General Manager Notes: False start to the 2107 season
It can't be over after 4 games, right?

Let's break the bad news first:

European Division
1. Gothenburg 4-1
2. Bordeaux 3-2
3. Paris 2-2
4. Maassluis 1-3

How did we get there?

Our season started in Gothenburg, quite possibly the toughest game on the schedule. The kind of game that if we win it, we have an edge in the tie-breakers, but if we lose, we can make up for it in the remaining 15 games. Fully anticipating on a closely contested game, the team completely let me down. Even 3 interceptions of the Giants' quarterback's throws were far from sufficient to prevent a 29-3 clobbering. QB Evan Drake was held to 177 passing yards. Our running back duo ran way too little for what our game plan should instill combining for just 16 carries for 33 rushing yards.

We continued with an awkward 31-19 victory over the Kansas Creationist. As our opponents wrongfully though it was a good idea to throw the ball 70 times in a single game, the defense didn't break, while the offense could barely make much ground simply because of the short field advantage we created. QB Evan Drake threw for just 166 yards, with touchdowns to his All IHOF caliber duo WR Calvin Maxwell and TE Garrett Alcala. RB Bennett Holmes added a touchdown on the ground, while DT Gabriel Morris accounted for a defensive touchdown on a fumble return.

With the chances in hand to improved to 2-1, we fumbled into a 24-17 loss at the Houston Mustangs. We heavily dominated the field position battle, but were somehow too incompetent to turn that into points. QB Evan Drake threw for 250 yards with touchdowns to WR Vinny Buysse and TE Garret Alcala.

And then we went into a classic battle with the Tucker Tigers, sporting a 3-0 record and the defending IHOF champions, interestingly enough favored to win based on the home field advantage. Alas, the defense decided to play the worst they could possibly play and embarrassed themselves by giving up 527 total yards. Combined with ill timed turnovers, it was insufficient for the offense to keep in pace and eventually it was all to no avail. QB Evan Drake threw for 362 yards with 2 touchdowns to TE Garret Alcala. WR Calvin Maxwell had 149 yards receiving. RB Bennett Holmes added a rushing touchdown.

Sitting 1-3 after an even number of home and road games means we're at least 1 game behind .500 pace. Sure, we played 2 of our toughest games already and lost at the third division leading team, but the truly bad news is that QB Evan Drake got hurt on the last play of the game against Tucker and is likely to miss our next 3 games. Our running game has been disappointing, our pass defense bad with the pass rush being extremely way below ability. No where to go up, but quite honestly I'm not yet convinced QB Monty Truitt can be a world beater. If he wins a game for us, it would be a novelty, as he was unable to lead us to victory in his first two full and one half games last season.


Lastly, I haven't mentioned which players did and which did not make our 53 men roster. The final series of cuts saw us forced to let go of fourth year DE Aiden Preston and LB Stephen Rhodes, third year WR Teddy Butler and rookies QB Allen Knott, RB Gino Blades and WR Shaun Randle, and veteran free agent off-season signing CB Herb Duffy.

Preston spent 3 seasons on roster, seeing limited action in his rookie season (and only that season). 2107 was supposed to be his season of breakthrough, but he was extremely out of shape after mid-pre-season and with his pass rush speed severely declined, he was not going to make the team.

Rhodes was supposed to make the team if Preston was going to fall apart, but Rhodes looked out of shape at mid-pre-season as well. Out of nowhere was the then undrafted rookie a starter on our supposed to be solid defense in 2014. In limited action in 2105 he proved to be a very solid pass rusher, but somehow he never convinced me that his on field performance was good enough to make him play at DE despite his apparent inability to position switch from LB to DE. He could still work okay-ish elsewhere in a 3-4 outside rusher.

Knott didn't improve enough to unseat Monty Truitt as our QB2. Blades played okay-ish, but looked far from capable of playing better than our first name lacking veteran Van Goodwin. Shaun Randle lacked the special teams skills. Duffy could have made the team as a potential nickelback with superior zone defense skills, but I decided to stick with our cohesive bunch of inferior cornerbacks. Shockingly, Duffy has not been signed elsewhere, despite that he's undoubtfully very talented. Butler had been our WR3 for the last season and a bit, but his lack of route running skills made me decide to go with our other WR3 candidates Rick Emerson, Alfredo Samuels, Herman Jeffries and the winner of this battle undrafted rookie Preston Gray. Butler already found a new home with the Rochester Razorbacks.

General Manager Notes: Back in business?
Or how the surprisingly better than rated Monty Truitt played well enough to keep us alive.

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 4-3
2. Bordeaux 4-3
3. Maassluis 3-4
4. Paris 2-5

The Giants have lost a couple of road games and dropped to a game above .500, while the Vineyards are moving up and down in their efforts to overcome their 41-0 loss at Gothenburg. Paris has lost the last 3 straight, not scoring a touchdown in their last two games. It gave us the opportunity to sneak back into the division title race.

Although it didn't feel that way after we returned home from a 23-10 loss at the Augusta Greenjackets. QB Monty Truitt was held to 121 yards passing, struggling to connect with the tight ends all game long. On the other end of things, the hottest running back in the league right now, Ted Meza, ran for 256 yards on us scoring the Greenjackets two touchdowns. RB Van Goodwin pounded our only touchdown in.

And then we got our confidence boosting 34-9 victory over the Paris Musketeers. The total yardage figures were misleading as we dominated the field position, starting our drives on average at the Paris 46-yard line. QB Monty Truitt played acceptable, throwing for 199 yards with touchdown passes to TE Wesley Martin and WR Vinny Buysse, who finally returned back to the land of 100-yard receivers after 2 full seasons without. RB Van Goodwin made the other two touchdowns.

The winning streak improved by 100% with a 41-23 victory over the Snapfinger Jazz. We were 17-0 before the fans even realized it as CB Dennis Finley had one of his special punt return touchdowns (a 89-yarder), which was followed up by a field goal after Snapfinger fumbled on their kickoff return and another fumble on their first play from scrimmage after the next kickoff return, we had gained only 38 total yards. From there on, it was cruising on, albeit the defense decided to vanish again, allowing a 200-yard rusher. QB Monty Truitt threw for 266 yards with touchdowns to WR Calvin Maxwell (twice, while gaining 139 yards for the game) and WR Vinny Buysse. RB Van Goodwin scored yet another rushing touchdown.

Next up? A visit to Bordeaux. A chance to continue the comeback to the race for the playoffs tickets. QB Evan Drake is cleared to play. He was questionable already for the Snapfinger game, but it felt too risky to let Drake play with that kind of injury that could quickly aggravate and put him out for more games. I believe we have a stronger team, but we'll have to up our game to prove it. Especially on the road. So, team, the last two games were good, but we need a little bit more to make this turn into a 3-game winning streak.

General Manager Notes: The division ship has sailed
But we're still clinging onto a wild card life boat.

Our struggles in the early part of the season are turning into a false start. We bounced back with a silly 27-22 victory at the Orlando Talons. The silliness wasn't the victory itself, but rather the non-sensical comeback they almost pulled off after they switched to their backup quarterback. Well, almost, they went from 27-6 down to 27-22 down with 43 seconds to go, it was over after we recovered the onside kick. QB Evan Drake struggled to 186 passing yards, throwing a touchdown to FB Randy Julian. RB Bennett Holmes ran for 139 yards and 2 touchdowns, including a phenomenal 91-yarder that resulted in the Talons' raise of the white flag.

The game of the season, at home against the Gothenburg Giants, ended up in a close battle. Once again we failed to make their quarterback look like the mediocre quarterback he's supposed to be, allowing him to throw for 351 yards. Our run defense was surprisingly fine, forcing their hand in a way. On our side, a late game interception destroyed our chance to tie it up. Our field goal to make it 24-17 (in Gothenburg advantage) came way too late to make it happen. QB Evan Drake threw for 284 yards, with a touchdown pass to WR Calvin Maxwell, who lead the receiving with 125 yards on just 5 catches. RB Van Goodwin added another rushing touchdown.

We bounced back again with a smooth 20-17 road victory at the Chicago Norsemen. Oscar Harrington kicked the game winner in the dying seconds shortly after we forced a crucial fumble, but we should have never let it come to that after a 17-6 lead at half time. QB Evan Drake threw for 272 yards with 2 touchdowns to our star WR Calvin Maxwell, who gained 176 yards on 5 catches, with the lion share coming on a 66-yard touchdown.

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 8-3
2. Maassluis 6-5
3. Bordeaux 6-5
4, Paris 3-8

The Giants swept us, the division title is no longer a realistic goal. The wild card race is incredibly tight, so, let's take a rare quick look at the situation at the moment in the AOC:

1. Tucker 11-0
2. Fort Wayne 8-3
3. Gothenburg 8-3
4. Toronto 6-4-1
5. San Antonio 7-4
6. Houston 6-5
7. Maassluis 6-5
8. Bordeaux 6-5
9. Atlanta 5-5-1
10. Rochester 5-5-1
11. Harlem 4-6-1
12. North Plainfield 4-7
13. Augusta 4-7
14. Orlando 4-7
15. Paris 3-8
16. Snapfinger 2-9

Yeah, tight and way too early to think about it. We just need to keep winning our games and we should be good to go. The annoying part is that we probably have the easiest schedule of all the teams in that race and, well, I have bad memories about "should be" situations.

So? One game at a time. Starting with a challenging home game against the North Plainfield Plague, a franchise that we loath to play as they've been stellar in playing spoiler in the rare seasons where they don't play well while we do. S Daniel Shapiro is still out with a broken fibula. Yes, he ended his holdout and as soon as he returned, we won 3 games straight. The rest of the team is good to go, with a couple with minor pains, but too little to be worrisome. We should go out there and win this game. To make it happen, we need to play up to our ability, which is something we've really struggled with. Maybe getting rookie LB Avery Distel more involved in our defense and pass rush in particular will help?

General Manager Notes: 2107 roster or why is that guy on the team?

As a general manager in this game, one of the crucial decision making moments is the cut down to 53 players for the regular season. The timing is a bit weird, because we're about 2/3rd into the regular season, but I still think it's worth looking over the roster that we had for opening day and explain why each player is on the team this season. The added bonus for me is to already make an evaluation on whether I made the right choices or not.

Let's go over the no-brainers first, the required slots:
QB Evan Drake, our QB1
QB Monty Truitt, our QB2 and potential future starter
RB Bennett Holmes, our RB1
RB Van Goodwin, our RB2
FB Randy Julian, our FB (and 3rd RB/FB)
TE Garrett Alcala, our TE1
TE Wesley Martin, our TE2
TE Nicholas Heath, our TE3
WR Calvin Maxwell, our WR1
WR Vinny Buysse, our WR2
WR Preston Gray, our WR3
WR Herman Jeffries, our KR2 and a second special teams WR
C Zane Chaplain, our starting C
C Lincoln Stonge, our run blocking backup C/G
G Andres Uwaezuoka, our starting RG
G Brett Stickney, our starting LG
LT Harold Gruenwalder, our starting LT
RT Ivan Dole, our starting RT
LT Roosevelt Dumrauf, our backup LT
P Jimmy Summers
K Oscar Harrington
DE Andres Harmon, our all-round DE
DE Damien Fletcher, our pass rush DE
DT Gabriel Morris, our star DT
DT Mitch Potchynok, our pass rushing DT
DE Deon Rosas, second pass rushing DE
DE Robbie Dobreski, fourth DE, another pass rusher
ILB Gus Coleman, our WLB
ILB Abraham Desimone, our MLB
OLB Tony Burks, our SLB
OLB Mack Pang, elite special teamer
ILB Mo Fausel, elite special teamer
CB Logan Wallace, shutdown CB1
CB Joel Delgado, shutdown CB2
CB Dennis Finley, elite PR
S Craig Clancy, our starting SS until Shapiro stops holding out
S John Aponte, our FS or nickelback
S Daniel Shapiro, our SS (was still holding out in pre-season)
S Lincoln Taylor, our backup S until Shapiro returns
LS Bennett Brock

That's still only 40 players, so let's look it the remaining 13 players.

QB Drake Bishop, mentor to Truitt, elite KH. I keep him inactive when Evan Drake starts, because the staff will otherwise make Bishop our QB2 ahead of Truitt, which I really don't want to happen. But in the games where Evan Drake was hurt, Bishop was forced to be active and also allowed to show his elite kick holding skills.

RB Marcus Jorg, our fourth RB/FB, because it's likely we'll need an injury replacement at some point. He's inactive because of lack of special teams skills. RB Goodwin and FB Julian are good enough special teamers and as long timers on team will play closer to a 85-rated than the 70-rated special teamers they are scouted at.

TE Darnell McKie, our 4th TE. We've seen plenty of injuries at this position to want to keep a 4th guy on team. McKie lost some of his skills, but remains decent enough of a 3rd down option and special teamer, with a cohesion boost.

WR Rick Emerson, made the team as our 3rd special teamer from the WR slot, but more importantly, at WR3 or WR4 he can make a cohesion boost. Last season he showed he can play up to WR2 quality if forced into action.

WR Alfredo Samuels, fair to be considered to be a bust, but releasing him would accelerate the signing bonus too much, making him a cap liability. If need be, he could jump in as a special teams WR, but he's clearly behind Maxwell, Jeffries and Emerson there.

G Nathaniel Robbins, it's smart to go into the season with 8 OL players. I'm confident in my backup C to act as backup G, but Robbins' added value is mentoring 2nd year Uwaezuoka. If need be, Robbins is good enough as a run blocker to play it RG.

DT Harvey Chiu, looks still okay-ish enough to potentially become a pass rushing DT. A lot of ifs, I confess. He's also one of our better special teamers at DL, which means he can keep the other guys that play on defense from getting exhausted. In the first 10 games he was actually part of the passing downs unit.

DT Sherman Cassanova, quite possibly the most disputed guy whether he's good enough. If his pass rush potential is true, we can still use him. Ideally he'd get some active roster time to grow, but we lack the mentor to make him improve and Cassanova lacks special team skills to make him part of that unit. He's quite likely a player that keeps an inactive slot occupied for 2 or 3 seasons and then gets cut. It would have been better to get a mentor DT for Chiu, but we lacked the cap space to hire one, if there actually was one out there to begin with.

LB Avery Distel is our third special teams LB, but lately I've switched him from ILB to OLB so he can jump onto the pass rush group at DE. This kid can also play pass defense, he's actually our LB4 as well.

CB Sherman Barnes keeps the locker room troubles away on the secondary. Yes, he's in part here because he's a leader. His skills otherwise are decent enough to actually not look bad when forced into action as running downs CB and actually is one of our special teamers out of the secondary.

CB Eduardo Cowdrick is solid enough to be a nickel or dimeback and special teamer. As a longtimer is more useful than a guy like Herb Duffy that we cut, despite that Duffy was the superior zone defender.

CB Wesley Cabrera is good enough to play a nickel or dimeback role. Okay enough to play special teams. Also our 3rd option at KR. As a longtimer is more useful than a guy like Herb Duffy that we cut, despite that Duffy was the superior zone defender.

S Jonathan White has awesome excellent zone defense potential, so he's well worth keeping around. Until Shapiro stopped his hold out, we tried to work him in as the alternate for draft bust Taylor, but as a rookie he's not quite the right play just yet. Next season he will be though. If he wants to re-sign with us.

General Manager Notes: Another season down the drain
If only we knew how we broke things...

The Maassluis Merchantmen will not be amongst the 12 teams still standing after the conclusion of the regular season. We wasted our opportunities in the close game, resulting in a very underwhelming 9-7 regular season campaign. Let's recap the last 5 games of the regular season to run down how we ended up there.

In a home game against the struggling North Plainfield Plague (4-7) we failed to make the best of our chances as we lost 20-19. A couple of 40-yard-ish runs for touchdowns put us down by 7 at the end of the first quarter. A missed extra point in the third quarter came back to haunt us, meaning we kicked a field goal to trim the deficit from 4 to 1, rather than making it a tie game with 5 minutes to go. We even drove downfield in the final minute, but didn't get close enough to attempt a potential game winning field goal. QB Evan Drake threw for 233 yards with touchdown passes to TE Garrett Alcala and WR Vinny Buysse.

The we bounced back with a 20-17 victory at the Arizona Miners. The defense once again let an inferior offense go wild on us, running for 219 yards with 6.6 per carry, in particular their quarterback getting 105 yards on 10 scrambles, but winning the turnover battle 5-0 flipped the coin just enough to make it fair to say that we were the better team regardless. Our inability to pound the ball in almost cost us, as we settled for field goals no less than 4 times. QB Evan Drake threw for 264 yards, RB Bennett Holmes was credited for our sole touchdown of the day.

And then the season came down to a must-win home game against the Bordeaux Vineyards, hot on our tail for the race to the final wild card. In a shoutout that entertained the neutral football fans. For most of the game, our defense had little answer to Bordeaux' off-season singing QB Johnathan Freeman. After a fantastic third quarter 82-yard run by Van Goodwin, we took the lead for the first time, but as we way to quickly saw that turn into a 7-point deficit, a nervous fourth quarter saw neither offense do anything impressive, despite that we had our chances as we finally started getting our usual field position advantage. End result 38-31 loss that although not mathematically, it mentally finished our season there and then. QB Evan Drake threw for 271 yards with touchdown passes to TE Garrett Alcala (twice) and TE Wesley Martin. RB Van Goodwin added up to 109 rushing yards and aforementioned touchdown.

In our final home game of the season, a 31-6 drubbing of the Iowa Cobbers was insufficient to keep our playoffs chances alive as elsewhere in the league other teams maintained their 1.5 win lead over us. The score was arguably even lower than we should have made it add up to ass we outgained Iowa 496 yards to 223 yards combined with a 15-yard advantage in the field position battle. A couple of missed field goal didn't help, maybe. QB Evan Drake threw for 353 yards with touchdown passes to WR Calvin Maxwell (twice) and TE Wesley Martin. Maxwell was the only player with a 100-yard performance, gaining 108 yards receiving. RB Bennett Holmes scored the fourth touchdown for us.

The season ended with another disappointing performance from our defense, but we did more than on special teams to hand our offense a 23-yard field position advantage, to turn it into a well deserved 32-17 victory. QB Evan Drake threw for 235 yards, with a touchdown pass TE Garett Alcala. RB Bennett Holmes ran for a score, while WR Calvin Maxwell scored on an 85-yard kickoff return. LB Gus Coleman continued a streak, making it 3 games straight with an interception.

European Division 2107, final
1. Gothenburg 11-5
2. Bordeaux 9-7
3. Maassluis 9-7
4. Paris 5-11

Gothenburg closed out the season with a 41-34 victory at Bordeaux, kicking the latter out of the playoffs as the Rochester Razorbacks snuck into the last wild card at 9-6-1 despite their own week 17 loss. Gothenburg swept the division, including their impressive home victories against Bordeaux (41-0) and against us (29-3). Bordeaux still finished ahead of us as well based on their stronger strength of schedule (yeah, we finished level on strength of victory with each a very underwhelming 53.5). To be fair, both Bordeaux and us posted those 7 of the 8 non-head-to-head wins against teams with a 6-10 or worse record. The only playoffs team we (both) beat are the Chicago Norsemen (8-7-1), who ended up being the least underwhelming team in the worst division in the league (we both swept that division).

Overall, we scored more points than half the 12 playoffs teams, but also allowed more points than 10 of them. I mean, let's look at where we shape up compared to the entire league.

We finish the season with the offense ranking:
7th in points scored
12th in total yards
12th in yards per pass attempt (10th in passing yards per game)
4th in yards per carry (15th in rushing yards per game)

The defense ranked:
32nd in yards allowed
tied 18th/19th in points allowed
23rd in yards per pass attempt (31st in passing yards per game)
tied 27th/28th in yards per carry (30th in rushing yards per game)

We finished the season with a +6 turnover margin (tied for 6th/7th), with unarguably the best overall team in return yards (both gained and allowed). Our red zone defense was actually quite efficient, ranking tied for 1st/3rd in least points allowed per visit, with 23 touchdowns allowed in 56 visits. In return, our red zone offense was mediocre and what really jumps out to me is how unMerchantmen worthy our pass rush has been, despite the perceived talent on the defense.

QB Evan Drake finished this season in the middle of the pack of all starting quarterbacks, falling very far below the desired 4K mark with just 3,249 yards in 13 games. Would he have gained 250 per game in the three he missed? Arguably. His 21:18 touchdown to interception ratio was playoffs unworthy. WR Calvin Maxwell finished 6th in the league with 1,268 receiving yards. TE Garrett Alcala came 44 yards short of the 1K-mark. Both scored 9 receiving touchdowns. QB Monty Truitt played admirably well enough to give him another look next off-season and pre-season about whether he's ready and capable of taking over.

As mentioned earlier, the running game has notoriously improved. Neither RB Bennett Holmes or RB Van Goodwin broke the 1K-mark, but as a duo they had the best season we've had from our RB duos in years. I'm confident enough to say that they outperformed the Lost Cause Ken Torphy. Speaking of him, he spent the entire season as a free agent after the Texas Sharks cut him right after training camp. But I didn't mean just this season, we never managed to get to see Torphy to take off for a 1500-yard season or so, despite his support cast. 4 of our 5 starting linemen had between 27 and 30 key run blocks, which is quite astonishing. Only LT Harold Gruenwalder was (unsurprisinly) at roughly half of that.

It should came as no surprise that I do not believe in individual accolades, in particular on defense, as I strongly believe that one player's good numbers is a result of the entire unit playing well. Or sometimes even a result of the whole unit struggling. That said, both LB Gus Coleman and LB Abraham Desimone finished in the top7 of the league with far above 100 tackles. Our sacks leader was quite the disappointment with just 5.0, remember that as recently as last season we had 6 players at or far above that number. LB Coleman also lead our team with 5 interceptions.

Calvin Maxwell was the league's leading kickoff returner (including 2 touchdowns), while Dennis Finley dropped back to 3rd best. K Oscar Harrington missed 5 field goals and 2 extra points, which for a mediocre kicker would be acceptable, but we all know that this guy is touted as the best in the league. It's fair to say that had he lived up to it, we would have finished the season with at least 1 additional victory and would still be in the race for the 2107 IHOF championship. P Jimmy Summers probably did well, I suppose.

All that said, we'll have no choice but to take a peak at the next page, which will reveal the start of a new chapter: the 2108 season. We'll be heading into it with 43 players signed and roughly $105M over the cap (pending retirements). That's not taking into account that we have a lot of draft picks, including the 1.17 pick, Gothenburg's 1st (somewhere between picks 1.25 and 1.32), picks 2.2, (from Brooklyn), 2.4 (North Plainfield) and 2.3 or 2.5 (from Paris), our own 2.20, Gothenburg's 2nd (between 2.25 and 2.32), 3.19 and Rochester's 3rd (between 3.21 and 3.32). We also have our 5th, 6th and 7th rounders. Most importantly, we have 5 of the top 37 picks in the upcoming draft. Yikes. Or lost of fun! Least go with the latter!

Indeed, time to turn he page.

Vinny Buysse retires

The verdict is out, Vinny Buysse today announced his retirement from professional football. The Maassluis Merchantmen wide receiver bids farewell after 10 seasons in the International House of Football.

Buysse was selected 7th overall in the 2098 draft, shortly after the Merchantmen traded up to that slot, giving the #18 and #20 overall picks to the Chesapeake Chitterlings. The additional first round pick was a result of trading the #15 overall in 2097 to the Arizona Miners for their 2098 first round pick. He became the fourth wide receiver taken that draft and one of nine in that first round.

Buysse landed in a tough spot, with the struggling quarterback Earnest Ashley unable to connect with Buysse. In 2099, Buysse was joined by fellow first round wide receiver Calvin Maxwell. That season, Buysse impressed with 112 receptions for 1,251 yards as the leading receiver in Maassluis. In 2100 roles flipped as Maxwell became the clear WR1 and Buysse didn't reach the 1,000-yard mark for two straight seasons. In 2102 Buysse bounced back with 1,129 yards.

In 2103 Buysse improved to 1,297 yards receiving after the departure of running back Ken Torphy, dubbed the Lost Cause in Maassluis, but more importantly the arrival of future hall of fame quarterback Winfred England. The arrival of quarterback Evan Drake in 2104 worked well for Buysse as he jumped ahead of Maxwell as the top receiver with 1,196 yards. In the last three seasons Buysse's decline set in, combined with the emergence of tight end Garrett Alcala as a viable receiving option, as Buysse peaked at 713 yards receiving last season.

At the time of retirement, Buysse leads his draft class in career receiving yards, but that's unlikely to hold ground as the two in pursuit are less than 150 yards behind. For the Merchantmen, Buysse ranks 9th in receptions and 10th in receiving yards (9,468 yards) and 12th in receiving touchdowns (51). Buysse will go out as a premier member of without a doubt the most talented offense in Merchantmen history, that completely failed to set their mark on the league as they achieved just one division title and trip to the playoffs.

General Manager Notes: The end if the line

To avoid confusion, with the "end of the line" I'm referring to the retirement of a couple of former Merchantmen players that didn't play their final season in orange white and blue, but will go out regarded as Merchantmen.

G Nickolas Toler filled out his retirement papers after 11 season in the IHOF. A first round pick for us in 2096, he came into the starting lineup mid-way into that rookie campaign and remained to be an undisputed starter for us. Touted as a very good run blocker, on top of being an excellent pass protector, somehow the running game never really got going with Toler and the talented foursome around him (more on that later). In an attempt to get under the salary cap, Toler and his fellow starting linemen were all released in the 2102 off-season. Toler found his new home with the Paris Musketeers right before training camp 2102 and hung around for 2 regular season campaigns, until being released shortly before training camp 2104. The Moontown Darksiders picked Toler up just in time for camp, but over there he rode the bench for 4 seasons, seeing most of his action on special teams. He was out of contract going into this off-season and decided it was enough at the age of 35.


G Roger Staigvil steps away from playing football after 10 seasons in the IHOF. As a high second round pick for the Merchantmen in 2097, he became a starter late in his rookie season. Despite regarded as an excellent run blocker, Staigvil and his fellow linemen failed to impress the league with their talent. In the 2102 off-season, as salary cap woes haunted the Merchantmen locker room, Staigvil was amongst the five starting linemen that were sent the door. Mid-way into the 2102 season, the Outer Banks Ospreys gave him a second chance. In the 2103 off-season he signed a 4-year deal with the Hanalei Dragons, where he was an undisputed starter and finally showed his run blocking skills with 47 key run blocks and All-IHOF second team honors in 2105. In 2107 he initially signed with the Chesapeake Chitterlings, but he didn't survive the post-training camp cuts there and didn't find a new team afterwards.


The retirement of Toler and Staigvil completes the retirement of the entire offensive line that was cut in the 2102 off-season. C Robbie Zinn retired as a free agent in the 2107 off-season after post-Maassluis stints in Harlem and Bordeaux. LT Isaac Delgado retired in the 2107 off-season after an injury plagued 2106 season, ending his career in Fairbanks after a stint in Atlanta. LT Johnny Houston retired much earlier in the 2103 off-season after no team offered him a second chance. All five were initially drafted by the Maassluis (Zinn in 2093, Houston and Delgado in 2094) Merchantmen and played together since Staigvil's emergence during the 2097 season.


RB Ken Torphy's retirement can't go by unnoticed either. Selected 6th overall in the 2099 draft as we mortgaged our 2100 and 2101 drafts to get there, we thought we had the offense to blow everybody in the league away. From behind aforementioned offensive linemen and with QB Earnest Ashley throwing the ball to WR Vinny Buysse and WR Calvin Maxwell - the most talented WR duo in the league and in Merchantmen history -, we thought Torphy was the missing piece to get this team really going. After 8-8, 6-10 and 5-11 campaigns, not only had the best Merchantmen offense ever assembled completely failed, the window of opportunity was about to close due to a serious cap hell situation. We decided to sacrifice the offensive line and stick with our quarterback and running back, but in retrospect the other way around would have been wiser. Ashley never lived up to top10 level hype and Torphy's top5 talent awesomeness never became truly visible.

In his first three seasons here, Torphy ran for 1,178, 1,312 and 1,388 yards, with his best per carry average at 4.3. He was a guarantee for 500 yards receiving as well, making him a top10 yards from scrimmage work horse in those season. Torphy also combined for 36 touchdowns in those seasons, even finishing 2nd in touchdowns scored in the league in 2100 with 18 scores. In the 2102 off-season, contract negotiations consistently failed as Torphy didn't want as much money as we offered, he kept insisting on being paid less, yet at the same time demanded us to release basically everybody else on the team. We decided to let him play out his contract, which turned into an abysmal 2102 season: 848 yard rushing with 2.77 per carry, 410 yards receiving, 6 total touchdowns. I dubbed him "The Lost Cause" after this season where he proved incapable of doing anything without a strong line.

In the 2103 off-season we were outbid by the Paris Musketeers in the 2103 off-season as they were willing to offer him $134M over 3 years. Still less than we offered in the 2102 off-season, but "c'est la vie". Over in Paris, Torphy had a fine first season (1,384 yards rushing with 4.64 per carry), but right after his decline set in as he got caught in a change of pace role. In 2106 he got a career extension with the Texas Sharks, where he signed a 3-year deal. He played a backup rol there and that stint got cut short to just 1 season: right after training camp 2107, the Sharks cut Torphy. No other team showed any interest in him and this off-season Torphy decided to give up. Torphy retires with 8,202 rushing yards (3.85 per carry), 2,987 receiving yards and 61 total touchdowns. At the moment of his retirement, Torphy ranks 17th in career rushing yards for the Merchantmen and ties for 25th with 42 total touchdowns, being in good company with RB Walt Blair and WR George Stuckey.

General Manager Notes: What a draft
5 pick in the top37, this better be a good class!

Oh boy, oh boy. What a weird off-season it has been. We started it with a serious cap situation, being projected at $149M over the cap. But after a chunk of renegotiations, we were almost out of it. With a lot of draft picks in the first and second round, there was a lot of cap space reserved for that as well. But, we've managed, almost. From the roster of 2107, we're down a couple of players, which I will break down first.

TE Nicholas Heath (rated 50/50) signed with the Toronto Lake Monsters. The kid is very talented, but this former 5th round pick was stuck as our TE3 behind the awesome duo of Garrett Alcala and Wesley Martin. It might have made more sense to try to keep Heath and sacrifice Martin, which I think initially was the plan, but I was expecting Heath to be a heavily sought after player, not expecting him to sign elsewhere for a very modest $6M cap figure. We have TE Darnell McKie as an emergency option and to fill the gap , we picked a rookie (more on that later).

WR Vinny Buysse retired and you can read the praise on him and the sadness of missed opportunities elsewhere.

WR Alfredo Samuels (rated 35/45) is officially still on roster, but we agreed terms for a trade with the Augusta Greenjackets to give him a new home after 2 seasons of being regarded as a 1st round busts that we only used on special teams and not even that regularly either. It wasn't a quick deal though, given that the loss of Buysse meant that we might end up with only 2 WR still signed (more on that later).

C Lincoln Stonge (rated 45/45) for several seasons was our center, but basically a placeholder until a better guy came around and we've given Zane Chaplain the job. It does mean that we'll have to wade through the scrap heap for an affordable backup, just to have 2 centers on roster. Or we take some risks this season and go into the season with just 1 center.

DE Damien Fletcher (rated 55/55) agreed terms to much, much, much less than he desired as he signed with the Outer Banks Ospreys. He was a bit on the decline, but mostly it was becoming unaffordable to keep 4 defensive ends aged 30+. Although the most talented one, we let the oldest guy walk away and drafted a new defensive end and defensive tackle.

LB Tony Burks (rated 50/50) is technically still on roster, but to get under the cap we had to sacrifice somebody on the defense and I chose to keep Abraham Desimone over Burks. We covered this loss by picking a linebacker in the draft.

S Daniel Shapiro (rated 45/45) barely played last season after a hold out and it resulted in us not trying to re-sign him. He chose the Fairbanks Northstars as his new home. We basically anticipated on his departure already as we saw recent late finds Crag Clancy and John Aponte grow into being an elite zone defending safety duo, making Shapiro drop to a nickel/dime role already when he returned to the team.

S Johnathan White (rated 25/35) has become an unrestricted free agent after we let the restricted status fly by. He might be a heavily pursued zone defender on the open market, but we will make him a reasonable offer as well, as we might have some cap space to bring him back.


We haven't signed an free agents from other teams, but we have invested some cap space in a couple of players that were out of contract and willing to sign for a bit less than they initially were looking for.

RB Marcus Jorg (rated 25/35) signed a new 2-year deal. He's a second year player and was a restricted free agent. Although he was on our 53-men roster, he didn't get activated in any games in 2107.

FB Randy Julian (rated 40/40) signed a new 2-year deal. He was an unrestricted free agent and turned down an offer from the Colorado Cutthroats to stay with us. We might increase his playing time this season, if he manages to fend of the rookie that we drafted.

WR Preston Gray (rated 40/45) was a restricted free agent. Given that he was basically our WR3 last season, the kid was asking for quite the salary and eventually I caved and decided that he's a promising kid well worth a relatively cheap 4-year deal, I mean, if he proves to be a 1,000-yard receiver...

WR Rick Emerson (rated 30/30) has been a loyal special teamer and WR4 for us recently. We had to scrap from the bottom of the barrel to find the cap space for him, but I think $4.7M for this season is fair enough, with $3M more in signing bonus divided over the next 2 seasons. The salary for the next two seasons are basically inflated figures, but we'll deal with that next off-season.

LT Harold Gruenwalder (rated 45/45) was an unrestricted free agent, but against all odds wasn't pursued by other teams and we managed to bring him back for a 7th season with us. It puts us into a luxury position as we also spent a high pick on a replacement, whom Gruenwalder will end up mentoring regardless of whether he'll remain to be our starter...


Which brings us to the draft class, as I've already hinted on most positions that we invested in them. But on the pile of players, I ended up investing a high second round pick on a player that may not have been pursued by other teams, but sometimes it's worth taking a gamble with a second round pick when your brand new offensive coordinator tells you who he thinks is the best quarterback of his class...

First things first, as no off-season, especially no draft, is complete if there's no Merchantmen trade. We swapped down from the #17 overall pick to the #28 overall pick with the Fort Wayne Fury and essentially got their 1st round pick in 2108 in return. Given that they came out of the blue to go 13-3 last season, we can certainly hope that it was a flash in the pan. But even an 8-8 campaign would leave us with an additional mid 1st round pick to spend. Later on we shipped a pair of 3rd round picks to the Paris Musketeers for their 3rd rounder next season and some miscellanea. So, enough blah blah, we did we end up picking?

1.24 LT Earl McBirney (early rated 15/65)
#20 on our draft board, 2nd lest T, 4th best OL.
Came back as "overrated" after interviews. It didn't shy my away enough from picking him. He's a heavy (335 lbs) pass protector, who can also support the running game. Very green, so a mentor was a must have and it might force our hand to let him sit his rookie season behind Gruenwalder, of flip around a bit and start him at left guard and either bench one four guards or center. A lot can happen in training camp and pre-season, so having 6 starting caliber linemen isn't excessive.

1.28 DE Frank Bernard (early rated 20/80)
#17 on our draft board, #1 DE, #2 DL, #3 DL/LB
With the daunting departure of Fletcher, getting a new defensive end was kind of unavoidable. Bernard brings in a solid dose of both pass rush speed and especially outstanding run stopping and play diagnosis, with the right endurance to use it all. One might say he's even better suited to play DT, but he's got the framework of a DE and it makes much more sense to not mess with that. Especially given what came next.

2.02 DT Efrain Hutchins (early rated 30/70)
#22 on our draft board, #2 DT, #3 DL, #5 LB/DL
Hutchins brings in a solid dose of run stopping and play diagnosis, but also provides excellent pass rush technique and the endurance to be able to play a lot of downs. This guy will be awesome to put on the field next to DT Gabriel Morris (rated 70/70).

2.04 LB Caiden Hastings (early rated 40/70)
#19 on our draft board, #1 LB, #3 DL/LB
Despite having two 100-tackle linebackers, I felt that the unavoidable decline of LB Abraham Desimone or of LB3 Tony Burks would make for a great opportunity to snag this guy up here and in the process make a cap friendly move by releasing one of them soon after (which we will do with the release of Burks). Hasting is an excellent run stopper and plenty of over skills to jump in as the LB2 next to All-IHOF LB Gus Coleman (rated 75/75).

2.05 QB Harrison Singleton (early rated 10/35)
#26 on our draft board, #1 QB
Every decade or so, I end up in a situation where our QB situation is questionable and figure that the cap situation and roster situation are balanced enough to take a gamble with a 2nd round pick on a quarterback. As I mentioned, our offensive coordinator's assessment, combined with my own strengths and weaknesses profile for a quarterback, made him jump to the top of the QB class for us, in what seemed to be a relatively weak class overall. I'm writing that despite that he was the 5th QB taken this draft. What makes Singelton look so interested, despite his perceived overall ability being underwhemling? He comes in with excellent sense rush ability and scramble frequency, combined with excellent timing potential. The big elephant in the room is his intelligence which may have been the reason for his Solecismic Test Score, hinting that he might not be all that great in avoiding interceptions. This might push us into making P Jimmy Summers our holder, keep Drake Bishop as the mentor and force Monty Truitt out of Maassluis. If we can't afford to keep 4 quarterbacks.

2.20 WR Jaylen Gearhart (early rated 30/45)
#46 on our draft board, #6 WR
We interviewed the top5 prospects at his position and initially hoped that enough of them looked great enough to be worth a trade up with all our picks. Four of five guys were taken by pick #6, which meant our trade option in a slot somewhere closely behind that failed to work out, it would have been a bad move. The 5th best WR was available at the #17 pick, but I got worried about WR Edwin Forbes' route running ability and decided to not pick him, but instead make the cap friendlier move to trade down. One of the end results was not having grabbed a WR at all with our 5 high picks, thus making it a bit of a forced move to grab the best left WR at this spot. Gearhart would in ancient times be destined for greatness with his excellent big play ability. In modern days football, he will also need the route running (his potential is very good) and endurance (also very good), combined with at least some additional skills (good courage, maybe?). He'll be in a spot where he could go anywhere from WR2 to WR6 as it looks right now.

4.18 S Noah Matthews (early rated 30/45)
#77 on our draft board, #5 S, #11 CB/S
My sleeper pick was CB CB Clifton Lukins, who got picked 11 slots higher than Matthews, for our new nickel/dime safety project. Lukins could be too light to be able to play safety, which won't be an issue with the massive 6'2" 211 pounds Matthews - if anything, he's too large. Matthews tops this class in intercepting skills, while having the play diagnosis and endurance to be suitable to play a lot of downs.

6.20 TE Ty Rumans (early rated 20/40)
#318 on our draft board, #17 TE
With the unavoidable loss of TE Nicholas Heath, I needed a backup plan and that was to spent a 6th or 7th round pick on a tight end. I looked at one that can play special teams and be good on third downs, with run blocking skills being secondary to that. He might not have much route running skills, but that seems to be less important at his position than it is at WR or RB. We'll likely try to sign some undrafted rookies to battle with Rumans for the roster spot.

7.03 FB Dean Lang (early rated 30/45)
#76 on our draft board, #4 FB
Yeah, we were not going to spent a 1st or 2nd round pick on the impressive FB Louis McIntyre, #4 overall on our draft board, because we just don't use the FB all that much. McIntyre got taken by the Houston Mustangs at slot 2.18, so we had our chances. Lang got picked before we knew whether FB Randy Julian would re-sign with us. Lang isn't very likely to make the team, it seems, as his ability to play special teams is lacking and would be something worthy of a roster spot. His pass blocking and blitz pickup could be solid enough to change on that though.

7.19 WR Perry Madison (early rated 15/35)
#231 on our draft board, #31 WR
Everybody wanted to pick a WR. We did in the mid-late 2nd round and added Madison later on in anticipation of trading WR Alfredo Samuels. Madison in potential is a similarly talented special team, but one that actually does have route running skills to make some catches. Will he make the team? That's questionable as we're already up to 56 players signed with clearly few excess elsewhere on the team.


So, that wrap up a big part of our off-season prior to training camp. There's one important part of it still remaining: the ramble for undrafted rookie free agents. We'll offer contracts to a bunch of them, knowing we can realistically take 14 of them to camp and only 4 of them to pre-season. We'll find out where those efforts end up soon enough...

The 19 of 2102 - before training camp 2108
After a bunch of trades, made during the 2102 draft and several in the off-seasons prior, the Maassluis Merchantmen finished that draft with 19 picks. A long list of young men hoping to win a job in the International House of Football. Joining the Merchantmen is, usually, one of the best chances to stick around in the league, at least on the same team. But with 18 others from the same class, will those odds still be the same? On the other end of things, the Merchantmen swept through their roster throughout that same pre-season and were in dire need of fresh meat. Hence, incoming the 19 of 2102. Tracking down where these kids end up over time became an interesting side story in the long history of IHOF, at minimum of the Merchantmen.

The list of 19 could arguably be considered to be slightly longer (like 33 names long) after including undrafted rookies. Which is fair, because they're still from the same draft class. So, let's list them by pick and after that in order of signing. In the first installment, we mentioned whether these guys made the 2102 regular season roster or not and mentioned any possible position switches. In the second installment, we went go over where they were going into the 2106 off-season and how likely they were to make the regular season roster. And now, in this third installment, we'll see where they are a couple of days before training camp 2108.


1.24 ILB Tony Burks - switched to SLB in 2103
status: free agent to be
The Merchantmen announced the release of Burks after 6 seasons of service. Although he became a starter of sorts as the LB3 on the team, he never lived up to the first round value hype. He's a 50/50 linebacker with 55 run defense, 60 zone defense and 75 play diagnosis, but lacks endurance (25). So, he can play, but wasn't 1st round worthy. He might have the overall skills to be a worthwhile addition for another team, but aged 29, that won't be easy.

2.6 TE Garrett Alcala
status: starting tight end in Maassluis
Alcala has established himself as a premier player at his position. He's a two-time All-IHOF Second Team pick after the game plan had been geared a bit more towards using Alcala. He lead the league in receiving touchdowns in 2105 and had a 1,000-yard season in 2106 and had hnis second 100-catch season in 2107. He's scouted at 60/60, being a 85 run blocker, with 65 endurance. He has clearly exceeded the prior "receiving skills are somewhat lacking" assessment. He goes into training camp 2108 as a 75 getting downfield, 55 big-play and 90 third-down receiver, with 40 route running.

2.13 CB Logan Wallace
status: starting cornerback in Maassluis
Wallace got his pay day recently and getting locked up for a 4-year $120M contract. The Merchantmen see him as an elite shutdown cornerback. Wallace is scouted as a 50/50 cornerback. He's an elite 100 man-to-man defender, with 85 bump-and-run, 40 interceptions and 45 endurance. His zone defense (30), run defense (0) and play diagnosis (25) make him one of those defenders that needs to be slotted in the right places to be effective, which does make it risky to give him $30M/season.

2.24 K Oscar Harrington
status: kicker in Maassluis
He's the elite of kicking, scouted at 90/90 overall. His kicking accuracy (95) and kicking power (100) speak for themselves. His kickoff skills have improved enough to think he can win games for the Merchantmen. Although bitter fans might point to his missed extra point against the North Plainfield Plague last season, but the reality is that in 98 games, he had 3 missed kicks that would have flipped one game from a loss to a win, one from a tie to a win and one from a loss to sending it to overtime.

2.28 CB Zachary Centers - switched to SS
status: retired
Centers has retired, making him the only one of the 2102 draft's top two rounds. He played in 5 games as a rookie and was cut mid-pre-season in 2103. He never got a job elsewhere in the league.

3.5 CB Wesley Cabrera
status: backup on the bubble in Maassluis
This 40/40 cornerback is still on the team, despite being on the bubble several times. His 30 man-to-man and 25 bump-and-run defense are too little to play as a true CB1 or CB2. His zone defense (55) and interceptions (70) are okay enough to have taken the nickel back role. He's also a decent special teamer (60) and the alternate kickoff returner (60). He could be on the bubble again in pre-season 2108...

3.18 RB Rondell Robertson
status: retired
This running back was mostly known for his punt returning skills, despite that his breakaway speed and hole recognition made him a serviceable RB3. After the discovery of CB Dennis Finlay to be potentially the most efficient punt returner in the league (which he did turn out to be) and Robertson's own decline in ability, Robertson was released in pre-season 2106. He found no new team and retired in the 2107 off-season.

4.3 OT Harold Gruenwalder - switched to LT
status: starter in Maassluis
Recently signed a new 3-year deal with the Merchantmen, but after 6 seasons of being the undisputed left tackle, he'll have to battle it out with first round pick Earl McBirney. Either way, he'll be asked to mentor the rookie. Gruenwalder is said to be a 45/45 left tackle, with 65 pass blocking and 70 blocking strength, while his lacking 15 run blocking and 30 endurance mean that he's not a complete lineman.

4.7 G Brett Stickney
status: starter in Maassluis
He has topped at being scouted at 65/65. With his 70 run blocking, 80 pass blocking, 50 blocking strength and 70 endurance, he's obviously a talented offensive lineman. In the last two seasons he improved, as the whole line did, as Stickney posted key run block figures of 25 and 28. Last season he earned game MVP honors in a 34-24 win at the Bordeaux Vineyards after recording 6 key run blocks.

4.23 S Daryl Heath - released in pre-season
status: starter in Capital City
Currently Heath still plays for the Capital City Blues and is still signed through thew 2109 season. Our scouts see him as a 40/40 safety with mostly run defense and play diagnosis. The Blues see him as a starter.

5.2 C Lincoln Stonge
status: free agent
Stonge's stint in Maassluis is about to come to an end as he announced to have no desire to sign a new contract. Over the years, Stonge's role flipflopped from starter to backup to starter and last season back to a backup role. He peaked at 55/55, but prior to training camp 2108 he's rated at 45/45. His 60 run blocking is too low to be an anchorman starting center. Combined with his cohesion value, he would be a solid option as the 4th interior lineman for the Merchantmen, but that ship has sailed. It remains to be seen whether any other team out there would fancy a 29-year old that is quite possibly the 33rd best center in the league.

5.6 LT Salvador Horton
status: retired
Horton is out of football. He was released after 8 games of inactivity in the 2102 season and retired in the 2103 off-season.

