For the select few that religiously follow the inner workings of the Valencia organization, there is the following ABCON scale which is a measure of financial advisor Abbi Cuss’ moods.
ABCON 5 – Finances are in order. Abbi’s Profanity % is slightly less than 10%.
ABCON 4 – Finances are on the edge but still turning a profit for the year. Abbi’s Profanity % goes above 20%.
ABCON 3 – Finances show that cash flow is negative for the year. Abbi’s Profanity % goes above 30%.
ABCON 2 – Finances blow through so much cash that the cash available is below $0 at the end of the year and there are no bonus funds available. Abbi’s Profanity % goes above 50 %.
ABCON 1 – Finances are so deep in the crapper that there are no in-game cash or bonus funds and the projected payroll for the following year exceeds the payroll cap even if none of the expiring contacts are signed. Abbi’s Profanity % approaches 66% which makes her conversations borderline incomprehensible.
Since the 2062 All-Star break when the Valencia funds were at $0 bonus funds and $0 available for in-game cash to go along with a projected 2063 opening day payroll that exceeded the max payroll, the Stars have turned the financial ship around at the expense of back-to-back seasons averaging 101 losses.
The in-game cash for 2064 started with $20M of in-game cash and barring an alien abduction in the Galaxy wil end the season with the same amount. Furthermore, there was $17.3M in bonus funds beginning the is season and the team is currently projected to make a profit of $24.2M this season. That profit would have been more if it were not for injuries to three of the five starting pitchers and the Stars’ GM taking on another $6.7M in payroll to fill those spots in a move to let the other fringe pitchers in AAA develop and save their big-league service times at bay for one more half-season or more.
The current projected 2065 payroll is at $31.2M but the word on the street is that $13.2M of tht payroll will not be invited back and allowed to go to free agency.
If the front office doesn’t spend an additional $2M beyond projected the remainder of this season, that $2M will be lost into a black hole as the bonus funds will be maxed out.
Will Abbi’s profanity percentage start climbing again and will a negative ABCON scale be needed? Not likely as GM Greathouse has alluded that 2065 will be the second stage of the rebuild to bring in some talent via free agency. But if the talent in free agency is similar to last year’s batch, will there even be enough free agent talent to soak up the additional $50M or so that needs to be spent?
