December 23, 2031
There's a baseball story brewing for the holidays here in Palm Springs--but according to the Codgers' front office, it's The Grinch Who Stole Christmas.
As officials of the local Planetary Extreme Baseball Alliance club would have it, superstar outfielder Shane Willis--who just last year won the Royal Raker award for the league's best hitter, the only Palm Springs player ever to do so--had agreed to a new deal with the team, only to do a heel turn and leave them at the altar, immediately filing for free agency and then signing with with the division rival Aurora Borealis.
Shane Willis
"It's the most hateful, hurtful, holeful event I've ever experienced," said Palm Springs General Manager Denny Hills, who seemed to be near tears. "Holeful means how it leaves a hole in your heart. It's a real word, trust me on that one. An actual medical term."
According to Hills, Willis had verbally agreed to sign a new four-year contract with Palm Springs, only to abruptly change his mind and file for free agency two days later.
"I remember it like it was yesterday, although it was actually a couple weeks ago....down to the smallest detail. My mind is like a steel, um, what do you call those things that, like, snap shut to trap something? Yes, trap! A steel trap," Hills averred.
"I sent everyone else from our legal and contract area--lawyers, secretaries, notaries, everybody--out of the room, because I knew this deal was primo sensitivo, to use the Spanish. It was just me and his agent, ol', um, well, I can't recall it off the top of my head," Hills continued. "Minor detail, doesn't matter."
"Anyway. We quit batting the ball back and forth and finally got down to brass tacks and agreed on a deal. We even did a pinky swear!" exclaimed Hills, his face flushed with emotion.
Nevertheless, Willis never signed the contract, and shortly thereafter rejected Palm Springs' qualifying offer as well, filing for free agency on December 6.
Reached in Aurora after a celebratory dinner with Will Topham, his new club's general manager, Willis offers a different version of events.
"I never heard from Palm Springs other than their qualifying offer, which was of course not nearly enough money. They did make me an offer after I was a free agent, like a lot of clubs did, but Aurora seems like they are in a good place to compete and of course offered enough for me to take care of my family, so I was more than happy to sign with them. Boy, these prawns I had tonight tasted great, too."
But what about the verbal agreement? The pinky swear? Willis is firm.
"I gotta be honest with you, I have no idea what Mr. Hills is talking about. We heard nothing from them at all, other than the QO like I said. And the pinky swear thing is just crazy! I know for a fact that could not have happened, because my agent, Randy Adams, actually had his pinkies surgically removed years ago, to avoid this very type of situation."
When this fact is relayed to Codgers GM Hills, his mouth drops open. "But....if....how....I don't understand. Who--well, who in the ding dang Dumbledore did that pinky swear with me!?" he wails, visibly distraught.
The exact terms of the deal Willis signed with Aurora were not immediately disclosed, but the contract is worth 130 million dollars over six years.
As to the identity of the pinky-pledger in Palm Springs, at press time that remained a mystery.