Seaporter1 Websites

Seaporter1 = Baseball150.com, Retroplay.net, and Tektona (virtual band) MP3s. (And coming soon — hopefully — in summer, 2024: sp1works.com, where my downloadable and otherwise-available works from all categories are to be gathered under one “roof”).

All provided and maintained by a “staff” of one (the “1” in “Seaporter1” )

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WEBSITE ORGANIZATION AND CONTENT DIRECTORY (TABLE). WHAT YOU CAN FIND AND WHERE:

8/1/2024: WHERE WE ARE AT THE MOMENT: SOME PAGES (ACROSS BOTH SITES, baseball150.com AND retroplay.net) ARE BEING UPDATED TO REFLECT THE FACT THAT 140 OF THE ORIGINALLY-PLANNED 150 MLB SEASONS HAVE BEEN “REPLAYED” WITH OUR EXCLUSIVE BIRTHPLACE-DETERMINED TEAMS. THIS MEANS THAT ONLY 10 SEASONS REMAIN TO BE PLAYED OUT UNDER THIS RETROPLAY SYSTEM (2011 THROUGH 2020) IN ORDER TO MEET THE PROJECT’S ORIGINAL GOAL. AS ALREADY NOTED ELSEWHERE, DON’T BE SURPRISED IF THE PROJECT IS EXTENDED TO INCLUDE THE “EXTRA INNINGS” OF 2021, ’22, ’23, AND ’24, BUT WE’LL SEE IF/WHEN WE GET THROUGH THAT WEIRD 2020 SEASON.

BUT RIGHT NOW, AFTER A FEW SCATTERED PAGE UPDATES (LOOK FOR RECENT JULY/AUGUST ’24 UPDATE DESIGNATIONS AT THE TOPS OF THE AFFECTED PAGES) , THE TOP PRIORITY WILL BE TO COMPLETE THOSE 10 REMAINING SEASONS A.S.A.P. (AS YOU CAN IMAGINE, I’M MIGHTY ANXIOUS, HAVING COME SO FAR (140 DONE, 10 TO GO) TO GET THROUGH THOSE YEARS (2011-2020) SO THAT ALL PAGES ON BOTH OF MY SITES CAN BE PUT INTO COHERENT FINAL FORMS AND A BOOK OR TWO CAN BE PRODUCED ON THE BASIS OF THE VOLUMINOUS DATA. GOTTA WALK, THOUGH, BEFORE WE CAN RUN, AS THEY SAY. HOPE TO SEE YOU A FEW WEEKS FROM NOW WITH THE FINAL GOOD STUFF!

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THE PLAN, AS OF 2/8/23:

OTHER THAN FIXING A FEW MINOR ERRORS IN PRESENTATION, MOST OF THE MATERIAL POSTED ON THESE 2-DOZEN-OR-SO PAGES SEEMS TO BE ADEQUATE FOR THE MOMENT, SO WHOLESCALE UPDATES ARE UNNECESSARY FOR THE NEAR FUTURE, I.M.O. FOR MY PART THEN, THOSE O.B.L. REPLAYS FROM 1946 TO 2020 (THE MAIN PROJECT’S TERMINAL GOAL) ARE CALLING MY NAME. FEEL FREE AND ENCOURAGED TO CHECK OUT BOTH OF MY BASEBALL-ORIENTED SITES AND MY VIRTUAL BAND’S OUTPUT (TEKTONA MP3s). BY INCLUDING A PRIMARY MENU (RETROPLAY.NET) AND SECONDARY MENU (BASEBALL150.COM) ON EACH OF MY POSTED PAGES, IT’S BEEN MADE SUPER-EASY FOR YOU TO BOUNCE AROUND BETWEEN ‘EM ALL AND HEAD OUT OFTEN INTO THIS RELATIVELY UNKNOWN BUT REWARDING TERRITORY (THE INTREPID EXPLORERS AMONG US WILL BE GLAD THEY MADE THE EFFORT). ON THE OTHER HAND, THOSE OF YOU WHO ARE MORE INCLINED TO LOOK FOR ERRORS WILL HAVE SEVERAL MONTHS TO STOCKPILE YOUR AMMO FOR MY RETURN FROM THE REPLAYS. EITHER WAY, I’LL GIVE YOU AN EMAIL LINK TO USE FOR FEEDBACK: 1@retroplay.net

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  Welcome to some unique backwater outposts

of the sprawling web

What “we” do here, or at least what’s planned

(running joke: I’m a “staff” of one)

PART ONE (“Baseball history viewed through an entirely new lens” “Home of Birthplace-Baseball” “Bio-Geo-ball Station”)

