The Sandlot League (Creating an Identity)

The great thing about Out of the Park 19 (and its previous editions) is that you can create many new and exciting projects. I decided to try my hand on a fictional creation with fictional players, I thought it would be difficult to fall into the imaginative world of fictional players compared to Major League players that you know.

It helped that I took my time on the inaugural draft, looked at the scouting reports on each player, while participating heavily on these first few seasons.

I have done many leagues recently starting off in 1901, and was frankly getting tired of the deadball era... I thought about starting in 1920, but thought it was still too far back, and I didn't want to wait 40 years until doing expansion.

I decided finally on 1945, coming off the heels of World War II. The 1940's and 1950's are heavily considered the golden age of baseball, and I would do expansion by 1960.

I named the league, The Sandlot League, because I really didn't have another name at the time, and it has slowly grown on me.

The league already consists of 24 teams, I based my team decisions on MLB's first 26 teams (1977 setup) and I am pretty satisfied with my choices. Here are the teams and divisions below...

A.L. East
Baltimore Terrapins
Boston Shamrocks
New York Titans
Toronto Maple Leafs

Maple Leafs' 1952 Road Jersey (Home Jerseys, above)

I have used the Baltimore Black Sox a lot recently & decided to switch it up with the Terrapins (The Baltimore Terrapins were a short-lived Federal League team). My go-to these days for Boston is the Shamrocks, I have used Pilgrims in an old APBA project in the early 2000's. Normally I have used the New York Knights for the American League New York-based team, and decided to use the Titans (which I usually base in the N.L,)... Another reason for that, is that this project will be featuring the Los Angeles Knights. I usually wait to add a Canadian team this early, due to the fact that Toronto, Montreal & Vancouver's populations were quite smaller in the early half of the century, but I really wanted to get the Maple Leafs in here.

For those that don't know, yes... Toronto had a Maple Leafs team for Baseball. In real life, the Maple Leafs were a minor league team (International League) that existed from 1896-1967, they had their best success in the 1950's as an unaffiliated team, and has 5 teams that are listed among the 100 greatest minor leagues of all-time.

I have also used the Baltimore Terrapins as a team using cards from the APBA Hall of Fame Set.

By the way, you can read about a Toronto fan's early memories of the Maple Leafs in the 50's in a very interesting blog named Mop Up Duty.

A.L. Central
Chicago Union
Detroit Motors
Milwaukee Braves
Ohio Buckeyes

In past projects, I have always had two Ohio teams, one in Cleveland and the other in Cincinnati. Both cities were in the top 10 U.S. populations during the first-half of the 20th Century, both have dramatically slid out of the Top 10 since. I have usually based many of my projects on the population in the past, the bigger the population, the most likeliness that they have a team, that's why I usually don't give Colorado a team, no earlier than 1960, when it started seeing a boom in its population.

I decide to go with one Ohio team, because I am trying to spread out the teams. I have used the Cincinnati Buckeyes in the past, while Cleveland featured the Cleveland Warriors.

This is the first time that I am using the Chicago Union logos, uniforms and franchise... they feature the black, red & gray elements associated with the Chicago White Sox of the 1950's & 1960's. I went with my go-to alternate of the Tigers, in the Detroit Motors, while also settling with the Milwaukee Braves. For the most part, I tried to avoid real team names, but how can you deny the Braves?

I am actually going with a 1940's/1950's edition of the Detroit Motors, instead of the ones pictured above... Here is the uniform get ups for them.

By the way, much of the uniforms that I have used should be credited towards TXRanger from the OOTP forums... His work is amazing.

A.L. West
Kansas City Athletics
Los Angeles Knights
Oil City Oilers
St Paul Saints

The Kansas City Athletics will not be using the kelly green colors often associated with those teams, but will be featuring the uniforms of the Kansas City Blues (of the 1950's). The Oil City Oilers will be team out of Dallas, which I only had one set of uniforms and logos for the Dallas Oilers, but found more in the Oil City department (created by a few OOTP players out there)... which featured a nice set of 70's & 80's uniforms that are reminiscent of the 1980's Mets.

The St. Paul / Minnesota team comes at the right time for 1945, considering that it was 1961 when the area was awarded the Minnesota Twins.

Now onto the National League...

N.L. East
Atlanta Generals
Brooklyn Atlantics
Philadelphia Veterans
Washington Capitols

I decided to use the Atlanta Generals, although I like the yellow color aspects of the Atlanta Thrashers' uniforms (I have used the Thrashers in the past). I have used the Philadelphia Patriots in numerous projects, and decided to go with the Veterans this time, their home 'V' uniform really sold me, plus their logo.

