Erik Brooks Modeling new City Connect "Blackout" uniform.... will he ever wear it again?
With all the recent hoopla surrounding the River Monsters, Erik Brooks seemed to be the forgotten man. Twin Cities blew their wad not once but twice in taking on two "salary dump" trades. The question then turned to... is there enough money left for Brooks? The answer appears to be yes. The usually financial prudent River Monsters enter the offseason with a sub $60 million dollar payroll. So even after adding in the Phoenix and Brooklyn trades that number only rises to about $83 million. Giving the team roughly $27 million more to work with in free agency before hitting the cap.
Most of the attention this offseason has gone to the offense. Baring an upgrade at SS, moving Randall Grey into a supersub role, the offense appears set. So now we need to turn our attention to pitching. The current rotation projects out to be Jerry Stone, Ruben Flores, and Enzo Bouton being the dependable work horses. Tokugawa Yamashita had his option picked up and will likely be the number 5. Henry Wemp and Antonio Garcia are earmarked to hold down the last spot and push out Yamashita. But you know what? That isn't a championship rotation.
We figure that since we are pushing the chips in, we absolutely need at least one more starter. So why not Erik Brooks? He's battle tested. Been to the war known as the BBA playoffs 9 times while wearing the green pinstripes. He deserves to finish his career here. Rumor has it that the team and his agent are finalizing a 5 year contract worth in the neighborhood of $10-11 million a season that has an opt out after year 2. Is the deal prudent? No. But who knows what will happen when free agency opens. We don't want to be the last team standing there looking stupid while everyone else has a chair to sit in.
The River Monsters announced that they have bought out the options of Yoshii Takuda and Niaz Minhas. Both players are in negotiations to return. Takuda figures to platoon with Yamashita at the number 5 spot. Both are huge injury risks so together maybe they equal one. Minhas, also injury prone, could be brought back on the cheap to be the teams utility INF. Though the River Monsters have been rumored to be looking at various ways to improve middle infield depth.
