. Morris, in all honesty, was merely a throw in the deal that sent outfielder Leon Drake from the south shores of Lake Erie to Lake St Clair. Drake hit .279 with 21 homers and a CA leading 21 triples for Cleveland last season and he will be reunited with his former GM, who left Cleveland for the rebuilding project that is the Dynamos two years ago. In return Cleveland gets Bill Moore, a 25 year old first baseman who once was called the greatest player in College Baseball History but did not make his FABL debut until this past season. He acquainted himself well in the big leagues, batting .327 with 9 homers as a rookie and will be counted on to fill Morris' large shoes at first base with the Foresters. Cleveland also gets a promising but injury prone minor league pitcher in Earle Robinson who was originally selected 5th overall by Brooklyn in the 1933 draft, and a 4th round draft pick. It was one of two deals announced by the Dynamos who also picked up catcher Clem Bliss from Pittsburgh for a pair of minor leaguers. It was not much of secret recently but the Dynamos also made official they will be taking Sal Pestilli with the number one pick in this December's draft. The final piece of news out of Detroit is that the Dynamos are about to fire beleaguered manager Tom Bray. They have not made the name of his replacement public yet but inside sources confirm it will be a legend in the sport. WHAT WENT WRONG IN BROOKLYN THIS TIME? Another season ends in disappointment for the Brooklyn Kings but at least this time there was some cause for celebration. After blowing two straight pennant races to the Cleveland Foresters the Kings finally got over the hump this time around and claimed their first Continental Association pennant since 1927. However the club remains the only FABL team never to win a World Championship Series as the Kings were swept by the red-hot Chicago Chiefs and are now 0 for 4 attempts to win a World Title while owning a dismal 3-16 record in post-season play. You can't blame this loss on the Curse of Ferdinand Hawkins, although I am certain his presence still lingers in the halls of Kings County Stadium over a year after his death and 45 years after Hawkins supposedly doomed the Kings to never winning a World Championship Series after he was released by the club following the inaugural season of FABL in 1892. The September failures of the past three years certainly seem otherworldly in Brooklyn when you consider the collapses the Kings had each season. 1934- Brooklyn won a team record 97 games but with 6 to play they lead the second place Cleveland Foresters by 2.5 games only to drop 4 of their final 6 and lose the pennant by a single game. 1935- A 95 win season ends in bitter disappointment as the Kings lost 4 of their last 7 contests including the final two on the season ending weekend. The last game is known as the Barrell debacle when Tom Barrell, despite being on the verge of his second straight Allen Award, comes up with one of his worst outings of the season with the pennant on the line and gets blown out in a season ending loss to the New York Stars that allows Cleveland to again win the pennant by a single game. 1936- This season the Kings again set a franchise record for victories with 98 but they were below .500 after the beginning of September posting a 13-16 record including the 4 series defeats. Brooklyn was lucky to hold off the hard-charging Philadelphia Sailors to finally win the pennant, and the door was certainly open for Cleveland to make another comeback win but they stumbled down the stretch as well for a change. There are slumps that every ballclub goes through but Brooklyn seems to be hit with them at the most inopportune time. It's almost like this team is....well, cursed. The players have to shoulder much of the blame for failing to perform in a key situation once again, but they are not the only guilty party in this case. Kings management is also heavily to blame. One can trace this lost opportunity to the middle of July when the Kings management team failed to go all-in and try to pry Rabbit Day from the Gothams, who were selling off everything that wasn't bolted down. How different might things be for Brooklyn if the Kings had offered New York say Bob Cummings, their first round pick and a young prospect or two for the two-time (and soon to be three time) Allen Award winning pitcher. All Day did was go 17-1 down the stretch as Chicago became the hottest team since, well since Brooklyn in the first half of the season, and embarrassed the Brooklyn hitters in the World Championship Series. As a team the Kings hit .187 in the Series. This was the best offense in baseball that scored nearly 1,000 runs this season, averaging 6.5 runs per game but they could only score 5 times in the first 3 games of the Series combined. Add in 11 errors in the Series and you don't have a winning recipe especially when Chicago is sending Rabbit Day and Al Miller to the mound for 3 of the 4 games. So you can blame it on the Curse if you like, or bad luck as the Brooklyn bats all cooled off at the same time but you and I know better. This season was lost the day the Brooklyn Kings management team got gun shy and backed off on a major deal for Rabbit Day. They pulled the trigger on such a deal the previous season to land Al Wheeler and Frank Vance and it got them nothing so I am sure that was a factor. They also learned before the deal was done that their competition for Day was not the Cleveland Foresters, so the Kings brain trust breathed a sigh of relief and decided to stand pat with the team they had and keep the few prospects remaining after two years of stocking up on veterans. The safe move if you will. Well the safe move is why Brooklyn is not celebrating a championship today, the curse has nothing to do with it. __________________ Cliff Markle HOB1 greatest pitcher 360-160, 9 Welch Awards, 11 WS titles

05-12-2021, 10:31 AM	#149
