Arfy's Ramblings

First off, let's meet two more coaches who got back to me yesterday

• Colorado Springs Night Watchmen  toe64  Tom, 49, Northwest Illinois area, Insurance, all Chicago teams - Blackhawks, Bears, Bulls, prefer the Cubs but will cheer for the White Sox when not playing the Cubs. Enjoy time with the family, golf, volleyball, zombie shows and movies.
• Dover Dinklebergs  tmfran  Toby, 36, fan of All St. Louis sports teams. Rams season ticket holder. Still a little bit of a cardinals football fan, even though the broke my heart as a boy just learning to love football. Bill bidwell is a ****. I work security for a large corporation in stl. Married with two kids. I gave up fantasy baseball when I found hbd.

At first this was a list of All-Star snubs.  But then I decided I wanted to include everybody.  So this list is the best player on each team that didn't make the all star team.


Sam Sanders LF Alb hitting .314, 21 hr's, and 66 RBI's.
Matt Jaha DH Bost .319 avg, .429 obp, 13 hr, 71 RBI's
Alan Wilson RF Char  .298, 20hr, 61 Rbi's.
Fergie Hill 2B Cin  .304, 33 hr's, 85 rbi's
Alberto Blasco RP Col 20 of 21 saves, 3.00 ERA in a hitters park
John Pong 1B Dov .325, ..422 obp, 19hr, 85 rbi's
Billy Haynes 1B .329 avg, .404 obp, 23 hr's, 66 rbi's
Ismael Duran P Far 11-5, 2.97 era, 1.12 whip
Carl Esposito 1B Hou .285 avg, 25 hr, 73 rbi's.
Rondell Kirwan RP Iowa City 7 for 7 saves, 1.53 ERA, 0.95 whip, lacks innings(29.1)
Rube Clark P Jackson 11-5, 3.44 ERA, 1.15 WHIP
 Rich Pierce 2B Jacksonville .292, .400 obp, 28 SB, 81 runs scored
Ivan Uribe C Kansas City .329 avg, .397 obp
Yusmeiro Veras RF L.A. .290 avg, 35 SB, 70 runs scored
Vic Rijo 1B Lou .329 avg, .397 obp, 20 hr's, 66 RBI's
Fausto DelaVega LF Mad .309 avg,  19 hr's, 64 Rbi's
Clay Jeter P Mon 11-4,  1.29 whip
Apollo Fltecher RP Nash 13 for 13 saves,  1.78 ERA, 1.78 Whip
Sam Slotnik RF N.O. .294 avg, 27 hr, 70 rbi's
Storm Mahoney RF NY 24 hr, 65 rbi's
Miguel Rivera P OKC 6-1, 1.66 ERA,  0.87 WHIP
Kevin Griffiths 1B .303 avg
Russell Powell 1B Roch .358 avg, .444 obp.  Sreiously?  These are Wade Boggs #'s.
Jack Rooney RP Salem  2.83 ERA, He lacks innings
Vasco Tejada RP San Juan 3.47 ERA, 1.07 WHIP, lacks innings
Benny Navarro 2B Sea .362 obp,  26 hr, 22 SB, 88 runs scored
Aurelia Canseco C STL  .309 avg, 18 hr, 61 rbi
Kevin Yamamoto 2B Syr .307 avg
Robert Wallace RF TB 29hr, 74 rbi
Rickie Halama 3B Van .314, 21 hr, 55 rbi
Andres Jacquez P Wichita 1.97 ERA, 1.16 whip, lacks innings

Interesting Numbers

• If you start at the top of the list in innings pitched and work your way down to find out the first pitcher to have more Strikeouts than Innings....the answer is Alex Martis from Houston..  He has 111 Strikeouts in 102 innings
• The 'I won't give up on you' award has to go to New York and pitcher Timo Lee .  In his two seasons with New York he has given up 165 Earned Runs in 174 innings.  Yes, that is an ERA of 8.53 in two seasons
• The top two players in infield hits this season,  both play for Seattle.JJ Decker and Clyde Nathan.
• Right Fielder Anthone Wright leads all pinch hitters this season hitting 11 for 26 as a pinch hitter.  That is a .423 average for those keeping track at home.
• Most innings played this season without an error?  Goes to Jose Alfonzo from Iowa City.  At first base he has played 95 games, 866.2 innings without an error.
• Tampa Bay leads the league in Balks with 5.  I wonder what goes into determining that?
• Vancouver Canucks are 1-7 in extra inning games
• Miguel Gonzales of Durham was the first pitcher in our world to get to 500 saves.   He started the season at 499.
• Cyrus Torres of Seattle might be the first and only pitcher to get 300 wins in our world.   He currently sits at 293.

