Surely nothing could go off course here.
River Monsters GM Alan Ehlers has never been afraid to go off the beaten path. He's not afraid of failure and often embraces being different(or ahead of the curve as he likes to call it). His teams are often built in one direction with the throttle on 11. This season appears to be a continuation of that strategy. The only difference here, however, is that the direction they are headed is ... no direction.
2054 will be a year of optionality for the River Monsters. As the team looks to rebuild the farm system and finances, they are planning to shy away from any large salary and or long term contracts. In order to attempt to field a somewhat competitive team with that objective in place, Twin Cities surveyed the ever changing landscape of the BBA to come up with a plan. While it would be against our better interest to give away our ideas. We will blantantly infer one or two of our strategies in this article to reward those who participate in actually reading articles.
Enter Eric Buckson. 28 years old, two time all star, three time Brewster winner, lead the BBA in saves during a 2.5 WAR campaign in 2050. His career seemed to derail a bit after 2050. In the next 4 seasons he failed to reach replacement level value. Heading into this off season, he was just some random 35 overall SP looking for a zero dollar minor league contracts(with $1.2 mil ML option).
So we have two things to unpack here. Why did his ratings drop? Why did his stats drop? The ratings drop is simple. He was listed as a starting pitcher. Brooklyn had tried to convert him into a swing man during his tenure there. A simple switch of the toggle and his ratings jumped back up to 55/60.
Stats take a bit more to figure out. My first take was that Brooklyn has easily been the worst defensive team in the league the past several seasons. For an extreme groundball, pitch to contact pitcher, Stephan Geloran(-27.7 ZR), and Ben Copeland(-21 ZR) failed Buckson miserably. It's no wonder he didn't succeed. He didn't have a chance.
But what about his 2051/52 seasons in Vegas? The Hustlers have always been a stellar defensive team. Did something happen in 2051 that would compromise that? Aha! The Hustlers had traded Damek Korbel off to Louisville that winter. Downgrading from one of the best double play combo's in recent memory, to an average to slighlty above average keystone combo in 2051.
So at the end of the day, Buckson is exactly the player you think he is. He'll be really good with a good infield and really bad with a bad one. What makes this signing interesting is that Twin Cities hasn't really been known for infield defense in recent years. Talks are that the team is looking to improve in that area. But talk is cheap, and so is Buckson. So the risk(zero dollars) is worth the reward.
