1955 World Series for Statis-Pro Baseball ⚾️
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All these years- I believe the 1955 World Series cards were published in the second volume of the third season of All-Star Replay, in 1979 or 1980- I knew the the pitchers for that set were wrong. The hits in the cards were just off. But I did not know why. I had thought the David C. LeSeuer pitcher’s card corrections from the 1980 season (published in 1981) had been misapplied. But the set predated the publishing of those corrections. It was a real puzzler.
(Original Set - From All-Star Replay, Volume 2 Issue Number 3):
I’ve been working a bit with the cards from the Great Pennant Races teams, figuring out how the old pitchers cards and the newer versions interrelate. So I’ve been looking more at the old pitcher’s creation charts as well as other basic elements of the game. And one night I woke up in the middle of the night with an idea. The strikeouts and walks on the old charts were designed to be pulled from one chart; but hits from another.
What if instead, at least for some teams in this set, they’d pulled the hits from the wrong chart? What if they pulled the split counts from the walks and strikeouts chart? It would make sense that there would be too many hits on the pitchers so affected, since the walks and strikeouts chart is constructed differently.
Sandy Amoros breaks Yogi Berra’s heart
Let’s look at a couple examples- 1955 Yankee pitcher Johnny Kucks. He allowed 122 hits in 126 2/3 innings (0.96 ratio). On the walks and strikeout chart this would be 16 splits, which results in an erroneous 11-28 pitcher’s singles range, which is what we see on his card. But had Avalon Hill used the proper chart it would be only 12 splits, for a pitcher’s singles range of 11-24. Brooklyn pitcher Johnny Podres has a ratio of 160/159.333 or 1.004. On the walks and strikeouts charts this is 19 splits for a pitcher’s singles range of 11-33. This is also what we see on his card, and once again the proper range from the hits chart for pitchers singles would be 11-24.
You can certainly double check my math, but the following pitchers would get the following pitcher’s singles ranges: (The other split counts for walks, strikeouts, wild pitches, etc. would remain the same as numeric counts but might have to be “moved”)
Example Pitcher’s singles, done right:
Don Newcombe 11-23
Carl Erskine 11-24
Johnny Podres 11-24
Billy Loes 11-23
Karl Spooner 11-22
Russ Meyer 11-26
Ed Roebuck 11-25
Don Bessent 11-21
Roger Craig 11-22
Clem Labine 11-21
Whitey Ford 11-18 (original range was 11-17, not sure why)
Bob Turley 11-21
Tommy Byrne 11-23 (same as on card)
…etc.
There are thus two ways to solve the pitcher’s card problem -recard the 1955 World Series pitchers using the proper results derived from the original card creation charts from the First or Second Edition of the rules;
Or -redo them fully as LeSeuer variant pitchers. In other words fully update them. This would produce the best fits. I’ve elected to fix these issues this way, and furthermore I’m adding Sandy Koufax (in his rookie year) for the Dodgers, and Eddie Lopat, who was a spot starter and Jim Konstanty to the Yankees as a reliever.
Konstanty is an interesting case, his overall stats are excellent, yet he was left off of the 1955 Yankee World Series roster and out of the Statis-Pro set. It almost makes no sense when you look at his 2.32 ERA and 73 innings pitched. He’s exactly what the 1955 Yankees need out of the ‘Pen. But if you look at his pitching logs you can see why- after a month of heavy usage in on July 31st he was pounded for 4 runs and 6 hits in a third of an inning, and from that point on he was completely ineffective and was used sparingly between that date and September 23rd. In that period, Konstanty allowed 24 hits, six walks and ten runs in only 11 2/3 innings. Opponents batted .344 against him. His season was a tale of two different pitchers- a very effective early closer who may have been overworked by Mid-Summer, followed by a stunning collapse in August and September, where he just couldn’t get anyone out. I include him so fans of the 1955 Yankees can have a complete team, but he should probably not be on New York’s World Series roster. Neither should Lopat, who was actually traded to Baltimore at the end of the year.
Koufax for the Dodgers would be an interesting “what-if”. While he is wild, he is also very effective. He would have given Brooklyn a very powerful right/left top line rotation with Newcombe. My guess is the Dodgers didn’t pick him for the Series because he was a rookie.
One last quirk is the original cards had a different way to calculate relief points than later cards. Part of the reason for this was managers also used their starters as closers in some games. I’ve kept those ratings as well as fielding bunting and batting card ratings. But if you wanted to use a more modern method, here are these results:
Brooklyn:
Newcombe: SR: 13 RR: 7
Erskine: SR: 15 RR: 9
Podres: SR: 15 RR: 9
Loes: SR: 14 RR: 8
Meyer: SR: 16 RR: 10
Roebuck: SR: 0 RR: 9
Labine: SR: 9 RR: 6
Spooner: SR: 11 RR: 7
Bessent: SR: 8 RR: 6
Craig: SR: 11 RR: 7
Koufax: SR: 10 RR: 4
New York:
Ford: SR: 12 RR: 7
Turley: SR: 15 RR: 8
Byrne: SR: 14 RR: 8
Larsen: SR: 12 RR: 8
Kucks: SR: 12 RR: 8
Grim: SR: 12 RR: 8
Morgan: SR: 8 RR: 7
Sturdivant: SR: 8 RR: 7
Coleman: SR: 15 SR: 9
Lopat: SR: 14 RR: 9
Konstanty: SR: 0 RR: 5
Anyway- here is the set of new pitching cards to use with the existing batters:
1955-WS-Pitchers.pdf (New Pitchers)
Notes:
- Tom Sturdivant is actually a right handed pitcher; he was mistakenly carded as a left hander in the original set.
- Mickey Mantle played with a leg injury, which significantly limited his effectiveness and ultimately contributed to the Yankees' loss to the Brooklyn Dodgers. After missing the first two games, Mantle was forced to move from center field to right field in Game 3 due to the injury, played very poorly in game 4, and he was unable to play the field for the rest of the series. He did pinch hit in Game 7, but was out on a pop-up. Mantle’s injury is commonly considered the main reason for the Yankee’s loss.