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	A look back at the 1926 Draft LOOK BACK AT THE 1926 FABL DRAFT Each year just before the FABL draft I have been doing annual recaps where I look back at the draft class from 10 years prior so with the 1936 draft fast approaching let's grade our clubs on how they did back in 1926. The 1926 draft was just the second for the human GM's and it was thought of at the time and certainly has proven to be a much weaker class then we had in 1925 which gave us among others Al Wheeler, Bud Jameson, Bill Ashbaugh, Doug Lightbody and Jack Cleaves. If there is one name that stands out from the 1926 class it is Karl Stevens and he stands out for all the wrong reasons. So looking back a decade later, how did we do with the first draft pick each of us made? 1- KARL STEVENS OF CLEVELAND FORESTERS They say a picture is worth a thousand words. This is probably all that needs to be said about Stevens. Here is a list of every position player selected first overall in the history of the FABL draft and their career major league games played: The only positive thing we can say about Cleveland's choice is at least it was a bad draft year and you will see Stevens was not the only bust. 2- WALT PALMER P PITTSBURGH MINERS One could say this was the pick that started the trend of FABL teams reaching for pitchers, although to be fair it probably began the previous year when Toronto traded up to select Eddie Quinn second overall. Another point in the Miners favour is the fact that Palmer had an amazing college career at Bayou State, posting a 29-8 record and a 2.48 era and helped his school to a National Title in 1925. Palmer was not a bad pick, just a pick saddled with a number of bad injuries that destroyed his career really before it could get started. Palmer missed 2 months his rookie pro season with elbow soreness and that started a trend that saw him suffer serious injuries each of his first five seasons. He would go 7-18 with a 5.10 era in 43 appearances with the Miners before they finally gave up and released him in 1933. They hung on to him that long likely because he showed the occasional flash of the skill he had in college such as tossing a 10-strikeout no-hitter in a AAA game in 1932 but in true Walt Palmer fashion he hurt his back 3 weeks later and missed over a month. Palmer is still active today and bouncing around the Lone Star League as a spare part. 3- FRED BARRELL C CHICAGO COUGARS With a redo the catcher from Georgia Baptist would likely be the number one pick. Barrell is now 31 years old and a key piece of the Brooklyn Kings pennant winning club. He spent 3 and a half seasons in Chicago and was dominant in leading the Cougars to the 1931 World Championship Series, hitting .609 and being named Series MVP. Barrell was traded to Brooklyn along with his brother Tom and Mike Murphy in the deal that brought Tommy Wilcox and catcher Mike Taylor to the Windy City. He has played 966 FABL games and has 1,063 hits and a .297 career batting average to go along with 2 all-star game appearances. 4- LARRY BROWN P DETROIT DYNAMOS It has been a long road to the big leagues for Larry Brown but he seems to have finally found a home in the Chicago Chiefs bullpen. Selected out of Oakland High School Brown went 20-11 at Class B in his second year of pro ball prompting the Brooklyn Kings to send catcher Dave Armstrong to Detroit for him. He would have some decent years in the minors for the Kings but struggled often when called up to the big club. He finally ran out of minor league options so he was sent to the Chiefs prior to opening day 1935 where he has had some modest success. Brown is 22-23 with 10 saves in his career. Detroit can't be too disappointed about the pick as Armstrong had several solid years with the Dynamos but their second round pick that year, pitcher Sam Sheppard, is enjoying much greater success although it did not come in Detroit as Sheppard was lost to St Louis in the 1931 Rule V draft. Sheppard won an Allen Award in 1935 after a 28-7 season and won 20 games again this year. 5- LEE GRIFFIN OF MONTREAL SAINTS Griffin had strong career at Grafton but his numbers were down in his draft year. He did show some power in AAA but struggled to keep his average up and it was even more obvious in Montreal, where he hit just .223 in 233 big league games before the Saints cut him loose in 1933. He ended his career last year with a stop in the independent Western Baseball League. 6- GEORGE JOHNSON P CHICAGO CHIEFS Owns probably the most common name in FABL and don't confuse him with pitcher George A Johnson or third baseman George X Johnson. This George Johnson is 14-16 in 80 FABL appearances with Brooklyn, the Philadelphia Sailors and for the last 3 seasons the Chicago Cougars. 7- ART HART 3B BALTIMORE CANNONS Hart hit .403 with 16 homers for Opelika State in his draft year and would go on to hit 87 homers in 413 AAA games but bat just .228. He hit just .201 in 55 games with the Cannons and now at 31 is unemployed after being released last winter. 8- REX KAISER OF BOSTON MINUTEMEN Another one of those guys who really did very little in his career but at least at 28 and having spent each of the past two seasons as the 5th or 6th outfielder in Boston he still has a career. Hit .252 in 44 games this past season and is a .249 hitter in 141 career games. Nothing more than a spare part but with the quality of this draft class that makes him not too bad a selection. 9- EVERETT JUERGENS OF PHILADELPHIA SAILORS Juergens had a 28 game hitting streak when he batted .323 as a sophomore at Sadler College but after slashing just .227/.272/.318 as a junior you have to wonder what the Sailors saw in him at the time. He spent the next 6 years in the Sailors system but never advanced past A ball before being released in 1933 at age 27. Signed with Austin of the Lone State League and has spent the past four seasons with the Violets as a decent AA outfielder. 10- FRANK CRAWFORD P PHILADELPHIA KEYSTONES Crawford proved to be the best of the first round pitchers taken as he has spent the past 6 seasons in the Keystones rotation, compiling a 61-50 record. There were a number of other good pitchers selected after him such as second rounders Del Lyons, Sam Sheppard and Gene Stevens and later picks Earle Whitten, Les Zoller and Ben Turner but this draft certainly lacked star power on the mound so Crawford becomes a very good pick under the circumstances. 11- FRANK HUDDLESTON SS TORONTO WOLVES Of the 11 position players taken in the first round, Huddleston is one of just 3 to play in more than 300 big league games. Not the most gifted offensively but he has hit .252 in 785 games for the Wolves, Huddleston's biggest strength is his work in the field making him a solid big league shortstop. 12- BILL WHITTING OF WASHINGTON EAGLES Bill Who? It was a poor class so you can't blame Washington for taking a chance on Whitting but he becomes another of the many outfielders from this class who did nothing. Whiting only played everyday for one season at Brooklyn State, but he did hit .344 for the Bears that season with 15 doubles. He didn't have much longball power and the game was shifting so corner outfielders without power would begin to have very little value. He spent most of his time in the Eagles system in AAA and did hit 23 homers and bat .302 at that level in 1931 but he was 26 years old at the time. Played a grand total of 8 big league games and went 1-for-6 at the plate. He has been a reserve outfielder for Galveston of the independent Lone Star League the past 3 seasons. 