by Midorikawa Michiyo, Niihama-shi Chronicle

October 3, 2011: Niihama, Japan - Four months after our exclusive report that the General Manager of the Ghosts is purely fictitious, your faithful correspondent has uncovered an even more outrageous revelation: making all decisions for the squad this season is the long-time clubhouse janitor.

Tomomi "Tommy-boy" Tomonaga, 67, has been with the team since its inception.  He is often only seen before and after games cleaning up locker room floors and urinals, and washing soiled uniforms and jockstraps.  He rarely interacts with the players, and many of the youngsters on the team don't even know his name.

But sources close to the team tell the Chronicle that at the start of the 2011 season, the new Ghosts owner, Akane Kenkyusham, decided he didn't want to spend any money on a General Manager.  "Our janitor could do just a good a job," he reportedly told aides, who took the notion literally and interviewed Tomonaga for the position.

What they found, according to our sources, was that this quiet, elderly man actually possessed a wealth of knowledge about baseball, including front office matters.  The expertise was apparently the result of decades of cleaning clubhouses of teams at all levels, and listening – as our source put it – "…like a fly on the wall."  And his depth of knowledge left jaws dropped.  "He knew OPS and VORP, he knew Rule 5, he knew arbitration and scouting.  We were astounded."

The sources say Kenkyusham, impressed by this, gave Tommy-boy a slight raise in his already pitiful salary and declared that all managerial decisions would come from the slight and little-known figure.

"We knew that wouldn't fly with the press," says our source.  "So we concocted this story that this American minor league manager, Mike Dunn, was running the team.  You in the media didn't need long to figure out that was a hoax."

This latest revelation is sure to rock Ghosts faithful as the team nears the end of the season, trailing the division leading Shin Seiki Evas by just 2.5 games and assured now of a second straight postseason appearance.

Our sources appear to have been willing to come forward in the wake of Tomonaga's decision to award veteran DH Shiggy Memoto a two-year, $22 million contract extension despite concern that Memoto is nearing 40.  The move prompted a flurry of second-guessing amongst fans, players, and even other LRS general managers, all of whom wonder if it jeopardizes the team's financial stability and ability to compete in coming seasons.

"A lot of stuff now makes sense," said team captain and All-Star third baseman Nobuhito Hasegawa when told of the disclosure.  "Some of the strange decisions can now be accounted for.  We, the players, are disappointed, to say the least."

The Chronicle is currently attempting to arrange an exclusive interview with Tomonaga and hope to bring you that in the coming weeks.

##

By Granville Price, Palm Springs Semaphore
Sept. 27, 2011

Palm Springs finds itself a hotbed of playoff fever as the hometown Codgers battle down to the wire for a wild card spot in the Sovereign League of the Planetary Extreme Baseball Alliance.

Saddled by injuries and general malaise, the hometown club at one point trailed hated rival Bakersfield by six games, and their playoff hopes appeared finished, but a blistering 16-7 record over the month of September has brought them dead even with the Bears with just six games left to play.  And fans have taken notice.

Retiree Gertrude Mulligan, passing by Elderberry Field a few hours before tonight's game against the Aurora Borealis, was typical. 

"The Codgers?  Are they still playing?  I thought the season was over,” she enthused.

Her husband Merton echoed her palpable excitement.  "Usually we get out of town around this time of year because it's so hot," he gushed.  "But there's some kind of problem with the water pump in the Town Car, so I guess we're stuck here for a while."

Central to the Codgers' charge has been third baseman Ollie Morris, who batted .455 with three home runs and 9 RBI ever the past seven days en route to being named the SL Player of the Week.

"Ollie just absolutely put us on his back and carried us," said right fielder Michael Smith.  "He was phenomenal.  A real phenom.  “Phenom” – is that even a word?  If so, it should be his, like, nickname, or something."

The Codgers take on Aurora at home for three games, then play a series against Yuma to close out the regular season.  If they remain tied with Bakersfield at that point, they would face the Bears in a special "play-in" game to determine which team made the playoffs.