On Discussing the Pirates
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 5:19 AM EST
Email
Print(UPDATED below the fold.)
Dejan Kovacevic's article today on how to frame media coverage of the Pirates is a pretty interesting one, and it's something I've thought about a lot. I worry that my response rambles quite a bit, in part because the issues in play here stretch well beyond baseball and into things like politics that aren't really in the purview of this blog. But I'm going to go ahead and publish it anyway, as a springboard for discussion. If you're scratching your head by the time you get to the end, I'm sorry, and I'll try to write something better tomorrow.
I'm not going to try to "prove" anything here. That seems impossible anyway, since the pro- and anti-management camps that Kovacevic describes as criticizing him from both sides are hard to even define. I can only really describe them using crude generalizations. And I want to be careful here to note that this article isn't a referendum on Kovacevic, who I think mostly does a good job, but on the way we all talk about the team. Anyway:
Without wanting to turn this into a political argument, a big problem with journalism in the past decade or so has been the tendency of journalists to achieve "balance" by presenting both sides of an argument without evaluating what either side is actually saying. Both political parties know that journalists do this, which means they're free to present their talking points without worrying about whether or not they're true. I think journalists have a duty to assess the information that's being fed to them (and to his credit, I'm sure this is what Kovacevic thinks also). I also think it's far from clear that the middle of any given issue is the correct place to be. Sometimes one side is just wrong.
Kovacevic writes:
This is happening all through society and, at the risk of dipping a toe into politics, there is a reason that Fox and MSNBC are both now getting better ratings than CNN, the only one that claims the middle road.
Kovacevic says this like it's a bad thing. Again, without wanting to get all political here--isn't CNN deadly boring to watch? Isn't it, uh, incredibly uninformative? This could be wrong, because I don't watch CNN unless I'm waiting for a flight or a bank teller, and I'd kind of rather wash my face with acid than watch it in any other circumstance, but in my experience it's 30% commercials, 28% dubious medical advice, 27% the latest analysis of what happened to some pretty girl who disappeared somewhere, and 15% political news that is just about impossible to understand because there's no effort to process the information. Most of the political discourse is delivered either by partisan talking heads who aren't making good-faith efforts to speak the truth, or by journalists who have to speak in an obfuscating sort of code for fear of offending people who think like the talking heads.
In discussing the Bucs, there has to be another way, a way of speaking the truth without bowing before the Pirates' management or systematically raging against it. The main problem right now with the dynamic between the pro- and anti-management camps is that the anti-management camp doesn't make a whole lot of sense most of the time. The bulk of the criticism aimed at Neal Huntington and Frank Coonelly either demands that the Pirates make some doomed, kamikaze run at contention right now, or blames Huntington and Coonelly for their inability to magically transform a thoroughly trashed organization into a World Series team within a month of being hired. It reminds me of the movie Idiocracy:
I got a three point plan to fix everything. Number one, we got this guy Not Sure. Number two, he's got a higher IQ than any man alive! And number three, he's gonna fix everything! I give you my word as President. He's gonna fix the ploblems with all the dead crops, he's gonna make em' groooow again! And that ain't all, I give you my wooord, he's gonna fix the dust storms tooo! I give you my wooord, he's gonna fiiiiix the economy. And he's soooo smaaaart, he's gonna do it aaaall in one week.
It simply wasn't realistic, given the dilapidated state of the major league roster, the near non-existence of the minor league system, and the fact that most of the Pirates' core players would be free agents after 2009, to have expected Huntington and Coonelly to mold the team they inherited into a contender. That core, the one featuring Jason Bay, Jack Wilson, Freddy Sanchez, Adam LaRoche and Xavier Nady, was given multiple opportunities, and it couldn't muster more than 68 wins. And, again, the Pirates risked losing most of those players by this point.