FLASH TO THE PAST

In this part, I'm going to jump back a few seasons back and look at some transaxtions.  Then we can evaluate how that panned out.

• Season 12 the top player in International Free Agency was Kansas City Outfielder, Jose Borbon .  He was igned for 17.5 million dollars by Nashville's Bnags.  Borbon has been traded 3 times   He has never hit over 19 home runs and has only hit over .300 once.  He has never won and Major league awards.  I would have to call this one a bust
• Season 13   First pick in the amateur draft goes to Las Vegas.(Currently St. Louis).  Stuart 11 selects SS Lou Jeffries with the first pick.  I look at his career and see that he only hits 30+ home runs once, only has 100 + rbi's once and has a .269 career average.  Now that I look, I see that he has over 100 runs scored twice and has had quite a few career stolen bases(316).  Was this a good pick?  At first glance I said no, it might be a wash though.  Just and FYI 3B Jared Glynn was selected second that season. 

Get to know your fellow coaches

Got a lot of responses back on this.  I was pleasantly surprised..   I have already found my self yaaking back and forth with a couple of coaches. If you didn't get a chance to get back to me, then send me something now and I'll include it tomorrow when I do an edition of Arfy's Ramblngs.

• Albuquerque Komodo Dragons     csudak  Name: Casey Location: 20 mins north of Boston Age: 31 Work: Sports Director for a YMCA Teams: All Boston teams Other: Semi-professional at food eating challenges
• Boston Pilgrims  kjmulli  im 29, live in wichita, ks and am a table games supervisor for a casino. i grew up between maine and pennsylvania and my fav teams are red sox,  bruins, dolphins, and lakers (the lakers one is weird, i know). i pretty much spend my time and money partying and traveling (just got back from a 12-day trip to jamaica and pennsylvania).
• Cincinnati Firestorm  jbburner  My name is JB. I am 51 and live in Chicago. I am a retired Wildland Firefighter. Favorite sports teams are the Cubs and Blackhawks and I also enjoy playing golf.
•  Houston Roughnecks  bagwellbuff  -Arfy could have saved me the trouble, since we are Facebook friends, and pulled this off my page. Oh well, I'll indulge him. I am a 55 year old who strongly believes in Andy Dufrene's philosophy in Shawshank Redemption: Get busy livin' or get busy dyin'.I am a graduate student in History at the University of Louisiana. I live in my native Cajun country of south Louisiana. Lafayette, La. is a cosmopolitan city with a music scene that rivals Nashville or Austin; you can't throw a stick without hitting a Grammy award nominee. After I get my Masters in May 2014, I plan to head to a PhD program. At this point, the University of Georgia is my top choice, since my lovely fiancee, whom I met my first-time around in college back in the mid-seventies, has a job with a downtown Atlanta law firm. Obviously, HBD is relaxation therapy for me and the nice people I have met playing this game are a bonus. About the name Bagwellbuff, my son is the Houston Astros fan and this was originally his name. A few years ago, I took over a GD team he lost interest in and kept playing under this username. I am proud of the Sim baseball championships and " Holy Grail" Tournament of Champions championship I won under my original username of timlan2057. My favorite sports teams are the St. Louis Rams, St. Louis Cardinals, Houston Rockets and Arsenal. I believe in loyalty and have rooted for all of these since 1967. I can't stand bandwagon fans who jump on and off. In summation, my WIS activity--especially in Pine Tar--is a nice niche in this exciting experience called My Life.
•  Iowa City Hawkeyes  tk21775  Travis, 31, Iowa, Insurance Agent, Michigan Wolverines; coach sons' baseball team for the last 5 years
•  Jackson Juggernauts bobbyj7  Name: Bob J Age: 45-50 Location: Upper Midwest Work: Technical
•  Kansas City Hotsteppers  italianajt  No prob! Adam Tarantino (yes it is and NO I'm not related to Quentin). just turned 30 on 08/03. Live in Albuquerque, NM where I am a Compliance Officer for an Independent Broker/Dealer (investments) I also umpire Little League and NM High School baseball,  New York Yankees is my favorite MLB team and the Baltimore Ravens is my favorite NFL team. I just welcomed my second child, a boy, into this world on 07/28!!!
•  Louisville ARF ARF ARF ARF's  Arfy* My name is Lauren.  Yes, I'm a dude.  I'm 40 and live in Walla Walla, WA.  Born in Cally, lived in Wisconsin and Montana most of my life.  I'm a salesman for Frito Lay Snacks Inc.  In my free time I enjoy Poker and Photography.   I grew up a Braves fan.  Also a HUGE Denver Broncos fan and also a big Boise State Bronco fan.   And on the 17th of August I will be nicotine free for one year, after spending 22 years of my life using! 
