March 2nd, 2020

Today we start the Spring Training camp that will preface the 14th season of the London Underground competing in the PEBA. Current GM Nigel Laverick is about to enter his fifth year in London and has presided over the most successful period in the franchise’s history. During his time the Underground have gone from a .500 ballclub (81-81) in 2016 through three straight postseason appearances to the franchise’s highest win total (97) last year with the team’s first ever Championship in 2018 to make the icing on the cake. Laverick though has always been at pains to point out that it’s not really been his doing, he merely took over a team that was headed upwards anyway and tweaked the edges to ensure London got where it wanted.

Each year it gets harder to tweak the edges to maintain the upward spiral. 97 wins would be very hard to better but a first round playoff exit is open to improvement, the pieces could be there to do it but fairly major surgery has been undertaken this off-season to stay within the budgetary constraints of a small market side aiming to outwit the big boys of the PEBA. The first change came surprisingly in the team’s personnel when long time Scouting Director  Gary Huddlestone‘s contract was not renewed. The team felt he was too old at 64 and hired 38-yr-old Arturo Torres, he had spent most of his playing career in the Alianza Béisbol Al Sur de la Frontera   but had a brief stint with the Manchester Maulers in 2010 and bounced around the minors for a few years before returning to the Mexican league to end his playing career in 2016.

With precious little wiggle room available in London’s budget Torres had to oversee a revamp without adding to, and preferably cutting, the payroll. Luis Mora became the first player casualty, he had been in the Underground’s bullpen since the franchise’s first Opening Day and had had a fine 2019 campaign (6-6, 36 saves 3.34 ERA) but his contract had become too expensive for a 34-yr-old with young Gary Stanley waiting in the wings. Luis was not offered an extention and left while arbitration through up another problem – Tuo-zhou Yang was awarded almost $16 million. That put a target squarely on his back, London could not afford to let him have another contract and would look to unload him if they could despite him being  the 2019 PEBA IL All-Leather Award at CF and only one year removed from  the 2018 PEBA IL Royal Raker Award. The fans loved him but Torres & Laverick would have to come up with a cheaper option. The Rule 5 draft provided a harvest of three players – William Ferguson, Javier Sepúlveda and  Christian George, the first two Torres assured Laverick would definitely fit into the 25-man but George would have to earn his place in the forthcoming Spring camp. Long being a silent attendee of the Winter Meetings London changed all that this year, Laverick & Torres were to be seen in & out of many a private suite  as they sought the missing pieces and hawked Yang. They emerged from the meetings with a new outfielder, Barton MacLugash, and a catcher Víctor Martí­nez , both obtained at small cost. They also continued talks begun in the meetings on through December and finally completed the deal on January 1st to send Yang to the Niihama-shi Ghosts along with prospect  Romá¡n Suárez  for top pitcher Kata Nakamura. A large brown paper bag of dollars went too but the Underground now had cover for the injured  Leonard Carver who was not due to pitch again until July at the earliest.

All of this meant London could afford not to be a player in the free agent feeding frenzy and salt their pounds away for a rainy day. A few feelers were put out early on but it soon became obvious that the allocated money wouldn’t get London anywhere and they settled for just signing Tomás Gonzáles to a modest $6 m contract over three years. The plan was for him to replace the departed Yang in centrefield, he might not produce the same offence but he has the speed and defence to glide over the outfield as well as the patience at the plate to perhaps replace some of Yang’s 100+ walks each year. All this influx of outfielders meant the release of Wilson Vélez and Paco Shaffer, two who had clung to the fringes of the Underground 25-man squad for some time without ever establishing themselves. Lorenzo Valenzuela‘s good performance last year seems to have pushed him past them and finally made him a fulltime member of the 25-man.

The last action in February was to tie up some of the contract extensions as soon as they could. Decheng Wen signed a $24 m contract for two more years, taking him to his 34th birthday and probably his final Underground contract. New arrival MacLugash picked up three more years at a cost of just over $6 million while bullpen arm Manny Vélez signed for four years and $9.5 million. But the biggest and most pleasing news for the fans was the announcement that All-Star second baseman Nathan Carter had signed a five-year deal worth a total of $57.5 million, now London’s great middle-infield combo of Carter and Chris Long were tied up until 2026 ! All of this had successfully cut $12 million off the payroll and probably saved enough to retain Hiroyuki Nii or Scott Morris for another year. Will the replacements be good enough to keep London’s run going and drive them to their fourth successive postseason appearance in Laverick’s fifth year? Only time will tell, the next month of camp might give an indication though ….