1964 Off Season
Vada Pinson gets $85K in arbitration, Lolich gets $220K & Jenkins gets $190K, sweet mercy. We release Joe McClain after 8 seasons with the club. Didn't want to do it but we can't afford to pay him anywhere near what he wants. SP Cecil Perkins also had to go. RP Carl Bouldin got a nice bump in arbitration though I can't for the life of me figure out why.
Lolich agrees to a 7 year deal worth $190K per season. Fergie Jenkins agrees to a 7 year deal at $150K per season. So this saves us a lot of money but we are still way over budget.
We move RP Bill Smith, C Cam Carreon & SS Dick Barone to the Dodgers for a middling 2B prospect just to save the $36K in salary.
The Red Sox offer us $123K for Carl Bouldin and we take it without letting our buttholes blink.
We don't want to move Vada Pinson but we have so much money tied up in our offense already that we entertain offers, and they are good offers. In the end the Indians package that includes 23 year old 3B Ron Santo, 24 year old LF Carl Yastrzemski and 19 year old 1B Gomer Hodge is too good to pass up.
The Boston Braves have moved to Atlanta and the St. Louis Browns have moved to Kansas City and have been renamed the Royals.
We enter the season a fairly unknown quantity. I know Lolich & Jenkins are stud, and that our 3-5 starts should be good, but they are untested. Our pen should be sharp as we've converted a couple starters and I think they'll do a good job.
Our lineup should still be strong but losing Pinson will hurt us. We'll move Javier back to the top of the order, bat Brooks Robinson 3rd and rely more on a maturing Hank Aaron. Manny Mota will patrol CF while Yaz and Lou Johnson platoon in LF.
Thing about this team is, after a few years of making a nice profit, we're way over budget now. We have a window of at least 2-3 years before money becomes an issue but it'd be nice to win if we're gonna lose money.