Once again Curacao Neptunus appears to be the winner of the transfer period. The Rotterdam based club has attracted five players to reinforce their ranks.
Last year the club from Rotterdam only acquired pitcher Kenny van den Branden from UVV. But this year the club acquired five from several clubs.
Dashenko Ricardo decided to move to Rotterdam. The player of team Kingdom of the Netherlands will join Gianison Boekhoudt behind the plate. Boekhoudt has also a couple of caps for the Dutch team. Both are in Taiwan right now to prepare for the upcoming Premier 12 tournament. Ricardo was the best hitter of his team in 2015. With Corendon Kinheim he batted .420, got four triples and drove in forty runs.
Another good hitter returns after a year of absence. Daniel Fernandez opted for Vaessen Pioniers in 2015. With that club he batted .315, collected 53 hits of which eleven doubles. He scored 34 runs and stole six bases.
Other players who decided to join the current Dutch and European champion are Byron Cornelisse, Steven van Groningen and Steven Wharwood.
Byron Cornelisse is the second player that leaves Vaessen Pioniers for Curacao Neptunus. The relief pitcher led the league in saves (9) in 2015.
Steven van Groningen comes from HCAW. With the club from Bussum he had the most (relief) appearances. He also led the team in wins (3), ERA (2.82), opposing batting average (.241) and saves (2).
Steven Wharwood decided to leave Mampaey the Hawks after the club lost the promotion/relegation series vs Oosterhout Twins. Wharwood led his team in slugging percentage (.365), doubles (6) and triples (2) and total bases (38).
A couple of players decided to leave Neptunus. Jorian van Acker, Adrian Anthony and Gyenuar Lopez decided to hang up their spikes. Backup catcher Maurik Huijser will play for Saints from Rotterdam. The team is playing a couple of divisions below the Hoofdklasse. Also Shurman Marlin will leave the club. He will play for Vaessen Pioniers next season. The brothers Gijs and Floris Timmer will also leave the club, even though Gijs never played for the Hoofdklasse team but played for their rookie team. Gijs will head to DSS from Haarlem and Floris will move to Oosterhout Twins.
I’d like to finish with a personal note.
What I am wondering is why Neptunus would get players Steven Wharwood and Dashenko 
Ricardo. The team already had a formidable lineup in 2015. The team won the championship easily. The team already had one of the best catchers in the league. The team already had a lights out outfield. As a team they were leading the league with a batting average of .326. They also led the league in on-base-percentage (.405) and slugging percentage (.444). Even though they were second in ERA (2.42) behind L&D Amsterdam Pirates, their pitching kept their opponents to a league leading (or low if you want to) batting average of .212.
Perhaps except for Jorian van Acker, it is not that the players that left had an enormous impact. By acquiring Ricardo, Fernandes, Van Groningen and Cornelisse, the shift of balance in the Hoofdklasse will be gone even more.
I think it is fair to say that Neptunus will be the strongest team once more and L&D Amsterdam Pirates will follow at some distance. After Pirates, the battle for third and fourth place may be even more interesting than it was in the previous seasons.
Of course it will be fun for Neptunus fans if the club will win its fourth straight championship (and perhaps their fifth, sixth and seventh straight in the coming years), but does that help Dutch baseball? Will the competition in the Hoofdklasse be more interesting? Not really. Dutch baseball is already dealing with declining numbers of spectators. When the gap between the top two and the rest will even get bigger, I fear that the attendance will even drop more.
Don’t get me wrong. I like to see a game at Neptunus. You see a good game of baseball there.
And of course you cannot blame the club for the financial dismay that some clubs are in. But in my humble opinion the acquisition of the stated players wasn’t really necessary. They already had one of the best catchers in the league. They already had a great bullpen. Regarding the bullpen, with Van Acker leaving and Loek van Mill likely playing at AAA next year, I can understand that the club was looking for reinforcements. I can also imagine that the club wants to repeat in the European Cup and eventually wants to win the Euro League Baseball. But still these moves will widen the gap between them and the rest of the Hoofdklasse teams and the league isn’t helped by that.
In all fairness, L&D Amsterdam Pirates also got two players that were impact players for the teams they played at in 2015. So to a certain extend, they can be blamed as well for the fact that the gap between the top two teams and the rest will widen.
Just my two cents.
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