Heading down to PNC tonight for the last Pirate game I'll see in person for the foreseeable future. Paul Maholm and the same old Pirates will face off against Adam Wainwright and the suddenly contending Cardinals. Don't like the odds tonight, but then again, when do I?
This can be the starting point for the trade deadline open thread. I don't think we're going to do much today, but I don't think much like Dave Littlefield, either (thank God) so who knows? Unexpected rumor #1 on the day: the Tigers appear interested in Jack Wilson. I have a lot of packing to do today, but I'm going to be doing most of it in front of the TV, so I'll post updates as they happen.
UPDATE (1:20): The PG kind of updates the Wilson talks, which is to say that they're still going on. My guess is that DL focuses on this all day and fails to get it done while Marte, Chacon, and Torres go untraded. ESPNs deadline shows, which is one of the few things they still get right, goes on the air at 1:30.
UPDATE (3:24)- The best relievers on the board, Dotel and Gagne, are gone, but with about a half hour left to the deadline I haven't heard the names Marte, Torres, or Chacon come up anywhere. Either Detroit is asking for them along with Wilson or they're not going anywhere.
UPDATE (4:09)- Looks like nothin' from here.
RIP Bill Robinson. Bones has a nice remembrance of Robinson posted at Honest Wagner.
Not a link, but the play-by-play guy on ESPN just called Aramis Ramirez a Gold Glove candidate. And I will now light myself on fire.
Charlie talks about the rumors that Joe Garagiola Jr. will become the Pirates new CEO. I remember his dad from my old VHS tape, The Battlin' Bucs, the First 100 Years of the Pittsburgh Pirates. That's not enough to convince me that Junior would be the right move for the Pirates, though.
Reader Mark sends along this article about the decline of Jason Bay that ran at BP last week. If the author (Marc Normandin) is right, we've got a lot to worry about.
The biggest trade of the deadline has already gone down with Mark Teixeira going to the Braves. I wrote a little at FanHouse about the strong seller's market that seems to exist this year, but the king's ransom that guys like Tex and Linebrink are bringing could work in reverse for the Pirates with contender's becoming uninterested in selling off prospects for the now. Except the Braves, that is, who have apparently decided that this year is the last year the World Series title will ever be awarded.
From the papers: Gas Can Bayliss, back and more focused. Steve Pearce got promoted to AAA and is finally at an age-appropriate level. Rob Biertempfel discusses Bob Nutting's rank as one of the worst owners in the bigs. Dejan chats with angry Pirate fans.
So I guess the trade deadline is tomorrow. I've hardly written about it at all, and I'm sure you've noticed that. It's been a purely subconscious choice, I assure you. I think the problem is that I don't feel like getting terribly interested in the deadline this year. The one thing I've noticed in my now 2 and 1/2 years of blogging about the Pirates is that the harder I think about things and the more I understand the team, the more negative and depressed I get when it comes to all things Pirates.
When I started writing in April of 2005, I was your typical Pirate fan. A sophomore in college at the time, I had spent each and every March since about 6th grade assuring my friends that THIS year would be the year the Pirates turn things around. I didn't necessarily believe the spin churned out by the team (I didn't read any Pirate blogs before I started my own and I mostly just read whatever the PG's coverage of the team was), I just wanted to think things would be different. I didn't start writing from the perspective that the team was good enough to be a winner, but I really didn't feel like they were that far away either. Any long-time reader of the blog knows that my favorite whipping boy of 2005 was Lloyd McClendon, because I felt that Lloyd was really holding the Pirates back from being a good team.
I started writing for family and friends. To most of them, I have been the ultimate source of Pirates knowledge for a long time. Once my readership grew beyond that, it became pretty clear to me that I had a lot to learn. I don't like doing things half-assed and I don't like passing an opinion or a prediction off as my own unless I'm sure I know what I'm talking about.
I dunno, I suppose it has something to do with the whole "science" thing that generally rules my life outside of this blog. Accordingly, I started reading more about the Pirates and attempting to broaden my general baseball understanding beyond the batting average and ERA numbers that anyone can recite from the box score.
The more and more I learned, the more I realized how bad things were and still are here in Pittsburgh. You can't learn about the Pirates' minor league system and not be horrified. You can't take a good look at Ed Creech's track record and be impressed. You can't look at the players that Dave Littlefield holds in the highest regard and not be scared. They took at 67-win team last year in which at least two offensive players may have had career years (Sanchez and Paulino), added one above-average first baseman, and expected to be contenders. That's insanity. Baseball teams don't work like that.
That brings us to this deadline. Everyone's hopes (mine included) for the future of the Pirates rest on whoever Bob Nutting hires as the new CEO of the team when the season ends. The thing that really concerns me is that while we're waiting, the same old people that run this team are allowed to handle another trade deadline. This year there seems to be a pretty clear seller's market that exists. The Brewers overpaid for Scott Linebrink. The Braves just overpaid for Mark Teixeira. The Red Sox are allegedly close to overpaying for Jermaine Dye. And yet, I can assure you that if the Pirates make any deals at this deadline, whoever ends up with Salomon Torres or Damaso Marte or (God forbid) someone else even more valuable to this team will be sitting in their office tomorrow afternoon with a shit-eating grin saying, "Can you believe Littlefield caved like that! I know everyone said he'd drop his asking price at zero hour, but I never imagined we could get (Torres or Marte or whoever) for that little!" It's what Littlefield does. Ask for the moon, settle for crumbs. With the market at this deadline, I think there may have been a real chance to remake this franchise and start things off in the right direction. The problem is that I know the Pirates and investing myself in thinking that might happen won't do anything but get me all worked up and upset when it doesn't (like last year's deadline). Instead, we're putting all of our eggs in the CEO basket. But hey, what's three or four more months to wait when we've been waiting fifteen years?
In the first inning Ronny Paulino did a great impression of a croquet wicket by letting a pitch go right under his legs and allowing a run to score before Ian Snell could work his way out of a jam. The pitch was somehow not scored a passed ball and I thought to myself, "Well, that's game over." It pretty much was, as Nate McLouth's solo homer in the sixth was the only run we scored today. Snell pitched well, only giving up two other runs and striking out seven in six innings of work, but that wasn't enough for this pathetic excuse for a baseball team. This Kyle Kendrick fellow who had only five more strikeouts than walks this year struck out four today and walked one. Mark me down as "not surprised."
The Phillies are pounding the crap out of the ball right now. We are losing a lot of baseball games. I'm terribly afraid of Ian Snell getting Kip Wells/Jason Schmidt disease at this point in his career, which is giving up on the team behind him, trying to strike everyone out, and blowing his arm to smithereens and/or destroying his career. Kyle Kendrick starts for the Phils today. He's got a decent ERA and a decent WHIP in eight starts, but he's only got 19 Ks to go with 14 strikeouts walks, which is pretty awful and kind of Zach Duke like. I fully expect the most dominating start of young Kyle's career today.
UPDATE:And no insult for Snell today. Because this team just isn't worth the effort now. Or was that my insult? Ooo, tricky tricky.
This is actually a yesterday move, but John Van Benschoten was demoted back to Indianapolis, will skip Tom Gorzelanny in the rotation because of his stiff shoulder, and have put Tony Armas back in the rotation for now. I know you're excited to see Armas back in the rotation now that his ERA is under 7.00. Oh, that wasn't excitement was it? Just pure indifference.
I fully grasp the fact that Masumi Kuwata was a starting pitcher in Japan. I know he was good and that he used to pitch a lot of innings over there. I mean, I'm fully aware of all of this. And I still don't think that he's any more than a gimmick one out type reliever. Would I put Kuwata in the mound with the game on the line? Sure, if I needed one out and there was a big swinging righty up that hadn't seen his array of pitches (slow ball, super slow ball, super-duper slow ball, and a slow curve) before, I'd have no problem putting him up there to face that one hitter. Putting him on the mound and asking him to work through the scorching hot Phillies lineup with no outs, a one run lead, and bases loaded? Suicide.
I know Chacon and Torres are supposed to be the set-up guys, but they've both started and they can both pitch a couple innings. If you can't use them in that slot in the fifth inning, who are you going to use? Middle relievers aren't set-up guys and they aren't closers because they aren't good enough. Why is it OK to bring them in with the game on the line just because it's the fifth inning? I felt hopeless watching this game tonight with Kuwata serving up batting practice to the Phillies as a 5-4 lead turned into a 10-5 loss before I could barely even register what was happening.
Of course it's not completely fair to blame Kuwata or Tracy for this loss. We can't forget Jose Castillo, who dropped an almost sure double play ball on Shane Youman's last pitch of the fifth inning. Two outs and a runner on third is a bit of a different situation in a 5-4 game than bases loaded, no outs. Wouldn't it be nice if we had a good glove guy on the team to man third base since Castillo can't hit anyways? Oh, we traded for Cesar Izturis?
Sweet merciful crap, this team is just a huge cluster$*%& of a mess right now. I'm having serious trouble even paying attention, let alone watching.
Shane Youman takes the mound tonight to face off against JD Durbin. Youman's lat start was the best of his short Pirate career, and yet it wasn't enough to garner a win because the Pirates got shut out 1-0. With the way the Phillies have been hitting of late, I don't expect Youman to duplicate that showing tonight. In fact, I don't expect much of anything from anyone wearing black and gold any more.
