MIAMI KILLER WHALES [GM JUSTIN]

[GM Gates]

While the Jim Zebow report didn't scream like Experience should have been immediately reinstated, I assume the league has the evidence needed to back up that decision. As for the players union launching an investigation, if they want to, they can, that would be their call to make. As for further punishment, at this point if they see it needed, i figure it would come down to his team and if they want to continue to suspend him or bring him back to the team.

[Talon]

  Even though it was a 0 TD 1 INT game, he was accurate and effective.  Great ratings across the board and he brought a different attitude to the field that was infectious.  It was a good debut.

[GM Gates]

Good to hear. I wasn't too worried about the 0 TD, 1 INT aspect, especially given it's a new team, but things definitely seemed a bit more of what we might have expected our offense to be.

I feel like leaving things as they are is a good idea for this week. I mean, aside from putting Jesus Young back in that is.

[Talon]

 

  Agreed

[GM Gates]

Excellent coach. Just a bit of business to attend to and then we should be good. I'll let you get back to practice.

——————

Selina, could you get me in touch with Mike Maker please.

——————

Mike, I just heard that your client Earl Christian was amnestied and while he is injured, I would like to offer him a contract.

Id like to offer $750K for the remainder of this season. I know Earl is injured, but his ability to come back late in the season and give us added depth would be beneficial to our title hopes.

In addition, I'd like to sign him for a second year, if we can find a number that works for both of us. I was thinking of something in the $2.5 million range. With this season being somewhat of a lost season for Earl, an added year could help him build his stock.

So what do you and Earl say?

[Talon]

MIKE MAKER INFORMS YOU THAT THEY WILL WAIT UNTIL ALL TEAMS ARE UNLOCKED BEFORE DECIDING ON THE FUTURE.

[Talon]

 

  So, anything else before Vegas?

[GM Gates]

Thanks Mike, we will talk again next week then.

—————

Sorry coach, was discussing some potential business and lost track of time. I don't have anything else to add so I'm just going to go ahead and get us ready for the week. Let's go out there and take the sting out of the Scorpions.

—————

Strategy/Depth Chart Changes:
RT1: Jesus Young
RT2: David Brill
RT3: Ricardo Millard

LT1: Gary Fenton
LT2: Jesus Young
LT3: David Brill

Lock In

[GM Gates]

1. Discuss your weeks results (if you won, who deserves a game ball for their efforts?) (if you lost, who needs to step up to prevent another loss?) (if you had a bye-week, discuss a game that caught your eye)

We overcame the Scorpions push and dominated the fourth quarter to win the game. The General looked great out there leading that come back and adding on top to keep the lead in our favor. He'd be the one I'd be giving the game ball to, but there are probably a few others I could name as well. What I also liked is that it shows how we can win. Last week we won on the ground and this week it was through the air. Being able to have both of those clicking will do us wonders the deeper we get into the season.

2. Discuss any news that interested you, if you had team specific news address it first.

That second half is what you love to see as a General Manager. When we brought Merv in we knew it would take some time to get used to things here and he seems to have picked it up quick and showed how good he is with that second half. Led us back into the game and took the lead and kept it. Definitely a thing you love to see.

As for other news...there's a little bit of everything out there. Players who want their teams to be better, players who don't like their coaches, players who aren't sure they still want to play...and players who are being asked to waive full guarantees. There seems to be a lot of discontent around other spaces in the HIFL.

3. Discuss your next opponent and game. What is your biggest advantage in this contest? (if you have a bye week, discuss what you hope to achieve this week)

We gave DC, who have been on quite the roll lately. They are the sort of team who may have been overlooked early on but they have really made sure to put their mark on the season with this impressive run. But as I said earlier we can beat teams through the air or on the ground and if last week showed anything, it's that the General can still lead a charge. Our biggest advantage is probably that and our defence. I know DC has a good one too, but I don't think people have seen the best of our defence yet this season.

[GM Gates]

Coach great comeback there. That's the kind of play I like to see from our QB. Merv really made that comeback happen.

