By Francis Ferry, NLN beat writer

December 15, 2040: Asheville, North Carolina – Often it has been that the Winter Meetings have been quiet time for Aurora. It has been four-years (2036) since the last Winter Meeting trade struck for the Borealis – sending Richard Neely, Paul de Kook, Taizo Fuji and $6.9M to Okinawa in exchange for Elek Kim, Juan Carlos Sanchez and Okinawa’s 3^rd round pick. Kim never threw a pitch for Aurora – released 2-weeks into the 2037 season and Sanchez was dealt to Arlington 3-years later for Vicente Gallardo and a 2nd round pick – part of a salary dump for the Bureaucrats, who, ironically, resigned Gallardo to a 4-year deal at just under $1.5M per less than what he previously had.

Those two picks? Okinawa’s 3^rd rounder became Aurora’s 2040 Minor League Pitcher of the Year, Toshimichi Ohayashi and the Arlington 2^nd this year became OF Jose Soto, who hit .335 with 15 HR for the Oceanic.

But I degress…

This year Aurora was active during the Winter Meetings, and this year they did make a trade and it was a deal that may pay off for the club – both financially as well as on the field – and at the same time, runs the risk of upsetting the fan base, as they moved one of their more beloved players – as well as some of their valuable prospects.

Brian Clark, a former-ERA champ, is gone.

The news spread like wild fire on a deep-freeze cold night on The Front Range, lighting up the late-night radio talk shows with both remorse and calls of hallelujah.

This time it was Aurora hoping for salary relief – and packaged with reliever Huibert Kodde, 2B Mario Mejia, CF Yataro Sugano, a 10^th round pick and $1M, Aurora snet him to Hartford in exchange for SP Thibault Dejean.

Dejean is a soon-to-be 26-year old from Alsace in France, who just finshed his fourth full year with Hartford – a year that was cut short with elbow surgery at the beginning of August – though he expects to be fully healthy in time for spring training. It was the fourth significant arm issue Thibault has had – and probably why the Harpoon was willing to part with an otherwise promising arm.

Over the first three seasons with Hartford he made 34-starts a year – making 125 consecutive starts before his current arm issue. Last year he was 8-10 with a 3.38 ERA and overall is 45-42 with a 3.10 ERA, 565 K, 178 BB and 1.15 WHIP in 766 IP. When healthy, he was one of the best arms in the IL and a 2038 All-Star. He also finished 2^nd in the 2037 Wunderkind voting (Zak Osmund of London) – and perhaps of some importance, is a left-hander replacing the left-handed Clark. He had played a key role as second-fiddle to Hartford Ace – Aaron Goater.

Of course, Aurora is not totally unfamiliar with bringing in pitchers with a history of arm troubles. In the spring of 2015 Aurora picked a ‘swingman’ named Martin Francisco from Arlington – and ‘Sawmill’ turned out to be a pretty good pickup. A year later it was Anastasio Lopez from Manchester – and the pair became quite the duo, being key cogs in the rotation of Aurora’s four titles in 5-years. Might Dejean provide a similar result for Aurora?

‘Slug’ was a 2^nd round pick in the 2027 draft, out of Bishop Moore HS – despite a partial tear to his labrum, causing him to miss the end of the high school season and a good portion of the Short A season – there was no Rookie League at the time. He made 7-starts for Mokule’ia that year with a 5.37 ERA. When he’s been healthy he’s been one of the best arms in the SL – he was 16-4 with an SL-leading 1.81 ERA in 2033 – runner-up in the Golden Arm to Shin Seiki’s Roberto Rivera. After slowly watching his ERA tick upward – and his K/9 tick downward, he bounced back last year – before a bone spur in the elbow derailed his season (ending at 10-6 with a 2.79 ERA).

2040 was a disaster – and with Aurora anxious to get young arms in the rotation (and onto the pitching staff), ‘Slug’ managed just 12-starts and 27 appearances.

Not only does Aurora gain 6-years on the calendar with the move (as Clark just turned 32), but they save roughly $9M (with the million heading to Hartford) this year and $14M next-year – and the possible $1.2M buyout on 2043. That is significant savings for a club that has fallen into some scary financial depths.

Of course for Hartford, they have the prospect of ditching a young pitcher who may well have seen better days thanks to his injury history and with age in the outfield – Monnington and Rodriguez ain’t getting any younger, Sugano may be ready in a year – two max, and set to saddle up next to Hwui-ning Yei in their outfield.

For a deal that has a lot of risk-reward on both sides, and with Hartford having the space to absorb some salary in the now, when chasing for a division title may well be off the table – this smells of being one of those deals that in the end looks good for both teams.

‘Swampy’ was the 38^th overall pick in the 2038 draft, has put up solid homerun numbers and hit .272 last year at SLRC – after splitting 2039 at both Montserrat and Mokule’ia. He was considered by many as the better prospect than draft class mate and 1^st selection ‘Vowels’ Ueda, who scouts and coaches alike have begin worrying about as he has developed the bad habit of swinging at bad pitches.

Thibault Dejean is a groundball pitcher with above average control of a wide arsenal of pitches, offering up a cutter, slider, forkball, splitter, change and circle change, leading fans to already talk excitedly and bet who will out do who when Dejean and Armando Batista – and his own arsenal of six-pitches, start taking bullpens together this spring.

The addition of Dejean promises to give Aurora a solid top three with Clymo, Batista and Dejean – assuming Clymo is still a Borealis going into the season – there have been rumors, leaving Yi, Tamayo and Pak to battle it out for the 4^th and 5^th spots in the rotation.