Remember Lloyd McClendon? You know, our previous manager that had a short temper, liked to steal bases, and batted Tike Redman leadoff a whole lot, while thinking that maybe batting him third wasn't a terrible idea? Well, now he's being credited with helping the Detroit Tigers offensive turnaround this year. Read this quote from him in the Detroit News:
"Even early in the season, when Sheff was struggling, he had a lot of walks," McClendon said. "Here, he's struggling, and he's got this ungodly on-base percentage."I'm not much on batting average," McClendon continued, turning to Ordonez.
"I think that's the most overrated stat in baseball. I'm an OBP guy, a run-production guy -- and the best way I can describe Magglio is that he's a line-drive, .300 hitter who happens to hit home runs. And that's why he's having an MVP-kind of year.
What is he brainwashed? Under the Imperius Curse? Does anyone remember Lloyd McClendon even mentioning on-base percentage in his 4+ years here?
So... I guess Jim Colborn didn't help John Van Benschoten out a whole lot. I think he's probably hurt again, because he's just getting worse and worse right now.
On the other hand, Ronny Paulino went 3-for-3 and had an RBI last night. I guess that's nice?
Sorry for the lack of posting today. I'm in Pittsburgh finishing moving out of my apartment and don't have a ton of spare time. Not sure I can post before the game, so the gamethread is going up now. Jamie Moyer and JVB go at it tonight. Supposedly Van Benschoten and Jim Colborn have been having some good side sessions in the pen, so hopefully he won't suck terribly again today. Moyer, is well, old. But the Phillies have been killing the ball lately and are within striking distance of both the NL East title and the Wild Card. Which means these games are quite important for them, and not so much for us. I'd like to see the signs of life that we saw yesterday surface again in this series, but I'm not counting on it.
I think everyone here remembers Dr. Oliver and Mr. Perez, right? Ollie dominated us for five innings today, holding us to one hit (which was questionable) and striking out eight batters, looking just like the guy we all hoped he would be after that great 2004 season. Then he booted a groundball and lost it, in 2005-2006 Ollie fashion, giving up a home run to Josh Phelps and five "unearned" runs in the inning. The Mets pulled him after that disastrous sixth and the Pirates managed to score three more runs in the seventh without hitting a ball hard the entire inning. With the eight runs in those two innings, the Pirates topped their run total from the last three games (seven) and cruised to their second win in twelve.
Paul Maholm pitched well in this one, cruising after a rough spot in the first until a Lastings Milledge homer in the sixth and some trouble in the seventh. Still, it was more than enough to win and the Pirates actually managed to get him enough runs to do that (shocking, I know), lead by the three hit attack from Josh Phelps, who will now presumably start for Adam LaRoche based on this huge sample size of four at-bats (I'm not kidding).
Two wins in twelve games. That's a lot better than one in eleven. Right? Right?!?
This gamethread is going to have to be short because I just got back from the eye doctor's and my pupils are the size of dinner plates and I can barely read what I'm typing in front of me. Oliver Perez makes his first start against the Pirates since we unceremoniously shipped him off to New York almost a year ago (at least I'm pretty sure this is his first start against us). He's had the expected career resurgence this year and is again one of the better lefties in the NL. We can't hit worth crap, so he's probably feeling pretty confident. He's facing off against Paul Maholm, but Maholm could be Sandy Koufax and I would assume the Mets would still score enough runs to win this one.
As I mentioned the other day, after answering Joe's questions to run on MetsToday as a Pirates season preview, I asked Joe a couple questions of my own to run here. I, of course, asked about Oliver Perez to see what the Mets' fans think of our former ace. Here's Joe's reply:
Yes, he's for real. There are games where he looks like one of the most
dominant lefthanders in the NL -- a bonafide ace. And though there have
been a handful of poor appearances, they have been few and far between
and nothing like the meltdowns we saw in 2006 (OK, there was one game
where he went nuclear, but that was in April and it hasn't happened
since). Last year, he was either absolutely awful or surprisingly
brilliant, with most folks expecting the former. However, in 2007 we
expect to see him pitch well -- I think a big difference this year is
that even when he doesn't have his good stuff, he's still able to throw
strikes, compete, and keep the Mets in the game.
Is it Rick Peterson? Is it getting out of Pittsburgh? I think it's a
combination of both. From Ollie's quotes, and what we heard from
Peterson, Perez was very confused about what the Pittsburgh organization
was telling him. I don't know that it was Jim Colborn or someone else,
but when he arrived it was clear that he was mixed up mentally and had
completely lost confidence in himself -- and self-confidence appears to
be key to his success. His facial expressions and body language are the
telltale signs of his performance in any game -- and there's a marked
difference in those indicators when you compare a game from July 2006 to
one in 2007.
With the Mets, Peterson worked on finding the most efficient mechanics,
and has gotten Perez to focus on repeating that delivery. His mechanics
are still not 100% consistent, but he uses the same motion and release
point about 70-85% of the time, which has been good enough.
As I mentioned, confidence is key to Oliver Perez. The more he repeats
his mechanics, the better success he's had, and every good outing seems
to feed his psyche. If he's dominant in the early innings, there's a
good chance he continues through to the 8th or 9th -- solely because his
confidence is riding high.
Now watch, he'll be so keyed up in his start against the Pirates, he'll
pitch himself out the game by the second inning and make everything I
said sound like horsehockey!
Tom Glavine walks the bases loaded, we fail to score. Tom Gorzelanny gets pounded and leaves with a sore shoulder. The Pirates have lost 10 of 11, are 17 games below .500, and have the second worst record in baseball. I'm not sure things can get worse.
Oliver Perez is pitching tomorrow. Crap. Things might get worse.
Two left-handed pitchers named Tom G. will take the mound tonight at Shea Stadium. Tom Gorzelanny will attempt to do what few Bucco pitchers have done since the break: win. Tom Glavine has done a bit of winning in his career. If he wins tonight it'll be #299 for him. Our Tom G. is a long way away from being their Tom G.
Ian Snell is a very intense guy, which is why he's one of my favorite Pirates. Still, there are limits to how far a player should go when talking about teammates in the press. I'm pretty sure Snell crossed that line after last night's loss to the Mets. He was clearly upset about the double that fell between Bay and Nady that should've been caught and the ground ball that treated Kata like a croquet wicket but wasn't ruled an error, but man, he gave up a home run to John Maine. Here are some of his words:
"I'm starting to break. I'm getting stressed out. I don't know about these other guys, but I just want to win. I don't want to be called a loser. Man, even my family calls our team losers, and I don't want anyone to say that about our team."
[...]
"All I know is that I'm going to take the blame," Snell said. "Everything's my fault. I don't want to put any pressure on the team. Nothing."He paused again, then made a 180-degree turn.
"There were some balls I thought we could have caught. We could have given up only three runs. I could have stayed in the game. I threw 50 pitches, and I'm out of the game. But they didn't give those guys errors, either, so ... it didn't work out in my favor."
Either he's trying harder and harder to piss the front office off and get moved out of this mess or he's just a giant dick. Except that he's kind of short. But seriously, he gave up a home run to a pitcher.
I'm having a hard time finding things to say about this one. The team has pretty much mailed things in, from what I can see, and it's really depressing to watch. Snell gives up a homer to a pitcher, Bay doesn't run down a fly ball, Kata plays matador at third, Pirates lose for the ninth time in ten games.
I suppose if you're looking for positives, Bay did hit two homers to go with a single and a crushed flyout, so maybe he'll stop hitting like Pat Meares now (sorry, Pat Meares, you were way better than Jason Bay's been in the past month). Nady did have two doubles to go with Bay's homers, but we still lost in a game that wasn't terribly close. You know things are bad when Adam LaRoche singles in Nady in the first inning and my dad and I both reacted with, "And this is the only lead we'll have tonight." We were right, unfortunately.
I still can't believe Snell gave up a home run to a pitcher. Ugh. This is ugly and it's not going to get better any time soon, I don't think.
We kick off a three-gamer with the Mets tonight at 7. The Mets have a slim 3 game lead over the Braves in the NL East right now and could probably use some wins to distance themselves from the pack. Enter the Pittsburgh Pirates. We just lost two of three from the lowly Astros. Not getting swept this week would be an accomplishment. If you're up for some extra curricular reading, I've previewed the Pirates pitching staff for Mets fans over at Mets Today. In return, Joe from Mets Today answered a couple questions for me that I will post on Thursday (oh whatever could the questions have been about?).
Ian Snell starts today against John Maine. Maine has very good this year. That's bad, because we make bad pitchers look good. Snell has slipped a bit since the break, looking a bit more like he did last year. He's given up five homers in two starts and four of those five have been by left-handed hitters. He's got to stem the tide right now, because his big leap this year has mostly been rooted in keeping the ball in the park and getting lefties out. He'll definitely be angry because of the sign stealing thing, and when Snell's angry, Snell usually pitches well.
Ian, why would anyone need to steal signs with you on the mound? Talk about excess.
Dejan's article in the PG today talks about how the current Pittsburgh Pirates don't have any .300 hitters among the regulars (Ryan Doumit doesn't count, I don't think, because he doesn't have the at-bats ... not that he's hitting .300 right now anyways). I'm not exactly a fan of using batting average as the most important stat to gauge offense, so let's look at some other fun numbers.
