YS 25.05 – Nine Declares Spring Training "Huge Success"

[RonCo]

Team goes 12-18, but blind front office pleased

March 31, 2025

If performance of the baseball club known as "The 9" is any predictor, this month of spring training tilts has proven that this is Luis Baca's club, and little else. Twelve wins against eight-teen losses? What is a fan to do? I mean, throw us a bone here. Yes, Baca led the league in OBP, but poor A-ball pitcher Tyler Corliss was thrown to the wolves at age 20, and promptly blew up and led the league in walks allowed. Like that's going to help anything.

In his inimitable style, however, team GM RonCo was upbeat. "We got out of the spring exactly what we hoped to get out of it. We saw a lot of kids play, and we got our front liners through it without any injury. It's great to be able to make it to opening day with the entire roster intact. You should all go buy tickets."

In truth, we suppose there was a little good news out of the club. The starting pitching, in particular, looked good with young hopeful José 'Dogface' Chávez looking like the guy everyone said he would last year. Chavez tossed 13.2 scoreless innings, and looked sharp doing it, walking only two and striking out 15. Projected 5th starter 25-year-old Alberto Sánchez struggled to a 6.57 ERA, but the rest--Dieter Hartinger (2.38 ERA), Hermeneglido Padez (1.69), and Lorenzo Peña (3.12) had very successful springs and each got a handful of starts and several innings in. With the exception of one Sanchez start, the staff was fairly solid the last two weeks of the season.

Offensively, new signees Peter McClure (2 homers and .426 OBP) and William McIntyre (2 homers and a .400 OBP) had nice springs--McIntyre's situation in specific could help turn the club around, as a resurgent season from him would be like found money.

So, yeah. Maybe the club will be okay. We'll see. Just don't go betting the back 40, ya hear?