Jake

It was ugly, I tell you. Ugly.

$10m per year for 3 or 4 years? Really? People thought that? Or $10m spread over 3 or 4 years? I've seen it mentioned, although I never really bought it. I mean, Pittsburgh turned down a $9.5m option this year and there were some people who suggested maybe he'd have been worth $9.5m for this one year, but it would have been idiotic to give him 4/40 or anything close. Not only did we turn that down, but we tried to trade him, and there were no takers. 10/year is just not something rooted in reality. If he were worth 10/year either we'd have kept him or someone would have traded for him. Note: We don't get a draft pick for him because he wasn't ranked.

YES!!!

That is actually a huge misconception. There was an article published last January saying that someone in the front office was pissed off about his weight, and it grew from there. He was not heavier than he should have been coming into camp. The real issue was he wasn't in top shape, emphasis on the top. He wasn't out of shape per se, just not in as good of shape as he should have been. Those who saw him at Piratefest last week say he looks great, though. Fingers are crossed, but breath is not being held.

Pedro, to be kind, Sucked last year. The optimist in me says he'll be OK. There's just too much power there. As for position, even before he was drafted, people were saying he'd eventually be a 1B. He's a big guy who has a reputation of not being mobile. Let's see what happens this season. Many pirate fans have written him off already. Me? I think there's too much talent there. He's supposedly in great shape right now. Let's see what he does this year. Having said that, his output last year is why we got McGeehee (sp?)

This is actually a good assessment of the trade. But, some of the accolades of this trade written earlier (traderape !), well, that's what is hard to figure out.

BOBBY HILL IS NOT NOTHING!!!!!! I'm sure he's a decent human being. But I'm glad he's no longer playing baseball for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Hardly a ringing endorsement. Yeah, but our strategy of overpaying for draft picks (See Josh Bell, Stetson Allie) was removed from the CBA, so our time of being good is probably over.

No one outside of Chicago liked the Amram trade. Get over that one. The front office that did that trade is long gone. Should be gone longer, but that's water under the bridge. First of all, you can't bring up the Bay trade with out bringing up the Nady trade if you want to trash our team. And, to be honest, our current FO, for the most part, sucks when it comes to acquiring major league talent other than the bullpen. But, as you bring up the Bay trade, perhaps you should read what the press was saying about that trade at the time it happened, and reconsider this trade.

How about good left-handed starters? Marshall is listed as a reliever in the MLBTR article. Are you suggesting he's a starter? Or are you referring to Travis Wood? Either way, he's a back end of the rotation starter. Not a commodity to be taken lightly, but still, a 3 at best. That ranking came before Torreyes showed elite contact skills in regular season A ball as an 18-year-old. He would have been much higher in the coming lists. No one is really projecting him to be a star. The guy weighs 14o lbs. how many 140 lb major leaguers are there ? Yeah, he's young and will fill out. Maybe he'll rank higher this year, but even so, would he crack anyone's (including ours!) top ten list?

Hey, if anyone's familiar with their team trading any and all remotely valuable players for prospects that don't pan out :lol: Ain't it the truth. And this, my friend, looks like a Pirate trade.

It's fun to read yinz guys reaction to this trade n'at. Good left handed relievers are not a dime a dozen, but a sought after commodity. Look at all of the teams looking for a good one. From MLBTR: "Baseball America ranked Sappelt and Torreyes as the Reds'20th and 22nd best prospects in last year's Prospect Handbook, respectively." You got a back end starter and two fringe prospects. A good trade, perhaps, but nothing that's going to put any team over the top.

I love this! This is great! We can't compete for free agents because we don't have the money. So, instead, we overspend on the draft. Now, we can't do that anymore! A good summary: http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/s_768718.html

Ludwick still not at the ball park. Lineup could change. Corresponding roster move has not yet been made.

Cutch, Jonesie, Kid, Lee, Ludwick, Pedro, Cedeno, Fort, Paul

BABIP is too subjective. How does it differentiate between a ball driven to the corner for a double vs a can of corn ? It doesn't. Here's my post from earlier. I think you're too hung up on the stats, and not seeing the forest for the trees. My question, basically, is while he has the lower LD% rate, where are the non-line drives landing? Are the ground balls finding holes aren't? Karstens is up there throwing a lot of junk. A lot this leads to soft popups, soft ground balls, etc. Balls in play, to be sure, but easily handled.

If Dave Littlefield had the money available, I'm sure he would have found a way to sign a worse contract.

Until this past offseason. And even then, I'm not so sure. which one are you thinking of from the offseason? there are a lot of trades that are really dumb but still a little bit understandable. like vernon wells is still a pretty good player (or at least was; this year he's been terrible) so i can understand why they'd want him, even though it's stupid to take on his entire salary while also trading players like napoli and rivera who had value. or trading a really good prospect like scott kazmir for a decent pitcher like victor zambrano. but what on earth was the motivation to trade for matt morris, immediately making him the highest-paid pirate in team history? the team was badly out of contention (like 20 games under .500 or whatever) when they acquired him, his performance had been declining to the point where he was at best a badly overpaid #4/5 starter, and the pirates really had no hope of contending the next year (final year of his contract) when he was due another $10 million. for their efforts the pirates got a handful of near-7.00 ERA starts before releasing morris, and blew almost $14 million on him. i can't think of a more inexplicable trade executed by a major league executive. As I just said in a previous post, it was to show that Moskos over Weiters was not about money. And, this was the dumbest of all of littlefields trades. Hands down. It's years later and we still cringe at the mention of it.

