[Westheim]

Berto taking the Raccoons to the arbitrator kinda of threw a wrench into … everything. But here he was, having signed up for an 18th season with the Critterfolk. That would tie him with Nick Brown (2001-18) for second-most campaigns at least partially participated in, trailing only Matt Nunley (2013-31) with 19 seasons. Isn’t that true, Berto? (pats Berto’s fuzzy head between the ears while Berto gobbles berries out of his favorite food bowl)

Yes, Maud, we can cancel the retirement ceremony for #7. – Yes, tell Yoshi Nomura to stay home. The double-retirement of #7 has to wait another year.

But there was no making mistakes here – we could not continue playing Berto as regular third baseman. He was a giant black hole on defense, with Cristiano estimating that the Raccoons lost an additional two games just for him rolling around the hot corner in his rotundity. And it was a shame – he still had good paws and a strong arm, he just couldn’t move side to side or turn with any velocity conducive to playing professional baseball… or beer league, really. No, we had to come up with a plan here, that would invariably see him be a part time player – or spend most of his time at first base. It wasn’t like Art Goetz had lit the world on fire in his 200-ish at-bats last year (.260/.293/.380). The Raccoons’ inability to find a first-sacker to do ANYTHING AT ALL was a bit tragic at this point, so maybe those two could to some time-share arrangement at first? Unfortunately, both were batting left-handed, so no synergy effect could be had.

What else did the Raccoons need? Well, pitching – always. But from a position player standpoint we definitely needed a backup catcher to Jeff Kilmer, who was signed for a while with another $9.7M over five years on his deal, signed before last season. No hot-fire catching prospect was anywhere near the big league team, with 20-year-old Ruben Gonzalez playing for the Panthers at the end of the year, and not hitting anything much there. He’d be back in Aumsville to begin the season.

The only real fixture besides old man Cosmo on the infield was Tony Hunter. Since Cosmo or whoever would fill in for him if he was not ready for Opening Day (Lando! Yay!) was currently figured to just keep second base warm for Arturo Carreno, the needs were really on the two corners. The free agent market at third base was pretty dire, while first base had a legit star in Danny Cruz on the market. He was of course a type A free agent, however – the Raccoons had three supplemental round picks coming up (should have been four…), so I was not entirely averse to burning the #16 pick for the right player. Cruz had just won another home run title with the Thunder (the fifth of his career, and never consecutively) and had smashed the ball for an .861 OPS. He was a switch-hitter, still competently defending first base, but would already be 36 on Opening Day, and would command not only our first-round pick, but also about $4M a year, which was most of the Raccoons’ available dosh.

On third base the only legit star was Nick Rozenboom coming off the Condors. He was however going to be *38* in January and the tooth of time was very obviously gnawing on him. He also had not hit for much at all the last two seasons. No compensation attached to him, but that was probably not the right move.

A quality third baseman was also difficult to acquire in a trade. I scratched on the Wolves and Scorpions’ doors for Sergio Barcia (.301/.398/.429) and Paul Laughren (.266/.385/.404), respectively, but it would have cost us at least one and probably both of Matt Waters and Jason Wheatley, or comparable prospects, and Jesus Maldonado as cherry on top.

Speaking of Maldonado – he was at least *an* option for regular third baseman. Playing all positions except for catcher and second base reasonably well had always seen him shifting around where there was a hole (he had once again played five different positions for at least 22 innings each last year), and in 409 career innings at third base he was a slight plus on defense. The fun fact here was that plugging Maldo at third base would cost us nothing at all.

So what about centerfield then? Could be Miguel Reyna, but I liked the idea of him platooning for the most part with Rikuto Ito. The other options already on the roster for centerfield (Van Anderson, Stephon Nettles) were all batting lefty, like Reyna, so we were perhaps in the market for a right-handed centerfield bat. There was also Jordan Gonzalez in AAA. He had played eight games with the Raccoons in 2040, hitting a meaningless .286 with 1 HR and 4 RBI, and was a switch-hitter. He was *an* option, and probably not any smarter or dumber than the other two. (Although I didn’t see Nettles on the Opening Day roster at all at this point…)

Ponderings aside, anybody remember Raffaello Sabre? The Capitals signed him for $22M over five years prior to last season. He spontaneously exploded, his stuff was shaved from 12 to 8 on the scouting report and he ended up in the bullpen after posting outlandish ERA’s. He finished the year with 103 innings of work and a 3-10 record with a 6.42 ERA. Yikes.