That's a pointless rule in dire need of abolishment. At some point I seem to a have needed that extra spot on the 40-man roster this year and moved him to the 60-day DL.
Oh, well, this will fix itself. It's August. He can "rehab" in AAA for 30 days, by when it will be September. Then he can be "recalled" and instantly demoted.
The high-level finesse that is roster management continues to elude me time and again. I still think that I have come some way with baseball the last three years. Three years ago I didn't know how many players were on a roster. OR in a lineup.
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By the way, I realize that I am doing quite a lot of whining here for a team playing .650 ball, far and ahead the best record any of my times has ever had this deep in a season. Unless my rotation suddenly decides to quit and become a boyband somewhere between here and September, this team is bound to win 100+ games.
Much of my frustration stems from emotional attachment I have developed with several of my players, albeit particular ones. Daniel Hall is the most prominent example. Most of the others are pitchers, and I am attached to Kisho Saito, Jason Turner, and Scott Wade all alike. Christopher Powell was such a player, the first reliable starter we ever had, and he had that one electric season with the <1.00 WHIP and several very good ones.
You want your favorite players to achieve great results. Dan The Man driving in a hundred in '84 was a fantastic thrill. Scott Wade winning 21 games in '89 was a great experience.
Our offense is just above average in runs scored in the league at this point, with just over 4.5 runs per game. That's not all that terrible! For comparison, the 1983 Coons, the first to make the playoffs, only scored 4.1 runs per game and those nine days over Christmas and the New Year this last winter were the greatest blast I can remember.
But the offense repeatedly betrays my darlings, foremost Jason Turner. And if the offense doesn't, the defense does, costing him two W's early this season. Turner could have easily won 20 games this year with just a tad more run support and one or two fielding earthquakes less.
I'd be thrilled to see Turner win 20 games! I doesn't come together this year, since he probably won't have enough starts left, since I will try to stretch out my rotation as far as possible once we clinch the CL North. The Osanais and Vinsons and Arnolds are betraying my darling, and it drives me so extremely mad at times.
So, I should enjoy my .650 team, instead I'm pulling the spoiled brat. I should shut my face more often.
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Random stat #1: Alberto Reyes on his Raccoons debut became the 200th player to done a brown uniform.
Random stat #2: the Raccoons' overall pythagorean record is now 1,200-1,186 and just over .500. Unfortunately, we were double digits below our expected record three times in our early years (so: inept AND unlucky) and the actual record is 1,170-1,216. But we're getting there.
Random note #3: the team will lose a key part or two after this season, as the preliminary budget shows $7.4M in salaries for next year - WITHOUT to-be-free-agents Jorge Salazar ($650k), Bob Arnold ($423k), Roberto Carrillo ($300k), Antonio Cordero ($225k), Gustavo Flores ($125k), and Alberto Reyes ($124k), in total about $1.85M. That makes for at least $9.25M in salaries (including at this point five arbitration cases: Turner, Higgins, Johnston, Lagarde, and Burnett) and with about $4.5M in operating expenses we're already very close to our $14.3M budget.