[fhomess]

September 1, 1877
The Brown Stockings extended their lead to a rather formidable seven games over the second place Red Caps, who managed just 3 wins in August. Boston’s decline has come on the heels of an incredibly disappointing season from the offense, which has just one batter hitting over .300. St. Louis has been dominating in all aspects of the game, leading the league in runs scored and runs allowed.

However, the big news of discussion in August comes amidst rumors of possible game fixing by various players of the Louisville Grays. While no names have come to the forefront, the team has played unexpectedly poor in certain games over the past month, leading to speculation among fans and other teams.

In Other News
Aug 1: St. Louis’ Jack Anderson shuts out the Louisville Grays on 6 hits.

Aug 6: National League rules require the home team to submit 3 names of approved local men as a possible umpire for each game, with the visiting team choosing one of them at random. For their game in Louisville, Chicago pulls out the name Dan Devinney, who some believe to be in the pay of the Grays. After examining the other names, Chicago finds that all three names were identical. After demanding a new umpire, the White Stockings go on to shut out the Grays on 3 hits behind a masterful pitching performance by starter Joe Gotcher.

Aug 11: Louisville gets shut out for the third time this month. This time it’s a 5 hit shutout by Gotcher and the White Stockings. Suspicion begins to circulate that the Grays are giving less than their best effort.

Aug 18: The first game in National League history in which no runs were scored during the first 9 innings of play takes place. St. Louis pitcher John Zackery and Chicago pitcher Bill Johnson duel to a scoreless draw after the standard 9 innings are complete. Bob Brose of the Brown Stockings leads off the 10th with a triple, and will score on a single by Jack Miller. Miller will, in turn, score on a single by Fred Kron to give St. Louis a 2-0 lead. Zackery finishes off the White Stockings in the bottom half of the inning for the shutout.

Aug 20: Louisville director Charles E. Chase receives an anonymous telegram saying that “something is wrong with the Louisville players” and that gamblers were betting on Hartford. The Dark Blues go on to score 10 runs in the 2nd inning while the Grays commit 6 errors in a 16-3 Hartford win.

Aug 21: Hartford defeats Louisville for the second consecutive game, this time by a score of 10-1 as the Grays commit 5 errors. Louisville leaves 22 men on base in the game.

Aug 23: After Louisville catcher Frank McMichan is injured on a play at the plate, Steve Tucker takes his place behind the dish with a mask on.

Aug 25: Louisville heads to Boston to face the Red Caps, and despite taking leads in the 8th and 9th innings, Boston rallies to tie each time. The Red Caps then score a run in the bottom of the 10th for the win. The Grays committed 7 errors over those final 3 innings.

Standings

                             W      L      PCT       GB
St. Louis Brown Stockings   31     13     .705        -
Boston Red Caps             26     22     .542      7.0
Cincinnati Reds             21     22     .488      9.5
Chicago White Stockings     20     23     .465     10.5
Louisville Grays            22     26     .458     11.0
Hartford Dark Blues         17     31     .354     16.0

League Leaders
Average
.352 Bob Polansky (STL)
.341 Tom Childers (CHW)
.328 Mike Stanley (STL)

Total Bases
93 Bob Polansky (STL)
86 Henry Rasnick (LOU)
81 Jim Linhart (HAR)

Stolen Bases

13 Fred Mannion (BOS)
11 Jim Heyman (HAR)
11 John Nero (CHW)

ERA
1.88 Jack Anderson (STL)
2.04 John Zackery (STL)
2.06 Bill Johnson (CHW)

Wins

18 John Storey (BOS)
13 Bill Johnson (CHW)
12 Jack Anderson (STL), John Zackery (STL)

Strikeouts
67 John Storey (BOS)
58 Joe Bormann (CIN)
50 John Zackery (STL)

[fhomess]

October 7, 1877
The St. Louis Brown Stockings took the pennant after Boston was unable to take advantage of some head to head match-ups. The large lead they had developed earlier in the season seems to have come into play, as St. Louis won just 2 of their last 8 games. One of the keys to St. Louis’ season appears to have been a new strategy in which the team employed two regular starting pitchers. Both Jack Anderson and John Zackery got regular turns to start games for the team, and while other teams started pitchers other than their regular starter, only the Brown Stockings regularly alternated between the two.

The Louisville Grays continued to be mired in accusations of game fixing, both in league games and in non-league match-ups. The surprise of the latter part of the season was that floundering Cincinnati suddenly found themselves in 2nd place by the time all was said and done. The key was a three game set with the Grays from September 6 through 8. The Grays were favored on paper, but the Reds managed to win under some suspicious circumstances. In addition, the Reds were partly responsible for St. Louis’ poor stretch to end the year. Cincinnati took all four contests against the Brown Stockings after the Brown Stockings had clinched the pennant.

In Other News
Sep 4: Boston and St. Louis meet for the first of their final 4 meetings with the Brown Stockigns up 7 games in the standings. The Red Caps commit 8 errors en route to a 16-5 loss to St. Louis.