5.13 DT Mitch Potchynok
status: backup in Maassluis
Turned into a 40/40 defensive tackle. In 2107 became a starter after many years of time share and barely active backup roles. His 65 pass rush technique, 65 play diagnosis and 60 special teams make him a suitable passing downs option. He has no endurance (0) and his lacking run defense (30) make him no better than such a role. Will have to maintain his level to make the 2108 roster in a crowded D-Line group.

5.23 G Floyd Graham
status: retired
After he was released in the 2103 off-season, the Rochester Razorbacks signed him week 1 to make him a starter for 2 straight season. He missed the 2105 season after he picked up a very serious groin injury late in the 2104 season. Despite being signed through 2108, he was released on the final roster cut day of 2106 and after no other team showed interest in him, he retired in the 2107 off-season.

5.24 OLB Marco Nichols
status: backup in Iowa
Is a 40/40 backup with the Iowa Cobbers. Nichols was cut in pre-season 2103 after a full season of inactivity in Maassluis, then was signed and cut for week 1 by the Toronto Lake Monsters and during the 2103 post-season signed a contract in San Antonio, which had been extended in 2104. In 2105 he was picked up by Iowa as a free agent and got his first playing time in the IHOF. His prime was in 2106 as their LB3, but his playing time declined in 2107. He remains to be a solid zone defender (70) and capable run defender (50).

6.5 S Eduardo Cowdrick - switched to CB
status: backup in Maassluis
Fully developed, Cowdrick has become a 40/40 cornerback. His 55 man-to-man and 50 zone defense are fine, His 70 interceptions make him a reasonable play on passing downs. His 85 endurance could make him a potential all downs player, but his 5 run defense and 40 play diagnosis are lacking for that. He's seeing playing time on defense, mostly in a dime back kind of role, after initially being mostly on the special teams unit.

6.31 TE Raul Milliken - released in pre-season
status: retired
Milliken has retired after being released after 8 games of inactivity in 2102 by and with the Merchantmen.

7.7 WR Rick Emerson
status: backup in Maassluis
Is a 30/30 wide receiver, mostly on roster for his 80 special teams ability. With 50 route running and 35 third-down receiving, he's a viable WR5 option. But due to injuries and retirements, Emerson's cohesion value has made him a solid play as a WR3 in recent seasons. He opened the 2106 season with back-to-back 97-yard performances, but hasn't won confidence from the staff in him to maintain the number of looks into his direction from that short stint as a WR2. Recently won the backup gig over former 1st round pick WR Alfredo Samuels and re-signing Emerson basically forced out former 1st round pick LB Tony Burks.

7.31 CB Steven Van Pelt
status: retired
He was released by Maassluis after 8 weeks of inactivity in the 2102 season. He kept hoping for a second chance, but it never came and he retired in the 2105 off-season.

undrafted QB Wendell DeMeester - released in pre-season
status: retired
Failed to make the 2102 team, is out of football.

undrafted TE Antoine Springer
status: retired
Failed to make the 2103 team, is out of football.

undrafted TE Tanner Sweeney - released after training camp
status: retired
Failed to make the 2102 team, is out of football.

undrafted QB Jay Bates
status: retired
Failed to make the 2103 team, is out of football.

undrafted RB Rod Eafon - released in pre-season
status: retired
Failed to make 2102 team, but is still in the league, without having played a single game. In 2102 released in pre-season by Maassluis, signed by Fort Wayne Fury that opost-season. In 2103 signed and released by Rochester Razorbacks in pre-season, then signed by Augusta Greenjackets in post-season. In 2104 played in 15 games for Augusta, but was released on roster cut day 2105. He retired in the 2106 off-season.

undrafted TE Darnell McKie
status: backup in Maassluis
Arrived and then had a bit of a drop back in the 2105 off-season. He's now now scouted as a 25/25 tight end. Lacks blocking skills (10 run blocking, 10 pass blocking), but besides being a 70 special teamer has proven to be a reliable key downs receiver with his 80 third-down receiving, and his heavily declined, but still acceptable 45 route running and 30 big-play ability. Despite still only 26, he's likely past his peak when he made clutch touchdown catches in 2104. Has been unhappy about playing time for years, but still signed a new contract in the 2107 off-season and if he fends off undrafted rookies in pre-season, he might get another new offer in pre-season. If he beats the rookies, he might even return to the TE3 slot...

undrafted WR Gage Greer
status: retired
Kept waiting in the wings to one day become a WR5/special teamer, but in 3 seasons on roster his activity was limited to just 1 game in 2102. In 2105 was released in the off-season and he retired subsequently this off-season.

undrafted C Stan Cloude - released in pre-season
status: retired
Failed to make the 2102 team, is out of football.

undrafted OT Carson McCormick - switched to LT
status: retired
Has grown into a 40/40 left tackle. Has played right tackle at times, but his 75 pass blocking is much better than his 40 run blocking. Lacks blocking strength (0) and endurance (30). Lost his starting role in 2105, but despite demanding a trade, no other team in IHOF ever showed interest in him. He played a backup role again in 2106, starting 2 games in relief due to injuries, but after he told the Merchantmen he wanted to play elsewhere, despite that no other teams were willing to even try him out, he retired this off-season.

undrafted ILB Mo Fausel
status: backup in Maassluis
At 25/25 is a declining linebacker as he peaked at 45/45. As a 90 special teamer is clearly an important member of that league leading part of the team. Aside from a 50 punishing hitter, lacks other defensive skills to be considered to play on defense.

undrafted CB Kendall Boone - released in pre-season
status: retired
Failed to make the 2102 team, is out of football.

undrafted RB Van Goodwin
status: backup in Maassluis
As a 20/20 running back, one has to wonder why he's still on the Merchantmen. The decline in skills has set in and he's currently scouted at 55 breakaway speed, 45 third-down running, but only 15 hole recognition, 0 route running and 0 endurance. Is a 70 special teamer, so still got his share of action on the special teams unit. But more incredibly, he's coming off a 767 yards, 4.57 yards per carry season, which is a testament on how cohesion can make a difference for a running back. Both were career highs after he was the RB2 in 2103 and 2104 and after he saw no action on the offense throughout the 2105 and 2106 seasons. Will make the team as a special teamer, but might lose his carries to new blood.

undrafted WR Calvin Hancock
status: retired
Peaked at 35/35, but last off-season degraded to a 20/20. As a result, after 3 seasons on special teams, was released in the 2105 off-season. He kept his hopes up throughout the 2106 season, but in the 2107 off-season gave up and retired.

undrafted C Gustavo Hartman
status: retired
Hartman has retired after being released after 8 games of inactivity in 2102 by and with the Merchantmen.


So, out of that long list of 19 drafted and 14 undrafted players, the Merchantmen will take 12 of this class into training camp 2108, while 4 others are still around in other places or the free agents pool.

For the 2108 season, it's likely that TE Alcala, G Stickney and CB Wallace will be undisputed starters. K Harrington could reasonably be lumped into that group as well. RB Goodwin might be used as the RB2 again, depending on whether he holds up well, otherwise sticks on the special teams unit. LT Gruenwalder could start if his replacement turns out to not be ready, but will otherwise stick around to mentor him. DT Potchynok could see playing time on specific downs. TE McKie, WR Emerson, LB Fausel, CB Cabrera and CB Cowdrick will likely stick on the special teams unit, with McKie being the prime suspect to be a potential pre-season roster cuts casualty.

General Manager Notes: Mid-Pre-Season and the 53 men for 2108 are known!

No dillydallying over which 11th defensive lineman to try out for another couple of pre-season games, I made the decisions on our 53 men for 2108 already. We went through a promising training camp and some noteworthy pre-season unpredictability.

Let's try to do this in quick bits first.

First things first: we released LB Tony Burks. He was in his final contract year at a $10M cap figure. I basically announced it already, but it's official now. He hasn't found a new home and I doubt he will in the second part of pre-season. He was a useful LB3 for us and had he not been a 1st round pick, not to be considered a bit of a bust.

Once we cleared cap space, we signed a lot of undrafted rookie free agents for training camp. Let's stick to the names for now, because some have already been cut, so it's too late to get attached to them now. RB Mo Henderson, RB Vincent Rodman, RB Cary Delgado, RB Malachi Byerly, TE Wesley Keener, TE Eric McMillian, TE Jackie Stokes, C Roman Gillespie, C Leo Carrano, C Zack Strickland, LB Alexander Newhart, DT Kelly Kirk, DT Howie Tucker and DT Zachary Abueva were the undrafted rookies we signed. Tucker and Abueva were switched to DE.

RB Henderson, RB Rodman, TE McMillian, TE Stokes, C Strickland, C Carrano and LB Newhart didn't make it to our pre-season roster. THe same applied to 7th round pick FB Dean Lang, Second-year DT Sherman Casanova and last season's backup LT Roosevelt Dumrauf. Casanova was inactive all of last season, Dumrauf played on special teams all 16 games.

After the frist two pre-season games, we terminated the contracts of undrafted rookies DT Kelly, DE Abueva, RB Byerly, 6th round pick TE Ty Rumans, last season's 5th round pick DT Harvey Chiu, who played in all 16 games. Even more noteworthy was the release of former 1st round S Lincoln Taylor, after he finally saw playing time in his 4th season with us, and QB Monty Truitt, our quarterback of the future project. Well, not anymore. We've got a new deputy in town.

Let's break down the 53-men that we've got, position group at a time, with their scouted ratings rounded to the nearest 5s and their training camp and pre-season progress or lack there of.

Kicker, Punter, Long Snapper
75/75 P Jimmy Summers (TC: n.c., P2: -1/-1)
90/90 K Oscar Harrington (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
20/20 LS Bennett Brock (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
Solid guys, nothing to add here, really.

Secondary
50/50 CB Logan Wallace (TC: n.c., P2: -4/-4)
50/50 CB Joel Delgado (TC: n.c., P2: -1/-1)
45/45 S Craig Clancy (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
40/40 CB Eduardo Cowdrick (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
40/40 CB Wesley Cabrera (TC: n.c., P2: -1/-1)
40/40 S John Aponte (TC: +1/+1, P2: nc/-2)
35/45 S Noah Matthews (TC: +4/-3, P2: n.c., rookie)
35/40 PR Dennis Finley (TC: +3/nc, P2: nc/-1)
35/35 CB Sherman Barnes (TC: n.c., P2: -6/-6)
30/30 S Jonathan White (TC: +3/nc, P2: nc/-1)
Shapiro left, Taylor cut, Matthews in. The rest is the same bunch. This should be a fine group of guys.

Linebackers
75/75 LB Gus Coleman (TC: n.c., P2: +1/+1)
45/70 LB Caiden Hastings (TC: +7/-3, P2: nc/+5, rookie)
55/55 LB Abraham Desimone (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
35/35 LB Avery Distel (TC: +4/nc, P2: -4/-5)
20/20 ST Mack Pang (TC: n.c., P2: -5/-5)
15/15 ST Mo Fausel (TC: n.c., P2: -8/-8)
Burks our, Hastings in. Hastings looks awesome and should jump ahead of Desimone somewhere during the upcoming season. Desimone is still the more solid zone defender though. Distel is an awesome pass rusher, but we've got so much talent on the D-Line now. Distel can now join Pang and Fausel on the league best special teams unit.

Defensive Line
70/70 DT Gabriel Morris (TC: n.c., P2: +1/+1)
40/70 DT Efrain Hutchins (TC: +5/-1, P2: +2/+3, rookie)
30/75 DE Frank Bernard (TC: +8/-1, P2: +1/-3, rookie)
40/40 DT Mitch Potchynok (TC: n.c., P2: +1/+1)
40/40 DE Andres Harmon (TC: n.c., P2: -3/-3)
35/35 DE Deon Rosas (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
35/35 DE Robbie Dobreskie (TC: n.c., P2: -3/-3)
25/35 DE Howie Tucker (TC: +3/+1, P2: +1/nc, rookie)
Fletcher left, Casanova and Chiu cut, Hutchins, Bernard and Tucker in.
Another fine group, Morris is solid, Hutchins and Bernard should become solid. The other guys are very good pass rushers. This group is sound.

Offensive Line
75/75 RT Ivan Dole (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
65/65 G Brett Stickney (TC: n.c., P2: +1/+1)
60/60 C Zane Chaplain (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
60/60 G Andres Uwaezuoke (TC: +2/-1, P2: +1/+1)
45/45 LT Harold Gruenwalder (TC: n.c., P2: +1/+1)
20/60 LT Earl McBirney (TC: +5/nc, P2: nc/-7, rookie)
25/50 C Roman Gillespie (TC: +6/+4, P2: n.c., rookie)
35/35 G Brett Robbins (TC: n.c., P2: -5/-5)
Stonge left, Dumrauf cut, McBirney and Gillespie in. I'm on the fence about McBirney, he looks both impressive and underwhelming: his training camp was good, his pre-season second look was discouraging. It makes bringing back Gruenwalder even that more important as an insurance.

Wide Receivers
65/65 WR Calvin Maxwell (TC: n.c., P2: -6/-6)
45/45 WR Preston Gray (TC: +4/nc, P2: +1/-1)
30/45 WR Jaylen Gearhart (TC: +2/nc, P2: n.c., rookie)
30/30 WR Ricke Emerson (TC: n.c., P2: +1/+1)
20/30 WR Perry Madison (TC: +2/+1, P2: nc/-4, rookie)
15/15 ST Herman Jeffries (TC: n.c., P2: -8/-8)
Buysse retired, Samuels traded, Gearhart and Madison drafted. The decline continues, fast. Missing out on a WR in the 1st round of the last draft was a huge miss. Our best bet now is the next draft with the additional 1st round pick from the Ft Wayne Fury... Gray will be our WR2, despite his inability to make catches downfield. So maybe rookie Gearhart will be asked to jump in as the new WR2 with his excellent big-play ability and very good potential in route running. Meh?

Tight Ends
55/55 TE Garrett Alcala (TC: n.c., P2: -6/-6)
40/40 TE Wesley Martin (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
25/40 TE Wesley Keener (TC: +2/nc, P2: nc/+1, rookie)
20/20 TE Darnell McKie (TC: n.c., P2: -5/-5)
Heath left, Keener joined. We really missed the boat by not locking up Heath previous off-season or the one before. Alcala's decline hopefully won't be a problem, he might be our best bet on third and long, third and short. Martin is reliable, McKie an ownership favorite, Keener shockingly the least impressive of the rookies, but I still chose him over the others that tried out. Keener looks like a green version of Martin.

Fullback
35/35 FB Randy Julian (TC: n.c., P2: -1/-1)
Yup, he's still here, despite that he was out of contract.

Running Backs
40/40 RB Bennett Holmes (TC: n.c., P2: n.c.)
35/40 RB Cary Delgado (TC: +4/+2, P2: +1/+2, rookie)
30/35 RB Marcus Jorg (TC: +1/nc, P2: nc/+1)
15/15 RB Van Goodwin (TC: n.c., P2: -5/-5)
Delgado in. Nobody left, as Goodwin and Holmes were a stellar duo last season. Goodwin declined even more, but in pre-season he looked just as sharp as last season. Delgado has 3rd down back potential, Jorg change of pace potential. We just need to lock 'em up for a couple of seasons and then let cohesion do the rest.

Quarterbacks
35/35 QB Evan Drake (TC: n.c., P2: -6/-6)
15/45 QB Harrison Singleton (TC: +4/-1, P2: nc/+8, rookie)
30/30 KH Drake Bishop (TC: n.c., P2: -8/-8)
Truitt released, Singleton drafted. So, Drake, still? Maybe, maybe not. Singleton played equally impressive in pre-season action so far. But more importantly, Singleton did the right things: improve. Drake is regressing, no longer the undeniable best out there in reading the pass rush. Bishop will be asked to mentor Singleton. We might stick this elite kick holder on the inactive roster though, if Drake wins the starting job in the final two pre-season games with mostly backups and youngsters on offense around our quarterbacks.

So, I left the biggest story for last: could Harrison Singleton be the new sheriff in town? Drake is the one for now, but this might be the moment to flip things around. Sure, I must be convinced that Singleton will give us a better chance to win games. This kid has already has excellent sense rush ability and very good timing with room for improvement. That and he can run, or so we hope, he decided not to test his legs in the first two pre-season games. He's quite old already (25, older than two of our starting offensive linemen), but we really can't know whether he'll play until 40. Nor should we care now anyway, the future is important, but winning now, this season, would be even better.

General Manager Notes: 2108 started well
But now we're on a losing streak...

We're at week 6 of the 2108 season and as per usual we've already had our early season bye week. It sucks, because over a century of football, it means we have to face more developed teams season after season and get less chance to have our players lick their wounds. In a way, it makes it more impressive that we're historically 3rd in most regular season wins amongst all franchises. But that moaning aside, let's take a look at the games we've played so far.

Week 1 vs Bordeaux: 34-20 win
This was a game that went back and forth with the score being tight until we took control in the 4th quarter with 10 unanswered points. The story of the game was rookie QB Harrison Singleton stepping in for injured QB Evan Drake early in the 1st quarter and despite throwing for just 112 yards and rushing for 28 yards, somehow quarterbacked the team to victory. Veteran RB Van Goodwin ran for 172 yards, including a 50-yard touchdown, and caught a touchdown pass from Singleton. RB Bennett Holmes also ran for a touchdown, while WR Calvin Maxwell returned a kickoff for a touchdown.

Week 2 at Outer Banks: 40-7 win
Humbly I'll point out that this was a typical Merchantmen victory. The total yardage presumes that the game was even, but we were dominating field position all day long. As a result, despite our inability to get in the end zone, we saw K Oscar Harrington convert 4 field goals. Rookie QB Harrison Singleton threw for 213 yards, threw a touchdown pass to TE Garrett Alcala and ran for a touchdown as well. LB Gus Coleman scored the other touchdown on an interception return. It was 1 of 4 interceptions, but 3 of them came in garbage time when the victory was already locked up. QB Evan Drake was on the bench, recovering from his elbow injury.

Week 3 vs Orlando: 31-27 loss
In what looked like to turn into a steamrolling victory, the team completely fell apart in the second half and pissed away a commanding 21-point lead. QB Harrison Singleton had a so-so game, throwing for 175 yards with 2 interceptions, but also touchdown passes to WR Calvin Maxwell and WR Preston Gray, whilst running for a team high 44 yards and a touchdown. The comeback of Orlando was completed when Singleton threw a 4th quarter pick six that gave Orlando the lead for the first all day. Our own 4 interceptions on defense all went to waste here.

Week 4, the frickin' way too early bye week.

Week 5 at North Plainfield: 34-27 loss
With QB Evan Drake back in action, we played our best game offensively, but the defense had a collective off day getting run all over. The Plague running back ran for 201 yards on us, including a late game 60-yard touchdown that turnout to be the decisive score, whilst his mediocre quarterback ended a long streak of games under 300 yards passing. So, yes, a very disappointing let down from our stronger end of the field. Drake threw for 341 yards, with touchdown passes to TE Garrett Alcala (twice) and WR Rick Emerson.

Week 6 vs Rochester: 27-13 loss
We lost a game that we should have never lost given the respective talent on the field. Our pass defense was far below the team's ability and that turned out to be the decisive factor. QB Evan Drake threw for 261 yards and completed a touchdown pass to TE Garrett Alcala. He also threw a game flipping 67-yard pick six. Another expensive home loss to a conference rival for the playoffs race, after the earlier meltdown against Orlando. These are the games that make the difference at the end of the season...

European Division standings:
1. Gothenburg 4-2
2. Maassluis 2-3
3. Paris 1-4
4. Bordeaux 0-4-1

In theory we're still in a win out division title situation, but our track record against the Gothenburg Giants in the last, like, 15 or so seasons is dreadful. As you might have concluded from my previous comments, Rochester and Orlando are currently occupying the wild card slots with 4 wins each.

Our strong start despite iffy play from our rookie quarterback was all a mirage, when Drake returned, the defense returned to being a talented bunch playing like they are the worst defense in football. No, Singleton isn't ready to play, Drake has shown he's still the man to lean on. Some tweaking of the offensive game plan appeared to fix some issues, but it makes no sense at all that it turned the defense into playing garbage. And even the special teams unit has played far below their ability.

Sure, losing against a talented offense is excusable, but although North Plainfield does feature one of the best running backs, the three offense we faced in our losses were all middle of the pack. I dread writing this, but apparently it's once again back to the drawing board to figure out what shot in the foot mistakes our defense is making that has cost us three games already.

2089 - 2093 Moe Sheldon period

The rebuild after the 2088 cap hell that lead to the departure of many players didn't take long. The Merchantmen spent the #13 overall pick in the draft on quarterback Brandon Bell, shortly after making a typical Merchantmen pick in defensive tackle Darien Fletcher at #9 overall. With as little as 8 new players, rookie Bell posted a respectable bounce back season as the team went 9-7. But the quarterback woes continued as Bell saw his strong start end in a week 17 loss to Paris and subsequent loss of the division title.

Merchantmen management proved to be ruthless once again although not released or traded, Bell's starting role was over right there and then. Veteran Moe Sheldon was shoved forward after a season of riding the bench and Bell only got opportunities when Sheldon was injured. Tight end Chris Gaynor and linebacker Brandon Brady were taken in the first round of the 2090 draft, bolstering the team.

It took the arrival of fifth round tight end Clarence Gore in 2091 for the offense to truly turn the page and Sheldon able to connect with star wide receiver Theodore Bondy. With 24 touchdowns versus 4 interceptions, Sheldon guided the Merchantmen to a 10-3-1 record (he sat out the last two games with the #2 seed locked up) en route to a division title and a trip to the AOC Championship game, where the hosting Tucker Tigers were victorious.

A nearly unchanged team improved to 11-4-1 in 2092, despite Sheldon's decline in avoidance of interceptions, but fell short to the Gothenburg Giants in the division title race and later on in the conference semifinals. In 2093 the Merchantmen drafted wide receiver Ed Schulz, as Theodore Bondy was getting up there in age, and also selected the excellent center Robbie Zinn in the second round to replace the retired Butch Pearson. Sheldon toned done on the interceptions a bit, but the team as a collective took a step back and missed the playoffs, in particular cornerback Kirk Hitchcock. The latter retired after that season, a full season later than quarterback Brandon Bell.

2089 9-7 (7th)
2090 6-10 (11th)
2091 10-5-1 (2nd) conference finalist
2092 11-4-1 (5th) conference semifinals
2093 7-8-1 (10th)

2094 - 2103 The Earnest Ashley fiasco

A new era began with the 2094 draft where the Merchantmen thought to have found their new franchise quarterback in second round pick Earnest Ashley. The same draft saw the Merchantmen select stud offensive tackle duo Isaac Delgado and Johnnie Houston. Moe Sheldon hung around to mentor Ashley, as the new kid was made the starter from day one. Ashley posted the first 4,000-yard season for a Merchantmen quarterback since Ellis McAlister in 2086.

Ashley struggled to get north of completing 50% of his passes in the Merchantmen game plan. It soon after dubbed him Mr. 50-50 and Coinflip amongst skeptics and the overall team performance was quite similar. Season after season, the Merchantmen came 1 or 2 wins short of even a wild card. The likes of 2095 rookies cornerback Ernie Grant and defensive end Richie Piotte boosted the defense. The offensive line got completed with a couple of new offensive guards as well in the 2096 and 2097 drafts.

Wide receiver Theodore Bondy hung around through the 2096 season, but never sniffed at 1,000 yards in his seasons with Ashley in command. His pupil Ed Schulz turned out to be a never fulfilling prophecy, his triplet of 1,000-yard seasons came all early in his career. In 2097 running back Bert Ta'Amu was acquired through trade, but he appeared to be way past his 1,600-yard shape and stuck around for just 2 seasons.

The no more excuses period began in 2099. With the arrival of 2098 #7 overall pick wide receiver Vinny Buysse, followed by the selection of wide receiver Calvin Maxwell #3 overall in 2099 and running back Ken Torphy at #6 in 2099, the talent to go places was there. But despite being surrounded by without a doubt the best skill players in football and ever to be assembled by the Merchantmen, Earnest Ashley continued to struggle.

As the team continued to go downhill season by season, it became harder and harder to keep the team together. In the 2102 off-season, cap hell broke loose, worse than ever before. Merchantmen management decided to gamble on hanging onto the core pieces on offense, but at the same time said goodbye to elite cornerback Ernie Grant and defensive end Richie Piotte, whilst all 5 starting offensive linemen were released. The Merchantmen ended up going into the new season with almost half their roster consisting of rookies.

2102 became another disaster season, although this time somewhat to be expected with the gigantic overhaul. More bad news was Ken Torphy's unwillingness to sign a very generous contract as his player agent kept demanding less money. Torphy walked away a free agent in the 2103 off-season and was subsequently nicknamed the Lost Cause.

The 2103 off-season also saw a reboot. The Merchantmen acquired Augusta Greenjackets legendary quarterback Winford England through trade and it became clear that Ashley's reign was over. Ashley's last pass attempt came in a blowout win in 2103 and he sat the entire 2104 season on the bench, retiring in the 2105 off-season after 9 seasons as the face of a sublimely talented team that played mediocre football, without a single trip to the playoffs.

Winfred England's stint as the Merchantmen quarterback lasted for just a single season. Despite a tremendous display of passing skills (4,335 yards and 29 touchdowns), which also saw the improvement of Calvin Maxwell towards his first 1,500-yard and double digit touchdown season, whilst Vinny Buysse reached what turned out to be his career high of 1,297 yards (far too low for a player with his level of talent). 2102 second round pick Tight end Garrett Alcala improved to being a serviceable option, but was still far away from his yet undiscovered ability to be a league leader at his position.

But even with a future hall of famer quarterback around, the playoffs were far way for the Merchantmen and England retired after just one season in orange, white and blue. He did get a chance to welcome the rookie class of 2103, which included defensive tackle Gabriel Morris, linebacker Gus Coleman and running back Bennett Holmes, as well as the signing of veteran defensive tackle Ben Courcy.

2094 8-8 (8th)
2095 7-9 (10th)
2096 8-8 (8th)
2097 10-6 (7th)
2098 4-11-1 (15th)
2099 8-8 (9th)
2100 6-10 (13th)
2101 5-11 (14th)
2102 4-12 (14th)
2103 7-8-1 (11th)

General Manager Notes: Another season down the drain?
It sure shapes up to it...

After an encouraging start, the Merchtnamen of 2108 have turned into the pile of trash that we've been for most of the last 15 seasons. Well, with some decent and impressive showings in between. But the last couple of games were one of the worst in team history. Incomprehensible, but reality as well.

Week 7 vs Toronto: 23-20 win
It was good to see the team competitive against one of the stronger franchises in the conference. We scored 17 points on our first three possessions, but eventually the defenses gaine control. We thanked our expensive kicker for both of his 52-yard field goals in the final minute of the game to boost us from a loss to a somewhat unexpected victory. QB Evan Drake threw for 344 yards, with 116 yards to WR Preston Gray and 113 yards to WR Calvin Maxwell, while Drake found TE Garrett Alcala and TE Wesley Martin for touchdowns.

Week 8 vs Paris: 33-6 win
A game of two halves, as in the first half the slugfest saw us struggling to turn our domination into touchdowns. In the second half the floodgates opened and we steamrolled to a convincing victory. We outgained Paris 406 to 203 yards, despite also having the field position advantage throughout the game, rarely starting from within our own 30-yard line. RB Bennett Holmes ran for 109 yards and a touchdown. QB Evan Drake threw for 214 yards with touchdown passes to TE Wesley Martin and WR Rick Emerson.

Week 9 at Harlem: 33-19 loss
Our little winning streak came to an end in one of the most unlikely losses the Merchantmen franchise ever saw. We dominated the field position battle, greatly supported by picking off Harlem's quarterback 4 times. But in return, they got to a hot start with a 73-yard pick six to open the scoring on our first possession and in the second half they quickly turned it from a tie game into a 1-touchdown game with their win with a kickoff return touchdown. On our score tying drive, QB Evan Drake was picked off for the second time and again for a touchdown. He finished the day with 253 yards passing, with a touchdown pass to WR Preston Gray. RB Van Goodwin scored our other touchdown.

Week 10 at Bordeaux: 27-13 loss
For the second game straight, QB Evan Drake threw an interception on our opening drive, but this time he got bailed out by our rookie linebacker Caiden Hastings with a 63-yard pick six in response to it. But despite doing well enough in field position, we were downright humiliated and outplayed by the Vineyards as they outgained us 388 to 195 yards. In a way we were lucky to still be in it when Bordeaux scored their third touchdown with just under 4 minutes to go. QB Evan Drake was held to 119 yards passing, whilst the entire offense remained touchdownless.

Week 11 at Gothenburg: 34-0 loss
Then just as we thought we couldn't sink as low as the dreadful performance in Bordeaux, the trip to Gothenburg turned into one of the biggest spankings in Merchantmen history. Probably top3, or worst3 if you wish. 143 total yards gained, 484 total yards allowed. It must have felt like they knew what we were going to do on every single play, on both sides of the ball, I mean, I decided to not investigate on this train wreck of a football game. QB Evan Drake was held to 77 yards passing on 27 passing plays as our yards per pass attempt for this game was an unimaginable 1.93.

Yeah... Ouch. Ouch. Ouch.

Going into the season, we expect to play a close game in Bordeaux and win if we get luckier, while hoping to stay within a touchdown in Gothenburg. But getting outgained the way we did in these last two games, I just can't remember such a pathetic showing from this team, like ever. We've managed to go 1-2 in games were we picked off the opposing quarterback 4 times in a game, those kind of games are usually a victory by default. But would we really deserve to be 6-4 and in the middle of the wild card race when we play this dreadful in crucial intradivision games?

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 8-2
2. Maassluis 4-6
3. Bordeaux 3-6-1
4, Paris 1-9

Can Gothenburg clinch the division in week 12? Yes, they will if they win and if we lose and Bordeaux doesn't win. Are our wild card hopes still there? Mathematically we could still leapfrog the Northeast second place team for the final wild card, but we're 2 wins down already and we only have tie-breakers over Toronto, the rest beat us head-to-head and it also causes our a pathetic intraconference record in case that tie-breaker comes into play.

The plan is to keep faith in QB Evan Drake until we are mathematically eliminated. Which is getting really hard with his 7 straight games with 1 or 2 interceptions thrown, especially with his average of 98 yards passing in the last two games. Does he rely that much on his tight end(s)?

TE Garrett Alcala returns to the active roster after a couple of games sideline with a leg injury, whilst his main backup TE Wesley Martin was also missing with a shoulder injury. It resulted in a forced release of 7th round pick WR Perry Madison and the return of our 6th round pick TE Ty Rumans after he won a 3-way roster spot battle to step in as the mandated 3rd tight end on the active roster. Where have the times gone when a long snapper would also count as a tight end (although ours is technically a center playing long snapper).

All things considered, I can't see how I can be very optimistic about the final 6 games of this regular season. It could be objectively considered to be the easiest 5-game stretch any team gets in the next 5 weeks, but we still have to face the Gothenburg Giants in week 17. Hopefully our shiny defense can start playing like a shiny defense, but they will need some help from the passing game. 6.04 yards per attempt won't get the job done. Even WR Calvin Maxwell is on pace to not have a 1,000-yard season for the first time since his underwhelming rookie campaign... At least our running backs (and the line in front of them) are doing shockingly well with a 5.0 yards per carry figure. Maybe we should run the ball a little bit of a lot more?

General Manager Notes: Stayin' alive mode
Or just playing spoiler?

Alright my dearest readers, a lot has changed in Maassluis since the last time I reported. Well, a lot, we had one major change in the depth chart department and some minor changes. The big one at the quarterback slot: Harrison Singleton has started the last 4 games for us. Let's rewind a bit.

Week 12 vs Capital City: 20-13 loss
In a must win and should win game, QB Evan Drake struggled. Despite throwing for 223 yards a touchdown to FB Randy Julian, his 2 interceptions were the last straw for me. The running game was okay, but the defense clearly doesn't believe in Drake and the gave away 371 total yards.

So, I made a couple of changes to the team.
Rookie QB Harrison Singleton to start ahead of QB Evan Drake. Singleton had done well in the early part of the season, sample size and what not, he lead the team to 2 victories and a sketchy loss.
2nd-year RB Marcus Jorg to play in the RB committee ahead of RB Van Goodwin, whom I kept active as a key member of the special teams unit. Goodwin was gaining 4.9 yards per carry, but without his absurd 172 yards in week 1, he was averaging barely 3.5 yards per carry.
Rookie LT Earl McBirney took over from LT Harold Gruenwalder. The first round rookie had to get reps and I felt that it was ok to put him in the toughest slot, the one where we picked him for. I decided to not plug him or Gruenwalder at guard, but trust in the other 4 starters.
Rookie DE Howard Tucker was activated and together with 2nd-Year LB Avery Distel made more involved in pass rush formations. Special Teams LB Mo Fausel was sacrificed.
Nothing too fancy, non complete overhaul, but just some obvious replacements of over the hill players.

Week 13 at Houston: 19-12 win
Holy smokes, welcome back QB Harrison Singleton. Despite our struggles in the final 30 yards of the field, Our strong-legged K Oscar Harrington converted a triple of long ones to give us enough of a cushion to get a strong enough lead that when Houston kicked a field goal with just over 1 minute to go, they had to go for the on-side kick. They recovered, but we stood strong. QB Singleton threw for 258 yards with a touchdown to WR Preston Gray.

Week 14 vs Texas: 47-22 win
The team clicked, and then some, and then some more. At half time we were leading 34-0 already. The backups of the Texas Sharks put up a fight and with a struggling QB Evan Drake on our offense, they got within 4 scores, but that just says it all. Rookie QB Harrison Singleton threw for 198 yards in limited action with a touchdown pass to WR Preston Gray, while Singleton joined RB Bennett Holmes and RB Marcus Jorg in each having a rushing touchdown. Freaky enough, the total yards figure was 411 to 410 in our favor, but that would be unfair as we also saw our secondary pick their quarterbacks off 3 times.

Week 15 at Paris: 27-7 win
In a turnover fest, we out took them 5-2, that combined with our more efficient offense and hard to beat defense, we posted a steadily buit up victory. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 175 yards and a touchdown to WR Calvin Maxwell, but also ran for a touchdown, where he was joined by rookie 3rd-down RB Cary Delgado.

Week 16 at Moontown: 19-16 win
The streak continued as QB Harrison Singleton threw for 248 yards with touchdowns to WR Calvin Maxwell and WR Rick Emerson. Crucial was our early built lead and our consistent ability to pin them deep. We forced them to start 2 drives on their own 1-yard line (freaky enough their only touchdown came on such a possession) and they never started further downfield that their own 25-yard line. In return, aside from our first drive, we were consistently far from our own red zone. Still, we needed a hail mary to pull it off.

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 11-4
2. Maassluis 8-7
3. Bordeaux 4-10-1
4. Paris 2-13

Week 17, Gothenburg comes to Maassluis. If we pull the upset, it will cost the Giants a bye week, which they can only blame themselves for if they blow it after their recent losing streak. We'll need help elsewhere to sneak into the playoffs and if we do, we're guaranteed to get a trip to Gothenburg there.

Can we beat Gothenburg? I'm doubtful. Harrison Singleton is on a hot streak and we're actually on the second longest winning streak in the league, but these guys have our number. I'm fearful about another 34-0 drubbing.

Unrelated, we've seen the Fort Wayne Fury struggle all season long. They won games back-to-back recently, but a 4-11, they're quite possibly the biggest disappointment compared to last season. Our convenience is having their first round pick. We could have help our own faith to try to push their pick into the top3, but our pride made us forget about it and try to keep winning, especially in the recent games against 2-13 Paris and 3-12 Moontown. With some (bad) luck, this pick will drop all the way to being the #8 overall, while at 'best' at can improve to #3.

But, the 2109 draft is far away still, we have a do-or-die game tomorrow.

General Manager Notes: Close, really close, but...

We choked. The football gods were 2/3rd of the way with us today, as the Harlem Apollos and Orlando Talons both lost. It created a window of opportunity for us, the Maassluis Merchantmen, to sneak into the playoffs. But to get there, we still had to beat our rivals from up North: the Gothenburg Giants.


Week 17 vs Gothenburg: 24-16 loss
After being called a 1.7 in 1,000 longshot to make the playoffs, an encouraging 4-game winning streak put us in a dependable, but eventually a win is in situation. The season on the line, the pressure was on.

Our rookie QB Harrison Singleton delivered, throwing a 40-yard catch and run pass on third and long to TE Garrett Alcala on the first possession of the game, but a bunch of plays later, he was sacked in scoring position and after he fumbled the ball, the opportunity was gone. The defense struggled and Gothenburg took a 7-0 lead on their first possession. The second drive was a thing of beauty, slowly, but steadily, we marched downfield and Singleton himself pounded it in from 2 yards out to tie it up 7-7. Then our cornerbacks fell asleep and gave up a 65-yard passing touchdown to hand Gothenburg the 14-7 lead.

We started the second quarter by pinning Gothenburg at their own 1-yard line, but their own punter delivered to not give us much of an advantage by pushing us to our 20-yard line. Another strong drive ensued, but a face mask penalty put us in third and long and we settled for a 46-yard field goal, these days a walk in the park for K Oscar Harrington. After three and out, our rookie RB Cary Delgado broke free on third and 3 for a 33-yard gain, but it got us nothing close than pushing them back. QB Harrison Singleton found TE Garrett Alcala for a 51-yard gain as we called a gung ho play and after we scored a 36-yard field goal, we were down just 14-13. Luck was on our side as the Gothenburg kickoff returned was stripped from the ball and we quickly kicked a 33-yard field goal for a 16-14 half time lead.

But as the Merchantmen defense took control of the game, with a quick interception by LB Gus Coleman, we found ourselves playing an unfamiliar kind of football, losing the field position battle to the Giants. Eventually they scored on a 39-yard field goal to take a 17-16 lead. The QB Harrison Singleton got picked off at midfield and the scare for a choke job started oozing through Oranje Haven. Gothenburg marched downfield and none other than Gus Barrymore caught the touchdown for their 24-16 lead.

Strong defense and sloppiness on the offenses then made for quite the unfancy football game. Gothenburg missed a 48-yard field goal with 7 minutes to go, keeping us still within a single score. With just over 2 minutes to go, it was still 24-16 in Gothenburg advantage and we found ourselves pinned at our own 7-yard line, already down a time out. QB Harrison Singelton kept the chains moving and on a now or never fourth down scramble, he took more risks than necessary and ended up fumbling after not sliding as he wanted to get more than just the first down. It was game over there: Gothenburg 24, Maassluis 16.

QB Harrison Singleton threw for 246 yards and ran for a touchdown. TE Garrett Alcala gained 129 yards receiving. But with his 5-2 win-loss record, what should be considered a 6-2 record, we have to believe that our 8-8 record is on the low end this season.

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 12-4
2. Maassluis 8-8
3. Bordeaux 4-11-1
4. Paris 3-13

Typically, had we swept Gothenburg, we would have won the division. But that's "would have, should have". Gothenburg was bailed out by Atlanta as they beat San Antonio in their place, gifting Gothenburg a bye week. We ended up outside the playoffs as 8-8 Harlem had tie-breakers over their division rival North Plainfield, over Orlando and over us. To be fair, in the other conference the 9-6-1 Brooklyn were left outside missing the playoffs, while even fourth place Frederick posted a 9-7 record.

Alas, we didn't make it. Do I regret not benching QB Evan Drake earlier on? No, I had reasons to believe that he was still capable of throwing the ball, but after too many struggles, it was time to move on. It was encouraging to see us come close, but in our inability to beat Gothenburg, it was too little too late. It is what it is.

We go into the 2109 off-season with the #6 and #16 overall draft picks, as well as a late 2nd rounder and the 3.1 and 4.2 picks on top of our own 2nd through 7th rounders. We're at a somewhat healthy cap situation at roughly $80M over the cap. Relatively speaking, of course. The only realistic risk is losing WR Calvin Maxwell to retirement, which would cost us at least $14M in cap space. In paper he was still our WR1, but despite 30 more targets, he gained 368 yards less than last season. We've really used him incorrectly this past season.

But if we indeed have found our QB and he's already established a sweet connection with young WR Preston Gray and the underappreciated TE Garrett Alcala, we might be a new star WR away from challenging the Giants and Tigers again in the AOC, because the defense is set.

Or maybe we still need a game planning masters to actually make these talented players play up to their potential...

General Manager Notes: We got the top rookie prospect!

Okay, it's been a while since my last report and I'll keep this to a bit of a minimum to quickly get you up to date on stuff you may or may not already have figured out.

Right before the off-season, we signed five young prospects that would become restricted free agents in this off-season. All were previously with us in training camp or more: RB Malachi Byerly, FB Kennedy Broady, WR Perry Madison, LT Mason Erickson and DE Zachary Abueva.

We went into the off-season one man down as DE Andres Harmon retired. He was with us for 4 seasons, after playing 8 seasons for the Paris Musketeers. He had the rare combination of ability to stop the run and also be a fast pass rusher. He played 63 regular season games for us, but his playoffs action all came while playing for Paris.

The big news came in the draft. First I traded up from the #6 slot to the #2 slot, sacrificing all our 1st, 2nd and 3rd round picks, but to me it was all worth it. We selected WR Jessie Vertelney, the #1 player on our draft board. I will have to mull over how to call this kid, because "Vertelney" sounds like he has a Dutch born grand-grand-grand-grand-grandfather, who back when he moved to the USA told the immigration services he was unwilling to tell his name, but instead his last name got written down as "won't tell".

It almost goes without saying that we restructured a lot of expensive contracts to get down from deep over the cap to almost $40M under the cap. In the middle of that, we signed a bunch of restricted free agents: RB Cary Delgado, RB Malachi Byerly, WR Perry Madison, C Roman Gillespie, LT Mason Erickson, DE Howie Tucker and DE Zachary Abueva. Will they make the team? Some might. We're still down to just 50 players signed. The good news is that it means we now have roughly $18.5M of cap space relief to work with to improve the roster or lock up potential future free agents. Or to re-sign a couple of guys that are out of contract, like DT Mitch Potchynok, LB Abraham Desimone and CB Sherman Barnes.

Last but not least, we've got an issue with QB Evan Drake. Our veteran starter has become angry after we benched him in the final games of last season. He's so mad at us, he doesn't even want to talk about a new contract. Which is too bad as his demands are reportedly pretty reasonable for a has-been that still thinks he's in the prime of his ability. Reality is that I'm not sure we want to keep this 36-year old over the hill player on team. I'm loyal to my players, but players that get mad after sitting out 5 games are not worthy of that loyalty. He claims to be the most loyal person on the planet, yeah right...

Cutting Drake now would improve our cap room to roughly $45M, that would be swell. But then, I'm struggling to see where and how to spend it. There's just so little roster spots where I see clear improvements on the free agent market, compared to our own current 50 players. Or should we snag up QB Jonathan Freeman, who was fantastic in Bordeaux in 2107, but quickly turned into a pick machine last season. But nah, probably not...

Vertelney? Vertelwel! We've got him!

General Manager Notes: ]2109 Draft recap

The 2109 IHOF draft concluded and other than the blockbuster trade for the #2 pick to select the top prospect of this class (in our opinion), it was quite quiet in our war room. We closed out our remaining picks with a bunch of possible make the team picks.

At 4.2 DT Leslie Jeffries, a run stopper with football intelligence and stamina.

At 4.16 G Tutan Shapiro, a strong run blocker with endurance.

At 5.18 LB Xavier Hoover, a smart run defender with endurance and special teams potential.

At 6.17 DE Steve Aber a fast pass rusher, with stamina and decent run stopping potential.

At 7.16 RB Mo Ellison, a fast, ball catching, elusive kid with endurance.

Yes, apparently we felt that endurance is a thing. DT Leslie Jeffries isn't per se an insurance for the free agent DT Mitch Potchynok, they are different types of D-Linemen. One is a running downs guy, the other passing downs. We can use them both. DE Steve Aber will battle with the 2nd year guys for a roster spot. RB Mo Ellison will likely fail to beat one of the guys already on team, but at RB you can never have too many guys going into training camp. G Tutan Shapiro will likely make the team as a new project, replacing G Nathaniel Robbins, who was on team to mentor one of our starters, which is a role now to be taken by starter Brett Stickney. LB Xavier Hoover fills a need as we said goodbye to long time starter LB Abraham Desimone.

Abrham Desimone was a 3rd round pick for us in 2100, but quickly developed into a starter on our team. His zone defense skills were crucial, but his endurance and run stopping ability made him not just a passing downs player, but an all downs LB2. For the upcoming season I didn't see anything more than a LB3 role for him, hence not offering him the kind of contract he was looking for. He left for the Williamsburg Colonials, who signed him pretty cheap at $14M this season, i bet he'll be their LB1 or LB2.

Finally, the rumors are also true that we're in the market for QB Billy Russell, a free agent, former League MVP and two-time Offensive Player of the Year. Our QB Harrison Singleton has a similar skill set and with the expected departure of QB Evan Drake (he wants to get traded and most likely I'll be forced to release him to make cap space available for other investments), it would be an interesting player to have as a backup plan. Kick holder QB Drake Bishop will stick around to mentor Singleton anyway. But it would be a bit of a luxury to sign a player like Russell, so, we'll have to see how that plays out.

General Manager Notes: quick 2109 training camp recap

Okay, the off-season is moving on and we're closing in on the most dreaded day in the football season, the day all scouts re-evaluate all the players. We've just concluded training camp and made our cuts down to 60 players signed. But let's backtrack just a little bit, as prior to camp and on top of the rookies we drafted, we signed a bunch of free agents.

Most prominent is QB Billy Russell, the 2103 and 2104 Offensive Player of the Year and 2104 League MVP. Russell is 34 years old and should be considered an improvement over QB Evan Drake. It paves the way to release Drake at mid-pre-season, if nothing weird happens. We're $1.6M under the cap right now and releasing Drake would improve it to almost $28M under the cap, which would be sufficient to lock up some starters in the last year of contract. It also creates an interesting battle between Russell and 2nd-year QB Harrison Singleton for the starting gig.

36-year old CB Norbert Goldfarb was signed to become our secondary leader and will improve the special teams unit.

DT Mitch Potchynok signed a new 3-year deal with us.

We signed 6 undrafted rookies: WR Kai Cote, G Mark Arce, LB Raymond Barber, LB Shawntae Ondes, LB Julio Pochman and CB Bryan Sokol. Sokol was position switched from S to CB, Pochman from ILB to OLB.