•  Madison Melons  reggie988  Hey. My name is Nick. 32. I'm based in Bloomington, IN. I'm a tour manager for bands. I've been a Cubs fan since I was a little kid (I guess I've always been a glutton for punishment).
•  Montreal Leaf Blowers  optistrat  I'll be honest, I'm resisting the temptation to give you a bunch of BS in the name of humor. In reality though, my name is Steve and I am 35 from Minnesota.  for work I publish Rat Rod Magazine which eats up most of my time. Aside from my work with cars, I love to root for all my local sports teams and consider myself a competition junky. If it's competitive, I like it.
•  Nashville Nalas  bnags  Brandon, 36, Hebron, KY(10 minutes south of Cinnati, OH), Bengals, Reds, KY Wildcats. Fan of all sports, but my favorite by far is the NFL. Whatif is actually my second favorite fantasy sports behind Strat-O-Matic. Website is stratomatic.com, check it out!
•  New Orleans Zephyrs  Fantasy Frea  My name is Nathan, 35 years old,      I live in Jacksonville, IL where I just been promoted to store manager for a US Cellular agent store. I am all sports fan pretty much. My favorite teams are the Cubs, Bulls, Bears and Blackhawks. I have 2 kids an 8 year old and a 2 year old both girls.
•  New York Damage Controllers     skuff730  Al-Amin, 28, Anchorage, AK. I am a TSgt in the US Air Force and a IT student. Favorite Sports teams are the Saints, Braves, SEC Football, NJ Devils.
•  Rochester Retards       wylie715  my real name is Mrk. I'm 56 years old, married with a 16 year old daughetr and twin 12 year old sons. I live in northern california, near SF. I work as a customer service advisor for a company that makes automobile accesories.  Up untll recently I drove a limo. My favorite baseball teams are the Yankees (I grew up in NY) and the Giants. I like the 49ers in football, the warriors and Knicks in basketball, and don't really care too much about hockey.
•  Salem Volcanoes       jkenned  Fair enough. Jason, 31 Binghamton, New York. I am from Missouri originally so I bleed Cardinal red and am close to building a shrine to Willie McGee in my office (well not really but I did just buy a McGee powder blue jersey). 3:09 PM     I am a doctoral candidate in Near Eastern Archaeology focusing on prehistoric ceramics and food consumption at several sites in Turkey and Syria.  I have worked in Jordan, Syria, Turkey as well as at several sites in the US but I am currently making ends meet while working on my dissertation as a shift supervisor at UPS.  HBD and GD have given me a great distraction from my dissertation but have probably extended my stay in graduate school by at least 6 months to a year,  but it was worth it. By this time next year I hope to have everything finished and to be starting my career as a professor of archaeology and celebrating my first world series win in HBD. Lofty goals I know but it helps to set high bars. 
• Seattle Strikers  Ghutton9  Glenn. 37. Sit at a computer all day. Cincy reds, bengals, bearcats. Interesting info- I love to lift weights, I play rec league soccer, I used to play a whole lot of softball in competitive tournaments but have kind of given it up.
• St. Louis Arch Angels       Flucie  If you don't mind don't use my last name. St. Louis Cardinals fan since 64, Dallas Cowboys fan since 66, and Born an ALABAMA CRIMSON TIDE fan.Roll Tide  Phillip, age:  60 Alabama Retired Correctional Supervisor. Worked over 25 years in Correctional facility. Work the highest rated facility (Max), also worked in the biggest facility in the state over 2000 inmates. Worked Segregation,( Were the inmates stays when they get in trouble.) I play this game to relax or pass the time.
• Tampa Bay Thunder   rxw1  Robert  - 46 - Orlando, Florida. I am a Sr IT Leader at Disney (Been there 20+ years). I coach Pop Warner Football and Little League Baseball for my kids. My favorite teams are the Mets & the Raiders (yeah I know they both suck!). I signed up for WIS in 2003 & won a SimBaseball World Series in my very first WIS season. How is that for luck?
• Vancouver Canucks        skplayer07  Tyler, 25, Ft. Knox, KY/Afghanistan, MP US Army, Cincinnati Reds/Bengals. I am a crazy sports fan, everything I do usually revolves around some type of sport. (Side note:  he is also Ghutton9's brother)
• Wichita DwArf'y Mojados  jibe  Name, Jim. Age 45. Location N. Minnesota, 20 miles from where the Mississippi river starts.  Work, we run an online sales for fruit plants imported from Canada. website, www.honeyberryusa.com We also have 5 acres of fruit orchard planted for future sales of fruit. I also will still do carpentery work.  Fav sport teams, Minnesota Gopher football and Minnesota Twins. Used to love the Vikings but too many heartaches and a bad coach named Brad Childress made them not so loveable. Married, no kids, 1 stray dog that hangs around.    (Side note:  This guy poops Championships, so look out!)

