Trying to bring a little common sense to the game of baseball. But considering many of the people who read baseball blogs, I'm probably just pissing into the wind.

Tuesday, June 2, 2020

Finishing up the brackets


Okay, so here we go with the other side of the bracket:

1988 Royals vs 2016 Royals                                 1988 has home field advantage

2008 Royals vs 2004 Royals                                 2008

2002 Royals vs 2000 Royals                                 2000

2019 Royals vs 2010 Royals                                  2010

1973 Royals vs 1992 Royals                                 1973


And now for the last bracket:

1986 Royals vs 2007 Royals                                  1986

1989 Royals vs 1983 Royals                                  1989

1987 Royals vs 1972 Royals                                  1987

2017 Royals vs 1993 Royals                                  1993

2006 Royals vs 2011 Royals                                  2011





Okay, so it wasn't as much random as I would have liked. But that's pretty much the definition of randomness. And I could have made sure all of the teams over .500  played another team without a winning record, but that has pretty much happened anyhow.

So next will be a list of all the brackets so far, and then on to the teams with a bye.

The rest of the match-ups

The first bracket:



1995 Royals vs 1991 Royals                                   1991 has home field advantage


 1990 Royals vs 1998 Royals                                   1990 has home field advantage


 1975 Royals vs 2012 Royals                                    1975 has home field advantage

                            I didn't even have to look up the records. This might be a sweep.

  
1996 Royals vs 2005 Royals                                    1996

  
2013 Royals vs 1999 Royals                                     2013




  
Onto the second bracket:

  
1979 Royals vs 2001 Royals                                     1979

                             This might be a laugher

  
1970 Royals vs 1997 Royals                                      1997

                              Even with the DH, this is very close. Could be an upset.
  

2009 Royals vs 2018 Royals                                     2009

                              How were the 2009 Royals better than anyone?

  
1982 Royals vs 1974 Royals                                     1982

                             Brett's first season


  

Yes, there are an uneven amount of match-ups in the brackets, but that is the nature of brackets.This will be evened out with the bye teams. The first bracket will add three byes, will the second one will add 4 bye teams.



So what are your predictions so far?



And on to the other side of the bracket.

The teams with a first round bye


So, to get this started. These are the teams I've selected for the 1st round byes. Generally they are among the better teams the Royals have had. I would have like to have done a straight  match-up tournament with no byes, but that doesn't really work.

So here we go, in no particular order:

1)    1985 Royals       World Series winner

2)    2015 Royals       World Series winner

3)    1980 Royals       World Series loser

4)    2014 Royals       World Series loser

5)    1976 Royals       Division winner

6)    1977 Royals       Division winner

7)    1978 Royals       Division winner

8)    1984 Royals       Division winner

9)    1994 Royals       The strike screwed them

10)   2003 Royals      (how did they have a winning record among all that suckiness)

11)   1971 Royals      The first winning season

12)   1981 Royals      They weren't really a play-off team, but I  needed one more team.

13)   1969 Royals      Where it all started

So a 1st round bye to each of these teams, leaving 38 more teams to fill out the bracket.

The rules

Okay, the rules/procedures;

I'm running this:

All comments are welcome, even if they are wrong

Anyone can act as manager/GM of a team during the second round, and any subsequent rounds. Hell, I'll even let you pick a team in the first round if you think you can make it through. This means that  you pick the starters and line-up before each game, and can choose substitutions. Details of how this will work to follow.

We will, as a sign of the apocalypse, use the Designated Hitter. Sadly, it only makes sense as 47 of the 51 teams used it. If two of the pre-DH teams play each other, it will be without the DH. As is only right and pure in this world.

This will be a 51-team bracket, as they Royals have completed 51 seasons.


There will be 13 teams selected to have a 1st round bye. I will choose them.

The other teams will be assigned to the brackets, top down, by a random number generator.

The teams given a first round bye will be assigned to a bracket by a random number generator.

There will be no rankings.

There will be no adjusting the brackets later.

Each set of teams will play a 9-game series.

3 home, 4 away, 2 home.

The team with the better record will be the home team.

The roster used will be the end-of-season roster for that year, which would have been the playoff roster, if they had/did make it. It will be a 25-man roster, and there will be a 40-man roster for injuries.

I haven't quite figured out all of the details yet, but if I am able, the visiting team will have Municipal Stadium as their home stadium.

Injures will be enabled.

Any team not having a human manager will utilize the computer manager, so you are managing against the AI, not me. This way  you have a chance.

I will try to do one series every day, and probably more on the weekends, up to the point where the bars are open again. Then we'll see.

After every series, I will post the results, the statistics, an updated bracket, and depending on time, a summary or re-cap.

That's all for now.

The greatest tournament of all time

I'm not sitting at home all day with nothing to do. I'm still working every day, and putting in as many hours as I did before all this started. But I am sitting home in the evenings and on the weekends, as there really isn't much to do at all. The house is clean, the car is clean, the yard work is done. Even if it wasn't, it's raining, and I don't feel the need to get wet.

As I sit around most evenings and weekends, I get bored, so I play a lot of baseball on Out Of The Park. One of the best simulation games around. I always play the Royals, of course, and have won the last 4 World Series, and I'm only in the 1980 season.

No, it's not fantasy baseball, but it's much better.

I've just upgraded to the 2020 Season, and it's well worth it. It has a lot of different features from when I started 10 years ago, and it's much better.


One of the features it has it that it allows you to run tournaments. You can do teams from any era, any team, any year, and so and so forth. And it lets you run historical leagues, or make up you own. So since I'm sitting here without a lot to do, I thought I might try out a tournament.

This, of course, will be a tournament to figure out which is the greatest team in Kansas City Royal history.  We all think we know, but due to the differences in era's, and type of game played, ball used, stadium, to juice or not to  juice, a team from one year that was great might not have been as good in a different year.

Which team is better? The 1985 team that won the World Series? Or the 2015 that won it all? Is the 1980 runner-up better than the 2014 runner-up? We don't know. But we are going to find out. Because I'm going to run the tournament and we'll see how it goes.

As always when I am doing this, I don't expect a lot of views or comments, but if  you do take a look, don't forget to tell me how I'm getting it all wrong and you know better. I, of course, will respond with kindness and humility, because I will know most of you personally.

If anyone wants to guest manage, that would be great. I will be posting the rules and brackets shortly, but those who respond will get their choice of team, in the order of response. 

Even if you aren't a Royals fan, I would have to question why. But you will be forgiven.