13- MIKE WILLIAMS OF CLEVELAND FORESTERS Well all I can say about Williams is at least he lasted longer with the Foresters than #1 overall pick Karl Stevens. He had an up and down college career but put up some good numbers at AAA Cincinnati over the next couple of seasons prompting the Foresters to give him a shot in 1930. Williams started 73 games in the Cleveland outfield that season and hit a respectable .275 with 12 homers. It was the pinnacle of his career as the following season he was in the starting lineup for the entire year but hit just .239. The numbers got worse the next two seasons and now he appears to be nothing more than an after thought in Cleveland - just a player to fill a vacancy on a minor league level if there is a shortage of prospects. He is 31 and still in the Foresters system so who knows, maybe he will get another chance but with a .241 batting average in 276 games with the big club chances seem remote. 14- JACK ROGERS 3B ST LOUIS PIONEERS Originally a 5th round pick of the Philadelphia Sailors in 1923, Rogers elected to attend College of San Diego instead where a strong junior year led to the Pioneers selecting him. He made his big league debut in St Louis in 1930, hitting just .240 but he belted 10 homers in 77 games for a last place club. He was waived by two teams over the next 6 months and eventually the Chicago Cougars claimed him. Rogers appeared in 8 games in 1931 for Chicago and 20 the following season before being cut loose again. He is now in the Western Baseball League after a big league career that lasted 105 gams and saw him hit .227. 15- GEORGE WILLIAMS P NEW YORK STARS It was a long route to the majors for Williams but he finally cracked the Stars roster in 1935, going 6-7 in 35 appearances including 23 starts. He was 6-9 this season and appears to have settled in as a swingman for New York but it will likely be a challenge to keep his roster spot as the club improves. A high school draft pick, Williams spent 7 years in the minors before finally getting his chance in New York at the age of 27. 16- WOODY ARMSTRONG SS-3B CLEVELAND FORESTERS What a terrible break for the Foresters to have three first round picks but have them be in what was just an awful year for top end talent. Imagine what the Foresters could have built with 3 first round picks in the 1925 draft? While they missed on the first two, Armstrong was a solid selection, although they did deal him to Montreal just a few months into his rookie pro season. Armstrong was selected to play in the first all-star game in 1933 but missed the game with an injury, something that plagued him throughout his career. He spent 7 and a half seasons in Montreal before being traded to the Chicago Cougars midway through the 1934 season. After another injury this past May the Cougars released him and he is presently playing in Newark, Detroit's AAA affiliate. His 847 major league games are third behind only a pair of catchers in this draft class (Fred Barrell and 6th rounder Jim Pool) and Armstrong has 795 hits and a .259 career average. SUMMARY A very weak crop but there was some talent that slipped through the cracks like 6th rounder Jim Pool or 10th round selection Bobby Allen or in the auto draft portion we have 11th round selection Ed Stewart or 16th round pick Walt Layton, who both have surpassed the 500 career FABL game plateau. In a redraft Fred Barrell, Huddleston, Armstrong and Crawford would really be the only first round selections who delivered much value. It is hard to give any team a failing grade as this draft class as a whole really rates as one of the worst I have seen. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-13-2021, 08:34 PM	#150
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	October 15, 1936 THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL October 15, 1936 FABL HANDS OUT HARDWARE It was nothing new for each of the FABL awards recipients as all four winners have claimed the hardware before. There was also little surprise as the voters recognized each winner in a landslide victory. As expected Rabbit Day capped a dominant season with his 3rd Allen Award as the top pitcher in the Federal Association. The 32 year old won the Fed pitching triple crown this season as he led the loop in wins (25), era (2.41) and strikeouts (156) to claim his third career Allan Award. His previous two came with Baltimore making him the only pitcher who has won an Allan Award in each association. Day was dealt from the New York Gothams to the Chicago Chiefs in June and proceeded to go 17-1 as a Chief including two wins in the World Championship Series that Chicago swept Brooklyn in. Day's 109 points included 15 first place votes to finish far ahead of his teammate and rookie sensation Al Miller (21-8). Ed Wood (22-11) of Boston finished third with Washington's Bill Anderson (22-14), who received the other first place vote likely from the Washington reporter, coming in fourth. Tom Barrell of the Brooklyn Kings won an unprecedented third straight Allan Award as the top pitcher in the Continental Association. Barrell was tied for the league lead in wins with a 21-6 record while leading both leagues with 158 strikeouts. He claimed 14 of the 16 first place votes with Cleveland's Dean Astle (21-15), who finished second and Brooklyn's Mike Murphy (17-8), who came in fourth, getting one first place vote apiece. The Philadelphia Sailors Merritt Thomas (20-6), a former rule V draft pickup, failed to earn a first place vote but did finish third in the balloting. The Continental Association Whitney Award winner is Brooklyn's Al Wheeler for the second consecutive season. It is the 4th such honour for Wheeler, who also won a pair of Whitney's with Detroit of the Federal Association. Wheeler joins his manager Powell Slocum and former New York Gotham Ed Ziehl as the only 4 time Whitney Award winners, of course that pales when compared to the record 8 Whitney Awards Max Morris has claimed. Wheeler led the CA in homers (38) and RBI's (145) but was denied his second straight triple crown as he finished second to Cleveland's Charlie Barry with a .359 batting average. Wheeler received 14 of the 16 first place votes with Cleveland teammates Dan Fowler (.312,33,121) and T.R. Goins (.330,20,104), who finished second and third, earned one first place ballot each. Bobby Barrell of the Philadelphia Keystones was the only unanimous winner as the Georgia Jolter joined Max Morris and Joe Masters as the only players