[Talon]

 

That clutch gene and the ability to calm the rest of the team down in the high pressure situation is just something you can't teach or quantify and The General has that X factor.

[GM Gates]

That's one of the reasons I'm glad we were able to get him here. You're right, you can't teach it and to see him execute in those high pressure situations...it's wonderful.

Looking ahead, DC is a different animal, but I don't see why we can't pick up the win. We can continue our win streak and continue our push for the division and more.

[Talon]

 

Asking Meek to throw 50+ times a game can't be sustainable, and if we get pressure on him he's in for a bad, bad day... I like our odds to disrupt their little hot streak.

[GM Gates]

So do I. We've got a defence that is capable of doing just that.

I don't have much else for you coach, so I will let you get to practice.

————————

Selina, can you get Mike Maker on the line for me?

————————

Mike, apologies for jumping the gun last week. My intentions with this call are much the same - we'd like to sign your client DT Earl Christian to a 2 year deal. Year 1 would be the rest of this season at $750K. Year 2 would be for $2.5 million in season 16. It would give him a chance to get healthy and compete for a title this year and next, without worrying about his contract status in season 16.

[Talon]

We'll consider it, but honestly, the minimum isn't any incentive to sign before he's healthy and ready to play.

[GM Gates]

That's fair Mike. If I had more money without ruining the team I'd offer it but I don't. Still thought I'd take the chance and send an offer. You never know right?

As for time to think on it, really once we roll into week 9 I wouldn't be able to fit Earl into our team financially. Not trying to put pressure or anything just want to be honest.

[Talon]

Understood.  Hopefully one of the other teams in the league will have the right funds to make a deal.  Take care.

[GM Gates]

I hope so too. Maybe we can reconnect about Earl this off-season. Take care Mike.

—————

Selina, I think that's everything for the week. Please send this along to the coaching staff.

—————

No changes from last week.

Lock In

[GM Gates]

1. Discuss your weeks results.

It was a rough week from kick off. It's hard to win games when your first few possessions end in turnovers. Interception, fumble, blocked punt...all of it was there. Now, once that was out of the way, the team made a valiant comeback attempt against DC but in the end, we weren't able to overcome the mistakes at the beginning. If you want to ask me who needs to step up, I'd say that the whole team needs to buckle down and really start playing hard from kick off. No more kicking it into high gear after we are down a few scores, we need to be playing the game hard from the word go.

2. Discuss any news that interested you, also what are some of the stats and/or stat leaders that have surprised you at the mid-point of the season?

Louisville starting their GM search was nice to see. Not content on waiting until the end of the season to find someone to take over, and wanting to get a jump, maybe finding a vulnerable GM who they can convince to come over to their team. They've got a lot of time to get it right.

As for the stat leaders...I don't know if there's anything that really jumped out as being super crazy as far as who was leading. You see a lot of DC players in the mix, which coincides with their recent run and streak so nothing too surprising there. Really, I'm more worried and focused on getting the Killer Whales consistent out there on the field.

3. Discuss your next opponent and game. What is your biggest advantage in this contest?

We welcome San Antonio to Miami. I'd like to sit here and wax poetic about where we might have an advantage, but I think the main thing is we can't look past this game. We need to start winning games, putting a streak together and start jumping over some of the teams ahead of us. We are halfway through the season and really need to start buckling down if we want to be playing meaningful games beyond week 17. San Antonio is one of those teams who might not look mighty on paper, but who can surprise you if you give them an inch to wiggle. They are the team who could bite you in the ass if you're not careful, and we can't have that. As I mentioned to start, we need to be ready to go and playing hard from kick off. We can't ease in, we can't give them any rope.

----------------

Coach...not an ideal start to that game. The team tried hard, but we just weren't able to overcome those early issues.

[Talon]

 

That's a tough offense to chase from behind, if we play them again in the post-season, we'll make sure to remedy that.

[GM Gates]

For sure, coach.