The Philadelphia Veterans' home 'V' alternate jersey that I use as their primary home jersey.

I had numerous options for Washington, but wanted to stay away from the usual Senators and Nationals due to trying to avoid real names, even if I am still use some names such as the Kansas City Athletics or the Los Angeles Angels (which will eventually switch to Dodger blue... more on that later in the post). I decided to go with the Capitols, the Washington Generals was an option, but obviously I decided to let Atlanta have the name instead.

The Atlanta Generals uniforms have a bit of 'shout out' element to the Atlanta Black Crackers' uniforms, I do love the fact that TX puts those element touches to his jerseys... which I do believe is not by mistake... you decide?

N.L. Central
Chicago Legends
Louisville Sluggers
Pittsburgh Arsenal
St Louis Terriers

The Chicago Legends came to be by accident, like most of these often do, the creation process itself takes on its own life or journey. You use a logo here, or a uniform there, a creation by someone else, while you add some of your own creation to the process. The league is forging its own identity, while you slowly put it together... it's a rather fun experience really.

The Legends uniforms came from someone's creation of the Cooperstown Legends, a team that they used as a minor league affiliate to one of their own projects. I have used the Chicago Nationals in the past, usually snagging the old Syracuse Nationals logo (right) from the old NBA days in basketball... while the team's look was always that of the Chicago Cubs.

The Legends reflect a look of their own, while I did borrow the Chicago White Sox' road jerseys from 1966, an often-overlooked beauty... without the caps, you would have thought they were intended for the Cubs.

They go well with the Legends' home jerseys above, seeing them in this format may not look like much, but with the caps and players sporting them, they have a simplistic, but straight-to-the-point look about them.

The Louisville Sluggers use a Cardinals approach with bird swinging bat, with the Cardinals colors featuring a bit of the Louisville Colonels' old uniforms.

Pittsburgh Arsenal features black and yellow.... with the Steelers, Pirates & Penguins... are you really surprised by this?

I had some cool uniforms for the St Louis Saints, but I really wanted to add Minnesota to the project, so I game them the St Paul Saints. I have numerous Browns uniforms and logos, but once again, I wanted something further from MLB history, so I went with the Federal League team.

N.L. West
California Seals
Denver Miners
Los Angeles Angels
Seattle Pilots

The California Seals will eventually evolve into darker colors to go along with their incarnation to become the San Francisco Seals (similar to Giants' color scheme), I have numerous colors for all, their 1945 look will feature 'sunshine' colors that are more equivalent to the Miami Dolphins. The Seals, of course, are one of the most popular Pacific Coast League teams of all-time, I do know that they are personal favorite of mine.

I have used the Denver Bears in previous projects, and was close to going with the Colorado Kings (which I love their look), but eventually I plan to add a Charlotte team named the Charlotte Imperials & the Monarchs or even Royals, so I thought there needed to be some balance, and not so much royalty early on. Plus I really loved the look of the Miners uniforms for Denver, while I also had numerous Miners uniforms for places like San Francisco, Pennsylvania, and even in smaller places like Scranton even.

Angels' home caps for the 1945 Sandlot League.

Check out the 'L' in Angeles, Angel wings, nice touch by TX.

The Los Angeles Angels (TX's creations above) will start off with a similar look to their expansion days, while they will evolve to more of a Dodgers-look, featuring the Dodgers' 'LA' look & Dodger blue to their uniforms, while sporting a halo. Once again, I can't take credit for the Dodger Blue look, these were inspired by SFGiants58 & his MLB: Project 32 series featured on Chris Creamer's Sports Logos.

I created the home version (like the one featured above, below) using my 3D Paint tool & by using my Jersey Maker template.

The Seattle Pilots will first feature their expansion look and will later evolve in a nice set of jerseys. I saw someone do a great job, using the moniker of the Metros (featured below), but have yet to find uniforms and logos alone out there.

The Seattle Metros were once a National Hockey Team, in fact they were the first American team to win a Stanley Cup back in 1917 & are often a very popular team name that fans keep hoping will be used in a possible future NHL team (a fan creation of their uniforms, below) and possible future NBA team, there are many, many cool logo designs along with other nicknames.

I believe I will have the eventual capability of putting together a Seattle Metros franchise, which could open the door for the Pilots or Aviators to come from another franchise location.

This concludes the creative concept scheme that became the Sandlot League.