It really doesn't matter to me if such a huge range of possibilities are normal SD or created in a black box..
I realized a long time ago that if, as your example, Bonds hitting between 55 HRS and 91 HRS in any given season is "normal" or to be expected, than that is just too big a field "of expected"
"For Me" because too much luck is involved.
here's a conversation on two teams...
Hey nev good team did they win a title?
"Yup 98-64 record and Bonds hit 91 HRS and won MVP"
Well good nev, that's to be expected.
Hey nev good team did they win a title?
Nope 80-82 and Bonds hit 55 hrs.
Well sorry nev but that's to be expected.
And this is the "expected" SD spread..which should happen 2/3rds of the time...Imagine the other 1/3rd?
and if it's a 3% chance that Bonds hits 70 HRS in half a season...and since we know that like flipping a coin, the previous occurrence has no effect on the 50/50 odds of the next flip...each flip, or in my example, each half is independent...meaning he has a 3% chance of hitting 70 HRS in the second half
Shouldn't Bonds have hit 140 Hrs in a season for me a couple of times based on my 2000 teams? Also I think the 114 hr season for Bonds was in a theme league...but I could be mistaken.
And, as I said... while I realized this a long time ago, that the normal variation of results is much to big for my liking...other parts of the game, many other things about the game I really enjoyed...which is why I continued to play...and as Bruce said this was my addiction.