Undrafted rookies LB Raymond Barber and LB Shawntae Ondes were released after training camp, as were 4 of the post-season future contract signings RB Malachi Byerly, WR Perry Madison, LT Mason Erickson and DE Zachary Abueva, as well as 7th round pick RB Mo Ellison.

Veteran DE Robbie Dobreski has announced holding out for an improved contract. He wants roughly $2.6M more in cap figure. His demands are reasonable, but we'll wait until after the first two pre-season games to see if we have the cap space available and to see whether he's still worth the salary increase.

We did say bye to TE Wesley Keener, TE Ty Rumans, G Nathaniel Robbins and CB Sherman Barnes as we didn't offer these free agents a new contract. None of them signed elsewhere for training camp. Keener and Rumans remain to be interesting prospects for the 4th tight end roster spot, as we failed to address that in the off-season.


Finally, the announced quick training camp report on which players made the most progress: DE Frank Bernard and DT Efrain Hutchins both went +9 on the 1-100 scale, which is phenomenal. Others with good progress were 2nd year QB Harrison Singleton (+4), rookie WR Jessie Vertelney (+5), 2nd year C Roman Gillespie (+5), undrafted rookie G Marc Arce (+4), 2nd year LT Earl McBirney (+5), rookie DE Steve Aber (+5), rookie DT Leslie Jeffries (+5), rookie LB Xavier Hoover (+4), 2nd year LB Caiden Hastings (+6), undrafted LB Julio Pochman (+5), 5th year CB Denis Finley (+4), undrafted rookie CB Skip Horner (+4) and undrafted rookie CB Byron Sokol (+10). The latter isn't a fair measure, as this also includes the results of the position switch, hence, we don't really know his exact progress.

All in all, a good training camp.

General Manager Notes: Pre-season giveth and taketh away
The 2109 edition!

It was evitable, pre-season will always come around and throw the plans into a wrinkle of sorts. Or help determine the final decisions on which 53 players will make the roster for the new season. Let's go through the team position group at a time, or maybe a bit more compressed, with our focus on the most important position in football.

Quarterbacks
Okay, we went into pre-season with 4 names, 3 of which could be considered legitimate starters and one guy that I'm not even sure I want to spend an active roster spot on as our kick holder, despite that Drake Bishop (25/25) still is one of the top5 in business. And a mentor for our youngest member of the group. Harrison Singleton (20/45) is our project guy, but he was also our lucky charm last season, basically we went 6-2 with him under center. The verdict isn't out yet, Two-time league MVP QB Billy Russell (30/30) is the new guy in the city, but didn't overwhelm with awesome play in pre-season. Initially Singelton outplayed Russell in the first two pre-season games, but in the back end of things, Singleton struggled and Russell shone. This could end up being a game day decision, as I haven't taken the time to analyse the situation just yet. One decision was made already: Evan Drake (35/35) has been released. I lost all hope that he would return to his pre 2108 form.

Evan Drake was initially drafted by the Arizona Miners in 2094 in the second round. After starting 12 games in his rookie season, he was demoted the season after and in the 2096 off-season traded to the Colorado Cutthroats. Immediately he guided them into the playoffs, even to a conference final in 2098, but after 8 seasons starting there, he fell out of favor. In came the Maassluis Merchantmen (yay!) and after a career high 4,416-yard season, the longest playoffs drought in team history ended. Drake remained to be the undisputed starter in Maassluis for 3 more seasons, but last season he fell out of favor as the Merchantmen went 2-6 with Drake leading the team. Drake was unamused, decided he was no longer willing to talk about a new contract in Maassluis and the release was there. It cleared enough cap space to extend a dozen contracts and still see the Merchantmen go into the new season with far too much cap space than is competitively affordable (every dollar not spent this season is a dollar unavailable to be spent in the next season).

The skill positon group
It can't have flown over without noticing, we grabbed the top kid in this draft. WR Jessie Vertelney (65/75) is already on par with our reigning star WR Calvin Maxwell (65/65), which should make for a solid duo. Maxwell will be the WR1 for now. WR Preston Gray (45/45) is a very welcome WR3, being our leading route runner until mid-season when I fully expect Vertelney to have surpassed Gray. Second-year WR Jaylen Gearhart (35/45) will be our WR4, but I'm convinced we can move all these guys up a slot once Maxwell calls it a game. TE Garrett Alcala (45/45) has declined a bit more, but will remain in rotation, just like TE Wesley Martin (35/35). Our back field rotation will consist of our three guys from late last season: RB Bennett Holmes (40/40), RB Marcus Jorg (30/35) and RB Cary Delgado (35/40).
WR Rick Emerson (25/25) will mentor Vertelney and Gearhart. WR Kai Cote (30/40) is our typical promising special teamer. TE Darnell McKie (20/20) will be our TE3, TE Ty Rumans (20/30) our emergency TE. FB Randy Julian (40/40) our 2-back formation filler. Veteran RB Van Goodwin (15/15) will be another special teamer.

Offensive Line
This group is fine. Starters will be LT Earl McBirney (35/60), G Brett Stickney (70/70), C Zane Chaplain (60/60), G Andres Uwaezuoke (60/60) and RT Ivan Dole (75/75). McBirney hasn't continued the decline that we saw in his rookie season. LT Harold Gruenwalder (45/45) is a solid backup to McBirney. C Roman Gillespie (35/50) is solid enough to step in with injuries. G Tutan Shapiro (30/40) is a project, plain and simple.

K Oscar Harrington (90/90), P Jimmy Summers (65/65) and LS Bennett Brock[/b] (21/21) are a good group of special teamers.

Front Seven
The group of players that I will rotate here will be large. DE Frank Bernard (50/70), DT Efrain Hutchins (65/70) and LB Caiden Hastings (70/70) have grown into a solid trio going into their second season. With returning veterans LB Gus Coleman (75/75) and DT Gabriel Morris (60/60) there's a solid base. Around them will be the youngsters DE Howie Tucker (35/35), DT Leslie Jeffries (30/45), LB Xavier Hoover (35/50) and LB Avery Distel (35/35). The group will be completed with rookie DE Steve Aber (30/50), veteran DT Mitch Potchynok (40/40), elite special teamer LB Mack Pang (15/15) and veteran DE Dean Rosas (20/20).
Undrafted rookie LB Julio Pochman didn't make it, but I'd love to try to bring him back if the opportunity arises as he's a promising pass rusher and zone defender in one, a multi-talented front seven guy!

Secondary
Another group where we will rotate a bit, trying to optimize the guys' talents. CB Logan Wallace (40/40), CB Joel Delgado (45/45) and rookie CB Bryan Sokol (30/45) will be the man-to-man coverage guys. The zone defenders group has gotten bigger, with rookie CB Skip Horner (30/40), S John Aponte (40/40), S Craig Clancy (35/35) and S Jonathan White (35/35). CB Eduardo Cowdrick (40/40) and S Noah Matthews (40/40) will also see their fair share of action. CB Dennis Finlay (30/30) is nothing but our elite punt returner and CB Norbert Goldfarb (15/15) is our new group leader, mentor and solid special teamer.


That means we also released a couple of other players at mid-pre-season. This includes try-out loser TE Enrique Corbett, This 30-year old veteran lost the roster spot battle to Ty Rumans. But earlier on we released FB Kennedy Broady, G Mark Arce, WR Herman Jeffries, DE Robbie Dobreski, LB Mo Fausel and CB Wesley Cabrera.

Robbie Dobreski leaves Maassluis after 11 seasons, with 166 games played for us, including 2 in the playoffs. His regular season tally has added up to 65.0 sacks (8th all-time for us) and 130 hurries, amongst others.

Wesley Cabrera played 101 games for the Merchantmen, 2 in the playoffs, flipping around from just a special teamer to starter to a backup and what not.

Herman Jeffries is another elite special teamer, but his problem is the lack of receiving skills, which other backups/special teamers do have. He leaves us after 64 regular season games played.

Mo Fausel played 110 games for us, 2 in the playoffs, exclusively as a special teamer. He was already down the list last season, falling behind Pang and Distel, while youngsters Hastings and Hoover can also jump on.


We'll start the season at home against the Paris Musketeers. Their fans and ownership won't want to hear this, but on paper they are the easiest opponent we'll face this season. We might have to call ourselves lucky to face their #1 overall pick QB Ikie Eichorst in his first IHOF game. He's extremely green, but he looks very promising and could be the player to turn that franchise around. So yeah, playing against this kid in week 1 and 8 is more favorable than twice in the second half of the regular season. Still, it will make for a clash between the #1 and #2 picks of the recent draft.

So, to conclude, we got a but younger again, and we'll be having an interesting QB decision. I'm leaning towards Singleton, but it might end up being Russell... It doesn't matter much though, they're similar players, sort of... We'll see.

General Manager Notes: 2109 started well, too well...

We're 6 weeks into the 2109 regular season. It should come as no surprise that it means we played 5 games and had our open week already. Quite annoyingly the schedule makers gave us 4 home games so far, which is great for confidence if we take full advantage of the home field situation, but drop a game and we're playing catchup already.


Week 1 vs Paris: 40-6 win
A great start and yet a disappointing one as well. We were up so big at half time (31-3) that both head coaches decided that it was better to take the starting quarterbacks off the field. It took away a great opportunity for QB Harrison Singelton to yank up the numbers as he threw for 216 yards, 2 touchdowns (to WR Calvin Maxwell and RB Cary Delgado) and added 31 yards rushing with 1 touchdown. RB Marcus Jorg also ran for a touchdown. QB Billy Russell threw for 138 yards in the second half. WR Calvin Maxwell yanked up 164 yards receiving on top of his touchdown. The defense kept the Paris offense outside of our red zone all game long. We could have put a score out there for the ages, but contrary to unpopular belief, the Merchantmen show modesty and not run up the score.

Week 2 at Frederick: 27-20 win
A solid sound performance that saw the score closer than our domination was. A kickoff return touchdown for Frederick in the final minute of the first half kept them in the game. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 237 yards, 2 touchdowns (to WR Calvin Maxwell and TE Garrett Alcala), while RB Cary Delgado ran for our other touchdown.

Week 3 vs Augusta: 37-34 win
A big test against a solid team that should be considered to be playoffs bound. It went back and forth, complete with a late game 53-yard go ahead field goal, a last minute equalizing field goal and out own final minute of overtime game winning field goal. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 266 yards and 1 touchdown to rookie WR Jessie Vertelney. RB Marcus Jorg scored the other offensive touchdown, while RB Bennett Holmes ran for 127 yards. Rookie CB Byron Sokol scored a defensive touchdown.


Week 4 vs San Antonio, 34-27 loss
The team fell back to earth, sort of, as the defense in particular struggled, giving up 440 total yards and a final minute losing touchdown. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 196 yards and 3 touchdowns (twice to WR Calvin Maxwell, once to TE Garrett Alcala). WR Calvin Maxwell had 125 yards receiving, RB Bennett Holmes 113 yards rushing and a touchdown.

Week 6 vs Atlanta, 19-17 loss
And then the team played very well, but the lucky dice all rolled against us. Rarely does a team give up 205 total yards, but lose. Kudos to the Vipers' defense for taking full advantage of our mistakes and their ability to force those mistakes. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 183 yards, while running for 70 yards and a touchdown. RB Marcus Jorg ran for our other touchdown.


European Division:
1. Gothenburg 5-1
2. Maassluis 3-2
3. Bordeaux 2-3
4. Paris 2-4

We're actually sitting at the 2nd wild card slot, for now. The league is competitive, no team is unbeaten or winless. , but today's loss against Atlanta was the kind of loss that you just can't afford down the road of a full season, especially with half our home games already behind us. It would have been so much more comforting to sit at 4-1 and have the kind of record that fits with our performance on the field. But it is what it is. On to the next 11 games, one by one.

General Manager Notes: Smooth sailing to the top?
At least the top of the division after 10 games.

We've gotten things back on track after the stellar 3-0 start to this season. We posted a triplet of road victories to today's crucial home game against the Gothenburg Giants, basically a must win game to keep our hopes alive for a division title.

Week 7 at Fort Wayne: 19-13 win
In a defensive struggle, our defense proved to be as good as they've been touted (by me), forcing the sole turnover of the game and a safety for intentional grounding. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 183 yards and a touchdown to WR Calvin Maxwell, while RB Cary Delgado contributed with a running touchdown.

Week 8 at Paris Musketeers: 48-14 win
We owned Paris. In week 1, last season, the season before, and I actually lost count on how long our active winning streak over them is (it turns out to be 13 straight now), causing the Paris owner to throw his arms up in the air and call us the "luckiest team ever". Maybe, but not in this game, where we beat the home team fair and square. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 194 yards and touchdowns to WR Calvin Maxwell and FB Randy Julian, while RB Marcus Jorg and Singelton himself contributed with running touchdowns. CB Joel Delgado and LB Gus Coleman contributed with interception return touchdowns.

Week 9 at Houston: 44-6 win
It's hard to explain how a game can be even in terms of production, yet one team ends up losing the ball on turnovers and the other ends up scoring points. It was 34-0 at half time in our favor and at that point the backups were already called upon to play out this game. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 129 yards and a touchdown to WR Calvin Maxwell, QB Billy Russel threw for 93 yards and a touchdown to TE Garrett Alcala, while RB Marucs Jorg ran for a touchdown. CB Joel Delgado and S Jonathan White scored on interception returns. It marked back-to-back games for Delgado.

Week 10 vs Bordeaux: 20-17 loss
Our homecoming after a splendid road series was a major disappointment. Despite having great field position all day long, the offense struggled to gain ground, especially our #1 ranked running game that was held to 61 yards, while a couple of kick/punt return fumbles nullified the turnover advantage that we had with 2 interceptions on defense. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 201 yards with a touchdown to TE Wesley Martin, while RB Bennett Holmes scored our other touchdown.

Week 11 vs Gothenburg: 46-29 win
At the end of the game, an eruption of joy was much warranted. After a closely contested first half, the offense got red hot in the second half, scoring 4 touchdowns after medium to long drives. QB Harrison Singelton took the offensive player of the week honors after throwing for 353 yards with touchdown passes to WR Jesse Vertelney (3 times), WR Preston Gray and TE Garrett Alcala. Vertelney had his biggest game of his short career so far as well, gaining 170 yards on 9 catches, while RB Bennett Holmes ran for 154 yards and a touchdown.

European Division
1. Maassluis 7-3
2. Gothenburg 7-3
3. Bordeaux 4-6
4. Paris 2-8

So yeah, we lead the division on this magnificent head-to-head win. And on top of the division and we're actually tied with two other 7-3 AOC division leaders at the top3 spots of the conference now. Strength of victory is currently the tie-breaker between Harlem, Tucker and Maassluis. We still have to visit Gothenburg in week 15, visit the defending league champions Chesapeake in week 14, amongst others. Our next game will be at Brooklyn, currently the #2 in the NAC, also sporting a 7-3 record and tie-breakers behind the #1 spot.

We'll be heavily tested from here on, we'll have to prove that we are rightfully the #1 scoring team, #6 scoring defense and top5 in both offensive and defensive yardage. All that complimented with a state of the art special teams unit. We can't start thinking about the playoffs quite yet, we're barely 2 wins ahead of the teams in pursuit of the wild cards, a game at a time is the only logical approach.

General Manager Notes: And then we missed the playoffs
Quite the letdown, to say the least...

Week 12 vs Brooklyn: 31-23 loss
It started as a shootout and shortly before half time we scored a late touchdown to trail 21-20. But the fair observation that we were one notch less impressive overall. Brooklyn gained 448 total yards without turnovers, that's hard to beat. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 243 yards with a touchdown to TE Garrett Alcala, while Singelton also scored our only ground game touchdown.

Week 13 at Harlem: 20-7 loss
The overall score makes you think we got manhandled, the reality was that we ran into the best team in the conference this season that was more capable of making something of their drives and proved to be a more elite defense. Our staff got really annoying here and took off QB Harrison Singelton way too soon. In return, QB Billy Russell threw for 153 yards and a touchdown to WR Preston Gray, while Singelton was held to 59 yards passing.

Week 14 at Chesapeake: 26-23 loss
Every season has a game or two where a team misses opportunities and ends up losing a close contest. This was one of those. The defending league champions sent it to overtime with 30 seconds to go and finished it in overtime with 33 seconds to go. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 242 yards and 2 touchdowns to rookie WR Jessie Vertelney.

Week 15 at Gothenburg: 34-9 loss
The only thing missing this season was a fair and square total beatdown as all but the loss at Harlem were would-have-could-have games. The Giants had a score to settle with us, apparently, and they broke our spirit and hopes to make the playoffs this season, clinching the division title in the process. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 134 yards and was pulled for the 4th time this season. QB Billy Russell threw for 62 yards as the replacement. RB Cary Delgado ran for our only touchdown.

Week 16 vs Williamsburg: 28-20 win
Mathematically still alive, we pulled one of those outplayed yet scoring more type of games, something we also hadn't endured this season. Field position ruled the day for us, as we scored 2 touchdowns shortly after interceptions in the opponents' red zone. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 156 yards with touchdowns to TE Garrett Alcala, WR Calvin Maxwell and WR Jessie Vertelney, his first perfect trio to his top 3 receivers. RB Cary Delgado scored a rushing touchdown.

Week 17 at Bordeaux: 30-10 win
Still mathematically alive, we had vengeance after the Vineyards beat us in our place earlier this season. The yardage figures suggest a close contest, but the reality is that 3 interceptions thrown by a quarterback under pressure can completely turn such a game into a blowout score. The pinnacle play was CB Eduardo Cowdrick's 99-yard interception return for a touchdown to put us 17-0 up late in the first half. RB Bennett Holmes ran for a touchdown, QB Harrison Singelton threw for 238 yards and a touchdown to WR Jessie Vertelney.

European Division
1. Gothenburg 11-5
2. Maassluis 9-7
3. Bordeaux 6-10
4. Paris 3-13

Paris 'earned' the #1 overall draft pick in 2110 with the worst record in the league. Gothenburg goes into the post season as the #2 seeds. And we failed, as there were 6 teams in the AOC with a 10-6 or better record, earning their spots in the post-season. We're in good company though, 3 more AOC hopefuls finished the season at 9-7, most shockingly the #10 'seeded' Augusta Greenjackets and their top scoring offense with 502 points scored and 365 allowed. We were the second team with a +100 points differential to miss the playoffs. League records show that it had happened 23 times before, most recently in 2091.


We played well and yet the season turned into a total letdown. 4th highest scoring team, 11th highest in least points allowed, but no playoffs.


QB Harrison Singelton finished the season with 3,230 yards passing (roughly 202 per game) and 25 touchdowns versus 6 interceptions, the 2nd lowest amongst all starting quarterbacks, crucial in making him rank 6th in passer rating. QB Billy Russell threw for 2 touchdowns.

RB Bennett Holmes ran for 924 yards with 5.08 per carry and 4 touchdowns. QB Singleton ran for a league best 5.71 yards per carry, gaining 640 yards and scoring 4 touchdowns. RB Cary Delgado ran for 4 touchdowns, but RB Marcus Jorg topped the team with 5 rushing touchdowns.

WR Calvin Maxwell had 72 receptions for 1,035 yards and 8 touchdowns. He returned to the 1,000-yard club after a down season. TE Garrett Alcala had 95 receptions for 900 yards and 6 touchdowns. WR Jessie Vertelney ended up with 60 receptions for 886 yards and 8 touchdowns. Other receiving touchdowns were scored by WR Preston Gray (2), TE Wesley Martin, FB Randy Julian and RB Cary Delgado.

G Andres Uwaezuoke led the team with 32 key run blocks, followed by G Brett Stickney (28), C Zane Chaplain (24) and RT Ivan Dole (21). Our LT Earl McBirney allowed only 3 sacks in 574 pass plays.

We finished the season as the #1 defense in interceptions. LB Gus Coleman and CB Joel Delgado co-lead the team with 4 each. S John Aponte had 3. CB Eduardo Cowdrick, S Johnatan White, CB Skip Horner and CB Byron Sokol had 2 each. CB Logan Wallace, S Craig Clancy, LB Caiden Hastings and S Noah Matthews were in the letdown group with just 1 pick each. LB Gus Coleman tied for 3rd in the league with 118 tackles, LB Caiden Hastings was also above 100 tackles. Our pass rush was extremely disappointing, we were just 31st in sacks (both gross and average numbers). LB Avery Distel lead the team with 6.5, whilst playing out of the RDE slot on our passing downs packages.

We finished the season without punt return or kickoff return touchdowns, our punt returner CB Dennis Finley finished the season with a mediocre 12.5 per punt return. our kickoff returner WR Calvin Maxwell lead all 'qualifiers' with a 29.8 average. WR Calvin Maxwell lead the team with 3 forced fumbles, all earned on special teams plays. He did have to share that 'lead' with LB Gus Coleman, our leading tackler.


Bla, individual stats, bla. It's meaningful to determine where we stand, but in the end the 9 wins and 7 losses are the crucial numbers that really count. The season ended ater week 17. That's all that matters now. We're shifting our focus to 2110.

General Manager Notes: 2109 Awards and 2110 start of the off-season
Let's build on what we did well last season!

The story of 2109 ends with some individual accolades for some of our players that put up statistics that were considered amongst the best of the best at their respective positions. QB Harrison Singelton, TE Garrett Alcala and LB Gus Coleman were picked as Solecismic All-IHOF Second Teamers. Coleman and Alcala had the gross production that made it quite obvious they would be considered for such honors, but Singleton was a surprise to me, despite his awesome touchdown to interception ratio and his league best yards per carry average amongst players with 100+ carries. It marks the first time in 106 seasons of the Merchantmen that a quarterback was selected as All-IHOF. In that regard, Singelton already achieved more than the handful of Hall of Famers and others.

Very good news came from WR Rick Emerson, he's been cleared from tobacco withdrawal system. We hope he can prove in camp and pre-season he's still a valuable member to the team.

We do go into the season down two players. CB Norbert Goldfarb was signed last off-season as a veteran to bolster our special teams unit, but in the end I never activated him at all last season, which means he was just around to keep things quiet in the locker room amongst our secondary guys. That's too bad, because our special teams unit clearly was on a down season after a couple of best of the best seasons.

RB Van Goodwin retires after 7 seasons on team, in which he played 128 regular season games and in both playoffs games in 2104.The former undrafted rookie signing struggled early in his career as a rusher. In 2102 we kept him exclusive on special teams, a unit he was a valuable member of throughout. In his second and third season he was part of our rotation, sharing carries with RB Bennett Holmes, being our third downs back. Then after 2 seasons of being left off the offensive side of the ball, we brought him back into that role in 2107 and 2108, which turned into his most impressive seasons. Last season he went back to just special teams and notified the team of his retirement from football. Good luck, Van.

And that brings us into the start of the 2110 off-season. We're currently at just 42 players signed while being $64 million over the cap. It will be a challenge once again, but I think we'll manage to get under without sacrificing many if any players. We will want to shave a bit more off than the value of the seven draft picks and the additional 2 players that will count towards the cap. It would be wise to save a bit more than that, as 14 players will see their contracts run out after next season, not counting QB Billy Russell, as he's demanding to get traded and will surely not extend with us. And on top of that, after QB Harrison Singelton's awesome season, it might be the right time to extend his contract with 2 remaining seasons to a new 5-year deal whilst his contract demands are still very manageable: he's seeking roughly $15M per year, including the left over signing bonus from his rookie contract.

Our list of free agents sees 10 names on it. TE Ty Rumans, WR Kai Cote, C Roman Gillespie, DE Howie Tucker, LB Julio Pochman, CB Skip Horner and CB Byron Sokol are restricted free agents. So, we also have 3 unrestricted free agents. TE Darnell McKie shouldn't be interesting to the other 31 teams in the league, but worth keeping for us as a cohesion booster. LB Mack Pang continues to be an elite special teamer. CB Dennis Finley was the best punt returner in football for a while, but made a leap back last season. Still, it's regrettable that our contract extension offers never reached their player agents shortly before week 1.

That's about where we stand for the moment. It's time to start making our spreadsheet for the draft that has pretty much started...

General Manager Notes: the forgotten faces?

Previously I mentioned the retirement of 2 players that were still on our team in the 2109 season, but several long-time members of past seasons also announced their retirement from football.

QB Evan Drake
It's undeniable: Evan Drake retired as a league champion. Picked in the second round of the 2094 draft, he was destined to be the Arizona Miners franchise quarterback. Except their ownership gave up on him after just 2 seasons of not really getting a fair chance to prove himself. The Colorado Cutthroats had no doubt and in 2096 Drake guided his new team into the playoffs. In 2098 the Cutthroats stranded in the NAC Conference game.

Despite a 4,000-yard seasons, he fell out of favor in the 2104 off-season and the Maassluis Merchantmen swooped him up. Drake lead the Merchantmen to the end of a playoffs drought, making the Merchantmen division champions in 2104 and victory in the wild card round. Drake remained the undisputed starter in Maassluis, until 2108 second round pick Harrison Singelton stepped in during for the injured Drake early in the season and took the starting role from Drake late in the season. Fallen out of favor, Drake wanted to leave Maassluis in 2109 and it took until the playoffs for him to finally get picked up again. The Brooklyn Fightin' Bums needed a backup quarterback and by virtue of having seen the field as a kick holder, Drake earned a championship ring as the Fightin' Bums won their first ever IHOF Bowl.

Drake retired with passing figures of 48,571 yards, 281 touchdowns and 215 interceptions in 208 regular season games. These kind of career figures are usually sufficient to get enshrined into the Solecismic Hall of Fame. For the Maassluis Merchantmen Drake ranks 9th in passing yards and passing touchdowns in 69 regular season games.


DE Robbie Dobreski
Picked in the third round of the 2098 draft, the Merchantmen felt that Dobreski should prove his pass rush skills from day one. He wasn't quite ready, but his playing time seriously increased in his third season on the team. In 2101 Dobreski made 10.5 sacks and in 2106 he topped that figure with 11.5 sacks. Caught in a rotation system, these were quite impressive figures. After 10 seasons on the rotation and 65.0 sacks later, Dobreski was out of shape in the 2109 off-season and failed to make the regular season roster. No other team showed interest and he retired with 164 regular season games and 2 playoffs games, all for the Merchantmen.


CB Wesley Cabrera
One of many members of the class of 2102, a 3rd round pick even, Cabrera never proved to be a true starter, but season after season kept making the team as the nth cornerback on the team. In the 2109 off-season, he finally fell out of favor and was released. Unable to find a new team, Cabrera retired this off-season, showing 101 games played for the Merchantmen (including 2 in the 2104 playoffs).

LB Mo Fausel
Whether Fausel is a member of the class of 2102 is disputable, as he was an undrafted rookie. But his role was never disputed, from day one he was a member of the special teams unit, racking up to 110 games played for the Merchantmen in that role. The undisputedness ended in the 2109 off-season as Fausel was no longer considered one of the best special teamers on the roster. No other team wanted to boost their special teams unit and Fausel retired this off-season.



But enough about the past now, we just finished the 2110 draft?
With some limited wheeling and dealing, we ended up swapping our 2nd and 6th round picks for future picks, picking up an additional 7th round pick in the process. Here's our sextet of picks, not counting the undrafted rookies that we haven't quite signed yet.

1.18 TE Ben Gordon
Scouting reports told us he's a fantastic receiver in potential. He fills a soon-to-be need as TE Garrett Alcala is getting up there in age and has been losing quite some of his speed and stuff. Hopefully he can adapt to leaving Texas...


3.20 P Sergio Scott
Yup, it was bound to happen at some point. Jimmy Summers is on the decline and has a moron as an agent requesting way more money that Summers deserves for his ability. Training camp and pre-season are still to come, but Scott is the favorite to win this role in 2110.

4.19 RB Richard Ragley
Anticipating the departure of punt return specialist CB Dennis Finley, we interviewed several promising return specialists this draft. Ragley impressed our staff members and we're hoping to have a guy here that can also return kickoffs. His route running and hole recognition are interesting enough to see whether he can join the rotation.

5.18 LB Bobby Diaz
A special teamer, with pass defense skills and some run defense ability. He'll have a chance to make the roster.

7.9 DT Trey Woods
A special teamer with pass rush technique. We were in search for somebody in the rotation after we released DE Dean Rosas a couple of days ago.

7.20 LS Joshua Harvey
Maybe we stick with our veteran LS Bennett Brock. Or maybe we switch to this 11.5 years younger alternative. We'll see after camp. Or pre-season.

General Manager Notes: 2110 training camp roster set
Just a bit of name dropping...

We're heading into training camp with 65 players on roster. Or a bit more if we want to sing a guy or 5 at the eleventh hour. Here's the bunch that we picked up, mostly undrafted rookie free agents, with the exception of the first two names.

DE Zachery Abvueva
A familiar face in Maassluis, we picked him up as an undrafted rookie in 2108, switched him from tackle to end. He went through the motions, getting cut by us at mid-pre-season in 2108 and again in 2109 as we re-signed him in the 2108 post-season and 2109 off-season. In 2109 the Kansas Creationists picked him up from the scrapheap and actually let him play a little bit in 5 games. He's still lacking run defense ability, has pass rush technique, no endurance, but can be a punishing hitter on special teams.

S Dan Peterson
A third-year pro, picked up by the Fort Wayne Fury as undrafted rookie in 2108. Played in 14 games for them that season, but was a pre-season casualty in 2109. The Rochester Razorbacks signed him just in time for week 1 action, but was mostly misplaced as a special teamer. He's an excellent zone defender, with run defense potential and the skills to force turnovers. Yes, he's only 5'7, but he will get a chance in pre-season with us, I suspect.

And now for the undrafted rookie signees: RB Marquis Ballard, RB Jonah Underhill, FB Cary Farmer, FB Kenneth Holse, CB Dalton Benton and S Lester Singleton. Most of them will need to show good progress in training camp to make the pre-season roster and then some more to have a tiny chance to make the final list of 53. Ballard will need to show he can play on our special teams unit and has the hole recognition to step in as an emergency runner. Underhill looks to have a neat combo of breakaway speed and hole recognition. Holse or Farmer has a shot to make the team as a special teamer. Benton is a man-to-man defender with interception skills, Singleton has the later with zone defense experience. All six are longshots, but you can never fully predict what will happen...

General Manager Notes: The battle for the roster spots 2110

Okay, let's dig a little bit into the roster building plan that's going on in Maassluis, because throwing names out there is one thing, but why would player X, Y or Z have a good or slim chance to make the team?

Let's break the roster down into the 53 spots available.

Ideally, I want to have 1 spare player for every mandatory minimum, except the three special teams positions (punter, kicker and long snapper). That means:
3 quarterbacks
3 running backs and fullbacks, 4 tight ends, 5 wide receivers
2 centers, 3 guards, 3 tackles
1 punter, 1 kicker
6 defensive ends and tackles, 6 linebackers
8 cornerbacks and safeties
1 long snapper

That's 46 already, but there's more to add here. Some of these numbers are just there as an insurance for injuries, most notably the QB3, TE4 and the 8th OL players. These will hopefully remain inactive all season and should have at least something going for them to deserve sticking around as well.

Due to the (lack of) endurance in a lot of defensive positions, but also at running back, it's preferrable to have a little bit more around (like 3 RB and 1 FB at minimum, 7 DE+DT). Not to mention that for many position groups you must have special teamers (2 RB/FB, 1 TE, 2 WR, 3 LB, 4 CB/S), which means some of these will tak away from the active roster spots available for the slotting of skill players and the defensive players. It gives some leeway to stick around a handful (at most) spots to play around with.

In recent seasons I signed a CB/S exclusively to break a lockerroom conflict. A mentor could also be used as an inactive player, but ideally that mentor does also have at least some skills (like being a special teamer). And last, but not least, for a special teams unit to really excel, having a decent return specialist is also required. Sometimes if they have the endurance to cope with it, they can be key players like your starting WR (kick returner Calvin Maxwell), but sometimes they are void of other skills (CB Dennis Finlay our current punt returner).

All these factor make it that there's no clearcut formula, but when you glance over the rosters of the Merchantmen in recent seasons, you'll notice that all of the above will hold up. Every now or then I end up playing russian roulette with 3 TE or 5 LB, which usually comes back to bite you before week 10 and force to cut the 53rd player, or place somebody on IR that is expected to return in just 3 or 4 weeks.

But just for the sake of it, let's go over how the 53 roster spots for 2110 could potentially breakdown:
QB1 - Harrison Singleton
QB2 - Billy Russell
QB3 - Drake Bishop
RB1 - Bennett Holmes
RB2 - Marcus Jorg / Jonah Underhill
RB3 - Cary Delgado
RB/ST - RB Marquis Ballard / FB Kenneth Holse
FB/ST - Randy Julian / Cary Farmer
TE1 - Ben Gordon
TE2 - Garratt Alcala
TE3/ST - Wesley Martin
TE4 - Darnell McKie / Ty Rumans
WR1 - Jessie Vertelney
WR2 - Calvin Maxwell
WR3 - Preston Gray
WR4 - Jaylen Gearhart
WR5/ST - Kai Cote
WR6/ST - Rick Emerson
C1 - Zane Chaplain
C2 - Roman Gillespie
G1 - Brett Stickney
G2 - Andres Uwaezuoka
G3 - Tutan Shapiro
LT1 - Earl McBirney
LT2 - Harold Gruenwalder
OT3 - Ivan Dole
P - Sergio Scott / Jimmy Summers
K - Oscar Harrington
DE1 - Frank Bernard
DE2 - Howie Tucker
DE3 - Steve Aber / Zachery Abueva
DT1 - Efrain Hutchins
DT2 - Gabriel Morris
DT3 - Trey Woods
DL7 - Mitch Pitchynok
DL8/pass rush LB - DT Leslie Jeffries / LB Julio Pochman
LB1 - Gus Coleman
LB2 - Caiden Hastings
LB3 - Xavier Hoover
LB4/ST - Avery Distel
LB5/ST - Mack Pang
LB6/ST - Bobby Diaz
CB1/m2m/BnR - Joel Delgado
CB2/m2m/BnR - Byron Sokol
CB3/run/m2m - Logan Wallace / Dalton Benton
CB4/zone - Skip Horner
S1 - John Aponte
S2 - Craig Clancy
S3 - Noah Matthews
CB/S8/zone - Jonathan White
CB/S9/zone - CB Eduardo Cowdrick / S Dan Peterson / S Lester Singleton
PR - CB Dennis Finlay / RB Richard Ragley
LS - Bennett Brock / Joshua Harvey

Well, how about that. They only spots I'm not 100% on are whether we really need 8 DL and 6 LB, whether we need 6 WR and whether we need 5 RB/FB, but that's basically having filled 50 slots and those last 3 are basically special teamers that may or may not be active if there's a reasonable alternative available amongst the other guys in the rotation. There's apparently not that much unknown in my mind and it also means every one of those rookies will really need to make an impression in training camp to even ear 1 of the 60 pre-season roster spots.

General Manager Notes: 5 down, 7 to go
Today we announced the release of 5 undrafted rookies. RB Marquis Ballard, RB Jonah Underhill, FB Clay Farmer, CB Dalton Benton and S Lester Singelton won't make our pre-season squad. In particular Benton and Lester Singleton are stuck in a group that was hard. Both have very good interception skills and the potential to be useful coverage guys (Benton in man-to-man and Lester Singelton in zone defense), but more importantly, both were amongst the 13 players that made good progress in training camp.

So, who were the 11 other players with good progress?

QB Harrison Singleton should come as no surprise, he's still roughly 30/45 by our staff, so there's quite the room for improvement. Rookie first round pick TE Ted Gordon has the looks of being 40/65ish. Backup C Roman Gillespie improved to 45/50. Our starting LT Earl McBirney is still not yet fully developed and grew to 50/60. DE Steve Aber improved to 35/50, DE Frank Bernard to 70/70, DT Leslie Jeffries to 35/45, LB Xavier Hoover to 45/45 (and I suspect he might have some additional progress in him), LB Julio Pochman is now 25/35, CB Skip Horner is 35/35 and free agent signing S Dan Peterson went up to 45/50. Gillespie, Aber and Peterson made the biggest leaps forward. Which is still no guarantee for the last two to make the team. But, that's something to re-examine after our first pre-season game, when the whole world could be so much different...

General Manager Notes: 8 down, 1 to go
Wait, what?

In our roster trimming down from 60 players to 53 players, the first big step has been made. We released 8 players, and signed 2 new players.

The release of 7th round picks LS Joshua Harvey and DT Trey Woods was harsh, but not unexpected given the presence of better veterans on roster. They might get back into the picture come post-season time, if we're not participating in the IHOF Bowl and if they haven't found a new home in between.

The release of TE Ty Rumans and LB Julio Pochman has been the results of picking rookies TE Ted Gordon and LB Bobby Diaz. It happens in the numbers game. But harder was the decision to release 3 long time members, all cornerbacks.

CB Eduardo Cowdrick was a 6th round pick in the mega 2102 draft class. He was never a starter, yet always in the CB3 or CB4 role and often joined the special teams unit. He's been active in 124 regular season games and the pair of 2104 playoffs games.

CB Logan Wallace was a 2nd round pick in the 2102 draft for us. For 7 straight seasons he was the undisputed shutdown corner for our team. But his skills were receding and as a result the stay in Maassluis ends after 122 regular season games and the obvious pair in the 2104 playoffs.

CB Dennis Finley's stay in Maassluis ends after 5 seasons. The late 7th round pick in 2105, he sat out his rookie season and then in 2106 became a sensation as the league's best punt returner. After 3 seasons lonely at the top, he had clearly lost some of his speed last season and now we've decided to look elsewhere in a position battle. Finley's journey with us ends after 64 regular season games.

RB Richard Ragley was drafted in the 4th round this off-season to replace Finley, but he showed far too little progress to unseat Finley. In both cases, we made the release after we signed a veteran at the same position with a reputation of being a top of the league punt returner. CB Will Warrick and RB Darnell Greenham both have a history in Toronto, where Greenham took over Warrick's role as the team's punt returner in 2108. Greenham also has a history in the European division, with stints in Paris and Gothenburg.

We've also started the negotiations with QB Harrison Singelton. Apparently we lowballed a bit too much on our first attempt, hence, we'll go for another shot at it. He's seeking a $120M 5-year deal, while being on the third year of his4-year rookie contract. We're trying to find a construction that makes him not too expensive this season and also a cap out candidate in the next 3 seasons, in case he's going to discover that he's a perennial All-IHOF candidate and starts asking for $75M per season, instead of his current $24M per year suggestion.

Aside from the released veterans, RB Bennett Holmes looks like the biggest casualty of the changes of time. I'm likely going to stick with him in a rotation with Marcus Jorg and Cary Delgado, but he's also less likely to be a special teams candidate. Which could pave the way for the FB duo of Randy Julian and rookie Kenneth Holse to both make the team and active 46-men roster. Rookie P Sergio Scott was unimpressive and we'll have to evaluate what to do between him and mentor P Jimmy Summers, the latter does look like the better option. With 54 players signed, that means even QB Billy Russell is likely to be save, despite his own drop in ability and desire to get traded. We've had some interest for him, but that has faded away.

Pre-season re-evaluation wasn't bad on all players. Rookie LB Bobby Diaz made good progress and looks like a viable passing downs option and a special teams option as well. But Diaz was the lone bright light in that regard. Well, that and we won both pre-season games, for whatever that will prove to be worth...

General Manager Notes: The battle for the roster spots 2110, update

Previously I posted a possible roster breakdown, let's revisit this with some of the changes we made:
QB1 - Harrison Singleton
QB2 - Billy Russell
QB3 - Drake Bishop
RB1 - Bennett Holmes
RB2 - Marcus Jorg - Jonah Underhill was released
RB3 - Cary Delgado
RB/ST - FB Kenneth Holse - RB Marquis Ballard was released
FB/ST - Randy Julian - Cary Farmer was released
TE1 - Ben Gordon
TE2 - Garratt Alcala
TE3/ST - Wesley Martin
TE4 - Darnell McKie - Ty Rumans was released
WR1 - Jessie Vertelney
WR2 - Calvin Maxwell
WR3 - Preston Gray
WR4 - Jaylen Gearhart
WR5/ST - Kai Cote
WR6/ST - Rick Emerson
C1 - Zane Chaplain
C2 - Roman Gillespie
G1 - Brett Stickney
G2 - Andres Uwaezuoka
G3 - Tutan Shapiro
LT1 - Earl McBirney
LT2 - Harold Gruenwalder
OT3 - Ivan Dole
P - Sergio Scott / Jimmy Summers
K - Oscar Harrington
DE1 - Frank Bernard
DE2 - Howie Tucker
DE3 - Steve Aber - Zachery Abueva still on roster
DT1 - Efrain Hutchins
DT2 - Gabriel Morris
DL6 - Zachery Abueva - Trey Woods was released
DL7 - Mitch Pitchynok
DL8/pass rush LB - DT Leslie Jeffries - LB Julio Pochman was released
LB1 - Gus Coleman
LB2 - Caiden Hastings
LB3 - Xavier Hoover
LB4/ST - Avery Distel
LB5/ST - Mack Pang
LB6/ST - Bobby Diaz
CB1/m2m/BnR - Joel Delgado
CB2/m2m/BnR - Byron Sokol
CB3/run/m2m - vacancy? Logan Wallace and Dalton Benton were released
CB4/zone - Skip Horner
S1 - John Aponte
S2 - Craig Clancy
S3 - Noah Matthews
CB/S8/zone - Jonathan White
CB/S9/zone - S Dan Peterson CB Eduardo Cowdrick and S Lester Singleton were released
PR - CB Will Warrick / RB Darnell Greenham - CB Dennis Finlay and RB Richard Ragley were released
LS - Bennett Brock - Joshua Harvey was released

So, we're down to 2 positional battles and a vacancy at the cornerback position. There was also a bit of a shuffle on the D-Line, but all things considered, most of what happened was according to the mock up.

General Manager Notes: Last cut made, no rookie punter in 2110

It was a tough but at the same time not a very hard decision: we released 3rd round rookie P Sergio Scott. His progress in training camp and pre-season were just not enough to warrant releasing veteran P Jimmy Summers. Granted, I had a couple of other options, like releasing one of the punt return tryout candidates or trading QB Billy Russell. Actually, one of those could still happen. Or both even...

General Manager Notes: When the quarterback gets pulled...

I'm disappointed in my staff. Today, for the 6th time in 24 starts, my staff members decided to pull our starting quarterback Harrison Singleton early in the third quarter. Apparently they are too confident or insecure when there's a lead or deficit of 3 or more touchdowns. I tried to show them game film of the worst choke in Merchantmen history, when we pissed away a 21-point lead in the last 9 minutes of a game in Gothenburg. I'll write about the game later on, but for now, I have to get this off my system. It's unprecedented in the long history of the Maassluis Merchantmen to see our quarterback get pulled, let alone in 1/4th of his starts. Staff, please stop!

And then... I find out I actually sent them a note at some unknown moment in the past, telling them that replacing the starter is a great idea. I just forgot that I never told them to revert back to the most logical thing to do: stick with the starter as long as possible...

General Manager Notes: The 53 for the 2110 season

Pre-season is over, our 53 names for the 2110 season are now known.

The quarterbacks
30/45 QB Harrison Singleton - our quarterback
25/25 QB Billy Russell - our backup quarterback
20/20 QB Drake Bishop - our emergency mentor kick holder

The backfield
30/30 RB Bennett Holmes - the main ball carrier
35/35 RB Marcus Jorg - the change of pace back
40/40 RB Cary Delgado - the pounder of the backfield
25/25 RB Darnell Greenham - new! - the backup punt returner
30/30 FB Randy Julian - the extra run blocker
25/45 FB Kenneth Holse - rookie - special teamer

The tight ends
40/60 TE Ben Gordon - rookie - the project
45/45 TE Garrett Alcala - the safety net in the passing game
30/30 TE Wesley Martin - the mentor and key blocker
20/20 TE Darnell McKie - living proof we can win playoffs games

the prima donnas
75/75 WR Jessie Vertelney - our playmaker
60/60 WR Calvin Maxwell - the legend, ready to play WR2
45/45 WR Preston Gray - the WR3 that can get open and won't drop it
35/45 WR Jaylen Gearhart - the gazelle
35/40 WR Kai Cote - the other gazelle
20/20 WR Rick Emerson - the mentor

the offensive linemen
60/60 C Zane Chaplain - the man in the middle
45/55 C Roman Gillespie - starting caliber interior lineman, stuck on the bench
65/65 G Brett Stickney - the do it all on the line
60/60 G Andres Uwaezuoke - the run blocking guard
30/45 G Tutan Shapiro - the man with the muscles, but not ready to play
75/75 RT Ivan Dole - our run blocking anchor
50/60 LT Earl McBirney - our left tackle, blindside protector
45/45 LT Harold Gruenwalder - the backup and mentor of McBirney

The defensive linemen
70/70 DE Frank Bernard - complete, elite, ready to run havoc
35/35 DE Howie Tucker - the pass rusher
35/50 DE Steve Aber - the project pass rusher
30/30 DE Zachary Abueva - the backup pass rusher
70/70 DT Efrain Hutchins - the successor to the all-time greats
55/55 DT Gabriel Morris - declining, still an excellent run stuffer
30/30 DT Mitch Potchynok - the big pass rusher up the middle
35/45 DT Leslie Jeffries - the extra run stuffer

The linebackers
75/75 LB Gus Coleman - the monster linebacker
65/65 LB Caiden Hastings - the running downs monster
50/50 LB Xavier Hoover - the running downs LB3
30/40 LB Bobby Diaz - rookie - the project, quality ass defender, special teamer
35/35 LB Avery Distel - will play on the D-Line as a pass rusher
15/15 LB Mack Pang - the special teams hero

The secondary
45/45 CB Joel Delgado - the shutdown corner?
35/45 CB Byron Sokol - the shutdown project
20/20 CB Will Warrick - new - the punt returner and backup corner
35/35 CB Skip Horner - our nickelback
45/45 S Dan Peterson - new - our new running downs safety
35/35 S Craig Clancy - the elite zone defender
35/35 S John Aponte - the other elite zonde defender
45/45 S Noah Matthews - the interceptions booster
35/35 S Johnatan White - we have too many zone defenders

The special teams specialists
65/65 P Jimmy Summers - better than the rookie we cut
90/90 K Oscar Harrington - best in the game
20/20 LS Bennett Brock - because we require one, he's great at it though

I feel good and confident about this group. Singelton was a reliable quarterback last season, while Russell now has the second season boost in case we're stuck with him. With Vertelney, Maxwell, Gray, Gordon and Alcala, we have a quintet that can compete. The O-line is solid and the same bunch for the 3rd season straight. The backfield the same 3 guys in rotation, with Singelton as the dual treat guy.