The highest OPS among regulars is Xavier Nady's .813. Doumit is at .834 but may not qualify (he will need about 502 PAs, he's got 213 at the present). The highest on-base percentage among regulars? Jose Bautista's .338. That's pitiful. Forget the not having a .300 average thing, that's a much bigger indictment of our offense. The highest slugging percentage by a good margin is Xavier Nady's .479. Remember, Nady is the guy that the team wants you to believe is the breakout power hitting star of 2007, and he's not even slugging .500 (though he is the only regular player that's close to .500, LaRoche is next at .439).
So, as the team stands right now, it's possible that no player will even approach an OBP of .350, let alone .400 for the 2007 season. Nady is probably the only guy with a chance of slugging .500 and he, Bay, and LaRoche are the only guys on the might OPS .800 on the season (I'm including Bay on the assumption that he'll find his form somewhere this second half, that might be a big assumption). You can throw Ryan Doumit into these categories, but he probably won't qualify for any of the rate stats, so including him is dubious at best.
The thing is, .350, .500, and .800 are mostly used to identify good hitters, not great ones. What I'm trying to say is, our offense really, really sucks.
We asked for Troy Glaus in return for Jack Wilson. Just let that sink in for a minute. Troy Glaus. For Jack Wilson. Was Dave Littlefield actually serious?
Meanwhile, the Red Sox are apparently shopping Wily Mo Pena and interested in Salomon Torres. Wily Mo Pena. Lot of power potential. No signs of reaching it. Strikes out a ton. Awful at getting on base. Yep, dude was born to be a Pirate. Jeff Manto would work wonders on his career.
Just saw this over at Charlie's blog. It's a link to a story on the Pirates' site about John Van Benschoten's side throwing session today with this quote buried inside of it, where JVB talks about his minor league career with the Pirates:
"Coming up through the system and being the No. 1 pick and no one really stepping up because no one wants to mess you up," said Van Benschoten, who was the team's first-round selection in the 2001 First-Year Player Draft. "They have a big organization and they need to take care of other people, so I think being almost left alone has just come to a head this year with a crash course here."Umm. I don't have a lot to say here. This certainly speaks for itself. I posted a little more at FanHouse, but most of the stuff there you already know. Let me just reiterate that a first round draft pick, a guy that was mainly a hitter in college and drafted as a pitcher, said that he was mostly not coached in the minor leagues. This is incredibly unacceptable. Someone should literally be fired on the spot for this.
I think you have to try to lose 1-0 most of the time. I especially think that when you lose 1-0 and the 2007 incarnation of Woody Williams started for the other team.
I mostly feel bad for Shane Youman, who got his official induction into the Pirates rotation today. He only gave up four hits in eight innings and held the Astros one run over those eight innings and gets saddled with the L because of the Pirates offense. That offense mustered only six hits today and drew zero (!) walks off of Williams and Brad Lidge. Matt Kata had two of those hits (which means he's going to keep playing ... damn) and LaRoche, Nady, Bay, and Izturis had the other four. Unfortunately, only one of those hits was a double and only two of them came in the same inning (Izturis and Bay singled). That's the recipe for a shut-out and that's what happened today.
I suppose we can add Woody Williams to the list of shitty pitchers that have dominated us this year. If you're keeping track at home, we've lost eight of nine since the break to fall to 41-56. Things are falling apart quickly. This is getting ugly and fast.
So a day removed from a brutal seven game losing streak, the Pirates have to at least somewhat like their chances of taking this series from the Astros. Shane Youman is going to take John Van Benschoten's spot in the rotation today to face off against Woody Williams. Williams has been pretty crappy this year, but hey, the Pirates are the cure for what ails crappy pitchers. A win keeps the Pirates out of the cellar, a loss could plummet them right back in.
First a word on WHYGAVS Night. Sorry I kinda dropped the ball on the planning of this thing. If we're all still around next year and the Pirates haven't driven us completely away, then I'll try to make sure one of the weekends I get home next summer is a home weekend and we'll make sure we do this right next time around. As for this one, thanks to Brian and a host of other Lackeys for showing up, as well as Dana and Jeremy for stopping by to say hello. If you're wondering what watching a game is like, well, it's kind of like being in the comments for a game, only with real voices. Lots of proclamations of doom and being sure the Pirates are going to blow a big lead, only to be physically relieved when they don't.
Finally, the losing streak is over. Paul Maholm didn't seem to be pitching incredibly well tonight, but he got through six innings without allowing a run and he and Salomon Torres danced through raindrops to only allow 2 runs to score in the seventh. Torres and Marte did a similar dance in the eighth (allowing one run this time), and Shawn Chacon made things interesting, but ultimately nailed down a scoreless ninth.
But this one wasn't about the pitching. It was about the Pirates actually scoring runs. We all laughed about Matt Kata in the starting lineup, but he doubled his Pirate hit total and scored twice out of the leadoff slot. Adam LaRoche had three hits (he's got the same average as Jason Bay now) and drove in a pair, Jason Bay hit two weak pop-ups to Chris Burke with Freddy Sanchez on third base both times and Freddy scored both times, and Freddy hit his third (!) home run since the break to put the icing on the cake. And all of this came after Wandy Rodriguez set down the first nine batters and had nightmarish visions of a Wandy perfecto dancing in our heads. Whew. That would've been embarassing.
Oh, and if you were wondering, just in my field of view there were two (2) people reading Harry Potter in the stands instead of watching the game. Who said Pittsburghers can't read?
Early gamethread tonight. Paul Maholm will do his best to keep the losing streak from reaching eight games against Wandy Rodriguez and the Astros tonight. Maholm and Wandy have both pitched pretty well of late save their last starts, so tonight might be a quick boring game, kind of like last night's. I'm again expecting to see the Cesar Izturis debut tonight, but then again Matt Kata had a hit last night so maybe he'll get to play for a week or so. I'll be honest, I still have no idea what Kata even looks like. A loss in this one gives us sole possession of last place in the Central, a place that most of us thought would belong to the Pirates this year. The Reds have kept it warm for us for most of the season, but I feel pretty confident this team is ready to assume their proper place.
Again, as a final reminder for anyone coming to the game tonight, I'll be at the statue of Roberto around 6:30, so if you'd like to hang out with some WHYGAVS people, stop by and say hello. If you can't make it that early, I'm probably just going to stake out a spot on the rotunda for the game.
With the bases loaded and one out in the ninth inning trailing 2-1, the Pittsburgh Pirates sent Matt Kata, who had been batting second and playing third base all night, to the plate. Matt Kata. Kata struck out, then Freddy Sanchez (our three hitter with an OPS of .729) followed suit and did the same. But you know, I'm really happy with the guys this team has in place. We're moving in the right direction and I hope we can have a big second half and turn things around.
For the second time this year, Tom Gorzelanny pitched a great game save for a first inning homer and lost on that first inning homer because the Pirates have no concept of how to hit a ball or score runs. Guess who's in last place in the NL Central? Guess who's only a half game away from the worst record in the NL? Guess who's lost seven in a row? You guessed the Pirates, and you were right. What an inspiring week this has been for the Pirates.
If there's one thing that's been able to pick up the spirits of disgruntled Pirate fans this year, it's definitely the Astros. We're 6-0 against them and as near as I can tell, both of our series sweeps have been against them this year. They're slumping (1-5 since the break) and so are we (0-6 since the break). They're sending Roy Oswalt to the mound tonight to face off against Tom Gorzelanny. The lineups aren't out yet, but it seems possible that we will see the debut of Cesar Izturis in black and gold tonight. I know you're holding your breath. Personally, I just want to see any sign of life from this crappy team right now. People got mad when we walked out of a game last month, but people don't seem nearly as pissed that the Pirates are walking out on the season.
It's still Saturday. I know a lot of people can't come, but I'll be there anyways, so if you're coming, meet around the statue of Roberto at 6:30 on Saturday. Look for the guy in the "Pittsburgh Baseball, Rebuilding Since 1992" shirt.
Alright, we've had the better part of a day to digest the Pirates picking up Cesar Izturis, so let's take some time to break down what this could mean for the Pirates.
If the Pirates were a more logical organization, I wouldn't mind this move. The Cubs seem to be paying for most of it and he can play second or third while Bautista is hurt, be a better utility guy than our current options, and maybe play short if we trade Jack Wilson and want Bixler to get a full year in AAA (which I don't necessarily agree with, but could at least understand). I'd say he's here for now and we'll buy him out at the end of the year and that's that.
Here's the problem. We're the Pirates. Dave Littlefield is our GM. Jim Tracy is our manager. I have this sinking feeling that Izturis has been acquired because Tracy and Colborn are mad at Jack Wilson and want to teach him a lesson after the dugout incident the other night. Izturis is a crappy hitter and not a terribly valuable player, which makes me certain that Tracy is one of his biggest fans and will do his best to insert him into the lineup at every possible junction. Buying him out is certainly the only logical thing to do when the season is over. I am in no way convinced that is going to happen.
That's the thing with being a Pirate fan. Sure, the move makes sense, but only from a logical standpoint. Do you really expect the Pirates to do what's logical? If you can see a way a move will go wrong, that's probably the direction the Pirates are moving in. Until they can show me otherwise, that's what I'm going to assume.
