2052.7: Feelings

GM: Fred Holmes

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2052.7: Feelings

Post by Rubaboo » Thu Nov 10, 2022 10:02 am

Well, we finally did it. Or, I finally did it. Does referring to myself and a group of ones and zeroes that live in the fabric of a baseball computer sim as 'we' make me some sort of crazy person? Meh, with this group, it's probably a misery loves company kind of situation.

Anyway, we/I finally brought it home. 36 seasons. 25 seasons since my first trip to the championship series. I'm a BBA champion. Ok, so now what? How am I suppposed to feel about this? I feel like I should write a TN commemorating the occasion, so here we are, doing this, instead of any of the list of other things I should be doing right now.

So how do I feel about this season, this team? How do I feel about the playoff run? The regular season? The transactions? The pebbles I moved to redirect the river of fate to deliver my team to the zenith of Brewsterdom? Well, mostly I feel... quiet. The playoffs were exciting, the afterglow is... satisfying? I don't know. My vocab is abandoning me on this one.

Let's take it all the way back to the offseason. I felt good about my signings. I've been playing the FA game for a few seasons now (another TN on this later. Maybe...) and I knew that I was in good shape from a roster standpoint. After shaking off the disappointment of crashing out of the 2051 playoffs and getting back to work, I knew we were in for a good season. I didn't think we'd win quite as many games as in 2051 but the playoffs were going to be the bare minimum from an expectation standpoint. Phoenix's injuries combined with Calgary being worse than I expected and El Paso never quite taking that step had us mostly cruising through the regular season and ending with 107 wins. Best record in the BBA, #1 JL seed, all of that jazz. Then, we just had to watch and wait for playoff sim 1. I was super excited that New Orleans and Vegas were on the opposite side of the bracket. Even feeling good about my team I wasn't feeling great about trying to get through both of those teams. Charm City was the only team in the league I had a losing record against in the regular season so I wasn't thrilled about potentially having to play them for my first matchup. I forgot about Atlantic City almost entirely for some reason. The knocked us out in 2050 and have always played us tough. Down 3-1 I was bracing for another earlier than expected exit during a 'this is your year' season. Then, as if before my eyes, the team rallied and we won 3 straight to take the series. It was like one of those 'you either melt in the fire or it hardens you' moments. For my computer simulation baseball team. The end of the first round brought relief, and also disappointment. Stupid Brett lost to Twin Cities so our plans to battle for the championship were destroyed. Thanks, Brett.

I hated having to play Vegas. And I loved it. Matt always works magic to have his team ready to roll. They're a definite gatekeeper type of team, if you want to get to the top of the mountain you have to get through them. I knew the series was going to be a grind. I also knew we were ready for it after the way we battled through Atlantic City. I knew Corfied was back, baby! I knew we had the offense. I had no idea how much of a fucking god Felix Roman would be. Game 4 of that series was one of the most challenging things I've ever watched on a repeatedly updating web browser page on my phone. Leading the series 2-1, but down 4-2 going into the 8th. Holy shit, we scored 5 runs in the 8th! Then, the sim hung. Not for long, probably only a few seconds, but long enough for me to have an entire conversation with myself. 'Holy shit, we're winning! We could go up 3-1! What is happening with the sim? They're not going to score 4 runs in the last two innings are they? ARE THEY? Cruz has been good this year, they won't, we got this. WHAT IS HAPPENING WITH THE SIM?" Right about the time I was about to start unravelling, the sim page updated. We gave up 4 runs between the 8th and 9th and lost. Fuck. We jumped on Vegas in the 1st in Game 5 and was feeling good. We closed that one out to go up 3-2. Then we went back and forth in game 6 and ended up losing 5-4 to set up a Game 7. Great. I'm already all jittery, can I handle Game 7 right now? Guess I'm going to have to. Felix fucking Roman. 3 HRs, 7 RBI in Game 7. Exhale. Relax. We won, we got it. On to the Championship Series!

I just want to start out this section by saying that I'm super glad I wasn't playing Alan in the Championship. I can never figure out what the hell that guy has going on. I feel like I'm asking to play Tic-Tac-Toe and he fires up Global Thermonuclear War. I would not have been thrilled about that matchup. As it was, I spent the entire morning of the Championship sim deciding what the hell to do with my bullpen. Leave it as is and potentially let Cruz, who had had some struggles, sink me or swap him out for a rookie and let my own overthinking and tinkering screw me. After much deliberation and back and forth with JWalk, I decided to make the swap, demoting Cruz to middle relieve and putting Lawrence in the closer slot. The morning before the Championship Series. NBD, right? I had looked over Nashville's roster and was feeling pretty good about my offense vs his but was definitely concerned about how our staffs matched up, especially in the bullpen. I was the #1 reliever ERA in the JL but, ratings wise and form-wise, I was feeling pretty overmatched. I was hoping to be able to jump on his starters early so the bullpen would be less of a factor. Mentally, I prepared myself for another 7 Game rollercoaster.