The defense is mostly the same bunch, with Bernard, Hutchins, Hastings and Hoover ready to show they are the sidekicks Coleman and Morris were waiting for. The secondary is good enough to defend the pass, they are the elite of the league with 50 interceptions in the last 2 seasons combined. And the special teams unit is really something special, arguably the best one in the league.

Yes, we've shown quite some flaws last season, but the core of a winning team was there and with another season of experience in the bag, this team should be ready to prove the world they're ready to make the playoffs and not just to participate in the post-season, but actually make something happen.

General Manager Notes: 2110, the first 6 weeks
With highs and lows and what not.

The 2110 season is in full swing. The Maassluis Merchantmen have played a tough stretch, with three on the road and with 4 of 5 opponents teams that had a winning record last season.

Week 1 at Gothenburg
No slow start to the 2110 season, the schedule makers decided to put the European Division blockbuster game as a season opener at the reigning European champions. It turned into a game of two tales, as Gothenburg rushed to a 27-6 lead at halftime. We decided to replace QB Harrison Singleton with QB Billy Russell and with the veteran under center, we rallied back to a 27-23 deficit. Then the Giants woke up again and built their lead back up into a solid victory. QB Singleton threw for 112 yards, QB Russell for 82 yards. Russell threw for the only Merchantmen touchdown of the game to WR Jessie Vertelney, who had 106 yards receiving. LB Gus Coleman made an interception and forced a fumble. DE Frank Bernard had 1.5 sacks.
Result: 23-37 loss


Week 2 at Hanalei
Hoping to bounce back as we were visiting the Dragons that went 6-10 last season, we were in for a disappointment. The big difference was made by the red zone efficiency (and 10 yards up to it), as Hanalei scored twice on 30-yard passes while we settled for a 30 and a bit field goals three times. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 250 yards. DE Howie Tucker had 1.5 sacks.
Result: 9-28 loss

Week 3 vs Atlanta
The best remedy to an 0-2 start is a sound victory in your first home game of the season. It started bad as although we stopped them on their first drive with an interception, QB Harrison Singleton replied it by throwing a pick six. From there on, the game was stingy, with a bunch of big plays turning into touchdowns. We had WR Calvin Maxwell score on a 90-yard kickoff return and CB Will Warrick on a 64-yard punt return, while the Vipers had a 94-yard touchdown pass in the fourth quarter. We played out the final 5 minutes of the game with a rock solid drive that concluded in a victory clinching field goal. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 202 yards and a touchdown to rookie TE Ted Gordon. DT Efrain Hutchins had 1.5 sacks.
Result: 32-27 victory

week 4 bye
It never gets old, we had our bye week early in the season.
Result: Gothenburg won, Bordeaux lost

week 5 vs Tucker
And then the team as a collective got red hot. Not just a little bit, we made the undefeated Tigers look like they forgot how to play football. Despite their strong running game, they reverted to throwing the ball a lot, and I mean a whole lot. But in 67 passing plays, only 22 of them resulted in a completed pass, while our defense completely bullied them: 5 interceptions, 6 sacks, 14 more hurried or blocked passes and 10 passes defended. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 311 yards with touchdowns to WR Calvin Maxwell and WR Jessie Vertelney (114 yards receiving for the day). RB Bennett Holmes ran for 109 yards and shared the running touchdowns with QB Singleton and RB Marcus Jorg for 1 each. CB Joel Delgado and CB Byron Sokol scored an interception return touchdown late in the fourth quarter when the game was pretty much over already. LB Gus Coleman had 1 interception, 1 forced fumble and 2 defended passes. DE Frank Bernard had 3.0 sacks, DT Gabriel Morris 2.5 sacks. CB Skip Horner had 1 interception and 2 defended passes.
Result: 52-23 victory.

week 6 at Augusta
As to be expected after such a shockingly big win, we fell back to earth in the road game at the strong Greenjackets. In particular their offense is top notch and last season was quite a shocker they missed the playoffs (we beat them in our house in overtime). I'm tempted to say we had our chances, but at the same time, a couple of times we shook ourselves into sleep while owning their passing game (we held an elite QB to 150 yards passing) as two big runs for 72 and 80 yards jump out on the box score and explain the difference in total yardage. The rest of the game our defense held them to field goals, but as our offense struggled in return, we wasted our chances to kick for a game tier and later on forgot to attempt to throw into the end zone in the dying seconds. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 229 yards, with 1 touchdown pass to WR Calvin Maxwell. S Dan Peterson scored a touchdown on a long fumble return.
Result: 20-26 loss

European Division
1. Gothenburg 5-1
2. Paris 3-2
3. Maassluis 2-3
4. Bordeaux 1-4

Our next stop will be in Paris and we will hope to extend our I-lost-count-long winning streak against them. They were no match for us in either game last season, but they have already tied their win total of last season, eking out their three home games with two come back from behind wins and a very impressive beatdown of the Orlando Talons today. And the season won't get much easier after that. The week 17 home game against Paris could be the only one where we're legitimately huge favorites in any of those 11 remaining regular season games...

General Manager Notes: 2011, the second six-week series

After our 2-3 start to the season, the middle 6 games of the regular season have been played. A series that included clashes with all 3 our division rivals, the second half of the intraconference series against the AOC Southeast division and an interconference home game against an NAC West opponent.

Week 7 at Paris
In terms of overall wins and losses, Paris is putting up a fight with us this season. Sending a strong message that we're still ahead was desirable and the team did, yet also learned that Paris wasn't going to let themselves pummeled anymore. Despite a 461 total yards performance, the offense struggled in the red zone as we settled for 3 short field goals. In return, the defense kept Paris in check after their first drive resulted in touchdown, as they didn't come any closer than a missed field goal. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 318 yards and a touchdown to WR Jessie Vertelney, who lead the team with 133 yards receiving. DE Frank Bernard had 2.0 sacks.
Result: 16-7 victory

Week 8 vs Snapfinger
And then we bounced back to earth again. In what felt like a trap game, that premonition delivered. Snapfinger's rookie QB Frank Leach had one of his best games so far, while our own offense struggled against the talented Snapfinger defense. We actually still lead by 6 points late in the fourth quarter, when Leach lead his team to their longest drive on the game, converting on a short touchdown run himself. We had a chance to turn it around, as on the final play of the game TE Ted Gordon broke free for a big gain, but as he failed to go out of bounds, time ran out when QB Harrison Singelton tried to spike the ball to stop the clock and give us a 45-yard field goal attempt. Singleton threw for just 172 yards, with 1 touchdown pass to WR Calvin Maxwell, who lead the team with 105 yards receiving. DE Frank Bernard and DT Efrain Hutchins had 1.5 sacks each.
Result: 16-17 loss

Week 9 vs Bordeaux
The team bounced back big time in the home game against Bordeaux. Our struggling division rivals picked off QB Harrison Singleton twice in the first quarter, but as they came away with 2 field goals from it, it became clear it wasn't going to be their day. Singleton threw for 325 yards and 3 touchdowns, all three to our current receiving phenomenon WR Jessie Vertelney. RB Bennett Holmes contributed with a rushing touchdown. DE Frank Bernard ran havoc on the opposing line once again, making 2.5 sacks.
Result: 37-12 victory

Week 10 at Orlando
And then we tripped another time over clock management. Despite the tough matchup, we found ourselves leading 16-10 going into the fourth quarter and still up 16-13 when we drained Orlando's time outs in the final minutes. But after their QB Conor Shea found his tight end wide open for a 37-yard gain, S John Aponte let our team down with unsportsmanship, resulting in a stopped clock and 15 more yards for Orlando. It gave them just enough time and distance to not just kick to send the game to overtime, but actually score a touchdown with 17 seconds remaining. Our Hail Mary attempt from our own 25-yard line failed and the game ended in a wasted opportunity to beat a wild card rival. QB Harrison Singelton was held to 175 yards passing. RB Bennett Holmes ran for our only touchdown of the game. DT Gabriel Morris forced 2 fumbles.
Result: 16-20 loss

Week 11 vs Gothenburg
And then the game of the season was here. In a sense that this would basically be our last chance to keep the visiting Giants from cakewalking to the division title. It turned out to be a fantastic game of football, with things going back and forth. We took an early 14-0 lead, struggled with turnovers, saw Gothenburg get by, while we did just enough to kick a field goal as the clock ran out for a 17-17 half time score.
Gothenburg dominated the third quarter, taking a 10-point lead, but in the fourth quarter the whole team stepped it up. First the defense forced three-and-out, followed by a punt returned to midfield. QB Harrison Singelton discovered TE Ted Gordon today, finding him twice to end the drive on a 16-yard touchdown. The defense then kept the Gothenburg quarterback in check for 3 straight incomplete passes and they panicked by punting from our 35-yard line, not feeling confident to attempt a 52-yard field goal.
In the final 7 minutes QB Harrison Singleton showed all of his skills. He ran for 11 yards, found a wide open TE Ted Gordon for a 22-yard gain and when already in field goal range, found WR Jessie Vertelney for the full 4 yards to extend the drive. A 9-yard scramble on 3rd and 7 gave us another fresh set of downs and despite all the penalties the offense was committing, eventually RB Bennett Holmes ran it in for a 4-point lead and just 1 minute remaining. The Giants came close, reaching our 34-yard line, but in particular DE Frank Bernard stepped up and his pass rush pressure was too much to overcome for the visitors. Despite needing a touchdown, Gothenburg decided not to attempt a Hail Mary and even a screen pass proved too much to ask of Burt Kiluk at this crucial moment.
QB Harrison Singleton threw for 284 yards with 2 touchdown passes, 1 to WR Calvin Maxwell (a 50-yarder, the old man can still do it) and 1 to TE Ted Gordon, who had a breakout performance with 124 yards receiving. RB Cary Delgado and RB Bennett Holmes both ran for a touchdown.
Result: 31-27 victory

Week 12 vs Oakland
In a game touted by stats driven media as the clash of two sack machines, the two league leaders were both kept in check by their opposing offensive linemen. Neither our DE Frank Bernard nor Oakland's DE Terry Hopper was able to add to their 13.5 sacks after 11 games played. It was also the clash of All-IHOF quarterbacks from last season, between their QB Roberto Fredrickson and his 5 interceptions versus our QB Harrison Singleton and his 6 interceptions. In this game, both were picked off, for each the 9th of the season already.
After a back and forth in the first half, that saw Oakland leading 17-14 by half time, turnovers eventually piled on too much for Oakland to stay in pace. A couple of fumbled punt returns, both forced by WR Calvin Maxwell, kept the Oakland offense off the field, while an earlier 97-yard interception return touchdown by S Dan Peterson already flipped the score into Maassluis advantage. Oakland finished strong with a 69-yard touchdown drive to get within 5 points and after we settled for a field goal, Oakland saw their completed Hail Mary pass get stopped at our 28-yard line to end the game.
QB Harrison Singleton threw for just 157 yards and a touchdown to WR Calvin Maxwell, while Singleton ran for a touchdown as well. RB Cary Delgado scored the other offensive touchdown. S Dan Peterson scored the aforementioned interception return touchdown.
Result: 31-23 victory


So, after a strong 4-2 series with both losses missed opportunities to secure the win, while 1 win was a nailbiter and 1 win was a shouldn't have gotten close anymore, we're bouncing back into the longshot wild card race and 21 wins behind the division leading Gothenburg Giants, with tie-breakers somewhat favorable, but most definitively not determined at all.

European Division
1. Gothenburg 8-3
2. Maassluis 6-5
3. Paris 5-6
4. Bordeaux 1-10

Our final stretch of the regular season will not be easy either. We start with three road games at Rochester (7-4), Fairbanks (3-8) and Bordeaux. Rochester is currently sitting at the #6 seed spot, which means a win there would be huge for the wild card race. Fairbanks has been struggling, but did win 3 of their last 5. Bordeaux is too good to be 1-10 (yet there they are), so we can't write it down as an easy win. We split the series with them in several recent seasons. Our season then will continue with home games against Colorado (8-3) and Paris. Colorado is one of four NAC leading 8-win teams that all lost in week 12. And Paris is no longer an instawin.

We're a little bit limping, with change of pace RB Marcus Jorg out for the rest of the regular season with a broken ankle and punt returner CB Will Warrick out with a concussion. Both will be replaced with RB Darnell Greenham, which comes to show how some decisions end up being a good one after all, as we nearly axed Greenham on the cutdown to 53 men. WR Preston Gray will return to the team after missing a couple of games, which prompted to the return of veteran WR Rick Emerson to the active roster.

But that's part of football and we * knock on wood * are not limping as much as a lot of other teams are. Orlando misses their quarterback in the final stretch, which feels like it ends their push for a wild card. Gothenburg missed their running back against us with a broken jaw and Bordeaux has place their star tight end on injured reserve. But at the same time, those are probably the worst of it all. Aside maybe our former LB Abraham Desimone. Williamburg has placed him on injured reserve after he needed MCL knee surgery. You never know in advance how players recover from such personal physical drama.

Anyway, we'll sail on and hope to find ourselves back truly back into the playoffs race after a win in Rochester. Which could be a must win to keep our hopes strong...

General Manager Notes: playoffs?

Alright, the final stretch of the 2010 regular season. As things unwound,. we had to win them all to get into the playoffs. So, did we make it?

Week 13 at Rochester
I'[m starting right away with it, despite the final score, this turned into a convincing victory against a rival in the wild card race. QB Harrison Singleton had a reborn chemistry with WR Jessie Vertelney on crucial downs, as 2 of only 4 of Vertelney's receptions turned touchdowns thrown from outside the red zone. Singelton threw for 270 yards on the day. Our pass defense was solid again, posting 11 broken up plays by the pass rush, while we defended 9 passes and CB Joel Delgado accounted for an interception.
Result: 20-17 victory

Week 14 at Fairbanks
We had Fairbanks rated higher than your average 3-9 team and throughout the first half, they lived up to it. But in the second half, our defense managed to halt them time after time far away from even field goal range, while our offense steadily increased our points total. CB Byron Sokol's pick six was just icing on the cake of a sound blowout victory. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 217 yards and 3 touchdowns, spreading them between TE Ted Gordon, RB Cary Delgado and WR Jessie Vertelney. RB Darnell Greenham contributed with a rushing touchdown.
Result: 38-13 victory

Week 15 at Bordeaux
In spite of a tremendous defensive showing, we barely beat the Bordeaux Vineyards. In particular QB Harrison Singleton struggled after the first possession, which turned into a 98-yard touchdown drive. He threw for 223 yards and a touchdown to TE Ted Gordon. DT Efrain Hutchins and DE Howie Tucker had 2.0 sacks each.
Result: 17-10 victory

Week 16 vs Colorado
Arguably the toughest opponent in this final stretch, the virtual top seeds in the NAC, we scored on each of our first four possessions and from there on were set to go. The Cutthroats put down a late game touchdown drive to bring themselves back within a touchdown, but we ran out the clock in the final 2 and a half minutes to keep our playoffs hopes alive. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 235 yards with touchdown passes to WR Jessie Vertelney and good old WR Calvin Maxwell, whilst also leading the team with 82 yards rushing. RB Bennett Holmes ran for a touchdown, while Vertelney had 104 yards receiving on top of his score. Our linebackers duo Gus Coleman and Caiden Hastings each had an interception.
Result: 26-21 victory

Week 17 vs Paris
And then, unexpectedly, things turned all around into a "win is in" scenario as most of the wild card hopefuls saw their wheels slowly coming off. We ended up playing a snow game (which I honestly didn't see coming), so thankfully our running game leaning offensive game plan was well placed. The Paris defense kept WR Calvin Maxwell and WR Jessie Vertelney to 10 yards receiving each, a sensational low for any Merchantmen WR duo, quite possibly the lowest ever? QB Harrison Singleton threw for just 124 yards, but also ran for 74 yards and a touchdown, while RB Bennett Holmes and RB Marcus Jorg (eariler back from injury than expected) both ran for a touchdown and also showed their ability to gain 5 yards per carry. Our defense did just enough to win the turnover battle 3-0 and by the end of the third quarter, the victory and last wild card in the conference were locked up.
Result: 30-14 victory

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 13-3
2. Maassluis 11-5
3. Paris 6-10
4. Bordeaux 2-14

The Gothenburg Giants go into the playoffs as the AOC's #1 seeds. The Tucker Tigers and Augusta Greenjackets also have a 13-3 record, earning them the #2 and #5 seeds respectively. The Houston Mustangs are the #4 seeds and go into the postseason with a 9-game winning streak. And our season will continue at the Harlem Apollos, 12-4 division champions. The Toronto Lake Monsters miss out, despite a 10-6 record, outscoring their opponents by 172 points and all their losses being by 7 or less points...

So, our season is extended into the playoffs, finally! We were close in each of the previous 4 seasons, it does fell like it was about time to get that over with. One game at a time. Harlem is in front of us. They were the AOC's #1 seeds last season and would have been again had they flipped around any of their 4 losses into victory. They're given as 2-point favorites, which seems fair given that we're pretty close in terms of scoring. Their run defense has been stellar, which could be bad for us as our running game is pretty crucial. We have to believe in our own strengths and play like we have these last 7 games. Preferably we up some of it, because this could be the toughest team since our winning streak started at home against Gothenburg. A game that reminded us we can beat any team out there.

General Manager Notes: early look back on the 2108 draft class
"5 picks in the top37, this better be a good class!"

Remember that? Maybe you don't and even I almost forgot, but that class is now the backbone of our team. Let's go over all the rookies from that season and see what I think of them now, after 3 regular seasons.


1.24 LT Earl McBirney (early rated 15/65)

#20 on our draft board, 2nd best T, 4th best OL.
Came back as "overrated" after interviews. It didn't shy my away enough from picking him. He's a heavy (335 lbs) pass protector, who can also support the running game. Very green, so a mentor was a must have and it might force our hand to let him sit his rookie season behind Gruenwalder, of flip around a bit and start him at left guard and either bench one four guards or center. A lot can happen in training camp and pre-season, so having 6 starting caliber linemen isn't excessive.

Now rated 60/60
McBirney has developed into being our starting left tackle. One might say he had a bit of an off season with 6 sacks allowed, but overall 10 sacks in 37 starts is a very good number for a left tackle. By my staff he's considered to be #3 in pass blocking technique amongst all offensive tackles in the league. That's all that matters here.



1.28 DE Frank Bernard (early rated 20/80)

#17 on our draft board, #1 DE, #2 DL, #3 DL/LB
With the daunting departure of Fletcher, getting a new defensive end was kind of unavoidable. Bernard brings in a solid dose of both pass rush speed and especially outstanding run stopping and play diagnosis, with the right endurance to use it all. One might say he's even better suited to play DT, but he's got the framework of a DE and it makes much more sense to not mess with that. Especially given what came next.

Now rated 70/70
Those that paid attention have seen Bernard's name pop up as having had a strong season where he was in the sacks lead race for a while. We don't care he couldn't hold on to it, other guys around him made up for it and it will keep him more affordable once he's up for renewal. He's an elite run stopper according to our staff and a key member to our defense.



2.02 DT Efrain Hutchins (early rated 30/70)

#22 on our draft board, #2 DT, #3 DL, #5 LB/DL
Hutchins brings in a solid dose of run stopping and play diagnosis, but also provides excellent pass rush technique and the endurance to be able to play a lot of downs. This guy will be awesome to put on the field next to DT Gabriel Morris (rated 70/70).

Now rated 70/70
With Morris declining, Hutchins is now the key member in the middle of the defensive line. He's an elite pass rusher up the middle and give enough run defense support to consider him a worthy successor to the all-time greats.



2.04 LB Caiden Hastings (early rated 40/70)
#19 on our draft board, #1 LB, #3 DL/LB
Despite having two 100-tackle linebackers, I felt that the unavoidable decline of LB Abraham Desimone or of LB3 Tony Burks would make for a great opportunity to snag this guy up here and in the process make a cap friendly move by releasing one of them soon after (which we will do with the release of Burks). Hasting is an excellent run stopper and plenty of over skills to jump in as the LB2 next to All-IHOF LB Gus Coleman (rated 75/75).

Now rated 65/65
Hastings is coming off his third straight season with 100 tackles. He plays a lot on our pass defense and I think we'll eventually take him out of those formations by putting rookie Bryan Diaz there, but on the balanced and run heavy downs, Hastings is undisputed. He's one of the elite run stoppers at linebacker in the league.



2.05 QB Harrison Singleton (early rated 10/35)

#26 on our draft board, #1 QB
Every decade or so, I end up in a situation where our QB situation is questionable and figure that the cap situation and roster situation are balanced enough to take a gamble with a 2nd round pick on a quarterback. As I mentioned, our offensive coordinator's assessment, combined with my own strengths and weaknesses profile for a quarterback, made him jump to the top of the QB class for us, in what seemed to be a relatively weak class overall. I'm writing that despite that he was the 5th QB taken this draft. What makes Singelton look so interested, despite his perceived overall ability being underwhelming? He comes in with excellent sense rush ability and scramble frequency, combined with excellent timing potential. The big elephant in the room is his intelligence which may have been the reason for his Solecismic Test Score, hinting that he might not be all that great in avoiding interceptions. This might push us into making P Jimmy Summers our holder, keep Drake Bishop as the mentor and force Monty Truitt out of Maassluis. If we can't afford to keep 4 quarterbacks.
Now rated 40/40
I'm not going to elaborate on Singleton much. He's delivering with his arm and legs. We're on average an 11-5 team with him starting. He was the first ever Merchantmen quarterback to receive All-IHOF honors. Our best quarterback since Lester Lowe, yes, also factoring in Alfred Hickman. Notable tidbit: Singelton scored a 41 on the Solecismic Test this off-season. Maybe his ability to avoid interceptions isn't as dreadful as it initially has been foreshadowed...



2.20 WR Jaylen Gearhart (early rated 30/45)

#46 on our draft board, #6 WR
We interviewed the top5 prospects at his position and initially hoped that enough of them looked great enough to be worth a trade up with all our picks. Four of five guys were taken by pick #6, which meant our trade option in a slot somewhere closely behind that failed to work out, it would have been a bad move. The 5th best WR was available at the #17 pick, but I got worried about WR Edwin Forbes' route running ability and decided to not pick him, but instead make the cap friendlier move to trade down. One of the end results was not having grabbed a WR at all with our 5 high picks, thus making it a bit of a forced move to grab the best left WR at this spot. Gearhart would in ancient times be destined for greatness with his excellent big play ability. In modern days football, he will also need the route running (his potential is very good) and endurance (also very good), combined with at least some additional skills (good courage, maybe?). He'll be in a spot where he could go anywhere from WR2 to WR6 as it looks right now.

Now rated 40/45
A reach in the second round, especially given that he fell behind two 2109 additions, but Gearhart is still on the team. Still needs to work on his route running if he wants to get into the mix as WR3 by the time Calvin Maxwell retires. I still believe in his excellent big-play ability to make a difference.



4.18 S Noah Matthews (early rated 30/45)

#77 on our draft board, #5 S, #11 CB/S
My sleeper pick was CB CB Clifton Lukins, who got picked 11 slots higher than Matthews, for our new nickel/dime safety project. Lukins could be too light to be able to play safety, which won't be an issue with the massive 6'2" 211 pounds Matthews - if anything, he's too large. Matthews tops this class in intercepting skills, while having the play diagnosis and endurance to be suitable to play a lot of downs.

Now rated 45/45
Ironically the highest drafted player on our entire secondary, as other than Matthews, only John Aponte was a draft pick (a 7th rounder for us). Matthews' gift is the sense for forcing interceptions and albeit he went without a pick this season, he has been crucial in that area in his first 2 seasons. I'm still not sure whether he really is a full time starter or just a role player on some formations, but that's a bit of a luxury to be able to think that way.



6.20 TE Ty Rumans (early rated 20/40)

#318 on our draft board, #17 TE
With the unavoidable loss of TE Nicholas Heath, I needed a backup plan and that was to spent a 6th or 7th round pick on a tight end. I looked at one that can play special teams and be good on third downs, with run blocking skills being secondary to that. He might not have much route running skills, but that seems to be less important at his position than it is at WR or RB. We'll likely try to sign some undrafted rookies to battle with Rumans for the roster spot.

Now rated 20/30
Rumans might go into the history books as the player we signed and released more than anybody else. We brought him back as much as 3 times already and he basically spent just 1 1/2 half season on our roster. Although technically we signed him as a restricted free agent twice, which means he was to be considered to have never left. We might take one more stab at it if he's still on the open market late in the playoffs and we either are out of contention or need to sign a tight end for injury disaster reasons. He played in 1 game for us so far, didn't even get to see action on the special teams unit that day, which is what makes him worth the trouble bringing him back a 5th time.



7.03 FB Dean Lang (early rated 30/45)

#76 on our draft board, #4 FB
Yeah, we were not going to spent a 1st or 2nd round pick on the impressive FB Louis McIntyre, #4 overall on our draft board, because we just don't use the FB all that much. McIntyre got taken by the Houston Mustangs at slot 2.18, so we had our chances. Lang got picked before we knew whether FB Randy Julian would re-sign with us. Lang isn't very likely to make the team, it seems, as his ability to play special teams is lacking and would be something worthy of a roster spot. His pass blocking and blitz pickup could be solid enough to change on that though.

now retired
He didn't make our pre-season roster as a rookie and then failed to convinced the Chesapeake Chitterlings in half a pre-season as well.


7.19 WR Perry Madison (early rated 15/35)
#231 on our draft board, #31 WR
Everybody wanted to pick a WR. We did in the mid-late 2nd round and added Madison later on in anticipation of trading WR Alfredo Samuels. Madison in potential is a similarly talented special team, but one that actually does have route running skills to make some catches. Will he make the team? That's questionable as we're already up to 56 players signed with clearly few excess elsewhere on the team.

Now rated 20/30
He made our 53-men roster, then was cut mid-season because of injury troubles at tight end (brining back Ty Rumans), then we re-signed Madison in the post-season. But he failed to impress in the second pre-season on team and it's actually surprising he didn't retire after the 2109 season already. His promise as a route runner with sticky hands hasn't come to reality.



And then there was a truckload of undrafted rookies that we signed and never played a down of football for us. But 5 of them did end up on our roster. Who are they?

TE Wesley Keener (early rated 20/40)
Now retired
Made the team as a rookie as our TE4, but in the 2109 off-season we decided to not re-sign him, choosing Ty Rumans over Keener.

C Roman Gillespie (early rated 20/45)
Now rated 45/55
Gillespie is currently angry over lack of playing time, stuck on s solid offensive line as our backup interior lineman. Hasn't played a single downs this season and saw action in 7 games prior seasons. He's still signed for another season and looks like a very capable run blocker.

DE Howie Tucker (early rated 20/35)
Now rated 35/35
Tucker was mentioned by Dogbytes as one of the good execution from unexpected places. Tucker is in the top 20 most gifted pass rushers at defensive end and is ferocious in terms of being a punishing hitter. His lack of endurance makes him a passing downs only player. He's still signed through 2111 and I'm expecting him to want to receive starting money next season.

DE Zachary Abueva (early rated 20/30)
Now rated 30/30
Abueva returned in Maassluis this season, after being cut as a rookie in pre-season, brought back in the post-season, only to get cut again in the 2109 pre-season. That landed him a stint in Kansas, where he was on roster that season, seeing action in 5 games. Abueva spent all of 2110 on the inactive section, despite that we know he's got very good pass rush technique, play diagnosis, punishing hitter skills and special teams ability. Very capable to step in if we need an injury replacement.

RB Cary Delgado (early rated 30/35)
Now rated 40/40
Last, but not least! Delgado is on our running back trio rotation, mostly on third down situations. His hole recognition is low, he's got no breakaway speed whatsoever, can't play on special teams, lacks endurance, but his power running and third down running make him the best option on team to throw out there on third and short. He's a fair third down receiving target as well for a short pass, although usually when he makes catch, it's on third down and he comes short of a first down. Anyway, he's kind of undisputed as our 3rd down back. No Albert "The Shovel" Shalon, but I doubt anyone can ever step into The Shovel's shoes, Shalon is 3rd all-time in conversion percentage amongst players with at least 100 3rd down carries (across the entire league, not just amongst Merchantmen players). And if we increase it to 50+ 3rd down carries, the career cut short Walt Blair is 1 of 3 others that are ahead of The Shovel. But we're getting sidetracked now.


So, as I already mentioned in Steelstone's awesome Youtube series about the IHOF, our 2110 success is a result of the 2108 draft more than anything else, I suspect. QB Singelton, RB Delgado, LT McBirney, DE Bernard, DE Tucker, DT Hutchins, LB Hastings, CB Delgado and S Matthews are all contributing. That's a lot more than the 2 starters per draft most teams get.

General Manager Notes: 2110 Wild Card Round!

Week 18 at Harlem
Despite the Apollos success in the regular season last and this season, they're struggling to draw a full stadium. The emptiness didn't bother our player sas they arrived in full belief they could avenge the regular season loss in 2109.

Harlem had the ball first and despite their ability to progress, it resulted in a49-yard field goal for a 3-0 lead for them. Our response was getting three-and-outed and after Harlem's pound, pound, pound approach, we found ourselves pinned as deep as our own 1-yard line. We got stuck and punted it back to midfield. Whilst driving deep inside our red zone for a 2-score lead, LB Gus Coleman stepped in with an interception. It was followed up with a phenomenal 41-yard run by RB Marcus Jurg to lead up to RB Bennett Holmes 21-yard touchdown run for our 7-3 lead after the first quarter.

As if the game took a 180 degree turn, our defense put down three and out and, while punt returner Will Warrick reached midfield after a 19-yard return. QB Harrison Singelton found WR Jessie Vertelney for 30 yards and what kept us from extending the lead was a blocked field goal. Harlem struggled on their next drive, while we did just enough to get a field goal at last for the 10-3 lead. Defenses dominated the remainder of the second quarter, until RB Bennett Holmes broke free for a 43-yard run, which eventually did nothing more than setting up a deep punt and Harlem having too little time to do anything before half time.

RB Cary Delgado and QB Harrison Singleton had 10+-yard runs on our first possession after the big break, followed by a 42-yard pass from Singleton to TE Ted Gordon, only to see us strand for a 23-yard field goal. But where we managed to get some points on the board, Harlem failed to get close, as we added another short kick for a 16-3 lead at the end of the third quarter.

The fourth quarter started with a bang for the Apollos, seeing their top cornerback pick off QB Harrison Singleton and running it back 36 yards to our 22-yard line. A defensive stand kept Harlem to scoring just a field goal, which turned out to be their last score of the game. We kept doing plenty enough between the red zones to score another pair of field goals, while our defense silenced the Harlem offense enough to smoothly increase to a 22-6 win.

QB Harrison Singleton threw for 268 yards, RB Bennett Holmes ran for 100 yards and the only touchdown of the game. LB Gus Coleman made 1 interception and forced 1 fumble, while making 14 tackles. K Oscar Harrington earned player of the game honors for his 5 short field goals.

Result: 22-6 victory!

We on to the conference semifinals and we're going back to where our season started: at the Gothenburg Giants. We put up a fight then and there and hope to do so once again. We haven't won in Gothenburg since 2103. We were kind of lucky that day, needed every one of the 3 interceptions and forcing them to kick field goals. It's such a game we're going to need to pull the upset. We're both on a 7-game winning streak, red hot, thinking we're on a mission. May the best team win? Sure, I think we're the most talented team, but the Giants make up for it with better game planning and such. But forget about that, believe in ourselves. Go Merchantmen, make it happen!

General Manager Notes: 2110 Conference Semifinals!

Week 19 at Gothenburg
After a stellar performance in the wild card round, our season is still going into week 19. The place to be: Gothenburg. Result of being the #6 seeds, we knew in advance that our trip to the IHOF Bowl would always have to go through a road game at the Giants. Although, I honestly decided to not even look at it that way and didn't think of it until after the win in Harlem. So, an All-European clash between two teams that each won their home game in the head-to-head matchup.

First possession was ours and after a sound and stellar 6-minute drive, anchored by a 22-yard pass from QB Harrison Singleton to TE Garrett Alcala and a 10-yard scramble by Singleton, a short 4-yard pass to WR Jessie Vertelney put us up 7-0. A tremendous three and out followed (with a -7 yard drive), as did a similar defensive stand by the Giants. The ensuing drive lasted quite long and eventually the Giants pounded it in for a 7-7 score at the end of the first quarter.

At the start of the second quarter, QB Harrison Singelton connected with TE Ted Gordon on a 17-yard pass to break into Giants' territory. But several plays later, a trick play went wrong and Singleton got picked off in Masssluis territory. The Giants then saw their quarterback Efrain Owens get hurt, entering Burk Kiluk (the guy I once called something like the best worst quarterback to destroy us). Although our defense stood strong, holding them to a 33-yard field goal, the playcaller switch may have been a key moment. Leaning heavily on 17-yard runs from both Marcus Jorg and Cary Delgado, we cruised into the Giants' red zone, only to see Singleton get picked off a second time. A rarity in his career, his 4th multi-interception game. After quick three and out, we fired back. Singleton found a wide open Jessie Vertelney downfield and he turned it into a 54-yard touchdown for a 14-10 lead! The Giants were unimpressed and played their own slow but steady, just in time to turn it around for a Giants 17-14 half time lead.

The second half, things got quite bad for us, especially our pass defense decided to stay behind. We got torched on third and long for 20 yards and then allowed a 30-yard touchdown run for a 24-14 deficit. A couple of penalties sabotaged our drive, shortly after followed by our state of the art special teams unit giving up a 30-yard punt return. Four plays later, Burt Kiluk found one of his tight ends in the end zone for a 30-14 Gothenburg lead. After another three and out, the Giants looked ready to punch the knock out, but DT Gabriel Morris forced a fumble that we recovered. QB Harrison Singleton found a wide open RB Cary Delgado on third and long, shortly after followed by Delgado's 24-yard run to set up Singleton's 6-yard touchdown pass to WR Jessie Vertelney. But up 31-21, Gothenburg was unimpressed and they marched into our red zone just before the fourth quarter.

After forcing the Giants to settle for a 19-yard field goal, we were down 34-21, but 2 touchdowns is enough to maintain hope. Although quickly entering Gothenburg territory, we were forced to punt. Our run defense continued to struggle, but a couple of incomplete passes ended the Giants' time draining drive before reaching field goal range QB Harrison Singleton extended the next drive with one of his characteristic scrambles, but on fourth and 2 with 4 minutes to go, we went conservative and it turned out that Gothenburg would play out the clock.

QB Harrison Singelton threw for 211 yards and 3 touchdowns, all to WR Jessie Vertelney. Singelton was also our most leading rusher. We didn't play all that bad, but the interceptions were quite the momentum switches and kept us from really having a chance to tie it up in the final minutes of the game. A solid season, where we beat 3 of the 4 bye week teams, but playing from the #6 seed spot, it's a much steeper hill to climb. And clearly we were outmatched by the Giants today.

Result: 21-34 loss


The Giants are not quite done yet, playing IHOF Bowl CVII against the Chesapeake Chitterlings, after clobbering the Tucker Tigers 47-13 in the AOC Championship game. We could say we put up more of a fight, but we have just as little to show for it. Our focus switches to 2111. We go into the off-season with 44 players signed (bar retirements), roughly $75M over the cap, on par with the previous two off-seasons. But this time around, we have several key players in their contract year: that class of 2108. Except for QB Harrison Singelton, we've got him locked up cheap for 4 more seasons...

So, that was that. 2110 is over for the Merchantmen. A winning record and at last one with a playoffs appearance and even a playoffs game victory. I have no doubt that we've found our franchise quarterback. We're loaded with young talented players across the roster. Stick this team together and we might be able to crash out in the playoffs at the Gothenburg Giants a couple more times... Unless the Toronto Lake Monsters really get their freak on. The Lake Monsters were arguably the best team in the regular season and missed out on the post-season dance. With stalworth teams like Tucker and Augusta also in the mix, the Atlantic Ocean Conference is loaded. I called parity, but this conference is top heavy above the parity level. We're in for quite the challenge if we really think we're ready to make a deep run... And we know that some of our guys can run. Fans and readers, see you back in the 2111 season!

Go Merchantmen!

General Manager Notes: Start of 2111 Off-Season

DE Richie Piotte has been inducted into the Solecismic Hall of Fame. Drafted in the second round of the 2095 draft, Piotte was switched from linebacker to defensive end and turned out to be one of the best of his generation. He spent 7 seasons with the Maassluis Merchantmen, until cap troubles made us choose a different route. Piotte then played 1 season for the Gothenburg Giants, 3 seasons for the Capital City Blues and spent 2106 in the free agents pool, as his salary demands no longer matched his ability to play elite football. He peaked in his second season, when he made 18.0 sacks, the first of his 8 double digit sacks seasons. It was also the first of his back-to-back All-IHOF second team selections. In 112 regular season games, Piotte made 85.5 sacks for the Merchantmen, the third highest all-time for the franchise. He got subsequently fired by the Paris Musketeers, where he had been the Defensive Coordinator for a couple of seasons. A weird off-season for Piotte for sure.

LS Bennett Brock retired after 8 seasons in Maassluis, which was the second half of his 14-career IHOF career after shorter stints in Hanalei and Fort Wayne. He played 128 regular season games and 4 playoffs games for the Merchantmen, while showing he was one of the best long snapper in the game.

31-year old CB Will Warrick and 29-year old RB Darnell Greenham retired after just 1 season in Maassluis. Both were signed to step in as the new punt returner and both ended up making the roster. Troubled by injuries, Warrick played in 10 games, while Greenham played in the other 6 games. Both proved to be still pretty good at it, but sadly neither felt like playing for another season.

Other noteworthy retirements from the Merchantmen alumni:
CB Dennis Finley, our elite punt returner from 2106 through 2109, the best in the league in that timespan, played in 64 games for us.
DE Deon Rosas, played 116 regular season games (and 2 in the 2104 playoffs), in which he made 27.5 sacks.
CB Donnie Dogins, played 51 regular season games (and 2 in the 2104 playoffs), was our starting nickelback, shined in his 8-interception season 2102, but after trade to Fort Wayne in 2105 his career went into a slump.
WR Herman Jeffries, for 4 seasons one of our special teamers, played 64 games for us.
S Lincoln Taylor, a 1st round draft bust, eventually played in just 12 games for us, all in his 4th and final season in Maassluis.

We hired a new Assistent Coach, 72-year old Zach Miller, he's at the end of a decorated career, including IHOF Bowl victories in 2085 as the Offensive Coordinator with North Plainfield and in 2102 as the Head Coach of the Toronto Lake Monsters.


Lastly, we've been seriously struggling to find a worthy player to add to our Ring of Honor. At the start of every season since the 10-season anniversary, we added a player. The minimum requirement is 100 games played or being a member of the Hall of Fame. Which basically means I have 215 candidates to pick from, but I'm not sure there's one that has been elite in this league and had enough impact on our franchise.

The 2111 pick has become S Bart Guthrie, initially drafted by us in the 1st round of the 2083 draft. Played only 4 seasons in Maassluis, he earned all-IHOF second team honors in 2086, but his salary demands made him unaffordable for a safety. In 2088 he won the IHOF Bowl with the Oakland Black Panthers, beating the Gothenburg Giants. At the Colorado Cutthroats he became a tackle machine, with 129 and 137 in back to back seasons in 2091 and 2092, while also combining for 12 interceptions those seasons. He was still a starter in his 15th and final season in the IHOF, when he played his 1-season stint with the Rochester Razorbacks.


Anyway, we move on to our draft preparation. Long snapper and punt returner look to be our glaring holes this off-season.

We have 7 free agents on the team.
QB Billy Russell wants to move on and I fully expect him to sign elsewhere for a backup role.
FB Randy Julian is on the decline, but we could use him for cohesion on 2-back formations.
FB Kenneth Holse is a restricted free agent, special teams elite to be, I fully expect to re-sign him.
P Jimmy Summers is slowly on the decline, which means one of our goals this off-season is figuring out where we go at his position.
DE Zachary Abueva is a restricted free agent, decent pass rusher, special teamer, worth re-signing.
LB Avery Distel is an excellent special teamer and decent passing downs linebacker or defensive end.
S Jonathan White is an excellent zone defender, but we're deep at those, might get sacrificed in a tight cap situation.

General Manager Notes: the 2111 off-season means scraping for cap room

We're a day away from training camp. The first free agency period has ended and it had some impact. We lost QB Billy Russell to the Toronto Lake Monsters, but he wasn't willing to stick around anyway. S Jonathan White signed with the Texas Sharks, curiously only 2 teams went after him, despite that he's an excellent zone defender. I let White go, I knew we wouldn't have the cap available to bid on him. We did re-sign LB Avery Distel and FB Randy Julian, as well as restricted free agents DE Zachary Abueva and FB Kenneth Holse. P Jimmy Summers is still in roster as a free agent, but I really don't see how we can afford him anymore. We signed only 1 new player: CB Corwin Drake, a punt returner that is considered a 3rd year player, but to date never even spent a day on an IHOF roster. Quite curious that he kept his hopes alive for this long and now he's going to get a chance to win the punt returner job on arguably the best special teams unit in the league.

The draft has been far from sexy for us, as I traded away our 1st and both 2nd round picks, including the bonus pick that was a result of a trade previous draft. We still rank 16th on the Dogbytes best draft rankings. Rightfully so as we picked 4 players that were in our top50 draft board, as well as both players that we interviewed as Very Underrated, a long snapper and we took a promising running back with our final pick.

Our score for the 2111 draft:

3.3 S Joe Ramsey (15/50)
Came out of nowhere on the radar when this 28th best player on the board was still available, knowing we were going to lose Jonathan White. Ramsey doesn't look like much as of now, so we'll have to wait for him to start improving and proving he's a solid zone defender, overall a worthy strong safety and possibly a special teamer as well.

3.26 P Tyrus Johnston (50/55)
Our veteran has become unaffordable. For the second straight draft we spent our 3rd round pick on a punter and this time it's likely we will stick with the rookie, even if he shows signs of not being as good as advertised. I almost flipped a coin between Johnston and the punter that Chesapeake took in the 5th round. Both were in our top50 draft board. The interview results were conclusive.

4.28 WR Kyle Belton (15/35)
A punt returner. Interviewed as Very Underrated. Will have to battle with the 5th round pick and veteran free agent Corwin Drake for a roster spot.

5.27 CB Ike Pollock (15/30)
A punt returner, zone defender and special teamer. But he will need to show progress in one, if not all areas of it, to have a shot at making the team. Interviewed as Very Underrated.

6.21 DE Calvin Buckley (35/55)
A run stopper and stuffer, might be able to play on special teams too. Not sure he'll make the team in this crowded bunch though. Top50 of this class to us.


6.26 DT Francisco Blades (25/50)
A run stopper and stuffer, might be able to play on special teams too. Not sure he'll make the team in this crowded bunch though. Top50 of this class to us.

7.3 LS Wayne Brewer (20/20; I mean, seriously, what else would he be?)
We needed a long snapper and our staff ranks him in the top10 best snappers in the league.

7.28 RB Renaldo Billodeaux (35/45)
This kid has breakaway speed, hole recognition and also the disputable elusiveness. He lacks endurance, but that's okay in our 3/4-back rotation. Billodeaux might be the successor to RB Bennett Holmes with his skill set. We would have pursued him as an undrafted rookie otherwise and likely found ourselves losing out to some team offering any kind of a signing bonus.

We went out there offering contracts to a dozen undrafted rookies, but I fully expect that some other teams will also have seen those guys. Or maybe they didn't, quite often we end up signing most of the hidden gems we find in this pool.

The trickiest part of the off-season is yet to come: finding a way to extend contracts of our 4th year defensive key players. DE Frank Bernard, DT Efrain Hutchins and LB Caiden Hastings, as well as LT Earl McBirney. Our cap space right now means we can at best lock only 2 of them up. We actually have the cap space for them next season, but that doesn't really count. We might end up forced to leave at least 2 of them free agents at the start of next off-season... One of them has already made a decision on his own: LB Caiden Hastings has decided to hold out for a contract that we seriously can't afford to offer him. This prick is basically demanding us to release like 20 other players on the team just so he can be the 4th highest paid player on the team. That's simply not going to happen, kid.

General Manager Notes: I hate player agents...

Okay, I'm going to make a promise for the remainder of this 2111 season: one final complaint about how much I loath player agents and their backwards logic in turning down contracts for players. Essentially, when a player requests a $20M signing bonus and a $25M salary for 4 seasons (for a total of roughly $120M), said agent will turndown a contract with a $50M signing bonus with salaries of $45M over 5 seasons, with the caveat being that I will offer only minimum salary for the first season, to compensate for the financial impact a $50M signing bonus have (we still have to pay that up front).

The end result of this has been that DT Efrain Hutchins did sign such a 5-year deal with us, but DE Frank Bernard and LT Earl McBirney didn't. The sad part of the latter is even that McBirney has yet to live up to the first round pick hype, despite that he's considered to be the second best pass protecting left tackle in football. Bernard was red hot early last season, but came down with only 1.5 sacks in the back end half of the regular season.

Outcome of all of this is both McBirney and Bernard becoming free agents next off-season. The side effect is that we ended up at almost $14M under the cap, which is a terrible cap situation. It sounds good, but it means that we didn't move enough cap costs for 2112 forward to 2111 to do the best then to field a strong team. It almost means there will be 8 other players to become unrestricted free agents: RB Bennett Holmes, TE Wesley Martin, C Roman Gillespie, DE Howie Tucker, LB Mack Pang, LB Caiden Hastings, CB Skip Horner and S Noah Matthews. The Hastings situations was unavoidable after his very short hold out (another moronic player agent), as has been Gillespie's situation, as this former undrafted rookie believes he's a starting caliber lineman. But the real loss will be with Tucker, Horner and Matthews, they could have been locked up with some of the unused $14M. Oh well, we'd better win it all this season. We are once again the favorites to win it all according to the DogBytes metrics!

