Baseball Premier League

[NYY #23]

William Henry Sherman is accustomed to getting what he wants in life, inheriting more money than he could ever spend in his life eight years ago, and a successful family business. But William Henry Sherman didn't have any desire to continue running his family business, he had another passion, baseball.

The professional game was in its infancy in 1873, with the Northeast League based in Massachusetts, and the American Baseball League based in New York the top two leagues in the country. After watching the Philadelphia Athletics capture the 1873 championship on the final day of the American Baseball League season Sherman knew that baseball was in his future, turned over control of the family business to his younger brother and tried to buy a franchise in the American Baseball League, but was turned away. Sherman then tried to buy a franchise in the Northeast League, but was again turned away. As an outsider without any experience in professional baseball trying to break into the close knit Northeast League or American Baseball League wasn't possible, but he wasn't going to give in easily, and purchased a six team professional baseball league called the Great Lakes League.

While Sherman was never athletically inclined, he did have a mind for business to go along with his passion for baseball. Sherman brought leadership and organization to the Great Lakes League, and in his first season in control he had the fortune of seeing a young pitcher turn into a star, as Bobby Mathews went 31-8 for the Cleveland Lakers, who finished the season in first place for the first time. Within three years the league would double in size expanding to Chicago, Pittsburgh, Detroit, and Cincinnati.

Heading in to the 1878 season the big news in baseball was the Northeast League becoming a baseball superpower after agreeing to merge with the American Baseball League. The popularity of baseball in the northeast was growing rapidly, and with the Boston, New York, Washington, Philadelphia, and Baltimore markets being locked up by the Northeast League it became the desired spot for the top baseball talent in the country featuring starts like Al Spalding, Jumbo McGinnis, Lip Pike, Levi Meyerle, and Cal McVey.

The rest of baseball wasn't as lucky, with the National Association of Baseball Players still struggling to stay relevant in the world of professional baseball after the teams of the American Baseball League left the Association. That left the National Association of Baseball Players controlling small upstart leagues in the south, Texas, California, with Sherman and the Great Lakes League the largest remaining league in the association.

At the annual winter meetings Sherman took advantage of that position and was the leading voice pushing for the separation of the professional teams from the amateur teams in the National Association of Baseball Players. After two successful votes the Association voted to split off the professional teams into the North American Baseball Association, or NABA for short. The second vote was to elect Sherman as the new president of NABA. Sherman would have his work cut out for him, but would begin to apply the same structure that was successful with the Great Lakes League to the rest of NABA.

[NYY #23]

I'll pause here for a little background information before I continue the backstory. I've already gone down the promotion/relegation path once and was having a lot of fun with it, until I had the bright idea to combine several leagues into one "Big Four" league, and that's where things starting going wrong. I went from having four leagues that performed well to one league that was as slow as molasses. I don't know what the problem was because I haven't had that problem with any other league, including larger leagues, but in the process of trying to untangle my mess I created an even bigger mess. In the end I "lost" a couple of leagues that I was really enjoying, or got to the point where it was easier to start fresh rather than figure out how far back I needed to go to recover from the problems I created.

So I cut my losses and decided to start over, but I didn't want to run into the same problems again. So one night I spent a long time coming up with an outline for the first 100 years of professional baseball from the beginning of professional baseball in the 1870's to 1970 with the goal of starting with one or two regional leagues that slowly grow into a network of regional leagues with the top teams breaking off into a true national league with promotion and relegation. I also went through 100 years twice with no problems, and with one final run through of 50 years with changes each year until I was satisfied things will work out as I planned.

Of course I've gone back and tweaked my outline about 50 times by now, but the concept remains the same, even if the number of leagues, number of teams, and time line has varied slightly each version. I won't be taking control of a team, but playing God in this baseball world, and I always feel that OOTP helps bring the story to life, so I'm not afraid to make some additional changes if they make sense.

My world will feature a mixture of real life and fictional teams, along with real life and fictional players. They'll live in the same universe, and I'll be using the Spritze database to import players as 18 year olds and letting OOTP control how they develop. That means anything can happen, and players won't necessarily develop like they did in real life. We'll see some stars become scrubs, some scrubs become stars, and some fictional players turn into stars.