to ever hit 50 or more homeruns in a season. Barrell (.353,53,162) also posted the 7th highest RBI total in FABL history to claim his second Federal Association Whitney Award. Pittsburgh catcher George Cleaves (.344,15,101) finished second in the balloting with Bob Martin (.355,8,100) of the Chiefs, Barrell's Keystone teammate Rankin Kellogg (.311,36,137) and Chicago's Ron Rattigan (.335,20,101) rounding out the top five. KEYSTONES BID FAREWELL TO ROSS Courtesy of the Philadelphia Record Hat tip to Bill Ross, who has announced his retirement. Ross will forever be revered by the Keystone faithful for his performance in Game 7 of the 1933 World's Championship Series as the winning pitcher in the deciding game to deliver a title to Philadelphia and as a two-time champion with the Keystones. His 5-1, 2.09 ERA in the postseason was an exclamation point to a 17-year FABL career, in which Ross won 230 games including 15 games nine times. Ross was acquired by the Keystones in a trade with the Chicago Cougars before the 1927 season with one ring in his pocket as a member of the 1922 champion Cougar squad. The winning mentality made its way on the train from Chicago to Philadelphia, as Ross helped push the Keystones to a 86-69 record and to winning their first title in 35 years. Ross started and won in Game 1 of a series Philadelphia won in five games. His 119 regular season wins as a Keystone place him sixth on the franchise's all-time list and his 34.4 WAR put him second among all Keystone pitchers. Others to announce their retirement this week included Roy Calfee, Joe Masters and manager James Gentry. Calfee spent 13 and a half of his 15 big league seasons with Detroit before finishing his career with the Pittsburgh Miners. He posted a career record of 169-135 and won back to back Allen Awards in 1928 and 1929. The '29 season, in which he helped lead the Dynamos to a World Championship was his greatest season as Calfee posted a 26-8 record before winning two more games in the Series. Masters ended his career on a winning note as a member of the World Champion Chicago Chiefs although he did not play in the Series. He will be best remembered for his 1928 season where he broke a 33 year old record by driving in 195 runs while smacking 56 homers and batting .388 to win the Whitney Award as the top hitter in the Federal Association. It was the best of his 13 year run with the Chiefs before being dealt to the cross-town Chicago Cougars in 1934. He finished up his career in Detroit this season before returning to the Chiefs for a final farewell, appearing in the final two games of the season. Masters ends his career with 265 homeruns and 2,425 hits. The 66 year old Gentry only had a cup of coffee as a player but enjoyed a long managerial career that saw him win 6 league championships in the minor leagues before briefly managing the Montreal Saints in 1934. After being led go by the Saints he signed with the Chicago Chiefs and spent the past two and half years with them, culminating in a club record 101 win season and their first World Championship Series victory since 1917. OTHER NOTES -The Toronto Wolves officially have a new owner as financier and investment magnate Bernie Millard has finalized a deal to purchase the FABL club from David J. Welcombe. League owners approved the sale last week and Millard becomes the third owner for Toronto in the past five years. Bert Thomas owned the club for 27 years until he was forced to sell it in 1929 after running into financial difficulties due to the Great Stock Market Crash. Welcombe assumed the reigns prior to the 1930 The Wolves are fresh off a 4th-place finish this season. They compiled a 77-77 mark in the Continental Association. Millard boasted to the press corps, "All my life, everything I've touched has turned to gold. I expect the Wolves to be the best baseball organization in the league and will work tirelessly toward that end." This season was a marked improvement for the Wolves as they reached the .500 mark for the first time since coming within a game of the Continental Association pennant in 1927 when they compiled a 82-72 record. Toronto has not finished first in the CA since 1911. Here is the Wolves recent history during the time Welcombe owned the club. It is surprising that the 55 year old Toronto native would sell the team just as the club appears to be turning the corner. - Apparently there is some second guessing going on in the Detroit Dynamos scouting office. Dynamos Scouting Director Fred Davis has been canvassing for the club to consider drafting high school first baseman Walt Messer instead of Narragansett College outfielder Sal Pestilli first overall. The move makes little sense as the Dynamos already have a highly touted young first baseman in Red Johnson, who was selected second overall last year and Messer, unlike Pestilli who is thought to be close to being big league ready, would certainly require some seasoning in the minors which would not sit well with Detroit Owner Eddie 'Big Money' Thompson. Thompson has put his GM on the hot seat and was a key factor in the club's decision to fire manager Tom Bray last week and replace him with Max Morris, who will act as a player-manager for the club. The expectation here is if Davis continues to push for Messer he will likely find himself joining Bray on the unemployment line as Thompson and his GM seem to be 100% settled on selecting the two-time Christian Trophy winning outfielder. -The Chicago Chiefs have reportedly narrowed their search for a new manager down to three candidates. As mentioned above 66 year old James Gentry decided to retire as skipper after leading the Chiefs to a World Championship earlier this month. No word on who the candidates are yet, but the club is believed to have started the interviewing process and among those speculated to be under consideration is bench coach Joe Ward. The 47 year old Ward has ties to the Chiefs GM as he managed Montreal for 6 plus seasons while both were with the Saints. There is a good chance the Chiefs may go outside the organization which opens the possibility of Ossie Julious ending up in Chicago, however a source close to the teams rules out Julious as a candidate for the Chiefs job. The 63 year old Julious, who recently surpassed George Theobald as the winningest manager in FABL history, is now a free agent after Baltimore elected not to renew his contract. Julious had spent the past 8 seasons as the Cannons bench boss and prior to that was with Toronto from 1906 until joining the Cannons for the 1928 season. My guess is Ossie will not go quietly into retirement and will be pounding the pavement looking for a new