Broken Bat - League Forum: IV.2

Post ID	Date & Time	Game Date

#89480	09/02/2022 7:25:13 am	Jun 25th, 2056
amalric7 Joined: 01/20/2016 Posts: 2257 New York Lancers V.4	Started 18-11 and made just a couple of minor tweaks in that time. Since then? 12-24!! Usual suspects: terrible starting pitching. Bats have been fine, relievers are good enough, ironic that we have a wealth of pitching prospects and nobody near ready to bring up. My most reliable starter the previous three seasons currently sports a 7.65 ERA! Think last night was our first league encounter with Deadwood. They certainly deadened our wood, sweeping the series - loss in extras, loss in extras, 1-run loss, shelled, 2-run loss. Fugly. Now, where can I purchase some rally underwear?

#89524	09/07/2022 7:10:18 pm	Jul 16th, 2056
5L1NK Joined: 06/10/2015 Posts: 296 Farmington Hills Cardinals Legends	We hit the all star break in classic Cardinal style, strong interleague showing with high hopes. I've been through this many a time. We are queued up for a shellacking in the next go around of interleague where all the teams we more or less dominated will get their well deserved revenge. Doesn't help with the demoralization of witnessing the Deadwood Dominance, I go 4-1, they go 5-0. and that's the best situation I can ask for. Deadwood is the clear favorite for promotion and if my first half Cardinals can't keep up, the second half will have them pull away to a laughable lead. Whining aside, let's look at some positives. We've got great rookie candidates on both sides of the ball. Reinhart & Savage have been neck and neck all season and i think the internal competition has kept them consistent. Both got all star nods and are still above .300 though there will be some regression expected. I haven't checked out the other rookie hitters around the league but I know my guys are definitely in the mix. Meade is an interesting case. He was awful out the gate and he's somehow seemed to have turned it around in interleague to somehow pull out a 6-1 record at the break. Cardinals history would suggest that he will now face a 5 game losing streak but I can enjoy his success while it lasts. Other than those positives we seem poised for another middle of the pack finish and extend our stay in IV.2. But who knows, we could pull off a miracle and catch up to an unstoppable Deadwood or spectacularly collapse and enjoy the sweet shame of relegation. Only time will tell! I wish you all the best of luck in the second half! (unless you're facing me!)

#89541	09/09/2022 6:58:22 am	Jul 21st, 2056
Jayhawker Joined: 01/15/2021 Posts: 30 Inactive	Better than expected first half from Lawrence - 2nd place feels a bit of fools gold, but I think we definitely deserve a shot to stay up. Usual suspects Shafer & Proctor, plus a bounce back season from Gallegos gave them All-Star nods. And rookie arms O'Neil and Miles have settled in well (19 SI & 13 SI since beginning of year!) I second the request for rally underwear when facing Deadwood... Won the first 5-3, then averaged 1.5 runs per game for the rest of the series. amarlic7 - I haven't been able to go to Columbia to snag some rally underwear, but if we come across some, Lawrence would consider lending out if playing Deadwood. Not to boast, but Lawrence did recently pass our last health check after receiving funding to renew our supply of Lotrimin Ultra

#89626	09/19/2022 4:07:26 pm	Aug 31st, 2056
5L1NK Joined: 06/10/2015 Posts: 296 Farmington Hills Cardinals Legends	So the Cards proved me wrong about the second half of interleague. Going 19-11 in the second half vs 20-10 in the first is nothing to complain about and I've been riding pretty high on that. Of course I have to face deadwood out the gate and get brought bright back down to where I belong. They truly are a better team than mine across the board. It's only a matter of time before they overtake me and finish with a minimum 5 game lead. Rookie talent has remained consistent so far with Meade, Reinhart and Savage giving mw hope for the future. I'm excited to see where they stack up on the ROTY voting. Lombardo is out, held onto him until the transaction deadline so he couldn't sign with one of you fellas and get revenge on me. One of two things will happen now. This leaned out rotation will step up and I'll actually pose a challenge to deadwood OR we crash and burn from the imaginary loss of team chemistry from dropping a tenured player and start trading places with Belleville for the rest of the season. Only time will tell! Best of luck to you all for the final stretch!

#89733	10/01/2022 4:57:47 pm	Oct 17th, 2056
Mudcat325 Joined: 12/20/2017 Posts: 101 Columbia Catfish IV.2	The Blue Jays are chirping a happy melody in the East division. Congratulations on clinching mishortt! Looks like in the West we are headed for a very dramatic down-to-the-wire finish! Will the Cardinals also have something good to tweet about or will the Perambulators walk off with the title? Good luck folks! It's been a very difficult season for me personally and it has very little to do with the game. Let's just say that I'm pretty fortunate to even be here to see this exciting finish. Every moment above ground is a precious thing and I'd just like to encourage everyone to make the best of each and every minute of your time you're given. Thanks, for letting me ramble and have fun everyone

#89742	10/02/2022 6:29:06 am	Oct 18th, 2056
amalric7 Joined: 01/20/2016 Posts: 2257 New York Lancers V.4	Vert glad you're still with us, Mudcat! On a similar note, I was off work for nine months with back problems last year, and it's just flared up again - it's just depressing. Hopefully it clicks back into place a lot sooner this time. It's been a very difficult season for me personally and it has everything to do with the game! Only downside to our offence has been the proliferation of GIDPs, again. Not enough double plays and too many errors on defence. But I could put up with these things if we could pitch in any shape or form - not a single starter with an ERA under 5! The only thing the starters do right is not give up a ton of home runs, and although the bullpen is fine the game has often gone by the time they enter. My boatload of pitching prospects is a very mixed bag, too. The starters could face a mass cull as soon as tonight. So it looks like we'll be playing in LLV next season, for the first time in 24 years - it'll take us bettering Lakeland by two games tonight to avoid that, and given they play four to our three that's extremely unlikely. It's probably for the best. We could use some so-called lighter competition and re-tooling...which means we could be playing in LLVI by this point next season! Good luck all.

