[Westheim]

No, Slappy, I really don’t know why I keep trying to get Rich Monck from the Cyclones now when the thought did not occur to me previously. They started it! – But look, I have spent all night on this! – (leads Slappy into the other room, where the pinboard on the long wall is entirely covered with stat tables, player pictures, little brown and white flags, and about a quarter mile of red string connecting it all in a fantastic spider web) – And now I know what this deal needs! Look! (hurries over to the far end of the pinboard and excitedly tips a claw on a picture at one end of the string) We need to offer more strawberry marmalade…!!

(Cristiano calmly rolls into the room with the open laptop on his thighs, pointing out how Roberto Soto batted .237/.285/.358 in 116 games in Ham Lake in ’62)

Cristiano, please!! – I have already figured out what we need to close the deal for Rich Monck, so will you PLEASE NOT CONFUSE ME WITH FACTS!!

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February 6 – The Raccoons acquire 26-year-old INF Rich Monck (.291, 81 HR, 269 RBI) and MR Mike Dean (7-3, 5.79 ERA, 1 SV) from the Cyclones for SP/MR Tom Delaney (36-31, 3.51 ERA), #38 prospect AA RF/LF Roberto Soto, AAA C Jeremy Healy, and AA CL Trevor Seitz.
February 7 – The Buffaloes sign up former Rebels 1B Mario Delgadillo (.316, 158 HR, 630 RBI) on a 2-yr, $8.88M deal.
February 12 – The Raccoons make a splash with the signing of 28-year-old right-handed SP Josh Elling (55-65, 3.53 ERA) to a 5-year, $35M contract. Elling spent the last season and a half with the Scorpions, who receive the Raccoons’ second-round pick as compensation.

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Rich Monck! Homers! Exciting!

From Australia, Monck had been in the 2053 July IFA pool. The Raccoons passed and he signed for all of $76k with the Blue Sox.

Can’t wait to see how that’s gonna backfire, but until then I still have two months to pretend that I found us a new Rich Hereford (although Monck doesn’t play the outfield). I wasn’t thrilled to part with Delaney, who seemed like a strong fit in a #5.5 starter role and would have spared us spending any thoughts on J.J. Sensabaugh going forwards.

Speaking of Sensabaugh, while Monck had no say in getting traded, he insisted in keeping his #18, which had been given to Freddy Castillo. I had tried to solve this problem by trading Castillo rather than Delaney, but the Cyclones weren’t having it. Castillo wanted another number ending in 8, but he couldn’t have #8 (Neil Reece, and single digits are not for pitchers anyway), #28 (Angel Casas), or #38 (just given to Ricky Baca, who I was still pretending we wouldn’t send back to where he came from on Opening Day). Sensabaugh, often-battered owner of #48 around these parts volunteered his number in the hope of generating some goodwill with that action. He got #56 instead. A nothing number for a nothing pitcher. (Sensabaugh’s whiskers hang)

The 40-man roster was at capacity. To get “Fly By Night” Dean on the roster, we had to take someone off, and Armando Suriel ended up on waivers. He went unclaimed.

Why trade away the #38 prospect in this? Well, like Cristiano said. He hit nothing in a full season of AA baseball. And if we played our cards right, we could get ten years and 300 homers out of Monck!

So normally, the Raccoons would not have gone after Josh Elling. Instead we were trying to get Mike Chartrand with a 1-year deal to kinda stay put for now, but Chartrand was fighting over pennies and we were trying to get a ******* deal done. Chartrand ultimately went to the Bayhawks for $2.56M. When the Cyclones came around with the Monck trade and it became apparent that if we didn’t part with Starr or Ben Morris, then we’d have to part with a starting pitcher (which turned out to be Delaney), we went after the best free agent that was still out there. We had the dosh – and we had a protected first-round pick (#12). If we had signed away the first-round pick, I probably would have passed, but with the 80-82 finish last year, we got to keep our first-rounder despite signing the penultimate type A free agent on the market (the last one being ex-Coon Kevin Hitchcock).

Elling has electric stuff, but on his bad days he doesn’t find the zone at all, so his BB/9 are a bit up there (over three at least) for a right-hander. His career record is a lie – even going 18-5 with Sacramento last year couldn’t erase the hole he found himself in after pitching with the deadbeat Wolves for five years before that. In 2059, he posted a 3.33 ERA and went 6-17. In 2060 he shaved off over half a run and went with a 2.69 ERA. He still ended up 9-12 in wins and losses. The Coons can be cruel to their starters, but not THIS cruel… mostly. Todd Oley (not even on the extended roster) was waived to make room on the 40-man.

After those two big additions, the Condors came and offered Elmer Maldonado basically for free. Maldonado had a contract north of $3M for ’63, and the Condors were overbudget and had gotten the order from their cheapskate owner to get within the budget by Opening Day. The Raccoons were too crowded in the outfield to consider an ultimately average, 31-year-old corner outfielder regardless of his going rate, though.

We already had a rather bloated extended roster with 18 pitchers and 17 position players hanging around in late February.

New contracts for old Portlanders: Mike Lane got $1.2M from the Thunder; Juan Mercado hooked up with the Elks for $560k; the Buffos took on Juan del Toro for $720k;