FRANCHISE STARS BASEBALL LEAGUE
Analyzing the first two months of the FSBL
June 1, Year 1 —Two months into the first season the Franchise Stars Baseball League, much is going according to expectations, some things not as much so, but the overall excitement surrounding the league has been overwhelmingly positive.
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For those unfamiliar, the FSBL setup features each franchise with a 100 player master list of the best players in its history (assigned to only one team). Forty players for each franchise were selected by random generator as their roster for season 1. Each year, 4 players from the remaining 60 PLUS one Negro Leaguer will get added to each franchise. That will take us through 15 years of drafts, so by the time those last drafted players finish their careers we'll have upward of 30 seasons of FSBL history. So when you see Babe Ruth isn't on the Yankees RELAX...he will be! He'll join in some amateur draft down the line, he's just not there now.
The standings and leaders (through links at the bottom of this page) and stats (through team links on either side) are available for the FSBL through June 1 and will be updated monthly (in game time, roughly 2 weeks in real time). Each week I do two broadcasts on the YouTube channel, each representing a Game of the Week from each Sunday on the schedule. The most recent broadcast is viewable at right.
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So with that out of the way, let's do a quick walk through what we've seen in the FSBL through the first two months.
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No-shock Standouts!
Five teams in the FSBL are playing .600 ball at this point: The Red Sox, Yankees, A's, Braves and Giants. Of those, the Braves are the only moderate surprise, and that's only because they didn't get a particularly good draw offensively for their Year 1 40-man. And pitching, particularly the Maddux/Spahn/Whitney/Smoltz/Nichols rotation, certainly has carried the day, as they've allowed the second-fewest runs in the FSBL behind only the Red Sox, who - with the A's and Giants - were considered to have the best rosters of any team for Year 1. The Yankees' roster was also regarded as solid, just a tick below, largely because they're missing all of the Ruth, Mantle, Dimaggio triad - and their pitching is decent rather than good. But, with the Yankees' pool, even a mediocre draw by their standards is elite within the context of the entire league.
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The Sox have the two leading batters in the AL, and neither of them is Ted Williams - though he's also been terrific. But Reggie Smith and Mookie Betts are on top of the batting table while Pedro Martinez and Cy Young have been dominant on the slab, leading the Sox to the division lead.
The Giants started off 11-0 before cooling off to merely hot instead of scalding. Willie Mays leads the NL in homers with 19 and is second in RBIs with 46, while Joe McGinnity is tied for the league lead in wins and Tim Keefe sits in the top 10 in ERA.
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The Bay Area is contemplating a World Series already, as the A's look like they'll hit cruise control on the AL West by the All-Star Break. Jimmie Foxx, Mark McGwire, Rickey Henderson and company are running roughshod, the only team with a double-digit lead in their division. Combined with a rotation led by Lefty Grove (2nd in ERA, 3rd in Ks) and Rube Waddell (2nd in Ks), the Bay Area bashers have Oakland up 12 games in the AL West.
Front and Central: Close, But Very Different
The AL Central is tight, but that's as much because teams have underperformed as anything else. The Cleveland Indians were expected to be a top team but started out in brutal fashion, with a potent lineup proving impotent for much of the first month. Besides Jim Thome, the Indians offense was one giant slump - talents such as Nap Lajoie, Jose Ramirez and Larry Doby all were mired around the Mendoza line. On top of that they couldn't pitch at all.
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Fortunately for Cleveland, nobody else in the division staked a claim. In fact, two months into the season, each team in the division is below .500. But the Indians' offense has now scored the 4th most runs in the AL, but their pitching has still allowed the 4th most runs in the league and they sit atop that abyss of mediocrity for now. The White Sox started off as badly as the Indians did, and the Tigers have been unfathomably bad. It would be fair to say on the entire Tigers roster only Mickey Tettleton and Frank Lary have performed to expectations through the first two months. And yet, they're only 5 games out.
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The White Sox lost Shoeless Joe Jackson to a broken leg expected to keep him out until after the All-Star Break. Jackson was batting .302 with 9 homers, 19 RBI and 18 runs scored in 27 games before the injury. Now, the Sox will try and tread water until he returns.
The NL Central is a bit different story, as - while the division is tightly packed like the AL Central - four of the five teams in the division have winning records.
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The first place Cubs and fourth place Reds are separated by three games, and each team in the division seems to have a few players underperforming and a few overperforming at the moment.
The Cubs are being led by Stan Hack, whose .354 mark has him third in the league in average. But, other than Bill Lange leading the league in steals with 19, Hack's the only player on either side of the ball among leaders in any major category.
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That's not the case for the Cardinals, the preseason favorite for the division, who have Bob Gibson tied for third in the NL in wins and Jim Edmonds and Johnny Mize in the top 10 in average, while Mize is also 2nd in homers and 4th in RBIs and OPS. Edmonds is unlikely to stay among the batting leaders for the long haul, but he and Mize have given the Cards a solid middle of the order thus far.
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If you're seeking NL Central players on the leaderboards, though, look to the Pittsburgh Pirates, where Bob Elliott ranks 6th in batting, Willie Stargell is tied for second in homers and both are in the Top 10 in RBIs, plus Jake Stenzel is among the stolen base leaders, plus Ed Morris is among the ERA leaders and Felipe Vazquez leads the NL in saves.
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Then come the Reds, who have nobody on any leaderboard. But they have five regulars batting .286 or higher, seven regulars with 20+ RBIs and a pitching staff that's been inconsistent but adequate.
Perhaps not Ex-cellent, But a Strong Start
The biggest surprise of the first two months has been the Montreal Expos, who are 6 games over .500 and only a 1/2 game out of a wildcard spot - though obviously well before that becomes something really worth looking at.
But Montreal has not only pitched well (as has every team in the NL East not named the Marlins), they've scored the most runs of any team in the East as well. The Expos got a great 40-man draw relative to their overall pool, and the combo of Bryce Harper and Andre Dawson have been terrific. But light-hitting shortstop Spike Owen is batting .305, Nick Johnson .309 and Wilson Ramos .299. With Max Scherzer and Javier Vazquez in the Top 10 in ERA and Jeff Reardon second in saves, the Expos have brought baseball back to Montreal in a big way!
The Dennis Green "They Are Who We Thought They Were" Section
The five worst records in the FSBL thus far belong to the Rangers, Rays, Padres, Tigers and Brewers. The first three are no surprise as Texas, San Diego and Tampa simply lack the talent to compete in Year 1.
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The Rangers have scored the fewest runs and allowed the third most, behind - you guessed it - San Diego and Tampa. The Brewers haven't been terrible, they're merely the weakest team in a solid division. Robin Yount's poor start has been a mystery - and a weight dragging down an otherwise decent offense.
AL TEAM PAGES
