TOWER GROVE — Back on the Blues beat, I was in Vancouver one winter, needing to catch a flight to Edmonton and writing on fumes. Battery fumes.
The AC adapter for my laptop was kaput and before catching a flight to Alberta – where I might find a computer store that sold an IBM compatible AC adapter, or might not — I had to file an article. Deadline is one thing. But a flashing red light and dwindling battery is some motivation.
Once in Edmonton, I began the hunt a new power cord and it was outside of town somewhere that I came upon a place with the needed adapter and a baseball game. It was on sale for $9.95 Canadian.
(Insert exchange-rate joke here.)
The game: Baseball Mogul 2001, I believe.
Part of the ever-evolving Baseball Mogul line.
The game was addictive and has only become more so as its improved — adding in pitch-by-pitch simulations, better graphics and improved statistics. But at its core it is profoundly easy to play and easy to get hooked on. Up in old Busch’s press box, Bernie Miklasz and I would fly through the seasons during 2004 and 2005. Bernie played out decades with the Baltimore Orioles as if he ran the team. I took my homestate Colorado Rockies from expansion to World Series champions as quickly as possible. Sometimes it took, well, at least a decade.
Baseball Mogul puts you in position to do everything from acquire players, offer trades, put a player on the block, change the price on ice cream, give beer away for free, sell broadcast rights, change the rotation and even move the team to another city, locales as different as Vancouver, British Columbia, and Tuscaloosa, Ala., where I believe you would lure free agents with Dream Land BBQ.
The best part of the game, is you can start a franchise in any year you pick — and recent additions have kept true to the players funneling into the leagues each season.
(I once drafted Grady Sizemore to someday replace Ken Griffey Jr. in center field.)
With the 2007 edition of the game, my latest tack has been to play out players’ careers as if they had not been derailed by injury or see if I can get some personal favorites into the Hall of Fame. (Yes, there is part of the program that inducts players into Cooperstown and even gives you the percentage of the votes received. No hand-wringing needed.) I shepherded Jim Abbott to a handful of All-Star games and perhaps the Hall of Fame. Got Rickey Henderson the single-season runs record. Robin Ventura has had some wacky power seasons with the early-1990s Rockies, and, just for fun, so did Griffey Jr.
Around a nucleus that included Griffey Jr., Ben McDonald, Jimmy Key, and Derek Jeter, who was drafted and put in the lineup as an 18-year-old, the team I built won 15 of 18 World Series.
Not too shabby, if a bit, um, outrageous.
Looking to continue the healthy-star simulations I started over, guiding the St. Louis Browns in 1950. Why 1950? That was the first year a young switch-hitter from Oklahoma appeared on the New York Yankees’ roster. See, the game also includes a minor-league system, where you develop players to their peak potential — or lose veterans until they retire. You can also move your minor-league teams to cities of your choosing. I put one in New Orleans, one in Columbia, Mo., and even one in Elgin, Ill.
I started my most recent game in 1950 because in the game’s 1950, Mickey Mantle first appears in the Yankees’ minors.
I traded for him, whatever the Yankees demanded.
And then I put him, only 18, in the starting lineup.
The Browns struggled, but he won the rookie of the year award that season, hit 47 home runs in his second season and won the MVP in 1953 with 55 homers. Around him, I acquired Eddie Mathews and Joe Adcock. But the first big move I made was signing Robin Roberts as a free agent and sending three big-league players to Boston for Warren Spahn. To save money, I shifted to a four-man rotation so I could rationalize Roberts’ and Spahn’s salary as paying for three pitchers.
Still, that team finished behind the mighty Yankees.
The game follows familiar rules: Players are arbitration eligible, but you can beat them to the arbitration hearings by signing them to long-term deals. After the 1952 season, Mantle was bound for arbitration. The game is set to today’s money no matter what year you start, so I signed him to a seven-year, $149-million deal with a three-year player option.
A few weeks later, I scanned the free agent pool and saw a certain reigning NL MVP who was seeking $18.5 million a year was, according to rumors, “nearing a four-year deal with the Boston Red Sox.”
I plunged in and signed Stan Musial.
That contract meant the Browns would surely spiral into debt that season unless they won, allowing me to raise ticket prices slowly, and kept on winning right through the World Series. That would mean big profits in the postseason.
The (virtual, Mogul) Browns’ opening day lineup for 1953:
2B Johnny Temple
RF Stan Musial
CF Mickey Mantle
1B Joe Adcock
LF Roy Sievers
3B Eddie Mathews
SS Granny Hamner
C Gus Triandos
RHP Robin Roberts
The team thundered through the American League. Musial moved to the middle of the order when my “damage” plan didn’t work. He hit .333 with 40 homers and 149 RBIs. Roberts won his second consecutive pitcher’s triple crown and Cy Young Award. Mantle, as I mentioned, took the MVP — his second, so far — with a .323 average and 153 RBIs.
The Browns won the World Series, dismissing the New York Giants in five.
But we lost so much money that the future is dicey.
That was when I happened upon a part of the game that I hadn’t seen before. I’ve built new ballparks, even moved a team or two — one to New Orleans, for thrills. But at the end of the 1953 season, as the Browns celebrated a title, up popped a window asking this question:
Would you like to move the Browns to Baltimore?
I clicked no and am now halfway through 1954, playing day by day. The Browns have a three-game lead on the Yankees. Mantle leads the league with 35 homers, Musial leads with 106 RBIs. I have lost $35 million and the payroll is twice the budget. Trouble is coming.
But the Browns will stay in St. Louis, opposite the Cardinals.
At least until I move them to Denver and the Time Zone Baseball Forgot.
For kicks.
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