[Westheim]

Perpetually scared now, but ultimately content with the Indians trade just conducted, I let myself ride the waves of newfound confidence that it’d be alright into the Winter Meetings.

Everybody (well, the Rebs and damn Elks for sure) tried to give the Raccoons their unwanted right-handed relievers, preferably for prospects, which was not exactly what I had in mind. If anything, the farm needed to be stocked.

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December 4 – Gasps around the league as career Crusaders SP Ben Seiter (236-139, 3.34 ERA) signs a 3-year, $17.8M contract with the Thunder.
December 4 – The Rebels acquire 3B Sergio Rubio (.283, 10 HR, 49 RBI) from the Blue Sox for catcher Josh Richmond (.290, 4 HR, 29 RBI) and a prospect.
December 5 – The Thunder acquire OF Scott Franks (.309, 20 HR, 391 RBI) from the Loggers, who receive a prospect.
December 5 – In a different trade, Oklahoma City trades for OF/1B Vince Goll (.280, 43 HR, 304 RBI) from the Gold Sox, also receiving $1.18M in cash for their prospect.
December 6 – The Raccoons dump MR Jorge Quinones (61-76, 4.12 ERA, 8 SV) on the Rebels in exchange for 28-year-old switch-hitting catcher Justin Aguilar (.282, 41 HR, 210 RBI).
December 6 – The Condors get SP Aaron Ledbetter (47-46, 3.86 ERA) and $1.08M in cash from the Falcons for a pair of prospects.
December 6 – For two more prospects, the Condors get 3B Jon Schomer (.238, 10 HR, 55 RBI) from the Rebels. Richmond’s returns include #30 prospect 1B Keith Bevilacqua.
December 8 – New York tries to overcome the loss of Ben Seiter with the signing of former Blue Sox catcher David Johnson (.281, 259 HR, 924 RBI) for $14.9M over two years. The 32-year-old two-time Gold Glover led the FL in RBI in 2066.
December 8 – The Warriors get ex-NYC 1B/RF/CF Jared Allen (.281, 60 HR, 301 RBI) on a 3-year deal worth $9.52M.

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The Raccoons paid up almost a million bucks on the Rebels trade, but it got rid of a left-hander that had posted a 7.52 ERA with the Raccoons in the last couple of months of the 2066 season and added a catcher in his walk year, which paired him nicely with Ramon Lopez, whose contract was also up after 2067. Jake Flowe would then be reassigned to AAA, since we weren’t gonna run three catchers, and it would be better for him to get regular playing time; he had a paw in the running for the catcher’s job in 2068 for sure, but he had also played across three different levels in ’66, which entailed mostly sitting on the bench with the Coons.

That was the end of the Winter Meetings. The Raccoons had some other talks, and were nibbling on a pair of free agent pitchers, but neither of them signed during the festivities / orgies.

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December 16 – The Aces sign up former Miners closer Jon Dominguez (46-51, 3.31 ERA, 252 SV) on a $2.48M contract just for the 2067 season.
December 17 – The Raccoons add a veteran starter, 35-year-old ex-SFB SP Ryan Musgrave (109-122, 3.98 ERA), on a 2-year, $3.5M contract.
December 20 – The Capitals give a $1.9M deal to 43-year-old 3B/1B Steve Dilly (.248, 199 HR, 916 RBI), who batted .235 with 13 homers for the Rebs last season.
December 25 – The Thunder grab *another* former Crusaders starter, Jeff Kozloski (99-121, 4.24 ERA), on a 3-year, $17.6M deal.
December 25 – 40-year-old 3B Zach Suggs (.297, 396 HR, 1,570 RBI) returns to the Capitals after a year in Boston, signing a new $1.88M deal for ’67. Suggs has 94.9 career WAR and will play in his 20th ABL season. He has won three World Series rings, all with different teams.

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Yes, Musgrave had been rocked for a 6.29 ERA in 2066. But he had also been backstabbed relentlessly for a .367 BABIP. If you give up 16 homers along with that, you’re gonna suffer. Thankfully the Raccoons were about to build a solid defensive infield, which should work well with the veteran groundballer here. Musgrave would be on his fourth CL North team here after long stints with the Titans and Crusaders, and one year with the damn Elks before his Bayside excursion.

The calendar then ran out on the Raccoons, who were still in talks with a veteran lefty reliever, Ryan de Jong, but other teams had gotten involved with that and were driving up the price. Dover and de Jong would make for a nice righty/lefty pair at the end of the pen, alternating in the eighth and ninth according to the opposing lineup. That would really help the pen take some shape as we really didn’t have much substance behind them. McMahan and Alvey were probably in there for lefty and/or long relief, and then there was the mushy right-handed side that would consist of some miserable combination of Josh C, Yamauchi, the Rule 5er Holzmeister, Barton, and Soriano. Three spots were available for that group, and not getting de Jong would make it four…

There was not a lot of in-house relief options in the pipeline. Cameron Bridges had been a sixth-rounder in 2063 and had gotten up to the Alley Cats at the end of ’65. He had played the whole ’66 season there, but had gotten run for a 5.56 ERA with unrefined control and seven homers allowed in 45 innings. And he was our best backup unless you were banking on the Rich Reads and J.J. Sensabaughs. J.J. was now 34 years old, and would never go away.

As the year closed down, the Raccoons were far ahead on BNN’s offseason WAR gains board (+6.7 after the Musgrave signing), which prompted awkward questions from their staff how it felt to be winning the offseason, to which I clumsily replied that I didn’t know how winning felt at all right now. The Agitator reliably tore right into that of course…

Of course it wasn’t hard to overcome our miniscule WAR losses in free agency. Juan Sanchez had departed with +1.7 WAR. All other free agents together had combined for *negative* WAR. Bringing in Dowsey for Spicer and adding a pair of 2+ WAR free agents (Musgrave, Roberts) was OBVIOUSLY going to shoot us up the leaderboard, but that didn’t mean that a bright future was ahead quite yet…

I was not convinced we’d get close to .500 yet; just look at the roster – look at all the players we had now with the stereotypical sign of a snot-face, stubborn trouble maker: a modern-ish name starting with J; count all the Justins, Jasons, Jesses, Joshes, Jadens, Joels, Jamies, and Jakes, and then tell me we’re not gonna be the rowdiest clubhouse in the league again…!

No, Jose Corral was *fine*. Jose was holding the entire bloody lineup together.

Other past Raccoons with new hats on their heads: Paul Labonte got $1.14M from the Crusaders; Justin Cullum joined the Buffos for $500k; New York then also went out and spent $3.72M over two years on Ramon Carreno; Elmer Maldonado was back in the division, signing for $790k with the Indians; Indy also signed Nick Robinson for $2.36M;