SPRINGFIELD REFLECTS ON “HORRIBLE SEASON”

Team shares the sentiment of fans that losing in the playoffs amounts to failure
by I.P. Freelee, staff writer

After losing in seven games to the eventual OTBA Champion in the Kuffrey League Championship, spirits were less than high in the Springfield locker room.   No one smiled, no one laughed and no one wanted to hear the well-wishes of those who were trying to say it was a good season.

“This season sucked,” Siro Bustamante told reporters.  “No one remembers that you made it to the league championship series.”

“I’m done,” multiple time All Star Alberto Mingo said as he cleaned out his locker.  “I can’t take more seasons of coming up close like this.  I won a few titles and I can go home knowing unlike this year I was around some guys who could get it done.”

The team finished at 83-79 and earned a wild card for their 11th appearance in the playoffs in 19 seasons but that wasn’t good enough for a club that saw nothing less than the franchise’s seventh championship as the standard for success.

“Our fans accept nothing less than a title,” owner Jason Wert said.  “How can we expect anything less of ourselves?  I mean, we could go out and win 133 regular season games but if we don’t get it done in the playoffs we could have lost that many and still had the same result.”

Reporters tried to press Wert on the high points of the season including the outstanding performance of staff ace Siro Bustamante but he wouldn’t budge except on one issue.

“I will say that it’s great a team with the 5th lowest payroll in the league can make the playoffs,” Wert said.  “We lost to a team in the playoffs who spent 40 million more on players than we did.  It shows you don’t have to spend to the salary cap to have a competitive team.  It’s about developing your talent and signing one or two free agents to reasonable contracts.  In that, we were a little successful this year.”