Sep 5: Pat Denton and Jack Waldrop of the Louisville Grays agree to throw their next game in Cincinnati for $25 each. Both commit errors that lead directly to Cincinnati runs. Both also go hitless as the Grays lose to the Reds 4-2.

Sep 5: Oglala Sioux chief Crazy Horse is killed by a guard at Fort Robinson, Nebraska.

Sep 6: Boston’s John Storey wins his 20th game of the season by beating the St. Louis Brown Stockings 5-4.

Sep 13: Boston’s John Storey shuts out the Brown Stockings on 4 hits, but the Red Caps are still 6.5 games behind the league leaders.

Sep 15: St. Louis beats Boston to clinch the pennant. In a hotly contested game that saw the Brown Stockings stay just a run or two ahead of the Red Caps throughout the whole game, finally winning by a score of 8-7.

Sep 25: Louisville newspaper reporter John Haldeman charges Denton and Waldrop of the Grays with throwing the previous day’s exhibition against Indianapolis. The two later admit this to the club’s directors.

Standings

                             W      L      PCT      GB
St. Louis Brown Stockings   37     23     .617       -
Cincinnati Reds             31     27     .534     5.0
Boston Red Caps             32     29     .525     5.5
Chicago White Stockings     29     31     .483     8.0
Louisville Grays            27     34     .443    10.5
Hartford Dark Blues         24     36     .400    13.0

League Leaders
Average

.353 John Nero (CHW)
.345 Bob Polansky (STL)
.344 Tom Childers (CHW)

Total Bases
120 Bob Polansky (STL)
119 Henry Rasnick (LOU)
111 John Nero (CHW)

Stolen Bases
16 Jim Heyman (HAR)
16 Fred Mannion (BOS)
12 John Nero (CHW)

ERA

1.92 John Zackery (STL)
2.08 Bill Johnson (CHW)
2.16 George Witcher (CIN)

Wins
22 John Storey (BOS)
19 Bill Johnson (CHW)
15 Jack Anderson (STL), John Zackery (STL)

Strikeouts
94 John Storey (BOS)
72 George Witcher (CIN)
64 John Zackery (STL)

[fhomess]

1877 Award Winners Announced!
The award winners for 1877 came from a pair of teams that had high hopes for the season but failed to deliver. Neither of these players were to blame, as they were chosen the best in their field.

Batter of the Year
RF John Nero (CHW): .353-.395-.435, 90 H, 13 2B, 12 SB, 13 BB

John Nero of the Chicago White Stockings was chosen as the league’s best batter for 1877. Nero led the National League in batting average, and was among the league leaders in hits, doubles, walks, and stolen bases. Nero played solid defense for Chicago, having signed with the team last winter after the Mutuals of New York disbanded. Nero was similarly honored by the National Association after the 1873 season.

Pitcher of the Year
SP John Storey (BOS): 22-19, 2.49 ERA, 351 IP, 94 K, 26 CG, 2 SHO

The Boston Red Caps didn’t know exactly what they’d be getting out of Storey this season, and they got as much as they could’ve hoped for. Storey led the National League in wins and strikeouts. He also started more games and completed more of them than any other pitcher in the league. At 23 years of age, Storey appears to have a tremendous career as a big league pitcher ahead of him.

[fhomess]

Here’s the season totals summary for 1877. Here's how the numbers compared with real life:

NA = Real National Association
TBS = The Baseball Saga (my sim)
* = estimated totals (no actual league totals available)

Stat       NA     TBS      %Diff
G         360     360       0.0%
AB      13667   13689       0.2
H        3705    3596       3.0
2B        431     424       1.7
3B        204     199       2.5
HR         24      23       4.3
BB        345     378       8.7
K         726     752       3.5
SB        216*    222       2.7
CS        118*    108       9.3
R        2040    1887       8.1
AVG      .271    .263       3.2
OBP      .289    .285       1.4
SLG      .338    .328       3.1
IP       3241  3218.2       0.7
CG        326     223      46.2
SHO        20      11      81.8
ERA      2.81    2.63       6.8

Notes:
1. Pretty good showing this year with the most obvious thing being that runs scored were a bit lower than in real life. This is one of the first times where I’ve run into this as I’ve typically been a bit high on runs scored. Still not bad, though. Last time I spoke a bit about adjusting the fielding in the game based on runs scored even though I don’t have good fielding data to go off of. I did, in fact lower the error rate a bit. Considering that both the ERA and the total runs scored were a bit low, I think the error rate isn’t necessarily to blame here. Rather, I think the problem came down to hits being a little low, SB% being a bit low, and K’s being a bit high.

