If you're a movie fan, you know all about the Marvel Cinematic Universe, or MCU, the fully-formed world in which the first 23 films in the MCU are based (and into which future films and TV series will be based). If you're a SherCo fan, you've probably read or heard about the SherCo Leagues of Baseball Simulation, or SLOBS, a fully-formed world that you create using the SLOBS manual that is where your league is based.
I'd like to introduce you to a new concept: the SherCo Baseball Universe, or SBU. It's a new product I'm developing using the experience of running 64 (yes, you read that right) short-season leagues using the concepts found in the SLOBS manual (with some personal modifications that I developed over the years). The SBU will be a product that's completely new and unique to SherCo. And because it's unique, I want to take some time over the coming blog posts to explain its origins, its concepts, and why I think the fictional universe created as the SBU is something even the most ardent "anti-fictional" player might want to take for a test drive.
Let's start with the origins ... Back in 1981, SherCo began promoting a new product for players who wanted to create their own league universes using a standard set of rules for player usage and the rules for re-rating players based on their performance in the league. A perpetual league that constantly created its own history and its own future through the playing out of a season. The concepts came from the Northfield League, comprised of game inventor, Steve LeShay, and some friends and family, who played 24-game short seasons and developed the rules for taking their in-game performances as the basis for rating players for the next season. Priced at $15 back in 1981, the kit came with the SLOBS Rulebook, a certificate of membership in SLOBS, and a coupon to apply against future purchases from SherCo. I jumped at the chance to get the manual. When I got it and read through it, I set about creating the universe according to the rules. Named the players, drew up the ballparks, created the teams, then the players on those teams, trying to make each one different enough so that there was variety and a little imbalance in the league. Four teams: Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington. No team names. 18-game schedule (each team playing the other three teams six times each). Twenty-man rosters.
That first season flew by. Mainly because I played as quickly as I could to get to the post-season rating and the creation of the new rookie crop. Philadelphia won that first title with an 11-7 record. After the first couple seasons, I settled into a routine, playing one day's games at a time, taking about three weeks to complete a season. Pretty soon five seasons turned into ten, ten turned into twenty, and twenty eventually turned into sixty-four. Player numbers got retired. Players got elected into the Hall of Fame. And it was one of the most fun experiences I've ever had playing tabletop baseball, regardless of the game I chose to play. It is in that spirit ... wanting to create an immersive universe to play in ... that led me to the idea that maybe all that work could be put into creating a new product where I play the games and re-rate the teams and new rookies, and then release them as a series of continuous season sets where all the work has been done ... and you just play the seasons as though they were the traditional season sets for real-life teams. Up next ... why a fictional universe might be right for you ...