Halifax? I'm in Halifax?

[jcrmoon42]

So...there I was. Minding my own business. I get one of those Recte-messages about a team being open. That was Indy. I thought about it. Looked it over. Hemmed and hawed and yawned and stretched. Then he gave it to someone else, because I'm sometimes slow like that. Honestly, the idea just didn't excite me. The Indianapolis Grasshoppers? Look, I'm and old school guy in these leagues. Not as old school as Rected and Brade, but still...I go back to like 1996 or something in the old Earl Weaver days. The Indianapolis Grasshoppers? That just wasn't doing it for me. Plus, my beloved Long Beach Surfers are taken by a really committed owner who is building the franchise and is unlikely to give it up. That hurts. Except for the joy of watching somebody love them like I do. That's cool.

Still...it got me thinking. I had dropped out of the league in early September of 2014. My time commitments got in the way. I just wasn't as committed as I had been. I left without much ceremony. My last post was this, "I had no problem once I downloaded the giant file and uploaded manually, but that's how I usually get the file anyway. It was just bigger than usual." Yeah.

Three weeks later, I lost my real world job. I had to dedicate myself to real life at that point. All my online activities suffered, as they should. I kept going in a couple of leagues but without focus. It was sad.

But things have gotten better. I love my job, traveling around the country running quiz bowl tournaments and talking to schools about playing the game. I work from home. My time is mostly my own. It's cool. In the midst of that, Recte got my MBWBA juices flowing again. So, I'm driving around Florida in between tournaments the other day when I get another message from Recte. Halifax is open. Without even thinking, I say yes. He says sweet. Here we go.

It was after the fact that I started thinking about what I had done. Halifax? The Halifax Hawks? Who the crap is that? Oh, right. They were the Washington Bobwhites. Back in March of 2014, some dude named Chris Robillard comes into the league, and a week later, one of the most storied franchises in league history rolls out of town in the dead of night and moves 1091 miles north to a city of less than 400 thousand people. Don't get me wrong, Halifax is a beautiful place and is on the cutting edge in a lot of ways. But I live in Chattanooga, which fits the same description and is about the same size, would you put a major league team in Chattanooga? I don't think so. Honestly, even when they were the Washington Bobwhites, I thought they were kind of goofy. The logo was weird. What's a bobwhite anyway? What do they have to do with Washington? No clue. Now, they were in Halifax. I only got the joy of seeing them for a couple of seasons before I left, but this Robillard guy apparently brought them back to prominence after years of sub-par play. They won their first championship in 2017, the first for the franchise since 1981. They made the playoffs as recently as 2025.

So, here we are. It is 2029. My OOTP persona is now 59 years old, and I'm taking over a formerly great team that is now sitting at 49-62 in last place in the JLA. They've got a couple of guys who can hit and a couple of guys who can pitch. The farm system is crap. The finances aren't terrible, but they aren't great either. Attendance is high, because ticket prices are low. So, they aren't really making any money. In short, it isn't the worst situation, but there is a lot of work to do to get them back to prominence.

I started out for my first export by cutting a bunch of dead weight and picking up some guys from the free agent market who are at least better than what we had. Nobody's job is safe at any level.

EVERY PLAYER IN THE ORGANIZATION IS AVAILABLE! I'm going to put my own mark on this team. You like somebody I've got, you let me know. I don't trade a lot under normal circumstances, but this isn't a normal circumstance. You can't build greatness from mediocrity. Sometimes you've got to get bad for a while to get good eventually. That's what I did in Long Beach. That's what I'm going to do here. I'm not interested in taking on a big pile of middling prospects for my major league vets. However, I will take a great possible future of one or two guys for the present piece that you need.

So, that's where I'm at. I'm back. I'm motivated. I want to see where I can take this team. Halifax may not be a big league town right now, but maybe we can help turn it into one. I can tell the Montreals, Jacksonvilles, and Atlantic Cities out there that they better put their big boy pants on, because Halifax is on the way...eventually.

[recte44]

I'm very open to a franchise move here in the offseason, if that's something you might want to do.

This Team News made me physically smile. It's damn good to have you back, Moonie.

[udlb58]

Always nice to get a little history refresher. Hard to believe it's been 15 in-game years since the team moved to Halifax. All I've ever known in my Brewster world is the Hawks.

[Fat Nige]

I remember Washington, I always used to lose to them


Now I lose to everyone

[jiminyhopkins]

I go back to like 1996 or something in the old Earl Weaver days.

It's an ever dwindling club....

[recte44]

Who's left? Is there just three of us?

[jcrmoon42]

Who's left? Is there just three of us?

You'd know best! I don't even know who half these guys are!

[recte44]

Yup. I think so.

Sent from my LGLS775 using Tapatalk

[crobillard]

I am getting caught up on so many happening around the league since I am gone, but I laughed so hard at this. Good stuff. Bring the Hawks back to glory, eh?