FanPost Friday: Best FanPosts of 2020!

It’s that time again where I share links to my very subjective list of best FanPosts of the year! There were some really good ones in 2020, perhaps due to the extra time some of us found ourselves with while we were waiting for baseball to start and/or stuck at home forever due to the ongoing pandemic. LLers are nothing if not resourceful and creative and these posts are a great display of the breadth of life experience and writing styles that our community brings to the table.

All right, let’s roll the highlight film!

Best Alternate Mariners History - Spectacle, Scandal & Kim Ng’s Seattle Mariners by bigthurst

Prompted by the Miami Marlins hiring Kim Ng as the first woman General Manager in MLB history, I suggested we go back to 2008 when Kim Ng was a top candidate for the Mariners GM before the job was given to Jack Zduriencik. Poster bigthurst gave us a believable, funny, and compelling alternate history where Ng was hired over Jack Z. Highly recommended!

Photo by Abbie Parr/Getty Images

Best Usage of the Seat Fleet - Honoring Family in Seat Fleet by Megan Ferguson

Ryan and Toby got to watch some baseball together (/ugly cries into Mariners hat).

Best Draftee Scouting Report by an LLer - 2019 Draft breakout - Tim Elliott - by Crossed_Up

This one was unprompted but it’s a great rundown on a pitcher who has gotten a bit forgotten in the prospect rankings but has a lot of potential. Also, it’s interesting to read this now since it was written before his teammate Emerson Hancock was drafted in 2020 with the Mariners’ first round pick.

Photo by Abbie Parr/Getty Images

The Backflash Kevin Category - Marco Gonzales and Evan White

Poster Backflash Kevin definitely wins LL Rookie of the Year honors with these two very well researched and composed deep dives on Marco Gonzales and Evan White. These ones are for the analytic folks out there, but even the non-stat heads in the community will enjoy these and hopefully learn something. Thanks, Kevin!

The Messed-Up Mascots Category - The Way of the Weird by btownfritz

Another unprompted gem! I will always choose to highlight weird mascots because they are fun and sports should be fun.

Photo by Lindsey Wasson/Getty Images

Darkest Timeline Category - Future Imperfect by btownfritz

Well, it didn’t happen, but what btownfritz here presupposes is....what would have happened if the Seattle Mariners won the 2020 World Series? Nothing good, it turns out!

Photo by Abbie Parr/Getty Images

Seattle Baseball History Category - It’s the 50th Anniversary of the Darkest Day in Seattle Baseball History by MarvThornbrry

Read about the day the Pilots died and check out their theme song!

Biggest FLEX - I Worked Out With Nelson Cruz and It Actually Didn’t Kill Me by Brittney Bush Bollay

Brittney decided to see if she could hang with one of Nelson Cruz’s legendary offseason workout routines.

A Bah Humbug Humdinger - A Dickens of an Offseason

Poster Sean P WAS me takes us on a WILD Christmas journey I won’t soon forget. Just read it.

All right, that wraps it up, folks. I hope you got a kick out of that trip down memory lane or perhaps read some gems that were missed the first time around. Thank you all so much for contributing these FanPosts and for all the comment activity on the FPF prompt posts. I’m very grateful to have this community as part of my life during these difficult times and I encourage all of you to keep popping into the Open Threads to vent/say hi/talk about food and sci-fi, etc. Everyone hang in there this winter. We’ll get through it together, while apart.