Arfy's Ramblings presents....."How the winners do it."

I sent trade chat's to the nine coaches in our world that have won a Pine Tar World Championship and I asked them: " In an effort to improve our world, our competitiveness, and our blog ,  What are the 3 most important steps to building a winning franchise?".  Here are their answers(Some did not respond):

Toe64(Colo Springs)
1) Don't be afraid to trade talent you have, for talent you need. 2) Balance home grown talent, FA's, and IFA's. 3) Don't rush players to the majors. Time served in the minors can be the difference between a good ML player and a great one!

 tk21775(Iowa City)
  1). Building through draft and/or International market. I feel like you have to get a good young core that doesn't eat up your payroll to help build around. After a few seasons you'll have a nice group to build around and spend money in free agency to fill some holes.  2). Pitching and defense; I usually start building my teams with these two things in mind and then add in the offense once my pitching is set. A good offense is nice but if I have a strong 3 man rotation it's hard to beat in the playoffs.  3). Be prepared 2/3 seasons ahead. When I first started in this world I looked out 3 seasons and saw that the third season offered the best FA class. By building through draft and Int'l the first two,  I was able to add some key pieces and then go after some solid free agents that really turned this team around. Now it doesn't always work as some players will get resigned but it helps with your budget by being prepared a few seasons in advance.

bnags(Nashville)
 1)Patience 2)Plan of action 3)Patience It takes a lot of time to learn the game first and foremost.  Second I dont believe that winning teams/franchises are built overnight. Have a plan, stick to it, and try to stick to it even if things go a little away from what you planned.

Ghutton9(Seattle)
1. Patience. Make a plan and stick to it. If you make a good plan early on then you can build a team that can have an extended run of success 2.Build around pitching. Hitters are nice but they are much more common to come by. Good pitching is a must. Kind of on the same point in a way is defense.    You have to have solid defenders to back up that pitching. 3. This is very important. Don't over spend. By over spending you put your franchise in a bind and long term success is very rare for a team that over spends.   The key is to lock up your young players early and avoid arbitration when they'll cost more and likely won't re sign with you for taking them to arbitration so often. Note: this is why I feel like my team is suffering right now.    I didn't follow my rules for long term success because I seen an opportunity to win a World Series. Of course that was another way to build a winning franchise but for the short term. That's another story though. Lol.

Flucie(St. Louis)
 Good Pitching staff, good contact hitting and LUCK. I really don't know.

rxw1(Tampa Bay)
 1) Keep a balanced mix of veterans &young players - avoid the massive rebuild 2) Focus strong pitching & defense - giving up unearned runs kills you in the long run 3) find the talent that fit your ballpark - if you can't win at home then you will never win a playoff series.

All great advice!  I appreciate everyone's honest response!