To be clear (Cause the truth is even more zany) Moskos was drafted over Weiters not because he was cheaper, but because he'd reach the majors faster. And, to prove money wasn't the issue, we traded for Morris. The guy who did all of this now works for the Cubs.

BABIP is too subjective. How does it differentiate between a ball driven to the corner for a double vs a can of corn ? UZR isn't perfect. And, there are a lot of guys not playing great defense. Lyle Overbay is one. Any catcher not named McKenry are 6 others. Pedro Alvarez will never will a gold glove, etc.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/pirates/s_747324.html Piece on Pirates defense. Just something we're talking about. We just took a series from the Reds, 2 games to 1. We scored a total of 4 runs in the series. Think about that. How'd we lose the third game ? 2 unearned runs (BTW, check out Karsten's ERA). The first game, rain delay, came with the bases loaded, 2 out, bottom of the first. Ground ball up the middle. Great stop by d'Arnaud (the goat yesterday). Most times (All of last year, in fact), that ball is going through, two runs score, Morton falls apart, we lose - we only scored 2 runs. Walker made a great play the next night. The video posted on the previous page - I didn't watch the whole thing, but it had a nice catch by Cutch.

You're gonna love when you find out who was the 1 player of those 5 to amount to anything. (What a mess of a sentence) And how the Pirates re-acquired him at their normal trade deadline dump that same year. (despite him doing nothing all season at the major league level. Only to trade him away later for a guy they'd non-tender a month after acquiring him. Sorry Jake. Heh, just saw this after my previous post. Yeah, we still talk about this.

Still talked about in the 'Burgh. Not to defend anything that happened there, especially since we had spots open on the 40 man, but ... If memory serves, the only player taken of the 5 to do anything in the majors over an extended time was Bautista. And, the reason for leaving him unprotected was that he only had 150 or so professional at bats and never played above A ball, it'd be hard to keep him on the roster. And, indeed it was - he was put on waivers twice. The thing is, he was claimed each time he was put on waivers, ultimately ending up back with the Pirates through a trade. Ultimately, it cost us Jeff Keppinger. Chris Shelton had a nice streak with the Tigers, but was gone by the end of the next year. Rich Thompson - don't know a thing about him. Jeff Bennet spent some time as a middle reliever with the Brewers Frank Brooks - don't know what he did. (Yes, I had to look up the names, save for Shelton and Bautista.) While it didn't really hurt in the long run, I don't mean to understate what a fiasco it was.

Still talked about in the 'Burgh. Not to defend anything that happened there, especially since we had spots open on the 40 man, but ... If memory serves, the only player taken of the 5 to do anything in the majors over an extended time was Bautista. And, the reason for leaving him unprotected was that he only had 150 or so professional at bats and never played above A ball, it'd be hard to keep him on the roster. And, indeed it was - he was put on waivers twice. The thing is, he was claimed each time he was put on waivers, ultimately ending up back with the Pirates through a trade. Ultimately, it cost us Jeff Keppinger. Chris Shelton had a nice streak with the Tigers, but was gone by the end of the next year. Rich Thompson - don't know a thing about him. Jeff Bennet spent some time as a middle reliever with the Brewers Frank Brooks - don't know what he did. (Yes, I had to look up the names, save for Shelton and Bautista.) While it didn't really hurt in the long run, I don't mean to understate what a fiasco it was.

First, you have to understand why Karstens & Maholm are doing well this year: The defense. Walker '11 >>>> Walker '10 & Iwamura. Cedeno '11 significantly better than Cedeno '10. Tabata '11 > Milledge '10. And, I could go on. The impending outfield of, Left to Right, Tabata, Cutch & Presley is going to lower your BABIP significantly. As is the defense. Yes, we're still weak @ 3B, but you get the idea. To that, I'll add this quote: As for the offense, yes, Cutch & Walker are the real deal, but you're leaving out Alex Presley. He's been doing it for 2 years now, no reason to think he'll stop. His OPS right now is over .900. Finally, let me add that they're not just beating up on pushover teams. They took 2 of three from the Red Sox and from the Philles. Other teams too. They still can't beat the Brewers, so there's a ways to go. A month ago, I wouldn't have argued the point - I was waiting for them to fall back to earth. But, they didn't. I've stopped waiting. Let's see what happens over the next two weeks - that will tell if my optimism is warranted. Going forward? There's reasonable talent in the minors. Look up Starling Marte. There was some great pitching @ AA Altoona last year, although all of those guys flaked out this year. Let's see what happens to them going forward. Danial McCutcheon, Moskos, Watson and Crotta have all made contributions during their rookie seasons. Brad Lincoln did well in his one start. In case of injury, He'll be fine in the rotation. d'Arnaud & Mercer are going to push Cedeno for SS. Gorkys Hernandez is doing some good stuff in Indy in CF. Matt Hague is putting up some good numbers at 1B. Are we a Championship caliber team right now? No. Probably not a division winner yet. There's still a lot of work to do. And the biggest part of that work is to get Pedro Alvarez on track. If we do (and there's reason to believe), a lineup of Presley, Tabata, Cutch, Pedro, Walker 1-5 is going to be tough to face - there's a good potential mix of speed and power. If we can get that slugging first baseman we covet, bat him third, Cutch second and Tabata sixth. Oh, to dream.... So, no, I don't see us going the way of the '03 Royals. I see the start of something good here. Attendance is up this year @ PNC park. I'm not the only one who sees it! (OK, that doesn't count - winning will do that.)