1. The main focus is on “replaying” historical Major League Baseball seasons from 1871 through 2020
2. “Fantasy league” rosters have been determined by A) the MLB player’s recorded birthplace; B) that location’s affiliation with a larger region (in most cases, although there are some “standalone” states); C) the player’s ability to “make the team” by notching a sufficient WAR value (Wins Above Replacement) in a given historical year to add to team WAR and D) filling the team’s positional needs (gotta cover ’em all, can’t put 8 outfielders and a pitcher out there!)
3. From the above, we can see that this whole RetroPlay.net system is A) Birthplace-based; B) WAR-based (sole performance-metrics criterion); and C), geared to replaying (“on paper”) all American-based MLB seasons from 1871 through 2020 (the “First 150”)
4. While the official Major League Baseball powers-that-be finally got around to — in 2020/21 —  recognizing some of the historical Negro Leagues as equally valid major leagues, “we’ve” incorporated those MLB-caliber players from NLB (Negro Leagues Baseball) — wherever reliable numbers were available, at least — in this system’s design from its inception (about 20 years ago) to the present day; it’s a lo-o-o-o-ng story, folks, fraught with delays, re-starts, re-workings, and thousands of hours of data collection and entry/re-entry. The point here is that in this system, we’ve included Black Baseball players wherever we could (must have the data, of course), right from the start
5. While not intending by any means to bite the hand that feeds by my comment just above (all of the WAR data used here comes from Baseball-Reference.com, and without that unmatched resource, this whole project would not have been possible), one huge cap-tip must also go to those NLB data-mining pros at Seamheads.com. As far as I can tell, the Negro Leagues Database (at the [old?] Baseball Gauge site) was the only place on the web where the NLB stats were painstakingly collected, the analytical data presented, and much of the Black-Baseball story was told. So for RetroPlay.net purposes, there are only two indispensables: Baseball-Reference.com, Seamheads.com
6. This is NOT in any way, shape, or form an attempt to rewrite history (it was what it was, and no one living now has any authority to re-shape it), but because this replay system includes hundreds of players who have been historically excluded (not only Blacks, but extra-nationals [“foreign-born”] for vast portions of that 150-year span), this system is being styled as the Open Baseball League (OBL); so even though a player is “confined” to playing for the regional team that includes his place of birth, every player has a team for which he can play, and that gives every MLB/NLB player (with a minimum of 10 plate appearances or 9 innings pitched in a given year) a potential place to play in each of the years he was historically active at the MLB/NLB level; this is an OPEN league in this sense: there’s only one league, but people born anywhere on the globe can find a place in it if they’re good enough to help the local team (and all of those born in the same locale move together through their careers as a cohort; they stay together, even if the league is re-aligned)
7. The gist of this main project: retroactively pit birthplace-based teams against each other in each MLB season from 1871 through 2020, with team WAR totals (covering the positions and observing roster limits) determining OBL standings; seasonal champions declared on that basis. NOTE: actual, historical WAR numbers for the given year supplied by Baseball-Reference.com (and Seamheads.com where applicable) are used to compute team totals (rounded to one decimal point), and if ties result, the current plan is to replay the season and break ties via adaptable software such as Old Time Baseball, Strategic Baseball Simulator, Out Of The Park series, etc. (this might become another project arm at some point if time permits; I’d sure love to carry that out!)
8. When “official” OBL results become available and are ready to post, they’ll show up on the Year-by-Year Open Baseball League results page here at RetroPlay.net

PART TWO (The “RetroPlay RE-set Hall of Fame“)

