Other Reality Baseball 2- Expansion Era Historical League with a Twist!

[Recte44]

Full League Name (Initials): Other Reality Baseball 2 (ORB2)
Main URL: Other Reality Baseball 2
Reports URL: BNN Home Page
Boards URL: Other Reality Baseball 2 Forums
Commissioner(s) OOTP Forum Username(s): Matt Rectenwald (Recte44)
Email Address: mrectenwald@gmail.com
OOTP Version: OOTP11
Game Needed: Required
Players: Historical (but not recalc'd)
# of Teams: 24 (We are planning to expand in years that MLB did)
Export Deadlines Days And Times: Tue, Thu, Sun 8am or pm Central (depends on my fluctuating schedule)
League Time Per Sim: 15 days (2 sims per one in game month)
First Season: 1962
Latest Season: 1975
Special Rules & Settings: This is an active WRITING league, please read the Constitution fully before signing up. NO fly by night owners please. These are hardened veterans of online leagues, if you're new and feel you can give a great effort and online presence, by all means apply. So what's the twist??? Each season we bring in "defectors", which are foreign stars. We also have a "Scout a Minor-Leaguer" program which uses the Minor League Baseball Reference to bring in players who never made the bigs but will get the shot in our alternate reality.
Currently Available Teams: Baltimore Orioles

[Recte44]

We're in the offseason of 1974-1975, just getting into the Free Agency Period, and having now SWITCHED TO OOTP11!!!

We have one opening.



The New York Mets were one of the ORB2's best teams throughout most of the late 60's and early 70's. Recently, they've come on some hard times and their longterm GM hasn't had his eye on the ball.

However, they do have some really nice pieces to start rebuilding their dynasty with. It all starts with Ed Kranepool. Now just 30, he's well on his way to being one of the all-time greats in the game's history. 2B Joe Morgan and SS Bobby Murcer are nice complimentary pieces as well.

On the hill, the Mets have Tom Seaver and Don Sutton but will need to fill the void created when long time ace Sandy Koufax recently retired.

Interested??? Register for our forums (see top post in this thread) and then PM me here with your username. We'll go from there!!!

[mavericktango]

Good league, active GM's and commish who knows his stuff. Well worth joining

[Recte44]

Looking now for a GM for the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Pirates haven't had a real active GM for a couple of seasons now, so if you're looking for a rebuild challenge this is a good one.



Pittsburgh Pirates

The Pirates, even without much direction, went 79-83 last season. They won the ORB2 Championship in 1964, but have largely been a ".500" squad throughout the 1970's to date.

Veteran power hitter Al "The Bull" Ferrera is the best player on the team, or in the situation currently, the best trade chip on the team. Actually there's quite a bit of young talent on the club so this is far from a barren wasteland. Guys like CF Mickey Rivers, 2B Rennie Stennett and 1B Bob Watson give the new GM a head start in revamping the everyday lineup.

On the mound, 29 year old Jim Palmer is the leader of a very mediocre crew. Scipio Spinks has also had his moments during his young career, and Ron Reed is a valuable workhorse. The bullpen is what the young kids call "a hot mess" and isn't worth my time to talk about.

Interested??? Register for our forums (see top post in this thread) and then PM me here with your username. We'll go from there!!!

[Recte44]

The Chicago Cubs

This is a plum opening for a prospective GM, being the first time in ORB2 history that this franchise has become available. I figure this one will be easy to fill given the large amount of Cubs fans and so I will take my time and find the ideal candidate. Our league is a writing league, which means we require a minimum of article writing each season, and we're looking for a long term GM to become a part of our community. The previous GM had been with us since the start of this league (1962 season). His business becoming more and more successful, he finally decided to leave the league not because he wanted to, but to be fair to the activity levels of our league. That's the kind of person we're looking for.

That being said, let's take a look at the Cubs situation.

They broke the curse in 1965, so there's none of that nonsense to deal with in this reality. As for recent history, the Cubs have been treading water. Since the 1965 season, they've only had a winning record twice and haven't made the playoffs. (Franchise History)

This current team started the first sim 6-4 and a half game behind the NL East leading Pittsburgh Pirates.

