[Westheim]

As the offseason whittled down it became more and more apparent that the Raccoons wouldn’t get another infielder to improve their bench – at least not the way they wanted it. Infielders there were plenty, but the Raccoons needed the right one. A left-handed batting second baseman for example to pair with Vickers if any of the starting middle infielders went down with injury (not that unlikely…). Now, left-handed batters at the keystone aren’t exactly impossible to find. We had one in AAA even, Edgar Barrios. The thing with Barrios was that since being acquired from the damn Elks two winters ago he had mostly sucked in AAA, now was 30 years old, and nobody had any major interest in seeing him on the 25-man roster. He also had an entirely forgettable 38 games with the Raccoons in ’35, batting .184 with 3 RBI in 76 at-bats. Jose Brito was not the answer, since he was a right-handed batter.

The other thing we tried was to trade Maruyama away, but that never got very far. Teams weren’t exactly hell-bent on adding a first baseman with no power to speak of.

If you carried Maruyama, Maldonado, Vickers, and (on most days) Kilmer on the bench, that was four right-handed batters already. The only non-right-handed options left where Nickas and Triolo, and they were a .553 OPS hitter between them. Triolo, for all his defensive agility, had put up -0.1 WAR in 77 games last year.

Left-handed hitters were plenty on the free agent leftovers market in late February, but we needed one capable of playing up the middle, preferably both spots, and then you arrived at people like Victor Ochoa, 29, with a career .472 OPS and no major league exposure since 11 dreadful games with the Thunder in 2034, and overall even less experience than Triolo.

Well, then we can stick with Triolo, right? Or Nickas, doesn’t really matter, they’re both terrible.

What? (looks into the sad, broken-hearted eyes of his two backup shortstops, both twitching their whiskers, before they both traipse out of the room, heads hanging)

I was still trying to get *anything at all* for Maruyama, the .649 OPS first baseman with a full season’s of experience, sprinkled over three years.

Nobody wanted him.

+++

February 28 – The Canadiens sign ex-SFB MR Jeremy Bloedow (21-29, 4.37 ERA, 44 SV) to a 3-yr, $3.5M contract.
March 17 – The Bayhawks trade defensively challenged 30-yr old LF/RF/1B Doug Levis (.258, 82 HR, 278 RBI) to the Falcons for MR Jon Salls (0-1, 2.08 ERA, 1 SV) and a prospect.

+++

Toby Ross joined the Scorpions for $326k; Juan Camps was now on the Titans for $342k;

…and then the winter was over.