Lucy Van Pelt yanks the football again...

They had the launch ready, but Andy C and I noticed some typos and they decided to wait until Monday to get the bugs ironed out. It's a very interesting card set. Apparently, we have been playing with a number of FantaSim cards and they are being replaced with the real things.

Seven new cards will appear among the top 50 4-day starters (a couple are additional cards for existing players), 12 new cards among the top 40 5-day starters (including a Rollie Fingers !!!???), and 4 new cards among the top 50 relievers.

We will get new higher-valued cards for Clemente, Murcer, Yaz, Dihigo, Kaline, King Kelly, George Stone, Galarraga, and Bobby Doerr that will be in consideration for use in $200 M leagues. Other significant cards include an $11+ million Mays that is a 1(-5) at all 3 OF positions, an $11+ million individual season for Josh Gibson, small-ball cards eligible for 3B for Honus Wagner, Torriente, and the above-mentioned King Kelly. There's also a bulletproof C card (Jocko Milligan 1891, all T-20(pb-20) worth) with a pile of XBH and on-base. Other interesting individual NeL season cards are included for Wille Wells, Oscar Charleston and Chino Smith. There are also some nice new cards from Frank Thomas (a 5e19 at 1B with the usual great card), Bob Elliott, Frank Chance, Matt Williams, Hoot Evers, Phil Cavaretta, Hal Trosky, and Manny Ramirez.

Some salaries have also been adjusted. Murray, Sutter, and Wilhelm are going up, the top-end lefty starters are being revalued to more adequately reflect their relative values among the high-end leagues. Some low-end cards are also going up - most low-end platooner cards are going up 5-10%, a few cheap starters have been adjusted (Higbe, most notably), Speaker and Cedeno have dropped down the CF rankings a bit, and some of the lopsided high-end cards (Gibson, Bagwell, Lynn off the top of my head) have been reduced slightly.

I think that, overall, they have done a good job of leveling the playability of different strategies. There are lots more 5-day starters at all salary levels, there is a good mix of new RP cards in the price ranges that seem to be most used in $80 and $100 MM leagues, there are numerous new small-ball hitters, many playable at $140 MM caps, and lots and lots of interesting names in the cheapo league salary range that I haven't even looked at.

PS - I have heard that SOM is for sale. Probably asking way more than it's worth, but you never know.

WOW!
I wonder how much he is asking? It can't be THAT much.

Please god, let someone arrange the capital, buy this thing, and turn it into the beast of a silver mine that it could be.

If my math isn't complete crap;

There seems to be about 100 leagues forming per week. That works out to 5200 a year.
Each team in each league works out to at least 16 bucks a pop. Multiply that by 9 and you get...144 bucks per league.

Multiply both of those numbers and you get 748,800 dollars a year for the online game. Gross.

I haven't a clue as to what the overhead cost for the online game would be. Garcia has to cost them at least 60,000.
Is it possible that this game Nets 500,000?

I'd guess he's asking less than 10 million, closer to 5.

This would go a long way to explaining the behavior of Strat towards it's online customers both long term(poor) and recently (good).
Which means now is the time to press Strat for any changes you want. The power of this community will never be as strong as it is now.
Six months after this company is sold (if my assumptions about the potential customer base for this game are correct) your voices will be drowned out by the sound of cha-ching.

Be careful what you wish for. All this SOM bashing and if the company goes out of business many of us will be bumming!

Be careful what you wish for. All this SOM bashing and if the company goes out of business many of us will be bumming!

I agree with this!

Be careful what you wish for. All this SOM bashing and if the company goes out of business many of us will be bumming!

Many of us are already bumming- its just a question of how much.

They had the launch ready, but Andy C and I noticed some typos and they decided to wait until Monday to get the bugs ironed out. It's a very interesting card set. Apparently, we have been playing with a number of FantaSim cards and they are being replaced with the real things.

Seven new cards will appear among the top 50 4-day starters (a couple are additional cards for existing players), 12 new cards among the top 40 5-day starters (including a Rollie Fingers !!!???), and 4 new cards among the top 50 relievers.

