2063.19 – Thin Pitching and Even Thinner Salsa

[Graham]

By all accounts, the Gold were prepared.

AGM Fernando Rosario had spreadsheets printed on actual paper, color-coded by defensive versatility and projected growth curves, and the "war room" had snacks: overly-salted tortilla chips, something calling itself guacamole, and a suspiciously watered-down salsa from a local Johannesburg vendor.

“This is the war room?” Mal, the unpaid intern, had asked earlier, poking her head in on her way to drop off a TikTok concept involving minor leaguers and a goat.

“It’s a metaphorical war,” GM Graham Luna had said, holding up a chip. “And we’re losing to sodium.”

Graham and Rosario's day started in the team dining room under flickering lights and a busted ceiling fan. Aniq Anbar went first overall, as every scout, analyst, and sentient being predicted. He was, by most accounts, the best player in the draft and looked like a future All-Star from the moment he walked off the team bus at the prep showcase.

“Damn,” Rosario muttered, crossing off his name with a red pen.

“Moment of silence,” Graham added, then toasted Anbar’s future with a grape Fanta.

Rayhan bin Ubaydah, the top-ranked 1B and fourth on the Gold’s board, went second to Sydney.

“Good bat, no wheels,” Rosario noted. “I wonder if Sydney will try him out at third," he said, revealing what the Gold would have done if bin Ubaydah fell to them. "He's got the arm and should hit over .300 every year, which oughta make up for any defensive shortcomings,” he added.

Buenos Aires took high school right-handed starting pitcher Mataio Apolo third. Rosario underlined “6'9"” five times and added a doodle of a ladder.

“Ceiling guy,” Graham said.

“Literally.”

At fourth overall, London took Harun Al Rachid bin Na’il, a rangy center fielder with more tools than big box hardware retailer. That left Johannesburg staring down the player at the top of their draft board: Salesi Tuati.

“It's Tuati time,” Rosario whispered, pressing the imaginary big red button.

Graham, for one, was thrilled. A 6’7” switch-hitting second baseman, Tuati had the tools, arm, and baseball IQ of a future GBC regular. Scouts projected Tuati to round into a .275 hitter with a heavy serving of doubles.

“He’s a 2B by nature but I think we can give him a shot at the hot corner or even left field if needed,” Rosario noted as Graham called the pick into the league office.

“He’s a baseball Rorschach test,” Graham replied. “And I see ‘starter by 2066.’”

After a few selections came the final pick of the first round, #10 overall to Cairo. The name announced: TePihi Ala, catcher.

Rosario stared at the board. Then back at his master list. Then at the board again.

“Who?” Graham asked.

They began flipping through the scout binders like panicked students cramming for a test.

“Is he fictional?” Graham wondered.

“Found him!” Rosario shouted triumphantly. “Page 61. Behind the appendix section on ‘Maybe Convert to Bullpen Catcher?’”

TePihi Ala had subpar receiving, a scattershot arm, and was ranked 145th on their board. Cairo had taken him tenth overall.

“Well,” Graham said, “good thing Cairo’s in our division.”

The salsa ran out shortly after, forcing the team to move to Graham’s office. Round two was a curveball. Their top remaining pitching target was taken just before they picked, so Johannesburg made a bold call: Justin Maybury, a high school lefty with a heater and a cartoonishly good splitter.

“Wasn’t he 22nd on our board?” Graham asked.

Rosario nodded. “But he’s the last guy with two plus pitches and a third that might turn into something. We can’t leave this draft with just 7th inning relievers who may or may not get above Double-A.”

Round three brought a surprise gift: Manaolana Heluma, a line-drive machine who had inexplicably fallen to 25th overall. The Gold had him 16th on their overall pre-draft rankings.

“He’s got opposite-field power and doesn’t chase,” Rosario grinned. “We’re putting him in right field. Like, tomorrow.”

“He’s also got the best hair in the draft,” Graham said, flipping through Rosario's scouting notes. “Page 3 of the fashion appendix.”

The later rounds were a mixed bag of project picks and wild cards. The Gold grabbed Soetsu Fujihara in the fourth round, a raw third baseman they planned to convert to catcher.

“Is he okay with that?” Rosario asked.

“I dunno,” Graham said, typing out a developmental schedule. “But he has soft hands and no lateral agility. That screams ‘future backup catcher with some offensive upside.’”

Then came relief pitchers Daniela Wakit and Dong-hua Liu in rounds five and eight, both high school arms with stamina questions and just two pitches.

“We stretch ’em out and get them a third pitch,” Graham promised. “At worst they can eat up multiple innings out of the pen.”

During all this, Rosario kept tabs on the rest of the draft, occasionally muttering insults at teams picking ahead of them. When Tokyo snagged Travis Worsfold (ranked #8 overall by the Gold) in the fifth round and Iakepa Katalou (ranked #9) in the fourth, Rosario offered a slow clap.

“They got bargains,” he said. “We had both higher than where they were taken, but we had other needs.”

“No room, it happens,” shrugged Graham.

“It does,” Rosario confirmed. “Plus we liked Fujihara’s mitt better than Katalou’s. Like I mentioned, Katalou frames like he’s afraid of the ball.”

“‘Like a man catching bees’,” Graham read off the computer screen.

When the last pick was in, the chips were gone, the Fanta bottles were empty, and Mal had sent a late text that read simply:

“if u bunt with 2 outs does that open some sort of portal to another dimension?”

Graham stared at the message for a long moment, then typed back:

“Don’t ever bunt with two outs.”

“But what if you’re down 11 and the pitcher is drunk?”

Graham rolled his eyes momentarily, then thumbed in his response: “Then you’ve already lost, but sure, go ahead a lay one down to test string theory.”

Rosario looked over. “We good?”

Graham leaned back in his chair and sighed. “We’re something. Ask me again in five years.”

[Jwalk100]

Must have chunky salsita!

[Graham]

Must have chunky salsita!

Some would say it's more important for an organization than depth at catcher.