1. “We” think that the actual National Baseball Hall of Fame has made some cringe-worthy errors with regard to its inductees (nothing new there, of course, as many proposed alternative (virtual) halls of fame have cropped up on the web; in essays and one-off articles; and in entire books devoted to the subject, many of which I’ve seen myself). But as far as I know, nobody has suggested what I am suggesting, and it occurs to me that a simple, straightforward, WAR-based formula could provide as much validity as any other HOF selection-system I’ve encountered. (Then again, it’s so simple and makes so much sense that I can hardly imagine that no one has proposed it, and I just wasn’t aware of someone beating me to the punch)
2. Since a true Hall-of-Famer (we’re talking only about players here, not any other category, just FYI) should have had BOTH great cumulative career (“counting”) stats AND have had a period of consistent, dominating, All-Star-production-level (“rate”) stats, wouldn’t it make sense to multiply career WAR by Average-per-162-games WAR to reflect both longevity in production and high rate of production? In other words, if we’re only looking at a player’s on-field performance and putting committee-voting politics aside (along with character issues, for this discussion), what matters more than higher-than-average, All-Star-type seasons, year-in and year-out, coming together to add up to a career that only an elite few can reach? Dedicated sabermetricians and full-time numbers-crunchers may find this to be too simplistic, but I’m merely recognizing the validity of WAR as a player-rating system — as naive as that may be, according to detractors — and taking the commonsense step of pairing a counting stat with a rate state to evaluate real career impact in context (year-to-year and over the years within an era)
3. Rationale and examples: The people who have given us WAR have identified a WAR value of 5 or better as an All-Star-caliber year, so a player who manages to average 5.0 WAR over 10-years’ worth of full seasons (5.0+ per-162-games average) is going to amass 50+ career WAR, and it’s safe to say that this particular player has had quite a career (relatively few reach 50.0+ career WAR); his RetroPlay Rating, or RPR (career WAR times per-162-games [average full-season] WAR) would be 250, and that qualifies him under this system to be a genuine HOFer (it seems to me that the threshold should be 225 points, for reasons that can be explained a bit later). But if a hypothetical player could reach 50.0+ career WAR by playing for 25 years — averaging only a mediocre 2.0 WAR-per-162-games — is that a solid HOFer in your book? I don’t think so; the rate of production is not HOF-level, so this player has been more of an accumulator than a perennial All-Star, and that makes a big difference in my estimation. On the other hand, there have been players whose rate of production has been outstanding, but their careers have been cut short, and career WAR totals amounted to less as a result (see Addie Joss, for example). It’s my contention that if a pitcher (like Joss) had pitched 1,620 innings (to qualify for an E.R.A. title, a pitcher must have worked at least 162 innings in most years since MLB implemented the rule, and the HOF ordinarily requires a 10-year career to qualify to be on the ballot), that (1,620+ IP) is sufficient to meet the 10-year career minimum; and if a “position player” has amassed 3.1 plate appearances per his team’s scheduled/played games (502 plate appearances to qualify for batting titles in most years since MLB implemented that rule), and again, the HOF requires the minimum 10-year career to be placed on the ballot, 5,020 plate appearances (we could possibly round it down to 5,000 with little objection) should suffice to reach the 10-year career bar. Bottom lines: it seems to me that a pitcher who’s thrown 1,620 innings (or a rounded-down 1,600, for that matter) has thrown 10-years’ worth, so we can consider that to be a 10-year career; likewise, the batter logging 5,000 plate appearances (even if in less than 10 years) has paid his 10-year career dues as well. I say, such players are certainly worthy of consideration, and if their rates of production (WAR-per-162) make up for any losses caused by shortened careers, they should find well-deserved places on the honor rolls
4. It seems to me that the fair threshold for RetroPlay RE-set Hall of Fame members should be a RetroPlay Rating of 225 (points) or more. Ways to look at this: 1) 225(+) points can be achieved by totaling 50.0 career War and multiplying that by 4.5 average-per-162-games WAR; in other words, a player can virtually average All-Star-type years (4.5 WAR per full season is rarely attained) and get to about 50 in career WAR in 11 or 12 (full) seasons (50.0 career WAR is an enviable total as well); 2) 225(+) can also be achieved by averaging 5.0 or more per 162 games while getting to 45(+) in career WAR (still fairly rare, when you survey the lists) by playing 9 years or more at that high rate of year-by-year production. Either way, that looks like a Hall-of-Famer to me. Once again, we’re not unnecessarily rewarding the accumulator-type (long career, mediocre production-per-year), nor are we punishing those whose ultra-productive years were cut short by unfortunate circumstances, including “untimely” death. But both multipliers — career and average full season WAR — have to reach an above-average level to get the player into the HOF conversation under the RetroPlay system
5. When all of the career numbers have been firmed up and ratings calculations have been finalized to my satisfaction, all of the pertinent data will be posted to this site (on the appropriate pages), and our “20/20 Hindsight Hall Of Fame” will be open for your inspection. It’ll take a while to get to that point, but “we” plan to get there as soon as possible, most likely early in 2022 [Note: as of the first full day of spring on March 21, 2022, we’re just about to touch home plate; several site pages are Opening-Day ready]

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Summing up and looking ahead, RetroPlay.net has three main components in place or in progress:

1. We’re in the retro-fantasy-league business; all of the qualified MLB-NLB players have been assigned by birthplace to their teams, and all of their historical numbers follow them as we “replay” the 1871 through 2020 seasons accordingly (see the Year-by-Year results here);
2. The historical component is just that; no fantasy replay element in this lane, just the actual historical MLB-NLB data from seasons played; we offer player directories and rankings that reflect/break down that data, up to and including a virtual RE-set Hall Of Fame, based entirely on factual data and our own, hopefully more-objective, numbers-only take on who deserves to be a Cooperstown inductee;
3. The NON-baseball music-composition project; On the “Tektona.net” page, MP3s produced by my virtual instrumental-rock/Retro-Rock band, TEKTONA, will be uploaded so you can download ’em, or just give ’em a listen, for that matter; tailor-made, jukebox-like graphics should be up soon, and the plan is to fill that virtual jukebox with dozens of 70s-80s-90s-type selections from TEKTONA, the best band that few ever heard of and which never actually existed (or something to that effect).