So I didn't expect this until the exact moment I made this post but I guess after however long the Cougars are back! I was already planning to write for
The Figment Sporting Journal which is way better because it contains a collection of the entire league's work, but I wasn't really planning on starting this back up. I've been busy and that won't change, so perhaps this was the perfect time to retire or scale back this report.
But I just can't resist. Even if all my players had bad careers and the true star of the franchise is the immortal Pug White. I just can't resist writing about the Cougars. Revivals are always exciting and I just enjoy this too much.
I'm not committing to any timeline or consistency, but Figment is starting sims again next week and I have control of the Cougars for the first time since 1963 and once I got back from vacation it truly set in how excited I was. Everything is different but Roger Alford is absurd and I guess it's cool that guys like Doc Griffin, Tom Holliday, and Henry Watson are still here. A lot of weird things have happened but at least Jerry Smith was a Hall-of-Famer. I was right to give him
a ton of praise when I drafted him and I'm sure every other time I mentioned him. And yes, I did trade for Morty.
The current day is now January 1st, 1975, and that will continue to advance starting Monday. The organization is a mess and the Cougars suck, so despite a new franchise high in wins (99) in 1966, they haven't broke my annoyingly long playoff drought.
It does start to get easier, as their are four divisions of six now, but ours contains three 95-win teams. And again. The Cougars suck. Three of the last four years have had 88 losses or more, and the only reason that '66 team was good is most of those players were guys I drafted or brought in. A relatively blank slate will be interesting, and with the 2nd ranked farm system I can do pretty much whatever I want. Our scout sucks, so I'm not sure what. But at least we have some time before the draft.
This should be extremely fun even if all the stars of old are gone or on the edge. We'll see the twilight of Hank Williams career but Buddy Miller and Adrian Czerwinski have plaques. Frenchy Mack just gave it up when he got hurt. Just 33 and a year removed from his 6th Allen in 7 seasons.
He could have been the best. 2,766 strikeouts, 2.66 ERA (147 ERA+), 1.09 WHIP, 3 rings, and 6 All-Stars. 89.8 WAR. All before 32.
But that was it. That was it. Baseball was robbed.
Okay enough non-Cougar talk. There's plenty of room for that everywhere else. Roger Alford is our new Pete Papenfus. Tom Halliday has done a great Skipper Schneider impression. And I guess we cosplay as a retirement home? Not even in a bad way either. Pair of 250-win hurlers. I can't wait to see how the chaos plays out, but the one thing I can guarantee is that I am trying to break this pennant drought.
It's been far too long...
Edit: I left out the best part! Pug Bryan is the manager! I
drafted him back in 2021! He's 61 and just a third year manager, but it would be awesome if our former draft pick is t he one who finally ends the drought. He had a costly outing in the infamous
game six extra inning loss in 1941. Just like my Blue Jays, we blew a 3-2 lead, but losing all four games by a single run was far more painful.
Oh no please don't be an omen...
At least we were on the road? Completely unrelated!