A few weeks ago, I tweaked the run/pass ratios in favor of the run. Now that Patten has been here a few weeks, should we put more emphasis on the air attack then the ground? Make better use of our weapons? It seems like we've trended that way in the past few games just because of score anyways.

I'm just trying to think how we can jumpstart our offense..

[Talon]

 

I think we can shift based on the strength of our opponent.  right now the one thing I think we are lacking offensively is a pure speed deep threat to stretch the field.  Jayson has elements of that in his game, but he is still more of a highly balanced talent, we don't have that speedster who can take the top off of the defense and as a result it's letting defenses sit on our routes a bit more than we'd like.  Sam is 32 and doesn't have that top gear anymore.. Pike and Hickson are more physical receivers, and our depth guys just lack that type of speed..  That might be the last thing we need to try to address, if it's even possible at this stage.

If it isn't, maybe we look at adding Maria out wide when we bring Knox in at running back, she is our fastest player after all.

[GM Gates]

A speedy deep threat receiver is something I've been looking for but haven't been able to find one yet. I'm still calling around to see what I can find, if anyone is moving one.

Worse case is we could put Crews out wide when Knox is in. Can't hurt to try anyways if we can't bring anyone in.

While we are talking about it, with the trade deadline looming is there anywhere else you'd like to see an improvement?

[Talon]

 

That is the biggest thing the comes to mind.

[GM Gates]

Sounds good.

So we've got San Antonio coming up next and they've been a mixed bag of results. Any strategic changes you think we should make? You mentioned tailoring our play calling to our opponent...should we lean one way over the other?

[Talon]

 

The new stats just dropped this week, you can see if they are stronger vs the run or the pass; so that's how I usually base it.

[GM Gates]

Sorry coach, that's on me for not checking. Seems like they've been leaky against the run and the pass, maybe a little worse against the pass then the run, but we might be able to leave things as we have them. Aside from integrating Maria from time to time.

[Talon]

 

If we can be balanced, that's great.  Nothing like giving the defense something they can't gameplan for.

[GM Gates]

Hopefully we can be balanced. I might shift us to 55/45 run/pass if that would help.

Also, do you need me to note anything in the lock in to get Maria in there as a receiver? Or will you and the staff be able to take care of that?

[Talon]

 

Just note to create a Crews WR package.

[GM Gates]

Will do coach.

The other thing I noticed is that we are giving up a lot of rush yards per game. Is that just due to poor run defence along our D-Line or something bigger? I don't know if we can just attribute it to McLendon being out or just facing solid running teams that we can't stop.

[Talon]

That's one I dont have a good answer for, I feel like we should be stuffng the run, but its not been that easy.

[GM Gates]

Well hopefully we do better this week. I do have a potential deal in the works to bring in some front line help. For now let's get to the game and back to our winning ways.

——————

Strategy/Depth Chart Changes:

MLB1: Joseph Spellman
(Spellman to replace Cotter in all depth charts)

Create a Maria Crews WR package for when Knox is at RB, as discussed with Coach Jose

Lock In

[GM Gates]

1. Discuss your weeks results (if you won, who deserves a game ball for their efforts?) (if you lost, who needs to step up to prevent another loss?) (if you had a bye-week, discuss what piece of news was most surprising to you)

That was a great win. We managed to keep San Antonio from getting into the end zone or kicking any field goals. And anytime the Knights were knocking on the door, our defence stood strong and changed the momentum for us. Game ball would have to go to Greenwood - he had Golden on lock all game, three interceptions and a touchdown...he was a catalyst in helping us take down the Knights. Spellman was great in his debut for us and Merv kept the offence marching each time we had the ball, and never got rattled, even after the early interception. This was a great win for our team especially as we enter the second half. 

2. Discuss any news that interested you, what do you make of the recent GM moves around the league? (Cover your news first; then move on)

Stephen Cotter is a great football player, a great line backer. Cotter is also...an intense individual. Trading him was not easy, but if the news is true, that might be a nice byproduct of doing so.