gig. If he is successful it may well be in AA or AAA and he will have to bide his time there until a big league club gets restless and fires their manager at some point next season. Julious had spent the past 31 seasons in a big league dugout but with the Chiefs not considering him that leaves only the Philadelphia Keystones as a possible destination. Still in the middle of a complete rebuild but finally some positive signs are showing, the Baltimore Cannons have hired John Lawrence from Class C in Boston's system to take over to replace Julious next year. The 55 year old Lawrence spent a decade as the Cincinnati High School head coach in the old feeder league system before landing in Hattiesburg 3 years ago. He piloted the Top Hats to a Gulf States League title last year. It seems like quite a reach for the Cannons signing a manager who has no experience beyond class C and also never played in the major leagues but perhaps the former minor league pitcher is just a stopgap option to help the Cannons young arms develop. The Philadelphia Keystones are also looking for a new manager after Ted Specter's contract was not renewed following a disappointing 64-90 season. Specter had been the Keystones manager for 3 seasons. One team that is definitely not on the search for a new manager is the Brooklyn Kings who this week signed Powell Slocum to a 4-year extension. Code: HIGHEST PAID MANAGERS Dick Pozza Montreal $28,954 Jim Wilson Cleveland $10,000 Ed Ziehl NY Gothams $9,384 Dan Andrew Pittsburgh $9,356* Bill Craigen NY Stars $8,808 walt Bailey Chi Cougars $8,214 Powell Slocum Brooklyn $7,552* Hank Leitke Toronto $7,500 recently signed extension __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal* The Scripture of Sports

05-14-2021, 04:53 PM	#153
Tiger Fan Hall Of Famer Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Ontario Canada Posts: 9,712	I will alert the sports editor of The Philadelphia Record to print a retraction. __________________ Cliff Markle HOB1 greatest pitcher 360-160, 9 Welch Awards, 11 WS titles

05-15-2021, 02:11 PM	#154
gstatman Minors (Rookie Ball) Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: Northern New Jersey Posts: 24	You'll have to excuse the writers over at the Philly Record. It's the tabloid paper in town. The Philadelphia Inquisitor is the paper for the discerning reader! __________________ Figment League Baseball: Philadelphia Keystones (1926-) Mythic League Baseball: Philadelphia Keystones (1886-) OOTP Dynasty Reports: At the Keystone: The Philadelphia Keystones of the FABL Greatest Team Tournament

05-15-2021, 09:26 PM	#155
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	1936 FABL draft : First round update THIS WEEK IN FABL BASEBALL DRAFT DAY! This has traditionally been the most exciting day in Figment Baseball but the draft as we know will be changing going forward. To start with this will be the final off-season draft as FABL has decided to move it's annual player selection day to the middle of June, which fits better with the college and high school seasons finishing up right about that time. To accommodate this the lowest minor league level which is usually heavily stocked with the most recent draft picks, will delay the start of it's season until shortly after the draft is completed. The other big news is a major change to the format necessitated by the Mock Draft in the game. It has been determined and is clear to see in any solo testing that the mock draft is far too accurately predicting who has the best potential. That might work fine in a league with full ratings visible but it is a death knell to the enjoyment playing stats only brings the league members. As a result it has been determined a lottery system will determine the future destination of players ranked in the first two rounds of the mock draft and normal drafting will resume with round three. Ideally, the OOTP development team listens to our request to make the mock draft an option you could toggle on or off, similar to scouting or storylines. So big changes ahead for the draft starting in June but let's not overlook all the excitement as the 1936 draft begins. The opening pick was well known as, despite some late wavering by some of their scouts, the Detroit Dynamos had long ago decided that Sal Pestilli would go number one. Pestilli, who's older brother Alf was a fourth round pick in 1934, won a pair of Christian Trophy's as the college baseball player of the year. That is a honour that has only been accomplished once before as Bill Moore was the player of the year in both 1931 and 1932. Moore will not become a teammate of Pestilli's however, as he was recently traded from Detroit to Cleveland in the deal that brought Max Morris and Leon Drake to the Dynamos. Pestilli becomes the second player ever selected first overall by Detroit and like 1925 first overall pick Al Wheeler, he is an outfielder. Seven times in total an outfielder has gone first overall, but Pestilli is the first since Montreal took Cliff Moss in 1927. As for Sal, Pestilli's .3801 is the highest career college batting average in history (including feeders). Pestilli also rankes 7th alltime in career hits by a college player with 260. The leader is Walt Mullen, who had 281 for Sadler between 1930-33. Pestilli's RBI total of 171 also puts him comfortably in the top ten. Here are the top 10 in career batting average, hits and rbi's. There was not a flurry of draft day trades but some deals were made with the biggest one being the New York Gothams sending the fifth and 13th picks to Baltimore for the second overall selection. It had been long speculated that the Cannons were set to draft Maryland native Walt Messer with the pick but the rebuilding Cannons decided two later first round selections were preferable to the 2 time Adwell Trophy Award winner who grew up not far from Baltimore's Banner Field and attended many Cannons games as a child. "It was a little disappointing," admitted Messer after hearing about the trade, "but it will be a thrill to try and one day play for such a successful franchise as the Gothams." The move reportedly backfired slightly on the Cannons as they are said to have had their sights firmly set on California high school second baseman Billy Woytek but the Philadelphia Keystones snapped him up at #3 leaving the Cannons with a pair of outfielders for their two picks in Gates University centerfielder Al Jennings, who was ranked 4th in the mock draft, and Mike T. Taylor, a high school corner outfielder from University Military Academy in Mobile, Alabama. Unlike each of the previous four years, when pitchers went number one, the first hurler of the 1936 draft did