Offensively, they are led by 3B Bill Madlock. This 24 year old has been a dynamo since the Cubs took him 3rd overall in 1972. Looking at the rest of the lineup, the Cubs have collected a nice group of young talent and this isn't a horrific situation at all, in fact, it's quite a desirable one.

THe pitching staff, however, is another story. All of the Cubs issues lie here, and will need to be the first order of business for the new GM. Vida Blue would be a #3 or #4 innings eater type on a good club, but in the "friendly confines" he's the ace. He struggles with control too much to take advantage of this great stuff. movement, and three plus pitches. Ken Forsch, the 2nd overall pick in 1969, took a huge step backwards last year and it remains to be seen if he'll be anything more than a back of the rotation guy at this point.

Financially, the club is in good shape, not having spent a lot of money in recent history and posting profits. They have nearly 1/2 of their current budget available, so if a new GM wanted to be aggressive in trades they could probably turn this club into an instant Wild Card contender (though with Philadelphia being an absolute juggernaut that probably would be ill advised and short sighted).

Interested? Think you're the guy we're looking for??? Register for our forums (see top post in this thread) and then PM me here with your username. We'll go from there!!!

[Recte44]

The 1975 Cubs - Lean Years in Wrigley

by Arch Stanton on Mon Jun 07, 2010 5:55 pm

Ten years ago, the Chicago Cubs completed the ultimate dream season, going from 69-93 to 100-62 and World Series champions. Happy days, it seemed, were indeed here again.

It was not to be. 1966 saw the Cubs barely miss the playoffs. 1967 saw them fall back to a losing record. The subsequent years have resulted in more of the same: more losses, more of the eternal struggle to maintain their revenue stream, more of what fans saw in the 40s and 50s. Original GM Nick Porcaro almost walked away from the team, but was persuaded to stay by Official Selig Puppet Matt Rectenwald. The question in front of us is...what kind of hand does Nick have to play in 1975? Can the Cubs return to their (brief) glory day(s)? Read on.

The GM

Seven owners are listed on the OOTP Managers page as having run their team for the entire history of the league: Porcaro, Rectenwald, Lyons ( :cry: ), Lynchy, LEE,,,,,, Chris "I'm The Original Chris" Wilson, and Chris "NO, I AM!" Ramsey. Of those seven, Nick has the worst record (1003-1103). However, only three of them have a World Series flag flying, and Nick is obviously in that group, so I think most of us would say :gimme: to a title and some bad seasons on either side of it.

Nick is smart, nice, writes great stuff when motivated, and manages to take pictures of teenage girls without giving off any creepy vibes. Who can dislike that?

The Offseason

The Cubs signed Lou Brock (who is not Lou Brock anymore), Jose Cardenal (who is not even what Lou Brock is now), and...Koichi Tabuchi. The first two don't matter, but the third one is interesting. Tabuchi is a Japanese import who hits about two doubles a month, but that's because he's busy trying to 8-iron a ball into the bleachers. His batting average is going to be bad, but if he can hit 30 HR a year, you can make a case that there's some value in that. In fact, the Cubs have become obsessed with catchers. They had five in Spring Training, and then signed two in March while claiming another one off waivers. I'm not sure what you can do with eight catchers, except for having seven people around to second guess the pitch calling of the starter. But I digress.

Offense

Bill Madlock is Tony Torchia without the Rectehacking, a base-hitting, standing-on-first-base-taking-off-his-batting-glove-while-smiling machine of a hitter. The front office hates to think to the future, however, because Madlock is obsessed with winning and money, and the Cubs are in short supply of both. Even a rich arbitration contract isn't going to make Madlock happy. He wants to get paid. Let's not dwell on that...I believe Nick is now taking pictures of bottles of cheap vodka and sending them to Fake Madlock in order to express his misery.

Cliff Johnson is another interesting story. He is one of the best representatives of the Three True Outcomes we have in this league; in fact, last year he led the NL in both HR and K. Add in 85 walks and double digit HBP totals, and you have a 40 homer guy with a .373 career OBP. In case you're not completely sold on him, he's perfectly happy with a decent salary and he's quite popular with the fans. (He can also play catcher, which means they have nine. Is this the new Billy Beane strategy?)