The Pirates picked up Cesar Izturis today for a player to be named. This is the same guy that was traded for Greg Maddux at the trade deadline last year. There is absolutely no reason for the Pirates to make this move unless Jack Wilson is about to be traded. They've already got Jose Castillo, Don Kelly, and Matt Kata eating roster space on this team and Izturis is no better than any of them. He's actually worse than Wilson, though he'd be a lot cheaper if the Pirates manage to move Wilson. Oh, and he's played for Jim Tracy before. No word yet who's getting moved off the roster to make room at the moment, though I'd bet on Kata or Kelly unless the Pirates are planning on announcing a second move in very short order.
UPDATE: Let's talk about the monies here. Izturis is making $4.15 million this year. I doubt the Cubs are chipping any money into this deal because they're probably making it to get rid of the contract. We'll have to buy him out at $300,000 at the end of the season or pay him $5.45 million for next year, which would be ludicrous. He's probably one of Jim Tracy's guys though, so don't assume that his time in Pittsburgh will be over after 2007 just because his contract is.
UPDATE #2: The article that's now up on Pirates.com says that cash considerations are included in the deal, which is nice.
UPDATE #3: The PG updates their story with this:
General manager Dave Littlefield flatly rejected the notion that acquiring one former All-Star shortstop necessarily means another soon will be shipped out."This has nothing to do with Jack Wilson," Littlefield said.
I hate you Dave Littlefield. I hate you.
OK, so we're really putting things off 'til the last minute here. Regardless, for anyone in the area WHYGAVS Night at PNC will be this Saturday, July 21st for the 7:05 game against the Astros. Without much time to sort things out, I'm thinking everyone should just buy cheap tickets and we can pick out a spot on the rotunda for the game. Who's interested? What time does everyone want to meet? Where? Are there any under-agers planning on coming (in which case a bar is not the optimal meeting place)? Let's talk about this in the comments and when the thread gets pushed down, I'll add it to the top of the sidebar. I'll post updates as they happen.
Sometimes I forget why the Ian Snell insult game ever got started. It's because Snell is a crazy m-f'er that will use anything he can find to get himself pissed off and fired up. After a poor start last year, he invented a slight from the Phillies and went out and dominated them, then did very little looking back from that point on. It was then that I suggested insulting Snell before every start, because it happened a couple other times last year.
So, Snell's had two straight crappy starts after the break where he's giving up gopher balls like crazy. What does Snell do? Accuse the Rockies of stealing his signs and promise to put a fastball in one of their earholes, Salomon Torres style, if he sees them again this year. This is why Snell is my favorite Pirate. I've already got the next Rockies series (August 20th-23rd) circled on my calendar. I don't know if the Rockies stole his signs today and I don't care. Ian Snell is pissed and that probably means good things for the next time he takes the mound.
Well, this is unfortunate. Someone appears to have stolen the 2007 version of Ian Snell and replaced him with the 2006 version. You remember that incarnation of Ian, the one with a ton of promise that also happened to serve up homers to left-handed batters like they were tootsie rolls and he was in a parade. He's now given up five homers in two starts since the break and four of those five were hit by guys standing on the left side of the plate. Todd Helton and Brad Hawpe were the culprits today, turning a 1-1 game into a 5-1 game with a pair of two-run jacks. Those outweighed the solo shots hit later in the game by Freddy and LaRoche and thus, we lost.
It was too bad, too. Snell was locked in early on with four strikeouts in a row to end the first and second innings. From there, Rajai Davis misplayed a Troy Tulowitzki ball into a double and Snell gave up a hit to pitcher Jeff Francis to tie the game up and things went all downhill from there. Six losses in six games to start the second half. Kind of reminds you of the way last season started, doesn't it? Glad to see things have changed so much.
The worst fear of a jobless blogger ... a baseball game that starts within an hour of when I wake up. The Pirates are trying to avoid a sweep at the hands of the dreaded Rockies today. I know, I laughed a little when I said it, too. Anyways, Snell takes the mound and will probably kill someone out on the field if the effort the Pirates put forth today resembles the effort put forth in the other games since the All-Star break.
Hey, Ian. You care waay to much! Hasn't anyone told you you're a Pirate? Just mail it in man.
What can I say about this team? They're playing bland, uninspired, poor baseball right now. Josh Fogg shut us down tonight save Nate McLouth's homer (which was honestly one of the hardest hit balls I've seen in person). In fact, McLouth's monster homer was one of two impressive things that I saw tonight. The other was a Masumi Kuwata 86 mph fastball. I didn't think the dude had it in him.
Josh Fogg had nothing on the ball tonight. For the first couple innings every out, every hit, and every foul ball was hit hard. See Fogg's thing is that he throws strikes. That should be great for a team like us that swings at everything. The guy has nothing on the ball and throws strikes. Time for a hitting bonanza, right? Wrong. Jason Bay reminds me of when I used to umpire for 9 and 10 year olds (worst job I ever had, by the way). Every team had a kid or two (or seven) that would bat in the back of the lineup and go up to the plate without a clue, praying to walk. That's what Bay looks like to me right now. He's got no idea what pitch is coming next ever.
The ninth inning tonight was the most pathetic thing I've ever seen at the ballpark in my life. Manny Corpas was on the mound for the Rockies tonight. He's been pretty decent this year, but he's definitely no JJ Putz. Except against the disinterested, mentally already at home Pittsburgh Pirates. Corpas threw twelve pitches tonight. All twelve were strikes. And he struck out the side. With Nady, Doumit, and Bay at the plate. Ugh.
I'm headed to the park tonight, weather permitting, to hopefully see Shane Youman stop this ugly skid the Pirates are on right now. Youman hasn't been terribly impressive in his two starts with us, but he has managed to win both of them and that's more than most of the rotation is doing right now. He's certainly been more encouraging than John Van Benschoten has to this point this year. The Rockies will counter with old friend Josh Fogg tonight. Fogg's been pretty terrible this year, but he seems like just the type of pitcher that's dominated us this year. I'm certainly almost expecting to see some old school Josh Fogg (not that old school Josh Fogg was that good) tonight at PNC Park tonight.
Very short on details thus far, but the Pirates have signed their first round pick Daniel Moskos.
I feel pretty sorry for Moskos, actually. I have a strong feeling that he's going to become the scapegoat for a lot of people for everything that's wrong with the Pirates. The guy can barely even get into a bar and have a drink and now he's going to have several thousand angry people holding him up and holding him responsible for what a couple idiots have done that's way out of his control.
No word yet on where Moskos will start. I would hope he'll start at least at Hickory, especially if we're going to use him as a reliever. If Brad Lincoln is any indication he'll probably get a couple appearances with Bradenton in the GCL before he gets moved up to anywhere, but in order for this pick to have a lot of value he's going to have to move through the system quickly. I guess we'll wait and see. There's a press conference sometime later today I think and I guess we'll learn more then.
I suppose this is the final fall-out of the Michael Barrett saga, the Cubs have traded Rob Bowen and a minor-league pitcher to the A's for the one and only Jason Kendall. This can't really be a great move for the Cubs. Kendall is washed up and has literally been the second least valuable offensive player in the league this year. Still, I guess Rob Bowen sucks pretty hard Wrigley Field is much more of a hitter's park than whatever they're calling the Oakland Coliseum now. Still, I just can't imagine this move helping the Cubs out a whole lot. I guess they're only giving up Bowen and a minor league reliever, but Kendall just seems so washed up that I fail to see this being the move that pushes them past the Brewers. I suppose he's coming cheap this late in the season and with us paying a hefty chunk of his big salary. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
On the bright side we didn't manage to make Taylor Buchholz look like Christy Mattewson.
On the not so bright side, John Van Benschoten really sucks, Jack Wilson is lazy, Jason Bay is colder than liquid nitrogen, the players and coaches might hate each other, we've lost four in a row, we're 12 games under .500, we managed to fake a comeback yet again, it hasn't rained in like a month, Dave Littlefield is still employed, we're just a year away from matching the most futile record in the history of sports, and ... I dunno. I could go on but I won't. What I'm getting at is, "things are shitty."
Well, the disastrous Atlanta road trip is over. Unfortunately, the Pirates don't have much time to sit home and lick their wounds because they're coming straight home to play the Rockies tonight. The Rockies are one of those teams that's doing what we're supposed to be doing (that is: rebuilding) and doing it pretty well. They're just a game below .500 this year in what is probably the best division in the National League (that's the West, if you weren't certain). Taylor Buchholz and John Van Benschoten will go at it on the mound tonight. We saw him twice last year when he pitched for the Astros and he's a good candidate for the "crappy pitcher we make look like Christy Matthewson" award, which we've already given out several times this year. And yes, I think that's the first time I've mentioned Christy Matthewson on the blog. It's been far too long.
Not sure if Perrotto is working from an actual list somewhere or just pulling names out of the air, but he's got a long list of people that he thinks Bob Nutting might talk to about replacing Kevin McClatchy. I'm not familiar with everyone on this list, but here's what I do know: Lucchino's not coming here and if they're named Duquette, they're going to be a bad hire. Beyond that? I dunno, knowing how the Pirates like to operate, guys with phrases like like "local ties" and "Western Pennsylvania guy" in their blurbs would be the front-runners. I don't really think this list is worth much speculation, just because it seems like a bunch of names thrown at a wall to see what sticks. I suppose it's somewhere to start from, though. My nightmare scenario: hire Jim Duquette, who in turn hires Steve Phillips to replace Dave Littlefield. I will renounce the Pirates forever and I'm not kidding.