not hear his name called until the fourth selection when the New York Stars selected highly touted St Paul, Minnesota high school lefthander Johnnie Jones. In all, six pitchers were selected in the first round, along with 5 outfielders and five infielders. The biggest surprise of the opening round was Toronto's decision to draft third baseman Joe Kleinman out of Coastal New Jersey College with the 10th pick. Kleinman is an exceptional defender but there are concerns about whether he can hit enough as a pro to play regularly, which caused him to not appear in the mock draft. Like the Gothams and Cannons, the Toronto Wolves had a pair of first round picks with their second one coming from a draft day trade with the Brooklyn Kings. The deal sent 20 year old minor league pitcher Jack Goff, who was 13-7 at Class A this season and ranked #80 on the top prospect lists to Brooklyn for the 16th and final pick of the opening round. The Kings had been after Goff ever since Toronto selected him in the second round of the 1934 draft. Goff is the son of former Kings pitcher and current bench coach Danny Goff. With the pick Toronto selected pitcher Jim Morrison, a 21 year old who was 8-4 for Indiana A&M this season. Morrison, who relies primarily on a sharp curve ball, has the makings of a future ace according to OSA. Here is the first round of the 1936 draft. OTHER NOTES While the primary focus was squarely on the draft there is some non-draft news out of Detroit. The winningest manager in FABL history has landed a new job after his contract was not renewed by Baltimore. Ossie Julious, who has managed in more FABL games than anyone in history has found new employment sitting next to Dynamo player/manager Max Morris as the Dynamo’s new bench coach. Detroit World columnist Fast Freddie Farhat broke the news stating "the feeling was that Morris would benefit from the veteran Julious sitting next to him." I can't imagine a better spot for the game's greatest power hitter to fine tune his managerial skills. Not only will he have Julious to lean on for advice, but also George Theobald. Theobald has won 8 pennants as a manager, more than anyone else in the game, and is second to Julious in both wins and total games managed. Theobald is not on the bench in Detroit, but is with the organization as a special advisor to the club and you can be sure that Morris will be bending his ear for some pointers. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-18-2021, 11:33 PM	#156
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	December 9, 1936 THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL December 9, 1936 POST-DRAFT EDITION The last December draft in Figment baseball has been completed. The good news for those teams who did not feel as happy as they hoped with their haul this time around is they will get to do it all over again in six month as the league transitions to a June draft. Here are some of my thoughts after observing the 1936 draft and then we will hear from some local newspapers on drafts for their individual clubs. BEST DRAFT CLASS - Hands down it is the New York Gothams but when you consider it felt like they owned half the picks in the first 3 rounds they better have come away with a big haul. The Gothams might have gutted a championship club last summer but they used many of the proceeds from that fire sale to restock their cupboard. The biggest move of the draft was the Gothams trading the 5th and 13th picks of the first round to move up to number two and select high school phenom Walt Messer. Messer, who many feel could one day be as good as Keystone superstar Rankin Kellogg, was just one of 3 first round picks the Gothams ended up with. New York not only picked up the second best position player available but they also got the second best pitcher, at least according to the mock draft, when they landed 20 year old lefthander Bunny Edwards, who was 20-5 over 3 seasons at Red River State, with the 7th pick. Add in Fred Vargas and Ed Stoddard, a pair of corner outfielders both ranked in the top ten of the mock, and the Gothams draft was a homerun. MOST QUESTIONABLE FIRST ROUND SELECTION- The Toronto Wolves left a lot of GM's asking their scouting directors if they missed something after Toronto grabbed third baseman Joe Kleinman 10th overall. Kleinman, who played at Coastal New Jersey College, was not listed in OSA's five round mock draft. He was very consistent over his three seasons of college ball with the Seahawks, hitting .303 over 165 games. He is an outstanding defensive third baseman who could possibly handle a shift to second or perhaps even shortstop, but the question is will he be consistent enough at the plate. The Wolves might know something the rest of the league doesn't but right now it feels like Kleinman was a big reach. Toronto did end up with a pair of first rounders after dealing minor leaguer Jack Goff to Brooklyn in exchange for the 16th overall selection. It was used on Jim Morrison, a high ceiling 21 year old lefthander who won 21 games the past 3 seasons for Indiana A&M. He is a groundball pitcher with 5 offerings including a terrific curve ball and OSA feels he has a golden arm and should be a top of the rotation pitcher. TEAMMATES DRAFTED: The top pair of drafted college teammates this year were Jake Creel and Joe Zell, double-play partners from Ferguson College in Greenville, North Carolina. Each was listed as a first round prospect in the mock draft but only Creel, at 12 to Cleveland, was taken in the first. Zell was the 18th pick as Baltimore grabbed him with the second selection of round two. Zell started 181 games over three seasons and boasts a .277 batting average. He was ranked 11th in the mock draft, two spots ahead of Creel, who played two seasons for the Wildcats and hit .271. Ferguson has done a pretty good job producing middle infielders as shortstop Bill Smith was a fifth round pick of Montreal in 1934 and is coming off a decent season at Class B Mobile while last year Ferguson alum Larry Bartlett was taken by St Louis in the 15th round. The second baseman hit .311 this past season as a rookie pro at Class A Hartford. Two high schools also had middle infield duo drafted. The Henry Snyder Tigers in Jersey City, New Jersey saw second baseman Ted Brown selected by Montreal in the third round while his doubleplay partner Lee Scott went one round later to the Chicago Cougars. Brown hit .547 with 4 homeruns 26 games as a senior and has committed to Chesapeake State while shortstop Scott hit .455 with 3 homers. Scott will go to Oklahoma City State if the Cougars do not convince him to turn pro. The Cougars also grabbed half of the