2. I seem to be getting a little closer on complete games as the league goes along. I alluded to the fact that St. Louis really employed a 2-man rotation in my final monthly sim update for the 1877 season. This was not something I had configured in league settings. League settings were set for 1-man rotations still, but St. Louis clearly had two pitchers they felt comfortable with, and the team had 8 more CG’s than any other team in the league. I also think the schedule is to help. The 1877 NL schedule is far more regular since it was organized by the league itself instead of the individual teams.

League Leading Stats
These stats represent the top individual performance in each category.

Stat       NA     TBS
AVG      .387    .353*
OBP      .407    .395*
SLG      .545    .470*
H         103      91
2B         19      16
3B         11      11
HR          4       2
BB         20      16
SB         ??      16

ERA      2.11    1.88+
W          40      22
IP      559.0   351.0
K         170      94
CG         61      26
SHO         6       3
L          25      19

*-Minimum of 200 PA's on the batting rates..
+-Minimum of 150 IP for the ERA title.

Actual League Settings
These are the values I had entered on the Strategy tab in League Setup.

League Totals         Modifiers
AB        167353
H          44522         .958
2B          8919         .504
3B           898        1.926
HR          5451        4.400
BB         16222        2.208
HBP         1850         .644
K          31828        1.620
BABIP       .285
Errors                  4.350
DP's                     .458
SP End                  6.000
RP End                  1.000
GB%                      .876
WP                      1.984
Balks                    .100
PB's                   19.517
SF                       .112
SB                       .782
SB Att                   .366
SB Suc%                  .993

I have the settings checked to automatically adjust league totals modifiers after each season and to automatically import player creation modifiers. That said, I modified almost all of the modifiers settings in order to get the results that I did.

[fhomess]

Top 5 Career Leaders
National League Only

Average minimum 200 PA

.347 Bob Polansky
.338 Tom Childers
.329 Henry Rasnick
.328 Jim Michel
.321 Jim Shemo

Home Runs

3 Bob Handy
3 Jim Shemo
2 Sepp Apel
2 Tom Arsenault
2 Joe Bonetti
2 Pat Denton
2 Jim Heyman
2 Jim Linhart
2 Henry Rasnick
2 Ed Roling
2 Bill Shew
2 Mike Stanley

Stolen Bases

29 Fred Mannion
27 John Arend
25 Jim Heyman
24 John Nero
23 Joe Bonetti

Runs Scored

114 Bob Polansky
103 John Gano
103 Fred Mannion
98 John Arend
97 John Nero

ERA minimum 200 IP

2.04 John Zackery
2.09 Bill McManis
2.12 Bill Johnson
2.12 George Witcher
2.15 Doc Taylor

Wins

40 Joe Bormann
30 Joe Gotcher
26 Charlie Barta
25 Will Svoboda
24 John Storey

Strikeouts

127 Joe Bormann
97 John Storey
92 Charlie Barta
81 George Witcher
74 John Zackery

[corkpilot]

Hi,
This is a great thread. I'd love to create something like this myself. I tried starting a historical league with the game but I can't seem to edit the number of teams in the league so that I can at least get a base league started and then edit schedules from there.

I downloaded your schedules for 1871 to 1875, but how do I load them into the game? I'm a bit new to this game so maybe I just need to familiarize myself a bit more before asking too many quesitons, but I'd love to know just how you got the original set up.

If I start in 1871 isn't the game supposed to automatically adjust the league set-up from year to year (i.e. teams folding, teams joining, new leagues, etc.)? Sounds like you are having to do this yourself from 1875-1876.

Thanks in advance.

[Powderguy]

So, what happened here??

[fhomess]

Well, it's been over a year, but I've always had it in the back of my mind that I'd like to try to continue this dynasty thread on through at least the 1900 season. Naturally, I got sidetracked by a number of things. 1878 was the first season that I no longer had pre-made FaceGen packs that I liked enough to use. As a result, I went ahead and created my own using NoPepper's work as a starting point. Once that was completed, it wasn't long before I had a new job, which severly impacted my ability to spend time on OOTP stuff. Beginning last spring, I began work on StatsLab, which is now something I consider pretty much done (Patch 2 is just waiting for OOTPX's latest patch). So, I decided to start looking at this again...

My first order of business is going to be converting the league to OOTPX and trying to verify that the league settings are all the same. I've had to reinstall my FaceGen stuff, including Bobble's Facial Hair mod. I still need to verify that the ballparks carried over properly and that I have the parks information moving forward. I also have been looking at league schedules. I used the as-played schedules in the NA and for 1876 and 1877. 1877 was the first season that the league took over scheduling of the games rather than let the teams schedule them. I really like using the as-played schedules better than the league schedules, but they don't appear to exist anywhere on the mods forum. I have copies of the original schedules, but not in OOTP format. Converting them is fairly quick and easy with a tool I've created, so I'll probably do that and then release them to the community. Finally, I'll need to test out the league settings for the 1878 season before simming it out. So it may still be a while before this is fully up and functional again. At any rate, it should be fun to get back to this and see how these players fare, especially with some of the other professional leagues that pop up over the next 22 seasons.