[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: 2084, off-season of head crunching
Sometimes a football team can be so loaded with talent, that some of those guys start thinking they aloe deserve ten percent of the available cap figure. It gets trickier when there's a hand full of those guys.

Such is the life in the Merchantmen general manager office this season. We've got a quarterback on the last year of contract, while the best cornerback in the game in the last year of contract has decided to hold out. I'm in negotiations with the agents of our All-IHOF guard Carlos Webb and have a situation at our offensive tackle position with two veterans and a second year guy eager to step in at left tackle. We may have a decision to make about our old left tackle Louie Murray... Our draft actually created a similar situation at the guard position, with two proven veterans and young promising second round pick. Luxury problems, I know...

Oh yeah, draft. We were sitting without a first round pick, as naturally, we still managed to grab one of the top 5 non-kickers of this draft, a slightly undersized guard named Michael Szott from Clemson. He's all around a very good player, in potential top10 in the league, we're expecting him to enter training camp very green. Our second second round pick we used on a new kicker: Thomas Robertson from Kansas State. Our staff thinks he's already close to on par with the guy we had, with a lot of potential to become the best kicker in the game, sweet.

What else did we get? A green but promising pass rusher or two in defensive end Jorge Marone and defensive tackle A.J. Ritt. Both will probably come in at a very unpolished state. We got a new third down back in Monty Digler, a new sixth linebacker in Daquan Forbes and potential dimeback in Courtney Blackwell, who turns out to be a very good punt returner as well, a bonus that we actually didn't really grab him for, given that we've already extended the contracts of our restricted free agent return specialists Gabe Broady and Travis Gellings. The latter probably has to expect to lose the premier role to back from injured reserve Ross Willbrandt, his eye condition is reportedly fully healed.

We've been very quiet on the free agency market. So far, zero players signed. Lack of cap space is a very logical reason.

Trading? Why, yes. We traded our third linebacker Darien Stokes to the Williamsburg Colonials for a future third round pick. The plan is to have Jermaine Page or Billy Springer move into the role. Aforementioned rookie Daquan Forbes might have a slight shot at it as well, as does our special teamer Skip Keith.

The bad news about our cap situation is that I've made a decision on four long time roster members. Third down back Raul Curie (104 games), defensive tackle Chandler Posante (95 games), defensive end Max Lyons (109 games) and safety Maurice Harkleroad (151 games) won't make our training camp roster. All four were no full time starters, but had a prominent role anyway in rotation duties. They join Dennis Nadell (159 games) into the unsigned player pool. These moves should give us the cap space required to extend the contracts of Kirk Hitchcock and Ellis McAlister. Always a sad day to release players, but, y'know, cap space.

Things will get uglier next off-season, when Theodore Bondy's contract needs an extension. The only one to blame is the people that keep drafting these top-notch players.

Let's just hope we actually go place this upcoming season, to make it all worth all those hundreds of millions of dollars. If Hitchcock and McAlister sign a new contract with us...