Birdnal’s GM Looking to Soar To New Heights

Jordan McCloud

St. Louis Birdnals Beat Writer

5/28/08

St. Louis – As spring training draws to a close for the St. Louis Birdnals, GM Irish Fury can only look up to the sky.  For that is where he foresees the team he built this offseason to be come July 21^st.  “Tell you the truth, anything but a Division Championship will be very, very disappointing to everybody in this organization,” says Fury. 

 

Any why wouldn’t it be?  With the off season acquisitions of Steve Randolph, Frank Douglass, Morgan Strickland, and William Hobbes, there is nowhere for the Birdnals to go but to improve on their 66-96 record last season.  As Fury states, “We felt that our young prospects in the minors were still a few years away, but we wanted to start winning now.  That way we could bring those future All Stars into a winning atmosphere.  With the additions that we made, the organization is very confident that will become a reality.”

 

“Steve and Frank are really going to give our line-up that extra bit I think we were missing that past few seasons.  And obviously, Strickland and Hobbes are major improvements to our staff.”  But the GM would also like to remind us all of an often overlooked pick up, LF Henry Simpson.  “Listen this kid is going to help us tremendously against lefties.  We haven’t given up on Santiago, but he just wasn’t getting the job done for us in that department.  Henry will.”

 

At times though, Fury can’t help but dwell on the past, “The last two seasons (record of 61-101 in Season 4) were very disappointing.  I took them kind of personal.  I mean those were the teams I built and obviously I didn’t get the job done.  We, as an organization, knew those weren’t our years for a World Series run, but finishing a combined 35 games under .500 really was not what we expected.  I can’t see myself doing this much longer if I don’t get better at it.”

 

How do his players feel about it all?  “We are ready to go as a team.  Us new old guys and these young old guys have gelled pretty well this spring, we feel like we can go the distance this year,” says Hobbes.  “This spring training has been so much different than any other one I’ve been involved with,” responds the Birdnal’s veteran presence, Bob Rivers.  “I guess its always better when you feel you can win.”

 

That’s the question isn’t it?  Whether or not the Birdnals will win this year?  One thing is for sure; it’s not your same Birdnal team this year.