The Lumbjerjacks magical run over the last two seasons has fallen short this week with Portland's Geoghegan Series loss to the Des Moines Kernals. Portland was hoping to become the second team in less than a decade to repeat as Brewster Champions, but losing two games at home, with Alaric Wullenweber on the mound no less, did the squad in and the season comes to a close.
"We just ran out of juice" said manager Mons Raider after the 6-2 loss in the series clincher. "Unfortunately you could see the writing on the wall heading in to the series. I think the emotional toll of last season, the injuries this season, and perhaps just age and fatigue in general just caused this squad to fall short in the end."
The writing was on the wall as Raider mentioned. The Lumberjacks limped home down the stretch, going just 8-15 in September to limp in to the post-season as the second wild card team. Competing for that spot forced Raider to compete up until the final day of the season, which forced him to use starting pitchers he'd have liked to have rested heading into the series.
"That was my mistake entirely" commented Raider. "We were already in the post-season. I should have rested Wullenweber and Putachli and not used them those final two games. I felt home field advantage was important and we wanted to clinch that. In the end, I think having a rested roster might have been more beneficial. Granted, we rest those guys and still lose the series, we'd just have a different narrative to talk about."
The Lumberjacks now head into an off-season where there are very few uncertainties. Most of the roster returns in 2061, including every starter on an offense that ranked 3rd in the 2060 in runs scored. The pitching will have some questions to answer this off-season, like whether to honor Juan Marroquin's team option for 2061 or save that salary for spending elsewhere. The team will also have some bench questions that will need answered this winter as well. But the team projects to have close to $30 million in cap space to spend this off-season so having the chunk of your roster in tact will only allow the team to improve this winter.