Further, teams with payrolls below $100 million or so--and I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone even in the anti-management camp suggest that the Pirates can top $100 million--simply must have a good core of homegrown or otherwise cheap young players to compete. The Rays did it this way. The Twins did it this way. The Brewers and the A's and the Marlins, when they were successful, did it this way. The Pirates just didn't have that. They weren't ready to compete, and they had to take some drastic steps to rework the farm system in order to generate young players to create a winning core. And when you have a farm system as busted as the Pirates' was--after 2007, Baseball America ranked it 26th out of the 30 MLB teams--that takes time, because ballplayers take many years to develop.
At the risk of turning this thing into a novel, I'll stop here, but everything in the last two paragraphs strikes me as obviously true. And so I suppose much of what has frustrated me about the way we've talked about the Pirates for the past couple of years is that we've been arguing about these things rather than arguing some of the finer points of what Huntington and Coonelly are doing. It's like if you're trying to talk about politics with someone and they say that the solution to our economic problems is a visit from the Magical Jobs Fairy. That's their opinion, and in some way they're entitled to it, but serious people find it useful to presume that the Magical Jobs Fairy does not exist and to work from there.
And so a lot of my personal frustration not so much with Kovacevic, but with all the discourse that surrounds the team, is that we're talking about Magical Job Fairies. We're arguing about whether the Bay/Nady/Wilson Pirates could have been molded into a contender. (Not a chance.) We're arguing about whether this management team is any different from the last one. (Clearly, it is.) We're arguing about why Huntington and Coonelly haven't gotten any results yet. (Because what they inherited was so far from being ready, obviously. It's like arguing with your neighbor that his three-year-old son should be dunking a basketball already.)
Most of this talk is really unhelpful. And if the Pirates were widely discussed on CNN, they'd never sort any of this out, because they'd never have anyone authoritative point out that one side is largely basing its arguments around premises that are unrealistic. I think that, obviously, Huntington and Coonelly's actions should be questioned, but it's really hard for me to take seriously most of the questioning that's currently going on. And since Kovacevic is such an important voice in discussions about the Pirates, it's no surprise that he feels like he's at the center of this.
I think if he's using the CNN model, though, he's getting things wrong, and he should call out more of the Magical Job Fairy stuff, so that the rest of us can talk to each other without navigating through so much of the "I'M DONE WITH THIS TEAM" and "IT'S A CULTURE OF WINNING, SRSLY" stuff that litters many online discussions. (It probably doesn't help that the opinion columns about the Pirates in the Post-Gazette, which are not written by Kovacevic, are mostly ridiculous garbage.) Maybe Kovacevic can't do this because moderating and calling B.S. aren't part of his job, but then I think those are tragic limitations of his job. A lot of my favorite journalists are the rare few who aren't afraid to appear to have an opinion, because their freedom from "balance" allows them to say what's actually going on. Kovacevic really is the sort of authority figure who could set a lot dialogue about the team back on the right path. Of course, he'd probably have to offend people to do that, so it'll never happen.
It is, actually, not at all clear that what Huntington and Coonelly are doing will work. There is, for example, the fact that they've shown no real ability to construct a bullpen. Their concept of "internal value" seems at times to be almost dogmatic, and it may get them into trouble if the team reaches the point where a couple extra million spent on a veteran really could make a big difference. Huntington and Coonelly have talked a great game about Latin America but so far haven't signed a prospect there for more than a few hundred thousand bucks. And then, of course, there's the giant, honking and totally legitimate question of whether the Pirates will really open the checkbook once they've built a good core of competitive young players. Those things are all fair game, and to the credit of Bucs fans everywhere, they've all been pretty widely discussed. We'll be further along, though, when we don't have to deal with so much Magical Job Fairy stuff along the way.
UPDATE by Charlie (2:00 PM):
Kovacevic responds:
Charlie incorrectly presumes that I find the middle -- or CNN, in this instance -- to be the correct path toward resolving a discussion or covering this beat. A couple replies:
1. I never wrote any such thing. I merely described the other two networks as gaining ratings on CNN, once the leader, as an example of how the nation appears to be moving toward the poles and how it increasingly prefers its news to come with views.