General Manager Notes: the 53 for 2111

Okay, let's recap how we winded down to the 53 players that will play in week 1 of the 2111 season for us. Starting by letting you know which players joined us in free agency between the draft and training camp, then mentioning which players didn't make the team.

TE Kyle Upshaw, CB Brad Morris, QB Darien Lincoln, CB Greg Carfagno, S Stan Cook, DT Christopher Wrighster and CB Preston Lewis have been our undrafted rookie class for 2111. Wrighster worked hard on making the switch to defensive end and got rewarded for it. Upshaw, Cook and Lewis also made the final roster. Morris has moved on to the Paris Musketeers. Lincoln and Carfagno didn't wow enough to make the team as our new quarterback project and our new punt returner.

Also not making the final 53-men roster were some long time members and rookie draft pick.

RB Marcus Jorg had become angry overplaying time, his agent's silly demand was not to just be the main ball carrier (which by game plan he was), but all that really mattered to him was being on the field on the first play from scrimmage. Nothing Less or more. Releasing Jorg opened up some cap room and paved the way for rookie Renaldo Billodeaux to make the team. Jorg leaves us after 4 seasons as a former undrafted rookie gem, eventually saw a lot of time-share action in the 4-1 2108 late season push and the last two seasons in between, so he's been used to playing winning football. Jorg had 204 carries for 834 yards and 9 touchdowns, a valuable member in the rotation with Bennett Holmes and Cary Delgado.

WR Rick Emerson left us after 9 seasons. He was our 7th round draft pick in 2102. In his first 7 seasons with us, he was active in every single game, primarily in a special teams role, but in the later seasons also as a cohesion booster. The last two seasons he was replaced on the special teams squad and saw less action, but turned out to be a huge factor mentally in the 7-game winning streak at the end of the regular season. He leaves after 127 games played, including 4 in the playoffs, in which he scored 5 touchdowns, the highlight being a Hail Mary catch in 2108 at the Moontown Darksiders in a 19-16 victory.

TE Darnell McKie leaves after 9 seasons in a mainly backup role. This former undrafted rookie broke into the team right away as our third tight end and over time occasionally also played on the special teams unit. We flipflopped with him between third and fourth string, but will never forget his pair of touchdowns in the 2104 playoffs, despite the 42-21 loss at Fort Wayne that day. McKie played in 94 games for us.

DT Mitch Potchynok leaves us after 9 seasons of service. A pass rush specialist, we trusted on Potchynok quite often over the years in our passing downs formations. His overall production was mostly helping disrupt and not getting the credits for the sacks made. He played in 134 games for us, which shows how trustworthy he was to me.

DE Zachary Abueva failed to make the team for the third time in his career. He did make the team in 2110, but we kept him inactive throughout. I do believe he's amongst the players that might get called in case of injuries.

DT Leslie Jeffries was our 4th round pick in 2109, but in 2 seasons he remained inactive. I still think he can be a capable run stopper, but we have better on roster. He has already moved on to play for the Paris Musketeers.

CB Ike Pollock was our late 5th round pick this draft, but despite his promising punt return and special teams potential, he got lost in the numbers game.

When I have some more time on my hands, we'll break down the 53 players that did make the team and I'll let you know how we fared in the first 5 games of the 2111 regular season...

General Manager Notes: The 53 for 2111

Alright, here's our group of 53 for the 2111 season. Before the first ball was kicked, thrown or carried, these guys were a top of the DogBytes metric. We've been there before, but I truly believe that this is a group capable of being anywhere between 10-6 and 16-0, capable of beating our divisonal rivals, especially the reigning IHOF champions: the Gothenburg Giants.

Let's run it down by position group.

Quarterbacks
40/40 QB Harrison Singleton
15/15 QB Drake Bishop
Singleton is our undisputed quarterback, he can throw and run. Bishop our kick holder that has a knack for avoiding interceptions.

Backfield
35/45 RB Renaldo Billodeaux - rookie
30/45 FB Kenneth Holse
35/35 RB Cary Delgado
25/25 RB Bennett Holmes
20/20 FB Randy Julian
Holmes will be our main ball carrier for another season, but Billodeaux will get a fair share of the carries, as we groom him to become the future main ball carrier. Delgado will continue to get third down touches. Holse has improved to be our fullback with his receiving skills, while Holse and Julian will be on our special teams unit.

Tight ends
55/60 TE Ted Gordon
40/40 TE Garrett Alcala
25/25 TE Wesley Martin
15/30 TE Kyle Upshaw - rookie
Almost nothing new here. Gordon will be our main tight end, with Alcala nand Martin also in the mix on multi-end formations. Upshaw is our new emergency guy, in case of injuries.

Wide Receivers
70/70 WR Jessie Vertelney
60/60 WR Calvin Maxwell
45/45 WR Preston Gray
40/45 WR Jaylen Gearhart
35/35 WR Kai Cote
20/35 WR Kyle Belton - rookie
Vetelney and Maxwell continue to be an elite duo in the league. Gray and Gearhart have the skills to play the WR3 and WR4 roles, Cote is our new special teams guy from this group. Belton will start the season inactive, he might get called upon if our punt returner gets hurt.

Offensive Line
75/75 RT Ivan Dole
60/60 LT Earl McBirney
60/60 C Zane Chaplain
60/60 Brett Stickney
55/55 G Andres Uwaezuoke
50/55 C Roman Gillespie
30/40 G Tutan Shapiro
30/30 LT Harold Gruenwalder
Same group as last season. McBirney protecting the blind side and Dole opening the running lanes on the right. Chaplain, Stickney ahd Uwaezuoke are a solid interior. Gillespie is a capable backup, as is Gruenwalder for the left side of the line. Shapiro is mainly still here because it's too expensive to hire a different veteran as the 8th lineman. It may have been even cheeper to go with an undrafted rookie here, but Shapiro at least has years of service to boost cohesion if we have to plug him in there.

Front Seven
70/70 DT Efrain Hutchins
70/70 LB Greg Coleman
70/70 LB Caiden Hastings
65/65 DE Frank Bernard
55/55 DT Gabriel Morris
50/50 LB Xavier Hoover
40/55 DE Calvin Buckley - rookie
45/50 DE Steve Aber
30/50 DT Francis Blades - rookie
35/40 LB Bobby Diaz
35/35 LB Avery Distel
30/35 DE Christopher Wrighster
35/35 DE Howie Tucker
10/10 LB Mack Pang
Solid group, with the big time all around boys Bernard, Hutchins, Coleman and Hastings helped by run stuffers Morris, Hoover, Buckley and Blades. Distel, Aber, Wrighster and Tucker bring the pass rush speed to have enough guys for a rotation to keep the group from getting tired. Diaz continues to be a bit of a project, might step in next season if Hastings leaves. Pang is obviously the master of special teams.

Secondary
45/45 CB Joel Delgado
45/45 S Dan Peterson
45/45 S Noah Matthews
40/40 CB Byron Sokol
35/35 S John Aponte
35/35 CB Skip Horner
20/45 S Joel Ramsey - rookie
25/40 S Stan Cook - rookie
35/30 CB Preston Lewis - rookie
25/25 S Craig Clancy
15/20 CB Corwin Drake - new veteran
Peterson is our all-around strong safety. Matthews is the turnover machine of the group. Delgado and Sokol are the man-to-man coverage guys. Aponte, Horner, Cook and Clancy bring enough solid zone defense and interception skills to keep the group from getting tired. Drake is our new punt returner. Ramsey, ironically the highest picked player of this group (a 3rd round pick), will start the season as a backup as he lacks the current skills to contribute. Lewis will be on the team to help defend the run and does have some other intangibles to support the core group.

Special Teamers
90/90 K Oscar Harrington
55/60 P Tyrus Johnston
20/20 LS Wayne Brewer - rookie
Yup, still that Harrington guy, the most talented kicker of his generation. Johnston comes in replacing Jimmy Summers. We think he's top10 material if he exceeds his perceived potential, but he could end up being another 3- or 4-season solution. Brewer is roughly the 10th best in business, solid enough for the short term.

So, here you have it. I wish we had a more impressive punt returner, but as we don't, we'll hope Drake can take enough advantage of the solid special teams group around him to play above average.

Just a heads up, it's been a couple of busy weeks and, to be frank, this team has let me down more than ever this season, making it a bit less motivating to write about their total inability to play up to their talent. But I'm sure I'll find some time in the next couple of days to recap the first 11 games of the regular season.

General Manger Notes: Time to call this is lost season?

Ouch. We failed mightily this season and we've still got 4 games to play. But even if we win them all, we'll need 5 other teams to completely crumble and drop to 8-8 and worse. Because, well, let's glance over the 12 games we've played so far.

Week 1 at Bordeaux
After a turnover plagued first half, we went into halftime trailing 17-10. Then we bounced back as the defense shutdown the Vineyards, while the offense did their things well enough. QB Singleton threw for 289 yards and touchdowns to TE Gordon and WR Vertelney. WR Maxwell had 125 yards receiving, RB Holmes ran for a touchdown.
Result: 27-17 win

Week 2 vs Kansas
In a sensational shootout, the defense struggled with a pass happy opponent. Late game interceptions kept us in it, but eventually we broke on the Creationists first drive in overtime. QB Singelton threw for 200 yards and touchdowns to WR Maxwell and WR Gray. Singleton and RB Holmes ran for touchdowns.
Result: 34-40 loss in OT

Week 3 vs Fort Wayne
In another high offense game, we struggled once again against the pass heavy Fury, but this time took it away early enough to maintain the touchdown lead. QB Singleton threw for 248 yards and touchdowns to TE Gordon and WR, Gray while WR Vertelney had 117 yards receiving. RB Delgado ran for a touchdown.
Result: 33-26 win

Week 4 open
Stupid early bye week

Week 5 vs North Plainfield
With a dreadful pass defense, we had to rely on our red zone defense to avoid getting completely humiliated by the visiting Plague. But our overall lack of competency finished with QB Singelton throwing a game losing interception whilst we were driving for the game winning field goal. Singleton threw for 244 yards with 2 touchdowns to WR Maxwell. TE Gordon had 110 yards receiving.
Result: 17-19 loss

Week 6 at Rochester
Our inability to get into the end zone came back to haunt us as QB Singleton got picked off no less than 3 times to help the Razorbacks into their victory. Singleton threw for 255 yards.
Result: 12-19 loss

Week 7 vs Toronto
In what could have been a smooth sailing victory, we were forced to kick on 6 of our first 7 possessions, eventually leaving the Lake Monsters just enough room to comeback and take a late game lead. Whilst trying to drive for a game winning field goal, QB Singleton fumbled on a scramble and with that completed the choke. Singleton threw for 268 yards.
Result: 20-21 loss

Week 8 at Paris
In a sensational barnburner of a match, the Musketeers put up a fight we haven't been used to getting involved in with them. Whilst they had plenty of game changing plays, we had our very own late in the game to seal the deal on a 69-yard QB Singleton to WR Vertelney throw. Singleton threw for 258 yards and also ran for 2 touchdowns. ROokie RB Billodeaux ran for a touchdown.
Result: 39-31 win

Week 9 at Harlem
Visiting what has to be the most unlikely 0-7 team in league history - the Apollos were basically pre-season favorites to lose against us in the AOC Championship game - QB Singleton helped them into an early lead with two short pick sixes. We somewhat bounced back, but a third pick ended up one too many. Singleton threw for 245 yards with touchdowns to TE Gordon and WR Gray, whilst RB Delgado and rookie RB Billodeaux ran for touchdowns.
Result: 31-34 loss

Week 10 vs Bordeaux
A foursome of turnovers could have hurt us against most other opponents, but today the Vineyards did far too little to take advantage of it, whilst our own offense played one of the better games this season. QB Singleton threw for 230 yards with touchdowns to TE Gordon (twice) and WR Maxwell, who also returned a kickoff for a touchdown. Rookie RB Billodeaux ran for a touchdown in his breakout game with 181 yards rushing.
Result: 41-26 win

Week 11 vs Gothenburg
After playing the close in the first half, the second half we fell apart and for the first time all season we got clearly outplayed. The Giants' quarterback walked off after a so-called perfect game, completely humiliating a should be one of the best pass rushing and pass defending defenses in the league - that has played like we are the crappiest. QB Singleton threw for 228 yards in his first turnover free game of the season, whilst SIngleton and RB Billodeaux ran for our touchdowns.
Result: 17-39 loss

Week 12 at Chicago
In what could have been a bounce back game, the wheels more than ever came off for the offense. Whilst we completely forgot to play our game balanced game plan, The struggling Norsemen took full advantage after scoring touchdowns on their first 3 drives, whilst picking off QB Singelton a career record 4 times to waltz to one of their easiest victories in quite some time. Singleton threw for 240 yards and a touchdown to TE Gordon.
Result 10-31 loss

Week 13 at Augusta
Deep down the wild card race, visiting one of the other hopefuls, this was a must win game. Despite outplaying them in the first half into a 17-7 lead, slowly, but steadily the lead slipt out of our hands and the Greenjackets forced overtime, where they completed the comeback from behind. QB Singleton threw for 203 yards with touchdowns to WR Maxwell, TE Alcala and WR Gray.
Result: 31-34 loss in OT

European Division standings
1. Gothenburg 10-2 division champions
2. Paris 5-7
3. Maassluis 4-8
4. Bordeaux 4-8

The division is out of reach, as is the first wild card. The second wild card in the AOC is currently held by the 7-5 Houston Mustangs. Mathematically, we're still alive, but whilst we need a 4-0 record ourselves, we'll need Rochester to go 1-3, North Plainfield 0-4, Houston 1-3, Paris 1-3 and - most unlikely of them all - Augusta 0-4. That's quite unlikely all 5 of them will completely meltdown.

But to be fair, would we really deserve to go into the playoffs after an 8-8 campaign in which we have played like we have turned into a team with a laughable bad pass defense, combined with a turnover infested offense, that despite a league leading red zone reaching ability has also settled for a league high number of field goals in that spot. That's something even our state of the art special teams unit can't overcome.

Ugh.

For those caring for individual accolades and in particular the all-time aspect of things, WR Calvin Maxwell has today become the all-time leader in kick off return yards, unseating J.R. Ritter, who retired with us in 2026. Maxwell needed 10 returns less than Ritter to reach the top. It puts Maxwell in the middle of a foursome that never played for another franchise that leads the league in all-time total and average yards in kickoff returning and punt returning. Jack Money is the obvious all-time leader in yards per kickoff return, Mark Perkins the leader in total punt return yards and Gabe Broady looking over his shoulder for the yards per punt return record. Depending on what minimum of attempts you require, Broady could be considered having lost the top spot to North Plainfield's current CB Travis Halverson, who's returning punts for the 3rd season in his 7-year career now.

So, amidst my objective reports and subjective judgement of how the team has been doing, it's clear we've been shooting ourselves in the feet too much this season to make the best of what is still a very potent team.

In the middle of this, we're also on pace to get the #1 overall pick in the 2112 draft, as the Atlanta Vipers are on shockingly bad run and only today doubled their win total to a 2-10 record. I mean, we have their 1st round pick, so, that's our lottery ticket. They currently have tie-breakers over the Harlem Apollos, who top us in the most disappointing team of the season. We've been here before, when the 2108 Fort Wayne Fury won 3 of their last 4 games to improve from #1 to #5.

But, that's something to take a look at after the season is over, we have no control over that bonus pick. We have to regroup and focus on our own longshot chances to sneak into the playoffs. As I said earlier, we're mathematically still alive, so, let's keep going for it!

General Manager Notes: 2111, a thrown away season

What a disaster of a season. We didn't get haunted by injuries, we did get plagued by a bunch of overpaid players not playing up to their ability at all. At least, that's how I perceive things to be. But let's back up a bit, last time I wrote, we were still a longshot to make the playoffs.

Week 14 at Arizona
For a short while, it looked like we were going to steamroll this road game at the Miners, taking advantage of a couple of red zone fumbles gaining a 17-0 lead. But then our total ineptitude to play defense to save our season showed up again as we gave up a Hail Mary pass to set up a game losing field goal as time expired. QB Singleton threw for 184 yards and a touchdown to WR Maxwell, while RB Billodeaux ran for a touchdown.
Result 23-24 loss

Week 15 vs Paris
The biggest mismatch in the IHOF of late played out as such once again. I won't tally up the number of straight games won against Paris now, but we've gone beyond double digits seasons ago already. Our red zone offense was shaky again, but we played overall impressive enough to make the never in doubt outcome get onto the scoreboard. QB Singleton threw for 325 yards and a touchdown to WR Vertelney, our lead receiver with 129 yards today. Singleton and RB Billodeaux had a rushing touchdown each.
Result: 33-10 win

Week 16 vs Iowa
With nothing on the line anymore, all of a sudden our defense played quite well against arguably the most talented quarterback in football (Donte Biletnikoff). We jumped to an early lead and, for a change against a non-French opponent, we maintained our cool and smooth sailed to an easy victory. QB Singelton threw for 214 yards and a touchdown to WR Maxwell. RB Billodeaux ran for 134 yards and a touchdown. CB Horner actually accounted for a defensive touchdown on an interception return.
Result: 27-7 win

Week 17 at Gothenburg
With home field advantage on the line, the Giants had something to play for, as such we had a spoiler role to fulfill. But despite our stingy defensive play for the first 40 minutes of the game, our offense pulled a dreadful no show of a game, while the defense eventually did fall apart in the last 20 minutes of the game. QB Singleton threw for 231 yards and had a touchdown to TE Alcala.
Result: 13-23 loss

European Division:
1. Gothenburg 13-3
2. Maassluis 6-10
3. Bordeaux 6-10
4. Paris 5-11

Despite our dreadful double-digit loss record, we still managed to outscore opponents. although by just 7 points.

QB Harrison Singleton has turned into a turnover machine with 22 interceptions thrown, almost doubling his career figure to 45 in 56 games where he threw more than a single pass in garbage time. He failed to improve his yards per pass attempt figure, despite being so-called fully developed now and playing with fully developed WR Jessie Vertelney, still going strong veteran WR Calvin Maxwell and TE Ted Gordon who's supposed to be fully developed as well now. Gordon played a dreadful season, hauling in only 931 yards on 172 targets. Vertelney improved to 1222 yards, whilst Maxwell had 956 yards receiving. Rookie RB Renaldo Billodeaux was a brighter light on the team, running for 1,105 yards with a 5.9 per carry average. QB Singelton and RB Bennett Holmes each gained 500+ yards as well. It's fair to say at least the running game was doing well. We actually lead the league with a franchise record 74 red zone visits. So, yeah, the turnovers must have been a huge deal in why we didn't end up scoring 500 points this season.

Defensively, we just never played up to our ability. The pass defense was dreadful, inept, a complete waste of cap money. I can live with finishing next to last in passing yards allowed per game, as it can be the result of playing with a lead (as we did in most games) and a result of having the field position advantage (which we usually have on special teams, combined with a decent turnover margin). Our lack of ability to force turnovers wasn't the only thing hurting here, we actually were second worst in yards per pass attempt, which means that teams throwing to save their game manage to do that well enough to come back from behind. Like those two games we lost by a single point and the two lost in overtime. I'm disappointed by the pass rush group as well. We finished the season under 20% pass rush pressure, while the talent is here to be top5 in the league and well above 22.5%. Our run defense was below mediocre as well at 4.7 yards per carry allowed.

Shocker of the season, Oscar Harrington converted all 80 of his kicks: 41 field goals and 39 extra points. Curiously, he didn't attempt a single 50-yarder, despite being having the most distance in his kicks of all in the league. We were the second best kickoff return team in terms of yards per return minus yards per return allowed, but our yards per punt return allowed figure was Merchantmen unworthy, being median and our own yards per punt return figure was barely top10.

So, some good things, some unexplainable bad things and with that we have to conclude that 6-10 is far, far, far below the floor I envisioned possible for such a talented group of players.

And for those wondering about our lottery ticket draft pick, the Atlanta Vipers won 4 of their last 5 games, to deteriorate what once looked like a possible #1 overall draft pick into the #6 overall draft pick, even behind the Paris Musketeers. 1 win less would have still placed them outside the top3 picks and we actually lost to the teams that will be picking #1 and #2 now, so it should have never been much higher than #3 anyway. Our own lack of ability to win games landed us the #10 overall pick, so we'll end up with quite some value to figure out how to replace the non-signing you-know-whats that turned down the most expensive contracts I ever offered to any players. Yes, apparently I'm still very bitter, those player agents should be fired and get told they made their players lose out on millions of dollars. Other owners in the league claim they will pay these players, but I've seen this before and know better than that, these players will never get all the money that we offered them had they stayed in Oranje Haven through the 2114 season. I wouldn't call 2112 a rebuild, but it is shaping up to be a bit of a what-the-bleep do we need to do to fix what wasn't supposed to broken off-season. Because 6-10 is beneath us. If only these players would actually listen...

Editor's Note
My annoyance with a couple of the game's to me incomprehensible backwards mechanics have caused serious disinterest in the game at the moment. I'm not ready to abandon ship just yet after 19 years, but that combined with less time during the week available to write about the team, my reporting may become even less frequent than 1 update per week. Hiatus? Hopefully not, but we'll see where things go in the next season or so.

General Manager Notes: 2112 off-season in full swing


WR Calvin Maxwell retired.

After 207 regular season and 4 playoffs games in 13 seasons with the Maassluis Merchantmen, he called it a career. Maxwell was half of the Thing One and Thing Two duo with RB Ken Torphy as the #3 and #6 overall picks of the 2099 draft. The Lost Cause Torphy retired in 2108 after an underwhelming career, highlighted with Torphy's final season where he demanded all five starting linemen to be released to make room for a new contract, which he subsequently refused to sign, followed by running for just 848 yards, 2 touchdowns and a 2.77 yard per carry average. Such silliness was never on Maxwell's mind, but it did hurt his chances to shine. Maxwell was teamed up with slightly older phenomenon WR Vinny Buysse, but they were stuck with QB Earnest "Coinflip" Ashley. It took the arrival of Hall of Fame QB Winfred England in 2103, followed by by QB Evan Drake a year later for the best receiving duo in the league to really start producing. 2103 was Maxwell's most stellar season with 1,524 receiving yards and 13 touchdowns.

Throughout his career, he was an All-IHOF Second Teamer 3 times, he had 9 1,000-yard seasons. Maxwell missed just 1 game due to injuries, despite playing double duty as a special teamer (Maxwell forced 16 fumbles in this role) and the lead kickoff returner. In the latter, he finishes his career as the IHOF's all-time leader in total kickoff return yards, which is even more spectacular given that he played in the era where kickoffs were kicked from much further downfield. His overall numbers include 1,060 receptions, 15,480 receiving yards, 92 receiving touchdowns and 9 kickoff return touchdowns.



Maxwell was one of 5 retirement calls at the start of the off-season.

FB Randy Julian, a 7th round draft pick in 2103, quits the game after 9 seasons in Maassluis. He played 143 regular season games and 4 playoffs games, in which his main focus was running receiving routes without being targeted, despite that his selling point was his run blocking. Julian clearly suffered from all the hits taken throughout his career: when he was released during the 2111 season and returned to the team a week later, it seemed like he had no recollection of having played for the Merchantmen before.

TE Wesley Martin, undrafted rookie signing in 2100, called it quits after 12 seasons with the Merchantmen. The run blocking TE3 that quite often was forced to play a TE2 role, played 187 games (including 4 in the playoffs) for the Merchantmen. He scored 17 receiving touchdowns, but also was a crucial member of an elite special team unit for most of his career.

LB Mack Pang retired after 5 seasons in Maassluis. His career started in 2101 with the San Antonio Tidal Force as a 7th round rookie, but after 5 years they let him walk away. After a season without a contract, the Merchantmen added Pang to their elite special teams unit in 2107, where Pang became a key member. He played in 82 games for the Merchantmen.

RB Johnnie Richardson played just the second half of the 2111 season in Maassluis. He was brought in to mentor rookie Renaldo Billodeaux and strengthen the special teams group. Richardson's days in the spotlights of the IHOF were his first 7 seasons, initially with 3 so-so seasons with the Snapfinger Jazz, the stint ending with a great season there, followed by 3 amazing seasons with the Oakland Black Panthers. In 2105 and 2106 he missed the playoffs after 2,260 and 1,990 yard seasons with 22 and 11 rushing touchdowns respectively, but in 2107 he was healthy and earned his IHOF Bowl ring. The decline was visible in the following 3 seasons at the Bordeaux Vineyards and the short stint in Maassluis gave him that 11th season in football.



The exodus didn't end there.

DE Frank Bernard signed a 3-year deal with the Paris Musketeers. He'll get much less money than the contract we offered him at the end of the 2111 off-season, but apparently Bernard prefers to play for a losing team for less money.

LB Caiden Hastings joined the reigning IHOF Champions, the Oakland Black Panthers. A franchise known for not wanting to pay big amounts of money to linebackers, shockingly offered him a bonus of $148M. We never intended to pay up to Hastings demands, but he made clear that he wanted to play elsewhere in the 2111 off-season already.

LT Earl McBirney signed a lucrative deal with the Toronto Lake Monsters, including a $145M signing bonus. This departure really hurt as we saw him as crucial protection to QB Harrison Singleton.

C Roman Gillespie signed with the Outer Banks Ospreys. In 4 seasons with us, he was stuck as the 4th interior lineman and was clearly ready for a starting role in this league. He played exceptionally well in 6 games for us in 2111, showing he deserves to make a move. In retrospect, we should have tried to trade him previous off-season to get some return of investment.



To fill some of those gaps, we signed 3 veteran free agents and traded for another.

RT Clayton Bernstein is a 28-year old 7th year veteran, with 99 starts for the Chesapeake Chitterlings on his resume. At 6'9" and 347 pounds, he's a big pass protector. We hope he can bring that on the left outside of the line.

CB Evan Merrell joins as after 3 seasons with the Gothenburg Giants, prior to that having played 4 seasons with the Orlando Talons. His man-to-man defense skills, interception skills, hard hitting, endurance and special teams skills make for an excellent addition to our secondary.

RB Sherman Ward was signed from the Paris Musketeers, where he played just 1 season, following 4 seasons with the Fairbanks Northstars. He's solid enough to be a change of pace back, but was primarily signed to fill the kickoff returner vacancy. At 29 years and playing the early decline position, it could be a short-term solution.

DT Dwayne Downs will join us in return for a 6th round draft pick in 2113. The 34-year old 6-time All-IHOF selection well out of favor with the Toronto Lake Monsters after just 1 season. Previously he was a core player on the Capital City Blues defensive line for 10 seasons. We'll find plenty of playing time on our rotation for him.



It didn't end there, obvously, we picked 7 players in the draft.

WR Rodolfo Lane looks to be the real deal. We moved up from the #6 and #10 overall picks to the #3 overall to select him. Lane was the last one of the 3 players that looked worth trading up for to be a true top3 pick addition. Our staff believes that Lane in potential is the second best wide receiver in the league's current pool of players, which teamed up with WR Jessie Vertelney makes for a fantastic tandem.

DE Lonnie Wynn was our pick at the 2.2 slot, a pick received as compensation for giving up both top10 picks for the #3 pick. Wynn looks to be a fine addition to our defensive line, with speed, strength, smarts and all around good enough to play in most formations.

We traded a 2nd, 3rd and 4th round pick for the Orlando Talons' 2114 first round pick. We've been quite lucky in recent seasons in acquiring future 1st rounders from fellow AOC teams after they played a tremendous season (Orlando went 13-3 last season) and then drop back, giving us a top10 pick.

LB Nicolas Giles was our highest 4th round pick, also received in the trade. His decent run defending, zone defending, play diagnosis and endurance could make him an acceptable replacement for Caiden Hastings, although it's likely we'll let him share playing time with 3rd year LB Bobby Diaz.

QB Bart Tanner was a misclick pick. In a sense that he was on our list for the later round picks, added with 2 picks to go and 1 player left from our 4th round prospects list, that target was picked. This by no means means Tanner is a terrible pick. he's got timing, sense rush ability, likes to scramble and might turn out to be a kick hold alternative. With QB Drake Bishop around as a mentor, Tanner might make the team as a project and competition for QB Harrison Singelton by the time the latter reaches the final year of contract.

C Russell Mahoney was picked in the 5th round to fill the void at backup center. He's a similar type of player as the departing C Roman Gillespie.

RB Angel Hammond was our 6th round pick. He looks decent enough to challenge for the RB2/change of pace back role. He might even be good enough to threaten RB Cary Delgado for the 3rd down back role.

G Jose Bryant was our 7th round pick. He looks to be a similar type of player to our current backup G Tutan Shepard, Bryant comes onto the team with the highest bench press score of all players on roster.



Not to go by unmentioned, we brought back a bunch of free agents, including the unrestricted S Noah Matthews in quite the bidding war, as well as DE Howie Tucker and RB Bennett Holmes. From the restricted free agents pool, we brought back DE Christopher Wrighster, CB Skip Horner and TE Kyle Upshaw.

We go into late free agency with second-year pros CB Preston Lewis and S Stan Cook as free agents. Both had salary demands that to me didn't match with their role and ability. So if we bring them back, they'll have to settle for less than their demands.

Obviously we'll do our best to bring on a dozen undrafted rookies to try to find some hidden gems in that group. With 53 players signed already, excluding the incoming DT Dwayne Downs, we have 6 roster spots for pre-season available. It'll be interesting to see which guys will choose us for their chance to get into professional football...

General Manager Notes: Undrafted rookies are here!

The scrambling for undrafted rookies commenced and today we found out which of the 9 that we targeted joined us.

FB Thurman Chachick, decent run blocker and special teamer, might have a chance to make the team, if he booms, as the second fullback.

TE Arnie Huffman, special teamer with potentially very good route running and courage, has a decent chance to make the team as the 4th tight end.

WR Hunter Tuitele, a kickoff return specialist.

LT Jordan Puckett, if he booms, he might challenge for the final o-lineman spot as a possible pass blocking talent.

CB Kent Wodarz, a zone defender, because we can't have too many of those, but a longshot to make the team.


S Stan Cook decided to sign a 3-year deal with the Frederick Red Menace, which was much closer to his demands than our lowball 1-year offer. Time will tell whether it was worth letting him go and stick with the other zone defenders on team.

General Manager Notes: The 53 Merchantmen for 2112

The 2112 roster is set, the final cutdown decision have been made.
At mid-pre-season, CB Corwin Drake, G Tutan Shapiro and LT Jordan Puckett were released. Undrafted rookie Puckett was a longshot to begin with. Shapiro may have hoped he'd move up in the hierarchy after the departure of C Roman Gillespie, but two rookies were more impressive in training camp and pre-season. Drake may come as a bit of a surprise, having been our punt returner last season, but rookie WR Rodolfo Lane will play that role on top of becoming our new WR2 (or WR1 even?).

Today the decision was made that RB Angel Hammond, FB Thurman Chachick and WR Kyle Belton won't make the team. It was quite the twisting and turning, but I decided to keep RB Bennett Holmes as our second special teamer out of the backfield, as well as our RB4, while other young wide receiver seem to be more useful. Belton's route running and special teams skills are too limited to have a shot at the WR4 role or WR5 role.

It also meant good news for a couple other players that were on the bubble: QB Bart Tanner, aforementioned RB Bennett Holmes, WR Hunter Tuitele, WR Kai Cote, WR Jaylen Gearhart, DE Steve Aber, DT Francisco Blades and CB Kent Wodarz. A bit of a spoiler that is, but here's our list of 53 for 2112.


Quarterbacks
40/40 QB Harrison Singleton (+2/+2 pre-season)
15/35 QB Bart Tanner (rookie, +2/+3 camp, +1/+7 pre-season)
15/15 QB Drake Bishop (-1/-1 pre-season)
Singelton is still our starter, but Tanner has shown quite the upside. Bishop has to stay as the mentor for Tanner and is our better kick holder, but won't be guaranteed to be on the active roster this season as our punter is capable of being the holder as well.

Backfield
40/45 RB Renaldo Billodeaux (+1/nc camp)
40/40 FB Kenneth Holse (+3/nc camp, nc/-2 pre-season)
40/40 RB Sherman Ward (fa signing, =9/-9 pre-season)
35/35 RB Cary Delgado (-1/-1 pre-season)
15/15 RB Bennett Holmes (-7/-7 pre-season)
Billodeaux is the real deal, at least he was last season. Holse is a suitable, do-it-all fullback and special teamer. Ward will be the change of pace back and our premier kickoff returner. Delgado remains to be the third down back. Holmes will be demoted to just a special teams role.

Tight ends
60/60 TE Ted Gordon
35/35 TE Garrett Alcala (-7/-7 pre-season)
25/35 TE Arnie Huffman (rookie, +3/-2 camp, nc/+3 pre-season)
20/30 TE Kyle Upshaw (+3/nc camp)
Gordon is the man, Alcala lost more of his route running, but will help boost cohesion as the TE2. Huffman is potentially an excellent route runner and fair run blocker, whilst being an improvement to the special teams group. Upshaw will be stuck as the inactive emergency TE4.

Wide receivers
70/70 WR Jessie Vertelney (+1/+1 pre-season)
50/75 WR Rodolfo Lane (rookie, +5/-1 camp, nc/-1 pre-season)
45/45 WR Preston Gray (+1/+1 pre-season)
35/35 WR Jaylen Gearhart (+4/nc camp, -9/-9 pre-season)
25/25 WR Kai Cote (-8/-8 pre-season)
15/20 WR Hunter Tuitele (rookie, +2/-1 camp, nc/-1 pre-season)
We should be good to go here, with quite possible the best WR duo in the league. Where have we seen that before and how little has it brought us in the past? Still, it should be a fantastic situation. Gray remains to be a solid WR3 for short routes. Gearhart has turned into a slightly different kind of player, has yet to make his first catch or see action on special teams, but I still believe in his talent. Cote will be a WR5/special teamer, Tuitele our kick off return alternate. But really, Vertelney and Lane, I really hope we can split the targets even and not too lopsided between them and the guys around them to finally make something good of our passing game.

Offensive Line
70/70 RT Ivan Dole (-4/-4 pre-season)
60/60 C Zane Chaplain
55/55 G Brett Stickney (-4/-4 pre-season)
55/55 G Andres Uwaezuoke (-1/-1 pre-season)
45/45 RT Clayton Bernstein (fa signing, -6/-6 pre-season)
30/40 G Jose Bryant (rookie, +3/nc camp, -1/-6 pre-season)
30/30 LT Harold Gruenwalder (-3/-3 pre-season)
15/40 C Russell Mahoney (rookie, +5/nc camp, -1/-4 pre-season)
Losing Earl McBirney was huge, but we hope to have found a suitable replacement in Bernstein. Worst case scenario, our excellent scrambling quarterback will scramble a bit more. Dole ios our run blocking anchor on the outside, Chaplain and the guards on the inside. If Bernstein gets tired or hurt, we might have to rely on good old Gruenwalder. Bryant hasn't shown longterm signs, but is still better than the guy we cut (Shapiro), whilst Mahoney gave us a mixed bag of signs.

Front Seven
70/70 DT Dwayne Downs (trade acquisition, -4/-4 pre-season)
70/70 DT Efrain Hutchins (-1/-1 pre-season)
60/60 LB Gus Coleman (-9/-9 pre-season)
55/55 DT Gabriel Morris
50/55 DE Calvin Buckley (+3/nc camp, +1/nc pre-season)
45/60 DE Lonnie Wynn (rookie, +5/-3 camp, +1/-3 pre-season)
45/45 LB Xavier Hoover (-1/-1 pre-season)
45/50 DE Steve Aber (+4/nc camp, -2/-2 pre-season)
40/50 DT Francisco Blades (+4/nc camp, nc/+1 pre-season)
40/45 LB Bobby Diaz (+3/nc camp, =2/+5 pre-season)
40/40 DE Christopher Wrighster (+3/nc camp, +3/+1 pre-season)
25/50 LB Nicholas Giles (rookie, +5/nc camp, nc/+5 pre-season)
35/35 LB Avery Distel
35/35 DE Howie Tucker
Despite our losses (DE Bernard and LB Hastings), this group looks fine. We have an awesome DT trio, which means we can run havoc all day long from that position, whilst we have sufficient support guys to deliver pass rush pressure or support the run stopping. In the linebackers group, Coleman is the sure thing, with Diaz our best pass defender and Hoover and Giles likely to divide playing time between them, whilst Distel might have to make a switch from pass rusher to pass defender.

Secondary
45/45 S Dan Peterson (+1/+1 pre-season)
45/45 S Noah Matthews
45/45 CB Evan Merrell (fa signing, -3/-3 pre-season)
40/40 CB Joel Delgado (-4/-4 pre-season)
40/40 CB Byron Sokol
35/35 S John Aponte
35/35 CB Skip Horner (+1/+1 pre-season)
25/45 S Joe Ramsey (+5/nc camp)
30/30 S Craig Clancy (+1/+1 pre-season)
20/30 CB Kent Wodarz (rookie, +3/nc camp, -1/-1 pre-season)
Sure, nothing spectacular here, but I have to trust the man-to-man experts Merrell, Sokol and Delgado, whilst the rest of the bunch are all zone defense specialists. We have plenty of interceptions forcing players as well here, so I'm not surer why we shouldn't feel like we can improve on our lackluster performance in pass defense last season.


The other stuff
85/85 K Oscar Harrington (-7/-7 pre-season)
60/60 P Tyrus Johnston (+1/nc camp)
20/20 LS Wayne Brewer
We have a kicker: the best out there, he was 80 for 80 last season. We have a promising punter and a long snapper. Yay.


So, yeah, I think we have a strong team. Secondary may lack an obvious star, but otherwise we have more than just a good bunch of support guys, we have plenty of guys that can make a difference.

The biggest question could be what kind of Singelton will show up: the reliable one that went 26-14 in the first two and a half seasons, or the turnover machine that went 6-10 last season. I hope 2111 was the outlier and we get to see the playmaker that he was earlier on. No more excuses, he's got to make it happen, or he'll have to look over his shoulder and wonder whether he'll get benched the way he was promoted to being our starter back in his own rookie season.

Merchantmen, get ready for the new season, we can do this, make me proud!

Great write up as always. I enjoy following this dynasty very much!

You wrote

Can you explain what you could have done to move cap costs forwards?

Thanks! Glad your enjoying it.

Sure. Late in pre-season, I will usually extend contracts to the marginal starters, premier backups that are out of contract in the next season. When tight on cap, it's better to give them what they want, but when I have a lot of additional cap space (I had quite a bit this season), I will rework the requested contract with basically the same salary in every season, which often means some of the money that was requested for the next season has been moved forward to the current season. I was going to pay up either way (extending now or signing said player in the next off-season), by paying up now, it means I pay more up front and have it count to the current year, not spread out over all years like with a signing bonus.

Yeah, I get you. It's a subtle move but useful as this money otherwise just does nothing (except improve bottom line, I guess).

Can you save big money like this or - seeing as you mentioned marginal starters and premier backups - or is this the kind of move which is overall shifting a few millions at most between seasons?

It's usually give or take the cap figure of one marginal starter / key backup. It's not much, but all the little things can help.

Busy weeks, I'll try to get a recap of the first 2/3rd of the regular season written in de weekend.

General Manager Notes: Flipping the coin, 2112 so far

Time has flown, we've already reached week 12 of the regular season. After a shaky start and a temporary quarterback switch, we're right in the mix of the playoffs teams in the AOC. Let's take a quick look back at our first 11 games of the 2112 regular season.

Week 1 at Paris
After a 17-game winning streak against the Musketeers, it finally came to an end. We had our chances to extend this streak, but while Paris scored 3 touchdowns from their red zone visits, we settled for field goals in our first 3 visits and also gave up a 76-yard pick six and a kickoff return touchdown. Rooke QB Bart Tanner came in late to brush up the humiliating score with his first career touchdown pass. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 217 yards and 1 interception, Tanner threw for 78 yards and 1 touchdown. WR Jessie Vertelney had 119 yards receiving, TE Ted Gordon 1 receivng touchdown.
16-35 loss

Week 2 at Outer Banks
No way around it, we were outmatched and got fleeced by the Ospreys' young QB. In return, QB Harrison Singelton got silenced, throwing for just 89 yards and 1 interception. Our only touchdown was an interception return by CB Evan Merrell.
16-27 loss

Week 3 at Orlando
We started the game well, but as soon as the Talons got their engines running, even a couple of missed field goals couldn't stop them from catching up, while a couple of late game interceptions turned it from a tie game into a 3-score loss. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 220 yards, 1 touchdown and 2 interceptions. RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for a touchdown, TE Ted Gordon had a receiving touchdown.
17-34 loss

Week 4 vs San Antonio
And then we finally got our first home game of the season and bounced back, big time. Although it was still close by half time, as we were trailing by 4 points then, the defense stood up in the second half and shutout the Tidal Force that half, while our own offense, in particular the running game, kept going well. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 147 yards, 1 touchdown, 2 interceptions, but also ran for 1 touchdown. RB Cary Delgado ran for 2 touchdowns, RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for 163 yards, including an 80-yard touchdown. Rookie WR Rodolfo Lane scored his first receiving touchdown.
38-21 victory

Week 5 no game

Week 6 vs Atlanta
Based on our dominance in this game (in particular holding the Vipers to 111 yards passing and just 3.0 yards per pass play), this should have been a cakewalk victory. But with our lack of ability to get into the end zone from the red zone, combined with a 92-yard pick six, this game was still tied when we drove into their red zone late in the fourth quarter. QB Harrison Singelton threw for 228 yards and 2 interceptions. RB Renaldo Billodeaux had 1 rushing touchdown.
20-13 victory

Week 7 at Fort Wayne
Our visit to the Fury resulted in one heck of a game for the neutral football fans. The lead in the game went left and right and this was clearly destined for a last to score wins scenario. And it did, as QB Harrison Singelton found WR Rodolfo Lane for 20 yards and TE Ted Gordon for 14 yards, whilst a Fury penalty stopped the clock for us with no time outs remaining K Oscar Harrington converted the 42-yarder to flip it from a 1-point loss into a victory. Singleton threw for 338 yards, 3 touchdowns and 1 interception. Gordon (twice) and Lane scored the receiving touchdowns.
24-22 victory

Week 8 vs Paris
Highly motivated to avenge the week 1 loss, we struggled to keep the Musketeers in check. Despite dominating the field position battle, our sudden big play ability resulted in a lopsided time of possession figure as Paris had possession of the ball for more than 40 minutes, while we were below 20 minutes. But our efficiency was slightly better. Even though we gave Paris chances to comeback from behind late with a late interception and a missed field goal. Their Hail Mary attempt came short and we held on. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 142 yards, 2 touchdowns and 2 interceptions. WR Rodolfo Lane and TE Ted Gordon split the receiving touchdowns again, RB Cary Delgado and RB Sherman Ward split the rushing touchdowns.
28-27 victory

Week 9 at Houston
Then, after a 4-game winning streak, Merchantmen management did something silly an decided to bench the quarterback. Rookie Bart Tanner came on and got eaten alive by the Mustangs, completing just 14 of 34 passes for 136 yards and 5 interceptions. The reason to bench QB Harrison Singleton, the interceptions, was clearly not just on him. The Mustangs were basically gifted their second victory of the season, while the Merchantmen may have thrown away a winnable game whilst actually virtually holding the last wild card to the playoffs in the AOC.
6-19 loss

Week 10 at Bordeaux
QB Harrison Singelton returned to the starting lineup and threw for 219 yards and 2 touchdowns without interception to guide his team to a convincing victory. WR Rodolfo Lane was on the receiving end of 2 touchdowns, while RB Sherman Ward ran for a couple. LB Bobby Diaz accounted for a 86-yard interception return touchdown.
38-14 victory

Week 11 vs Gothenburg
And then came the big test, against the Giants, at home. We marched into a 14-0 lead in the first quarter, but saw the Giants get close in the second quarter, us still leading 14-10 at half time. With 13 more unanswered points, including a 56-yard field goal, the Giants took a 2-score lead as we went into the fourth quarter trailing 23-14. Things went back and forth, but helped by the fumbling Giants, right after the 2-minute warning, we thought we had kicked into 27-26 a lead for the victory. Despite the defense standing strong, a Giants 56-yard field goal with 30 seconds remaining flipped it into a 29-27 deficit. QB Harrison Singelton completed a Hail Mary from our 34-yard line to WR Jessie Vertelney for 50 yards and following time, with 3 seconds to go, K Oscar Harrington converted the game winning 33-yarder. Oranje Haven figuratively exploded, a sensational victory was achieved over our Swedish division rivals. Singelton threw for 282 yards, 1 touchdown and 3 interceptions. WR Rodolfo Lane caught the receiving touchdown, RB Renaldo Billodeaux and RB Sherman Ward ran for a touchdown.
30-29 victory

Week 12 vs Capital City
Our luck didn't run out in our visit to the Blues as a missed extra point in the final 2 minutes of the game put the final score on the board. Earlier this game, WR Rodolfo Lane scored an 80-yard punt return touchdown, while LB Bobby Diaz scored a 60-yard interception return touchdown. Late in the game at the end of a 13-play 98-yard drive, QB Harrison Singleton found Lane for a short touchdown, taking the lead for the first time in this game and it turned out to be just enough. Singelton threw for 179 yards.
24-23 victory


European Division
1. Gothenburg 9-2
2. Maassluis 7-4
3. Bordeaux 5-6
4. Paris 2-9

Lo and behold, we're in the first wild card spot on tie-breakers ahead of the 7-4 Tucker Tigers. 6-5 Harlem and a foursome of 5-6 teams are on our tail. Gothenburg is on pace for home field advantage.

Half of our losses have come to the teams of the virtual #1 and #2 draft picks. 4 of our victories were by just 1 or 2 points. We're currently getting outscored by our opponents by 7 points... It's a weird season. Despite the wins, I'm not feeling like we're in control when we win these games. Heck, Singelton is on a 7-game winning streak, but his td:int ratio is 10:10 in those wins. Perhaps he watches too much Alfred Hickman highlight reels from our only IHOF Bowl winning season. Remember, Hickman then was 27:28 in that figure during the regular season, had 12 games with 2+ interceptions, in particular the 9-game stretch from week 11 through the conference semi finals. Let's not forget that we never missed the playoffs with Hickman under center, despite my hate:love relationship with his interception proneness...

