Major League Cricket Sandbox

[Aislabie]

Major League Cricket

Bermuda Triangles
1. Ben McDermott
2. Kamau Leverock
3. Mohammad Hafeez
4. Delray Rawlins
5. Dion Stovell
6. Wayne Parnell
7. Allan Douglas
8. Janeiro Tucker
9. Dale Steyn
10. Rodney Trott
11. Malachi Jones

R. Kamindu Mendis
R. Jacobi Robinson
R. Steven Outerbridge
R. Tre Manders
R. Deunte Darrell
R. Stefan Kelly
R. Terryn Fray
R. Steven Bremar
R. Greg Maybury

Chicago Gales
1. Chris Gayle
2. Avishka Fernando
3. Solomon Mire
4. Jake Weatherald
5. Ricardo Powell
6. Liam Plunkett
7. Stu Mills
8. Jannisar Khan
9. Elmore Hutchinson
10. Manny Aulakh
11. Saqib Saleem

R. Michael Carberry
R. Michael Leask
R. Tom Barber
R. Farhan Malik
R. Jordan DeSilva
R. Varun Sehdev
R. Harry Bush
R. Sinclair Smith
R. Jay Pathak

Columbia Governors
1. Colin Munro
2. Alex Hales
3. Cameron Steel
4. Bhavindu Adhihetty
5. Ben Cutting
6. Robbie Frylinck
7. Ibrahim Khaleel
8. Karan Ganesh
9. Prashanth Nair
10. Nosthush Kenjige
11. Chris Harwood

R. Andre Fletcher
R. Ben Laughlin
R. Tom Sole
R. Chris Sole
R. Andy Mohammed
R. Dennis Evans
R. Shayan Abdulghani
R. Raymond Ramrattan
R. Ali Sheikh

Hollywood Stars
1. Chris Lynn
2. Steven Taylor
3. Rassie van der Dussen
4. Nicholas Standford
5. Imad Wasim
6. Chris Morris
7. Cameron Stevenson
8. Ryan Corns
9. Damion Jacobs
10. Ryan Persaud
11. Jermaine Lawson

R. Neil Broom
R. Sikandar Raza
R. Navin Stewart
R. Harsh Thaker
R. Shahid Ahmadzai
R. Davion Davidson
R. David Wakefield
R. Rahul Jariwala
R. Gaurav Patanker

Indy Hoosiers
1. Hazrat Zazai
2. Roy Silva
3. Ravi Timbawala
4. Camilus Alexander
5. Qaiser Ali
6. Shakeel Ahmad
7. Chris Green
8. Saurabh Netravalkar
9. Hammad Shahid
10. Sandeep Lamichhane
11. Lasith Malinga

R. Benny Howell
R. Isuru Udana
R. Ashar Zaidi
R. Cameron Boyce
R. Cecil Pervez
R. Kevin Sandher
R. Adrian Gordon
R. Salman Ahmad
R. Raj Vyas

Los Angeles Celestials
1. Akeem Dodson
2. Jaskaran Malhotra
3. Kieron Pollard
4. Aaron Jones
5. Wanindu Hasaranga
6. Chaturanga de Silva
7. Umar Nawaz
8. Hasan Ali
9. Abhimanyu Rajp
10. Vikash Mohan
11. Burt Cockley

R. Aamer Yamin
R. Michael Richardson
R. Romario Shepherd
R. Andrea Agathangelou
R. Kamal Bashir
R. Cejay Outerbridge
R. Kurt Ramdath
R. Sahil Patel
R. Sahaj Patel

Manhattan Legacy
1. Rahmanullah Gurbaz
2. Sunil Narine
3. Nkrumah Bonner
4. Ravi Bopara
5. Jonathan Wells
6. Alex Amsterdam
7. Jonathan Foo
8. Gavin Singh
9. Barrington Bartley
10. Usman Ashraf
11. Sukhdeep Brar

R. Mirwais Ashraf
R. Shaiman Anwar
R. Binura Fernando
R. Cassius Burton
R. Adil Bhatti
R. Oliver Pitcher
R. Rashard Marshall
R. Timothy Surujbally
R. Jonathan Bonner

