The Future of the Haymakers?

Troy, NY:  Making it to the championship series two of the last three years and not winning has left a dark cloud over the small city of Troy.  The Haymakers came to town in 2007 and have been fairly irrelevant in the NASBL until 2010.  A flurry of trades brought some big names and some major excitement to the area.  The past three seasons, the Haymakers have won at least 90 games thanks to a number of dominating performances.  But does it matter if you do not win it all?  Probably not.  No one remembers or cares about the teams that don't make the finish.  Heck this reporter can not even remember the other NASBL World Series losers of past seasons not from Troy.
   So can the fans cry "Wait 'til next year!"?....well, actually no.  With down years from key players and no picks in the first five rounds of the upcoming draft; the fans will have to look elsewhere to see a contending team.  Burlington (or the Lake Champlain area) is about a 3 hour drive to the north where you can see the Cannibals and Fighting Sioux while the Chin Music play about three hours to the south.  It's about time to gas up and go.

   The fans that actually decide to stick around to watch the games played in Troy next season will have the benefit of watching Edwin Encarnacion in a lineup of part-timers and wash-ups.  Recent trades have not helped this.  The acquisition of B.J. Upton, a player that Troy management has never liked in the first place, is going to make the team hard to watch.  The reason for picking up Upton?  "We got him for nothing, and there is no way he can be this bad going forward."  That sounds eerily similar to what was said when the Haymakers picked up Andrew Jones years ago.  Just what did Andrew Jones do for the Haymakers in 2008?  Only hit .182 with a .626 OPS.  Lets not forget he was part of one of the major trade blunders for Troy. He was out of the league for two straight years after that and his career, save for two seasons as a bat off the bench, was pretty much over.
  The small bright spot on the team are the two starters, Madison Bumgarner and recent pickup Kris Medlen and closer Greg Holland.  Team management has been a fan of Holland for a while now, and he's primed to take over the closer role next season.  Bumgarner and Medlen will be a decent one/two punch at the top of the rotation, but the rest rotation is looking like a barren wasteland of has-beens and never-was'.

  Mudville has nothing on the Troy Haymakers.