Anyway, that was 56 seasons ago. We're in 2112, roughly 2/3rd into a regular season where we're struggling, yet mostly winning. Our cohesion in the passing game is hurting and I suspect it's part of the reason Singleton is struggling more than he has in the past. On the O-Line, we reinstalled LT Harold Gruenwalder over off-season signing RT Clayton Bernstein. The latter is livid over playing time, but the man has to understand that he's sitting behind a left tackle that hasn't given up a sack in 8 starts so far this season.

We might not spreading around the ball enough in the passing game to truly take defenses ff guard. Singleton is clearly dangerous against any team to go out for a long run, forcing them to keep an eye on him, but he might want to us to call more throws into the direction of our solid WR3 Preston Gray and our reliable backfield receivers FB Kenneth Holse and RB Cary Delgado. Our big-play WR4 Jaylen Gearhart hasn't even been targeted.

All things considered, we're somewhat lucky to be in the mix, but I want us to stick with a one game at a time approach. Sail on, Merchantmen, winds have been strong this season, but we're still on course.

General Manager Notes: 2112, playoffs or not?

The season has progressed and we've reached the back end of the regular season. We're red hot, 7-1 in the last 8 games, with our sole loss coming in a game where I benched QB Harrison Singelton. 5 more games are in the books, including back to back games of the week against the #1 seed bound Texas Sharks and Gothenburg Giants. So, how'd that go?

Week 13 vs Rochester
A phenomenal performance by the defense, combined with a reborn QB Harrison Singleton resulted in perhaps the most convincing victory of the season. We were leading 37-0 when the Razorbacks finally came onto the scoreboard with a 4th quarter field goal. Singleton threw for 309 yards and 3 touchdowns, spreading them over WR Rodolfo Lane (2 touchdowns) and WR Preston Gray. WR Jessie Vertelney had 134 receiving yards. RB Sherman Ward and RB Cary Delgado split the rushing touchdowns.
37-6 victory

Week 14 vs Texas
The game of the week series between Texas, Gothenburg and Maassluis began in Maassluis. The visit of the Sharks to Oranje Haven resulted in a very even matched game, loaded with all kinds of drama. We jumped to a 10-0 lead and held onto 10-6 at half time. Then RB Renaldo Billodeaux fumbled the ball in our own half in our first possession of the second half and right after Texas took a 13-10 lead after their first touchdown of the game. Things went back and forth until Texas was driving down field for a 2-score lead. An interception by CB Evan Merrell at our 2-yard line turned out to be the momentum flip as we responded with a 9-play 78-yard drive, including a 50-yard long bomb throw by QB Harrison Singleton to WR Jessie Vertelney and a 4th down touchdown pass to WR Rodolfo Lane to level the score 20-20. An interception with 41-yard return by CB Joel Delgado near midfield in the final minute helped setup a potential game winning field goal. K Oscar Harrington converted a 35-yarder and on their final play the Sharks saw their Hail Mary attempt get batted down. Singleton threw for 194 yards, 2 touchdowns and 2 interceptions. Lane an TE Ted Gordon split those receiving touchdowns.
23-20 victory

Week 15 at Gothenburg
Trailing by 2 wins, but on a 9-1 spree, we felt like we could put up a fight at the Giants. They were still feeling sore about their dramatic loss in Oranje Haven earlier on (a game that could have gone either way) and were highly motivated to not only beat us, but also clinch the division title. To be frank, we were never really into the game and despite holding the Giants quarterback to 127 yards passing, 4 missed field goals and 2 missed extra points by supposedly the best kicker in football (apparently our K Oscar Harrington is still the man) helped us from getting completely humiliated and just getting a normal clobbering. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 157 yards and 4 interceptions. We scored no touchdowns.
6-25 loss

Week 16 at Moontown
In what looked to be an exciting game where we bounced back from an early 20-3 deficit, into trailing just 20-16 at half time, the story of the game turned out to not be the final score. Halfway into the third quarter, on a seemingly standard 2-yard run play, QB Harrison Singleton twisted his leg and was carted off with a seemingly very serious knee injury. Rookie QB Bart Tanner was brought on and contributed with the game's second interception thrown that got ran back for a touchdown. At the end of the game, the home team had scored on an offensive fumble return touchdown, two pick sixes and 3 field goals. Singleton threw for 164 yards, 2 touchdowns, 2 interceptions, while Tanner threw for 82 yards and 1 interception. TE Ted Gordon was on the receiving end of Singleton's touchdown passes.
22-30 loss

After the game, the bad news arrived: QB Harrison Singleton had to go into MCL Knee Surgery and is estimated to be out for roughly 9 to 10 months, which likely means he'll miss the start of the 2113 season as well, providing he wants to work his ass of to come back and will still be as good as we know him to be.

Week 17 vs Bordeaux
Still bummed over the loss of Singleton, we signed a promising rookie, that by a flurry of miscommunication issues ended up being active for the game, while some usual special teams stand outs were inactivated. The visiting Vineyards had their own quarterback drama, losing their starter as well to injury and estimated to be out throughout the playoffs. Our situation was simple: win and we'd still end up as the #5 seeds. Lose and we'd need help from either Toronto to beat Harlem or from Augusta to beat Tucker. Bordeaux would need both on top of beating us to grab the final wild card. Whatever it was, despite that our defense sacked the Bordeaux fill-in 9 times, he also completed 25 of 39 passes for 446 yards to guide his team to victory. Our QB Bart Tanner threw for 277 yards, 1 touchdown and 2 interceptions. TE Ted Gordon was on the receiving end of our only touchdown of the day.
19-27 loss

European Division
1. Gothenburg 14-2
2. Maassluis 9-7
3. Bordeaux 9-7
4. Paris 3-13

We took second place on strength of victory tie-breaker. Our wins over division winners Gothenburg, Texas and Fort Wayne were far superior over Bordeaux' wins as the best team they beat was us. The same tie-breaker put as far ahead of Harlem as well, they also won only 1 game against a playoffs making 9-7 team. Gothenburg earned the #1 seed in the playoffs, Paris the #1 pick in the 2113 draft, which they won't be able to use as they traded it to the Chesapeake Chitterlings. If they keep it, it will be the first time in IHOF history the Chitterlings use the #1 overall pick. It leaves the Giants as the only team to have never held the #1 overall pick (including that we lump together franchises that had name changes in the first 30ish seasons of the league).

The good news was that the Toronto Lake Monsters in their hunt for the #2 seed and a bye week demolished the Harlem Apollos 62-7 and we piggybacked on it into the playoffs! We'll be visiting the Orlando Talons, who ended the Tucker Tigers' streak of division titles at 22... The Tigers still made the playoffs as the #5 seeds and will visit the Fort Wayne Fury. But we will be without our starting quarterback, while our center Zane Chaplain is still out with tonsilitis, which makes me skeptical about whether we can make some noise. It doesn't mean we won't try, though!

Congratulations on making the playoffs, MIJB, but that injury to Singleton is brutal! Can you switch to a run-based game around your backup, or will you just air out and let the dice roll how they do? Seems tricky when one of your big strengths is the passing game.

From reading your reports and watching some of the videos out there it's clear that Gothenburg are an absolutely brutal winning machine with insane consistency. What's the secret to their success do you think? Anyway, I'm hoping for a season where you take the division in the near future =)

Thanks. Despite our history and tradition, it's only the 3rd time in the last 20 seasons we made the playoffs, but somehow I think this team is less deserving than we've been half of the 17 seasons we didn't make it. I do think we're a playoff caliber team, with Singleton that is.

Interesting questions. I tend not to want to go too much into detail, some of the competition in IHOF reads along and it could give them more of an advantage over me than vice versa. But I'll nevertheless try to elaborate a bit.

I think Singleton (as is his stand-in Tanner) is such a powerful scrambling QB that he makes for an additional running threat and somewhat turns the balanced offense into more running than passing anyway. The OC is run-oriented (Smashmouth type), but I'm always wary for overdoing things and know my biggest shorting coming: game planning. It's not my thing and all I know is I'm barely better at it than the seemingly completely random AI. Missing our center also makes it unrealistic to shift to heavy running, that's a crucial position for a good running game. It's not surprising our running game has been below our standards over the last couple of games. Tanner is a unexperienced version of Singleton, in theory Tanner should be able to play like Singleton did as a rookie.


The current owner of the Gothenburg franchise (Julio Riddols) no doubt is the reason why Gothenburg thrives and has turned the European division from Maassluis dominated to Gothenburg dominated. He seems to have game planning figured out and makes the difference there between our two franchises, whereas I somehow have lost a step in that area while the average level of game planning in IHOF has clearly increased.

Julio Riddols more so than me gets the best out of limited players, in part because (I think) he takes the time to craft and redo his game plans during the season, almost from game to game. That's something I feel like I'm too limited in to understand game mechanisms enough to make it work for me. It can do wonders to check on opposing teams' tendencies to do crazy stuff like running a lot out of a 104 formation, which then becomes very easy to counter, but you'll have to be 100% convinced your opponent does it all the time. I think he's capable of doing that as well.

I'm sure we'll win a division at some point again. Becoming the third franchise with 1000 regular season wins is a realistic goal for the 2113 and 2114 season, we're at 980 now. And it's a challenging one as well, because the Kansas Creationists (and predecors) have caught up and are at 981 wins now. Although it's a bit of a silly comparison, because we're only 1 of 4 franchises that had the same ownership since the beginning and 2 of them are lightyears ahead of us, and the fourth even further behind us than we're behind Tucker and Chesapeake. Fairbanks has the same owner since opening day 2004 as well, but that owner switched placed with non-playing commissioner for a short period of time.

General Manager Notes: 2112's wild Wild Card game

Week 18 at Orlando
Down our quarterback, I tempered my expectations and felt that we might come home from a serious drubbing in Orlando. At the same time, I should feel quite good about the team we put together and if QB Bart Tanner could go through the game mistake free, we might actually be able to put up a fight.

Orlando scored quickly on their first possession, which got me very much scared this could turn into a blowout. But on our own first possession, helped by a 38-yard kickoff return, we didn't need to gain too many yards and we did just enough to keep the chains moving and see RB Renaldo Billodeaux run it in from 6 yards out for a 7-7 tie game. A sack by rookie DE Lonnie Wynn focred 3 and out, giving us hope we could stand our ground from time to time. After we got stopped quickly as well, Orlando saw their running back com up with a big 23-yard run to set up field goal for a 10-7 lead after the first quarter.

After a slow but steady drive, we tied it up again, but found ourselves completely off guard on the ensuing kickoff return, allowing a 91-yard touchdown. After several three and outs, Orlando was deep inside their own red zone and after their quarterback appeared to get his passing game going, his second attempt of the drive got picked off by S Craig Clancy. QB Bart Tanner connected on a key third and long with TE Garrett Alcala, converted a short one with a scramble and then tied the score 17-17 with a short pass to wide open WR Preston Gray. A defensive stand gave us the ball back, but as we were driving for a lead taking field goal, Tanner's pass got picked off and returned deep enough to set Orlando up for a 20-17 lead at half time.

We came out of the break looking bland, but on Orlando's first possession our young defensive ends strip sacked the their quarterback, our S Dan Peterson picked up the scattering ball and got it to midfield. Supported by a long run from RB Sherman Ward, QB Bart Tanner found WR Jessie Vertelney and fellow rookie WR Rodolfo Lane for long enough throws to set up the 20-20 tying field goal. After long, yet inefficient drive from Orlando, we did just enough to end the third quarter barely inside Orlando's half with a fresh set of downs.

After three no-gainers of plays, we were sadly forced to punt to pin Orlando deep. They responded with 31-yard and 37-yard passing plays, eventually resulting in a touchdown. The missed extra point made it 26-20 for Orlando, giving us a little bit more hope this wasn't going to end there and then. Another strong kickoff return from RB Sherman Ward brought us near midfield and helped by an unneccessary roughness penalty, we came close enough to converted a 42-yard field goal for a 26-23 trailing score. We stopped Orlando on their next drive, but ended up pinned at our own 1-yard line. After three short plays, we were forced to punt and gave up a 17-yard return that helped set up Orlando's field goal for a 29-23 lead. With 1:55 remaining and having spent all our time outs on on that last drive, a deep kickoff placed us at our own 25-yard line. We went for a risky play right away and QB Bart Tanner's pass got picked off. Orlando ran one more play, but after they earned a new set of downs, victory formation was there.

QB Bart Tanner threw for 181 yards, 1 touchdown and 2 interceptions. WR Preston Gray was on the receiving end of the touchdown, RB Renaldo Billodeaux accounted for our running touchdown. Somehow we stayed in the game, despite allowing 19 of 25 passes to get completed and giving up 5.44 yards per run, it felt like the kickoff return touchdown and field goal swinging interception at the end of the first half did us in. Field position and just enough third down conversions kept us in it.
23-29 loss


And that wraps up our 2112 season. A strange season, where we started 0-3, then got red hot by winning most of our games by 3 or less points, including coin flip wins over Gothenburg and Texas, to end the season with another 3-game losing streak, in which we lost our QB Harrison Singleton to a career threatening knee injury. It foreshadows a tough decision to make in the off-season, once we know how long Singleton will be out: do we search for replacement, or will we give the keys to Bart Tanner until Singleton returns. If he returns, or returns looking able to play at his old level.

We'll be roughly $40M over the cap, not accounting for the draft picks. Just 7 players are out of contract going into the off-season. Obviously emergency signing QB Cory Backer is one of them. FB Kenneth Holse, TE Arnie Huffman, kick return alternate WR Hunter Tuitele and CB Kent Wodarz will be restricted free agents and likely to have low demands. DT Dwayne Downs was a one-year rental, but if the cap space is available, we might try to bring him back. LT Harold Gruenwalder is the most interesting case. He was pushed into the starting lineup due to newly signed RT Clayton Bernstein's inability to play left tackle well and Gruenwalder surprised the football world with 0 sacks allowed in 494 passing plays, whilst not turning out to be the weak link in the running game. If Gruenwalder doesn't return, his agent's salary demands could be too rich for all 32 IHOF franchises, quite possibly forcing him into sitting out the season. Imagine that...

I also fear for QB Drake Bishop to retire, as he was active in just 1 regular season game, despite that last season he proved to be crucial for K Oscar Harrington as his kick holder. RB Bennett Holmes could be another suspect for retirement. But that's something to wait and see, after the remainder of the playoffs has played out.

Nice write ups as always and I appreciate you taking the time to answer my questions knowing that other IHOF GM's read along. I was aware of that risk when I commented so I probably should say next time don't worry about answering until the season is over =)

Despite being a starting QB down it turned out to be a game which could have gone either way until that late, late pick.

Thanks also for the small history lesson. Typically Fairbanks would go on to win the bowl of course!

General Manager Notes: 2113 begins

Some of our preparation to 2113 started during the playoffs. After we got knocked out by the Orlando Talons in a could have should have game. But before their luck ran out in the next round as they lost on a miraculous Hail Mary touchdown pass by the Toronto Lake Monsters, who went on to humiliate the Gothenburg Giants in Gothenburg 37-6 and in the IHOF Bowl ran out of luck as well, falling 20-13 against the Fairbanks Northstars, a team that went in to the playoffs with a 9-6-1 record and a -12 points differential. Anyway, we signed a couple of young guys that would be restricted free agents in the early free agency period: RB Korey Burnett, WR Edgar Horn, C Duane Ondre, LB Charles Wintch and S Tanner Phillip. Burnett played in 15 games for the Colorado Cutthroats in 2111, Ondre in 1 games for the Houston Stallions that season. The others are void of any playing experience in IHOF.

Our cap situation is doable. We're $40M over the cap, but almost $57M if we add in the most expensive 4 draft picks in of the 6 we have in hand. With 47 players signed, it means we have can get to the 53-men roster with just using the picks and not signing any free agents. Which won't do though, as we have a 12 free agents listed as on roster. I'm confident I can work out renegotiations to get us under the cap at the start of free agency, a cap out of our most expensive player WR Jessie Vertelney would save roughly $30M in cap costs. I will also have to look at the 16 players in the final contract year, I need to figure out which are worth locking up through 2114 or even beyond. QB Drake Bishop, RB Bennett Holmes, TE Garrett Alcala, G Brett Stickney and DT Gabriel Morris are amongst that bunch and being in their 30s, they are candidates for a wait and see, or the other way around, might want to extend to keep them from retiring.

There are two major roster spot situations to address: quarterback and left tackle. I elaborated on that after our loss in Orlando and the situation is unchanged.

QB Harrison Singleton is estimated to miss the first 22 weeks of the season, which adds up to all of pre-season and the regular season. I'd love to see him back for the playoffs, but we'd actually have to find a suitable replacement to get there and if we do, it wouldn't make sense to hand the keys to a rusty Singleton after his replacement got us that far.

LT Harold Gruenwalder is a free agent and coming off his best season ever. Every other team in the league would only see him as backup material in a pass heavy offense, but if he doesn't crash in pre-season, he's worth keeping as our man on the left side of the line. RT Clayton Bernstein has flopped as a LT alternative, but he's still signed for 3 more seasons and after he started in the last 4 games due to injuries on the line, he came around and went from demanding a trade to being just 'disgruntled'.

All things considered, an interesting off-season coming up, where I hope we can build on a strange yet hopeful 2112 campaign towards ending the Giants' domination of the division and hopefully getting things done in the playoffs.

General Manager Notes: 2113 Draft and other stuff

The big pieces of the off-season have finished and we got out of it without much special to report on. That is to say, what is special in the off-season? A fancy top5 or draft pick usually is and so can be a free agent signing.

Let's start with the stuff that's always neat: the draft. We went into it with six picks, being down our 6th round pick for the rights to DT Dwayne Downs as a one-year rental. I decided that I wasn't too keen on the prospects left for the 2nd and 3rd round and swapped both for the Brooklyn Fightin' Bums 2nd round pick next draft and a 7th rounder this draft. That left us with 5 picks for the 2113 class, not counting the soon to be arriving undrafted rookie signings.

Pick 1.22 - LB Jorge Mayes
Planning ahead here as LB Gus Coleman is entering his 11th season. He might be not much more in potential than our 4th round pick last season (LB Nicolas Giles), but there might be nothing wrong to play them both, eventually. Mayes is a run stopper and zone defender with endurance. That's good enough for me. Worth a 1st round pick though? He feels like more of a 2nd round pick at the moment, despite his 30/70ish scouted ratings.

Pick 4.21 - DT Garrett Theurer
This pick somewhat crossed the free agency signing, which I will elaborate on later, making it a bit less likely Theurer will have a shot at making the 53-men roster, but we'll have to trust our staff regardless. Run defense, pass rush, play diagnosis. This kid can play 2 out of 3 downs. He arrives looking 25/50ish.

Pick 5.22 - LT Kristopher Harmon
It will come as no surprise that I was looking for a left tackle project after we lost LT Earl McBirney last season and as of this pick had no "I'm back" from LT Harold Gruenwalder either. If Harmon improves upon his initial looks, he'll be a worthy successor to Gruenwalder. Harmon arrived looking 25/50ish.

Pick 7.10 - QB Shawn DeLay
Clearly, a 10/40ish graded player can't be ready to quarterback a playoffs caliber team, but with QB Harrison Singleton out and the verdict far from out yet on QB Bert Tanner, picking up another project in the 7th round can't be a huge mistake.

Pick 7.22 - P Zack Lestage
Do we need a new punter? Maybe, maybe not. P Tyrus Johnston is barely a top10 player at his position, so taking a shot at the best of this rookie class late in the 7th round is worth it. We should hope Lestage will improve on his 40/50ish early impression.


Aside from the draft, the most surprising move was bringing DT Dwayne Downs back for another season, this time getting a 1-year $22.7M contract, which means we signed the top player from the Grey Sheet. So, yay. But it's quite telling no other team should even the slightest of interest in Downs and to be fair, we offered him the absolute minimum he was willing to consider midway through the early free agency.

LT Harold Gruenwalder signed a cheep 2-year deal, but I felt he deserves to stay and only in Maassluis can play up to starting quality with his cohesion boost.

Other than those two, we re-signed all the unrestricted free agents that we had on roster last season or signed to a future contract in the post-season. We'll lump QB Corey Backer into that pile as well.

That and we extended the contract of WR Jessie Vertelney through 2117. He better start posting 1,500-yard seasons. He barely got past 1,000 yards last season and didn't score a touchdown at all. Yikes.

Oh yeah, DE Howie Tucker decided to hold out. Which is a shame, because I was going to make him an offer during the pre-season anyway. I decided to make him a worthy offer before training camp, to talk him out of it.

General Manager Notes: 2113 training camp with 70 men roster

DE Howie Tucker signed a new 3-year deal, quickly ending his hold out. Believe it or not: I offered him less than I likely would have during the pre-season action. He accepted the offer; jolly good, sir.

We signed QB Dakota Peterson from the Rochester Razorbacks. Their starter the last two seasons and previously the Snapfinger Jazz backup for 4 seasons. His production through the air is somewhat underwhelming, but at this point we have to consider a 45/45ish ball thrower with decent enough sense rush ability, running legs, timing and whatnot a pleasant placeholder for Singleton at $7.5M per season for 2 seasons.

We added up to 70 by signing 5 undrafted rookies: C Leonardo McConnell, DE Erick Carlin, DT Viking Wedderburn, DE Jamie Coffey and DE Leslie Kelly. The last two will be asked to bulk up and make a switch to defensive end. C McConnell is 20/35ish, DE Carlin 25/35ish, DE Coffey 20/45ish, DE Kelly 25/30ish and DT Wedderburn 25/40ish.

It means we go into camp with 6 quarterbacks (including QB Harrison Singleton), 5 running backs, 1 fullback, 4 tight ends, 7 wide receivers, 4 centers, 3 guards, 2 left tackles, 2 right tackles, 1 kicker, 2 punters, 8 defensive ends (excluding LB Avery Distel), 6 defensive tackles, 7 linebackers, 5 cornerbacks, 6 safeties and 1 long snapper. It will quite the challenge to trim down to 60 just based on training camp results. Although it should be obvious that the surplus position groups are the most likely spots to trim down...

With a new offensive coordinator style, it will be even more challenging to rework our game plan on offense.

Which sums up basically the action post draft and before training camp.

Kerry Lewis added to Merchantmen Ring of Honor

Long overdue. 2046 IHOF Legend of the Game Kerry Lewis has been chosen to be the 100th addition to the Maassluis Merchantmen Ring of Honor. Football fans with a sense of history have lobbied for Lewis before, but it wasn't until now that the committee has caved in and accepts that the IHOF's all-time leader in games played deserves this spot. His name will be revealed on the ring during the pre-season week 2 home game against the reigning IHOF champion Fairbanks Northstars.

Although listed as a quarterback, Kerry Lewis joined the Merchantmen in 2029 with the intent to be their new kick holder and only third string emergency quarterback in the process, behind eventual Hall of Famer "Rusty" Harrison and career back Tracy Kerr. For 14 seasons, Lewis was the holder of kicker Charles Anthony, the all-time Merchantmen leader in field goals and points scored and in the latter the IHOF's all-time leader as well. When Anthony retired in the 2043 off-season, Lewis held the ball for Mack Heatherley for a season and 3 more for Marvin Creekmur.

Lewis was part of the franchise in a timeframe where the team made the playoffs for 9 seasons straight from 2035 through 2043, highlighted by an Atlantic Ocean Conference Championship in 2039 and subsequently lost IHOF Bowl. Curiously he was called upon just twice to play his natural quarterback position, leading his team to a 16-7 victory in week 17 of the 2037 season over the Bordeaux Vineyards when the #2 seed was already locked up and once more 2 seasons later late in a blowout loss at the Tucker Tigers.

Lewis' reputation as a holder was undisputed, best in the business. His iron man reputation is a result of playing in 287 regular season games and 17 playoffs games. If it wasn't for a shutout loss in week 9 of his rookie season where he didn't get onto the field, he would have accumulated 300+ straight games played.

But amidst a franchise with so many big names over 109 seasons of football, season after season he was an afterthought for the Ring of Honor. Until now, 66 seasons after his retirement. For a franchise that clamors to have a tradition of strong special teams units, it's about time Lewis joins the list, 3 seasons after Charles Anthony was added, which was also long overdue. Kickoff specialist Al Bettis and return specialists Jack Money, Scott Dupuis, Mark Perkins and most recently Calvin Maxwell also made the ring, most of them decades after the fact.


The full list of 100 names in the Ring of Honor
QB Louie Flannery*, "Rusty" Harrison*, Jay McGee, Bryson Chow*, Lester Lowe, Alfred Hickman, Ellis McAllister, Kerry Lewis
RB/FB Randy Harris, Stanley Givens*, Darrin Keegan, Harold Riley, Norbert Talley*, Fernando Scott
FB Albert "The Shovel" Shalon, Gilbert Taliancich
TE Jim Reiser, Jorge Jurevicius, Emmanuel Forbes, Monty Elliot
WR Bryce Ewald, Alfredo Bass, Gabe Springer*, Freddie Upshaw, Terry Thomason, Terry Haskell*, Jack Money, Kai Oburn, Riddick Stanley*, Scott Dupuis, J.R. Mills*, "Theo" Bondy*, Mark Perkins, Ed Schulz, Vinny Buysse, Calvin Maxwell
C Brant Heinrich, Shawm Hudspeth, B.J. Samuels, Cristian Sampson, Zack Whelan, Tom Anaya*, Butch Pearson
G Casey Kappers, J.J. Reilly, Ricky Castillo, Bryant Huffman, Carlos Webb, Michael Szott
OT "Indestructible" Ivan Jacques, Kerry Zumdahl*, Roman Torrez, Scott Null, Oscar Meadows*, Louie Murray, Nathan Hadinger, Howard Humphrey*
K Al Bettis, Charles Anthony
DE Broderick Amadro, Jordan St. Pierre, Daquan "Da Machine" Strugielski*, Arnie May, Richie Piotte*
DT Charles Gomez, Andy Cottle, Dennis Lucas*, Brian Lincoln, Shaun "The Behemoth" Hartman*, Preston Urquoila, Glen Stiegler, Darien Fletcher
LB Cody Cluff, Bernie Surry, Mike Kershner, R.J. Knight, Fred McCorkle, Daniel "Double D" Duncan, Wesley Devine*, Jeremiah Collier, Edward Ross*, Gabe Hamilton, Antoino Battle, Craig McCorkle*, Glenn Brewer, Brandon Brady
CB Tai Wayne, Randall Allen, Everett Heiser, Peter Tucker*, Kirk Hitchcock*, Ernie Grant
S Lincoln Gilmore, Eddie Cole, Jimmy Chellino, Perry Walker, Thurman Hopper, Devon Farrell, Bart Guthrie*
* IHOF Hall of Fame enshrined

General Manager Notes: 2113 Pre-Season Roster Set

Training Camp has finished and we told 10 players they won't make our pre-season roster. It's sad, because I saw upside in at least half of these kids. But we'll have to abide to the roster size limits and we'll still have an excess of 7 players to the regular season roster limit.

We released 7th round rookie QB Shawn Delay, last season's emergency signing QB Corey Backer, big-play WR Edgar Horn, undrafted rookie C Leonardo McConnell, 2112 5th round pick C Russell Mahoney, undrafted rookies DE Erick Carlin, DE Leslie Kelly and DT Viking Wedderburn, special teams expert LB Charles Wintch and finally 2112 undrafted rookie CB Kent Wodarz.

It wasn't even like they all had a bad training camp, Mahoney, Kelly and Wodarz were amongst the 11 players that made good progress. I'll list all the players that went +3 or better on the 1-100 scale by my staff.
QB Shawn DeLay +3
QB Bart Tanner +3
WR Rodolfo Lane +5
C Russel Mahoney +4
C Duane Ondre +6
LT Kristopher Harmon +3
P Zack Lestage +3
DE Erick Carlin +3
DE Lonnie Wynn +4
DE Jamie Coffey +5
DE Leslie Kelly +4
DT Francisco Blades +3
DT Garrett Theurer +5
DT Viking Wedderburn +3
LB Jorge Mayes +7
LB Nicolas Giles +5
CB Kent Wodarz +4
S Joe Ramsey +4

On the 60 men roster is QB Harrison Singleton. He's listed out for 22 weeks, which should keep him sidelined until roughly the start of the playoffs. Rest be assured, he won't see the field until he's cleared, there won't be any rushing him onto the field while almost ready. But it will mean we'll go into the regular season with 6 inactive players on the roster on top of the 46 active players. We'll see in a day or so where we stand as the re-assessment of mid-pre-season will be clear.

I'm curious - from a game mechanics perspective - is there a risk that Singleton comes back considerably weaker? And if so, how risky do you believe it is? He's basically been out for a year by the time he should return, right? So hopefully not too much time to degrade.

We won't know until he's fully recovered. I'm expecting something along these lines:

Singleton will be listed as "out" until roughly week 10 or 12.

From there on he'll go somewhere from doubtful or questionable to probable. Eventually he'll be back to 100% in week 17 or thereabouts, at which point we'll know whether this injury cost him a ratings hit.
If there is a hit, we'll see a different player, but it's not carved in stone, neither do I know which ratings will or will not take a big reduction.
If, big if, there is no hit, Singleton will be rusty.

The really tricky part is whether or not to actually put Singelton on the field once he hits "doubtful" (or questionable or probable), because with these kind of injuries the risk of reinjuring are almost a guarantee (hence risking another season on the sidelines and what not). So, it's a no brainer to me, whatever happens, Singelton won't make it to the active roster unless he's 100%.

And that trickiest part of that: it will mean I need to keep my roster legal at all times, because if I miss an injury elsewhere on the team, or somehow end up with 45 active, the AI will goof around and activate Singelton no matter what, risk him getting on the field, reinjure himself and quite likely destroy his career.


Some people might throw Singleton on injured reserve at this stage already, but I'm going to try to stay optimistic and hope to see him return to 100% in time to start in the playoffs or earlier if we get lucky with his recovery. If by miracle we'll end up in the bowl game and Singelton is not yet 100%, there and then we'll have a decision to make, but to be fair, if we make it that far, would it make sense to bench the QB that got us there?

General Manager Notes: Down to 53 for 2113?

Yesterday was the second cut down day. Without hesitation, we released 7 players to set a 53-men roster for the final 2 pre-season games. We split the first two beating the IHOF Champions Fairbanks Northstars 16-9 in Oranje Haven, while we followed up with a 33-28 loss at the Kansas Creationists.

The seven players released are RB Korey Burnett, G Jose Bryant, P Zack Lestage, DE Jamie Coffey, DT Garrett Theurer, S Joe Ramsey and S Tanner Phillip.

RB Burnett didn't play in the first pre-season games, but the lack of regression with the returning guys from last season at RB meant that there was no reason to replace any of them, making Burnett the 5th wheel.

G Bryant lost the roster spot battle for the 8th O-lineman to rookie LT Kristopher Harmon.

P Lestage looks like he's IHOF caliber, but our 3rd-year Tyrus Johnston is holding up in ability and potential as a top10 guy. I will keep my eyes open for a top5 guy, but for now Johnston is the best we can get. Lestage is now amongst 6 punters that are on the open market and seriously deserve a roster spot. Although, Lestage is about 32nd in ability, so it could be tough for him.

DE Coffey is now the most talented pass rusher on the open market. But we have so much similar guys on team already, with more years on roster. It just wasn't meant to be, I guess?

DT Theurer took a hit in potential in pre-season, according to my staff. It's too bad, I had good hopes for him. He's still decent backup material, but he wasn't going to play on our rotation behind 4 clearly better guys.

S Ramsey felt like a tough decision, he was the last man out. Reality is that we used him just twice in his first 2 seasons. So unless I could find an active roster spot for him, there was no way it would make sense to keep him, other than for injury replacement reasons or if one of the veteran safeties would have fallen apart, which didn't happen.

S Phillip lost the battle for the kickoff returner spot to RB Sherman Ward and in particular WR Hunter Tuitele. Phillip seems to have better potential, about to be better than both right now, but I decided against Phillip. This kid should make a roster spot elsewhere, it was a disgrace he sat without a roster spot elsewhere in the league all of last season.

We'll head into our final pre-season games now and start the talks with players out of contract next season. We have roughly $23.5M to work with and the most expensive player to talk with will be TE Ted Gordon, a proven 900-yard receiver.


This all also means QB Harrison Singleton did not get placed on injured reserve, we'll keep him inactive until he's ready to return at 100%. Only if the recovery ends up taking longer, we will reconsider late in the season. For the starting quarterback gig for the regular season, it's on between QB Bart Tanner and QB Dakota Peterson. In early pre-season action, Tanner got sacked a lot, while Peterson didn't get sacked and actually used his legs better than Tanner. I haven't made up my mind on this quite yet.

Singleton returns to practice
Maassluis Merchantmen quarterback Harrison Singleton has returned to the practice field. After a grueling knee injury suffered in a week 16 loss at the Moontown Darksiders, Singleton had been sidelined. This week, he was cleared to return to joining the team during practice sessions. The Merchantmen medical staff upgraded Singleton's injury status from 'out' to 'probable'. But Merchantmen management has been clear about when and where Singleton will return to the starting lineup. General manager M.IJ.B. was clear: "Singleton won't join the active roster until he's upgraded to 100%." The medical staff projects a recovery maybe just in time for week 17's home game against the Paris Musketeers. Until then, Bart Tanner and Dakota Peterson will remain the viable options at quarterback.

General Manager Notes: 2113, a lost season

I have no way to make things sound better than they are, we're near the bottom of the league after 12 weeks of action and it's quite clear that we're incapable of doing anything remotely close to what this bunch of players should be capable of.

I could try to motivate myself to recap every single game we've played so far, but it would be a depressing story as we started the season with a 3-game losing streak (23-27 vs Gothenburg, 14-26 at Frederick, 20-34 at San Antonio) and followed it up with a shocking 27-19 win vs Tucker, pathetic losses at Augusta (21-42) and Paris (10-21), a miraculous 20-18 win vs Snapfinger, hopeless losses at Bordeaux (21-42), Orlando (17-40) and Gothenburg (23-44) and an overtime 31-28 win vs Brooklyn. Curiously, we're 3-1 in home games this season, but our 0-7 record on the road makes it all moot.

I've flipflopped between QB Bart Tanner and QB Dakota Peterson. Tanner started in week 1, Peterson in week 2 through 7, then Tanner from week 8 through 12. Peterson has clearly been more prone to pass rush pressure. The offensive line has proven to be too weak to give the quarterbacks time, both struggle to complete 50% of their passes and float around 200 yards per game.

The ineptitude of our passing game has in no way been saved by our state of the art receiving group. WR Jessie Vertelney has 49 catches for 642 yards, without a single touchdown. WR Rodolfo Lane has 43 catches for 562 yards, with 8 touchdowns. TE Ted Gordon keeps getting in the way or making the safe target catches with 68 receptions for 711 yards. The rest of the bunch, let us not even talk about them.

Amidst this, RB Renaldo Billodeaux is on pace for a "Pro Bowl" worthy set of stats, averaging nearly 5.5 yards per carry with 4 100-yard performances and 8 touchdowns in 11 games. Yes, we're still a running team, but apparently even more so after switching from a "Smashmouth" type offensive coordinator to a "Balanced" type.

The defense and in particular the pass defense has played disappointing. We're not just last in yards per game allowed, but also in yards per pass attempt. And the pass rush is far from impressive, closer to a failure for what these guys' skills are than playing up to par. Overall, well, a unit we can't be proud of.

The special teams unit is doing somewhat fine. I guess.

European Division
1. Gothenburg 7-3-1
2. Bordeaux 7-4
3. Paris 3-8
4. Maassluis 3-8

Yeah, we're at the bottom. The division title is mathematically out already, because Gothenburg and Bordeaux still face one another in week 17 and both already have tie-breakers secured over us. Bordeaux will still be the team to surpass for the final wild card. Or we're going to need another kind of miracle, which would require the 8-3 Tucker Tigers to lose all of their final 5 games. Obviously we'll try to play spoiler to Bordeaux once they visit us, after all, we have 4 home games remining in the bottom 5, but even if we go undefeated in that final quintet, it's very unlikely.

Oh well, I might refocus on the return of Singleton in one of the final games. I'm still cautious, but so far the forecast is he'll be able to play up to the same level as before his injury. And all that with his contract year coming up in 2114...

*Oof* Tough, tough season =(

Some small silver linings in the apparent return of Singleton as a capable player (fingers crossed...) and a higher than usual draft position

General Manager Notes: Worst season ever avoided, barely

A dreadful season has come to an end. In a season where we got outscored by our opponents by 110 points over 16 games, it required a couple of blowout victories over our French division rivals to keep it north of our -122 figure in the 2102 season. It was still our 3rd ever with -100 or worse. "Dreadful" indeed.

That was a bit of a spoiler on our final games. In week 13 we managed to lose a home game to Harlem 35-23 despite picking their quarterback off 5 times. We followed up with a hard fought 29-22 loss at Chesapeake and in week 16 we lost 28-7 at home against Williamsburg. We wrapped around that unwatchable home game with solid 34-10 and 41-21 wins against Bordeaux and Paris. Beating Bordeaux required us 3 interception return touchdowns, whilst the week 17 victory saw QB Bart Tanner achieve his first 300-yard performance, leaning heavily on WR Jessie Vertelney's 149 yards receiving, his second best in 5 season with us.

European Division
1. Gothenburg 10-5-1
2. Bordeaux 9-7
3. Maassluis 5-11
4. Paris 4-12

Bordeaux would have still missed the playoffs had they beaten us in week 15, which is a tiny solace to what otherwise was a bit of a turnaround season for the Vineyards. Gothenburg lost crucial home games in the middle of the season to Tucker and Augusta, which dropped them to the #3 seed, although the Giants might put it all on their week 17 loss at Bordeaux. Despite our pathetic showing, we still didn't finish last in the division.

People in and around Indianapolis would have cheered for their team to fail even harder, but that's just not our attitude. We'll get the 7ht overall pick in the 2114 draft as well as a yet to be determined how high or low first round pick from Orlando.

Sadly QB Harrison Singleton didn't recover in time to get to play this season, but the outlook for now is he'll be as good as ever. Which is bad news for QB Dakota Peterson and QB Bart Tanner, as this should mean their demotion to playing for second fiddle in the next off-season. But with their respective bottom of the league passer ratings, they should be happy to still be in the league next season, they had the luxury to team up with the most talented wide receiver duo in the league right now and possibly in Merchantmen history.

RB Renaldo Billodeaux finished the season with 1,338 yards and 10 touchdowns without a single fumble. He was a rare bright light on our offense. Although WR Rodolfo Lane might be worth mentioning somewhat as he is quickly turning into one of the best punt return specialist in the IHOF ever.

The defense was plain and simply Merchantmen unworthy. The team finished last in sacks with just 20. The final stretch was just acceptable enough to finish below 400 yard per game allowed, but we still finished last. And the points allowed figure swung to Paris because of the head-to-head beating we gave them in week 17, or we would have "earned" another last place.

So, yeah, all in all, a season we shall try to forget as quickly as possible.

Is it 2114 already? Not yet, we'll have to sit out the playoffs first...

Merchantmen Retirement Wave 2114
The 2114 IHOF off-season was unkind to the Maassluis Merchantmen. No less than 4 players to remember announced their retirements from football. 34 seasons of service accounting for 592 games played stepped away.

TE Garrett Alcala retired after 12 seasons in Maassluis. A high 2nd round pick in 2102, Alcala jumped into the starting lineup right away. Initially mostly as a blocker, but eventually his role in the passing game grew, resulting in a 14-touchdown season followed up by a pair of 100-catch seasons, including a 1,059-yard figure in 2106. With 688 receptions for 7,090 yards and 53 touchdowns, Alcala set new all-time highs for a Maassluis Merchantmen tight end. Alcala retires after 194 games played, all for the Merchantmen.

G Brett Stickney left the Merchantmen after 12 seasons. A 4th round pick in 2102, Stickney was a starter from day one on the team and only injuries ever kept him off the field. Reliable in both the pass protection and paving the way for the running backs, Stickney was a lineman the offense could depend on. Stickney steps away after an injury crippled 2113 season, putting 185 games played for the Merchantmen as his final tally.

RB Bennett Holmes retired after 11 seasons in Maassluis. A 3rd round pick in 2103, already as a rookie, Holmes was a member of a two- or three-headed rotation. Usually Holmes was listed as the starter, at least on paper. Stuck in the timeshare, despite consistently racking up 5.0 yards per carry seasons, his sole 1,000-yard campaign was in his 8th season with the Merchantmen. That season (2110), Holmes defied all scouting reports, while widely described as over the hill, he had a sensational 5.33 yards per carry. With 7,216 rushing yards, 34 rushing touchdowns and a 4.8 yards per carry average, Holmes certainly belongs amongst the list of legendary Merchantmen ball carriers, especially considering his (for a Maassluis running back) unprecedented 180 games played.

In contrast, DT Dwayne Downs played just 2 seasons in Maassluis. A #4 overall pick in 2101 for the Capital City Blues, Downs was a monster defensive tackle. After 10 seasons without playoffs football, the Toronto Lake Monsters hauled Downs as a free agent, helping them back into the playoffs. It turned out to be a 1-year stint as he was subsequently traded to Maassluis in 2112, where he also helped his new team make the playoffs. Last season Downs signed a new 1-year deal, for a 2nd and apparently final season with the Merchantmen. As a 6-time All IHOF selection, Downs might end up in the conversation for Hall of Fame accolades.

Singleton signs new 3-year deal with Merchantmen
QB Harrison Singleton and the Maassluis Merchantmen today agreed terms on a new 3-year contract. Not counting the annual contract restructures, Singleton had reached the final season of his big 5-year contract signed in 2110, which came right after his first one and a half seasons as the starter. Following the grueling knee injury that side-lined Singleton for the entire 2113 season, the Merchantmen made no secret of wanting to lock up their franchise quarterback.

John Aponte leaves Merchantmen for Colonials
Today the Williamsburg Colonials announced the signing of S John Aponte. The experienced and elite zone defender decided to turn down a contract offer from the Maassluis Merchantmen, where he had played all 8 of his IHOF seasons after being one of their 7th round picks in 2106. Aponte had been a starter from day one and leaves the Merchantmen after 131 games, never missing any.


Steve Aber signs with Ospreys
The Outer Banks Ospreys signed DE Steve Aber as a free agent. After 5 seasons with the Maassluis Merchantmen in a backup role, Aber spreads his wings in hopes to finally get a chance to show the football world he's got what it takes to be a premier pass rusher. Aber was a starter in several of the Merchantmen's sensational victories over the last 4 seasons, yet he never won team management over and was active in only 3 regular games in the last 3 seasons.


Merchantmen won't re-sign Sherman Ward and Freddie Burnham
Today the Maassluis Merchantmen have decided to not offer a new contract to free agents RB Sherman Ward and LT Freddie Burnham, while they will make an offer to CB Kent Wodarz. For Ward this ends the stint in Maassluis after 2 seasons as the team's kickoff returner and change of pace ball carrier. Burnham was a late season signing as injuries kept piling up on the Merchantmen offensive line. Wodarz returned to Maassluis late last season after he was a training camp casualty earlier in his second season in Maassluis. Wodarz already turned down a contract offer from the Merchantmen when he still had restricted status, hence it's unclear at the moment whether Wodarz desires to stick around or hope for a bigger contract elsewhere.

General Manager Notes: 2114 training camp roster ready!

Our training camp roster is set. I've decided to not go over the top and bring the maximum of 70 players to camp, offering contracts to 10 free agents and seeing us sign 9 of them, to make for 61 players on team. That excludes RB Sherman Ward and LT Freddie Burnham (both are still with us as free agents), but they will not go along. It means we'll have to make just 1 release after camp and prior to pre-season action.

I've put QB Dakota Peterson in the trade block as I fully expect us to go with QB Harrison Singelton as our starter and with QB Bart Tanner in the backup role, ahead of kick holder Drake Bishop.

I'll list the 61 players by position group and elaborate on our off-season movements below each group. I can't truly forecast which players will make the 53-men roster eventually, after all, pre-season craziness has yet to take place.

Quarterbacks
45/45 QB Dakota Peterson
40/40 QB Harrison Singleton
20/35 QB Bart Tanner
10/10 QB Drake Bishop
Same group as the end of last season. The main change is Singelton returning to the team from injury and signing a contract extension. Both Peterson and Bishop are in the final year, Bishop will get an extension in pre-season. Peterson will be on the trade block.

Backfield
50/50 RB Rusty Kemp
45/45 RB Renaldo Billodeaux
40/40 FB Kenneth Holse
35/35 RB Cary Delgado
30/40 RB Edwin Erickson
25/35 RB Tommy Tasker
There are 3 new names here. Kemp is a 6th year veteran free agent signing, Tasker a 7th round rookie and Erickson an undrafted rookie. RB Bennett Holmes retired and RB Sherman Ward has been left unsigned. Kemp is an elite special teamer while also bringing along very good hole recognition, third down running, punt returning and blitz pickup skills. Tasker thrives from his breakaway speed and blitz pickup, while Erickson leans on hole recognition, breakaway speed and special teams ability.

Tight Ends
60/60 TE Ted Gordon
25/55 TE Corbin Robbins
35/35 TE Juan Brady
35/35 TE Arnie Huffman
20/25 TE Kyle Upshaw
Robbins was our top rookie pick at #19 overall, while Brady joined as a 12th year veteran to mentor him. Some claim Robbins was the second best at his position, but my staff disagreed and prompted me to pick him over the higher graded tight end. This fills the void of losing our all-time leading receiving tight end Garrett Alcala. Having Gordon and Robbins gives us plenty of opportunity to throw even more out of multiple tight end formations. Brady brings enough special teams skills, route running and run blocking ability to make him good enough for the 46-active slots.

Wide Receivers
75/75 WR Rodolfo Lane
70/70 WR Jessie Vertelney
45/45 WR Preston Gray
30/30 WR Jaylen Gearhart
15/35 WR Maurice Sweeney
25/25 WR Kai Cote
15/20 WR Hunter Tuitele
Sweeney was a 7th round pick this draft, exclusively for his kickoff return ability, at which our staff expects him to be top20 already and potentially close to the top5. Lane has improved into best in business, wouldn't it be nice to actually see hm play up to it and get above his personal bests of 59 receptions and 757 receiving yards? Maybe Lane and Vertelney just needed to stick around and get Singelton back on the team to finally let the cohesion kick in?

