All-Time Since 1990: Earth Division
When I completed reverse-chronological recaps for every Fantasy Astrology Baseball season between 2020 and 2000, I took a break to calculate the career fantasy points of all the players who had made a FABL team in that span, and then put together a list of “All-2000’s” depth charts. As I was completing recaps for the 1990’s over the last two months, I’ve also been updating my All-Time Career Fantasy Points database, which now contains more than 30 years’ worth of data. (31 years, to be exact: from 1990 to 2020).
Rather than posting a full list of top All-Time-Since-the-1990’s players for each sign, I’ll instead highlight just the noteworthy new additions from the last decade. I’m starting with the three signs in the Earth Division, since Virgo players have put up the most aggregate points during the time period in question. Keep in mind, this is not an ideal way to calculate true sign superiority, since more lineup consistency will lead to fewer overall players, and thus not as many total fantasy points. But 1,874,298 fantasy points is a LOT of fantasy points…
The top new Virgo addition of the 1990’s slots right into his sign’s starting shortstop slot, and is unlikely to be supplanted, even on an All-Time basis. Baseball’s preeminent iron man Cal Ripken Jr. finished his career just four (4!) fantasy points behind Jim Thome, making him Virgo’s number two all time scorer (so far), even though Ripken had a higher points-per-season average by nearly 80 annual points. Virgo actually added three 90’s shortstops who surpassed incumbent All-2000’s starter Elvis Andrus: Robin Yount, who moved to center field later in his career, and Julio Franco, who also qualified at second base and first base.
Sandwiched between Ripken and Yount, we have leadoff hitter extraordinaire Tim Raines, who supplants Luis Gonzalez for the starting left field role – although if this were a simulation, Raines and Gonzalez would occupy the two corner outfield spots flanking All-2000’s holdover Bernie Williams. Several thousand career points behind Gonzalez, we have former Negative Polarity MVP Albert Belle, who actually has the highest career points-per- season AND points-per- game average of any Virgo batter so far. The only other position getting a new starter, possibly on an All-Time basis, is second base, where Ryne Sandberg was once the highest-paid player in the sport.
No pitcher is likely to surpass Randy Johnson as All-Time Virgo starting pitcher, but the Maidenz did add a reliable SP2 in 18-year veteran Orel Hershiser. His sometime Dodger teammate Tom Candiotti occupies a spot in the backup rotation, along with Mike Boddicker, who I guess pitched for the Orioles. Virgo did improve significantly in the bullpen, gaining two left-handed closers known for their time with the Mets. 21-year veteran John Franco leads the way, while Randy Myers is just about a thousand career fantasy points in front of Jason Isringhausen.
Here’s why I don’t care to abide strictly by positional eligibility rules. Let’s say you have Chipper Jones as your number one third baseman. In fact, he was THE number one third baseman since the 90’s, so that’s pretty good. And what if your number two third baseman is George Brett… who was THE number two third baseman since the 90’s. Are you going to have one of them on the bench, simply because they share a primary position? No, you’d move Brett to first base, or move Chipper to left field… or move them BOTH and let Ken Caminiti take the hot corner. OR you could have super utility star Tony Phillips at third… because there’s no way he overtakes new 90’s addition Lou Whitaker at his primary position of second base.
If Chipper Jones did take left field, he would play opposite one of the best hitters in history, Tony Gwynn. An outfield of Gwynn, Carlos Beltran, and C. Jones is pretty formidable, even if it does leave Andruw Jones on the bench. George Brett at first would be the first of three really impressive lefties there, the second being Adrian Gonzalez, and the third: new 90’s addition, and current Miami manager, Don Mattingly.
John Smoltz is still atop the Bulls rotation, although new additions occupy the SP2 and SP3 slots. Dennis Martinez is not only the top player from Nicaragua since the 90’s, but he also has had the second-longest career of any Taurus player in the same time period. (Number one is lefty relief specialist Jesse Orosco, who slots in as the new number 3 reliever.) Jack Morris has had a long and illustrious career, allowing him to finish above David Wells and Roy Halladay in career points – although he trails Halladay in points-per-game and points-per-season averages. Right behind Wells and Halladay is a third starting pitcher developed by the Blue Jays, Jimmy Key.
Capricorn had the least impact of new 1990’s additions of any Earth sign, at least from a points perspective – but then again, no one is likely to surpass All-2000’s holdovers Rickey Henderson and Albert Pujols, two of baseball’s very best. Chili Davis played more games as a Designated Hitter than anywhere in the field, and his career fantasy points total would surpass fellow primary DH’s Edgar Martinez and Edwin Encarnacion. But I bent the rules for the All-2000’s Goats, putting those two on the depth chart at their secondary position of third base, so I’ll do the same with Chili, which in his case is center field. That puts him above All-2000’s holdover Mike Cameron, who is himself above two new 90’s additions, Devon White and Brady Anderson.
If fantasy points took defense into account, Ozzie Smith would likely be one of the top scorers of all time. As it stands, he accrued enough points to surpass Hanley Ramirez as the primary Capricorn shortstop. Longevity was the name of the game for Carlton Fisk, who beat out Victor Martinez behind the plate, thanks to a staggering 24-year major league career (compared to Victor’s still-impressive 16). If you don’t like the idea of two DH’s atop the third base depth chart, new 90’s addition Dean Palmer has you covered at the hot corner. Lonnie Smith and Otis Nixon serve as outfield depth behind holdovers Alfonso Soriano and Matt Holliday.
The top two Capricorn 90’s pitching additions actually slot in at the top of their rotation, although there’s a bit of a caveat for the new “ace.” Knuckleballer Charlie Hough pitched a whopping 25 years in the majors, and his career was split almost evenly between starts and relief appearances (51.28% starts, including 40 in 1987). This means he beat out David Cone for the top spot, despite a career points-per-game average of just 33.4 – compared to Cone’s team-leading 58.0. Former Cy Young Award winner Jack McDowell slots in as the 9th overall starter.
Meanwhile, in the bullpen, Greg Swindell and Jeff Montgomery jumped in as the number 3 and 4 relievers, respectively. However the former got there based mostly on the innings he ate as a starter (40.5% starts in his career), while the latter had a more traditional saves-getting profile. Michael “Mike” Jackson rounds out the relief corps, pushing out the electric Brad Lidge, due to a much larger sample size (17 years to 11).
Next time, I’ll do a position-by-position look at the two signs fighting for the 2021 Fantasy Astrology Baseball League title: Taurus and Libra. I hope it will still be competitive halfway through the two-week long matchup.