Sunday, March 31, 2013
Arturo Bruto, Manchester Boutique

[Ed. Note: The following is the first in a semi-regular series written by Manchester Maulers owner Arturo Bruto.  The Maulers begin their defense of the Imperial League pennant at Arlington this week.  New Maulers Jeff Cline, Brooks Erickson and Nathan Bolitho are expected to play important roles as the club challenges for the Rodriguez Cup.

While most of the roster is set, there remain a few unknowns as the club prepares for Opening Day.  It is, for example, not yet clear which rookie, Cal Stout or Stephen Longchamps, will play the first base position vacated by Kikugoro Memoto, who moves to designated hitter this season.  Nor has General Manager Morris Cooley announced who will make the roster as the backup catcher.  Last season’s starter, Juan Jose Benítez, is reportedly out of favor with club management, which also happens to be strangely enthralled with Juan Garza.  Garza, who was acquired from West Virginia during the off-season, is out of minor league options and would thus have to be exposed to waivers if he does not make the Maulers coming out of spring training.  Benítez, conversely, has three minor league option years remaining, which means that he could be optioned to AAA New Brunswick without being exposed to waivers.  Finally, the competition for the final bullpen position appears to be in a dead heat between lefties Marvin Boone and Sergio López.

While fans are understandably interested in these final roster decisions, Maulers owner Arturo Bruto’s column aims to offer fans a different, unique perspective on the club.  The Boutique hopes that readers enjoy this unvarnished glimpse into Bruto’s imagination.]

Dear readers!  Loving fans!  Welcome, welcome, welcome to “Artie’s Story”!  Woo-hoo!  Oh man, I am so, so excited about this!  Whoop-ha!  Look out; Artie is in print!  Yeah!

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy!  Okay, okay… calm and cool.  Cool?  Cool?  Cool.  “Like a cucumber!”  Yeah!  I am always telling Mo [ed. note: Morris Cooley] about my “sayings”!  Have you ever read something as clever as that?  “Cool like a cucumber!”  Ha!

Alright, alright; calm down, people, calm down.  Jeez!  This column is serious business; it’s a new season of Maulers baseball!  Yeah!

Friends, listen: we were so, so close last year.  So I said to Mo, I said, “Mo: I am opening up my wallet; I mean, opening it up!”  Heh, heh… “opening up my wallet”.  Ha!  So I said, “Tell me what you need, Mo.  Tell.  Me.  What.  You.  Need!”

So Mo says to me – and he always talks in a real professional-like way – so he says: “Ah yes, Arturo (he’s always calling me “Arturo”).  Well, the first thing that I need is for you to stay out of my way.”  Can you believe that?!  Ha, that Mo!  He is always yanking my chain like that.  Heh… “yanking my chain”!  Good, good guy, that Mo.

Anyway, then he says to me: “Our revenue stream has been very strong since I took over as GM, but I think that there is still untapped market potential.”  Yeah, well, I didn’t have any idea what he was talking about.  But, hey, Mo’s got that silver tongue, so I just had to nod my head and smile.  Heh… “silver tongue”!

So Mo keeps on running his yap – “running his yap”! – and he says, “I want to add another 5,000 seats to Whiten Field.  I anticipate that the long-term uptick in revenue will outstrip the short-term expense.”  Now, Mo also said a whole bunch of other stuff, too, but I didn’t really catch it.  To tell y’all the truth, I was a bit slow that morning, as I had been up all night busting a move at the Bush reunion show – “busting a move”!  Ha, oh man!  I’m on a roll today!

So anyway, here’s what I really want to tell you in the first edition of “Artie’s Story”: we’ve got a whole bunch of new players and a whole bunch of guys that are coming back, and now Mo has dialed up – “dialed up”! – a whole new set of improvements to the old ball yard.  Once again, you can be confident that the Maulers are the gold standard in sporting entertainment, The Greatest Show in New England!  So come on out to Whiten Field!

Oh yeah, we did raise ticket prices this year, but hey, if you want to witness baseball history in the making, you’ve got to pony up the cash every now and again…”pony up”!  Ha!  Oh, these sayings of mine!  So we’ll see you at the “W”!