I managed to keep my cool through the live sim. It was a small-ish group, most guys were muted and there was no game sound, which mostly left me alone with my own thoughts. Not necessarily ideal. Nothing to do now but let my brain churn while watching every decision I made in the export play out before my eyes. Two low scoring affairs were a welcome sight after the offensive insanity of the last two series, especially since I won both. Going to Game 3 up 2-0 was a good feeling because I wasn't feeling super great about my #3 and #4 starters, Avery and Olivas. Avery started the bottom of the 1st like this: Walk, Walk, Fly Out, Walk, Walk, Walk, Fly Out, Ground Out. A little bit of ridiculous to break some of the tension that I'd been feeling. Avery settled in a bit after his... let's call it shaky, start to the game. He still had a no hitter going through 4 innings. With 6 walks. In a game we were losing. We all got a chuckle out of it when someone brought that up which was a good thing. After the 1st inning circus, the teams settled in to a tight affair once again, and we got to the 7th trailing 3-2. We started the 7th with back to back ground outs, then things got interesting. A pinch hit solo shot for Creegan Corney followed by a pair of walks and a double to the fence scored 3 runs and gave us a 5-3 lead. In my gut I felt like that half inning won us the title. The comeback, the never feeling like we're out of a game or a series is a pretty interesting power. Game 4 featured the return of Felix Roman, who had been largely invisible in Games 1-3, and Carlos Olivas inducing every groud ball in the world to keep the Bluebirds offense mostly at bay. We scored one in the 1st and four in the 3rd and watched Olivas kill the infield grass for 7.1 innings on our way to a sweep clinching 5-1 win.

So now what? I allowed myself a fist pump when Mauro Menoza of all people struck out Martin Hemming looking for the last out of the game. So now what? I had always considered dropping the mic and leaving if my team won. Literally announcing it on the live stream and going out on top. That didn't feel right. Even now, after a couple of days, I'm not sure what to feel, what to do. The only thing that feels right is getting back to work. I'm happy that we won. I'm proud. I feel vindicated. I feel like every decision I made came out right and the BBA reckoning that I'm facing for typing that will be swift and brutal. I feel like, somehow, my work isn't done yet. Like I need to try to stay good for awhile and try to make Randy put me on his dynasty page. I want to stay and enjoy having that little trophy underneath my forum name (gimmie my trophy, Matt). So, there you go, esteemed fellow general managers, you're stuck with me for a while yet.

Mostly, I feel disappointed in Brett. We had a shot this year and you blew it. Not cool.
Fred Holmes
General Manager
Mexico City Aztecs - BBA

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JL Sun Belt Champs - 2035, 2036, 2038
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JL Manager of the Year - 2023, 2024, 2026, 2052

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Re: 2052.7: Feelings

Post by Dington » Thu Nov 10, 2022 10:26 am

Well played, sir. My bats were cold, bullpen shitty, and manager sat on his hands. Hope to meet again next year when hopefully I can pay more attention during the live sim haha.
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Re: 2052.7: Feelings

Post by bschr682 » Thu Nov 10, 2022 11:37 am

Well if matt keeps this running for the rest of our lives, maybe we will matchup in the title game someday...
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Re: 2052.7: Feelings

Post by Jwalk100 » Thu Nov 10, 2022 2:07 pm

Great job, Fred!

Sometimes you need to get outside your head to hear different viewpoints.
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Re: 2052.7: Feelings

Post by ae37jr » Thu Nov 10, 2022 2:25 pm

Rubaboo wrote:
Thu Nov 10, 2022 10:02 am
I just want to start out this section by saying that I'm super glad I wasn't playing Alan in the Championship. I can never figure out what the hell that guy has going on. I feel like I'm asking to play Tic-Tac-Toe and he fires up Global Thermonuclear War. I would not have been thrilled about that matchup.
I'm pretty sure you would have mopped the floor with us. My thermonuclear warfare only works on teams with flaws. Even though we had the 3rd best record in the league, it felt like a distant 3rd. Mexico City and Nashville were the class of the league this year. Besides, all your lefty pitching would have left my best hitter this year on the bench. Congrats on the win. You deserve it. A long time coming.
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