Well, that closes out a nicely lackluster series. I thought maybe when Freddy Sanchez hit a homer in the second AB of the game off of Buddy Carlyle that maybe our fortunes would be different than in the first two games of the series. I should've known better. You can add Carlyle to the list of crappy pitchers that have dominated us this year, a list that seems to grow and grow by the week.
Today was a pretty typical Pirate loss. The Braves scored on a wild pitch/passed ball in which Doumit and Maholm either got mixed up or Doumit just failed poorly in his predesignated job of "catching" the ball, they scored on a Jose Castillo throwing error, they scored on Salomon Torres, who's return didn't look much than before he left, but none of it mattered because we didn't score after Freddy's homer. Carlyle cruised through eight innings on 91 pitches, only allowing four hits and striking out four to go with no walks. Bob Wickman closed out the game on six pitches and the Pirates hightailed it to the airport, probably eager to pretend like this weekend never happened. Too bad that's not really an option.
Paul Maholm takes the mound at 1:05 today to try and avoid a sweep that would pretty much erase all of the optimism that surrounded this team going into the All-Star break. His mound opponent will be Buddy Carlyle, who's been pretty average in eight starts this year. Maholm's been better than that of late, but the week off seems to have affected Ian Snell and Tom Gorzelanny, so Maholm may be a little rusty, as well (of course Chuck James and Tim Hudson weren't rusty at all, so maybe it's more of a function of good offense vs. bad offense, we shall see). Bouncing back from two pretty bad losses would be a nice thing to see from this team. Will we see it? Well, I'm not holding my breath.
We have the worst luck with these damn rain delays. Earlier in the year, we blew a big lead to the Cubs just in time for the rain to come and delay the game to the next day when the Cubs finished off the win, then beat us again for good measure. Tonight we come storming back to tie the game just before a deluge, then have the rain come just in time to cool our bats off and have the Braves eek out a win against us.
We should mostly thank Bobby Cox for even being in this one. After Chuck James dominated us (for the second time this year) through six innings, holding us to two hits, Cox yanked him about 95 pitches and watched Tyler Yates and Rafael Soriano blow the lead as quickly as they could, highlighted by Ryan Doumit's pinch-hit three run homer. That didn't matter because Shawn Chacon had no grip on the strikezone tonight (four walks, one intentional over one and two-thirds) throwing only 20 of 43 pitches for strikes. That makes it pretty hard to win, and accordingly, we lost.
Tom Gorzelanny and Chuck James, already in progress. If this one had gone up before the game started, I would've told you that bouncing back from last night's embarrassment was relatively
important. We're already down 4-0, so all I can really say is "ugh."
This is only a blog. I don't really have much in the way of sources. I mostly only have opinion. But I honestly don't think Mark Cuban applying to buy the Cubs is a big deal to anyone that hopes he's going to buy the Pirates. Yes, Cuban is rich. Yes, Cuban is interested. But Cuban is also incredibly headstrong and arrogant (he's suing his old coach for beating him in the playoffs for chrissake) and he's not a friend of Bud Selig. What I mean to say is that if he wants to own a backwater franchise like the Pirates, Selig might allow that (if the Pirates ever go up for sale). But a marquee franchise like the Cubs? Come on. One of Selig's friends is interested in the team at the moment, and that makes him a very clear front-runner. Unless he's not interested at all, Cuban's got nothing but money and hopes right now.
Gee, thanks for coming tonight, guys.
The Pirates decidedly remained on break tonight with Snell giving up homers to lefties like it was 2006, people spacing out in the field, and runs just not really getting scored at all. In the first inning LaRoche made a bad error, the second base umpire made a bad call, and Snell gave up a three run bomb to Brian McCann. It looked for a while like we could keep things close at 3-0, but Snell hit the wall in the sixth and it went from 3-0 to 9-0 before I even knew what happened. There were balls flying out of the park, a piss-poor Grabow sighting, and Tony Armas (?!?) slamming the door on things (his scoreless 2 and 2/3 innings dropped his ERA way down to 8.18).
There wasn't much else to talk about from this one. I personally loved the part where Ronny Paulino singled in Jason Bay and Greg Brown called it a "small victory" for the Pirates, or something to that effect. Umm, nothing about tonight was victorious. We were roundly crushed in no uncertain fashion. Just because we scored a run off of a crappy reliever in the ninth inning doesn't mean we achieved any sort of victory at all tonight. We lost because we played like crap. End of story.
It seems like forever since we've actually had a baseball game to talk about. I guess it's only been five days, but that definitely seems like forever. The well-rested Pirates and the well-rested Braves will go at it tonight at 7:35 in Atlanta. Tim Hudson and Ian Snell will take the mound.
The question for the Pirates is whether or not their sudden streak of competence that they flashed into the break can last. They're on a 9 of 13 stretch currently, though that seems like ancient history to me right now. I honestly think their best shot at .500 is to get really hot and mostly even things out, then play around .500 ball the rest of the way out rather than to constantly play above .500 for the entire half. Of course, I think they're only going to win about 73 games this year, so you probably don't want to ask me how they're going to get to .500.
Ian, I'd call you stupid but this is the Ian Snell insult game and it's no time for me to be insulting stupid people by lumping you in.
Remember the WHYGAVS poll? Well, it's back (under the "About Me" if you're having trouble finding it). The question is a simple one, how many wins will the Pirates finish with this year? Click your answer, then defend it in the comments if you'd like. As usual, I'll leave the poll up for a week.
Actually, the second half has already started, but everyone likes to call all the games after the All-Star break the second half, so let's just go with that. Are the Pirates a second half team? Can they get to .500? Can they compete in the second half? Let's try and answer those questions.
The Pirates finished the first half at 40-48. That puts them on pace for 73-74 wins. I can't find the exact post in which I said this, but my pre-season guess was 73 wins. So that means that in order for me to think they're going to play better than that, I have to have seen something from the Pirates in the first that I didn't expect to see that makes me believe that they're going to be better in the second half. I'm not going to lie. I haven't seen that.
For every player that's had an encouraging first half (Snell, Gorzelanny, Nady), there's at least one that's had a disappointing first half (Duke, Bay, LaRoche, Paulino). Maybe the under performers will start to play better, but what's to say the overachievers won't come back to earth? It's easy to let this last stretch make things seem rosy from here on out, but 13 games isn't even a tenth of the season. It's great to see the Pirates play well over this stretch, but it's just not enough for me to call them a good team.
I'm not trying to be negative here and I'm sorry if that's how I'm coming off, but as likely as Bay is to heat up, Nady is just as likely to cool off a bit. As likely as Duke is to find his stride after his injury or Maholm is to keep up his good work of late, Snell and Gorzelanny are to come back to earth. Not that they're going to be bad, mind you, just that they'll be a little more in line with what's expected. LaRoche might heat up? Doumit might cool off. There are still a lot of things that have to go right and stay right for this to be a team that's eight games over .500 in the second half. I know they came close last year, but they had a statistically unlucky first half last year that was followed up by a statistically lucky second half. Their final record last year was much more indicative of them as a team than their 37-32 second half.
What I'm going for is that I still think this is an inherently flawed baseball team. I see people asking if I think the Bucs should be buyers or sellers at the deadline. The answer is that if you really think about this team as a whole, and not just about the last 13 games, do you see them contending this year or next year? Do you see the addition of Walker and McCutchen and maybe Bixler and Pearce as the last pieces of the puzzle by 2009? I don't. Until that puzzle is together, we have to be sellers. But who do you sell off of this team? Someone might be interested in Chacon, but how much could he really bring? Last year he brought a soon-to-be free agent Craig Wilson to the Yankees. He might be slightly more valuable now, but not much. What about Torres? His value is an all-time low right now. Jack Wilson? I'm sorry, but anyone that takes him in a trade will view it as them doing us a favor. We could trade Jason Bay, but that's a white flag for the organization, a sign we're starting over. I know that won't fly with the front office or the ownership. Besides, do you trust Littlefield to do the right thing if he trades Bay? He's spent a year and a half trying to build up the bullpen, and look at the bullpen.
I'm not trying to be hopelessly bleak. There are a lot of players on this team I like, probably more than on Pirate teams of the recent past. I'm just not sold that this team is a contender yet, or close to it and I don't think the people running the team know how to get it there.
Do people still want to do this? I'm thinking the July 21st game against the Astros. I know it's Paul Waner number retirement night and all, but it's really the only option left. It's a bit late to do a whole lot of organizing, but we can always buy tickets and stand together on the rotunda or something similar to that. What does everyone think?
Here it is, the end of the mid-season rundown. It's the pitchers.
Ian Snell- Ian Snell is the straw that stirs the drink on the Pirates. I haven't seen a Pirate that hates losing like Snell does since, I dunno, ever. He gets fired up for every start like it's game seven of the World Series. He drove himself to become one of the best starters in the league this year just because no one thought he could do it. I know it's only a couple years into his Pirate career, but Snell has a chance to be my favorite Pirate since Van Slyke. Not kidding.