Milligan College High School duo as they selected Eddie Curtis from the Memphis, Tennessee school in the 7th round. Milligan's Tommy Mickens went 15 picks earlier to the New York Stars. Curtis, a shortstop nicknamed 'Slick Eddie' , is a three year starter with a .503 batting average while second baseman Mickens also started for three seasons and has a .440 career high school batting average. WHAT THE LOCAL REPORTS ARE SAYING: Various comments on the draft courtesy of hometown news sources NEW YORK GOTHAMS - New York is abuzz with the news they club drafted both the number 2 ranked hitter and second ranked pitcher this week. The Gothams obviously have a lot of new players in their system with all of the extra picks and they have high expectations for their early picks but they also hope the sheer volume of middle round picks will yield a few gems and make their minor league system much stronger. Getting both Messer and Edwards is huge. Plus Vargas and Stoddard were pretty highly thought of corner outfielders by the mock. The Gothams scouting team had the four them ranked 3, 5, 7, 10 on their draft board. PHILADELPHIA KEYSTONES (excerpt from an interview with Keystones Scouting Director Harry Dunn as published in the Philadelphia Inquisitor)- The Keystones had a very high pick for the first time in a while and needed to hit on it. We have a propensity for adding pitchers to the organization, so Dunn was resisting the urge. The scouting team was very high on Bunny Edwards and the only available player above him on his list was Billy Woytek. Philadelphia had taken a second baseman first overall right before the human GM-era, Howie Shifflett, and the returns on that pick have been okay (not a home run, more of a double). I was a little reticent to use the pick on a second baseman, but he reportedly has the tools and my top prospect at second base, Marshall Strickland, took a slight step back, so he might not be a future stalwart for the Keystones that I thought he would be at that position. Austin Moore came on, but Woytek is a player that might eclipse both after his first minor league season. Beyond Woytek, the Keystones were happy to nab Hank Beckman, as he was the last in the tier on my list. Hans Wright may be the first prospect to find himself in a post-Kellogg Keystones lineup. Frank Bennet is a player who can play all three outfield positions, as well as both corner infield spots. The Keystones also dealt for Pete Asher from the Cougars for a 7th-rounder. Asher will put some pressure on Bob Cleveland at short and Shifflett and Cy Cox at second base in Spring Training. He'll definitely have an inside track on making the club, but the question is whether he will make the club at the expense of either Cleveland, Shifflett, Cox or Steve Summers. No local picks in the first 9 picks, which the Keystones usually like to have at least one from the Delaware Valley. BOSTON MINUTEMEN(from an article in the Boston Record) - Boston was picking from the 11th position for most of the draft. When you are in that spot you really have to play the wait and see game. A lot of guys that we coveted were simply taken before it was Boston's turn to select. Our first pick of the day was 3B Denny Andrews. Andrews, who was the 5th rated prospect on scout Johnny Robards list, and 7th on the OSA Mock List, fell all the way to Boston thanks to a run on pitchers. Andrews has shown hints of having the raw power that organizations covet out of a corner infield spot. If anyone remembers the Minutemen took Mack Sutton who also plays 3B with their first pick from last years draft. The organization does not let things like that bother them as competition breeds greatness and trade chips. Without a second round pick the Minutemen sat pat until they picked twice in the 3rd round. Cal Howe is a college outfielder with a very high upside according to OSA. He doesn't have the raw power that Boston was looking for but he was great at getting on base in three college seasons. the second 3rd round pick was C Bob Artesan out of Midvale HS in Utah. The idea here is that Artesan can be paired with another 1st round pick from a year ago in Bill Van Ness (Boston's top prospect as of this writing) to form a formidable 1-2 punch behind the dish. 4th round selection Si "the Rock of Rochester" Crocker showcased one of the best power bats in all of the HS prospects available. If Crocker can hit for any average at all his power will make him a player of note in the Boston organization. In rounds 5-8 Boston did their own run on starting arms. Generally speaking, Boston like to draft pitchers that have more than three pitches in their arsenal. However Boston had to deviate slightly from that plan based on some favorable scouting report for 6th round selection Joe Sargent who OSA feels can develop into a mid-rotation piece. Aside from Sargent, 5th round selection Johnny Coon, 7th round selection Tom Martin and 8th round choice Edsel Jones all feature a variety of offerings. Last season Boston was very good (or lucky) with all of their mid round pitching selections as the C level Hattiesburg staff dominated posting a team SP ERA of 2.54 and leading the Hatters to 103 victories on the season. The whole pitching staff will be promoted so replacements were needed. With the last two picks of the day Boston went with Jim Hill who could play 5 different positions giving whatever manager gets him some options and Jim Kline a slick fielding SS that will need the bat to develop if he is going to hang around for more than a year. MONTREAL SAINTS (courtesy of the Montreal Star quotes from Saints scouting director Fred Rowe) - I love drafting in Figment- mainly because of the variance for folks based on scouts and not having those stars. Sure, there is a good deal of similarity in that who did not have Pestilli #1 or at lest top 3 and a few others at the top, but then from there it gets interesting fast. For instance, at 8 in the draft, Montréal was able to draft our scout's picks 10, 12, 16, 20, and 24 and we are real happy with Doyle in the first round. Doyle would be pitcher Wally Doyle, who was the fourth pitcher selected in the draft at 8th overall. The 18 year old lefthander was 9-1 for Waco High School in Texas this season and his 29 career high school wins ties him for the fifth most all-time. OSA feels Doyle could easily front a team's rotation and he has great raw stuff but needs work on his command. CHICAGO CHIEFS- (from the Chicago Daily News) With no first round pick due to the trade that brought Rabbit Day and a World Championship to Whitney Park the Chiefs primary focus was collecting a bunch of high school arms with their mid-round