Miami Surfers
1. Evin Lewis
2. Rohan Mustafa
3. AB de Villiers
4. Willem Ludick
5. Tamar Lambert
6. Akhil Husbands
7. Timroy Allen
8. Rustam Bhatti
9. Stephen Parry
10. Garey Mathurin
11. Jeremy Gordon

R. Chesney Hughes
R. Charles Coventry
R. Obus Pienaar
R. Miles Bascombe
R. Japen Patel
R. Sewnarine Chattergoon
R. Steve Massiah
R. Charles Trott
R. Christian Burgess

New York Empire
1. Lendl Simmons
2. Gareth Delany
3. Thikshila de Silva
4. Jehan Mubarak
5. Narsingh Deonarine
6. Majid Rizvi
7. Carmi Le Roux
8. Amit Mishra
9. Rusty Theron
10. Jessy Singh
11. Dave Mohammed

R. Mohammad Azharullah
R. David Delany
R. Danial Ahmed
R. Adam Sanford
R. Pathum Madusanka
R. Josh Gilbert
R. Macai Simmons
R. Durand Soraine
R. Regis Burton

Penn State Liberty
1. Luke Wright
2. Monank Patel
3. Heinrich Klaasen
4. Richard Ramdeen
5. Donwell Hector
6. Darren Sammy
7. Sachithra Senanayake
8. Ritesh Kadu
9. Karima Gore
10. Naseer Jamali
11. Derrick Brangman

R. Chadwick Walton
R. Eddie Leie
R. Marco Marais
R. Lahiru Kumara
R. Glenford Banner
R. Carl Wright
R. Conroy Wright
R. Oronde Bascome
R. Mital Patel

Philadelphia Gentlemen
1. Henry Davids
2. Ian Holland
3. Mrunal Patel
4. Zeeshan Siddiqi
5. Orlando Baker
6. Irfan Pathan
7. Rashid Khan
8. Tohidul Islam
9. Satsimranjit Dhindsa
10. Mitchell McCleneghan
11. Yannick Elliott

R. Andrew Tye
R. Bernaard Scholtz
R. Paul van Meekeren
R. Kennar Lewis
R. Onias Bascome
R. Justin Pitcher
R. Adrian Gordon
R. Denis Lindsay
R. Troy Baptiste

Raleigh Oaks
1. Sami Aslam
2. Sherfane Rutherford
3. Sunny Sohal
4. Abdullah Syed
5. Dwayne Bravo
6. Timil Patel
7. Sagar Patel
8. Francis Mendonca
9. Jason Dawes
10. Jeffrey Vandersay
11. Lakshan Sandakan

R. Chris Barnwell
R. Mohammad Ashraful
R. Siddhant Lohani
R. Shivil Kaushik
R. Abzal Dean
R. Marcus Charlemagne
R. Faisal Jamkhandi
R. George O'Brien
R. Karthik Gattepalli

Richmond Coders
1. Shehan Jayasuriya
2. Heino Kuhn
3. Xavier Marshall
4. Shakib Al Hasan
5. Dasun Shanaka
6. Najibullah Zadran
7. Nicholas Kirton
8. Greg Strydom
9. Asif Khan
10. Cameron Gannon
11. Shashank Vittaladevaram

R. Richie Berrington
R. Azam Khan
R. Ramon Sealy
R. Anand Tummala
R. Javein Thomas
R. Usman Rafiq
R. Arjun Patel
R. Sai Teja Mukkumalla
R. Omar Afridi

San Fran Bridgers
1. William Perkins
2. David Willey
3. Umar Akmal
4. Shoaib Malik
5. Shawn Findlay
6. Raj Bhavsar
7. Okera Bascome
8. Paul Wintz
9. Mohammad Amir
10. Salman Nazar
11. Arsh Buch

R. Mohammad Hasnain
R. Richard Oliver
R. Tim David
R. Omari Williams
R. Mohak Buch
R. Aravind Patnam
R. Awais Mubarak
R. Simon Laveau
R. Durale Forrest

St Thomas Caribs
1. Dwayne Smith
2. Johnson Charles
3. Jon-Russ Campbell
4. Damodar Daesrath
5. Dunae Nathaniel
6. Carlos Brathwaite
7. Hayden Walsh
8. Dane Piedt
9. Alderman Lesmond
10. Nelson Bolan
11. Oshane Thomas

