[Westheim]

February 1 – CL Jim Durden (139 SV, 2.09 ERA) joins the Indians for a year, earning $600k. He was with the Scorpions so far.
February 7 – 37-yr old SP William Williams (125-98, 3.33 ERA), who only started nine games with the Warriors last year due to injury, signs a 2-yr, $1.078M contract with the Gold Sox.
February 8 – SP Carlos Castro (103-82, 3.15 ERA) joins the Warriors for 7-yr, $5.254M.
February 9 – The Raccoons sign 30-yr old career minor leaguer SP Joe Thornton on a minor league deal.
February 11 – INF Dimian Barrios signs a 4-yr, $2.28M contract with the Condors. The Raccoons receive a supplemental round pick.
February 19 – The Miners and Seung-ook Yi (202 SV) agree on a 2-yr, $584k deal. Yi already closed games for Pittsburgh in 1985 before joining the Buffaloes last year.

Thornton gives us a good option in case a starter or two go down to injury. He’s never made the majors, but has good stuff according to our scouts. He’s a lefty with a cutter-slider combo and will be assigned to AAA.

But there’s no talking around it. February was over, and I didn’t get anything meaningful done this off-season. We didn’t improve the rotation, we didn’t improve the outfield, we didn’t improve anything. The Canadiens may be happy about it.

March 4 – 39-yr old outfielder Harry Beauman (.309, 52 HR, 502 RBI) receives a 2-yr, $832k contract from the Condors.
March 6 – The Raccoons sign 30-yr old outfielder Carlos León (.280 with 61 HR for his career) for 1-yr, $272k. He played most of his career with the Wolves, where he became the only ABL player to hit for the cycle twice.
March 26 – The Raccoons add INF Yong-chan Chong, a career .278 hitter. The 27-yr old infielder will make $137k for one year.

León will be the starting rightfielder, most likely. Bill Stevens is pushed out of the 25-man roster with this signing, and Weber and Gonzalez will be backups. It’s an improvement, but not a big one. León does not play in center, so Sanchez will start there. Defensively, Weber in CF and Sanchez in RF would be a better disposition.

Chong is the first South Korean player on the Raccoons roster, and will fill up the infield with both Perez and Campbell going back to AAA. Chong can play all four positions and should get some starts here and there, too.

No, it’s not been a great off season.

We signed two international discoveries, one from Venezuela and one from the Netherlands. Neither’s gonna be a Hall of Famer.

The hawt prospects in the ABL do not include any young Coon kits in the Top 10, but a whole litter in the Top 60:
14th – AAA 2B Dani Perez
28th – A OF Jesus Gonzalez (the recent signing from Venezuela)
35th – AAA 1B/3B Joe Jackson (first round pick two years ago)
56th – AAA RF Marcos Costello
58th – AA OF Glenn Johnston (acquired this winter)
97th – A OF Vern Kinnear (acquired this winter)
172nd – AAA CL Juan Martinez
193rd – AA SP Miguel Martinez (first round pick last year)

Oh, yes, we now have two pitchers named Miguel Martinez in our system, and five Martinezes in total…

The system is ranked 6th in the ABL (not bad for coming back from rock bottom a few years back). See the first and third guys on that list. Those could perfectly replace some mid-30s guys next year.