Generous Opportunities - The Miami Hurricane
Mar 19, 2024 7:51:56 GMT -5
Texas Rangers, Commish_Ron, and 1 more like this
Post by sansterre - Milwaukee Brewers on Mar 19, 2024 7:51:56 GMT -5
Miami has had a fairly rough history over the last 30 years.
From 2040 to 2052 they had a thirteen year streak of disappointment, with a single season above 72 wins in that entire span. Then they strung together three straight 90+ win seasons, all of which got them to the playoffs, and in none of which did they win a single series. They then put up a pair of 87 win seasons, both of which fell just short of the playoffs, and then a thirteen year streak from 2058 to 2070 of seasons that averaged in the low-mid 70s for wins. This most recent season they won 73 games and finished 23rd in Team WAR.
So Miami's a struggling team on a rebuild?
Not exactly.
Not exactly.
Miami's budget is 8th in the league, at $190M. "Okay," I hear you say, "what was it before this bad run?" Funny you should ask.
In 2066, Miami was 21st in Budget at $164M and 19th in Revenue.
In 2067, Miami was 9th in Budget at $190M and . . . 20th in Revenue.
So what the heck happened? Their current owner shows a "Generous and Patient" personality - my guess is that something terrible happened to their owner, and he was replaced by someone who loves nothing more than writing checks. So Miami, despite their reasonably poor track record, is actually a pretty plush budget team right now.
So has their current GM bumped their payroll to match?
Not even a little bit. Miami has the 12th lowest payroll in the league, but this makes them the 2nd *least* leveraged team in the PBL right now (behind Oakland). Miami has money, but it's all (presumably) being plowed into draftees, player development, IAFA and International Scouting.
On their major league roster, the team had zero players who put up more than 3 WAR last year. They're a straight up mediocre team across the board.
But what does the future hold?
Their AAA has a few ML-ready arms, from Ray Hopf (24 years old, 7/9/6 now, 9/9/6 potential) and Raul Romero (9/6/6). And their overall farm system?
Take it with a grain of salt, but the game thinks that they have the 3rd best farm system right now, with Hopf and Dan Ashley in low A (22 years old, 6/4/5 now but with 10/6/8 potential) leading the group.
There's no reason to think that Miami is going to make a leap this year. Or even next year. But they've got a pretty solid amount of talent to work with, a strong GM in Nick Pickard (since 2067) and a generous owner who keeps their budget high even when they're not winning.
When Miami decides to push its chips into the pot, it'll be able to do so. Hard. Between their strong prospects and the $100M sitting in reserve to be thrown at rounding out the team, when Miami makes their move it should be considerable.
But when will that be? Probably not for another several years, but don't be surprised if Miami makes a strong playoff push within the next 5 years. And if they do so successfully, their budget won't stay at $190M, it'll go up. There's a non-zero chance that Miami could be a serious player in the pennant race of the NL for some time if their rebuild hits on all cylinders.
All we can do now is wait and see. And brace for landfall.
All we can do now is wait and see. And brace for landfall.