My last run through I saw Cy Young turn into a great pitcher on a bad team to a bad pitcher on a bad team, finishing with a 99-154 record in his career. Cy Young turned out to be Doc Landis, who went 12-29 with a 3.35 ERA in his only season in the American Association, but turned into a 585 game winner for one of the best teams in the universe. It was a universe where Portland, Hartford, and New Haven combined for 27 championships, while teams from Boston, New York, and Washington combined for 2. It was a world where Elmer Bliss pitched back to back no hitters in 1904, which I have never seen before in any league I've done. But sadly that was just a test, and I'm ready to begin for real now.

Before I go any further I want to take the time to thank the fabulous modders that we are lucky to have. To me there is nothing better than a logo and uniform to bring a league to life. I'm a big fan of the retro logo's and uniform that are done by the dynamic duo of knuckler and txranger, and I'll be using a lot of their work in this dynasty. A lot of times I have an idea on where I want a team, and find a logo and uniform to match. I tried to find who created the logo's and uniforms that I'm using, and in addition to the ones by knuckler and txranger I will be using creations by Hankyu Braves, stlee, isedelyod, smythejd, Honorable Pawn, le receveur, and pwal, and wanted to thank them too. I'm sure there could be others as well, and I realize I should have kept track of who did what to give proper credit for specific ones.

At this point it's time to get back to the road to the Baseball Premier League and tell some of the interesting stories and history that's developed already. If you have any questions or have anything that you'd like to see please let me know, but for now back to the story.

[Trebro]

One of these days, I'll work on an alternative history dynasty. (My main problem is not knowing how I want to scale it...I kinda want multiple leagues but then you can't drill down as deeply, and I like seeing that part, too. ARGH!) Looking forward to this!

[moonlightmerc]

I'm looking forward to reading this dynasty.!!

[NYY #23]

Originally Posted by Trebro

One of these days, I'll work on an alternative history dynasty. (My main problem is not knowing how I want to scale it...I kinda want multiple leagues but then you can't drill down as deeply, and I like seeing that part, too. ARGH!) Looking forward to this!

Thanks! Scale is always my problem too. I'm hoping to be able to counter that with the main focus on the premier league, with the other leagues being secondary. I'm hoping that the promotion/relegation will also add some exciting stories to the mix as well.

[NYY #23]

Originally Posted by moonlightmerc

I'm looking forward to reading this dynasty.!!

Thank you!

[NYY #23]

Heading into the 1878 season Sherman wanted to do something that would get NABA noticed, and followed the precedent set by the Northeast League Sherman would attempt to consolidate the Great Lakes League and some of the other top teams in NABA into the Central League. The more established teams in Texas would join ranks with a franchise in St. Louis, Kansas City, and Oklahoma and play in the Texas League, with the winner of the Great Lakes League set to face off against the winner of the Texas League in the first professional championship series.

Sherman was hoping for a repeat of the 1877 season where the Central League went down to the wire, but it was the Chicago Lincolns who ran away with the Great Lakes League, although a rash of injuries toward the end of the season made things appear a little closer than it was. The newly formed Texas League saw the St Louis Cardinals win by 8 games, leaving the Central League with little excitement at the end of the season.

The league was hoping for an exciting championship series to cap the season, but the Cardinals won three straight games 13-1, 2-1, and 9-1 with the injury riddled Lincolns looking out of place. It was a hardly the exciting championship match-up that the league was hoping for, although fans couldn't help but be impressed by the young Cardinals starter Will White, who won both games he pitched for the Cardinals, and struck out 17 batters.

It wasn't a bad showing for the Central League, but not as good of a showing as Sherman would have liked. In another first Sherman issued trophies at the end of the season to honor the best pitcher and hitter in the Great Lakes League and the Texas League. Even that didn't go as well as expected when Candy Cummings of the Austin Senators won the trophy for best pitcher in the Texas League with a 28-12 record and 1.36 ERA, over Will White who went 24-8 with a 1.46 ERA, but showed how good he could be in the playoffs. The Cardinals would have one award winner though, Tom York who hit .315 for the season, although catcher Mike Ledwith hit .358 and didn't win the award.

