[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: ... and how 2096 started
Like with a big surprise.

Theodore Bondy decided to return for another season! Even playing a WR3 role for the later part of the season wasn't a reason to think he's lost the love of the game. Theo will join us for an 15th straight season, providing he makes the regular season roster, obviously.

Our former Linebacker Craig McCorkle was to my own surprise inducted into the Solecismic Hall of Fame. Our 18th overall pick in the 2079 draft, he played 9 seasons with us, all but the rookie campaign as a full time starter. He played out his career after we traded him in 2088 over cap woes for 3 seasons with the Arizona Miners and a final season with the Fairbanks Northstars. Yes, he was great, one of the 10 best linebackers in team history, but only the 3rd to deserve HOF honors? He played in 143 regular season and 9 playoffs games for us. A complete linebacker, no doubt. Those final four season on a league wide scale did make him jump into a realm of good enough, it seems.

Sticking with the retired players theme, our former standout defensive tackle Heath Oliver, a cap casualty as well in 2088, apparently retired following the 2094 season. Initially a Merchantmen great (he ended up playing 5 seasons with us, 79 games in total), his stint with the Gothenburg Giants will become his true home with 7 seasons and over 100 games played for them. A one-time All-IHOF team selection, it remains to be seen whether the HOF selection committee deems him worthy. I suspect he'll fall short, despite how massive a player he was.

We also learned about the retirement of our one-season defensive end project Jorge Marone. Despite being a third round pick, we gave up on him after just one season and eventually he proved us wrong. He bounced around a bit, almost retiring in 2086, but the Chesapeake Chitterlings gave him a future contract. He failed to make their 2086 team, then bounced around from Rochester to Paris and by trade ended up in Chesapeake again, playing for 7 seasons there, without missing a game. He finished his career with 60.0 sacks and most importantly: an IHOF Bowl victory at the end of the 2093 season.

Four of our own players on roster decided to not return for the 2096 season.

Quarterback Moe Sheldon joined us in 2088 after the cap woes decimated our team, stepping in after we release Ellis McAlister. Sheldon had to fend off several young projects to still end up starting in 74 regular season games for us in 8 seasons on roster. 2091 was clearly his best season, when he threw for 24 touchdowns and only 4 interceptions in 14 games guiding us to a bye week and a close loss in the AOC Championship game. Lately he mentored Earnest Ashley.

Cornerback Jackie Richardson's role had gotten smaller here, slowly falling from a highly touted shutdown cornerback signed as a free agent in 2090 to our fourth corner last season, mentoring the youngsters. He played for 6 seasons in San Antonio prior to joining us and spent 6 seasons with us as well. He ended up played in 96 games, including 4 in the playoffs.

Guard Desmond Pritchett leaves us after just one season. We felt he was still good enough for another season or two as a starter, but he decided otherwise, making 2095 his only season in Maassluis.

Long snapper Bryce Karney joined us late in his career, after 4 seasons in Moontown and 4 seasons in Gothenburg. He topped those figures with 6 seasons in Maassluis, playing in 96 total games for us. He lost the 2083 bowl game with Moontown against Gothenburg, then lost the 2088 bowl game with Gothenburg against Oakland, meaning he went to two bowl games without victory.

Last but certainly not least, wide receiver Nicolas Coady retired. We picked him in the 5th round of the 2095 draft and it had been my plan to bring him back during the season if the opportunity would arise after we solved the punter puzzle, an injured reserve would make room for him, or maybe in the post-season after us getting eliminated. I forgot about it and as such, the kid decided to retire. Quite the bummer, I really wanted to see what he could show us in his second training camp and pre-season, this kid was one of the most enigmatic players we ever drafted in terms of how good or bad he might be. We'll never know, forever he'll fail to go into the history books to have ever played a down in the IHOF...

With all that said, we're entering the 2096 off-season with 44 players on roster and 9 draft picks as we have two additional 3rd rounders, which adds up to 53 players already. We have 5 restricted free agents that I will probably attempt to re-sign in kick holder Jon Giles, tight end Ike Nixon, guard Vince Henselman, special teams linebacker Jose Meadows and interceptions specialist cornerback Britt Hudson.

Okay, full roster, but we actually have $85 million in cap space. Yes, you're reading that correctly. Obviously some of that is reserved for the draft picks, including an expensive #12 overall pick, which together add up to roughly $28 million, giving us about $57 million to play around with. How about that!

And trust me, we're going to invest that money. Some of it will go to underpaid last year of contract players like Ed Schulz and Robbie Zinn, maybe Clayton Jackson, Darien Fletcher and George Stuckey will convince me. Theodore Bondy is also up for renewal. At the same time, our most expensive wide receiver is Branden Sandlin. Indeed, the backup that played in only 2 games last season, he's currently 4th highest paid on team...

So, we're onto a new off-season with cap space to work with, a young quarterback that I still have faith in, a future hall of fame wide receiver that might hang around for another season and lots of plans to improve our defense to bring us really back to Merchantmen worthy levels. The Gothenburg Giants have dominated this division long enough now, it's time to end their streak of AOC Championship game clashes with the Tucker Tigers. Let's do this, Merchantmen!