Why do you Play???......

[Frank Bailey]

Does my answer have to be the same after a .300 night as it is after a .700 night?

[danielz]

I do this to try and achieve the impossible. My latest impossible achievement is having Musial, Dimaggio, Brett, Simmons and Cepeda bat 2 thru 6 and somehow have Cicotte 2-13 thru 69 games.

[Northcoast Aggies]

I'm a glutton for punishment!! :lol:

[modmark46]

Yep, I second what Bobby, and others, have said above. I mean, I love baseball. It's my favorite sport. Played ball in HS, and have played softball forever (SP & Modified FP, although retirement is looming. MIGHT squeeze out one more season). I have played SOM baseball & football since I was 16 (34 years ago). I love building teams with so many HOF players. Plus, my son plays, and we spend a great deal of time on the phone, discussing our teams, strategies, highs and lows. Sharing this passion with him helps bridge the geographical distance between us, since he is in Colorado and I am in New Hampshire. And, the guy that got me in to SOM so long ago, 13baseballs, plays here as well. We haven't seen each other since I graduated HS in '74, but talk frequently through this game, and compete against one another. How cool is that? This excellent community of gamers, who are so helpful, generous, supportive and funny, is the best. Honestly, although I have never met any of you in person, I feel that you are all a part of a big circle of friends/pen pals. My W% isn't much better than Bobby's, but really, although winning is great, that (obvisouly) isn't what keeps me coming back. :)

[MICHAELEVANS]

Why do I play? I'm a masochist. Plain and simple. I love the pain of waking up to discover all my teams got swept. :lol: :lol: I, too, have a *ahem* "less than stellar" winning percentage.

Really, it is for all the reasons above. I love baseball, especially old time baseball, and I love the cameraderie here.

[rosenthm]

What a great question to pose. It's caused me to be a bit more reflective than usual and ask myself why I really do play SOM baseball. The obvious and first answer that pops into my head is that I love baseball. I've grown up in a family that loves the game and remember way back listening to Harry Carey and Jack Buck do Cardinal games on the radio. I also love to play games and my two brothers and I played the SOM board game back in the 60's. The computer version isn't quite the same as looking at your card after the actual roll of the dice, but it opens up so many more possibilities for fun and competition. Many of you have probably wondered why a woman, and an older and more mature one at that, would want to play this silly game year after year. And that brings me to the real draw of playing this game with you guys. I had a 'conversation' once with a great guy many of you remember...Clay...and we talked about how playing SOM on line is probably one of the most egalitarian activities in which we had participated. When we play against teams and managers, and we have conversations about drafts and HAL and certain players underperforming or overperforming...we don't know or care if that other manager is black, white, or green. The labels that often get in the way of developing respectful relationships...Republican, Democrats...Catholic, Muslim, Protestant, Jew...gay, straight...Yankees fan, Boston fan, Cubs fan, Cardinals fan...are not known or obvious and we can "like" the people we play against as just people that enjoy the fun of baseball. We really come to care about each other. Worry when we don't hear from someone, cry when an illness or death touches one of us or a family member, cheer at the birth or adoption of a child, and root for the possibility of a new job or comfortable retirement. Now for those of you that think I'm being too 'touchy-feely'...these same sensitivities do not get in the way of snatching Dizzy Dean or Ty Cobb right out from another's draft list...there is credibility in my title of Queen of the Weasels.

I've probably got the worst winning percentage of any of the regulars that play this game...and we've seen from previous posts that winning is low on the priority list of draws that bring us back. I'm not a statistician and doing all that Stat stuff would ruin the game for me. (Are there people that actually enjoy doing their taxes?) But why do I still put up with all the hassle's from TSN, and why do I continue to put myself out there on a venue that sets me up for thousands of spam emails about male enhancement? Because of the community of players that shows up here regularly to celebrate this great game as we rewrite the history and games of it's greatest players.

Thanks Bobby for the question and Happy New Year to everyone!

[modmark46]

Great response, Marge. And...TSN is responsible for all the Viagra (and the like SPAM) I get every day? I was wondering where that garbage sprung from! I want a discount! :)

[Palanion]

I paraphrase "Field of Dreams," they built it so I came.

Having been a fan of the tabletop original, finding this online was a dream come true. I only knew one person who played Strat (the friend at age 10 who also introduced baseball in general, and football to me) and I recently wrote of that in another thread.
But, having not ever played more than maybe 30-40 games of a season before throwing the dice out the window, finding the game here was a big treat, it has become my hobby.
I discovered this place spring of 2004. I tried a couple 200X teams and then was given a credit for ATGII, since TSN wanted to promote the new product. Sure, I enjoyed the 200X teams, but I can't even remember who I had on either of those teams. Yet, in my 11 ATG teams I can remember quite a bit of them. My first team was in Sportsman 46 with Joe Jackson (my favorite historical ball player) and Maury Wills and Christy Mathewson (one of my all-time favorites), Carl Hubbell, Tony Perez, etc. The team was not very good.
There was a a Yankee '56 team that won 90-plus, Chicks Dig the Longball league, a Tiger '84 effort, a 50/50 theme, a Yankee '56 team that underachieved, a 60 mil. attempt that lost 90 games, a Yankee '56 team that wasn't even as good as the previous one, my first Forbes '09 team, more aggravation over trying to make the perfect (nay, worst) Yankee '56 team, etc.

There are two big reasons I am still here after 11 losing seasons (and one finals loss).
1) I learn more about the game with each team, and feel like I will never stop learning, which is good. If I learned it all, I would get bored.
2) The people. Whether it is asking for advice from my peers or knowing enough to offer advice to newbies. Having a league entering a third season, though it was not a keeper league originally but a normal public one, because everyone is having such a good time in it – though I am sick of losing to Tomwistar all the time, just like Frank Bailey must be tired of winning his division but not the league (that also includes Bobby, Munich Man, Bunze0, Guido, Tim Orz and more - like an all-star team)
Because whether you are a freak playing 200 teams in two years or only 11, we all have this one thing in common.

And an insatiable desire to blame HAL for Rick Aguilera getting overworked in a five-man bullpen, but to take all the credit when Mincher and Merkle combine to drive in 120 runs and score 100 in a Yankee '56 platoon... yeah that's me.

Bill

[Simon31]

Wow! Between rosenthm and Palonion's comments it doesn't leave much to add! Well said to the both of you! Like muttdoc, I too am here for the babes! Unfortunately, the only one that will chat with me is Jessica from TSN...at least for free. I am also here for revenge! Revenge for all the SOM tabletop beatings I suffered in my younger days both with my buddies, and my wife, who refuses to play with me anymore as she considers me no challange! I have since changed my strategy though. I am like the short boxer who believes a taller man loses a lot in his punch swinging down. I have already given some of you sore kneecaps and soon I have hopes of moving up! I will have my revenge! Hahahahaaaa :twisted:

[Treyomo]

I play to fulfill my genetic destiny. My dad was bald by 30, my brother was essentially bald by 32, while I'm merely thinning at age 35. Playing allows me to pull my hair out at a much faster pace than nature will allow.

Or it's because I love baseball, love stats, and love the people. One of the two.