Meanwhile the Northeast League was able to have three pitchers who would win 30 games that season, Al Spalding (31), Sam Kimber (30), and rookie Dan Thompson (30). They also had the New York Yankees, Brooklyn Dodgers, and New York Titans battling it out in the New York League, until the Yankees pulled in front the final week of the season. The league also had two pitchers, Adrian Oates of the Dodgers and Al Spalding of the Providence Whalers who were on the cusp of winning the 200th game of their career.

The only thing the Northeast League was lacking was a championship series, and that would be coming in 1879.

[MarkInCincy]

That sound you hear is me getting sucked into another dynasty of yours!!!!!!!

Another amazing idea with very interesting 'twists'

[NYY #23]

Originally Posted by MarkInCincy

That sound you hear is me getting sucked into another dynasty of yours!!!!!!!

Another amazing idea with very interesting 'twists'

Thank you!

[NYY #23]

"Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak." - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Upon taking control of the North American Baseball Association William Henry Sherman learned very soon that he inherited an organization in trouble. Many teams were playing irregular schedules, lacked organization, and were playing on poor quality fields. Based on the quality many of the teams that NABA fielded it would be a stretch for many of the teams to be labeled professional.

Meanwhile the popularity of the Northeast League was growing rapidly, with the league expanding to 28 teams with 8 teams jumping ship from NABA to join. The best players in the country wanted to play in the Northeast League, and the league began playing an end of season series to proclaim a champion. The Northeast League also borrowed another of Sherman's ideas when they named Jumbo McGinnis the Pitcher of the Year in 1879, and again in 1880.



McGinnis quickly became one of the most popular players in the league after going 36-6 with a 0.90 ERA in 1879 and 28-2 with a 0.88 ERA on the way to leading the Worcester Hearts to back to back Northeast League championships. The Northeast had the advantage in money, power, and players.

Sherman wouldn't give in easily though, and after being rebuffed in his request to have the champion of the Central League take on the champion of the Eastern League Sherman would go on the offensive. Sherman knew that to the public and the press that NABA needed to be viewed in a more positive light. What NABA lacked in quality they would make up for it in quantity.

The crown jewel of NABA, the Central League would expand to 24 teams to match the Northeast League's numbers, and within two years NABA had either set-up or helped to get under control the 14 team Pacific Coast League, the 12 team Southern League, the 14 team Great Plains League, and the 12 team Atlantic League. Geographically NABA controlled most of the country, and targeted the Northeast League from the west with a team in Pittsburgh, and from the south with a team in Alexandria, Virginia.

With 80 teams in the association they appeared to be growing quickly, but costs were rising more quickly. In an effort to fill seats tickets were often given away, and teams would be forced to spend money to lure players away from the Northeast League. Cap Anson was one of those players who was lured to Los Angeles after hitting .398. But even that strategy wasn't without risks, as Anson was able to show after injuring his shoulder and seeing his batting average drop 127 points.

Sherman would continue to go on the attack with money, attempting to place teams in Northeast League cities, and even scheduling an exhibition series between all league champions in the same city that the Northeast League championship was being played in.

The battles would continue both on and off the field, but it was an investment Sherman made with a sporting goods store started by J. Walter Spalding in Chicago that would pay dividends. That investment led to an agreement with Spalding to become the official supplier of baseball to the North American Baseball Association, and a meeting with Spalding's brother Al in 1883.

As one of the most successful and respected players in the game, Spalding was well connected with the Northeast League. Sherman and Spalding quickly developed a mutual respect for each other, and with Spalding as his intermediary negotiations with the Northeast League began. Over the next four years progress between Sherman and Spalding continued, which effected the relationship between NABA and the Northeast League. It started off small, with each side agreeing to honor the others territories, and then extending that to player contracts.

Next came an agreement for both NABA and the Northeast League to send players on a tour to promote baseball and Spalding sporting goods around the world. Then finally the National Agreement which was signed and validated by both parties and would lead to the first champion of professional baseball and would be valid through the 1890 season.

[NYY #23]

1888 was the year of the pitcher, with Bobby Mathews of the Cleveland Lakers winning his 400th career game, and striking out the 4500th batter of his career. The Lakers entered the season as the defending champion in the Central League, but they struggled down the stretch and the Michigan Wolverines winning 82 games and the Central League. With Al Atkinson finishing 28-13 with a 1.98 ERA, and John Ewing going 28-13 with a 1.97 ERA the Wolverines had the pitching to sweep the Texas Longhorns 3-0 in the semi-finals.