As for the GM news, I always feel for them when colleagues lose a job. In these cases, GM Gooch was able to land in Louisville and GM Cure, perhaps he will find a home somewhere and get another chance to build a team up.

3. Rate your teams activity level this week when it comes to the Trade deadline, should fans have their notifications on for a big deal, or is it likely to be quiet?

We will be active but the extent of how active I don't know. I will be making calls and seeing what we can do to push us over the hump, but I don't know if there's another huge blockbuster out there for us. Time will tell though.

4. How safe do you feel you are right now, is your job secure?

I feel safe in my job. Some people say that's when you should feel the most vulnerable but based on conversations had earlier this season, I don't have a reason to feel like I'm sitting in a red hot seat.

5. Discuss your next opponent and game. What is your biggest advantage in this contest? (if you have a bye week, discuss what you hope to achieve this week)

We travel across the pond to face the Bats of Tottenham. This is the type of team that, if we look past them because of their record, they could end up taking the win from us and we can't have that, not while we are in the thick of things in the East. We need to play the same way we did against San Antonio, show up in time and ball out on defence to stop the Bats from getting any momentum. Our advantage lies with Patton. He's getting more comfortable in the offence and as he does, he's only going to gel more with our players. He knows what needs to be done to win and to win a game like this.

——————

Coach, great win against the Knights. It's always good to shutout an opponent. I know we might need to make some tweaks to how we utilize Crews as a wide receiver, but doing so seemed to pay dividends this week. Spellman looked to fit right in to the defence as well and if the news report is true, seems like a week where everything worked out for us.

[Talon]

 

Yeah I'll have to adjust our ratios a little bit, but I liked how she helped our offense split out wide, it was a problem for those defenders.

[GM Gates]

It definitely looked to be and short of making a surprise splash, hopefully having her out there continues to be a problem.

Looking at our game against Tottenham, they should be a team we can beat especially if we can get to their quarterback and keep some pressure on him.

[Talon]

 

Agreed, a loss this week would be a major set back.

[GM Gates]

My thoughts exactly.

I looked around the trade market for a wide receiving upgrade but that might be something to earmark for the off season. I did want to ask, with us planning to employ Maria as a wide receiver from time to time, do you feel that we might need some more depth at running back?

[Talon]

 

With the way Cross ran last week, I don't think so.

[GM Gates]

Alright good to know. I wasn't sure if adding another body for depth would help in the event of an injury.

Coming into the season, our depth at FS and DE were the question marks. Do those questions still exist or are there other positions where the depth seems rougher now that we are 9 weeks in? Only spot that might come to mind for me, defensively, is at DT, mainly due to Merlin being out.

[Talon]

 

Yeah, we're a little thin at DT, but everyone is thin somewhere this time of year.

[GM Gates]

Alright coach I will let you head to practice. Thanks for all your insight.

—————

Selina, are you able to confirm that we have $400K in salary remaining and no bonus?

[Talon]

You're correct!

[GM Gates]

Thank you Selina.

Can you get me in touch with Coach Jose again?

——————

Alright coach I made some moves to give us some better depth at positions which should help this year and next. We've got Tottenham coming up and we need to win. I'd love to go into the bye week on a roll so we can fine tune and come out guns blazing.

So let's go out their and beat the Bats.

——————

Strategy/Depth Chart Changes:

RB1 - Maria Crews
RB2 - Christopher Knox
RB3 - Frederick Cross
RB4 - Robert Bryant

DT1 - Ali Muhammad
DT2 - Harry Steele
DT3 - James Kaplan
DT4 - William Coleman

SS1 - Craig Watkins
SS2 - Troy Garcia

FS1 - Francisco Berlin
FS2 - Isaac Thompson

Tweak the Maria Crews WR package as discussed with Coach Jose.