R. Samuel Badree
R. Kwasi James
R. Bront DeFreitas
R. Lennox Samuel
R. Dale Africa
R. Sheldon John
R. :local Kevin Joseph
R. Clifford Fanis
R. Andrew Eusebe

Tampa Bay Pirates
1. Fahad Babar
2. George Worker
3. Srinivas Salver
4. Geoff Barnett
5. Thisara Perera
6. Mohammad Nawaz
7. Akshay Homraj
8. Harish Easwaraiah
9. Krishmar Santokie
10. Alessandro Morris
11. Parth Desai

R. Brandon King
R. Ish Sodhi
R. Peter Trego
R. Shemroy Barrington
R. Mohendra Khublall
R. Dennico Hollis
R. Kushal Ganji
R. George Adams
R. Sam Das


Texan Ranchers
1. Tristan Coleman
2. Ronnie Hira
3. Glenn Maxwell
4. Corey Anderson
5. Shadab Khan
6. Shehan Kamileen
7. Tyson Gordon
8. Shiva Vashishat
9. Shaheed Keshvani
10. Nathan Rimmington
11. Muhammad Ghous

R. Kieran Noema-Barnett
R. Javon Searles
R. Recordo Gordon
R. Tobias Visee
R. Nisarg Patel
R. Cameron Mirza
R. Jonathan Randolph
R. Keshav Pabbisetty
R. Majjid Zubair

Toronto Skaters
1. Ravinderpal Singh
2. Bhanuka Rajapaksa
3. Nitish Kumar
4. Dhanuka Pathirana
5. Shahid Afridi
6. Rizwan Cheema
7. Ashish Bagai
8. Saad Bin Zafar
9. Wahab Riaz
10. Nikhil Dutta
11. Ravi Rampaul

R. Keddy Lesporis
R. Royston Crandon
R. Abraash Khan
R. Usman Limbada
R. Mark Montfort
R. Umair Ghani
R. Srimantha Wijeyaratne
R. Kenneth Kamyuka
R. Kyle Phillip

Vancouver Islanders
1. Danushka Gunalathika
2. Kusal Perera
3. Ruvindu Gunasekara
4. Davy Jacobs
5. Yuvraj Singh
6. Rodrigo Thomas
7. Hamza Tariq
8. Hiral Patel
9. Matt Coles
10. Junaid Siddiqui
11. Romesh Eranga

R. JP Kotze
R. Harvir Baidwan
R. Jimmy Hansra
R. Royston Crandon
R. Navneet Dhaliwal
R. Raza ur-Rahman
R. Umar Bhatti
R. Rayyan Pathan
R. Dillon Heyliger

Vegas Chancers
1. Ramith Rambukwella
2. Luke Ronchi
3. JP Duminy
4. Andre Russell
5. Aditya Mishra
6. Trevin Bastiampillai
7. Oraine Williams
8. Boomer Collins
9. Marty Kain
10. Ali Khan
11. Aman Lobana

R. Nuwan Thushara
R. Kevin Koththigoda
R. Aaron Summers
R. David Pieters
R. Aditya Thyagarajan
R. Charag Singh
R. Greg Sewdial
R. Quasen Alfred
R. Hemnarine Chattergoon

 

[Aislabie]

How have I come up with these squads?
I used an algorithm to assign a financial value to each player of no less than $20,000. It wasn't a perfect system, and it valued experience over all else, but it gave a good ballpark figure to work with. The ten most expensive players in the league are as follows:

1. Kieron Pollard (Los Angeles Celestials, $263,000)
2. Dwayne Bravo (Raleigh Oaks, $246,000)
3. Chris Gayle (Chicago Gales, $222,000)
4. Ravi Bopara (Manhattan Legacy, $209,000)
5. Shoaib Malik (San Fran Bridgers, $204,000)
6. Shakib Al Hasan (Richmond Coders, $199,000)
7. Shahid Afridi (Toronto Skaters, $195,000)
8. Sunil Narine (Manhattan Legacy, $193,000)
9. Andre Russell (Vegas Chancers, $189,000)
10. Dwayne Smith (St Thomas Caribs, $180,000)

The five most expensive local players in the league are as follows:

1. Liam Plunkett (Chicago Gales, $94,000)
2. Corey Anderson (Texan Ranchers, $89,000)
3. Jehan Mubarak (New York Empire, $82,000)
4. Shehan Jayasuriya (Richmond Coders, $82,000)
5. Rusty Theron (New York Empire, $80,000)

Like I say, not an exact science but close enough. Plus it kind of mimics the weird world of sports contracts where players really aren't paid according to their value.