The Newark Trotters won 85 games in the regular season in the Northeast League with a balanced offense featuring catcher Dick Buckley (.322, 21 HR, 96 RBI), 3B Frank Bishop (.303, 19 HR, 62 RBI) and SS Pat Lyons (.298, 16 HR, 70 RBI) to go along with Bill Wise (24-13, 2.45) and Charlie Petty (26-14, 2.45) in the rotation. The Trotters would be taking on the Oakland Oaks in the semi-finals. The Trotters were the heavy favorite, but they weren't counting on running in to Charlie Buffinton in the postseason, who finished 25-9 in the regular season and won a pair of games against the Trotters as the Oaks swept Newark.

The Oaks would face off against the Michigan Wolverines in the championship series and would win four straight games to win the first championship of professional baseball surprising the rest of professional baseball after beating teams from the Northeast League and the Central League.

[NYY #23]

Jumbo McGinnis was coming off a dominating 1888 season where he went 36-6 with a 1.21 ERA for the Worcester Hearts, but entered this season thinking about his two playoff starts last year when he gave up 10 earned runs in 16 innings, but McGinnis shook things off coming into his 16th season pitching for the Hearts. Pitching has been Worcester's trademark, and with McGinnis (23-19, 2.40), Bill Sweeney (29-14, 2.79) and Pete Wood (32-8, 2.76) they cruised to the 1889 championship, and dominated again in 1890. The Northeast League again felt good about their position in professional baseball after Worcester's two straight wins, and it would be Sherman's Central League who lost both of the Championship Series that they played in.

Sherman could take some solace in the Oakland Oaks championship as a NABA team, but Sherman began feeling pressure from many of the member teams who were unhappy with Sherman controlling both the Central League and NABA, particularly with the Pacific Coast League where eight teams threatened to leave the Association after the National Agreement expired following the 1890 season.

It would be Al Spalding who would help to ease some of the tension with what would be his first World Tour following the 1889 season. Spalding would announce his retirement from playing baseball after winning 352 games in the Northeast League, and would travel with a group of players from leagues around the country. With stops in Canada, Cuba, Australia, Egypt, Paris, and London his goals were to promote and spread the game of baseball around the world, while potentially opening up new market's for Spalding's family business.

It would take years before it would be known whether the seeds planted would grow, but for Spalding it was a defining trip that transformed him from a popular baseball player to leader, promoter, and respected businessman. After returning to the United States in 1890 would spend time travelling the country, visiting teams and players, and promoting the game of baseball.

With the National Agreement ending following the season Spalding was becoming an even more important figure in professional baseball, and one of the few people with links to both Sherman and NABA and the Northeast League. Spalding would attend the winter meetings following the 1890 season, and would be part of the next great compromise.

The Northeast League would join NABA and for the first time all of the professional baseball leagues in the country would fall under the same umbrella, under the condition that Spalding would serve as president of NABA. While Sherman didn't want to give up the power of running NABA he knew that the Association would look much differently if he remained as president, and over the past few years he had developed a strong relationship with Spalding, and agreed to step aside and go back to running the Central League.

While NABA would next enter a period of peace and prosperity it would be the next chapter that laid the groundwork for the future.

[NYY #23]

I haven't reached the true "story" yet, but I realized I made a stupid mistake that's going to cause some problems with how I want the history. Since I'm still doing the back story I'm going to start over, and go back and edit some of the names and numbers. It shouldn't have a big impact, so I'd feel better about getting things right from the beginning.

[NYY #23]

The 90's would be a period of transition for professional baseball. Al Spalding would take control over NABA from William Henry Sherman. The Boston Pilgrims would win the NABA Championship in 1891, 1894, and 1896 with the Worcester Hearts fading away, and new and up and coming players would bring hope around the country. Honus Wagner would hit .371 for the Springfield Rifles, with young pitchers like Christy Mathewson making a strong first impression.

