Milwaukee: A New Baseball History

[Martyrzade]

As recently as the 1950's Milwaukee was one of the nations ten largest cities. Today its a mid sized city in a relatively marginal market size region. Its baseball history and tradition is rich, varied and rife with failure.

Abner Dalrymple was Milwaukees only batting champion on a team that lasted one season in 1878.

A Union Association franchise finished in second place in winning percentage in that leagues only season in 1884. Milwaukee replaced a failed franchise in Washington and only actually played 12 games.

Milwaukee gained an American Association franchise for the last 36 games of the 1891 season. The American Association then folded.

The first American League Milwaukee Brewers played one season in 1901 before moving to St. Louis and eventually becoming the Baltimore Orioles.

The Boston Braves moved to Milwaukee in 1953 and won the cities on championship. They left after the 1965 season.

The current Milwaukee Brewers moved from Seattle in 1970. They have played in but one world series, losing to St. Louis in 1982. They have had a losing record for 12 consecutive seasons.

This dynasty will be an attempt to reimagine history by going back to 1901 and running a competant team that will hopefully not need to be relocated to Saint Louis. I will be faithful to the structure and fluidity of Major League Baseball but this will be an all new league with all new results. The teams that move in 1902 and 1903 will be the ones that performed the worst in the season before. Boston and Philadelphia will be excused as the turbulent 1950's will require both of those cities to have two franchises. So six teams are on the cutting block. The team that loses the most money in 1901 moves to Saint Louis, the team with the worst record in 1902 goes to New York.

After that its 50 years of stability before the cities with multiple teams get stripped of the least successful franchise. The weak sisters go to LA, San Fran, Kansas City and back to the two cities that will lose teams early.

This dynasty will be detail light, usually just one post per season, theres alot of history to get through and a whole new reality to create.



A note on nicknames: Baltimore, Washington and Milwaukee will keep thier origional 1901 nicknames, all other franchises will revert to the nicknames they eventually hold in the present day. There will be no Beaneaters. Franchises that move will retain thier origional nickname, no matter how silly it looks in the new city. The New York Yankees will never come to be, see how nice this new reality is already. :)

Cities are equalized, rosters shuffled and players are fictional.


American League 1901

Baltimore Orioles
Boston Red Sox
Chicago White Sox
Cleveland Indians
Detroit Tigers
Milwaukee Brewers
Philadelphia Athletics
Washington Senators

National League 1901

Boston Braves
Brooklyn Dodgers
Chicago Cubs
Cincinnati Reds
New York Giants
Philadelphia Phillies
Pittsburgh Pirates
St. Louis Cardinals

[Martyrzade]

1901 Milwaukee Brewers

Dame chance has smiled upon the franchise in the early going. We have a payroll of 25.2 million, the lowest in the major leagues. This almost guarantees our not being the financial weak sister that gets moved to Saint Louis. It also means we are the early favorites for worst team, and that one moves in 1903. Boston and Philadelphia are immune because two franchises are required in both towns for relocations in the 50’s. The Chicago White Sox are not immune. This baseball history may not have teams on both sides of Chicago. The team that relocates in 1902 is immune for 1903.

On first look we seem to have a first baseman, and not much else. We have a LF in Nashville and a few possible superstars way down in the rookie leagues. The pitching side of things is a bit better with three solid starters, two of which are rookies, so not much better. The bullpen is scary looking and the staff in Nashville is practically in full out revolt, they may burn down Music City Stadium. We have about 30 million to spend.

C David Troglodyte 78
IB Eric Snively 94
2B Ken McLoughlin 68
SS Joseph Obringer 66
3B Pat O’Rourke 65
RF Dee Downie 71
CF Dwight Studnik 85
LF Sean Eason 67

We head to the free agent market where Stew Bacsik, a 90 rated 3B and Homer Johansen 93/98 CF await. We have the inside lane on Johanson as his best friend is Pat O’Rourke. Bacsik will of course be replacing O’Rourke but we wont tell. The best available pitcher is an overpriced primadonna named Pizzaro, we take a pass and fish out another rookie to help fill out our hideous bullpen: Tom Shipman, 86/89.

We lowball Johansen and get him for 8.25 mil for 7 years. Bacsik signs for 7.4 over 6 years and Shipman is ours for the low price of 1.8 million for 4 years. We send Studnik and a CF prospect named Telesco 63/100 from the rookie league to the Braves for LF Jamie Teppermeister 88/100.

Lineup:

1 C David Troglodyte 78/79
2 3B Stew Bacsik 90
3 CF Homer Johansen 93/98
4 LF Jamie Tepermeister 88/100
5 1B Eric Snively 94
6 RF Dee Downie 71
7 2B Ken McLoughlin 68/81
8 SS Joseph Obringer 66
9 P

SP: Matthew Wood 86/93
Ben Wilcox 85/99
Omar Cascald 82
Albert Acarons 75/76
Rob Duncan 73
CL: Tom Shipman 86/89

Payroll 43.8 million. Budget 55.1 mil.


April: 14-11, third place 5.0 games behind Philadelphia.
May: 31-19, tied for first place with Philadelphia.
June: 47-28, first place by 5.5 games over Philadelphia.
July: 58-39, first place by 1.5 games over Philadelphia.
August: 70-52, second place 4.5 games behind Philadelphia.
Final: 86-68, third place 5.0 games behind Philadelphia.

Our 4.26 team ERA led the American league to our complete surprise. A few positional weaknesses in our lineup put us near the back in batting. Our attendance is the lowest in the league due probably to our insanely high $30 ticket prices. Someone should have looked at that before the season. Our modest payroll does however make us the most profitable club in the AL. The Baltimore Orioles end up in the red and are headed for Saint Louis in 1902.

Team Leaders
ERA Ben Wilcox 3.46
Wins: Ben Wilcox 19-11
Saves: Tom Shipman 33
Average: Stew Bacsik .325
Homers: Eric Snively 57
Steals: Homer Johansen 25




AMERICAN LEAGUE (1901)

AL W L PCT GB AVG HR SB ERA
Philadelphia 91 63 .591 -- .276 222 79 4.31
Cleveland 87 67 .565 4.0 .281 201 109 4.78
Milwaukee 86 68 .558 5.0 .271 241 68 4.26
Boston 81 73 .526 10.0 .265 184 66 4.36
Baltimore 78 76 .506 13.0 .261 196 82 4.61
Detroit 75 79 .487 16.0 .274 216 93 4.70
Chicago 64 90 .416 27.0 .279 191 69 5.63
Washington 58 96 .377 33.0 .275 106 104 5.09


NATIONAL LEAGUE (1901)

NL W L PCT GB AVG HR SB ERA
Brooklyn 99 55 .643 -- .285 252 60 4.22
Chicago 89 65 .578 10.0 .280 216 74 4.08
Boston 85 69 .552 14.0 .281 245 89 5.11
Cincinnati 81 73 .526 18.0 .287 271 115 5.04
Philadelphia 80 74 .519 19.0 .269 169 52 4.17
St. Louis 79 75 .513 20.0 .283 184 101 4.71
New York 64 90 .416 35.0 .268 164 105 5.29
Pittsburgh 35 119 .227 64.0 .251 134 53 7.48


WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS
Dodgers defeat Athletics, 4-0