We will get new higher-valued cards for Clemente, Murcer, Yaz, Dihigo, Kaline, King Kelly, George Stone, Galarraga, and Bobby Doerr that will be in consideration for use in $200 M leagues. Other significant cards include an $11+ million Mays that is a 1(-5) at all 3 OF positions, an $11+ million individual season for Josh Gibson, small-ball cards eligible for 3B for Honus Wagner, Torriente, and the above-mentioned King Kelly. There's also a bulletproof C card (Jocko Milligan 1891, all T-20(pb-20) worth) with a pile of XBH and on-base. Other interesting individual NeL season cards are included for Wille Wells, Oscar Charleston and Chino Smith. There are also some nice new cards from Frank Thomas (a 5e19 at 1B with the usual great card), Bob Elliott, Frank Chance, Matt Williams, Hoot Evers, Phil Cavaretta, Hal Trosky, and Manny Ramirez.

Some salaries have also been adjusted. Murray, Sutter, and Wilhelm are going up, the top-end lefty starters are being revalued to more adequately reflect their relative values among the high-end leagues. Some low-end cards are also going up - most low-end platooner cards are going up 5-10%, a few cheap starters have been adjusted (Higbe, most notably), Speaker and Cedeno have dropped down the CF rankings a bit, and some of the lopsided high-end cards (Gibson, Bagwell, Lynn off the top of my head) have been reduced slightly.

I think that, overall, they have done a good job of leveling the playability of different strategies. There are lots more 5-day starters at all salary levels, there is a good mix of new RP cards in the price ranges that seem to be most used in $80 and $100 MM leagues, there are numerous new small-ball hitters, many playable at $140 MM caps, and lots and lots of interesting names in the cheapo league salary range that I haven't even looked at.

Thanks for the update. And, a great job, in providing the insight too.

Yes-

thanks Gumby for reminding me to thank RBurgh as well-
Still not sure why SoM wouldnt provide us with the update but this one is much appreciated.

Well, it's pretty clear that SOM is simply worse at PR than a 64 yer old math geek engineer.

Names and years:

4-day starters: Sutton 1972, Vance 11924 (cadillac version of the year we have been using, but a 3R), Kevin Brown 96, Seaver 73, Lady Baldwin 1886, Maddux 98 (I doubt this card will be used much, but somebody will fall in love with it I'm sure), Babe Adams 1920. All these cards are over $9.2 million.

5-day starters: Guy Hecker Louisville 1882 (the all-time ERA leader I believe), Gene Conley 1959, Dick Bosman 1969, Sid Fernandez 1985, Jimmy Ring 1919, Rollie Fingers 1973, Jim Kaat 1972, Syl Johnson 1938, Bill Doak 1924, Bill Butland 1942, Jose Mendez 1920, Stu Miller 1958, Mel Stottlemyre 1964, Jack Coombs 1916, Jose Rijo 1990. I think Fingers, Johnson, and Doak are cadillac cards replacing Chevy seasons.

Relievers: Gagne 2003, Tom Gordon 2004, Haddix 64 are new entries, and Sutter 77 is a cadillac card. Other very worthwhile new cards include Steve Ontiveros, Jeff Nelson, Terry Fox, Cadillacs for Sosa, Garber, and Arroyo, and new cards for Doug Brocail and Don McMahon.

Hitters: Josh Gibson 37, Willie Mays 65, Yaz 70, Martin Dihigo 27 (a $9 million plus entry rated ss-3e33, 1b2e8, lf-(-3)e11, 2b-2e26, and rf-2 - you figure out where to play him), Murcer 72 (cf-1(-2)e3 and 4R), Willie Wells 31, Frank Thomas 97, Al Kaline 55, Clemente 67 (his MVP season), King Kelly 1886, George R. Stone 06, Torriente 20 (cf-2(-2)e8, 3b-3e14, rf-2, lf-3), Charleston 27 (cf-2(-2)e7 and rf-2), Chino Smith 27 (rf-2(-1)e9 2b-3e32), Doerr 48, Buck Leonard 37, Honus Wagner 00 (rf-4(+1)e6 3b-3e38 1b-4 and 2b-4 and .383 with lots of XBH), Bob Elliott 47, Frank Chance 05, Galarraga 88, Matt Williams 99, Hoot Evers 50, Phil Cavaretta 45, Harry Hooper 20, Jocko Milligan 1891 (bulletproof c-2(0)e13, T-20(pb-18) that can really hit, also 1b-4e14), Hal Trosky Sr. 40, Manny Ramirez 2004.

Other interesting guys I haven't looked at: Dykstra 93 (325 times on base in real life), Jeff Conine 96, Nate Colbert 70, Davey Lopes 78 (his Gold Glove season), Grady Sizemore 05, Buddy Bell 79, Kal Daniels 87, David Justice 91, Amos Strunk 13 (his 11 card would be better), Carl Everett 98, Freddie Patek 71.

Appreciate the info, Rburgh. Much thanks!