Offensive Linemen
70/70 RT Ivan Dole
60/60 C Zane Chaplain
55/55 G Andres Uwaezuoke
25/75 LT Dan Clancy
45/45 RT Clayton Bernstein
25/45 G Kristopher Harmon
30/40 C Duane Ondre
20/45 G Alfred Pearsall
25/25 LT Harold Gruenwalder
Clancy was our pick at #24 overall and I truly hope his excellent pass protection skills will come true. Pearsall was an undrafted rookie signing, leaning towards a run blocking type. Grunewalder and Bernstein will likely battle for the mentor role for Clancy, although I could see us using Bernstein as our second guard.

Defensive Linemen
70/70 DT Efrain Hutchins
55/60 DE Lonnie Wynn
55/55 DE Calvin Buckley
45/50 DT Francisco Blades
40/40 DT Gabriel Morris
40/40 DE Christopher Wrighster
35/35 DE Howie Tucker
20/40 DE Ernest Frias
Frias is an undrafted rookie. We lost Dwayne Downs to retirement, a huge gap on the line. I may need to keep an eye open for a half-decent veteran that could step in here, as Hutchins, Blades and Morris is a little bit thin to get through the season. We also lost DE Steve Abner to free agency, a player I almost forgot that he was actually on our team, despite that he was a very reliable pass rusher when we had to use him due to injuries and stuff.

Linebackers
55/65 ILB Jorge Mayes
55/55 ILB Gus Coleman
40/40 ILB Xavier Hoover
40/40 OLB Bobby Diaz
30/50 OLB Nicolas Giles
35/35 OLB Avery Distel
25/40 OLB Raymond Casper
15/30 ILB Jimmie Poole
Casper and Poole are undrafted rookie signings. Casper is a special teamer with pass rush strength and play diagnosis, but is too small to switch to defensive end. Poole is a special teamer with pass rush technique and zone defense skills, but he's undersized to make a switch to defensive end. Key here is for Giles and Mayes to really get to their potential and start anchoring this defense.

Secondary
45/45 S Dan Peterson
45/45 CB Evan Merrell
45/45 S Noah Matthews
45/45 CB Byron Sokol
35/35 CB Skip Horner
35/35 CB Joel Delgado
20/40 S Joe Hamblin
25/30 CB Kent Wodarz
20/35 S Peter Hinsley
25/25 S Craig Clancy
15/25 CB Seth Hook
We lost S John Aponte to free agency, despite that I tried to re-sign him. Hamblin, Hinsley and Hook are all undrafted rookie signings. Hinsley is a zone defender. Hook is a special teamer with some man-to-man and bump and run potential. Hamblin is a run stopper and punishing hitter with some zone defense potential. It is what it is, I suppose? Until I ever re-figure out how defense works, this very talented bunch will not play up to their ability and finish last in passing yards allowed.

Special Teams guys
65/65 P Tyrus Johnston
85/85 K Oscar Harrington
20/20 LS Wayne Brewer
A fine group, with Harrington elite and the other two above average compared to their counterparts elsewhere in the league.

General Manager Notes: And then there were 53
Yup, we've already trimmed down the roster. Almost, that is.

Training 2114 was slightly underwhelming. The list of players that made a strong impression wasn't as large is I could have hoped. At the same time, we've climbed back to the top of Mount Cohesion, which means we're a relatively old team with players that have little room of improvement. So, which players did make a good impression?
QB Bart Tanner, rookie TE Corbin Robbins, C Duane Ondre, rookie G Alfred Pearsall, rookie LT Dan Clancy, DT Francisco Blades, LB Jorge Mayes, LB Nicolas Giles, CB Kent Wodarz and rookie S Peter Hinsley.

Rookie S Joel Hamblin made too little progress to make our pre-season team. But he wasn't the only player to know for sure he won't make the 2114 team, as we releases 6 players after the first two pre-season games: rookie RB Tommy Tasker, TE Kyle Upshaw, WR Hunter Tuitele, G Kristopher Harmon, rookie LB Jimmie Poole and rookie CB Seth Hook. QB Dakota Peterson will not make the team either, he'll move to the Orlando Talons to improve from QB3 with us to QB2 with them.

The unexplainable mess of pre-season was unkind to RB Cary Delgado, FB Kenneth Holse, veteran signing TE Juan Brady, WR Hunter Tuitele, WR Jaylen Gearhart, RT Ivan Dole, K Oscar Harrington, DT Francisco Blades, DT Gabriel Morris, LB Avery Distel, CB Evan Merrell and S Craig Clancy. In practice, most keep their projected role on the team, except for Delgado (demoted to inactive mentor), Tuitele (cut in favor of rookie WR Maurice Sweeney) and Morris or Blades. We need to keep our eyes open for an improvement at our DT rotation.

The remainder of pre-season will be mostly used to lock up potential free agents. QB Drake Bishop, TE Arnie Huffman, WR Kai Cote, RT Ivan Dole, LB Avery Distel, LB Bobby Diaz and CB Skip Horner have been part of the first swing. RB Renaldo Billodeaux and P Tyrus Johnston have to re-evaluate their player agents' as their mathematically challenged assistants turned down the kind of contracts they usually prefer over high bonus deals. How about that.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot we actually played a pair of exhibition games. The first one saw the magnificent return of QB Harrison Singleton, as he completed 8 for 8 for 102 yards, 1 touchdown and a perfect passer rating against the defending NAC champion Hanalei Dragons. With Bart Tanner under center, we struggled in the second half, but so did the opponents as we ended up winning 24-13 with the half time score also being the end of game score.

In our first pre-season game at home, we beat the Kansas Creationists 16-10 in overtime, with RB Renaldo Billodeaux running the game winner in. QB Harrison Singelton somewhat struggled in his first on the field action in Oranje Haven after the horrific knee injury that sidelined him all of last season, but the connection with WR Jessie Vertelney looked smooth. Now, if only Singleton could jell with league best WR Rodolfo Lane and the tight end duo, we should be in for a fantastic season.

General Manager Notes: Yikes, we're in a tough division

The 2114 season is underway and the Merchantmen have played quite so-so-ish. In contrast, the rest of the division has steamrolled through the first 5 weeks, only tripping over fellow European Division teams, making for an incredible situation where a winning record could still put you in last place. How did we arrive there?

Week 1 vs Bordeaux
The official return of QB Harrison Singleton saw him shine like in his early seasons. Singleton threw for 238 yards, 2 touchdowns and ran for 52 yards on top of it. He found WR Rodolfo Lane for 130 yards and a touchdown, while TE Ted Gordon hauled in the other touchdown. Newly signed former Bordeaux RB Rusty Kemp accounted for 2 rushing touchdowns, while RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for 117 yards.
Result: 43-27 win

Week 2 at Hanalei
A visits to the reigning NAC Champions saw us choke an early 17-0 lead based on interceptions from our defense on the Hanalei Dragons first two drives. Hanalei bounced back taking a 19-17 lead, but as our offense finally got rolling, we turned it into a 31-19 lead late in the 4th quarter. It wasn't enough as three straight drives saw QB Harrison Singelton turn the ball over, resulting in 22 unanswered points. Singelton threw for 279 yards with touchdowns to TE Ted Gordon and WR Jessie Vertelney, while RB Rusty Kemp ran for one and CB Evan Merrell returned an interception for touchdown.
Result: 31-41 loss

Week 3 vs Orlando
With a struggling Talons coming to Maassluis, there was some optimism in upsetting them. Despite our field position domination, a couple of interceptions thrown by QB Harrison Singleton kept things close. The Orlando offense woke up in the fourth quarter, tying the score with 40 seconds to go, but on our final drive, we decided not to play for overtime and Singleton found WR Rodolfo Lane for a Hail Mary 42-yard touchdown pass to grab an unlikely victory. Singleton threw for 287 yards and touchdowns to WR Jessie Vertelney and aforementioned game winner to Lane, for him adding up to 105 yards receiving. RB Rusty Kemp added a couple of rushing touchdowns to the tally.
Result: 35-28 victory

Week 4
We had once again the way too early bye week. It is what it is, we'll always have to deal with it.

Week 5 at North Plainfield
Rarely have we beaten the North Plainfield Plague while we were having a good start to the season and it turned into yet another disappointment. Losing the turnover battle 5-1, even our impressive red zone defense was insufficient to overcome all the giveaways. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 249 yards and 2 touchdowns, one each to his duo TE Corbin Robbins and TE Ted Gordon, the latter on a 127-yard performance for the day.
Result: 20-30 loss

Week 6 vs Rochester
And then we bounced back, at home, again. The visiting Razorbacks were an opponent to fear, but for the first time this season our pass defense seriously showed up and held them to 38 net yards on 31 passing plays, averaging to a 1.23 yards per pass attempt average. In particular CB Evan Merrell was on fire, accounting for 1 interception and 2 forced fumbles (sadly neither turned into a turnover). The final score was still closer than needed to be, as the Razorbacks managed to score on a safety and a kickoff return touchdown. QB Harrison Singleton was underwhelming with 160 passing yards and 1 touchdown to WR Rodolfo Lane. RB Renaldo Billodeaux scored his first 2 touchdowns of the season.
Result: 25-21 victory

European Division standings
1. Paris 4-1
2. Gothenburg 4-2
3. Maassluis 3-2
4. Bordeaux 3-2

After week 5, the division was 11-2 in non-divisional games, with us accounting for both losses. In week 6, all three rivals lost and we jumped back into the race. I mean, with 5 rounds of divisional games still to be played, let alone 5 or 5 more games outside it, this is by no means a guarantee to end up in a strong division with 3 playoffs tickets and a last place winning record team.

With 3 wins at home and 2 losses on the road, we really have no idea what to think here. In particular QB Harrison Singleton has once again been the hit-or-miss version of himself and not the stellar game manager that he was in his frist 3 seasons. Quite the pity, as I was so happy about his recovery from the knee surgery and offered him a new semi-expensive contract. Sooner or later, we'll have to decided whether we see more upside in QB Bart Tanner, who is in his 3rd season now and needs to get on the field to develop. It might be a game plan problem, but that makes no sense given how well Singleton did early on with a similar game plan and with an inferior receiving group (no offense meant to our clearly over the hill veteran legends WR Calvin Maxwell and TE Garrett Alcala).

Next up the biggest test so far as the Toronto Lake Monsters will come to the city. Oranje Haven will be sold out once again, no doubt.

General Manager Notes: It's Tanner Time

We're rolling on, but things are not quite going as you might expect. We lost DT Efrain Hutchins to a concussing against Rochester in week 5, while both QB Harrison Singleton and RB Renaldo Billodeaux dropped out against Toronto in week 7.

Week 7 vs Toronto
A big test against the virtual top seeds in the conference. QB Harrison Singleton had a crucial role with ill timed turnovers. We'll never know what could have been, but despite losing the turnover battle 4-0, we still managed to win the field position battle, which is quite improbable and proves we can play ball with the top teams. Singelton threw for 236 yards and a touchdown to TE Ted Gordon, with had 114 yards receiving while WR Rodolfo Lane had 108 yards receiving. RB Rusty Kemp added another pair of rushing touchdowns. But as the turnovers piled on, so came the injuries to Singleton, prompting the return of QB Bart Tanner.
Result: 21-42 loss

Week 8 vs Paris
There's no denying this: we completely blew Paris away. They dropped back to earth harder than I've seen teams fall back in quite some time. We outgained them 468 to 187 in total yards, overcame 3 interceptions thrown and still managed to almost shut them out, if it wasn't for their sole field goal with 5 minutes to go. Their bust-or-not quarterback managed to stay mistake free, but also got pulled and saw his back up play things out against our kick holder third string ball thrower. Humiliation at it's best or worst. QB Bart Tanner threw for 226 yards with 2 touchdown passes, while QB Drake Bishop threw for 1 touchdown. WR Rodolfo Lane had 122 yards receiving with 1 touchdown, TE Ted Gordon and RB Rusty Kemp also caught a touchdown pass. Undrafted rookie RB Edwin Erickson ran for 2 touchdowns.
Result: 41-3 win

Week 9 at Harlem
We followed up with a bit test at the Harlem Apollos and albeit we allowed touchdowns on their first two possessions, QB Bart Tanner and the guys around him played solid enough to make up for it with ball possession drives. Tanner threw for 280 yards and 2 touchdowns, both to WR Rodolfo Lane, who gained 145 receiving yards in the process.
Result: 24-21 win

Week 10 at Bordeaux
The stomping of the French teams continued with a quite surprising easy win at the Bordeaux Vineyards. We seriously expected them to avenge the week 1 loss, but their defense really let them down. Or our offense is seriously getting pumped up, with QB Bart Tanner leading the way with 365 yards passing and 2 touchdowns to WR Rodolfo Lane, who in the process gained 176 yards. Undrafted rookie sensation Edwin Erickson ran for 128 yards and 3 touchdowns, all three scores in the first quarter. The offense stopped at 554 total yards, a figure I seriously thought we should be capable of, but haven't gotten really close to. Not to mention that until this game, I was still on the fence about whether Tanner is truly more promising that QB Harrison Singleton. The switch might be more final now than it was last season, I think it's Tanner Time.
Result: 38-12 win


European Division
1. Gothenburg 7-2
2. Maassluis 6-3
3. Paris 4-5
4. Bordeaux 4-5

Take away the pounding we gave the French teams and they're still combining for 1 win over .500, but the early season tight race could be headed for a two-horse race. One that gets a serious showdown in the next round of games, in an undeniable game of the week: the Merchantmen at the Giants.

The quarterback situation might be a non-situation now, the injury to Singleton may be a blessing in disguise for the team. The luxury at the running back position is more puzzling. Erickson has been amazing in the absence of Billodeaux, but our #1 rusher is fully recovered for the game in Gothenburg, while Kemp is a touchdown machine. Rodolfo Lane has risen to the top and at least for a week, he'll be called the leading receiver in the IHOF. Ted Gordon is also on pace for a 1,200-yard kind of season. Now imagine Jessie Vertelney actually improving from his 4 catches for 46 yards per game and this offense could challenge for one of the most productie Merchantmen offenses ever. 400+ yard per game offense are rare in Maassluis, it happened in 2058 and 2059 (when QB Lester Lowe was at his peak), 2077 (when QB Sammy Erickson threw for 4,731 yards with 2,228 to WR J.R. Mills) and 2078 (the one-season rental QB Bennett Morris' season). All of which were phenomenal fun offenses to watch.

But, this might be the jinx of jinxes and make this team drop hard in our next game, which for decades has been our hardest game of the season. Our last two wins in Gothenburg were in 2103 (11 seasons ago) and 2087 (27 seasons ago). We played a strong game at the NAC Champions in week 2, maybe we can do the same at the AOC and IHOF champions in week 10. I won't count on it, but this team has been amazing at times. So, why not?

General Manager Notes: Playoffs?

Okay, the season is shaping up to be a good one. Still, second place behind the Gothenburg Giants, but with 2 games remaining against them, there was every reason to think the division title was still possible, at the very least mathematically speaking. But a loss in Gothenburg would drop us behind 2 wins and as I mentioned in my previous update, a visit to Gothenburg was up next for us.

Week 11 at Gothenburg
Boy, oh boy, did we let ourselves down in this game. We actually played kind of quite well, but QB Bart Tanner threw no less than 6 interceptions and saw his sidekicks lose 2 of 3 fumbles. Add in an unimaginable 2 kickoff return touchdowns allowed by what should be the best special teams unit in the league and you have to understand there's only just as much as a defense can do is keeping the Giants offense to 2 touchdowns and 3 field goals. The running game was invisible as Tanner was forced to throw a lot, throwing for 246 yards and running for a touchdown. Third string QB Drake Bishop threw a touchdown pass to WR Jessie Vertelney in garbage time. THe score board showed a scoring deficit, no lies.
Result: 14-37 loss

Week 12 vs Oakland
The best remedy to a painful loss is going to your own home stadium and putting up a fight against an opponent that could be considered to be the better team. It turned out the Black Panthers came to Maassluis to display one of their sloppiest performances in a decade. Or maybe we also deserved some credit with outstanding defensive play and an offense that played their hearts out, scoring touchdowns on our first four possessions. QB Bart Tanner returned to turnover free game management, throwing for 186 yards and 3 touchdowns, wit a pair to WR Jessie Vertelney and one to TE Ted Gordon. RB Rusty Kemp ran for 2 touchdowns, while rookie sensation RB Edwin Erickson ran for 123 yards, including a phenomenal 54-yard touchdown.
Result: 42-7 win

Week 13 at Fort Wayne
In season like these, the Merchantmen have a knack for pissing away games at struggling teams, which was certainly the right description for QB Ellis Cushman's Fury and their 1-10 record going into this game. The stud quarterback didn't play all that bad even, but the Merchantmen were more solid all around as QB Bart Tanner threw for 222 yards, a touchdown to WR Jessie Vertelney and pounding one own his own as well. Rookie RB Edwin Erickson was brought back to earth on 13 carries for 22 yards showing, but with the likes of TE Ted Gordon gaining 112 yards receiving, the offense showed their ability to make up for struggling others. The end result was a save and sound victory.
Result: 26-17 win

Week 14 vs Fairbanks
With the visiting Northstars struggling after a strong start to their season, the defense put another impressive game on the field. The visiting offense never got far from the 50-yard line, while we made the best of the positive turnover battle. QB Bart Tanner threw for 196 yards, with a touchdown to WR Rodolfo Lane and yet another running touchdown. RB Renaldo Billodeaux scored the other offensive touchdown, showing he was rightfully returning to the starting lineup ahead of the rookie RB Edwin Erickson.
Result: 24-3 win

Week 15 at Paris
Despite that we managed to overwhelm the Musketeers most of the game, our offense struggled to get points on the board. With just over a minute remaining, Paris scored their first touchdown of the game after a long drive that started right after QB Bart Tanner got picked off in the their end zone while we were driving for the game clinching touchdown. They failed on their two-point conversion, but they did recover the onside kickoff and we were in for a nail biting final minute. The defense came up strong to end it there and then. QB Bart Tanner threw for 307 yards with a touchdown to TE Ted Gordon, while RB Rusty Kemp ran for a touchdown.
Result: 17-12 win

Week 16 at Colorado
And then the wheels came off, in terms of that we somehow failed to put a passing game on the field. Sure, losing WR Jessie Vertelney at the eleventh hour to an appendectomy was tough, but we should have plenty enough left to make up for it. QB Bart Tanner threw for just 180 yards in 53 passing plays, getting held without a touchdown, although he did run for a score. As did RB Renaldo Billodeaux on his 132-yard performance.
Result: 20-33 loss

With a 10-5 record going into the final game of the regular season, we knew we were in a win is in modus and could otherwise sneak in if the Snapfinger Jazz would complete their late season collaps (after a 9-2 start) with a loss at the Tucker Tigers. The bad news, we were up against the Gothenburg Giants, albeit at our own place. The good news, they might rest a player or two after having locked up the #1 seed in the AOC with their 13-2 record.

Week 17 vs Gothenburg
A final showdown to the regular season as we turned the game of the week into a sensational one. Gothenburg showed up, eager to win another game, but so did we, as our offense played their hearts out and the defense with the knives between the teeth. G Andres Uwaezuoke got ejected from the game early on for unsportsmanship conduct, DT Efrain Hutchins was carted off while playing like this was the last game of his career (I hope not, he's way too young) and one of the Giants offensive linemen was carried off with a concussion.
We stormed to a 14-0 lead, but just as easily saw the Giants level things in the second quarter after a very short field following Bart Tanner's first interception. The second half turned into an all or nothing party, as neither punter got a chance to show their skills. Every drive ended with a touchdown, a successful field goal or got cut short by an interception. The Merchantmen today were better at this and slowly but steadily we gained and increased the lead.
QB Bart Tanner threw for 269 yards, with touchdown passes to WR Preston Gray (twice) and RB Renaldo Billodeaux, whilst Tanner also ran for a touchdown. Billodeaux ran for 111 yards, showing once again how crucial it is for the Merchantmen offense to stay unpredictable.
Result: 40-30 win

Playoffs baby!

European Division
1. Gothenburg 13-3
2. Maassluis 11-5
3. Paris 7-9
4. Bordeaux 6-10

Gothenburg steamrolled through the regular season, we were actually the first team this season to score more than 26 points against them. They earned the #1 seed on head-to-head win over the equally impressive 13-3 Toronto Lake Monsters. Just behind them are the 12-4 Tucker Tigers, our next opponents. The Tigers actually had to win their last game to avoid missing the playoffs (with an 11-5 record), as they held the 10-6 Snapfinger Jazz outside the playoffs. Also making it in the AOC are the 9-7 Houston Mustangs and 11-4-1 Augusta Greenjackets, the later are on a sublime 10-game winning streak as they will travel to Houston to keep that going.

The NAC wasn't just a punch of pushovers, as the 12-4 Chesapeake Chitterlings, 11-5 Texas Sharks, 11-5 Kansas Creationists and 10-6 Hanalei Dragons all went through a strong regular season campaign. They were joined by the 9-7 Capital City Blues and the 9-5-2 Oakland Black Panthers, who will face division rivals Hanalei again after a much needed week 17 victory at them.

So, we return to the playoffs once again, for the third time in 5 season. Despite that QB Bart Tanner didn't put much more impressive passing numbers on the field than QB Harrison Singleton did, the little things added up just enough for Tanner to go 8-2 in win/loss while Singleton went 3-3 as a starter. Tanner threw for 2,544 yards, 15 touchdowns, 12 interceptions and ran for 5 touchdowns. Singleton threw for 1,449 yards, 10 touchdowns, 10 interceptions and didn't run for a touchdown.

Our running game was one key to our success as we finished the regular season with league leading 5.08 yards per carry. RB Rusyt Kemp ran for 832 yards (4.81 avg) and 10 touchdown, RB Renaldo Billodeaux for 739 yards (5.13 avg) and 4 touchdowns, and RB Edwin Erickson for 405 yards (6.33 avg) and 6 touchdowns. Erickson earned the Dogbytes Offensive Misfit Toy Rookie of the Year honors.

The receivers group was both impressive and still somewhat underwhelming for what they should be capable of. WR Rodolfo Lane had 87 catches for 1,354 yards and 9 touchdowns (whilst also being the league's best punt returner), TE Ted Gordon had 114 catches for 1,227 yards and 7 touchdowns, WR Jessie Vertelney had 55 catches for 724 yards and 6 touchdowns, rookie TE Corbin Robbins had 31 catches for 399 yards and 1 touchdown. Gordon and Lane are both in the running for All-IHOF accolades.


But that's all the past now, we're moving on into week 18, the start of the playoffs, the wild card round. We'll be visiting the Tucker Tigers, the most successful franchise in the IHOF and the team we have by far the worst winning percentage against. Our last two encounters with the Tigers were both impressive victories, but we actually haven't played at Venable Stadium since 2005. Our last victory there was in 2087, 27 seasons ago.

So, let's bring out all the clichés and tells us why we actually do stand a chance and might come up with an upset victory. I can't think of any that quickly, but we have reason enough to think we have what it takes to pull it off. So, make it happen. Go Merchantmen!

General Manager Background Information: The inactive squad and the new arrivals

"Why is this player on the team?"
One fellow IHOF general manager once said something along those lines, pointing out that an important part of roster management is having a plan for every single one of the 53 roster spots. Now, I know I've been said to be one of those kind of general managers, but sometimes I wonder myself: am I, really? So, as it got me thinking, I decided to take a look at the current roster of 53 (yay, we actually have only 53 and no extra's due to injured reserve long term troubles) and look at two groups of players. The first being the group of players that joined the team in 2114 and the second being the group of players that spent (most of) the regular season on inactive. I'll start with that second group.


The inactive seven

RB Cary Delgado
Delgado lost the third down back role to new signing Rusty Kemp, but he was still capable of mentoring our undrafted rookie Edwin Erickson. He was also our backfield leader, although I honestly don't pay much more attention to this than trying to avoid conflicts.

TE Juan Brady
The plan was to make Brady an active backup, but he ended up being an inactive mentor to rookie first round pick Corbin Robbins. In case of injury, which always is tricky at tight end, he'd have been a worthy replacement for the special teams duties. And like Delgado, Brady is a position group leader.

WR Jaylen Gearhart
He was bound to ride the bench, but ended up on the inactive group lacking special teams skills. Freaky enough, we had to activate him in the last two games and in his seventh season on roster had his first receptions. How about that.

LT Harold Gruenwalder
The explanation repeats, Gruenwalder was on the team to mentor rookie Dan Clancy. And in case of injury emergengy, I wouldn't feel all that bad if Gruenwalder and his cohesion would be forced to play a game.

LB Gus Coleman
This was the shocker, at mid-season I decided to bench our richly rewarded legend after 10 seasons as our starter and last season's share time role. We have better pass defenders and run stopper and Coleman has no place on the special teams squad. He was still able to mentor second-year pro Jorge Mayes.

LB Raymond Casper
This was a tough decision as Casper could be a promising run stuffer, albeit undersized to play on the defensive line. His special teams skills were too little still to onto the field there, but next season his chance will come. If he gets re-signed.

CB Kent Wodarz
A solid enough zone defender and ok-ish special teamer, but I'm not confident enough in Wodarz to let him play. He's locked up for another season. We might need him if S Craig Clancy decides to retire or undrafted rookie S Peter Hinsley doesn't want to re-sign. Hinsley's emergence as a worthy nickel and dime formation zone defender was part of the reason.



The new arrivals for 2114

RB Edwin Erickson
The undrafted rookie emerged as a worthy replacement for Renaldo Billodeaux. For a short while, I thought he was solid enough to become the starter now, but that makes no sense just yet. Erickson is on a 1-year deal and giving him too much playing time makes him unaffordable, even as a restricted free agent. But more importantly, Billodeaux is still more developed and skilled in every aspect. Erickson is a younger version of him, he was rushed into action and was supposed to jell with the team for a season or two, like we usually do with time-share running backs.

RB Rusty Kemp
Unlike the rookie Erickson, Kemp was forced into action because veteran Cary Delgado hit a wall in pre-season. Kemp didn't and got promoted from just special teams duty to also being our third down back and our change of pace guy. He scored 11 touchdowns, he aced it.

TE Corbin Robbins
We didn't really need a new TE2, but then there was this kid available in the draft and I figured: why not? We threw the ball 3.5 times per game to him, he made about 2 catches per game. We use a lot of multiple tight end formations, so it makes sense to have a second solid player at his position.

TE Juan Brady
I talked about him already. He spent the season mentoring Robbins.

WR Maurice Sweeney
This kid was our new kickoff returner. He didn't wow, but he's still green and should be able to reach the 30-yard per return figure we desire to see from him.

G Alfred Pearsall
In a way it was too bad we failed to make him play more on the special teams unit, as is usually the plan with our backup linemen. He did have a mentor in Andres Uwaezuoke, but I decided to make him play a backup role and play our backup RT Clayton Bernstein at left guard.

LT Dan Clancy
Promising pass blocker, he had to play and so he did. Knowing O-line stats are more of a team performance than individual, the kid allowed only 3 sacks in 619 pass plays. That's outstanding.

DE Ernst Frias
Initially he was only on our goal line personnel, but at mid-season as we had to readjust over Efrain Hutchins injury, I gave more place on run-oriented formations.

LB Raymond Casper
I talked about him already.

S Peter Hinsley
This undrafted rookie took his chance and I fully expect him to be a sought after player in post-draft free agency if we decide to not reward his season with a big contract, as I fully expect his agent to demand important backup role money. And we'll give him $5M per season if that's what they want. This kid will be the replacement of John Aponte (he signed with the Williamsburg Colonials in the off-season) that we needed.



So, that's some background information on why these guys were still on our team. And why they will be on the team in the next 1 to for 4 weeks...

General Manager Notes: One And Done

2114 has ended. The IHOF Bowl was the other night and our rivals from up north lost a defensive battle to the Chesapeake Chitterlings 21-17. Nope, we didn't make the big game. Gothenburg beat Tucker in the AOC Championship game. Which is a spoiler about what happened to us in the playoffs.

Week 18 at Tucker
I took the liberty to call one or two games in the regular season the worst of our season. In fact, I think there was only one true beatdown, the loss at Colorado. The other losses we could link prominently to our lack of ball protection as fumbles and interceptions were all over our offense.
Not so much in this game at the Tucker Tigers. We were dreadful defensively, allowed the Tigers to gain 538 total yards, down 21-0 nothing before the first quarter was over. That's nowhere even close to how reliable our defense has been in the regular season. Thankfully we had an offense capable of sniffing at 400 yards and even putting 40 points on the board against Gothenburg. But that offense wasn't present in Tucker either. We scored one lowzy touchdown and our kicker that gets twice the money the second highest paid kicker gets missed the extra point. We also lost the turnover battle 3-0, but that was far from the reasons, as 2 of our turnovers came in garbage time and with QB Harrison Singelton back under center after we decided to yank our better quarterback in a must win game.
QB Bart Tanner threw for 157 yards, including a 72-yarder to TE Ted Gordon. Our running game was actually solid, but somehow we chose to call a pass about 3/4th of the time. That's no Merchantmen football...
Result: 6-34 loss


On the roll over of seasons, we received the news of 3 players retiring from football that were on our roster last season.

TE Juan Brady spent just 1 season with us, inactive, mentoring our first round rookie TE Corbin Robbins.

CB Evan Merrell stepped away after 10 seasons floating around in the AOC to 3 different teams. Orlando was his first stop after they selected him in the first round of the 2105 draft. His ability to play football took a sudden nose dive in pre-season 2107, which led to Orlando letting him walk after a decent 2108 campaign. He signed in Gothenburg for 3 seasons and after that he moved on to our team. He played 47 games with the Orlando Talons, 41 with the Gothenburg Giants and 50 with us. His retirement was quite sudden after a strong season with 5 interceptions and 18 defended passes. Quite the bummer for us that he's leaving us after that.

And then there was a serious big name retirement.

LB Gus Coleman, our high 2nd round pick in the 2103 draft spent all 12 of his seasons in IHOF with us. He played in a rotation role as a rookie, but from his second season he was an every down man for 8 straight seasons. Then age happened and younger guys took over step by step, until Coleman became an inactive backup late last season, making miss a game for the first time in his career. The final tally? 191 games played, 8 seasons with 100+ tackles (he ranks 5th all time with 1203 tackles for us), 35 interceptions (6th all-time amongst all Merchantmen players. 5 time All-IHOF selection, twice a 2nd teamer. Yeah, was a mirage of what he used to be, but we can't forget that he was a key player in our turnaround back into a contender at times as we reached the playoffs 4 times during his tenure.


So, into the future we go now. By virtue of trades, we're going into the draft with the #13, #23, #24, #55 and #56 picks heading our 10-pick load. We're going into free agency with 42 players signed and just $2.5M over the cap. RB Edwin Erickson, G Alfred Pearsall, DE Ernst Frias, LB Raymond Casper and S Peter Hinsley are restricted free agents after their undrafted rookie season. LT Harold Gruenwalder chose to not retire, we might try to bring him back for another season, although we have another mentor for LT Dan Clancy on team already. C Duane Ondre will likely be a hot commodity in free agency. DT Francisco Blades might be demanding too much money for any other team out there even looking at him, unless they like his zodiac sign.

So, that's our wrap of 2114 and the introduction to 2115. Here we go!

Merchantmen retirement stories
During the average IHOF off-season, roughly 800 football players or hopefuls announce their retirement from football. Some after highly decorated seasons, receiving news stories in several media. Others were already stuck in anonymity after they didn't find a roster spot in what supposed to be their rookie season and step away unnoticed. The Maassluis Merchantmen have a tradition of giving players that made some impact for the team to get a bit of a farewell call. Even if they didn't retire officially as a Merchantman. Here's a shout out to 6 players that didn't make the headlines.


Abraham Desimone
Linebacker Desimone was the Merchantmen's first selection in the 2100 draft, being taken in the middle of the third round. After a situational role as a rookie, he became an all downs starter in his second season and remained to be so for 7 straight seasons. In 2108 the decline kicked in as his role shifted to mostly passing downs. In 2109 he signed with the Williamsburg Colonials as a free agent after his player agent demanded all downs rewards. In 2110 Desimone got severely injured and missed most of the regular season. In 2111 he returned in a time share role, but in the 2112 off-season he didn't survive the 53-men cuts in Williamsburg and got no other interest. He retired in the 2113 off-season, having 146 games played for the Merchantmen on his resume, once earning All-IHOF second team honors.

Darnell McKie
Tight end McKie rolled into the Merchantmen roster as an undrafted rookie free agent signing in 2102. He was active in all 16 games that season as the TE3, but it was in 2014 when he made some moderate impact on the team, becoming a reliable third and short and goalline situation target. In 2105 he dropped to fourth string and after unexplainable regression in his ability, he never got back to his 2104 form and the downfall kicked in. In 2111 the unavoidable happened as McKie was released in the pre-season cutdown wave to 53. He got a short stint with the Toronto Lake Monsters, signing with them in the post-season, but after he didn't get a contract in the 2112 off-season, McKie retired officially in the 2113 off-season. His resume in Maassluis shows 94 games played, with 5 of his 6 touchdowns scored in the 2104 regular season and playoffs.

Gino Shea
K Shea was taken high in the third round of the 2098 draft. Despite being clearly an IHOF caliber kicker, in 2101 he couldn't come to an agreement with the Merchantmen on a contract extension, prompting his departure as a free agent in 2102. Shea moved on to the Chesapeake Chitterlings, where he got to play in his first IHOF Bowl right away, albeit losing to the Toronto Lake Monsters. In 2108 came the highlight of his career, winning the IHOF Bowl with Chesapeake. The next off-season he didn't find a new team after his contract had expired, until Toronto picked him up in week 13 of the regular season. In 2112, still with Toronto, he played and lost in his third IHOF Bowl. In 2114 he was cut shortly after a 42-21 victory with the Lake Monsters in Maassluis and he didn't get a third chance elsewhere. This off-season he announced his retirement from football after 17 seasons, having played 270 football games in IHOF, with 64 of those for the Merchantmen.

Jimmy Summers
Punter Summers was a third round pick in 2099 for the Arizona Miners, where he stayed for 6 seasons. After getting cut in the 2105 pre-season, he got quickly picked up to punt a season for the Houston Mustangs. In 2106 Summers signed a 3-year deal with the Maassluis Merchantmen in late free agency and in 2108 signed an extension through the 2110 season. After the Merchantmen picked punter in the 2111 draft, Summers was signed at the 11th hour by the Tucker Tigers and lost the IHOF Bowl with them. In 2112 the Bordeaux Vineyards signed him. In the 2114 off-season Summers announced his retirement from football. His resume shows 82 games played for the Merchantmen.

Daniel Shapiro
S Shapiro played 36 games for the Maassluis Merchantmen in the prime of his football career. After 4 seasons with the Atlanta Vipers, the 2101 first round pick forced becoming a free agent in 2105 after holding out for 6 weeks in 2104. The Merchantmen went through the same headcase situation in his third season in Maassluis (2107), when he held out through week 8. The Fairbanks Northstars signed Shapiro in 2108, where he hung around until they cut him right before opening day 2112. Shapiro didn't get a new chance.

Tommy Tasker
Running back Tasker's career in the IHOF was short, almost non-existent. The breakaway specialist with receiving skills was taken by the Merchantmen in the 7th round of the 2114 draft. Albeit not surviving the roster cuts for the regular season, the Merchantmen were hoping to have a training camp roster spot for Tasker for a second chance, although they didn't opt to offer him (or anybody else) a future contract in the playoffs.

I have been all over the place with kickers in this league, in my (gulp) 120+ seasons in this league. I think for a long stretch I committed to spending the absolute minimum at the K position, and signed a new undrafted rookie each season. I committed to one guy with a funny name for a 17 year career and he's among the all time league leaders in some stats. And more recently I have mostly plunged for value among veteran free agents, signing and re-signing K Gino Shea for several seasons with my Chits, including the bowl win seven years back. Part of his place in my memory is that his name triggers an earworm song that made mention of Chilean strongman Pinochet by name, so I end up muttering "Hey Mister Gino Shea" in tune, in my head when I see him on screen and get a snicker out of it, because my mind just loves fake/parody song lyrics.

Anyway... good on you, Mister Gino Shea.

We can relax for a bit here, we're only in the 112th season of IHOF football. :D

ah, right, not a math guy here

gino shea was pretty good for toronto while it lasted -- but a guy similar to him but some 15 yrs younger was available. that's how it goes in football.

General Manager Notes: Let's blame it on the player agents, again

QB Bart Tanner has announced to hold out. And so have DE Lonnie Wynn and LB Bobby Diaz. Their player agents are total morons, they should know by now that players like these (starters in the final year of contract) three would always get a contract extension offer in pre-season from us. Diaz' demands are fair and if it wasn't for that toll of an agent, we would have made him a better offer than requested. Same story on Tanner. My plan is to lock him up for 3 seasons, one more than their request. Wynn's demands are ludicrously exorbitant. He's requesting the kind of money that neither fits with his ability nor with his playing time and role on the team, let alone his good, but far from great statistics.

My main concern for now is finding the right contract for WR Rodolfo Lane, also in his final year. His demands are obviously insane ($70M per season), but it's not absurdly more than what we're offering WR Jessie Vertelney. The later and TE Ted Gordon signed a restructured longer contract, which gives us just enough cap room to make Lane an offer.

The biggest challenge after that is finding the right way to free some money up for aforementioned Tanner and Diaz. One way would be to restructure the deal with QB Harrison Singleton. Which will be tricky and kind of illogical as he's getting the second highest cap figure on team while likely to be our backup of Tanner in the upcoming season. Releasing Singleton will clear about $22.7M, which would put us in a spot where we're looking for a new backup QB. Restructuring the Singleton deal with an additional year could clear about $7.5M, a cap out roughly $10.5M. The conundrum really is: do we feel okay paying $25M to our backup quarterback, knowing he'll be demanding a trade by the end of the season if he doesn't get forced into a lot of action because of an injury to or terrible performance by Tanner.

The cap situation is very whacky at the moment. We're about $18M under the cap, with 53 signed (including 3 hold outs) and projected to be roughly $165M under next season. A truckload of that will be spent on WR Lane, but that still leaves us with about $80M to work on extensions. And we're going to have to with 22 players in the final contract year. It's an unusual situation for the Merchantmen. Obviously, I want to extend them all, but most of these players will also require a small investment from this season's cap. In other words, we have enough cap space next season to keep many of those players, but lack the space this season to make it happen. I mean, I doubt we have obvious dead weight hanging around on the team. I did re-sign backups DT Francisco Blades and RB Edwin Erickson to relatively cut friendly new contracts, which could combine to another $7M to work with, but clearly I hope to keep them on the team for the upcoming season.


The draft and pre-draft free agency have ended now. Aside from our usual wave of contract renegotiations with the expensive players, we managed to re-sign second year G Alfred Pearsall, LB Raymond Casper, DE Ernest Frias, RB Edwin Erickson and S Peter Hinsley. C Duane Ondre and DT Francisco Blades were unrestricted free agents and give us depth at their positions. We didn't sign anybody from other teams. LT Harold Gruenwalder is still a free agent, we hope to sign him to a cheap minimum deal in time for training camp as I don't expect to see him get playing time on the team, but it's better to have him as our 9th lineman for pre-season as his cohesion value makes him more useful than most others on the market.


I'll try to elaborate more on our draft picks after we filled our training camp roster with undrafted rookies. For now, I can tell you we ended up using all three first round picks in their own slots and traded away everything else, except our seventh round pick. We took CB Clyde Monds at spot 7.24 after we spent the #13 on WR Rufus Montgomery, #23 on DT Carlos Fisher and #24 on G Herb Nieves. I think Monds could help in our run defense. Fisher is an all around DT, but we'll still need a third DT next to Fisher and DT Efrain Hutchins to give the two studs some time to catch their breath. G Nieves should be our new left side guard. Montgomery was the surprise here, being the first WR taken this draft. He was the top WR on our board, despite that the league scouting had him listed as the 10th best or there about. Anyway, it will mean we'll have to work on a game plan with 5 1st round pick targets, which hopefully will be what we needed to finally unleash both WR Vertelney and WR Lane. But more on that later, probably.

General Manager Notes: the 2114 undrafted rookies

The rest of the league is paying more attention. For the first time in quite some seasons a good number of undrafted rookies that I made an offer to, decided to sign elsewhere for a much better offer. Sure, I'm a little bit of a lowballer, but we're never offering just the rookie minimum salary at this stage of the season. Curiously, we missed out on all the offensive players we targeted. Who did we sign? K Zack Beard, P Nicolas Webb, LS Roderick Kaeding, DE A.J. Dunn, DT Bryan Lomax, CB Asher McElroy, CB Enrique Carlixto and S Donovan Soriano. Soriano will be switched to cornerback.

LB Bobby Diaz signed a 5-year contract, ending his holdout already. We made an generous offer to QB Bart Tanner and even a fair one to DE Lonnie Wynn to persuade them into ending their holdout and stick with us. WR Rodolfo Lane signed an absurd $361M for 5 years deal, costing us $44.6M this season and $84.5 in each of the next 4 seasons. Imagine capping that out a couple of times and he'll add up to a cap figure of over $100M... We capped out QB Harrison Singleton, but is basically means that if Tanner ends his hold out, Singleton will be an expensive backup in 2115 and a free agent in 2116. If Tanner doesn't end his hold out, well, I guess it's Singleton's team again, which would be a curious change of events... I've publicly shown my adoration for Singleton and my displeasure in how he turned into a turnover machine.

Okay, so, what are those rookies like?

WR Rufus Montgomery (25/55) appears to be very underrated and we have reasons to expect to see him rise upwards from the current evaluation. Clearly his route running potential (70ish) will be crucial for this to be a hit or miss. Montgomery shows getting downfield ability combined with avoiding drops and solid enough endurance to be a serious addition to the receivers group and should give us the liberty to spread the targets over 3 WR rather than 2.

G Herb Nieves (40/65) seems to be trending downwards, which would suggest he was a wasted first round pick. His run blocking is underwhelming, which would make him a bit of a misfit and could result in last season's undrafted rookie G Alfred Pearsall betting a shot at breaking into our starters, unless RT Clayton Bernstein shows he can still play for another year.

DT Carlos Fisher (25/65) appears to be green, yet likely to end up as advertised. He brings in awesome pass rush technique (100), run defense (80) and enough endurance to let him play on a majority of defensive formations.

Undrafted DT Byron Lomax (30/50) looks a bit underrated and looks to have the pass rush strength and run defense combination to actually have a shot at making the 53-men roster.

Undrafted DE A.J. Dunn (15/25) has some pass rush technique and is a bit of a punishing hitter, but at the moment he looks like a post training camp casualty.

CB Clyde Monds (25/45) could be a bit overrated. He clearly lacks man-to-man coverage ability, making him useless for passing downs. He might turnout to be our new kickoff returner, which I didn't have in mind when I picked him, but his special teams skills otherwise seem to be below sticking around for a double role. He might turn out to be a good option for stopping the run, but his zone defense is kind of lacking as well. Maybe he should only be used in a bump and run role.

CB Enrique Carlixto (10/30) seems to be a very overrated, but he still might be a better special teams and run defense option than Moulds.

CB Asher McElroy (25/45) could be underrated and turn out to be a fine addition to the team. He's got the ability to force turnovers and on top of having decent coverage skills, isn't total void of run defense ability, which is a problem for several of our veteran corners.

CB Donovan Soriano (20/40 as a safety) has a nice combination of special teams skills, nose for interceptions and okay potential in run defense. Like some of the other rookies, he does lack the coverage skills, other than bump and run, to fit on our pass defense formations.

LS Roderick Kaeding looks like he'll be a top5 long snapper. That would be nice, because our veteran LS Wayne Brewer is a notch below that at top10ish. I mean, it's just a long snapper, but we've got to offer that overpaid kicker of ours (K Oscar Harrington) the snapper and holder that eliminate any possible complaint.

K Zack Beard (25/50) might be underrated, but other than being about $30M cheaper than our veteran K Oscar Harrington, his skills aren't eye popping exceptional.

P Nicolas Webb (45/50) might be a bit overrated, we'll have to evaluate that at mid pre-season, if he looks okay in training camp. At least he's got the power (Snap!), but he doesn't look like he's going to be a worthy replacement for P Tyrus Johnston and might push me into extending Johnston's contract for at least another season after this one. I hoped to grab the best punter of this class with our 3.24 pick, but the Hanalei Dragons were ahead of us with the 3.6 pick and grabbed underrated P Luis Newman.

Will we stick at the 61 players (including 2 holdouts) for training camp? Probably not, I figured we have a little bit of roster space to offer some leftover undrafted rookies a training camp spot, as well as making LT Harold Gruenwalder a final take it or leave it offer. No other team in the league would have any better use for him than an inactive mentor, for us he could provide just enough cohesion to be better than an off the street free agent if our stud LT Dan Clancy gets hurt.


So yeah, that's where we're at. We likely got two good players out of the 3 first round picks. But training camp and especially the pre-season mess have yet to come. And once we've reached that point, it's time to look at the bunch of last year of contract players and figure out which of them deserve some of the roughly $16M of cap room we have available right now to persuade them into signing an extension rather than hitting the open market in the 2115 off-season..

General Manager Notes: Annoying agents and extra rookies

We ran into a wall on the negotiations with the agents of QB Bart Tanner and DE Lonnie Wynn. I thought we made them a generous and a fair offer respectively, but apparently they felt indifferent. We're going to get back to the table, but for Wynn this could end up being a take it or leave it situation. For Tanner, our goals are clear, he's our starter. Locking him up for 3 seasons at under $15M each would be swell.

Talks with LT Harold Gruenwalder failed. We made him a final one-year bonus free minimum salary offer. Yes, that's low, but we know that no other team is going to sign him and he would have had a longshot at the 53-men roster. It's just sad to see a guy need to walk off like this after 180 games for us, including his incredible comeback of the year worthy 2112 season with 0 sacks allowed in 13 starts.

On the low end of the roster, we signed 6 more undrafted rookies, giving them a training camp spot and a reasonable shot at a pre-season spot as well. FB Taylor Sawyer, TE Richie Osborne and TE Julian Steen will quite likely even have a shot at the 53-men roster. WR Axel Saycocie is quite the longshot given our grown group, while CB Howard Carlson and S Frederick Harmon joined an already very crowded secondary.

