[Westheim]

Then the offseason started in earnest. With the Stalker and Gutierrez matters settled, the Raccoons went to look at their roster, and there were some holes. Assuming we would not resign Mario Rosas, which was more than likely, we had to fill two spots in the rotation behind Bernie Chavez, Raffaello Sabre, and Ignacio del Rio (who was expected to be ready for Opening Day, unlike Nick Bates). And the spots were *behind* them; if we couldn’t keep Rosas, we couldn’t hope to get somebody in free agency, either. The personnel at hand had proven time and again that they weren’t up to snuff. We were talking about the Coffees and Gurney of the world here… Darren Brown’s future was uncertain, but would certainly be in St. Pete to start the new season.

In fact, to reduce clutter, the Raccoons offloaded several roster fillers back to the AAA roster right away. This included Brown, Carlos Contreras, Justin LeDuc, and the unbearable Kyle Green, who was walking 6.5 batters per nine frames and that as a 25-year-old righty. Big red flag. Biggest red flag we’d seen flown in a while. That left only 15 pitchers on the extended roster in late October, including the outgoing Rico Gutierrez, the up-in-the-air Mario Rosas, the injured Nick Bates, who was expected back until June with torn elbow ligaments, and potential roster fillers at the back end of the pen in Gurney and de la Cruz. Also around hung Antonio Prieto, who had silently had a decent call-up, appearing in 15 games and pitching to a 2.13 ERA with 11 K in 12.2 innings. Also seven walks, but at least he was only 23.

If the Raccoons couldn’t retain Ed Blair, Prieto was pretty much guaranteed a roster spot over de la Cruz. Jason Gurney only figured to end up in the bullpen if we traded one of the other three southpaws in there.

What about AAA starters? There was an entire handful that merited at least casual consideration, including Brown and Contreras, although only one of them had pitched to an ERA better than 4.18 in AAA in 2033, and Brown had even been above 5. There was Travis Coffee, who had not been called up again after being injured in a spot start in August. He had compiled a 2.82 ERA in 115 innings in AAA, making 16 starts and a handful of relief appearances. He had only featured in five Coons games, and had only pitched 5.2 innings. Last year he had made 19 appearances for Portland (16 starts) and had done *okay*, 5-7 with a 4.31 ERA. We had surely seen worse!

There was also a pair of 23-year-old right-handers, 2030 second-rounder Jason Lucas (12-16, 4.18 ERA in AAA) and 2031 first-rounder Jonathan Dykstra (8-13, 4.42 ERA). Both had control issues that needed ironing out. Neither had high strikeout totals. They were not ready for primetime, but at least on the radar. Lucas also had to go on the 40-man roster before December 1 to protect him from the rule 5 draft where he would likely be taken.

Moving along to catching, we were willing to go forward with Elliott Thompson, but were looking for a different platoon partner, because our budget didn’t allow to blow $1.3M or so on Fernando Garcia, who had been mostly a disappointment.

There was no suitable replacement for Garcia in AAA (or on the extended roster in David Tinnin). Peeking at AA Ham Lake we saw 19-year-old Tony Morales, a $95k expense in the July 2030 IFA period. He had made his debut in Aumsville just before his 19th birthday in April and had clocked opposing pitching for an .888 OPS in 50 games, meriting fast-tracking him to Ham Lake, where he’d swatted .251/.308/.440 the rest of the way. Between the two levels he had hit 15 dingers and 59 extra-base hits in 121 games. There might be a pure hitter here! His defense was *decent* but not extraordinary. He was also a lefty batter. He was no threat to Thompson right now, because jumping him to the majors right now seemed ill-advised. He might start the season in Ham Lake, but we fully expected him to be in St. Pete by the summer.

Next up, the infield – where the starting positions seem all but taken. Zitzner, Stalker, Ramos, Zeltser around the diamond – what else would we do? Zelts had only batted .273 and for a .685 OPS after his trade from the Caps, but I declared that a sample size issue. The guy had done nothing but hitting in the Federal League and was a 6-year veteran; he had batted .300 in qualifying fashion three times (and four times in total) for Pittsburgh and Washington; I was not going to be distracted by 209 at-bats slightly out of shape.

Tom Hawkins and Justin Marsingill figured to be solid backup options, but both were right-handed, leaving us with little options to put the finger on the scale by f.e. occasionally sitting Stalker against a right-handed pitcher. (Rich Vickers, left to his devices in AAA in September, was also a right-handed batter) That was not a HUGE problem – while Stalker had a higher average against lefties, the difference was only 16 points. Moreover, ALL of his homers in ’33 had been off right-handed pitchers, so he had a higher OPS against righties (30 points). This was mostly in line with his career splits, too, which were actually more pronounced (although he did have 26 career homers vs. left-handed hurling). It would be a nice option to have, but not something worth sleepless nights.

The outfield was a bit of work, though.

Taking stock, the Critters had finished the season with seven outfielders on the extended roster. Jimmy Wallace had slumped in September, but had posted the highest OPS of all (.769). His defense remained atrocious. In center we had Adrian Reichardt, whenever he felt like not hurting all over, and as options Manny Fernandez – nice debut with a 108 OPS+ and 19 stolen bases in almost 400 PA – as well as Billy Jennings, Juan Camps, and Preston Pinkerton. Sean Catella was also around, but let’s remain serious here. Yes, he had hit .393 this year. That was in 28 at-bats, and he remained a .235/.278/.296 for his disappointing 5-year career. The biggest impact about him was probably that we resorted to recalling him every single year…

Catella and Pinkerton were likely the odd guys out given that we could either platoon both Fernandez and Reichardt in center as well as Jennings and Camps in right, or try to trade one of them and get a switch-hitter or super utility.

The biggest issue to a Wallace-Reichardt-Fernandez-Camps-Jennings outfield was egos. All five considered themselves to be starters, and we could only reasonably start three on any given day.

The only reasonable option in AAA was Ed Hooge, who had featured less this year than last, and who did many things reasonably well, but didn’t excel in any. He hit for a decent average. Had decent power. Decent defense. Decent speed. This meant that he would not get any attention as long as those five outfielders were still around.

+++

October 21 – The Buffaloes acquire C Jeremiah Brooks (.300, 71 HR, 419 RBI) from the Rebels for LF/RF/1B Danny Figueroa (.317, 10 HR, 61 RBI) and a prospect.

+++

The Raccoons during late October signed 1-year extensions with Chris Wise ($650k), Jimmy Wallace ($525k), and John Hennessy ($330k), avoiding arbitration with all three of them.

And this is where I am currently stuck on a deal, or actually two, but I can only do one, and I might not do any of them, and I need to break my skull over the options a bit more. Yes, this involves Fernando Garcia, but him alone is not enough to get a strong addition I am looking for in any case…