Consider the following scenario -
your team,the oldest in the league's short 20 years history, extremely popular among fans, loved and hated New York Yankee style, just finished a long 7 games championship series. Defeated, but not down, as your team did well for the series and was close to winning it all.
Your team finished last in the first half of the season, with the head coach resigned half way through the half as your team got bitten hard by the injury bug, bad pitching, and inconsistent hitting. Getting blown out at the beginning of the game, as well as giving up big lead during the game, wasn't uncommon. There were some bright spots, like your new Big-League-Seasoned-Flame-Throwing-Starter help sell out stadiums, or your new twenty something rookie pitcher was more than solid among the bad bullpen. He in fact pitched like his number suggests, no.42, he reminds you of the bright future of the team, and his own.
All-Star game came and went. It was fun.
Came August. A new foreigner came in. A tall American lefty by the name of Kroon. He track record wasn't impressive. Actually none of your foreign players had spectacular stats, in part because you are a small budget team that ironically had perhaps the most fans.
So new guy Kroon came in, threw strikes, never blown a safe and was near-perfect in twenty or so tries. With the afore mentioned rookie no 42, another 2nd year guy, and another American lefty reliever, all of a sudden your bullpen is set and solid. The 'pen is so good that the game is basically decided by the 6th. You know, your starter gets you through the top of the 6th with a small lead, then you bring out your 1-2-3 'pen guys and the game's in good hands.
Your hitting is back too. While still not a whole lotta power but at least the hit parade is now more consistent and shows up more often. You had a guy in your team hitting Ichiro-like, was hurt at the beginning of the season, came back doing well; Your clean-up hitter is chasing .400 for the most part of the season. He plays hard, hitting well, quiet yet you knew he's the leader, a guy to count on in crunch time . So you started hitting, getting guys on base, utilize the quickness in your line-up, making it hard for opposing pitchers once a man gets on base.
You began to climb back in the standings, even ended up having a big 10-game lead over the 2nd place team. Your pitching staff's set. You began to know who's pitching on what day and you know you are winning most of the games. You ended up finishing up top for the 2nd half of the season, albeit lost some games in the last week of the regular seasons, when games don't really count.
For the 2nd straight year, you are up against your arch-rival, another old guard for the league, ran by a business so big that everyday folks can't live without it, in the championship series. Down 0-2 in the series, you picked up a win off a come back single from your star outfielder, who's been out most of the season with a broken arm. You even went late for game 6th, 17-innings late. Withstood a 4-4 tie for most of the game, the contest was 6 and half hours long, the longest ever in the league's history. Your star closer pitched 3 1/3, your 2nd year reliever pitched 5 1/3 with a broken nail in his middle finger. No.42 pitched the final two innings, perfect with 5Ks. You made history, and came up victorious, before the final game of the season. You lost that game, watching the arch-rival pouring beers and Champaign, celebrating their first 3-peat in team history. You came home, defeated but not down, knowing that you are good for the next year.
You woke up the next day, watching the news, reading the papers, business as usual. You saw several of your players being searched by the equivalent of FBI, saying that they might have hooked up with your former pitcher-with-potential -turned-booster (you remember how much signing bonus you paid him back then), set up errors and/or bad pitching, to ensure the betting result part of the game, is controlled. The players involved included the afore mentioned former Big-Leaguer. no.42, the 2nd year pitcher, your veteran, feisty utility man, and the bookish veteran reliever, popular among female fans. You terminated their contracts immediately to keep your sanity , your team is in danger of breaking up, as your GM had repeatedly said in the past that he would blow it all up seeing things like this happened to his team. Worse yet, the league is also in danger of going out in flames, as it's down to the minimum four teams, two down from last year thanks to similar situations. The investigation will go on, while you and your players future remained uncertain.
You don't want this happen to any team, let alone your favorite team. Anyone told you that this would happen just seven days prior, you would laugh it off like a good but late April Fool's. Except it ain't a joke, it's real, And it's could be worse. You could end up not having pro baseball next year. Players could ended up out of job, out and away from the only thing they've ever known how to do.
This is movie material, the kind that you would only want to see in a movie, because it made it a good movie. In life, you don't wish this on nobody. NOBODY. Yet, the nightmare ain't over. This is just the beginning of (hopefully not) the end...