Osborne, Saycocie, Carlson and Harmon were all amongst the bunch of players that made decent progress. They were amongst the likes of TE Corbin Robbins, C Duane Ondre, G Alfred Pearsall, K Zack Beard, LB Raymond Casper, CB Enrique Carlixto, CB Asher McElroy, CB Donovan Soriano and S Peter Hinsley. The real stand outs in terms of progress this training camp were pretty much the guys we expected (or at minimum hoped) to see from: WR Rufus Montgomery, G Herb Nieves, LT Dan Clancy, DE Ernest Frias, DT Carlos Fisher and LB Nick Giles. No progress was reported on QB Bart Tanner, clearly a result of skipping camp.

I've already made up my mind on which 7 players won't make the pre-season roster. We will still be very deep in quantity on the defensive line and the secondary, while we're also going to take 8 wide receivers into the pre-season madness.

But the core of business for the next day or two is getting QB Bart Tanner on team. I hope he understands that he's got a unique opportunity to work with the same guys for another season, with the addition of WR Rufus Montgomery, who's continuing to look better and better day after day. It almost makes me regret putting $166M of cap space next season on the duo in front of him. Providing they prove to be worth starting ahead of him...

General Manager Notes: The 52 for 2115
Wait, what? 52?

DE Lonnie Wynn is still holding out, but after early pre-season action, I've made up my mind for the upcoming regular season. The roster is set. Unless Wynn finds a new home through trade. But the main thing is that he'll be the 53rd player as soon as he ends his hold out. We won't have or make the cap room to offer him the absurd money his agent out of the blue started demanding at mid-pre-season.

QB Bart Tanner singed a new 2-year deal on the day of our first pre-season game. We quickly activated him and he saw action in the two pre-season games, having a key role in the 33-13 come back from behind win over the Frederick Red Menace. Tanner scarcely played on the road in our 21-13 win at the Capital City Blues, QB Harrison Singleton guided the team well, whilst the defense kept them outside our red zone all game long.

So, who are our 53 men?


Quarterbacks
40/40 QB Harrison Singleton
35/40 QB Bart Tanner
10/10 QB Drake Bishop
New: none
Left: none
Tanner is our guy. Singleton can play too, but we've seen too much turnover issues with him in the last 3 seasons. Bishop is our kick holder, when we have an active roster spot for him.

Backfield
50/50 RB Rusty Kemp
45/45 RB Renaldo Billodeaux
30/35 RB Edwin Erickson
30/30 FB Kenneth Holse
New:
Left: RB Cary Delgado (released)
We're going with the same group as last season, basically. It was clear last season that Kemp jumped into the third-down back role ahead of Delgado. Together with Billodeaux it proved to be an elite tandem in the IHOF. Erickson showed to be a solid alternate for Billodeaux.

Tight Ends
55/55 TE Ted Gordon
40/55 TE Corbin Robbins
35/35 TE Arnie Huffman
25/30 TE Richie Osborne
New: Osborne (undrafted rookie)
Left: TE Juan Brady (retired)
Gordon exploded last season, turning from a 900-yard into a 1200-yard receiver, while Robbins has everything in him to be such a player, if it wasn't for Gordon being here too. I'll try to work Robbins into more targets and slow down a bit on Gordon to save him from overloading him. Huffman barely got targeted last season, but he's got the route running and courage to make catches over the middle. Osborne snuck into the team as I want to go into the season with 4 tight ends.

Wide Receivers
70/70 WR Jessie Vertelney
65/65 WR Rodolfo Lane
35/60 WR Rufus Montgomery
35/35 WR Preston Gray
20/30 WR Maurice Sweeney
15/15 WR Kai Cote
New: Montgomery (1st round rookie)
Left: WR Jaylen Gearhart (released)
It was with pain in the heart to release veteran Gearhart after so many seasons, especially after he finally got his first catches late last season. But the arrival of Montgomery was the obvious cause for it to happen. Lane took a step back in his athleticism, but remains to be a solid player. Combined with Vertelney and the quickly rising Montgomery, we have a phenomenal duo turning into a fantastic trio. Gray continues to be a solid WR4, Cote a special teamer, Sweeney our excellent kickoff returner.

Offensive Line
55/75 LT Dan Clancy
60/60 RT Ivan Dole
55/55 C Zane Chaplain
45/60 G Herb Nieves
45/45 G Andres Uwaezuoke
45/45 RT Clayton Bernstein
30/50 G Alfred Pearsall
35/35 C Duane Ondre
New: Nieves (first round rookie)
Left: LT Harold Gruenwalder (unsigned)
Clancy and Dole continue to be a solid tackle duo, Clancy as our excellent pass protector and Dole as the running game anchorman. Chaplain is our center, but at guard I'm not quite convinced yet who of the other linemen should play opposite of veteran Uwaezuoke, all four other linemen have their strengths and weaknesses. Gruenwalder will get his next moments in the spotlight next pre-season when he's the likely new addition to our Ring of Honor.

Defensive Line
70/70 DT Efrain Hutchins
60/60 DE Lonnie Wynn
50/50 DE Calvin Buckley
30/65 DT Carlos Fisher
45/45 DT Francisco Blades
35/50 DT Bryan Lomax
35/35 DE Christopher Wrighster
30/40 DE Ernest Frias
25/25 DE Howie Tucker
25/25 DT Gabriel Morris
New: Fisher (first round rookie), Lomax (undrafted rookie)
Left: none
It's rare for us to take 10 defensive linemen into the season, not even counting LB Avery Distel, but yet here we are. Distel will be the placeholder, kind of, until Wynn ends his hold out. Morris is still here as a mentor, his playing days are clearly over. Blades looks to be surpassed by rookie Lomax, but it will be a game day decision, or close to anyway. Tucker lost some of his speed, which is another reason to shift things around a bit and he might not get a contract extension either. Hutchins and Fisher are stalwarts, Frias a running downs expert, Wrighster the technical rusher, Buckley the strength guy.

Linebackers
65/65 LB Javier Mayes
40/40 LB Xavier Hoover
40/40 LB Bobby Diaz
40/40 LB Nicholas Giles
35/40 LB Raymond Casper
25/25 LB Avery Distel
New: none
Left: LB Gus Coleman (retired)
One man down, a big one, but he was out of the active roster from midway through the season already. Giles took a hit in his agility and speed, which could cost him quite some playing time to Hoover, although both will be running downs guys. Diaz is a passing downs guy, Mayes the do-it-all. Casper will start inactive again. Distel will likely fill in for the hold out Wynn on the defensive line.

Secondary
45/45 S Dan Peterson
45/45 CB Byron Sokol
30/45 S Peter Hinsley
30/45 CB Asher McElroy
35/35 CB Skip Horner
35/35 S Noah Matthews
30/30 CB Kent Wodarz
25/25 CB Joel Delgado
15/15 S Craig Clancy
New: McElroy (undrafted rookie)
Left: CB Evan Merrell (retired)
Several players took a step back, most prominently Peterson and Matthews, but in return it looks like Hensley and Wodarz are ready to jump into the zone defenders rotation. McElroy might turn out to be a running down corner option. Albeit the huge group that we took to camp and still into early pre-season action, only these 9 guys showed enough to make the team. Ideally we'll add one more guy here to have a bit more leeway with injuries, but it will likely depend on what will happen to DE Lonnie Wynn. Until then, Sokol will see Delgado return to the passing downs cornerback duo, while Peterson, Horner and likely even the almost-falling-apart Clancy will remain in the zone defenders rotation.

Special Teamers
75/75 K Oscar Harrington
65/65 P Tyrus Johnston
20/20 LS Roderick Kaeding
New: Kaeding (undrafted rookie)
Left: LS Wayne Brewer (released)
Harrington is still overpaid, but he's supposed to be the best in business. I wish the league allowed for having split duties for kickers like in the old Al Bettis days, because Harrington is only mediocre in that element. Johnston signed a new deal. Kaeding was a Misfit Toy discovery, apparently he's the third best guy in business, so: yay.


Well, that's where we stand now. Until the final two pre-season games have been played and we go into the late renegotiations phase, to lock up some of our players that are out of contract next off-season. S Dan Peterson, RB Rusty Kemp and RT Ivan Dole are the most prominent ones, but we also have to consider a talk with DT Clayton Bernstein, DE Howie Tucker, DT Gabriel Morris, CB Joel Delgado, S Craig Clancy and maybe DE Lonnie Wynn.

And then from here on less Wynn whining, more winning and winning.

General Manager Notes: 2115 is not our year

Without going into the details of every single game so far, loyal readers probably already know that we're playing one of our worst seasons in quite some time. Given how little was changed from last season's team that played so well, it's sucking the enjoyment out of this game for me. Losing is okay if there are obvious reasons, but it's like the 2115 team is a completely different team from the one we fielded in 2114. I seriously hope it wasn't the switch of offensive coordinator, because then apparently he has broken our working offense and coincidentally infected the defense into pushover prone, while our special teams unit has dropped to barely above mediocre.

I'll make a write up at some point this weekend about our games so far after week 12's results are in, but don't get your hopes up on every single detail in all the games we played. The current team does not deserve any kind of praise or media attention. These guys have to play up to their ability and in particular our prima donna wide receiver duo has to stop counting their absurd piles of money and start playing up to it.

General Manager Notes: 2115, a step back; playoffs out of sight

The 2115 season is a train wreck of sorts. We're falling apart in terms of performance, the kind we've rarely seen before, except maybe when "The Lost Cause" and "Mr 50-50" were polluting our offense.


Week 1 vs Paris
We started the season with, on paper, the easiest game of the season. Au contrair. Paris outgained us 454-247 in total yardage won the turnover battle 3-1 and despite all that still needed two late game field goals to pull of the victory. Our leading rusher gained 31 yards. QB Bart Tanner threw for just 176 yards with 3 interceptions. Our touchdowns were a RB Renaldo Billodeaux run and a WR Rodolfo Lane punt return.
Result: 20-26 loss


Week 2 at Kansas
Facing one of the elite teams in the other conference, we were in for a pounding and it turned out to be one. We were outgained 458-245 with a 2-2 turnover battle. QB Bart Tanner was held to 138 yards passing with 2 interceptions. Tanner did throw his first touchdown of the season to WR Rodolfo Lane, while RB Renaldo Billodeaux accounted for a running touchdown.
Result: 17-30 loss


Week 3 vs Augusta
Despite losing the turnover battle 0-1, we outgained our strong opponents 342-269 in total yards. QB Bart Tanner threw for 195 yards , with a touchdown to TE Ted Gordon. RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for our other touchdown.
Result: 20-10 win


Week 4
Our usual early bye week. DE Lonnie Wynn announced the end of his hold out. We'll see what his grudge will look like next off-season. For now, we'll be happy to have his skills back on the field.


Week 5 vs San Antonio
We played perhaps our best game so far, but losing the turnover battle 2-1 and allowing an 88-yard kickoff return, we wasted our chances basede on outgaining them 421-377. QB Bart Tanner threw for 348 yards, with a pair of touchdowns to TE Ted Gordon. RB Rusty Kemp scored a running touchdown. WR Jessie Vertelney gained 154 yards receiving.
Result: 24-31 loss


Week 6 vs Atlanta
Our streak of home games against fellow wild card hopefuls continued and we lost yet another one. We were outgained 445-243 in total yardage, lost the turnover battle 2-1 and needed all of our red zone defense to keep the Vipers from scoring more than 1 offensive touchdown. QB Bart Tanner threw for 175 yards with a touchdown pass to TE Ted Gordon. CB Byron Sokol had an 80-yard interception return early in the fourth quarter.
Result: 14-29 loss


Week 7 at Fort Wayne
Playing our easiest road game of the season, on paper, we once again did ourselves a disservice. We lost the turnover battle 5-1, which was enough to tilt the total yardage advantage (253-221) into a hopeless loss. QB Bart Tanner threw for 225 yards, with a touchdown pass to WR Jessie Vertelney.
Result: 7-16 loss


Week 8 at Paris
Fed up with QB Bart Tanner's pathetic play, I decided it was time to bring back the veteran QB Harrison Singleton. It resulted in a shock through the team, but initially didn't result in quality play at all. After going down 20-0 within 16 minutes, we somehow clawed our way back into the game and pulled a robbery of a comeback against one of the three worst teams in the league. We lost the turnover battle 5-4, got outgained 376-282 total yards, but with field position plays and a last minute 71-yard pick six, we turned a game that deserved to go into overtime into a two-score win. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 155 yards, with 3 interceptions and a touchdown pass to WR Rodolfo Lane. Singleton and RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran touchdowns.
Result: 37-23 win


Week 9 at Houston
Disappointed by QB Harrison Singleton's 4 turnovers, despite his victory we benched him in favor of QB Bart Tanner. This time it did result in on field performance, winning the total yardage battle 400-257, the turnover battle 2-0 and seeing their only points come from a single 55-yard field goal. QB Bart Tanner threw for 258 yards, with touchdown passes to WR Rodolfo Lane and a pair to WR Jessie Vertelney, who did so on a 116-yard performance. RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for another touchdown.
Result: 29-3 win


Week 10 vs Bordeaux
Having clawed our way back into the wild card race, a win against our division rivals right in front of us could have helped the turnaround. But no, we lost the turnover battle 3-1 and got outgained 446-432 total yards against a second year quarterback that made his first career start in place of Bordeaux' injured starter Tyrus Dennis. QB Bart Tanner threw for 320 yards, with a touchdown pass to Jessie Verrtelney. RB Renaldo Billodeaux and RB Rusty Kemp both ran for a touchdown. Vertelney had 137 yards receiving, WR Rodolfo Lane 104 yards receiving. A rare performance by a duo that should be capable of making a 100-yard duo must less unique than it has been so far during their massively overpaid careers.
Result: 21-35 loss


Week 11 at Gothenburg
Expecting a loss in our toughest game on the regular season schedule, I still showed my disappointment in what was yet another pathetic performance by a team that has far too much talent to sit where we do right now. We got outgained 421-211 yards, actually won the turnover battle 2-1, but gaining 19 yards on 12 carries will just not do for any team. QB Bart Tanner threw for 210 yards, with a touchdown to TE Corbin Robbins.
Result: 7-34 loss


Week 12 vs Chicago
Just as I was about to proclaim I give up on this team, we out of the blue play up to our ability at last. We needed another train wreck of a first quarter, which we ended up trailing 17-0 after a pick six and an 83-yard touchdown pass. With 4 unanswered touchdowns in the fourth quarter, we bounced back, ending up at 3-3 in the turnover battle, but 428-285 in total yardage, earning a well deserved victory. Albeit we did need a 95-yard interception return touchdown by CB Byron Sokol to flip a potential victory sealing drive for Chicago into our go ahead score. QB Bart Tanner threw for 263 yards with 3 interceptions, but also touchdowns to TE Arnie Huffman and WR Rufus Montgomery. RB Renaldo Billodeaux scored two touchdowns on the ground. CB Byron Sokol's aforementioned big play was our other six-pointer.
Result: 37-27 win


European Division
1. Gothenburg 8-3
2. Bordeaux 6-5
3. Maassluis 4-7
4. Paris 2-9

The playoffs are far out of sight, with Houston (7-4) and Augusta (7-4) in the 6th and 7th place spots. I think the only thing we've got going for us if we catch up with them, is that we beat them both. Our remaining schedule is doable, playing at Rochester (3-8), vs Arizona (3-8), vs Gothenburg, at Iowa (3-8) and at Bordeaux. But it's very likely Houston, Augusta or Bordeaux will still end up better than 9-7, making all of this moot. Even Gothenburg could drop the next 4 and still secure finishing ahead of us with a week 17 win at Paris.

But an old saying has to get out again. We'll have to go back to the one game at a time approach. Try to do our best to win the next game and look no further than that. We'll take another look at all the scenarios once we head into week 17.

Do I know what little thing I did to cause the butterfly effect of seeing the whole team turn into a pile of [insert expletive of your choice]? No, I do not. I doubt it's the change of offensive coordinator. I doubt it's the departure of a handful of inactive backups. I doubt it's the arrival of the most promising wide receiver of the class of 2115. I doubt it's getting a better long snapper. I doubt it's because we re-signed QB Bart Tanner and WR Rodolfo Lane to new contracts. And I doubt it's because DE Lonnie Wynn help out for a couple of games early on.

General Manager Notes: Back to Singleton

We finished the season with a strong serie of games, somewhat expected given that we had some good matchups. But it wasn't good enough, we still finished far away from the playoffs. But more on that later, first let's recap the last 5 regular season games, one by one.

Week 13 at Rochester
Sometimes a victory can just fall into your lap. Now, let's not talk this team down, but when you're 14-0 up after barely 2 minutes with just 1 5-yard play from scrimmage by your offense, it's clear that turnovers set everything up for it. A quick pick six and a fumble in opponents' territory can do that. We were 24-7 up after the first quarter and never looked back. Even when we switched quarterbacks, we kept on pounding. We outgained the Razorbacks 391-285 in total yards and won the turnover battle 4-1. Our average drive start was at our own 46-yard line, which makes it even more impressive to gain nearly 400 yards. QB Bart Tanner threw for 171 yards and 3 touchdowns, QB Harrison Singleton threw for 94 yards and 1 touchdown. RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for 2 touchdowns, while the 4 receiving touchdowns were split amongst TE Arnie Huffman, TE Corbin Robbins, WR Rodolfo Lane and WR Jessie Vertelney. The latter had a 9-catch 169 yards performance.
Result: 52-13 win

Week 14 vs Arizona
Despite outgaining the Miners 468-364 in total yards and usually pining them back deep, we struggled to put points on the board. Perhaps a result of QB Bart Tanner's 2 interceptions thrown early in the game, both while we were moving into scoring position. It wasn't until the fourth quarter where we finally pulled off, sealing the deal with WR Rodolfo Lane's 77-yard punt return touchdown. Tanner threw for 313 yards and 3 touchdowns, flipping those to WR Rodolfo Lane, TE Corbin Robbins and WR Jessie Vertelney, with the latter gaining 111 yards receiving throughout the game. RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for 105 yards.
Result: 13-16 win

Week 15 vs Gothenburg
And then came a do or die kind of game. Although the impossibility of catching the Giants (they went into the game 9-4, we 6-7 with inferior tie-breakers), to keep the slimmest of chances to make the playoffs, we needed to win this game too. Despite that we put up a fight early on, a pick six thrown by QB Bart Tanner and a 25-yard touchdown run getting called back (rightfully so because of a holding penalty), we went into halftime trailing 17-13.
The interception on our first drive of the second half apparently sucked the last bits of belief of the team in going places this season, as the Giants scored another touchdown on the ensuing drive and followed up with a 93-yard touchdown drive on their next possession. An end zone interception on Gothenburg's knock out drive brought back a little bit of hope, but it was just a little glitch. Eventually we found ourselves in a go for it situation on 4th and 24, where we didn't even call the kind of play that would be good enough to make a first down. Apparently the OC that managed to break an offense that was impressive last season, he really, really, really sucks.
The Giants outgained us 342-307 in total yards and won the turnover battle 2-1. Tanner threw for 211 yards, with no touchdowns. Our sole touchdown of the game was a run from RB Rusty Kemp.
Result: 13-34 loss

Week 16 at Iowa
With the season down the drain, we didn't drastically change our depth chart, except for one thing: reverting back to good old QB Harrison Singleton. Livid about his situation, combined with the fact that he did eek out a victory on his sole start this season, I figured "why not?" and it turned out to be a good decision. In the process, we spoiled Iowa's chances to make the playoffs. Singleton threw for 270 yards with 4 touchdowns, tossing those to WR Rodolfo Lane (a pair), TE Arnie Huffman and TE Corbin Robbins. RB Renaldo Billodeaux ran for 109 yards and a touchdown, WR Jessie Vertelney had 127 yards receiving. We outgained the Cobbers 465-318 in total yards with a 1-1 turnover battle.
Result: 38-13 win

Week 17 at Bordeaux
With the Vineyards also no longer in the running for the playoffs, while having secured second place on division record tie-breaker over us, all that was on the line was just pride. Their young quarterback torched us in Oranje Haven earlier on, but on his second clash with us, the defense was ruthless on him, picking him off 5 times and forcing him to fumble twice. We won the turnover battle 7-1. Our own offense struggled to gain ground, getting outgained 386-271 total yards. Helped by the turnovers, we kept in the game throughout and eventually a triplet of fourth quarter defensive touchdowns did make the difference. QB Harrison Singleton threw for 182 yards with a touchdown pass to WR Rodolfo Lane. CB Kent Wodarz, LB Bobby Diaz and CB Byron Sokol accounted for the defensive touchdowns. Sokol scored his third interception return touchdown of this season.
Result: 31-13 win


European Division standings
1. Gothenburg 12-4
2. Bordeaux 8-8
3. Maassluis 8-8
4. Paris 3-13

I could kick ourselves for losing the season opener at home to Paris (32nd in points allowed this season) and ater on losing at Fort Wayne (32nd in points scored this season), but even had we flipped those around, we still would have come a win short from the last wild card. The AOC was cutthroat at the top, with San Antonio missing the playoffs with an 11-5 record. elsewhere in the league, 4 division champions had a worse record than them. Kansas' victory over us in week 2 turned out to be a difference maker for them as they won their division in a four-way tie with all teams at a unbearable to watch 6-10 record. We went 3-0 against Kansas' division rivals.

So there we were again: an 8-8 team that outscored their opponents by 45 points. We did get outgained 357-338 on average in total yardage, while the special teams unit recovered in the second half of the season and we made up for that yardage difference in that area. A crucial statistic was our truckload of turnovers (34), which even our pick machine defense (4th in the league with 31 takeaways) couldn't overcome.

Our running game regressed, going from 147 to 120 yards per game and from 5.28 to 4.87 yards per carry. As did our passing game, dropping from 256 to 231 yards per game and from 6.87 to 6.36 yards per attempt.

Defensively, our should be solid pass rush dropped to below 20% in pass rush percentage. I can say this on and on, but that's just downright unacceptable for the kind of talent that's walking around on this team.

K Oscar Harrington scored the league lowest number of field goals. He shanked 2 field goals and missed - cut-his-overpaid-ass worthy - 4 extra points. I could tell how our individual players did, but after a disappointing season like this one, I don't want to applaud any individuals. As a team, these 53 players let me and especially themselves down.

Cutting down on turnovers might turn out to be the only solution. That suggest it's not just enough to bench QB Harrison Singleton, but his replacement QB Bart Tanner has shown that after his stupid hold out, he should now go punch his agent for not accepting a bigger long-term deal with much more guaranteed money, because Tanner might have had his final start in the IHOF in week 15 of this season. Don't be shocked if Maassluis closes the door on both Singleton and Tanner in the next off-season and enters the market for a new quarterback. Because with all the money spent on the talent at wide receiver on this team, no quarterback should be allowed to play as poorly as what we saw from this position last season.

Or was it all on the new offensive coordinator that turned an awesome offense in a dud?

General Manager Notes: The 2116 Off-Season begins

The 2116 season is on the horizon, but before we get there, we're expecting some waves and stormy weather on our journey. We made a far from unsurprising change in our staff, have a high number of retirements to handle and go into the off-season with our usual big figure voer the cap with a truckload of draft picks to work with. But first some other news.



WR Calvin Maxwell got induced into the IHOF Hall of Fame.

This has to sound like a no-brainer as Maxwell played 12 season for us, with 8 of those being a 1,000-yard receiver, with 5 of those seasons reaching 1,400+. When all was said and done, he ranked 2nd all-time for Merchantmen players in receiving yards, 4th in receptions and 5th in receiving touchdowns. On top of that, he ranks 1st in IHOF history in kick off return yards (amongst all 32 franchises) and 1st amongst Merchantmen players in special teams tackles. Sadly we had little succes winning games during Maxwell's tenure, as we made the playoffs just twice and won 1 division title (in 2104).



The off-season started with the no less than 5 retirement announcements.

RT Ivan Dole
Our 1st round pick 2104 was a day one starter and held on to being our right side offensive tackle for the full 12 seasons. From early on he was our best run blocker, most seasons being a guarantee for 30+ key run blocks. At the time of his retirement, he ranks 3rd all-time amongst Merchantmen player in key run blocks. Dole started in 189 regular season games and 6 playoffs games, missing just 3 throughout his career. His personal best season came in 2114 when he was picked as an All-IHOF second teamer with 40 key run blocks, 5 pancake blocks and just 5 sacks allowed. It wouldn't shock me if Dole ends up elected into the IHOF Hall of Fame.

DT Gabriel Morris
The #10 overall pick in the 2103 draft took the league by storm. As a rookie, Morris already recorded 6.5 sacks, but it turned out to be his highest number in 13 seasons of service in Maassluis. In 2014 Morris contributed with 24 hurries and 65 tackles, earning All-IHOF second team honors that season, but from there on the decline in production set in. Still, for 10 seasons straight, Morris was an undisputed starter and in 2113 and 2114 he stil got his fair share of playing time in rotation. Morris spent 2115 on the inactive roster, mentoring two promising rookies. His tenure in Maassluis and the IHOF at that ends after 188 regular season games played and 6 playoffs games.

S Craig Clancy
Picked up as an undrafted rookie, Clancy already was a starter in that 2104 season and remained to be in the big rotation across the secondary throughout. With 190 regular season and 6 playoffs games played for the Merchantmen, Clancy proved to be reliable and and undisputed member of the team.

QB Drake Bishop
Although initially a backup quarterback for the Harlem Apollos, after 5 seasons there, the once undrafted rookie was signed by the Maassluis Merchantmen. Although with a reputation of being excellent in avoiding interceptions, Bishop's role was clearly to be a backup with kick holding duties and later on as a mentor to the young prospects in Maassluis, like today's duo Harrison Singleton and Bart Tanner. Curiously, despite an 11-season tenure in Maassluis, Bishop wasn't undisputed as the kick holder of choice, occasionally sitting out games inactive as the punter of service took over the kick holding duties. As a result, Bishop walks away from football after a season with just 3 games played and remarkably coming short of 100 games for the Merchantmen with 89 regular season games and 4 playoffs games played.

LB Avery Distel
A 7th round pick in 2107, Distel was a longshot to make the team back them, turning out to be unable to make a true switch to defensive end. But despite those limitations, we threw him out there form time to time, even ignoring that he was a suitable passing downs linebacker as well with sufficient zone defense skills. Also being a member of the special teams unit, Distel was active in all games from mid-way into his rookie season, ending up at 135 regular season and 4 playoffs games played. His personal highlight may have been the 2109 season, when he lead the team with 6.5 sacks (which also is a sad testament to how dreadful the pass rush was that season).



Staff changes

Offensive coordinator Keegan Harper was hired by the Brooklyn Fightin' Bums as their new Head Coach. We considered this a blessing in disguise as I felt that Harper has somehow broken an offense that had been doing so well in 2114. As a replacement, we hired 38-year old Ryan Whalen, who prefers to play a Balanced style offense. Whalen was previously with the Orlando Talons, but they decided to fire Whalen after just 2 seasons.



Cap situation

We're heading into free agency and the draft with just 41 players signed, with 5 restricted free agents and DE Lonnie Wynn and RT Clayton Bernstein the obvious unrestricted free agents. We're $37M over the salary cap, with an expected cost of $41M of the 12 draft picks we're holding. But we've already gone through the first wave of renegotiations and are now at $69M under the salary cap.

Most notable is that we signed QB Harrison Singleton to a new 2-year deal. Apparently starting in the last 2 regular season games was enough to reconsider his angriness and made him willing extend his contract. Singleton now accounts for a $39M cap figure. QB Bart Tanner is again in the final year of contract and this time around is demanding a 5-year deal, averaging $47M per season, starting with a $36M cap figure this season. I'm skeptical and at the moment unsure whether I feel his worth that kind of money, especially on a 5-year contract. But it's "never in doubt" that he will holdout again in post draft free agency, so we'll have to make up our mind before the more logical pre-season's renegotiation wave.

So, that's where we're at. We've had one particular player that jumped up on our draft board as a worthy candidate for a top15 pick (we hold the #15 overall), but we have to keep in mind that although our staff is very good at scouting, their interviewing abilities are just 'good'. So, we'll see where that will bring us...

General Manager Notes: the 2116 off-season continues

Before we look into the state of our team, I've stumbled upon a couple of players that said goodbye to the game and didn't get noticed because they were not under contract anywhere in the IHOF last season.

LT Harold Gruenwalder
He joined us as a 4th round pick in 2102 and already as a rookie started 16 games for us, allowing just 4 sacks. Although he struggled to reach that high level in the following years, he remained the left tackle for a long time. When we drafted Earl McBirney in 2108, Gruenwalder kept the starting role that season, but in 2109 the change of tackle to place. After McBirney's departure in 2112, Gruenwalder was still around and called upon to protect the young scrambling quarterbacks on team. It was quite the success, posting a season of 16 starts without a single sack allowed, although he was snubbed from All-IHOF honors for lack of involvement in the running game. It was just one more season, as in 2113 he lost the starting role. In the 2115 off-season, Gruenwalder left Maassluis, unwilling to sign for veteran minimum salary, his agent not telling him no other teams were showing any interest in him. Gruenwalder played in 127 regular season games for the Merchantmen and in 5 playoffs games.

WR Jaylen Gearhart
He was a 2nd round pick in the 2108 draft for the Merchantmen. Albeit considered a bust of sorts, given that he was rarely used on the offense, for many years he was a member of the special teams unit. As late is in the next to last game of his 7th season in Maassluis, Gearhart made his first career catch. In the 2115 off-season, Gearhart was released to make room for first round pick Rufus Montgomery. After a season long waiting by the phone, Gearhart took the hint that his IHOF playing career was over. He played in 85 games for the Merchantmen in 7 seasons of service.

RB Cary Delgado
He was an undrafted rookie signing in 2108. Mostly used as a power back and third down receiving option, Delgado had his fair share of playing time from the second season and onwards. The arrival of Rusty Kemp pushed Delgado into an inactive backup role in 2114 and eventually he failed to make the regular season roster for 2115. Delgado played in 99 games for the Merchantmen, scoring 21 touchdowns.

S John Aponte
He was a 7th round pick in 2106 that ended up being an undisputed starter from the get go. An excellent zone defender who never missed a single game, Aponte was an important member to the Merchantmen defense, whilst also occasionally jumping onto the special teams unit. In the 2114 off-season, Aponte decided to take an offer from the Williamsburg Colonials over a stay in Maassluis. In 8 seasons in Maassluis, Aponte played in 128 regular season games and 3 playoffs games.


2116 Draft Update
We missed out on QB Zach Christianson, who was our #1 target, by one pick: the Williamsburg Colonials selected him at 1.14. Instead, we took CB Zachary Blair at the 1.15 slot, a kid we hope will prove to be the all downs shut down corner we've been missing for some time now. We traded away all 3 2nd round picks and are working the phones about the triplet of 3rd round picks.



Free Agency 2116

DE Lonnie Wynn
We re-hired DE Lonnie Wynn for a 4-year deal worth $40M. Yes, people, be amazed, that's $40M total, not per year. Remember how his agent's demands skyrocketed into wanting $140M over 4 years last season during his hold out? We even offered Wynn $98M over 4 years and got told it was too little. Well, well, well... Anyway, good to have Wynn stick around, he did prove to be one of our better pass rushers.

RT Edwin Northcutt
We hired a new right tackle to step into the spot that was wide open after Ivan Dole's unanticipated retirement. Northcutt is a run blocking expert and signed a 3-year contract worth $10M per season. We hope to re-sign RT Clayton Bernstein as a backup, or keep our eyes open for another backup option. We looked at the tackles in this draft class, but the most suitable options were all long gone by the time the 1.15 pick came on the clock.

Restricted free agents
DT Byron Lomax, TE Rich Osborne, LS Roderick Kaeding and CB Asher McElroy signed a new 2-year contract. All four were undrafted rookies last season on a 1-year deal then. We're still in negotiations with S Peter Hinsley. His demands are, understandably, higher after a season in which he was basically a starter for us. McElroy signed a rotation role contract, the other three signed minimum deals.

General Manager Notes: holdouts and new arrivals

The inevitable has happened: QB Bart Tanner has decided to hold out.

After a train wreck of a season, in which he threw 21 interceptions in 13 games, while dropping from a passer rating of 80.7 in 2114 to 70.2 in 2115 and while dropping from 5 to no rushing touchdowns, the kid thinks he did enough to get an upgrade from the $10.6M cap figure last season and the figure $12.7M he's due this season, to getting a new 4-year deal for roughly $44M per season. Is your agent insane? Have you not noticed you lost your starting job after such abysmal play? Bottom line, I think this is basically end of career for Bart Tanner. No other team in the IHOF will be interested to come close to such an offer. Impossible. Nor can we afford such a lunacy.

LB Jorge Mayes has jumped in on the "I want to get paid like a starting quarterback" mess. He's requesting a 5-year $165M deal, which is, to be fair, market value for a stud at his position. Is he a stud? He lead the league in tackles by a landslide. He also "lead" the league in catches allowed, which is one of those stats that sounds bad, but at the same time, is it really? Does it mean he was responsible for the completion? Or does it mean he was the first guy to arrive at the crime scene and make sure things wouldn't get out of hand? We've already offered him a $190M contract, which he declined. Yup, we offered $25M more, mostly in guaranteed money, yet the mathematically incapable agent of his turned it down. Sure, we get it, we're familiar with such incompetence.

We'll try to bring Mayes to his senses and get him to training camp. Tanner's case is a Ken Torphy, a lost cause. I don't see him coming back as our starter and odds are we'll be reverting back to QB Harrison Singleton. Unless we think we can find a way to spend the $27.6M of left over cap space on a quarterback that's fallen out of favor elsewhere in the league. We've had moderate success with that in the past...



The new arrivals
A grand total of 17 new players has reported for training camp in Maassluis. Veteran QB Blake Stai (scouted 15/15) was signed in case we find a young project worth mentoring, which sort of also applies to WR Antonio Price (40/40), whom we'll see as an alternative mentor for WR Rufus Montgomery in case we see WR Preston Gray as too expensive for a WR4 mentor role. I've already mentioned the signing of 31-year old RT Edwin Northcutt (45/45). He'll get some competition as RT Clayton Bernstein re-signed a 2-year deal in Maassluis.

Our rookie class consists of 14 kids, with 7 of them signed as post-draft free agents. RB Reggie Gretzky (30/35), WR Claude Nakis (15/20), K Carter Madison (25/35), LB Ezekiel O'Neal (25/45), LB Wendell Reynolds (20/30), CB Marquis Wolf (25/35) and S Adrian Kornegay (15/25) have signed a 1-year contract. With 65 players signed (including the 2 hold outs), we'll have to release some of them after training camp. Unless they all impress and make some of the selections obsolete.

Pick 1.15 CB Zachary Blair (30/60) scares the crap out of me. Yes, he looks promising and was a top5 prospect on our draft board, but we've already seen the league scouts report on him too, giving Blair much higher grades. That's an alarm bell going off, We might have picked the bust of the draft here... But being a first round rookie, he's unaffordable to be cut this or next season, because he's on a $30M signing bonus and releasing him now would give us $22.5M in dead cap space next season. I mean, that's all "if he sucks", let's hope he's truly somewhere in between the 60 and 70 overall grade...

LB Roy Finch (25/45) was our 5.16 pick. His best traits are his punishing hitting, run defense and special teams. He should blend in as a running downs option as well as a special teams replacement for the retired Avery Distel.

S Britt Schulz (15/25) was our 6.15 pick and all the signs are that he was an underrated prospect. In then end, he might just only be a very good zone defender, but a secondary can never have too many of those.

K Myles Washington (35/55) was our 7.12 pick and is meant to put pressure on veteran K Oscar Harrington to prove us he's worth being the highest paid kicker in league history. Washington's kickoff skills are even more lacking than Harrington's, which could lead us to sticking with the old guy. Unless undrafted rookie Cart Madison jumps ahead of them both.

QB Kent Figures (15/40) skipped the combine, but still scored a 46 in the Solecismic Test and with second best sense rush ability, he was worth a shot at pick 7.14. We interviewed Figures before the draft, but that came back inconclusive.

At pick 7.18 we took a flyer on CB Greg Bradley (15/30) and his punishing hitting and interceptions skills. If his man to man or zone defense skills improve, he'll have a shot at making the team.

At pick 7.27 we took S Cesar Welch (15/40). Another zone defender, with some run defense and paly diagnosis to boot. Which is much needed for a strong safety.

The already mentioned undrafted free agent signings all have their own specialties. RB Gretzky has the breakaway speed and hole recognition combination we have going around on our offense and also brings in third down receiving and special teams skills. WR Nakis is a kickoff returner with possibly just enough special teams upside. K Madison is a kickoff specialist. LB O'Neal is a special teamer, with play diagnosis, run defense and pass rush skills, but he's too small to move to defensive end. LB Reynolds is a punishing hitting special teamer. CB Wolf is a zone defender and nothing but. S Kornegay is a special teamer with zone defense ability.

We missed out on DT Drew McIntyre, a 20/50 rated pass rusher that was on our draft board in the top 15. So, why didn't we pick him? Well, we're so crowded already, even the retirement of DT Gabriel Morris and LB Avery Distel still keep us at 9 true defensive linemen. McIntyre took a cheaper contract in Orlando, but to be fair, their signing bonus was much more enticing than our prove it to get it approach.

We also missed out on power runner RB Bubba Darling and big play WR Mitch O'Neill, both signed in Frederick for a $1M signing bonus. Another big play WR Teddy Cornbower took a $11M signing bonus in Tucker. So it goes, the kid joins their heads or tails group (half of them make the team, the other half never play a down in the IHOF) of fast wide receivers that they usually spend their 2nd round pick on.


All in all, the new arrivals are underwhelming, which reeks of status quo, which in football actually means regression. My focus will now be getting LB Jorge Mayes willing to stay on the team and on the quarterback situation. Missing out on QB Zack Christianson (10/50) might turn out to be not all bad, but I'm not convinced Singleton or Tanner is capable of playing up to the early career promising play they gave us. I don't see any obvious trade targets, but in this league you never know, some teams out of nowhere ship their super star quarterbacks without trying to milk the market. Or maybe Figures turns out to be more promising than we can hope for now...

General Manager Notes: Training Camp 2116

LB Jorge Mayes reported for camp. He signed a new 5-year contract with us, giving him a $25M signing bonus, a salary of $19M this season and $30M in each of the next 4 seasons.

QB Bart Tanner is still holding out and has skipped training camp. All signs are that QB Harrison Singleton will get this team back, something I did not expect at this stage of the season in 2115 and especially not when he went down with that career threatening injury.

So, we went through training camp and it makes sense to make a round up of the roster. Yet at the same time, people who now this game well, they know that after our first pre-season game, some players will magically become a completely different person, which could make this breakdown premature. But let's do it anyway.


Quarterbacks
40/40 QB Harrison Singleton
40/40 QB Bart Tanner
15/40 QB Kent Figures +2/+1 camp
15/15 QB Blake Stai +1/+1 camp
Pre-season cuts: none
53 Men bubble: Tanner, Figures, Stai
Underwhelming improvement by the rookie Figures, which makes it far less likely he's worth sticking around as a project for the near future. But if Tanner continues to hold out, we'll need a QB2 one way or another. Stai's stay is not per se based on keeping a project around, but when it comes down to the last spot, that's certainly something to consider.

Backfield
55/55 RB Rusty Kemp
45/45 RB Renaldo Billodeaux
35/35 RB Edwin Erickson +2/+0 camp
30/35 RB Reggie Gretzky +1/-1 camp
30/30 FB Kenneth Holse
Pre-season cuts: Gretzky
53 Men bubble: none
We gave the rookie Gretzky a shot at it, but he didn't wow and as such it's already over for him. We're expecting some regression for Billodeaux and Kemp, but we'll still expect to see these 4 guys make the eventual roster.

Tight Ends
55/55 TE Ted Gordon
55/55 TE Corwin Robbins
35/35 TE Arnie Huffman
25/30 TE Richie Osborne +4/+0 camp
Pre-season cuts: none
53 Men bubble: Osborne
Despite that Gordon showed he can be a 1,000-yard receiver, I'm higher on Robbins as a receiver and we'll likely give them both 100 targets again. Huffman has the route running and courage to make plays as well, so I might be foolish not putting him in as a primary or secondary targets in some formations. Osborne made good progress, but his job as the TE4 is not safe. I mean, if I see an upgrade on the open market, I made make a move for it, but we'll certainly go into the regular season with 4 tight ends and Osborne is for now that player.

Wide Receivers
70/70 WR Jessie Vertelney
65/65 WR Rodolfo Lane
50/60 WR Rufus Montgomery +5/+0 camp
35/35 WR Antonio Price
35/35 WR Preston Gray
25/30 WR Maurice Sweeney +2/+0 camp
20/20 WR Claude Nakis +2/+0 camp
15/15 WR Kai Cote
Pre-season cuts: Gray, Nakis
53 Men bubble: none
I need to find the right way to put Vertelney, Lane and Montgomery all in the mix with 120 targets. It's such a waste of cap money and talent not to use them properly. Price will make the team to mentor Montgomery and as the emergency WR3 in case one of the big3 goes out. Sweeney is our kick off return specialist, Cote a special teamer.

Offensive Line
75/75 LT Dan Clancy +7/+1 camp
55/60 G Herb Nieves +4/+0 camp
55/55 C Zane Chaplain
45/45 G Andres Uwaezuoke
45/45 RT Clayton Bernstein
45/45 RT Dennis Northcutt
40/50 G Alfred Pearsall +5/+0 camp
35/35 C Duane Ondre
Pre-season cuts: none
53 Men bubble: none
Bar pre-season non-sense, this will be our group for 2116. Clancy is the elite left tackle that we hoped him to be. Chaplain and Uwaezuoke are safe with their cohesion value. Northcutt will likely be our new run blocking right tackle. The second guard slot is still up for grabs for all of the other guys. Nieves looks like he has a small advantage, but he's not got this locked up.

Defensive Line
70/70 DT Efrain Hutchins
60/60 DE Lonnie Wynn
50/65 DT Carlos Fisher +6/+0 camp
50/50 DE Calvin Buckley
40/50 DT Bryan Lomax +3/+0 camp
45/45 DT Francisco Blades
35/35 DE Ernest Frias +1/-1 camp
35/35 DE Christopher Wrighster
25/25 DE Howie Tucker
Pre-season cuts: none
53 Men bubble: Blades, Tucker
Fisher and Hutchins could be the best duo in business. The tricky part with defensive tackles is that most can't be all downs players. Hence, we've got Lomax and Blades to play on some running downs, whilst some of the defensive ends could sub in on passing downs. Wrighster, Buckley and Wynn are the obvious pass rushing ends, with Tucker as the alternative. Frias is the run stopping end, which makes it likely he'll be on the field in some formations. Blades and Tucker are on the bubble as I'm not sure yet we're going to take 9 defensive linemen into the regular season. Taking 8 active looks like a bit too much already.

Linebackers
65/65 LB Jorge Mayes
40/40 LB Xavier Hoover
40/40 LB Bobby Diaz
40/40 LB Raymond Casper +3/+0 camp
40/40 LB Nicholas Giles
30/45 LB Ezekiel O'Neal +5/-3 camp
25/45 LB Roy Finch +4/+0 camp
20/30 LB Wendell Reynolds +3/+1 camp
Pre-season cuts: none
53 Men bubble: O'Neal, Finch, Reynolds, Casper
Locking Mayes up, means we've got no room for other expensive linebackers anymore. As such, we'll continue with using Diaz as our passing downs LB2 and put Hoover and Giles on running downs as the LB2 and LB3 around Mayes. Casper and Reynolds are special teams specialists, but so are Hoover, Diaz and O'Neal, which means the rookies are not likely to make the team. Finch and O'Neal lack zone defense ability, which means to make the team they have to prove to be an improvement over Hoover. They're close, but close is not quite good enough.

Secondary
35/60 CB Zachary Blair +5/+1 camp
45/45 S Dan Peterson
45/45 CB Byron Sokol
40/40 S Peter Hinsley +4/-2 camp
35/45 CB Asher McElroy +4/+0 camp
35/35 CB Skip Horner
34/34 S Noah Matthews
30/40 CB Marquis Wolf +4/+2 camp
20/40 S Cesar Welch +6/+1 camp
30/30 CB Kent Wodarz
20/30 CB Adrian Kornegay +2/+2 camp
25/25 CB Joel Delgado
15/30 CB Greg Bradley +3/+1 camp
15/25 S Britt Schulz +2/+0 camp
Pre-season cuts: Bradley
53 Men bubble: Kornegay, Wolf, Delgado, Wodarz, Schulz, Welch
Kornegay made the switch from safety to cornerback well, which seems to suit him a bit better anyway with his body frame. But the only reason he'll likely make the team is he's by far the best special teamer of this unit. Bradley still looks like nothing more than a punishing hitter, I just don't see how to justify keeping him. Blair didn't bomb, yet, so for now, he's going to be the other corner opposite Sokol. Hopefully Blair's endurance will allow for him to eventually be an all downs corner, which would be bad for McElroy or Wodarz. Peterson, Matthews, Horner and rookie Wolf are the undisputed guys to make the team. Delgado must not break, or face the consequences. Schulz and Welch are both promising, but I'd like to see a bit more proof of their respective signs of being underrated players. Wodarz is showing arthritis and it's going to be tricky for him to play football going forward. Putting him on injured reserve is something I'm seriously considering.

Special teamers
75/75 K Oscar Harrington
65/65 P Tyrus Johnston
40/55 K Myles Washington +3/+0 camp
25/30 K Carter Madison +3/-3 camp
20/20 LS Roderick Kaeding
Pre-season cuts: Washington
53 Men bubble: Madison, Harrington
Okay, it's less likely now, I already concluded Washington wouldn't be an improvement, but Madison might show just enough upside in pre-season to make us consider releasing the most talented kicker to ever play for the Merchantmen. Harrington's cap cost has decreased and we might find the $1.5M that we'll need to extend his contract into next season. But Madison will get a chance here, based on his kickoff ability. We might still think about the open market if we get tight on cap space. Johnston is safe for another season. Kaeding is to me our long snapper for the next 15 or so seasons. If we could offer him such a long contract at minimum salary now, I would offer it.


So, tricky quarterback situation, still some decision to be made in a crowded secondary and in the front seven there's also a player or two to not make the team. At least, that's where we are for the next day or two. Until we've played our first pre-season game at the Brooklyn Fightin' Bums.