Brooklyn to Extend Window?
(Contention Window....you're doin' it wrong.)
It's no secret that the Brooklyn Robins are about 5 months away from hitting the nuke and doing a total reset on the franchise. This has been in the works for quite some time. But like the little disclaimer on the bottom of the wrestling poster says... card is always subject to change.
It's been an odd season in the Johnson League. Teams that should be good are not. Some of those teams.... namely Montreal and Huntsville have been so bad that they too are starting rebuilds. This is causing a stir in the composition of the league. With 6 playoff spots awarded every season, exactly who will earn these spots in 2037 and 2038?
In the Atlantic Division alone.. Charm City, Atlantic City, and now Montreal are in the midst of various stages of rebuild. If the Robins throw in the towel then that presumably leaves Rockville with a clear path to a division title.
But even the Pikemen have a lot of tough decisions to make in the coming years. Arthur Dempster (10/8/6 Ratings) could potentially become a free agent after the season, Pep Gomez has started to do the lump boogie and is still on pace to pick up his innings based option, and a small army of young players are set for either large pay increases or free agency. Especially considering the recent trend in free agents. Rockville has 10 players set to hit free agency after the 2038 season. They could conceivably ask for $100-200 million annually in this crazy climate.
We all know that Rockville is a very well run team and they will most likely make moves preemptively to solve the financial crunch. That's my point though. When having to make a large transition in team structure. Missteps and losses of value are likely to occur. The Pikemen will very soon enter a critical point in their current dynasty that could go either way. This process could start as early as this winter.
So does Brooklyn stay the course or do they try to hang in there, bleed even more money, and hope to capitalize on what could be the worst division in the BBA next season? After all, this current build is all about finding and exploiting deffiencies as they take the road less traveled.
The biggest issue here is that this team was built to self destruct following the 2037 season. Chris Workman (5/7/5/8/6 Ratings) is just about toast already. Balderas and Nightmare are probably not far behind. A-Mart is a ticking time bomb who has the first spot in the parking lot, not because of stature, but because he is so fragile the state issued him a handicap sticker for his car(should have saved this for a TN). And the biggest reason of all... Mauro Flores (10/7/8 Ratings) is set to become a very rich man next season as he will be a free agent.
So let's start with Flores. Brooklyn did consider trading him in the offseason to possibly extend the window. The question was posed... Would they have had a better shot of winning the Landis with one year of Flores or two years of whatever they got for him. The fact that he still dons Brooklyn pinstripes suggests what that answer was. Extending the run means revisiting this question again. It's probably the biggest detractor of extending. If Brooklyn wants to compete in 2038, they would 150% have to trade Flores. And I really don't see how dealing him now would help the 2037 teams chances.
Martinez is the other big question. He could opt out after this season. I guess it could go either way. Does he take the guaranteed $17 million coming off an injury plagued season, or does he try to get one more big contract at the age of 33? What I do know is that if he walks and Flores walks, and some of the older guys decline like expected then this team is complete dog shit. You could say... "Hey, that's $30 million coming off the books" but we are so far in debt we can't even sign a league minimum contract or make a waiver claim. And trading is not an option either as we've already gutted the farm. Like I said. This team was built to self destruct like a letter to inspector gadget.
My hunch is the team is currently weighing all these options and trying to come up with the best path to take. 2037 is still the magic number and despite what the record currently says, the Robins are set to receive a huge influx of talent later this month both from DL activations and trades. Once whole they should have a more then adequate offense to go along with the Johnson Leagues best pitching staff. Take that all you Cyclone haters!
