1872 los angeles seraphs team preview

1872 LOS ANGELES SERAPHS
TEAM PREVIEW

Incoming:
2B Justin Cripps (FA)
3B/SS Mat Johansen (FA)
CF Mark Wilkinson (Trade)

We decided if you can't beat them, steal them. I don't keep up with upcoming free agents on other teams, so much to my delight, Mat Johansen was a free agent and I was hellbent on doing whatever I had to, in order to bring him here. Not just as a trump card to New York (though, that helped) but more because he's precisely what we needed. So I was delighted when he signed with us. Joining him from New York is infielder Justin Cripps. He wasn't a key member of the title team, but I felt like he was a nice upgrade for us anyway.

Wilkinson is on the tail end of his career, but spent the entire bulk of it with the Baseball Club whether in Pacific, WA or Enderby, England or most recently in Philadelphia...he's been the constant on that franchise. But a falling out with management resulted in him being put on the block and we snapped him up in exchange for SP Haden Perris

PROSPECT TO WATCH FOR:
SP Jaime Juarez
We're in LA. And this guy has been generating buzz since the day we drafted him three years ago. I brought him up last year to get some experience and now he's poised to head into the rotation for real. He's got some pretty outstanding measurables and like I said, it's not often a rookie sells jerseys like this before he even gets his first MLB start, but this kid has the whole city eating out of his hand.

LF Ramon Escarceja
We acquired him in the deal back in '67 that sent Lars-Erik Johansen to Bantam (I was confused, we dealt him to BAN, then he went back to WAS before signing with New York to win three titles with his son and then retire again.) and the only reason I could feel comfortable with that deal was knowing this guy would be the real deal. Again, it's straight up pandering to the Hispanic community in LA, but the team is still new here and we've been successful, but I wanted guys on the club that people could identify with and well, he's one that will accomplish that for 'em.

In any case, I think after last season, I feel like this year's club is better no question. And I feel like we're more poised for the playoffs, too. It's hard to say, such a crapshoot and such. But, if we were ever going to do it, I guess this is the year it'd happen.

Or at least, for the future of my job I hope so. Because no title this year and I will be fired.
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The soup de jour in this league is parity. Good teams win early if they draft and sign well, but once that ends, they end up having to pay the guys who play for them, they're usually not able to afford the big ticket guys and have to jettison them and start again. New York experienced this after their three-peat, as many of the core members of that squad went away.

The league is designed this way on purpose. Parity is no accident, but teams can still reel off playoff runs and title defenses, yet, it's not the sort of league where teams can stockpile cheap talent and hold onto it for years on end.

By design.