CFBL 1990, Year #1
Beat Battson Does!
The 1st year of the league was the only year that teams were allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money during the year to bid on players -- and for good reason. BEAT BATTSON and Journalists & Murderers made a mockery of fair play, as an intense rivalry built between the two, with bids spiraling out of control. By the time the regular season was completed, the two teams collectively had spent $988 and another $136 during the playoffs. The average regular season amount spent by the other six teams was $172; BEAT BATTSON and the Murderers increased that average to $253.
Be that as it may, 1990 became The Year That BEAT BATTSON Bought the Pennant -- and Lived Up To Its Name.
Team (owners) (bonus pick)
Journalists & Murderers (Ray LeBov): Greenwell
Scum Sucking Dogs (Mike Coonan, Fred Hobbs): Puckett
Brooklyn Beatniks (Chuck Dalldorf): Will Clark
Chicago Blues Sox (L. Leary, B. Scarlett, M. Tuttle): Hershiser (Clark)
East Coast Homeboys (Al & Michael Liberato): Eric Davis (Canseco)
Sac Colons (Steve Crozier, Bob Scofield): Saberhagen (Clark)
River Rats (Rick Battson): Canseco
BEAT BATTSON (Tim Howe, Lance Olson): Sierra
Rules: Basic fantasy baseball rules were adopted; a round-by-round draft was held; 19 players per team, with an extra $2 per week for players 20 - 22. A bonus round allowed each team to select one player prior to the serpentine draft. If more than two teams picked the same bonus round player, cards were drawn to decide who would get which player. Cards were drawn to decide divisions, and the season was split into halves; the winner of each half made the playoffs. Tiebreakers were established and were used to decide a race in both divisions. No salary cap was used.
Season: Teams were basically in three camps: The Big Spenders (BEAT BATTSON, Journalists & Murderers); the Moderate Spenders (River Rats, Homeboys, Sac Colons); and the Cheap Bums (S.S. Dogs, Beatniks, Blues Sox). Except for the Beatniks, the year's contenders came from the first two groups.
1st Half: The Murderers got off to a fast, smart start (e.g., picking up the eventual RBI leader, Cecil Fielder, for $2 the Sunday night after the draft) and spent the half making numerous changes and spending big bucks...and eventually winning the Piersall Division with an impressive 7-3 record. In the Stengel Division, the Beatniks tied the S.S. Dogs and BEAT BATTSON and won the tiebreaker (most runs produced). The Beatniks, the mirror opposite of the Murderers and BEAT BATTSON, spent little money and relied on draftees that spent the 1st half of the season relatively injury-free.
2nd Half: The Rats started the 2nd half, 0-3, but, in a huge comeback (winning 6 of their last 7), tied the Homeboys in a last-week, head-to-head game, winning a 1-point tiebreaker. Then, in the 2nd half tiebreaker, the Rats beat the Homeboys by 13 2nd half runs produced to take the title. The Rats would have lost a tiebreaker to the Colons if the Colons had been able to win the last week, which would have resulted in a 3-way tie with the Rats and Homeboys, but they lost a 2-point heartbreaker to the Murderers.
The Homeboys did not make the playoffs despite tying for the best overall record. The S.S. Dogs produced the most runs during the season, but could do no better than lose a 1st half title tiebreaker, having fewer runs produced than the Beatniks.
Final standings:
Jimmy Piersall Division
1st Half 2nd Half Overall
BEAT BATTSON (2nd) 5-5 (457) 7-3 (499) 12-8 (956)
Brooklyn Beatniks (1st) 5-5 (528) 5-5 (451) 10-10 (979)
Scum Sucking Dogs 5-5 (511) 4-6 (508) 9-11 (1019)
Chicago Blues Sox 4-6 (507) 4-6 (483) 8-12 (990)
Casey Stengel Division
1st Half 2nd Half Overall
East Coast Homeboys 6-4 (473) 6-4 (437) 12-8 (910)
River Rats (2nd) 5-5 (469) 6-4 (450) 11-9 (919)
Journalists & Murderers (1st) 7-3 (546) 3-7 (438) 10-10 (984)
Sac Colons 3-7 (488) 5-5 (508) 8-12 (996)
The Playoffs:
Division: The Rats beat the Murderers both weeks in their 2-week playoff (total score), 229-208, to win the Stengel Division, stopping the Murderers in their attempt to buy the pennant. In the Piersall Division, BEAT BATTSON overcame a 1st week 20-point deficit and roared back to win the 2-week playoff, 185-179, over the Beatniks.
Championship: The River Rats beat BEAT BATTSON the 1st week of the finals and were leading in the 2nd week when the team hit the wall. BEAT BATTSON came back to win the 2nd week by 12, then rolled to a huge 55-pt. win in week #3.
Starring for BEAT BATTSON were draft picks OF Sierra (#1), OF George Bell (#3), SS TFernandez (#6), RP DJones (#9), 2B Alomar (#11), RP Olson (#12) and pick-ups 3B Sabo (Week #3, $2), SP Drabek (#6, $36), OF Gant (#9, $23), 1B Palmeiro (#10, $15.50), 3B Magadan (#11, $23.50), C Santiago (#16, $2) and SP McDonald (#17, $21.50).
The Murderers took 3rd place with back-to-back wins over an injury-depleted Beatnik team that, frankly, had not learned over the course of the season how to watch and pick up players. But the Beatnik team was an anomaly in the playoffs, having had what turned out to be a solid draft -- after being teased by other owners during the draft when they tried three times to pick up players that already had been drafted -- but spending almost no money during the season or the playoffs.
The BEAT BATTSON owners spent $555 over the course of the year, so the team's two owners won less individually than the River Rat owner won himself. A small victory for the beaten Rat owner.
MLB Awards:
1990 Post-Season Awards & FBL Teams
AL-MVP: OF RHenderson, Sac Colons, D#2
NL-MVP: OF Bonds, Blues Sox, D#7; traded to Murderers, W#14, for SP King, SP Heaton & RP Dibble
AL-Cy Young: SP Welch, River Rats, D#6
NL-Cy Young: SP Drabek, Beat Battson, W#6, $36
AL-Rookie: C SAlomar, Beat Battson, D#9; dropped, W#22; Murderers, W#23; dropped, W#24
NL-Rookie: OF Justice, River Rats, W#19, $13.25
Pesky Pole at twilight at Fenway Park