#89759	10/03/2022 1:14:52 am	Oct 22nd, 2056
amalric7 Joined: 01/20/2016 Posts: 2257 New York Lancers V.4	LOL, ohhh we came oh so close! Sweep of Waltham and Lakeland dropping two of their first three meant that it all came down to the final game of the regular season - Lakeland had two pitchers with an ERA averaging 5.50 (or closer to it) give them seven innings of 2 hit, 1 run ball, and edged it 2-1. They stay up, we go down, that's just the way it is sometimes, and congrats to them. I probably hurt my chances this season by mostly moving Alonso off second base. He's far and away the best guy I have to play there and CF, but his glove has always let him down at the pivot. So I thought I'd reduce the errors by moving him to CF (after a failed experiment at 3B due to Gonzales slumping half the season) and having Ledesma be my regular 2B (instead of playing the OF). Turns out Ledesma isn't a slick gloveman either. As a result of this and (probably) some poor RNG returns, our defence had 27 more errors this year and 45 less double plays, hardly a recipe for success. Always next year, huh?

#89888	10/15/2022 8:27:15 am	Mar 2nd, 2057
5L1NK Joined: 06/10/2015 Posts: 296 Farmington Hills Cardinals Legends	Well, 2057 is upon us now and the mindset of the club was determined yesterday with the blockbuster signing of Rene Ochoa. His addition gives me the most confidence in our offense in a long time. Of course knowing my luck, this could be the year he falls off a cliff. I'm only wiling to drop almost 9 mil on a player I don't desperately need unless we're in a win now mode. Biggest question mark is the effectiveness of the pitching staff. Training Update 0 wasn't kind to Ramon and last year's Cy Young winner Keith Pope. My hope is that they can at least remain serviceable. The hope is that Meade's Rookie pitcher of the year campaign last season wasn't a fluke and he continues his success, We'll need him to step up more than ever. As for our first glance around the league this season, I'm not looking forward to my matchups against Belleville and Jefferson City. Belleville wiped the floor with me in the last series of 2056 to ensure I had no chance of promotion while 2053's end of season collapse to Jefferson City still haunts me. This is the first time my club has not been ranked highest in the league for a while so we finally get a switch up of schedule with our 2nd half having more home series than the first. Maybe that will help us succeed. I'm going to enjoy the next week of youth on display in spring training before we start playing the games that matter. Welcome to all the newcomers to IV.2 and best of luck unless you're playing me!

#90441	12/24/2022 10:53:55 am	Jan 13th, 2058
amalric7 Joined: 01/20/2016 Posts: 2257 New York Lancers V.4	Annnnnnnd....we're back. Second good season in ten was very welcome, but perhaps that was simply the cosy confines of LLV. We have a few old guys who have still been bringing it so I've only made one cut, but I have a few 27-year olds needing playing time, so it'll be spring training and cup games for them until we see how the league plays out. Good luck all! And Merry Christmas!

#90539	01/04/2023 8:20:16 am	Mar 10th, 2058
5L1NK Joined: 06/10/2015 Posts: 296 Farmington Hills Cardinals Legends	Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Happy New Year and welcome back! Happy to have you and mudcat back to liven up the thread again. It's going to be a year of reunions as familiar opponents and players are ramping up for 2058. Couple former Cardinals are primed for revenge games this season: Sung Ki Lee - Livermore Generals (was a cardinal for 8 days) Lawrence Lombardo - Livermore Generals Marco Rivera - Lawrence Hawks Tracy Norman - Lakeville Bears My hopes are that these guys don't have MVP performances against me but my luck hasn't been that great. Another year of being highly ranked in IV.2 which will give us the same schedule that will lead to our classic second half downfall. Provo finished off the season strong and I'm fearing them most of all in the west. Lakeville has had a long history of being better than us with the exception of their demotion year. Belleville's season will be the biggest question mark, Training update 0 massacred their ageing staff and I'm intrigued to see how Knor will pivot if his team struggles early on. New London is going to be full of piss and vinegar from their demotion so I expect a strong showing. Every manager in the west has minimum 4 years of ownership under their belt so this is looking to shape up as a very competitive west division. The east is going to be a slugfest with the exception of Orlando. They're going to go bot in a few weeks and by the time an owner comes in to pick up the pieces it'll probably be too late. With Stillwater, Lawrence and Hackensack all having strong finishes and New York and Columbia with deserving promotions, I could see 5th place getting demoted with a winning record. Enjoy the rest of spring training and good luck this season!