As Strat-O-Matic approaches the 50th anniversary of the game, Baseball Musings is offering free games to lucky contestants. From the company:
Since 1961, Strat-O-Matic has created the most realistic simulation of statistically accurate baseball. Every player is rated by Strat-O-Matic’s unique rating system with statistical precision in each phase of the game – batting, pitching, defense and running.
Strat-O-Matic Baseball is played with the exact same rules as professional baseball. Each major leaguer has his own Strat-O-Matic Player Card based on his overall stats from the 2009 season. The gamer controls every aspect of each play from determining the starting line-up, stealing, hitting and running to replacing the starting pitcher. Instead of a bat and ball, the gamer uses dice, player cards and charts to play the game.
I’ve played for 30 years, since my junior year of college. We drafted leagues, stayed up late at night playing series, and often watched other games with great interest. Along the way we witnessed great plays, unlikely MVPs, clutch home runs, all with a roll of the dice. The game evolved from a very simple one set of stats for the batter, one for the pitcher, to taking account of left and right matchups, park effects, clutch hitting, and better defensive simulations. I play by mail now, but I always look forward to the results arriving in my inbox.
There will be four contests over the next week. The winner of the first contest gets a choice of the classic board game or the latest version of the computer game. This game will be random. Leave a comment with your name and a valid email address. For each comment I will then run the Evil Player program, which simply chooses a random player from those who have seen action in the current season. If I run it for you and it comes up with Joe Mather, you win. I will reply to each comment with the name of the player selected for you.
Why Joe Mather? In college I lived on the 13th floor of Mather House, and my first Strat-O-Matic League was called The 13th Floor Strat-O-Matic League.
As of today, there are 858 players. If you enter and lose, you may enter again by leaving another comment. I will run the comments in order, but I won’t be in front of the computer all day, so you may need to wait to find out if you won. Members of The 13th Floor Strat-O-Matic League, The SOMBILLA, and the PWBL are not eligible.
Update, 4:34 EDT 5/5/2010: This contest has no winner after 24 hours, so I’m modifying the rules. If Joe Mather comes up as the Evil Player, or he is in the top 20 on the list, you’ll win the prize.
Update, 4:48 EDT 5/5/2010: We have a winner! Hans takes home the prize. Thanks to everyone who played!
Russ Ortiz, how demoralizing. But maybe it’ll be demoralizing like game 3 of the 2004 ALCS. The nadir of despair before everything turns around.
@Rob Thunder: Your player is Tim Wakefield.
@Jason Wojciechowski: Your player is Chris Ray. Another repeater.
@Brent Siemers: Your player is John Hughes. He repeats as well.
@Taylor Curtis: Your player is Adrian Gonzalez.
Dennis Reyes on Cinco de Mayo?!?!
This has to be my day!
2nd at bat, first pitch – hit me again.
Maybe Bill North changed his name to PfoHo…
Chris Ray-Gun! Ray-Gun Rondo! I’m punchy!
Lineup
1. Chone Figgins 3B
2. Torii Hunter CF
3. Manny Ramirez DH
4. Todd Helton 1B
5. Dexter Fowler LF
6. Marlon Byrd RF
7. Dan Uggla 2B
8. Cesar Izturis SS
9. Carlos Ruiz C
Bench
Brian Schneider c
Mark Teahen 1b/3b/of
Omar Infante 2b/ss/of
Skip Schumaker of/2b
Rotation
1. CC Sabathia (L)
2. Livan Hernandez
3. Jon Lester (L)
4. Aaron Harang
5. Matt Palmer
Bullpen
Jonathan Broxton CL
Jason Frasor SU
Tim Wakefield LR
Fu-Te Ni MR
Chris Perez MR
Raul Valdes(L)
Will Ohman(L)
AAA
Jayson Nix
Troy Glaus
Miguel Cairo
Juan Francisco
Andy Marte
Ronny Cedeno
Mike Redmond
Randy Winn
Matt Stairs
Justin Berg
Jason Bulger
Ramon Troncoso
Gerardo Enrique Parra
Juan Rincon
Jeff Gray MR
Tony Gwynn Jr of
Chris Narveson(L)
Darren O’Day
John Hughes
Woot, Adrian Gonzalez! What am I going to do with all these corner infielders? Maybe Votto can catch…
Adding Aubrey “Hepburn” Huff to the mix
Brian Barden (INF)
Wilson Ramos (C)
Alex Rios (OF)
Derek Lowe (SP)
Josh Hamilton (OF)
Carlos Zambrano (SP/RP)
Brandon Medders (RP)
Alex Gonzalez (SS)
Lou Montanez (OF)
Aubrey Huff (1B/3B)
I like small teams. Not big ones.
