2047 Riyadh Preview Redux

[scottsdale_joe]

2047 Riyadh Review Redux
By Khepri Quraishi, Epypt Today Sports
February 1, 2048

Last year Cairo GM Joe Geoghegan and I sat down and reviewed the Riyadh Red Crescents. Maybe we shouldn’t have. The review essentially sucked. Let’s review it. Our review comments are in italics. Our analysis is in bold.

First Base
Most likely starter will be Collin Adams who signed a minor league deal with Riyadh late last season. He’s a defensive whiz who they hope can hit. Adams played in only 39 games and hit .207. Clive Timberlake and Roy MacGugan played more and hit .289 and .270 respectively.

Second Base
Grady Fern hit .242 for Charm City in the BBA. He’s another defensive wizard and should improve his offensive numbers in the UMEBA. Alas, he’s lazy and stupid but will make $2.0 million this year. Grady did OK, hitting .288 and playing good defense.

Shortstop
José Montaño played for Mexico in the BBA last year. Riyadh is paying him $6.5 million, hoping he betters his .245 average and hit some home runs. His defense is unparalleled. Montaño provided the good defense expected but disappointed mightily at the plate with a .239 average

Third Base
Iron man Jaime Ramírez comes over from Portland in the BBA where he hit .287 in 54 games. He’s pushing 36 years old but is still an excellent third baseman and he can hit. He’ll complete an infield that won’t see many ground balls getting through to the outfield. Ramírez was brilliant in the field. He hit .268, slightly below expectations.

Left Field
Donnie Peacock can run down fly balls but hit only .205 with Riyadh last season. Aurelio Lopez, on the other hand hit, .272 but is less adept in the field. Take your choice. Juan Martínez ended up being the major player here, but he hit just .232. Lopez hit .294 but played in just 42 games and was released at year end.

Center Field
Torvald Van Donkelaar fits the Riyadh mold for excellent defense and is as fast as a rabbit. ut he only hit .229 with the Red Crescents last season. Van Donkelaar had a +5.0 zone rating but managed just a .203 batting average and a negative WAR.

Right Field
Mike Martin is Gold Glove material and also can hit - .284 with the Crescents last year when he led the league in triples. Martin continued to shine in the field but his average dropped from .284 to .235. After leading the league he triples in 2046, he managed only one in 2047.

Catcher
Mike Schofield and Pablo Espinoza will battle for the job. Both are good defensively. Schofield has more power and is considered a team leader. Yup, good defense, but Espinoza hit just .205 and Schofield managed an anemic .168

Designated Hitter
Maskai Sato joined Riyadh last year and blasted 47 home runs while knocking in 122. He’s well worth his $5.5 million salary. Sadly Sato slipped from .319 with 47 home runs to .245 with 34 while leading the league in plate appearances. His WAR fell from 4.9 to 0.7.

Rotation

• Bert Hackwith was 8-3, 3.69 last year. He’s an UMEBA veteran.
• Juan Rodriguez comes over from the BBA for big bucks ($8.0 million this year, $11.0 million next). Just two years ago he won 16 games for Brooklyn. Last he struggled mightily with Valencia. For that money, he better perform.
• Andresa Pires was mostly a reliever in the BBA. He’ll finally get a chance to full-time start. He works hard, but he’s fragile.
• Alejandro Soto is age 35 and would appear to be a weak link in the rotation. He did do well in three starts last year after being recalled.
• Jimmy Cook is lazy and greedy and fragile. If he wants to rise above minimum salary, he’ll have to perform. He was 4-2 in nine starts last year with a 4.70 ERA.

Epic fail! Hackworth degraded to 6-15 with a 5.24 ERA. Rodriguez was a major disappointment at 7-19, 4.53. Pires was 1-6, 5.19 when he was claimed off waivers by Manana. Soto had an ERA of over 7.00, mostly from the bullpen. Cook was 4-7 as a swing man with an ERA of 5.77

Bullpen

• Raul Correa should be the closer. Riyadh risked $3.5 million in FA dollars to sign the former Rockville hurler. He had a 3.11 ERA in 60 games for Rockville last year.
• Ricardo Quadrado was a swing man for Riyadh last year after signing a minor league deal in June.
• Gustavo Muñóz disappointed a bit last year but made 74 relief appearances for the Red Crescents. Improvement is expected.
• And then there a host of other guys to battle for the rest of the bullpen jobs.

Correa appeared in 70 games with an ERA 5.14. Quadrado was the team’s pitching star with a 9-2 record and a fine 3.91 ERA. Muñóz was 2-6 with an inflated 5.32 ERA. Ch’ang-Chien Xin, who we didn’t mention, had a 3.06 ERA. No one managed more than seven saves.,

SUMMARY

Brilliant defense. Geoghegan - "This might be the best defensive team that I have ever seen". The D was Ok but hardly brilliant.

Potentially potent offense. Geoghegan - "If the BBA players coming over produce, the offense could be outstanding". No one overproduced and the offense was below mediocre.

Pitching will be the question mark. Geoghegan - "Isn't it always?" The question was answered in spades and the answer totally undermined the team’s chances to succeed.

This team won’t finish last. If all goes well, the Red Crescents could see playoff action. How wrong could we be?

[Fat Nige]

A complete underperformance everywhere. No-one hit near .300 and that obviously spelt trouble, a complete power outage that just wasn’t saved by one of the best UMEBA defenses. The pitching staff was always a complete joke once Rodriguez, Soto and Hackworth failed. But there was nothing you could do, decent pitchers are rare in the best of places and the lower reaches of the UMEBA certainly isn’t the best of places by any stretch of the imagination

[scottsdale_joe]

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair."

[Fat Nige]

What the Dickens are you quoting to me ?