Congratulations to the winners of the 2025 SABR Games & Simulations Fantasy Baseball Leagues:
League 1 – Earl Weavers (Derek Bain)
League 2 – Pinstripe Pride 28 (Mike Mandelkorn)
League 3 – Jacks (Jack Snyder)
In League 1, the Earl Weavers were strong across all categories, leading the league in runs scored while tallying 48 batting and 46 pitching points to finish 8.5 points ahead of the runner-up Turkey Reds (Andy Palomino). Riley Greene led the Weavers with 36 round-trippers and 111 ribbies while the starting rotation featured a pair of 200-strikeout hurlers in Garrett Crochet and Hunter Brown. Jo Adell (24 HR) and Cade Horton (1.98 ERA) proved to be astute mid-season pickups. There was a fierce battle for third place between a trio of teams with the Red Sea Pedestrians (Jason Winston) finishing just one-half point ahead of Old Judges (Mike Eisenbath) and 1.5 points better than Team Fighting Amish (Rick Beam).
Pinstripe Pride 28 dominated in League 2 to earn back-to-back championships. The SC Monarchs (Mike Eisenbath) provided the only serious competition but they ended the season 8.5 points off the pace to notch second place. Microleaguers (Derek Bain) took third and the Second City Slammers (Nicholas Ver Halen) outlasted the Wolf Runners (Rod Humphrey) for the fourth slot. Riley Greene paced the Pinstripe brigade with additional support from Jazz Chisholm on offense, while Mike Mandelkorn masterfully manipulated his pitching staff without any individual topping 200 innings pitched.
Jacks (Jack Snyder) coasted to a 10-point victory in League 3, thanks to a monster season from Aaron Judge (.331/53/114) and a healthy Byron Buxton (35 HR, 23 SB). On the mound, Yoshinobu Yamamoto topped the staff with 201 whiffs, an ERA of 2.49 and a 0.990 WHIP while Max Fried and Carlos Rodon combined for 36 victories. When the dust settled, Big Mass Machine (Norm Ginsberg) secured runner-up honors while the Diamond Stars (Durward Hamil) and Broadcast Blasts (Derek Bain) recorded 80+ points to finish third and fourth, respectively.
You can check out league standings, rosters, team-by-team statistics and draft results along with league rules and contact information here:
A lifelong resident of central New Jersey, I enjoy spending quality time with my wife and three children. In my professional life I’ve worked for three local healthcare systems as a server and network administrator over the last 30 years. Co-chair of the SABR Games and Simulations Committee since August 2022 along with Mark Wendling.
My hobbies include baseball, statistics, computers and video games along with freshwater fishing. I have authored five books and contributed articles to Seamheads, Fangraphs and my site, Hardball Retro. Follow my HardballRetro channels on Twitch for live-streaming of classic and current baseball video games and view the resulting playthrough videos on YouTube!
Visit my Amazon author page to check out my books, promotional videos, and post a review if you're a Hardball Retro fan!
My Books:
"Hardball Retro’s Compendium of Baseball Video Games and Electronic Handhelds," published in September 2024 with co-author John Racanelli, is available in paperback and digital (Kindle) format at Amazon.com.Hardball Retro’s Compendium of Baseball Video Games and Electronic Handhelds was recognized with the 2025 Sporting News-SABR Baseball Research Award.
“Hardball Architects – Volume 1 (American League Teams)”,published in July 2020, is available in paperback and digital (Kindle) format at Amazon.com.
“Hardball Architects – Volume 2 (National League Teams)”,published in April 2022, is available in paperback and digital (Kindle) format at Amazon.com.
“Hardball Architects” examines the trades, free agent acquisitions, draft picks and other transactions for the 30 Major League Baseball franchises, divided into a 2-volume set (American League and National League). All key moves are scrutinized for every team and Sabermetric principles are applied to the roster construction throughout the lifetime of the organization to encapsulate the hits and misses by front office executives.
“Hardball Retroactive”,published in June 2018, is available in paperback and digital (Kindle) format at Amazon.com. A cross-section of essays that I penned for Seamheads.com along with my Baseball Analytics blog spanning nearly a decade touching on subjects including "Taking the Extra Base", "General Manager Scorecard", "Worst Trades", "BABIP By Location" and "Baseball Birthplaces and the Retro World Baseball Classic". Rediscover your favorite hardball arcade and simulations in "Play Retro Baseball Video Games In Your Browser" or take a deep dive into every franchise's minor league successes and failures in relation to their major league operations in "Minors vs. Majors".
“Hardball Retrospective” is available in paperback and digital (Kindle) format at Amazon.com.Supplemental Statistics, Charts and Graphs along with a discussion forum are offered at TuataraSoftware.com. In Hardball Retrospective, I placed every ballplayer in the modern era (from 1901-present) on their original teams. Using a variety of advanced statistics and methods, I generated revised standings for each season based entirely on the performance of each team’s “original” players. I discuss every team’s “original” players and seasons at length along with organizational performance with respect to the Amateur Draft (or First-Year Player Draft), amateur free agent signings and other methods of player acquisition. Season standings, WAR and Win Shares totals for the “original” teams are compared against the real-time or “actual” team results to assess each franchise’s scouting, development and general management skills.
Don Daglow (Intellivision World Series Major League Baseball, Earl Weaver Baseball, Tony LaRussa Baseball) contributed the foreword for Hardball Retrospective. The foreword and preview of my book are accessible here.
“Hardball Retrospective - Addendum 2014 to 2016”supplements my research for Hardball Retrospective, providing retroactive standings based on Wins Above Replacement (WAR) and Win Shares (WS) for each "original" team over the past three seasons (2014-2016). Team totals from 2010 - 2013 are included for reference purposes. “Addendum” is available in paperback and digital (Kindle) format at Amazon.com.
Contact me on BlueSky - @hardballretro.bsky.social