Ok, bullpen’s full. Any more relievers and I’ll be forced to stretch Albers back out.
SS – Yuniesky Betancourt
3B – David Freese
CF – Brett Gardner
RF – Justin Upton
RP – Chris Perez
RP – Matt Albers
RP – Leo Nunez
RP – Raul Valdes(z)
RP – Eric O’Flaherty
RP – Joe Smith
RP – Manny Corpas
@Mark Kubitz: Your player is Clayton Kershaw. See the original post for a change to speed up the contest.
@Jason Clark: Your player is Rick Ankiel. See the original post for a rule change to speed things along.
make him in my top 20, David!
@Michael: Your player is Franklin Morales. See the original post for a rule change to speed things along.
@Jason Wojciechowski: Your player is David Murphy.
thanks. do you know, generally, how often Mather has been in the top 20 thus far?
@Brent Siemers: Your player is Brandon League. See the original post for a rule change to speed things along.
I’ll add Murphy to the Irish charm right next to O’Flaherty. That + the new rule ought to guarantee a victory!
Kershaw will fit in well (as long as he doesn’t pitch like last night).
Good rule change.
@Taylor Curtis: Your player is Wilson Ramos. See the original post for a rule change to speed things along.
Lineup
1. Chone Figgins 3B
2. Torii Hunter CF
3. Manny Ramirez DH
4. Todd Helton 1B
5. Dexter Fowler LF
6. Marlon Byrd RF
7. Dan Uggla 2B
8. Cesar Izturis SS
9. Carlos Ruiz C
Bench
Brian Schneider c
Mark Teahen 1b/3b/of
Omar Infante 2b/ss/of
Skip Schumaker of/2b
Rotation
1. CC Sabathia (L)
2. Livan Hernandez
3. Jon Lester (L)
4. Aaron Harang
5. Matt Palmer
Bullpen
Jonathan Broxton CL
Jason Frasor SU
Tim Wakefield LR
Brandon League MR
Chris Perez MR
Raul Valdes(L)
Will Ohman(L)
AAA
Jayson Nix
Troy Glaus
Miguel Cairo
Juan Francisco
Andy Marte
Ronny Cedeno
Mike Redmond
Randy Winn
Matt Stairs
Justin Berg
Jason Bulger
Ramon Troncoso
Gerardo Enrique Parra
Juan Rincon
Jeff Gray MR
Tony Gwynn Jr of
Chris Narveson(L)
Darren O’Day
John Hughes(L) 1B
Fu-Te Ni MR
Wilson Ramos, another player on my fantasy team (this week, anyway). With the new rule, this thing won’t take long now!
@Hans: Your player is Aaron Heilman, but Joe Mather comes up 11th on the list, so under the new rule, you win! Send your name, address, phone number and your preference for the board or computer game to me, pinto@baseballmusings.com and I’ll send you the game. Thanks for playing, and congratulations!
@Bryan Trostel: We had a winner under the new rules.
@lar: We had a winner under the new rule.
Oh, so close! Congrats Hans.
@Michael: Not that often, but we did have a winner with the new rule.
Way to go, Hans!
@Jason Wojciechowski: We had a winner under the new rule.
IF: Pablo Sandoval, Miguel Montero, Justin Morneau, Max Ramirez, Brandon Phillips
OF: Andruw Jones, Lou Montanez
SP: Justin Duchscherer, Scott Olsen, Sean Gallagher (DL for toe)
RP: Evan Meek, Jeff Gray, Jesse Crain, Kyle McClellan
and…
@Mark Kubitz: We had a winner under the new rule.
@Brent Siemers: We had a winner under the new rule.
@Taylor Curtis: We had a winner.
Great contest – I was going to place a wager that it would all come full circle and Mather would come up at #13 on a list.
Congrats to Hans, enjoy the game!
@Didi: We had a winner.
Blake Dewitt
Matt Kemp
Jonathan Papelbon
Arthur Rhodes
Joel Hanrahan
Jesse Chavez
Mark Grudzielanek
Missed it by that much! Congrats Hans!
Nice change to the rules.
congrats, Mark.
David, you are a trooper to do this.
oops, i mean, congrats, Hans.
Kent (Thanks for putting up with all of us David)
k2darcy@hotmail.com