[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: Win some, lose some
Or the other way around?

We played two more games since my last report and the results were almost night and day different. Our road game at the Fort Wayne Fury was one to forget quickly, which will be very hard actually. And the road game at the Paris Musketeers one to cherish, but we'll know to not take things for granted and understand that we need to keep this level of play up to withstand the Gothenburg Giants that are on our tail.

So, Fort Wayne on the road. We allowed only one touchdown on the Fury's opening drive, which started after Earnest Ashley was picked off on a long bomb at their 1-yard line on our first play from scrimmage. But where the Fury slow but steadily kept turning screen passes into 25-yard gains, we struggled to get even 10 yards out of 3 plays. The end result was that they scored 6 field goals en route to a 25-13 victory. Our first touchdown was Richie Piotte's 44-yard strip sack recovery for 44 yards, while Ashley ran for the second one with 4 minutes to go, when the game was pretty much over. Actually, a blocked punt with 2 minutes to go gave us one more chance, but we ran out of downs before we ran out of time outs. Ashley threw for 86 yards, Ed Schulz had 0 catches on 8 targets. Yes, you read that right: 0 catches on 8 targets. Bert Ta'Amu ran for 38 yards against his old time on just 11 carries. We had possession of the ball less than 17 minutes. We gave up 480 total yards, we gained 115 total yards.

So, how do you respond to that? Earnest Ashley responded with 466 yards and 3 touchdowns, completing 11 passes to George Stuckey for 205 yards and 5 passes to Ed Schulz for 134 yards, both scoring one touchdown. The defense still got run all over just like in week 1 against Paris, but our pass defense kept them in check enough to make our 526 total yards really count.

Gothenburg keeps on winning, beating the San Antonio Tidal Force 38-24, while Bordeaux lost at them and followed by by losing 28-3 at home against the Houston Mustangs.

Division
1. Maassluis 6-1
2. Gothenburg 5-2
3. Paris 1-6
4. Bordeaux 1-6

I mentioned the Houston Mustangs, they will be our next opponents. They're sitting a top their division as well, with a 5-2 record. This could be a pass heavy game, in a sense that Houston and Maassluis rank as the top two in the league in yards per completion. Our pass defense is slightly more scarier, while the running games (offense and defense) are somewhat on par. Even their special teams play isn't far off from ours. So yeah, this could be a close one, it shall be no surprise that the home playing Mustangs are slightly favored.


So, back to today's game, we'll have to understand that George Stuckey's performance was far from unique, yet it was the 30th time a Merchantmen player gained 200+ yards receiving. (Sadly the Solecismic record books are broken for the time period 2079 through 2085, which meant I had to track some of the numbers by hand). Stuckey is the 12th player to achieve this, the full list (with season achieved for the first time and total 200+ games):
2012 Alfredo Bass
2016 Gabe Springer (4x)
2017 Vince McAlister
2030 Terry Thomason
2044 Terry Haskell (2x)
2055 Kai Oburn (2x)
2057 Riddick Stanley
2066 Gerald Cook
2077 J.R. Mills (4x)
2085 Theodore Bondy (11x, including 2x playoffs)
2096 Ed Schulz
2097 George Stuckey

It may come as no surprise that Theo has the single-game franchise record with 285 yards in week 17 of the 2086 season, that season where he had 167 catches for 2,449 yards and 19 touchdowns.

On this list, the one player that really feels like an oddity is Gerald Cook, despite that he had excellent route running ability, we tried to use him as a double coverage magnet and get Bubba Ellard, Riddick Stanley, J.T Rivera or tight end Michael Tenbroeke open. Given that it was the 2066 season, it was easy to forget any offensive accolades though, our defense carried us through the season and specifically in the playoffs. Go ask the Texas Sharks quarterback...

Still, it's kind of surprising that Stuckey broke out today, he jumped up from 22 to 33 receptions and 246 yards to 451 yards. He's always had to fight for his roster spot, was actually traded during one pre-season, until the acquiring team backed out of the deal. He had two 100-yard games until today, both 117-yard showings, but in divisional demolitions. Well, today sticking with Stuckey paid off.

Anyway, we're firmly back on earth with at least one foot. Should have been two feet, but the win today makes the offday in Fort Wayne feel like that: an offday. But there's really no reason to think we can't run in a similar stinker in the remaining 13 weeks of the season. Yes, I'm going to remain optimistic, we're still in the race, firmly, and should strive for getting to week 21. But to get there, we'll have to play well in week 9 first.