Ollie Brown, who looks like he just smelled a fart,

is a step below Madlock and Johnson. He's also hitting home runs (59 in the last two seasons), but his overall offense production is only slightly above average. The rest of the offense is not as impressive. Superjew has added value to the team by being sent home when lefties are pitching, and 1st round pick Denny Walling should add some batting average (albeit relatively empty from an OPS standpoint).

Having said that, there are three more players who deserve mentioning, even if it's only in the Ripley's Believe It Or Not category. Roger Freed mauled AAA pitching for two and a half years before the Cubs called him up, and he appears to be well-suited to a decent career as a corner OF/DH/pinch hitter. Davey Johnson has the most consistent career I think I've ever seen in this game. Last - and least - Dusty Baker is my least favorite person in the history of baseball. You can keep your racists and your adulterers and your cheaters. Give me Dusty.

Pitching

The rotation is bad. I didn't want to say it, but any credibility I might have in this piece would be dashed if I tried to pretend that the Cubs' starting pitchers were somehow a viable group. They're not. Vida Blue is the ace. His career ERA+ is 99. ops: Ken Forsch and Claude Osteen have identical 4/8/8 ratings, and both are heavily dependent on the defense behind them to keep them in games. Last year, Forsch had a BABIP of .340; Osteen's was .320. That's bad. After that, it gets worse, so let's stop there.

The closer is Dave Tomlin, who again has those 4/8/8 ratings. In his case, however, he has received good defense and helps himself out by holding runners well and fielding his position like a shortstop. If the 9th inning defense holds up, he'll have a great career; if not, he'll still be solid. The rest of the bullpen is a mess. Rawly Eastwick should be effective, but the rest of them are best left to their anonymity. My vote - since I obviously know what I'm doing - would be to add an arm (or two or three) when the Great Mass of Humanity hits the waiver wire after the first sim. They'll be needed in the 6th and 7th innings if the Cubs want to carry any leads to Eastwick and Tomlin.

Defense

Unspectacular. Johnson and Tito Fuentes are excellent middle infielders, but neither one can hit. Madlock is currently split between 2B and 3B, and he's underqualified for both. The outfield defense is solid, with great work in CF and Brown's cannon arm (16 assists last year) in RF. The problem with this defense is that Chicago really needs elite fielding to protect Forsch, Osteen, and Tomlin, and they don't have it. If the pitching staff was more strikeout-heavy, there wouldn't be a problem. Unfortunately, there are going to be lots of plays to be made, and these guys are going to not be able to make all the grabs they need.

Outlook

Full disclosure: I've been a Cubs fan all my life. I have a Cubs tattoo above my left ankle. Even though I'm writing about an imaginary Cubs team, I still hate to say that they're not very good. There are some good pieces here. I like the reclamation projects (Epstein), the great human interest stories (Freed), and the owner trying to pull it all together. I want to say that the Cubs are going to surprise people, that they might nip at the heels of the insanely ridiculous Phillies for a while before settling for a wildcard berth.

But I just don't see it. Nick, we're glad you stayed, and we hope you stick around for years to come, but 1975 probably isn't going to make you feel any better than 1974 did.

74-88, 5th in the NL East.

[Recte44]

Come get the Cubbies!!!

[Recte44]

Still looking to grab a Cubs GM!

[Recte44]

Currently have the Baltimore Orioles opening up. Any interested parties, please PM me here for more info!

[7teen]

The revolving door that is the Orioles and the Pirates are once again open. The Orioles made the post-season last year but have suffered this season due to a lack of participation by their owner.

The Pirates have been around .500 the past few seasons, but have suffered from a lack of consistency.

Sign up and claim one of these two teams. We really need someone willing to stick around for a while and straighten these two teams out!

[KCCardinalFan]

This is a fantastic league that has a lot of dedicated owners, and many orginal owners. Active forums and an always active trade market, this is a great league for anyone that loves historical baseball!

[tharpri]

I would be interested in the Pirates.
I have played OOTP for years and enjoy historical leagues best.
cincinnati.rick@gmail.com