Tom Gorzelanny- I had high expectations for Gorzo this year, but he's blown them all away. He's not quite been better than Snell and I think he might be out-pitching his peripherals a bit, but screw it. He's only 24 and he's getting better. I'm a bit worried about some high pitch-counts he's rung up and I think it's something to keep an eye on, but I'm not overly concerned. Yet.
Paul Maholm- He got off to a terrible start. Since his loss to the Yankees dropped him to a 2-9 record with a 5.33 ERA, he's actually been decent. Not great, mind you, but much more serviceable. He has a 3.53 ERA in his five starts since then and he's held opposing hitters to a .230 batting average. In 35 and 2/3 innings he's got 23 strikeouts to go with 9 walks and he's only allowed three homers. If he keeps this up, he'll be a downright decent 3 or 4 guy. I've gotta see it for more than five starts though.
Zach Duke- I hope his struggles are due to his arm problems. I want to believe they are. Ask me if I think they are. Go on. Ask me. I don't think they are. He just gives up a ton of hits and doesn't miss bats at all. That's not going to cut it in the big leagues. I hope he figures out what's going wrong on his rehab starts since he won't be back for a while, but I dunno how much minor league competition can help him at this point.
John Van Benschoten- Given all of the arm surgeries he's had, it's a miracle he's on the field. Unfortunately, it's not been a terribly helpful miracle. It's more along the "water to wine" than "raising the dead." Still, I suppose he's better than Tony Armas.
Shane Youman- I don't understand this guy. I wrote a long post about him over the winter in which I concluded that he's just kind of hard to hit and I don't know why. I hate to be terribly rigid about things, but being as involved in science as I am, I like an explanation for things. Youman doesn't strike out a ton of guys and he walks quite a few. And yet, he's had a very successful minor league career and he's been pretty good in two short stints with the Pirates. This guy makes less sense to me than P-chem. I don't expect it to continue, but it wouldn't surprise me if it does.
Shawn Chacon- Surprisingly competent this year. He wasn't great as a starter (save his ten strikeout game that we found a way to LOSE), but he's been pretty solid out of the pen and I guess he's probably the primary set-up guy at the moment. His high WHIP worries me, but he's striking batters out a rate that's a lot higher than his career rate, which is an encouraging sign. I'm happy with him in the pen right now.
Matt Capps- I'll cop to being completely mystified as to how a guy with a 94-mph fastball and little else gets as many guys out as Capps does, but the dude does it. He's been even better than he was in his rookie campaign last year and as long as his arm stays attached to his upper body, I think we've got ourselves a closer for a while.
Damaso Marte- In 36 appearances, he's pitched less than 27 innings. He's been lights out against lefties and not sucky against righties. Unfortunately, I don't think I trust him in a bigger role than the one he has right now. Still, given the bullpen nightmares of this season, I think he's got to get at least a bit of an expanded role in the second half.
John Grabow- Last year was a step forward for Grabow into becoming a competent and useful reliever. Thus far this year has been two steps back.
Salomon Torres- I think his arm injury may have contributed to his poor showing this year. After a pretty bad April, Sully was pretty good in May until he started blowing saves again. I'd love him back in a seventh or eighth inning role if he gets his arm in shape, but he no longer really wants to be here. Not that I blame him.
Masumi Kuwata- I actually like the signing of him, just because of the press it's gotten in Japan and the increased presence of the Pirates over there can't be a bad thing. But he's a gimmick reliever. Bring him in to get one hitter out that has a weakness for breaking stuff and get him the hell out of the game. He's ancient and he doesn't take long to figure out.
Hold your breath for the following
John Wasdin- Sucks.
Tony Armas- Sucks.
Jonah Bayliss- Sucks, but is kind of young.
Josh Sharpless- Sucks, but is kind of young and local.
Brian Rogers- Sucks, but is kind of young.
Marty McLeary- Sucks.
Dan Kolb- Sucked, but is gone now.
Juan Perez- I forgot he even pitched for us this year.
Quick links and some new blogs for the blogroll for everyone to enjoy. The most boring day of the season seems like a good day to do this.
How can you not love a blog named Be Like Tike?
More Pittsburgh sports focused than Pirates-focused, but the name is a good one, Doubt About It. Somewhere, Lanny is crying.
The Pirates Fans For Change have their website up and running. I like the looks of it, but if you're at work turn the speakers down because there's some music.
Meanwhile, HW points us towards a Tracy Ringolsby column expecting big changes with the way the Pirates are run. I sure hope so. Since it's a slow baseball news day, I already posted a take over at FanHouse.
I kinda slacked on these yesterday, but here's the rest of the hitters and the pitchers will follow sometime later today.
Jack Wilson- Sadly, Wilson's .259/.317/.364 line this year gives him the second best OPS+ of his career to date, one of 80. The worst part about Wilson's performance this year is that he spaced out for like a week, playing awful defense and seeming to not care about anything on the field. That lead to his actual benching in favor of Jose Castillo, who gave the team a shot in the arm with his play. Think about that statement. There's no use left for Wilson on the team here in Pittsburgh and it would be nice to find a team that wants a defense first shortstop for a pennant run (Red Sox?), but Wilson's contract makes him pretty much worthless to anyone. So, he talks too much, slacks off, and on top of everything, sucks. He's pretty much my least favorite Pirate right now.
Freddy Sanchez- It has become very clear that if Freddy's not hitting around .320 or higher, he's not a very valuable offensive player. Hitting .300 just isn't worth much without on-base skills and a bit of pop. Freddy has very little of either. He's still batting .296, but he's only got on OPS of .709, almost 150 points lower than last year. He's on pace to lose about 15 doubles and 2 homers from last year, too. It just seems like teams have figured out how to play those little drop doubles he hit down the lines last year and he's struggling for it. On top of everything, he's playing pretty bad defense at second base. Hopefully he can re-adjust and get a little hotter in the second half, but in the first half, well, he's no All-Star.
Adam LaRoche- After waiting all year for this guy to break out, it's finally happened. How hot has he been in the last couple weeks? Consider this, after a .133/.255/.265 April, he's got his line up to .239/.324/.439, which gives him an OPS+ of 100, exactly league average. When he's hitting, it's hard to believe he ever slumped as bad as he did because he looks so effortless at the plate. The first half was definitely a disappointment, but I'm expecting big things from LaRoche in the second half.
Ryan Doumit- Ahh, Doumit has finally embraced his role as the new Craig Wilson. Spurned by management, the guy tears the cover off the ball whenever he plays, but mostly unsubstantiated rumors of nightmarish defense keep him from being an every day player. Doumit's hitting well from both sides of the plate this year and has already set a career high in doubles and matched his career high in homers. He's also got the best outfield arm on the team, though it's clear that the place he belongs is behind the plate because there's not really any other viable options there as far as logical people are concerned.
Ronny Paulino- But logical people don't run the Pirates, so Ronny Paulino gets most of the starts behind the plate. Certainly, Ronny is a better hitter than his first half line of .234/.279/.348 indicates, but there's little reason to believe his .310 average from last year can be replicated. He's a bad defensive catcher with an undeserved reputation for handling the pitchers given small and skewed sample sizes between he and Doumit. Pretty much, he's a backup catcher and the sooner the Pirates realize it, the better.
Jose Bautista- Another guy for whom the second half will be the measuring stick for his year. He started out strong, but has tailed off badly in the past couple weeks and that's scary given how he did the same thing in the second half last year. When he's on he's got nice pop and can get on a ton. When he's off, he's clueless. He's surprised by playing some nice D at third this year.
Jose Castillo- Same old, now without power. He would probably make a nice utility guy on a team that wasn't playing utility guys at second and third already.
Josh Phelps- Still uncertain of his purpose on the team.
Don Kelly- No idea why he was ever on the team in the first place.
Humberto Cota- is still breathing.
Matt Kata- ?
It's on. Freddy's there for us. People are telling me the NL has to win to salvage pride. I don't believe that. Does this thing still matter?
I give Paul Meyer at the PG a lot of flak for his fluffy writing style, but I've got to be honest, I'm really enjoying the series he's running on the freak show '97 team (part 1 here and part 2 here if you've missed them so far). I was 12 that summer and a lot less critical of things than I am now. I remember assuming that the 78 wins meant that we had a good core of young players that would kick-start the franchise. Clearly, I was wrong and now there's only a few players from that team even left in the league. Still, it was certainly fun while it lasted, and that's why reading Meyer's stories about it are fun, too.
Isn't this just the most boring time of year? Right when the Pirates were getting really fun to watch, we have to take three days off. I'm working on the mid-season stuff to keep churning out over the next couple days, but tonight I'll be liveblogging the Home Run Derby over at FanHouse. Sure the derby is kind of long, but it can still be a lot of fun. Besides, what else are you going to watch tonight? You can feel free to hop over there and talk in the comments (it's kind of a pain to comment over there, but oh well) or use this thread to talk about the derby.
Taking my good old time over the All-Star Break to review the first half of 2007. This will have a few parts. Like, at least three and maybe more.
