2018 Astrology Awards Recap
View the 2018 FABL Lineups Here!
Since the 2020 season was greatly truncated due to COVID, 2018 and 2019 are the first time in this project where we get to see two full Fantasy Astrology Baseball League seasons back to back. This allows us to do a year-over-year comparison of how each sign performed over a similar sample size. So rather than repeat the chart I posted for 2019 and 2020, here’s a graph of fantasy point totals of all 12 FABL signs plotted next to each other. The lines are color-coded based on my very well researched system, and arranged on the bottom in the order of the zodiac wheel.
The marker styles are arranged by Division: Fire = squares, Earth = triangles, Air = diamonds, and Water = circles.
I mentioned before that 2019 had the smallest range (difference between the highest scoring and lowest scoring signs) of any season in the prior 30 years, including the strike-shortened 1994-95 seasons. In another (possibly related) statistical oddity, 10 of the 12 signs increased their year-over-year point totals from ‘18 to ‘19. The only regressers were Virgo and Aries, with the latter falling out of first place for just the second time in the previous seven-year span (more on that later). The biggest increases belonged to Leo, who jumped all the way from tenth to a very narrow second place finish, and Aquarius, who had a much more modest rise from 12th (i.e. last) to 11th (i.e. next to last).
I’ll build out this graph as I continue in reverse chronological order through the FABL seasons, but for now, let’s give out some Fantasy Astrology awards! I’ll start with the Cy Young’s, since pitchers were the highest three fantasy point scorers in the league. Leo ace Max Scherzer (3,020 points / 91.5 points-per-game) was the league’s only 3,000-point scorer, and thus definitely deserves the CYA for the Positive Polarity. He also led the league with 300 strikeouts, making him just the fourth pitcher in history to amass five seasons of at least 250 K (according to the back of his Topps card). Despite this excellence, Mad Max lost the real-world National League version of the award to Jacob deGrom (2,827 / 88.3), who is a Gemini, and thus also pitches in the PP. For the Negative Polarity, the top option is Pisces ace Justin Verlander (2,860 / 84.1), who would defend his title going into 2019.
Here’s what Scherzer might look like wearing Leo colors; just ignore the curly W on his cap.
Sticking with the Negative Polarity, Jose Ramirez (2,796 / 17.8) was the top offensive fantasy point scorer in all of baseball, despite having the lowest points-per-game total of the top four batters (but that just means he played in more games, so that’s a positive in a way). He also had the lowest height of all the other top power hitters in the league, as he is just the fourth 5’9” or shorter player since 2000 to hit 30 home runs (again, this piece of trivia taken from his Topps card). Ramirez lost the real-life AL MVP award to Mookie Betts (2,792 / 20.5), but since Betts’s Libra Scales play in the Positive Polarity, these two get to share the honors in Fantasy Astrology land. Real-life NL winner, Sagittarian Christian Yelich (2,737 / 18.6), will have to be content with second place in the FABL voting, just seven points ahead of bronze medal winner J.D. Martinez (2,730 / 18.2), the Leo DH.
You have to go nearly 50 spots down before finding a player eligible for Rookie of the Year honors: Pisces third baseman Miguel Andujar (1,975 / 13.3), who didn’t win the real-life AL version of the award, despite a season with the third-most extra base hits ever by a rookie (yet again, per Topps). The guy to whom he was runner-up was actually right on his heels with 1,940 total fantasy points, but as you might know, Shohei Ohtani of the Cancer Crabs accrued that point total in a unique way. The Japanese two-way player totaled 1,376 points as a DH (with a near identical to Andujar 13.2 points per game) and an additional 564 points in 10 games started as a pitcher. The Positive Polarity RoY mirrors the real-life NL version of the award, as no first-year outfielder was more exciting than Ronald Acuna Jr. (1,746 / 15.7), who combines with Yelich to give Sagittarius a top-tier pair roaming the grass.
2018 was a historic year for relief pitching, at least from a fantasy point perspective. But while only one of the top two closers could win the AL Reliever of the Year (since they both played for AL West teams), I get to bestow both of them with the FABL version of the award, since they were born under sun signs with opposite polarities! The pitcher who actually took home the hardware was Aries closer Edwin Diaz (2,672 / 36.6), who saved 57 games for the Seattle Mariners, becoming the 14th player in history to eclipse 50 saves. But no less impressive was Cancer closer Blake Treinen (2,480 / 36.5), who “only” totaled 38 saves for the Athletics, but he did so with a 0.75 ERA. These two were clearly head and shoulders above the rest of the field.
Next time we’ll take a look back at the most dominant sign of the recent era, the Aries Rams, and examine how their lineup has evolved during their time at the top.