I have finished my 3 leagues with the 2023 season Strat cards. I have Blanco on each of those teams and for the same reason, to steal home. The 3 leagues are 16 teams, 18 teams and 20 teams. Only the 20-team league allows a 10% add on of AB and IP. Those are all similar leagues.
In those 3 leagues, all the other teams combined stole home 4 times and were caught 12 times. I assume most of those were failed suicide squeeze attempts. The only players that stole home were Abrams (1) and De La Cruz (3). My teams stole home 32 times and were caught 44 times. Only 26 of those were by Blanco, the others are Velasquez (4), McCarthy (1) and Sabol (1). I am pretty sure that Sabol was safe on a ‘failed’ suicide squeeze attempt. My teams were successful 42% of the time and all the other teams were successful just 25% of the time. My chances are usually 35%. I usually attempt stealing home with 2 outs so I compare that 35% with the hit chances for the batter. Usually, I pinch run with Blanco on 1st and steal my way to third, if he can make it.
In all 3 leagues, Blanco had 280 steals and 68 caught. That is 80.5%! 186 steals of 2nd for 93.9%, 68 steals of third for 74.7% and 26 steals of home for 44.1%. All that effort resulted in 145 runs scored. I was expecting more runs scored when I tallied up the numbers but that is still a good total.
On the two teams that I thought could win the entire league, Blanco stole 80 and 77 bases. For the team that I was rebuilding the pitching staff, Blanco stole 123 bases, mostly in my 80 home games. In fact, most of the steals are happening in my home games as Hal is no where near as aggressive as me with pinch running.
Another interesting fact is how some of the percentages varied in each league. In the 18-team league, I was 5 out of 21 stealing home, for 24%. In the 16-team league, I was 15 for 36 stealing home, for 42%. In the 20-team league, I was 12 for 19 stealing home, for 63%. In the 18-team league, I remember that Blanco was like 0 for 7 stealing home at one point and it still didn’t deter me.
I didn’t have any future expectations when I drafted Blanco in the 5th round of all 3 leagues. He was clearly an overdraft. I know some people viewed that as a mistake too. He was a one-year wonder in my mind and that was ok. I had no idea he would repeat his year and I might have a shot at the same type of card, and maybe he’ll even be better. I would say that I got lucky with that draft pick.
I still buy the actual cards. Last year, the Locastro card went into my baseball trophy case and this year I’ll have to add Blanco’s card.