SHARK OUT 3 – Six Feet Under

–PandaSunbeams

You can read Parts One and Two of this series here and here.

Inspired by TUN’s GLOATED series, I’ve decided to rank the Hellmouth Sunbeams. Now, TUN’s series is fantastic and does a great job of examining the statistics and contributions of each player, and is a great measurement of how things work on the Breath Mints. But this is the Hellmouth Sunbeams, and worth can’t be measured in just ability alone here. I’ve come up with an 8 point system that I call the SHARK OUT rating that allowed me to rank all 43 Sunbeams. SHARK OUT stands for:

S – Seasons with the team
H – Hellmouthyness
A – Ability
R – Radicalness
K – King Shit

O – OGness
U – Unestimability
T – Tragedy

Each player has been scored from 1 to 10 in each category, except for Seasons, which is 1 point per each season (or partial season) playing on the active roster. OG points are: 10 points for being on the Original Active Roster, 5 points if you originated on the Sunbeams or in the Sunbeams Shadows. 0 points otherwise.

I will not be explaining these categories further.

Is this method of ranking perfect? Absolutely not. Is it subjective and based almost entirely on my personal opinion? You betcha. However, it’s these qualities that I think make this as accurate as a Sunbeams rating system can get.

This time we’re going from 21 to 11. Buckle up!

21. Wyatt Mason VII
Seasons: 1, Hellmouthyness: 8, Ability: 3, Radicalness: 9, KS: 2, OG: 0, Unestimability: 7, Tragedy: 10

Originally, I wanted to give Wya77 (as we affectionately called it) a Tragedy of 100. We got attached to this little guy HARD and FAST. If you want to have a nice little cry, look up Olive’s Sunbeams animatics on Youtube and watch Wya77. I miss it every day.

20. Alaynabella Hollywood
Seasons: 6, Hellmouthyness: 5, Ability: 2, Radicalness: 7, KS: 6, OG: 10, Unestimability: 3, Tragedy: 8

Alyanabella Hollywood was the original leadoff batter for the Hellmouth Sunbeams (and one of only 3 in the history of the team). She was part of Hollyweed, the friendship pairing between her and Randy Marijuana, and was never quite good at the game while she was with us. After being vultured off for Hahn Fox, she ate a peanut with the Flowers and was reduced to near-Nerd levels of post peanut stats.

However, after a wild sequence of events leading to her stealing the spot of, of all people, Nagomi McDaniel, she eventually rose to become a competent pitcher with the Garages. We love to see her thrive in Seattle.

19. Rhys Trombone
Seasons: 3, Hellmouthyness: 5, Ability: 7, Radicalness: 3, KS: 4, OG: 10, Unestimability: 7, Tragedy: 9

Rhys Trombone was the first to fall in the Sim, making sure that the Sunbeams were terrible in the mid-Discipline era. Rhys will always be remembered fondly as someone who probably played the trombone and was taken from us too soon.

18. Hahn Fox
Seasons: 18, Hellmouthyness: 3, Ability: 8, Radicalness: 6, KS: 5, OG: 0, Unestimability: 7, Tragedy: 1

Hahn Fox. There’s a lot to say about Hahn Fox, but I’ll try to keep it brief. It is my opinion that the arrival of Hahn Fox was the turning point for the Sunbeams in the DE. We’d just gone through the loss of Randy in Breckenridge, and were reeling over our roster. At the time, Hahn had just been pinging from the Dale to the Flowers, and we kind of thought that the Wild Low Sweetheart would continue her journey.

But she just… stayed. And since that point, Hahn has been the Rock (the Party Rock?) of the Hellmouth Sunbeams. Only missing a handful of games in the next 18 seasons, Hahn brought her consistent play and even keel to a team embroiled in chaos and nonsense. Plus she’s really into her wife and that’s just neat. She only ranks this low because unlike many other Sunbeams, she’s just not that tragic of a figure.

17. Velasquez Meadows
Seasons: 3, Hellmouthyness: 5, Ability: 7, Radicalness: 3, KS: 7, OG: 10, Unestimability: 6, Tragedy: 8

Number 2 in the “We’ll just take all the good Hellmouth players away” in the early DE. Killed later in the same season that took Rhys Trombone, Velasquez was just as harsh a loss. Though the Sunbeams would eventually find their place, the 1-2 punch of season 3 took the wind out of the sails of many a sandship.

16. Jayden Wright
Seasons: 11, Hellmouthyness: 9, Ability: 7, Radicalness: 3, KS: 5, OG: 5, Unestimability: 3, Tragedy: 6

Jayden Wright was brought onto the team to take the place of Eugenia Bickle in the Bickle Batter plan that would see Eugenia moved to the Lineup. Sunbeams pitching has often been considered a joke (and for decent reason), but Jayden had good, solid stats to build on. And then she built on them! By the late EE, Jayden was a 6 star pitcher on her way to becoming a real force in the league.