Jason Bay: If Jason Bay's clutchness wasn't such a touchy and hotly debated topic 'round these parts, I'd probably refer to Jason as "Jason May" all the time. For the second straight year he had a gigantic month of May, going .336/.403/.536 for the month, picking up a player of the week award along the way. Since then he's been frigid and getting colder all the time, bringing him to his current .766 OPS at the break. He's got to hit better than this, plain and simple. His slugging percentage is lower than Adam LaRoche's at the moment. Think about that. Right now he's the fourth best hitter on the team behind Nady, Doumit, and LaRoche. Unacceptable. Careerwise, his numbers have been better in the second half than the first, so I'm sure the numbers will even out over time, but this has been painful to watch. I think we can call Jason disappointing thus far.
Xavier Nady: Chalk this one up in the category of pleasant surprises. We knew Weapon X could kill left-handed hitting pitching, but his ability to hit righties was a rather suspect thing before this year. Instead, he's gone .284/.333/.507 against right handed pitching this year, meaning that he's been a good every day player for us. This leads to the inevitable, "Dave Littlefield did a good job acquiring him" sentiment from some Pirate fans. That's crap. As great as Nady's been for us, his OPS+ is 121. That's good, not great. Perez still has the ability to be a Cy Young winner in New York, I think. This is not Nady's fault and I don't hold it against him. In fact, I like him a lot and hope he keeps killing the ball.
Chris Duffy: File this one under this is exactly what we should expected and yet for some didn't. Duff's just not a good hitter. I do commend him for drawing some more walks this year (21 in 270 PAs as opposed to 19 in 348 last year), but that's just not enough. He's maddeningly inconsistent, and I'm sick of waiting for him.
Nate McLouth: I think Nate might actually not be a bad fifth outfielder. Since mid-June he's had a very respectable .273/.360/.500 line while seeing some decent playing tim. Still, I'm probably just cherry-picking stats here for a guy that's shown very little consistency in his big-league career.
Rajai Davis: He's in the thank God the Pirates exist or I'd be jobless category. He's got no real power, he's not especially great at reaching base (though he's done a decent job of drawing walks while he's up), and he's a poor outfielder. Sure is fast, though.
Welcome back to the party, Jason. After a month in which he looked roundly clueless at the plate, Bay had a homer to dead center today and four RBIs to help the Pirates to a series closing win over the Cubbies. Shane Youman did his Shane Youman thing, not pitching particularly well, but keeping the Pirates in the lead and picking up his second win in as many starts.
While it's always nice for the players to get some down time for the break, this is coming at a pretty bad time for the Pirates since they've won 9 of 13 and are getting pretty solid offensive contributions from just about everyone on the team. I have to think some part of them has to want to just keep playing right now while they're on a roll
Shane Youman and Carlos Zambrano, already underway at PNC this afternoon with the Pirates down 1-0. A win sends them into the break at eight games below .500
I have a wedding and such to go to today (not my own), so the gamethread's gotta go up early. Ted Lily and John Van Benschoten in this one with the Pirates hoping to keep a four game winning streak alive and maybe even get JVB his first win in almost three years at the major league level. The offense is really rolling at this point and I think if Jason Bay and Adam LaRoche every started hitting at the same time as Xavier Nady and Freddy Sanchez, we'd have a Minnesota Twins type day. Probably too much to hope for. I'll stick with hoping for maybe three of the four to click at once.
"The one thing I do want to stress is that I really am supportive of and committed to the direction the team is headed," Nutting said. "I believe that the plan we have in place is a good one. And the last thing Dave or Jim Tracy or this team needs is speculation about what's going to happen. What they need is to be able to stay focused and turn in a great second half of baseball."Does he mean a.) I'm really happy with the things that have happened since I've taken over as owner, such as visiting the Dominican Republic, Kevin McClatchy being shown the door, and the like, or does he mean b.) I really think Dave and Jim have this team moving in the right direction and Dave has a lot of vision as to how this team is going to get to the next level and I am excited about that.
Sheesh, this team is on a roll right now. After being carried by Adam LaRoche for a week, Freddy Sanchez and Xavier Nady stepped up last night to help the team to eight runs and a relatively easy win over the scorching hot Cubs. Paul Maholm had yet another solid outing, marred only by Shawn Chacon allowing two inherited runners to score in the eighth, and knocked in two runs on his own to help things along. The Pirates have now won eight of eleven since the interleague play nightmare ended. Of course the most impressive part of those eight wins have been the last four over the Brewers and Cubs. How long can the Pirates keep this play up? With JVB and Shane Youman making the last two starts in the series, I suppose we'll see.
The Brewers ran into an Adam LaRoche buzzsaw and the Pirates managed to take three of four from the division leaders (could this have had anything to do with it?) which was all-in-all fun to watch and pretty damn surprising. But the road isn't getting any easier for the Buccos because the Cubbies follow the Brewers into PNC and they're playing every bit as well as Milwaukee is right now, if not better. Jason Marquis and Paul Maholm face off tonight in the series opener as Maholm looks to keep his recent streak of competent pitching alive. The Cubs, meanwhile, are only 4.5 games back of Milwaukee and can make things very interesting with a series win or a sweep over the Pirates this weekend heading into the break. Greg Brown and company will probably try to tell you it's a big series for the Pirates, but they're wrong, it's a huuuuge series for the Cubs.
Is this news? Hard to say. If Bob Nutting hires a real baseball man as the next CEO, it would be hard to say that it's a bad move for the team. One would assume that a real baseball man as CEO would not be pleased with Dave Littlefield as the GM. If Bob Nutting hires, say, himself or his brother or some kind of business or newspaper man as the next CEO, well, things won't get better.
I already posted a take on it at the Fanhouse, so you can check that out as well. As I noted there, many will certainly claim that the protest was a success because of this. I think this is probably a move that's been in the works for a long time, like, since Nutting became the official owner back in January (which is what McClatchy says). I suppose we'll learn more about this as time goes on.
And the Adam LaRoche show continues. He added three more hits, a double and two homers, to his recent tear and Ryan Doumit added his second homer in as many days (LaRoche and Doumit have now hit five in the past two games) to help the Pirates to a relatively easy 6-3 win over Ben Sheets today. Gorzelanny made another solid start to get his ninth win, Tracy bailed him out early (didn't let him start the eighth with 100 pitches), and Capps and Chacon held down the eighth and ninth innings for the win.
Who are these guys?
Fire up your radios for this 12:35 start and get ready for Greg Brown to tell you that this is the most important game the Pirates will play all year. Tom Gorzelanny will face off against Brewers ace Ben Sheets in what would be the NL's version of Verlander vs. Sabathia if the Pirates didn't suck so much. Sheets has always pitched well against us despite his lackluster 6-7 record, which is due more to the people around him sucking than anything. Gorzo is making his last start before the whole "final vote" thing ends and while I'd love to push him and tell you to vote for him, Chris Young is winning and deserves it more, and I'd be lying if I said Chris Young sticking it to DL and making the All-Star game over Gorzo wouldn't bring me just a little bit of happiness. Jason Bay is back in the lineup today, but batting sixth. If he keeps slumping, LaRoche is going to catch him in every important stat soon. Raise your hand if you saw that one coming.
Ian Snell is a beast. That's all there is to it. He's becoming one of those guys that if you don't get to him the first time around, you don't get to him at all. The first three Brewer hitters got to him today, and he slammed the door shut after that. That wall he used to hit after the fifth or sixth inning is gone and he cruised through eight today, giving up nothing after the three-run homer to Ryan Braun in the first. I'm practically gushing. He gets better every time out. I can't believe he's not an All-Star.
Of course he couldn't do it by himself. Once you give the other team a 3-0 head start, someone has to step up the bats and get the Buccos some runs. Ryan Doumit and Adam LaRoche provided the fireworks (see what I did there, it's the Fourth of July and I called home runs fireworks, I'm so clever) at the plate with a two-run homer apiece that made a 3-1 Brewers lead (we scored once on a Nate McLouth triple and Jose Bautista sac fly) into a 5-3 Pirates win.
And let's talk about LaRoche. After the June 27th game against the Marlins, LaRoche was hitting .211. He's now hitting .235. He's just killing the ball right now. His slugging percentage is over .400, his OPS is over .700, and it's still rising. I know those numbers aren't great, but when you factor in his terrible April, I think it's pretty impressive. His numbers are going to match Bay's pretty soon if Bay doesn't wake up. Can you imagine how cool it would be if they both got hot together? Nah, that's too happy of a thought for Pirate baseball.
Ian Snell and Claudio Vargas are going at it at four today in front of a crowd that is almost certainly there for the Big & Rich concert. You'll probably be grilling big slabs of meat and blowing stuff up because it's the Fourth of July. I don't need to insult Ian today, just remind him that not only was he snubbed for the All-Star game, but for the Final Vote as well. That should be more than enough motivation for him.
Happy Fourth of July everyone.
You guys are never going to believe this. Sean Burnett has elbow discomfort and is going to see Dr. James Andrews to get a second opinion on his arm. Stuff like that never happens to Pirate pitchers, right?
OK, this really isn't that funny, or at least I'm sure it isn't to Burnett. But it does go to show just how right Zach Duke was to give the finger to the Pirates' doctors and get the second opinion right off the bat. Burnett was having trouble last month and the doctors told him he was fine and to rest his arm a bit. He tried to come back and things haven't gone well and now he's getting another opinion. To quote some Scrubs... are the Pirates' doctors real doctors, or are they doctors like Dr. Pepper is a doctor?
