Wayyy back in the summer of ’14, when the EFL world was a peaceful, happy place, ruled by a benevolent mountain range, before the rise of the serpents from the plains of Kansas – Cheese Man committed a sin. Yes, folks, it’s time for a confession. Even dairy products are subject to effects of the fall.

Here’s how it came down.

The Cheese Man was not happy. His team was not very good. Yes, there were worse teams, but not enough of them. He looked at his roster. “These guys have great potential,” he said to himself, “but they’re not getting the job done.” So he decided to find out what a winning roster looks like. (This was the temptation that led to the sin.)

Cheese Man checked out the Alleghenys. Suddenly it all came clear to him: they have Trout, and we don’t! No wonder they always win! (And now the sin begins to develop…)  From there, it was inevitable. “How come they have Trout, and we don’t? That’s not fair!”  <crash> Yes, that sound effect you just heard was the breaking of the 10th commandment. Cheese Man coveted Mike Trout.

He pouted for a while. And then he noticed something, next to the name of Trout. A year! It was 2016! After that year, Trout would no longer be an Allegheny! Who would he go to? Cheese Man began to rub his hands together. A plot began to form in his cheesy head. An idea was birthed. What would it take to get Trout for 2017? The answer was obvious. Money!

So now the problem was how to get enough money to outbid everyone two and a half years out. The plan was for the Cheese to go on a strict diet. No more long, expensive contracts. No contracts past 2016 unless they are under $3 million per. Cut back on the rookie draft – stay with the cheap guys. Yes, this means that our 2015/16 teams won’t be so great, but that will only increase the value of our 1st-round rookie pick in 2017. Which we will trade for Bryce Harper (this was decided in 2015). That’s the other way to keep a lot of money – resist the lure of the first round of the rookie draft. So Cheese Man got a superstar – for one year – AND $10 million.

Harper had a down year in 2016, so we tried to trade for Machado first. But the Wolverines only snarled at us, as Wolverines are prone to do. So we went back to our original plan, and the Kangaroos jumped (that’s what they are prone to do) all over it.

The plan was to go into the 2017 free agent draft with the most money. Haviland has won every bidding contest we’ve ever had, so the Dragons were our most dreaded opposition. We figured that we’d head into the draft with $55 million: $35M for Trout, and $20M for another superstar. Haviland, of course, had the next highest total: $40 million, and we could only hope that he wouldn’t go above our budget. So it was not a sure thing.

But then the impossible happened! The Dragons crawled back into their lair, and left the Cheese with the Big Fish for the lowest possible price! Amazing, but true.

So after 2 and a half years of scheming – the Trout was hooked. Now all we have to do is win the league.

2 Comments

  • What a sordid tale of avarice and intrigue. Of course the fates won’t let the Cheese get away with this. Right?

    Here is how Baseball Prospectus, wielding PECOTA, sees our projected records. (I calculated these by adding their projected WARP to a replacement season of 54-108, which is roughly where PECOTA locates replacement level performance. Most WAR-like systems place it somewhat lower, more like 45 wins.)

    Working from the bottom up. Please scroll one line at a time for the proper dramatic effect.

    DC: 74 – 88 (12.0 WAR offense, 10.0 WAR pitching)
    Flint Hill: 82 – 80 (19.7 WAR offense, 8.1 WAR pitching)
    Canberra: 83 – 79 (16.5 WAR offense, 12.5 WAR pitching)
    Pittsburgh: 84 – 78 (20.0 WAR offense, 10.3 WAR pitching)
    Haviland: 87 – 75 (18.8 WAR offense, 13.9 WAR pitching)
    Kaline: 89 – 73 (22.2 WAR offense, 13.3 WAR pitching)
    Old Detroit: 94 – 68 (23.3 WAR offense, 16.9 WAR pitching)
    Cottage: 96 – 66 (30.4 WAR offense, 11.1 WAR pitching)
    Peshastin: 99 – 63 (27.7 WAR offense, 16.1 WAR pitching)
    Portland: 101 – 61 (29.6 WAR offense, 17.5 WAR pitching)

    Those of you who would take comfort (or fright) at these predictions, beware: this is PECOTA, of the unusual WARP predictions: Trout at only 7.1 WARP?, Yasmani Grandal all the way up to 6.3? Trea Turner (5.4) will be 1.5 games more valuable than Bryce Harper (3.9)? Matt Moore (at $9,250,000 and 1.2 WARP) less valuable than Anthony DeSclafani ($500,000, and suffering from a strained UCL)?

    And Portland and Peshastin duking it out for first place, with none of our traditional champions in the race after early September? Obviously we can’t trust PECOTA. Even if it does forecast a frustrating third place finish for the pretentious Cheese.

    • I goofed. There is a mistake in at least the Cheesey WARP numbers. I’ll fix my errors and get back to you.