Baseball was growing in popularity, and it was a decade that saw the Michigan Wolverines capture their first title in 1892 after losing the first three championship series. The Billings Mustangs would represent the International League and capture the title in 1893, with the Wisconsin Badgers (1895), San Antonio Bullets (1897), Chicago Cubs (1898), and Las Vegas Aces (1899) rounding out the champions.

Spalding would organize two more World Tours in 1892 and again in 1894 returning to many of the same areas that were visited in 1889. Around the world the interest in baseball was growing, although not as quickly as it did in America.

Spalding returned to London on both trips, and in addition to his time spreading baseball Spalding spent time learning about the Football Association. Spalding was in London the year the Football Association introduced a Second Division, and become intrigued by what the Football Association called test matches and the concept of promotion and relegation.

Spalding and the World Tour spent even more time in London for the third trip, and Spalding would spent time with the leaders of the Football Association, and developed a friendship with Arthur Kinnaird, the president of the Football Association. Spalding would learn all he could about how the Football Association worked, and left London with the goal of bringing parts of the Football Association model back to NABA.

Spalding was well respected by members of NABA, and Spalding was easily re-elected after his initial term expired after the 1894 season, and was up for election again in 1898. It was during the 1898 winter meetings that Spalding would lay out his plan for the first time for the Premier League, promotion and relegation, and moving to the new system following the 1900 season. With 96 teams in the association it was put to a vote among all members teams with 15 teams abstaining from voting, 25 votes against the Premier League, 56 votes for promotion/relegation.

The Premier League would begin play in the 1901 season with the following parameters:
• William Henry Sherman would become president of the Premier League
• 22 teams would play in the Premier League with a balanced schedule of 4 home and 4 road games for each team against every opponent
• The bottom three teams in the Premier League will face off an a promotion/relegation series with the top three in League A with the winner of the series playing in the Premier League and the loser playing in League A the following season.
• The bottom three teams in League A will face off against the top three teams in League B in a promotion/relegation series.
• The bottom three teams in League B will face off against the top three teams in League C in a promotion/relegation series.

The teams playing in the Premier League will consist of the following:
• Top three teams in each Northeast League sub-league will get 3 automatic entry (6)
• The top team teams in the Great Lakes League and the Texas League will get automatic entry (4)
• The top team in the Southern League, Atlantic League, Pacific Coast League, and Great Plains League will get one automatic entry (4)
• Northeast League will have positions 4-7 face off in each sub league to complete for spot in Premier League (2)
• Great Lakes League and Texas League will have teams in positions 3-6 in tournament for entry in Premier League (2)
• Southern League and Texas League will have team's in positions 2-3 face off to compete for entry in Premier League (2)
• Pacific Coast League and Great Plains League will have teams in positions 2-9 face off in tournament to complete for entry in Premier League (2)

[NYY #23]

I apologize for the false start, but I've now gone back through and resimmed 1871-1900, and the Premier Baseball League is about to begin. In doing that some of the back story has changed, and I've edited the posts to reflect that. In going back and starting over I did simplify things slightly with franchise movement, and some of the planned teams are on the shelf for now.

The interesting part is that only one of the 22 teams from round 1 has made it back to the Premier League in round 2. That shouldn't matter too much though.

Up next will be an introduction to the Premier League teams, and getting things started. I've glanced over most of the 30 year history, but will go into a little bit more depth on some players at some point.

[NYY #23]

Most wouldn’t think of the Nashua, New Hampshire as a professional baseball city, and at the turn of the century the population was just hair under 25,000 people. At best they'd be no higher than a single A franchise in today's modern world, but this world is a universe that will develop how it develops.

Back to the Huskies, who have been in the Northeast League since the beginning, and have had an interesting history. While the Huskies never finished higher than 2nd, until this year, they also have had just 6 losing seasons. In the Northeast League just 5 teams have had a better winning percentage throughout the history of the league, but teams above and below the Huskies would be looked at more favorably because of the championships that they won.

The Huskies have a balanced offense, defense, and pitching this year, ranked 2nd best in the Northeast League. The Huskies had the benefit of three young players break out at the same time, and should be a team that is able to stick around the Premier League for at least a few years.



24 year old John Titus is the team's new starting left fielder, and hit .300 with 62 RBI in his first year as a starter.



