Alt-1923: Season Recap!

 

It's my intention to write a World Series preview in the next day or two, but I do feel like it's worth writing something separate (if only in bullet form) for the season that just ended.  So as not to bury the lede, the Yankees had a historically good season and ran away with the AL pennant, and will be facing their former landlords, the New York Giants, in the World Series.

• The Yankees finished with a completely crazy 121-41 record, good for a .746 winning percentage. This smashes their own 115-win record from 1920 and the Cubs' 116 wins in 1906, though the latter team still holds the record for winning percentage (.763).  The Yankees had 116 wins through 154 games, but the Cubs only played 152 in 1906 for what that was worth.
• I imagine Ty Cobb getting a bunch of interviews as one of the only (or maybe the only?) still-active players to have some first-hand experience against those Cubs, albeit in the 1907 and 1908 World Series rather than 1906. 
• The Yankees did this despite some really potentially devastating injuries--they only had Oscar Charleston for 58 games in 1923, lost Ty Cobb for about a month, and lost Eddie Collins and Louis Santop for the season during the same early-September week. The roster is so deep, however, that they didn't really skip a beat in making Terry and Traynor into regulars and shifting Heilmann to the outfield (where he's a much better fielder). 
• How well did they play? They had two different months when they went 22-6 (.785), and neither was their best month--in May they went 24-4 (.857).  Their worst month was April, when they were "only" 16-11 (.592), a 96-win pace.
• They were 1st in basically every offensive category, except extra-base hits (where they were a surprising 6th of 10), strikeouts (which they kept down relative to recent years, perhaps due to Charleston's absence, and only finished 4th), and stolen bases (where they finished 2nd!). 
• Key to their success was their pitching. Dazzy Vance went 30-2, and as a team they finished 1st in ERA and Starters' ERA, WAR for pitchers, hits allowed, walks, strikeouts, and zone rating. They finished 2nd in a lot of other categories, and the only thing they didn't do super-well was suppress home runs (they were 6th). 
• At the team vs. team level, the Yankees wiped out the Red Sox (going 17-1 against them) and Peppers (16-2), but were 13-5 or 12-6 vs. most teams. The worst they did was 11-7 vs. the Packers. 
• As a result of all of this, the Yankees ended up winning the AL by 28 games over the 2nd-place Athletics, with the Packers in 3rd 30 games back. The White Sox brought up the rear, 57-105 and a jaw-dropping 64 games back. 
• As noted, the Yankees have a very deep roster and that led to a balanced lineup. There wasn't an obvious breakout, dominant season from anybody, but the team hit .322 (only 20 qualified hitters in the whole MLB did better, including 5 Yankees as you'd expect), and had a team OPS of .826, which would have placed them #29 among qualified hitters.  Absolutely bananas. 
• The Yankees had the #2, #3, and #4 hitters in batting average (Cobb, Collins, and Heilmann), though Cobb had another rotten September to give the batting crown to Shoeless Joe Jackson.  Those three also were the top 3 in AL OBP, with Collins on top. Of course, he's now out injured for the World Series.
• With Ruth hurt most of the year, the AL MVP race is open for the first time in years. 
• To the extent that there's an obvious MVP candidate on the Yankees to coalesce around, it's probably Heilmann. He's #4 in AL batting average, tops in RBI with 150 (2nd in all-time AL single season history), #2 in AL OBP, #2 in AL SLG, #1 in AL OPS, #1 in AL WAR, #1 in AL runs scored. He had 200+ hits. He even led the AL in Win Probability Added. 
• The other obvious Yankees candidate for MVP is Dazzy Vance, who had the breakout year I've been waiting for since 1916. He had 30 wins (as noted above), led the league in strikeouts, and finished 2nd in ERA just 0.1 run behind Shocker. I was sufficiently paranoid about injuries near the end that he skipped his final start, as did Luque and Faber.
• Going briefly into Watsonian mode, Dobie Moore might get my vote over Heilmann. He took over as the starting 3B and played very well there, moved over to full-time 2B when Collins went down, and was the SS when Peckinpaugh needed a rest. He ended up hitting .339 with 100+ RBI and led the league in triples. Still, he "only" had 4.5 WAR vs. Heilmann's 7.5.
• There aren't any really obvious non-Yankee candidates, either. Joe Hauser of the White Sox led the league in home runs, with Jake Fournier not too far behind, but Heilmann had the better all-around year.
• In the NL, it'll probably be Hornsby for MVP. He led the league in batting average, and was 2nd in HR and RBI. He led the NL in WAR with a completely crazy 9.5. However, Torriente had a historic season and was the first player in history to hit 50+ home runs, setting a new single-season record.
• Torriente also took the lead in career home runs, which was an interesting twist for me. Torriente has a 17-homer lead over Ruth, which might be rather hard for Ruth to make up in the short term. If this year's injuries were the Alt-1915 universe's equivalent of Ruth's 1922 absences, he still has the 1925 equivalent absences to get through. On the other hand, Ruth is one year younger than Torriente, and Ruth hit 448 home runs from 1924-1933, so I think even if he can't do more than inch up on Torriente in coming years he could blow past him if he outlasts him and plays longer...
• Before moving to the NL in a bit more detail, I'll congratulate the Toronto Maple Leafs, Sacramento Senators, Charlotte Hornets, Des Moines Demons, Dayton Ducks and Hartford Whales for winning the championships of their leagues, and in particular note Toronto, Charlotte, and Dayton for winning their level's championships.
• Toronto wasn't as dominant in the IL as the Yankees were in the AL, but they took care of business and reeled in a Mud Hens team that led much of the season. Buzz Arlett won the IL Triple Crown (and set AAA records for HR and RBI in the process, as well as for WAR), and the Leafs beat a Senators team (that ran away with the PCL) in five games. 
• Charlotte has Gehringer, Cochrane, and Dihigo, and swept Des Moines. Baltimore should be hard to beat soon, and they get another high pick in the next draft because the Orioles are still terrible at the MLB level.
• As for the Yankees' opponents in the 1923 World Series, the Giants built a big lead in the NL and basically coasted the last few months--they led Boston and St. Louis by 11.5 games at the end of July, gave back about half of that lead and sat ~5-6 games up over the latter half of August and most of September before padding it a bit at the end.
• The Giants' best month was a 17-8 July, which they followed up with a 12-17 August as their worst month.
• The Giants seem to have been good at everything, but not necessarily great at anything. They were 2nd-3rd in most major offensive categories (but 1st in OPS and wOBA), and 5th-6th in most pitching categories (but 1st in pitching WAR and strikeouts). 

I suppose I should quit here since I'm about to wander off into a World Series Preview. That'll be next!