Lock In

[GM Gates]

1. Discuss your weeks results (if you won, who deserves a game ball for their efforts?) (if you lost, who needs to step up to prevent another loss?) (if you had a bye-week, discuss what piece of news was most surprising to you)

What started as a low scoring nail biter turned into a great win for us. The General kept at it and in the fourth, he managed to pull away with three touchdowns. And our defence stymied the Bats at every opportunity to really keep them out of the end zone and off the scoreboard after that first touchdown. Lots of players stepped up there to keep the game tied until we were able to pull away. I'd probably give the game ball to Patton for leading the charge in that fourth or the entire defence for keeping the Bats to seven points. That was the kind of win I like to see and the kind of win we needed heading into the bye.

2. Discuss any news that interested you. (Cover your news first; then move on)

When I first spoke to Merv after the trade, he told me he wanted to win, and what was said in the news just reaffirms that. He's not looking for the glory that comes with the stats - as good as they are - as much as he is winning games and the Impact Bowl. It's great to hear.

As for other news...Franchise to Cancun. I don't know if it's the best move for either party but it might be the only one that unfolds for Franchise. I doubt a team like Rapid City or Salt Lake is going to come calling given the way things have gone in Milwaukee for him.

3. With the trade deadline in the rear view, what move surprised you the most?

Where do I start? Landing Pierce and Jackson in Vegas is a big time move that will pay off in years to come. Milwaukee trading Glass might take the cake for me. Not because they traded him but because of what they got back. I'm pretty sure they got back less for Glass then other teams got back for corners of much lesser skill and talent. But that's probably why Franchise is rumored to be going to Cancun.

4. Tell us a player on offense and defense you want to see more from in the second half of the season.

On defence I'd like to see some more out of Craig Watkins. He had a good week this week but I think, looking at the season as a whole, there's a lot more he could do to really set our defence apart. Last season he was everywhere doing everything and I think this season he's been lost somewhat. But I'm confident he can step that up and be everywhere yet again, making big plays. Again that doesn't mean he's not doing anything, I just know there's more there.

On offence, I'd probably say Christopher Knox. Like Watkins, it isn't because he isn't doing anything, but with us having Maria Crews line up at receiver more often, it opens the door for Knox to get a bit more reps and a bit more of an opportunity. And I would love to see him perform well and give us two consistent, viable options at running back.

5. Discuss your next opponent and game. What is your biggest advantage in this contest? (if you have a bye week, discuss what you hope to achieve this week)

Bye week. I think what we hope to achieve this week is a little health and to work on some things to tighten it up for the home stretch. We've made a lot of progress, but there's still games left to play and we need to be on top form.

——————

Coach, great win over the Bats. Was a bit nerve racking there but Merv did his thing and turned that game around in the fourth. He almost seems to have a different gear when it turns into the fourth quarter.

[Talon]

 

Even when he isn't at his best, he knows how to turn it on in the clutch.  That what makes him one of those elite guys you want on your roster.

[GM Gates]

It's what makes the gamble to bring him in worth it. He's got those qualities you can't teach.

I don't have too much for you this week. I figure we keep things status quo for the week even if it is our bye week. I'd like to make sure the team is still in the right mindset when we come out of it.

One question I did have was at the center position. I noticed Marler came in to fill in for Sumner in the last game and held his own. Was that more due to Tottenhams pass rush or is Marler capable of holding his own as the starting center?

[Talon]

 

Marler is our highest graded center in run blocking, but the lowest in pass blocking; meanwhile Sumner and Tuggle are equal in pass blocking, but Sumner is the better run blocker, and Marler is by far the strongest..   in reality Sumner is a guy we could do without next year if we keep these two on lower contracts and let them battle for the starting job.

[GM Gates]

Excellent. I was hoping to let the two of them battle it out for the starting spot next season so it's good to hear they are where they are.

Anyways coach, I honestly don't have anything else to go over this week. So I will let you get to it.

——————

Selina, could you get me in touch with Drew Leventhal please?

——————

Drew, how's it going? We spoke a few weeks ago about Jayson Little's contract situation and I wanted to circle back to that. After crunching the numbers, I wanted to offer Jayson a 3 year extension, starting Season 16, worth $13 million a season with $2 million in bonus money.

[Talon]

Let us think about it, and we'll get back to you.