And then she had an allergic reaction.

And then she was bitten by a shark.

Well, we tried to have a good pitcher.

15. Sigmund Castillo
Seasons: 14, Hellmouthyness: 5, Ability: 8, Radicalness: 5, KS: 7, OG: 0, Unestimability: 6, Tragedy: 5

But, Jayden wasn’t our ONLY try at having a good pitcher. And one time we actually had success!

Sigmund Castillo started on the Sunbeams as a trade for Alexander Horne from the Lovers. They were pretty much the only Sunbeam with actual baserunning skill, and, when on base, would often steal multiple times and be driven in by Igneus Delacruz behind them. However, they were not good at actually getting on base. So, in the aforementioned Bickle Batter plan, we used Sigmund as the pivot. But while Sigmund was in the shadows, they were training, and building.

After two seasons of shadow infusing on pitching, Sigmund emerged with a brand new set of siege weaponry, and began launching fastballs from trebuchets. In the 5 seasons Sigmund has pitched, they’ve performed as well as almost any pitcher in history, and we look forward to them continuing their new legacy in the next era.

14. Paula Reddick
Seasons: 9, Hellmouthyness: 6, Ability: 7, Radicalness: 4, KS: 4, OG: 5, Unestimability: 9, Tragedy: 7

On of my favorite things that occurred because of Paula Reddick is that it made Sky (who draws all the amazing blaseball minis) draw a Truck. Just a regular Truck. Because Paula is a ghost that sometimes haunts trucks.

But as a player, Paula is amazing in the hyper-optimized Sunbeams tradition. A being of almost entirely divinity and moxie, Paula achieved a near-record OBP of .484 while only putting up a BA of .276. She’s not the best but dang, she’s good at what she does.

13. Hendricks Richardson
Seasons: 17, Hellmouthyness: 9, Ability: 6, Radicalness: 1, KS: 7, OG: 0, Unestimability: 10, Tragedy: 3

And now we come to the last entry on the list to receive no OG points, Hendricks Richardson. Hendricks was, like Hahn, a rock, a player who showed up and just stayed where they were. The difference is that Hendricks had almost no stats. However, I maintain that Hendricks Richardson is one of the best in the history of the game at doing a lot with a little. In season 11 (which was cracked for the Sunbeams for sure), Hendricks managed to get into the top 10 for Hits, which is crazy for a batter with only a handful of stars, circumstances not withstanding. While it is true that there are several seasons in which Hendricks was the worst Sunbeams batter, they were still a batter that could be putting up top 3 numbers for multiple teams. Hendricks, to me, embodies the Hellmouth tradition of being Unestimable, and also was a big-ass Marxist dragon, which is just really cool.

12. Emmett Internet
Seasons: 5, Hellmouthyness: 8, Ability: 6, Radicalness: 6, KS: 4, OG: 10, Unestimability: 7, Tragedy: 8

Season 3, with the aforementioned incinerations of Rhys and Velasquez, but Season 4 seemed like it would be alright. The Sunbeams dodged any further incinerations, and even won Precognition in the Season 4 Elections.

Things were looking up!

Until Season 5, Day 91, when Emmett Internet was the first of two to fall to the Precog curse of the Hellmouth. At the time, Emmett was one of our two best, and it again seemed like the Sim was just picking off our best players one by one. Emmett’s presence is tightly woven into the fabric of Sunbeams lore, though, as the Precog Trio carries with it some of the deepest feelings the team has.

11. Dudley Mueller
Seasons: 15, Hellmouthyness: 8, Ability: 10, Radicalness: 3, KS: 8, OG: 5, Unestimability: 7, Tragedy: 2

As a side note, to all the Tragedy above, something good did (eventually) come out of one of these events. The incineration of Rhys Trombone gave the Sunbeams the energy drink monstrosity known as Dudley Mueller. While Dudley’s origins were humble, their thirst for blood would soon make them a force to be reckoned with.

A diet of Parties, Peanuts, and Plasma between seasons 7 and 10 would lead Dudley into the Expansion Era with a monstrous 5+ statline, putting up numbers in Seasons 11 through 13 that rivaled the best performances of Aldon Cashmoney and Nagomi McDaniel, and they continue to perform above this level as they’re on their current world tour in Houston, Ohio, and Hades. Truly, Dudley exemplifies one of the core tenets of the Sunbeams: we take our players and we make them better (or they make themselves better).

And there you have it, numbers 21 through 11. We’re getting into the top 10 in our final article, which will come out some time in the future. With only 10 names remaining, I know who people are waiting to see, but who will take the top slot?

Remember to stare into the sun responsibly!