After that, I set a salary cap of $1,000,000 per team. Originally I considered excluding the franchise players () but ultimately found that this made squads bloated with too many expensive overseas players.

I also tried to give each team a little bit of a character as I built the squads (Chicago are all about big hitting; New York are all about their local players; Bermuda, St Thomas, Toronto and Vancouver all about their home countries), but that wasn't essential. The key was to get the teams to a state of approximate parity.

In the end of course, the teams aren't all even. There are a few teams that stand out as obvious favourites (especially Vancouver), and some teams that don't (looking at you St Thomas, but it isn't easy being based in the Virgin Islands).

How might I simulate it?
I do not feel like inputting 400 players, then simulating 320-odd games. I'm afraid that's not what I'm about, especially as my main hobby at the moment is resimulating the entire history of motorsports with spreadsheets. Instead, I'll be rating the teams out of five stars for their batting and bowling (giving them a rating of between 2 and 10), then rolling dice to decide a winner.

Spoiler: How dice simulation will work

Home Team
Batting rating: 3
Bowling rating: 4
Home bonus: 1
Dice roll: 5
Score: 13

Away Team
Batting rating: 5
Bowling rating: 3
Dice roll: 1
Score: 9

Home team wins!

If scores are level, then I'll deal with it at the time but it'll probably be a tie (dice rolls equal) or no result (dice rolls different). If that happens too often, I might change it.

 

[Aislabie]

AMERICAN LEAGUE

East Division
Manhattan Legacy
Miami Surfers
Penn State Liberty
Raleigh Oaks
St Thomas Caribs

West Division
Chicago Gales
Columbia Governors
Indy Hoosiers
Los Angeles Celestials
Texan Ranchers

INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE

Atlantic Division
Bermuda Triangles
New York Empire
Philadelphia Gentlemen
Tampa Bay Pirates
Toronto Skaters

Pacific Division
Hollywood Stars
Richmond Coders
San Fran Bridgers
Vancouver Islanders
Vegas Chancers

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Regular Season

30-match regular season
- three-match series played home and away against everyone in the division
- three-match cross-division series at home and away

Spoiler: Example schedule: Richmond Coders

1. Hollywood Stars (H)
2. Hollywood Stars (H)
3. Hollywood Stars (H)
4. Vegas Chancers (A)
5. Vegas Chancers (A)
6. Vegas Chancers (A)
7. Bermuda Triangles (A)
8. Bermuda Triangles (A)
9. Bermuda Triangles (A)
10. Vancouver Islanders (H)
11. Vancouver Islanders (H)
12. Vancouver Islanders (H)
13. San Fran Bridgers (A)
14. San Fran Bridgers (A)
15. San Fran Bridgers (A)
16. Vegas Chancers (H)
17. Vegas Chancers (H)
18. Vegas Chancers (H)
19. New York Empire (H)
20. New York Empire (H)
21. New York Empire (H)
22. Vancouver Islanders (A)
23. Vancouver Islanders (A)
24. Vancouver Islanders (A)
25. San Fran Bridgers (H)
26. San Fran Bridgers (H)
27. San Fran Bridgers (H)
28. Hollywood Stars (A)
29. Hollywood Stars (A)
30. Hollywood Stars (A)

denotes cross-division match

Playoffs

Division Semi-Finals (one-off match)
Division 2nd vs Division 3rd @ Division 2nd

Division Championship (best of 3)
Division 1st vs Winner @ Division 1st

League Championship (best of 3)
Winner vs Winner @ alternating

Major League Championship (best of 5)
Winner vs Winner @ alternating

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

This results in 300 regular season matches and between 20 and 27 playoff matches.