Jake

The season ended July 31st. :banghead:

Actually, (and I can still say this for at least 8 more weeks) we've won the World Series more recently that you have. liar You mean the 8 more weeks part?

Yeah, I did. As much of a sham as he is, he still took care of his clients, and go them the money. That's his job, and he did it very well. Best in the business. It may not have been good for baseball, but it was good for his clients. However, what he did with A-Rod was not for his client's wishes. And, with this, he becomes a welcher. I never liked him, but I respected him. Now, no longer.

Pedro Alvarez says he's not reporting with out more money. Players union is filing a grievance that the agreement came after midnight. I used to have respect for Boras. But, he's a sore loser. Article and venomous fan rebuttal here: http://community.post-gazette.com/blogs/pbc/archive/2008/08/27/union-to-file-grievance-regarding-alvarez.aspx#comments

Actually, (and I can still say this for at least 8 more weeks) we've won the World Series more recently that you have.

Jason Bay fan? Big time. And Rob Mackowiack.

What are your thoughts on Karstens was his 2 starts against the Cubs and Diamondbacks a fluke or the real deal? The cubs win was more flukier than the DBacks win, to be sure. I (and I guess just about everybody) see Karstens as a middle of the rotation guy. Those guys throw great games from time to time, and I think he just happened to get those for his first two starts as a Pirate. I don't think it's the norm, but I do think it will be repeated from time to time.

I'm not letting my kids watch this. Oh, my 7 year old has decided she's now a Red Sox fan. I don't blame her.

Ho hum.

Some interesting numbers from the Pirates draft season after signing Alvarez last night: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08229/904846-63.stm Seems they're working very hard on exorcising the ghosts of Dave Littlefield and Kevin McClatchy. Remember this when, starting in '10, the Pirates begin a streak of winning the division for the next 5 years. :lol: Seriously... We now have players in the system who are about ready to join the majors in the next two years, and others a couple of years off. I don't think I could ever say that in my years as a Pirate fan.

That may have been a side benefit, but the underlying reason they traded Bay was because there was no chance of being retained after next year. The same could apply to Nady and Marte, but you can give Huntington the benefit of the doubt since both of those guys had value beyond their true abilities. There were some making the argument that we could retain Bay, especially after Nady was traded. If we extended him for two years @ 14 million/year, the cost of the outfield in '10 would be around @18 million, which should be affordable. Last night, we had another high scoring defeat - 13-7. We have the offense, even without Bay and Nady (although it's certainly not as potent as it was.) 26 of our 50 wins this year have been come from behind. Certainly, this attests to both the strength of our hitting and the weakness of our starting pitching. If the 8 players we traded for , We picked up two pitchers that can fill the back end of the rotation today. Two that potentially will be factors in the future. One outfielder who will, at the very least, compete for playing time. One with superstar potential who's added a lot of question marks to his resume. A relief pitcher who throws 97. And, a third baseman who used to be ranked very high. Theoretically, next year, McCutcheon's bat will replace one of Bay or Nady, if not in power than in overall support. Pearce now has competition from Moss for the other outfield spot. We'll have three guys vying for time at 3B (as opposed to no one this year) with (hopefully) Alvarez pushing them a year from now. And, our starting pitching is much deeper now. There was a rumor back in January that you guys were asking about McClouth. That's when I changed my avatar to McClouth (From Kendall). Trade him? Hardly. We may finally have a team that can compete now. (Emphasis on may ) The bottom line is we needed Pitching.

I don't know much of the history of the Pirates and their trades, but why wouldn't their minor leagues be pretty well stacked? They're a small market team. Ed Creech. Not to take anything away from Ed Creech - his drafting was, to be kind, awful. But, some of the Dave Littlefield were just.... I don't have the words. Let's take the Aramis trade. Yeah, he had to trade him. Fine. But, couldn't he have gotten a bit more than what he got? But, between awful drafts, and awful dumping of players, well..... you get the idea.

You're assuming our two trades this month were salary dumps. They were not. They were about replenishing the minor leagues, and depth in general.

Was it as bad as it looked? Maholm doesn't give up five runs too often.

SWAG on our lineup: Freddy McAlphabet Nate Doumit Moss Pearce Dirtbag Jack Maholm

http://community.post-gazette.com/blogs/pbc/default.aspx

Fixed. Sad, but true. Worth it in the long run, I hope.

If we were against Snell or Maholm, Id say we can easliy scratch out 3-4 runs if Marquis can hold them down, but when were facing a no name pitcher in his first start, at least in the NL, the Cubs are often baffled. Snell, yes. Maholm, no. With one or two exceptions, he's been lights out since the start of June.

How's rebuilding from Bonds leaving going for you? Not too well, unfortunately. Thanks for asking.

There goes the first shutout.

Where's Fred and all of his stats???

Well, uh, yeah. #-o

Going forward, Freddy will bat leadoff. He's hurt, but should be back tomorrow. McClouth will bat third. LaRoche (the healthy one) will start at Third. The outfiled will be, starting tomorrow, Moss, McClouoth, Pearce.

The desire to get one was there. But, two things. Most important, no one who had a young potential front line starter was making him available. The Rays have three, and all were untouchable. Also, we need quantity as much as quality. JVB didn't work out. Yoslan Herrera isn't looking to promising. We now have a couple of guys who can compete for those back end of the rotation jobs, something we needed. Bryan Morris could be a top of the rotation guy. Way too soon to call.

I believe we're 2 over .500 against all teams besides the Cubs. As for LLF's comments, it really has no basis in reality. The one thing that's going to help you today is that two of our best hitters were traded in the last week. The reality is, prior to these trades, we're a very good hitting team that can't pitch. We're not losing games 4-3. We're losing 7-9. In fact, 26 of our 50 wins have been come from behind wins. While we've lost two of our most productive hitters, there are still guys hitting. Look at Doumit. Look at Adam LaRoche's July numbers. I don't need to talk about McClouth. The problem has been starting pitching, pure and simple. It's kind to call it pitiful. Let's start with Matt Morris. ('nuff said there.) Snell & Gorzo have been a LOT worse than last year (Thanks, Jim Tracy). Maholm has been good, very good as of late. Duke was better this year than last, but still has a ways to go. Dumatrait had a couple of good stats but ended up on the DL. I won't even discuss the rest of the guys as there was maybe two good starts amongst them. It's no accident that 5 of the 8 players we acquired are Pitchers. But to say that not shutting us out makes us look better than we are has no basis in the facts. You do realize that Nady and Bay are both gone now, and Laroche is on the DL? Yes, I realize this. I meant to include it in my post. But, that still doesn't address the point that we are a good hitting team. Not as good as we were, but still good.