That all being said, I think Dejan is right when he says Burnett's career is in jeopardy right now. If he's got another major elbow problem and has to have another major surgery, he'll be 26 or 27 before he can even get back to AAA, if he can pitch again. He'll have made the official move from "prospect" to "Adam Hyzdu" at that point, I think.
I don't like to say that the Pirates won this one as much as the Brewers completely lost it. If I didn't know better (hell, I don't know better), I would think today's game was fixed. They dropped every fly ball, misplayed everything hit at them, I don't even know how to describe how ugly it was. They looked like the '62 Mets rather than the best team in the NL. I was embarrassed for them. The best thing that happened during the whole game for them was Prince Fielder hit a pop-up and assaulted a Gatorade cooler.
Meanwhile for the Pirates, Shane Youman did what he normally does, which is not strike people out, but not give up many hits or many runs either. He got his first big-league win today, so congrats to him on that one. I will never, ever call him "Sugar Shane" Youman ever in my life, though. I hate Greg Brown. If that nickname catches on, I dunno, I'll light myself on fire or something.
The offensive stars in this one for us were Bill Hall, Kevin Mench, and Corey Hart, who excelled in turning flyouts into doubles and doubles into triples all day long. We couldn't have won the game without them today.
Honestly, that's the only reason I can think of that LIVE was invited to PNC Park for this concert today. Are they they the Clarks? Are they the Poverty Neck Hillbillies? Are they Donnie Iris? Are they a currently popular and relevant band? No, no, no, and no. So how else could the Pirates have picked them for the concert today? Especially after the Me First and the Gimme Gimmes fiasco last year? The only reason can possibly be that the Pirate marketing department is trying to take us back to 1994 when Throwing Copper was released and the Pirates were only in year 2 of the rebuilding process.
Also- Shane Youman takes the mound for us and Chris Capuano makes his return from the DL for the Brewers. This one kicks off at 4:05 and it is on TV if you are lucky and don't have a real job like me. I'll probably hang around in the comments to talk about it if it stays interesting.
Consistently in the past five years, there has never been a Pirate that loved being a Pirate more than Salomon Torres. Getting a second chance from a franchise when a league has left you for dead will do that to a person. Whenever the trade rumors inevitably swirl around him in July, he always says he loves being a Pirate and doesn't want to leave.
Well, that's all changed now. Not surprisingly, Torres was very offended when we didn't use his baseball academy in the Dominican (that was a stupid thing for us to do, I can't even put into words how stupid it was) and he filed a grievance in the spring over it. Now he feels that his slow rehab is payback for that grievance. If it is, well, you've seen the bullpen. I can't explain how incredibly pathetic it would be to carry out a grudge in a way that has hurt the team so badly. Hidden somewhere in this story is a lesson to all ballplayers to not negotiate with idiot jackasses like Dave Littlefield without an agent.
Anyways, we've been looking for a guy the Pirates can deal at the deadline, and I suppose we have one now. Assuming that Torres' poor performance this year was linked to his arm troubles, he's gotta be the type of guy that some team would like to have for a stretch run.
So, yesterday Zach Duke went to Allegheny General and had that fun test done where they shoot his arm up with dye and if any of the dye leaks, there's a ligament tear and he needs TJ surgery. And the fine doctors at AGH told the Duke that he was fine and his ligament isn't torn and he doesn't need surgery. And Duke seemed OK with that for a bit. And then Duke decided that wasnt good enough for him, so he's going to see Dr. James Andrews in Birmingham for a second opinion.
Duke says he's being cautious, but part of me thinks back to Mike Gonzalez, his clean arthogram last fall, and his TJ surgery this year. I don't know anything about the test or how accurate it is, or even if Gonzo's injury last fall is related to his injury this year. Tom Gorzelanny did have the same test at the same time as Gonzo and he seems to be fine. Maybe Duke is just being safe. Or maybe he thinks there's something seriously wrong with his arm. I suppose we'll find out.
Something about watching Masumi Kuwata stand on the mound and turn a 3-3 game into a 10-3 game was really, really disheartening. There was just nothing there and for some reason, Tracy and co. expected something to be there.
Damien Miller's second half is already better than his first half, and it's because of the Pirates. He came into last night with one homer and 10 RBIs, he left with three and 17. How does that even happen?
What an ugly, ugly game. This is what happens when we play teams that are much better than us. The beat the crap out of us. Also, I'd like to welcome John Van Benschoten to the, "I just threw a quality start and watched it get destroyed by someone that wouldn't be in the major leagues if the Pirates didn't have a team this year," club.
Don't let everyone fool you; the Pirates will not play another important series this year. You can read stuff like this in the PG, but I'll keep saying what I've been saying all year, the Pirates are a bad team. Even if we sweep the Brewers this week, we're eight games back with three to go before the All-Star break. That's not a thing to be excited about. The Pirates won 67 games last year. They are on pace to win 70 this year. You can tell yourself that's a key improvement if you like, but it's not getting us into October. Maybe the Pirates will go five games above .500 after the break, but there's absolutely no evidence that this is a second half team. The Pirates were outscored 323 to 280 after the break. The winning record was nice and it was what counts in the end, but the team's ability to reproduce it is suspect at best.
I'm not trying to be negative, just trying to refocus everything here in the light of the propaganda from the team that things aren't as bad as they really are. The problem this off-season was that they took a lucky second half out of proportion and pretended that they were almost a contender. They're setting up to do that to us again.
Anyways, Bucs and Brewers tonight at 7. JVB and Jeff Suppan go at it in this series that is imminently more important for the Brewers to win and maintain a big league in the Central coming into the break.
I don't know how many of you read the Fanhouse on a daily basis, or read it beyond what I post over there. I'm sure some of you do and lots of you don't and whichever it is is fine. I'm not trying to force the Fanhouse on anyone or anything, but I will say that every day MJD writes a column called The Debriefing which is probably my favorite morning (when I wake up in the morning) sports read. And today, he used the column to single out the Pirates' ownership and the problem they've created for baseball. It's a great read and while it won't be anything new to any of you, it's proof that to at least some extent, the walkout on Saturday had some kind of effect.
When I said that it failed, I was talking more about my observation of the people that did or didn't walk out, what they were saying, and how into it they seemed to be. That was depressing to me. But I think a lot of the truth is that the people that would've walked out five years ago did just that and didn't come back for one game to prove a point. And that's OK too. But what the protest has done is draw attention to the type of owners that the Nutting family is. There are a lot more people around the country now, people that watch Baseball Tonight, people that read Yahoo! Sports, people that read the Fanhouse, that understand just what is going on here in Pittsburgh, and awareness is never a bad thing. The question now is, how do we keep the awareness up? How do we keep this thought in people's minds?
I don't know the answer to that. People can stop going, but tell me the honest truth: as a Pirate fan do you think to yourself, "Man, it sucks what Jeffrey Loria is doing in Miami" or do you think, "Eh, Loria can do what he wants down there. No one cares about baseball in Florida."? What's your gut reaction to the Florida Marlins? I know what mine is, and I'm sad to say it's the second one. I know that's not the case and I know Loria is just as bad as the Nuttings, if not worse, and I know he's driven Marlin fans away, but it's still my gut reaction when I seen an empty park down there (PS- please don't hate me, Marlin fans). Sure, not going to Pirate games will send a message to the owners, but it'll send a message to everyone else, too. One reader sent me an e-mail today that suggested that we start a grassroots tradition at the park to show our increasing frustration with the ownership. Something as simple as not singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" or, I dunno, throwing the stupid t-shirts from the t-shirt toss back onto the field. That seems like a great idea on the surface, but damn does it have to get some coverage for it to work. Any ideas?
Might as well lump these two things together, right?
Zach Duke is going on the DL retroactive to his last start in Florida and he's going to AGH today to get his arm checked out. He's hopeful, I'm not. Shane Youman will take his slot in the rotation. Sean Burnett will presumably mope about it. If the results of his test come online today, I'll make sure to post them.
Meanwhile, Freddy Sanchez is our all-star. I like Freddy and everything, but what a load of crap. I know he's been hot this year, but all he really does is hit singles right now. He's only sluggling .375 and he's only getting on at a .331 clip. That's not an all-star. Tom Gorzelanny made the "final vote" where he will be trounced by four players whose fans' care much more than the Pirates' fans do. Ian Snell was left off of everything completely. That will probably piss him off. At least I hope it does.
And if you needed proof that ballot-box stuffing happens, I give you Barry Bonds surprise all-star starter.
Oh, and a podcast should be coming this afternoon or tomorrow.
Talk about punchless, sheesh. Mike Bacsik shut us down today and besides Adam LaRoche, it seemed like no one could get anything going against the guy. LaRoche banged out half of our six hits to give him five in two days and get his average up to what I have to think is a season high .230. Beyond that, only Nady, Castillo, and Paulino had hits and we went down tamely in the series finale to drop their half-season record to 35-46, or just about right on pace with their 67 win seasons in the past two years. We wasted another nice outing from Paul Maholm in which he only gave up three runs and struck out five in seven innings. A sweep in this series would've been nice, but I suppose it was just too much to ask for.
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