Bob Wicker was 29-15 this year with a 2.33 ERA as a 22 year old. It's Wicker's fourth year in the league, and maybe breakout is a stretch, but Wicker took a big step forward, and has been showing improvement each year. Wicker went 64-52 in real life, and has already surpassed those totals with a 79-61 record.



20 year old Doc Moskiman delivered a 26-17 season with a 2.76 ERA for the Huskies in his first full year as a starter. Combined with Wicker the Huskies will have a pair of solid young starters to pair with veteran Bill Hoffer, who was 15-11 with a 2.95 ERA.

[NYY #23]

Only two of the fourteen teams in the Northeast League are from New Hampshire, and they finished first and second in the standings this year. The Manchester Mills never finished higher than 6th before 1890, but have finished 2nd in 6 of the 11 seasons since.



Tom Cotter came to Manchester in a trade with the Boston Red Sox following the 1896 season in exchange for four players. Cotter hit .391 with 14 home runs, and 105 RBI to win the Batter of the Year award in his first year with Manchester. Cotter has been the team's offensive leader since, while none of the four players the Red Sox received in the trade have amounted to much.



Gussie Gannon is the Mills' top pitcher going 26-17 with a 3.04 ERA. The 26 year old signed with Manchester as an 18 year old, and after two seasons with an ERA over 5 Gannon improved to 8-3 with a 3.91 ERA in his first season as a starter, before breaking out with a 25-16 season the next year. In real life Gannon pitched just 5 innings in 1895.

[NYY #23]

In a league that features two teams from Boston and teams from Baltimore and Washington the Northeast League has sent two teams from New Hampshire and now a team from Portland, Maine to the Premier League. Portland just recently finished above .500 for the first time in 18 years last season and since 1871 the recently completed 1900 season was just their fourth winning season. Timing is everything for the Portland Moose, and for the first time Portland has a core of young players.



Harold Thorington led the team this season with a .341 batting average as a 24 year old. Thorington led off for the Moose and played left field, leading the team with 78 runs scored.



23 year old George Cooper lost 23 games two seasons ago, but Cooper made improvements last year going 24-10 with a 1.89 ERA and went 26-16 with a 2.25 ERA this year. Cooper is joined by Jimmy Wiggs (22-21, 2.22) and Billy Campbell (19-7, 3.38).

[NYY #23]

The Scranton Electrics finished seventh in the league in 1900, and had the most difficult road for any team in the Northeast League, but went on a hot streak to capture a spot in the Premier League. History to this point hasn't been kind to the Electrics with losing seasons from 1884-1899, but Scranton turned things around this year with a seventh place finish, and they'll be the only team from Pennsylvania that will qualify for the Premier League.



Brian Amodeo has been with Scranton since 1889, and he has seen more losses than wins, but the 32 year old right fielder is the team's best hitter, hitting .308 this year. For his career Amodeo is a .279 career hitter with 166 stolen bases. He's part of a balanced lineup, with no real stars, but also a lineup without any big holes.



Bob Blewett joined the Electrics' rotation five years ago, and the 23 year old has made improvements every season. This year was Blewett's first winning season as he went 25-14 with a 2.45 ERA while striking out 114 batters in 345 1/3 innings. Blewettt has also taken 19 year old Harrisburg native John Brackenridge under his wing, and his protege was 24-17 with a 3.11 ERA this year.

[NYY #23]

For the fourth straight year the Albany Woodcutters finished first in the American Baseball League subdivision of the Northeast League. They've done it with solid hitting, solid pitching, and solid defense, and Albany expects their stay in the Premier League to be a long one.



22 year old catcher Bill Byers has been the Woodcutters' star at the plate for the past two seasons. Byers followed up last year's breakout season (.378, 105 RBI, 95 R) with another solid season (.346, 77 RBI, 79 R), and got plenty of help in the lineup from CF-Emmet Heidrick (.361), LF-Jack Scheible (.316), and SS-Preston Savage (.297)



Cy Vorhees led a trio of 20 game winners for Albany with a 23-19 season in which he posted a 2.78 ERA. The former Pitcher of the Year was joined by 30 year old Ed Scott (23-18, 3.05) and 27 year old Oscar Streit (21-15, 3.62) in the rotation.