Bates Masters his Craft
(That's him on the mound you sick freaks.)
It was just another, in a long line of bad trades for the Brooklyn Robins. Those were the headlines when the Robins shipped Henry Rectenberg (.303/.395/.564, 13 HR, 45 RBI) off to Las Vegas before the start to the 2035 season. Rectenberg had posted a 4 War season at the age of 20. But in 3 other seasons did little or nothing to make us believe he would be any good. Sure...he didn't reach his prime yet, sure... he played in a park that nerfed lefty hitters. Factors that Brooklyn leaned on in giving him extra rope. But it wasn't until a podcast in which the Hustlers GM brought his son on the air to talk about how Rectenberg was his favorite player that the Robins caved in and jettisoned the young Rectenberg to Sin City.
The return haul was almost inconsequential. We all knew Rectenberg would sneakily bump a little here and there and become an all star level player. He'd probably even sign a 3 year contract that would mysteriously cover 5 seasons. That was all to be expected. Brooklyn knew they were going to lose this trade and lose it hard. The only real question would be.. how bad would the players they got back become.
The lesser player in the deal was Oginga Coujoe (0 - 0, 2.45 ERA, 0.71 WHIP, 14 K). He's played about expected. A young left handed reliever who will give you 50-60 solid inning a season for 6 cheap years. He won't hurt your team but at the same time is far from an impact player. The other player received was the higher risk. His name is Ken Bates (1 - 1, 1.76 ERA, 1.10 WHIP, 42 K).
Hot Pants was figured to be a good fit because he is a solid all around pitcher with his one noticable flaw being that he was homer prone. The Robins are notorious for masking homer prone pitchers with their large home ballpark and constant cherry picking of starters to avoid unfavorable matchups. His first year in Brooklyn didn't go to well. In fact, according to data collected by Randy Weigand, Bates was considered one of the worst starting pitchers in the BBA in 2035.
Determined to prove the critics wrong, Kenny hit the weight room before the 2036 season and showed up to camp in the best shape of his life. This resulted in the best 6 innings of his career. Of course he blew out his radial nerve in the process and missed most of the season, but at least the short sample looked good on his baseball card. Would 2037 be a continuation of those 6 amazing innings or would it be the same old hotpants?
Early results have indicated that there is reason to believe that Bates may have indeed mastered his craft. He currently leads the Johnson League in starting pitcher ERA. Which is kind of ironic because, while he does have 11 starts this season, he is heavily involved in the cyclone part of the Brooklyn rotation and generally only pitches 3-4 innings at a time.
The Robins believe this to be a key in the success of their pitching staff. They tend to limit "non elite" pitchers to 50 pitches regardless of stamina. When hurlers go beyond 50, their "energy meter" tends to drain at a much more rapid pace. This seems to help effectiveness. At least so far it has for pitching Master Bates. Who finally is looking like the pitcher we'd thought he'd be.