selections. The organization likes to lean towards ground ball pitchers and they added Bob Ferraiuolo (round 3), Jim Fitts (round 7), George Scruggs (round 8), Nelson Bailey (round 9) and Jim Taylor (round 10). The 3rd rounder, Ferraiuolo is a sidearm pitcher out of Grafton University but like the others specializes in ground balls. Bailey is a local kid who was 8-3 for Lake Zurich in his only season of high school ball. BROOKLYN KINGS(press release from Kings Scouting Director John Spears)- We feel trading our first round pick for Jack Goff was a nice safe option. The son of former Kings pitching legend and current bench coach Danny Goff, Jack is just 20 years old and has two injury free minor league seasons under his belt as a top 100 prospect. We might have got a higher ceiling guy such as Jim Morrison that Toronto took with the pick had we kept it, but that comes with perhaps more risk as well. Not picking until the 5th round doesn’t give us much to choose from so we gambled on Manny Franco maybe putting things together at one point and reclaiming the ability that earned him High school All American status as a junior before regressing this past season. Franco is also a local kid, having pitched for Old Westbury High on Long Island. Other than that we obviously didn’t get much. Maybe Roger Landry’s cousin develops and hopefully the curse is lifted with our selection of Ferdinand Hawkins grandson Ian Weber in the 9th round. OTHER NOTES CHIEFS FIND THEIR MAN The Chicago Chiefs have announced that bench coach Joe Ward has been named as the new manager, with Dolph Geis being added as the bench coach. Prior to being brought in as the bench coach in Chicago last season, Ward had spent 7 seasons as the manager in Montreal, compiling a 481-532 record. Geis--a former Pittsburgh outfielder--spent 1936 managing Salem in the COW League. The job with the World Champions became open when 66 year old James Gentry decided to retire as skipper and go out as a winner. Rumour has it Ward was not their first choice as the Chiefs had unsuccessfully tried to lure coaches from several other organizations but, surprisingly, none jumped at the opportunity to take over a championship team. One of those said to be under consideration was Brooklyn Kings pitching coach Bill Libby, but he reportedly turned down the offer because he had recently signed a 3 year extension with the Kings. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-24-2021, 02:56 PM	#157
Jiggs McGee All Star Reserve Join Date: Dec 2019 Posts: 677	This Week in Figment Baseball March 8, 1937 THIS WEEK IN FIGMENT BASEBALL March 8, 1937 HALL OF FAME ANNOUNCES ORIGINAL INDUCTEES While everyone might have a personal favourite or two they believe warrant inclusion it is hard to dispute the case for any of the five who will comprise the first class. Here is a look at each of them. ALLAN ALLEN (1890-1909 Cougars, Toronto, Cleveland) Double Al is the greatest pitcher of all-time, so good that the trophy awarded to the top pitcher in each circuit every season is named after him. Had the award been around when he was a player Allen may well have won over a dozen of them. He won a record 514 games in his career and is the all-time leader in a number of categories including games and innings pitched. MAX MORRIS 1914-present Cleveland, St Louis, Gothams, Detroit Might Mo revolutionized the game and to his credit he is the only active player inducted in to the Hall. He is best known for his power, as his 702 homeruns and counting are 259 more than the second player on the list. Morris is also one of only three players (fellow 1937 HOF class members Powell Slocum and John Dibblee are the others) to surpass the 3,500 hit plateau. He owns a record 8 Whitney Awards as the league's top hitter and now, after an off-season trade to Detroit, will try his hand at managing while also finishing out his playing career with the Dynamos. CHARLIE SIS 1903-1921 St Louis, Toronto Only Double Al won more than the 395 victories Sis posted over his stellar career. He is the all-time leader in career strikeouts and one of just 2 pitchers to top the 3,000 mark. Sis' 94 shutouts are also a FABL record POWELL SLOCUM 1905-1925 Baltimore, Brooklyn The career batting average and hits leader won 15 batting titles and 4 Whitney Awards in his career. His .435 average in 1913 is the highest single season total in FABL history and he has more career singles (3194) than all but 7 players have hits in their career. He has had two stints as a manager with Brooklyn and led the Kings to the Continental Association pennant this past season. JOHN WAGGONER 1897-1914 Stars, Gothams His 194.4 is the highest career WAR in FABL history and Waggoner is 7th all-time with 3,207 hits. He never won a batting title or led his association in a triple crown category but he led in doubles 4 times, stolen bases twice and triples once and was a key member of 3 World Championship New York Stars teams in the first decade of this century. SO WHO IS NEXT? The Hall has confirmed that 4 players will be added next season as well as a manager and a builder. The builder will quite clearly be league founder William Whitney but the names of the other inductees will cause some speculation. This reporter expects the manager will be George Theobald, who led Boston and Detroit to a total of 8 Federal Association pennants and 4 World Championship Series victories. The other possible candidate is Ossie Julious, who recently passed Theobald to become the all-time leader in games managed and career victories. Julious won his only World Championship with Toronto in 1911 on a team that featured Hall of Famer Charlie Sis. He also managed Baltimore before leaving the Cannons this season to take a job as the bench coach (with Hall of Famer Max Morris as a first year manager) in Detroit. Theobald is also a part of the Dynamos organization as a consultant to owner Eddie "Big Money" Thompson. The players under consideration for the second group of inductees are said to Ed Ziehl, John Dibblee, Jack Arabian, Zebulon Banks, Woody Trease, Mike Marner, Calvin Kidd and Joe Ward. The expectation is the voting will be open to members of the media beginning with the class prior to the 1939 season. __________________ Lead Columnist of The Figment Sporting Journal The Scripture of Sports

05-24-2021, 03:22 PM	#158
LordTC Major Leagues Join Date: Aug 2009 Posts: 476	Really enjoyed this. Thanks for putting the work in. __________________ Baseball RPG from 1871 on: https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=328549 Signup for Multiplayer Baseball RPG: https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=328705