It was a quiet afternoon in the office of the new General Manager of the Pittsburgh Oilers, inside the office was the desk where the General Manager, Mr. Saylor sat. To the left of him was some shelf of what looked to be old memorabilia some items of note on that shelf were a white hat with a cypress green brim with matching pinstripes running in a pattern around it adorned with a green ‘B’, A white Pennant with a green stripe on the base in green letters reading ‘BOSTON’ with a three-leaf clover around it, and finally a picture of 25 people dressed in a white uniform with their names above them, with green lined button panels complete with that same green with a sign beside them displaying ‘1906 EASTERN LEAGUE CHAMPIONS’. The reporter tasked to interview the new General Manager was waiting impatiently in his office, tapping on his pencil to add something to break this silence rather than look out the window for a view or look at his display case of what Mr. Saylor himself would call ‘Memories from another time ago’.
While it came as a stir that a new Manager stepped in from a defunct Baseball league, it had both good and bad stirs; one of which being a GM who’s got experience in his belt, the other being that they never heard of this man, or the league he hailed from before. But now he has gained a job working for the Legacy Baseball League in a different city from where he last worked, “Well, it’s closer to home at the Queen City than Boston” Mr. Saylor quipped to himself as he finally arrived to share about his first season to the Pittsburgh Gazette Times.
When asked about what changes he did during the first part of the season, General Manager Mr. Saylor reminisced, “Well upon inspecting with what I had for a team, I felt like we had something in there.. it was going to take some work to get there, I wasn’t expecting to win out of the gate but I felt like I was going in the right direction with how the Oilers did with their 66-54 Record, that’s an improvement from the last few seasons from what I had been told. This team needed some retooling. But back in February, The first thing I started with rehauling the entire organization’s staff.”
“I fired the Manager, the Bench Coach, The Assistant Manager, the Pitching Coach, and one of the Base Coaches” he answered before sharing the names of who he hired for his incoming staff, names such as Charles Bennent, Lester ‘The Skull’ Kenworthy, A former first baseman on his playing career on the New York Kings as the Oilers Pitching Coach, and Raliegh Bounds.
After which, Mr. Saylor described his roster in detail, pointing out 38-year-old outfielder Randy Slinger being one such player he recalled changing around on his role; going as far as benching him and starting Wilbur Lee over him or using Slinger on 1st Base. “I saw how Slinger was handing that ball out there and while he’s got some pop in his swing he can’t catch a flyball to save his life. Wilbur though, while I was dealing with Outfielder injuries, Lee Impressed me with his grit. It makes me wonder why the old manager kept him in Gettysburg though”. Wilbur Lee first started on the Oilers in 1903 and stayed on their roster for three seasons with a 0.5 WAR and an average of .250 Batting average over those three seasons before being sent to the Minors for four seasons before returning to the Majors in 1909 where in 78 games, Lee posted a .298 average, .696 OPS with a 2.0 WAR season on both Left and Right Field.
Other players of note for the 1909 had been Center Fielder Charles Bird who over 67 games recorded a .300 batting average, 3.4 WAR, and a .779 OPS, the infield comprised of the duo of James Knight at 2nd Base and Alfred Miller at Short who posted a similar stat line.
Mr. Saylor’s work already had shown results in just one single season, in 1908, the Oilers broke even with a 60-60 win/lose record and were 20 games out from the playoffs. Now his team finished with a 66-54 record and was only 6 games out by the time the 1909 Playoffs were set to begin. His trading acquisitions included Wilfred Longworth from the Brooklyn Whales, while he was showing a good performance and how great he felt from this year, & while he did share that he doesn’t get along much well with his manager and the team, all-in-all he’s been a good unit for the team. Longworth’s popularity alone helped to lead to a 16% increase in attendance and brought more butts in seats.
However, despite all the progress, Mr. Saylor has made so far, he feels there’s still more work to be done to attempt to build up the roster as-is instead of tearing it down and rebuilding it from the ground up; he hasn’t gone that drastic yet. “While Lee and Bird had been impressive out on the outfield, it can’t be just the two of them out there. And while the pitching has me surprised from what they’re worth in my eyes, but…” he goes on before sighing, “I don’t know if I’ll ever find another starter like Butler again, though Oxden had been a good close second to me, it can’t be just him either,” harkening back to his days under the Boston Shamrocks with his young starting Pitcher James Butler who won multiple awards for his performance on the mound; he and his Pitching teammate Ben Burks were a great one-two punch back on the Shamrocks days before he finished, “But I will keep trying to look, I don’t give up that easily. I will keep compiling and building up a Better Outfield, Pitching staff, and a team overall as I did back in Boston”.
As Mr. Saylor summarized shortly before this meeting came to a close, he had in one season brought up a middling team closer to the playoffs than the Oilers had ever been since 1902, there’s still work to be done in Pittsburgh, fans are now eager than before to look forward to what 1910 had to bring for the Oilers no matter what would be to come for the team