2. If I felt the middle ground was the answer and never deigned to challenge information that was presented to me, I am guessing we would not have had 3-4 weeks of extensive Matt Capps conversation here at this point. Nor would the very commonly held perception that the Pirates have been pocketing profits been addressed -- whether or not to anyone's full satisfaction -- with a month's worth of work on the finances series last month.
This is taking information presented, challenging it and, hopefully, fortifying its clarity for the readers.
I most assuredly never have viewed the beat as hearing the polar opposites and cutting a line down the middle. I do listen to all arguments, hear all cases and try to find out whichever way that goes. If that leads to one of the polar extremes, so be it.
I do, however, appreciate the general sentiment Charlie expresses about our coverage here, as well as his many excellent general thoughts in this particular post.
That's all fair enough. I don't want to go into too much detail in response because, again, I don't want this to be a referendum on Kovacevic.
Someone did ask in the comments about what I would like to see happen, though, what I meant by setting the dialogue on the right path. I guess what I'd like to see is for someone with a very loud voice to explain, historically, why the Pirates' plan is the right idea, and then write in a way that presumes the plan is a good one and that, instead, focuses on the Pirates' tactics. From the limited amount I've heard, Rocco DeMaro seems to do a pretty good job of this, but unfortunately he's a radio guy, so what he says basically disappears into the ether as soon as it comes out of his mouth. There are some bloggers who already do this, but I don't think our voices are loud enough to make much of a difference. Kovacevic's series on the Dominican and on the team's finances are definitely the right idea, but there's still way too much dithering throughout Pirate Nation about whether the rebuilding the Bucs have undergone is a good idea, when to me it transparently is. I don't know--maybe I'm overestimating Kovacevic's role in shaping the discourse.
172 comments
|
3 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
Great piece ! Great job Charlie !
"Baseball is better than football. Think about it, eighty degrees, a cold beer and a short-sleeve shirt is better than 30 degrees, a hip flask and six layers of clothes under a lap blanket. Take your pick: suntan or frostbite. " - Thomas Boswell
Yikes
We may consider Wolf Blitzer as right/balanced/providing the sensible point of view because we can place him (presumably) betwixt and between Keith Olbermann and Bill O’Reilly. If it were only that simple! But it’s not.
This conceit is silly right from the get go because it assumes as true two claims that it ought to prove, namely: That the three cable networks necessarily include the right (or true and fair) position to adopt with regards to an event, a situation, a historical outcome, etc. and that they exhaustively mark the place in which legitimate political discourse will appear. Why would any sensible person believe that the American cable news networks are an engine of truth and fairness for the whole world? They are no more an engine of true and fair claims than the British or French or Pakistani or Chinese media. Each requires critical evaluation.
When thus considered, the norms which define "balanced journalism" are just a ruse that enable bad journalists to cover their asses and the powerful to co-opt the media. In whom or what should a reasonable person place his or her faith: Wolf Blitzer or his or her ‘lying’ eyes? The responsible choice between the two is rather obvious.
Steve Z
CRITICAL EVALUATION
The key element you are missing is that media that makes you think and come to a conclusion ON YOUR OWN is better than a controlled or non-investigated story. Free society’s don’t control their media they offer choices and from those select channels you can draw your own conclusion. Controlled society’s such as China, Iran or North Korea control all aspects of media including television and internet. In a controlled society no thoughtful opinion can be formed unless one has access to either internal or external information not being presented by the controlled media. Media outlets in free society’s that fail to complete investigative journalism on political “stories or viewpoints” might as well be in a controlled society. These outlets such as CNN do a disservice to free citizens, but these free citizens are slowly awakening and not taking the word of the “free media” at face value. The point is not whether you agree with FOX or MSNBC it is the fact that they are at least challenging the validity of political stories and attempting to hold liars accountable on both sides.
The pirates organization seems to be willing to be open and share its rationale behind specific decisions. They have reached a point where at least you can and may actually want to draw a conclusion about their progress. You may not agree with those decisions or like the progress, but at least you have an opinion or point of view that you desire to be heard. Your point of view or opinion can then be expounded on by others who have done their research.
It is essential for people who either like or hate current management to constantly scrutinize and question roster moves along with financial decisions. OUR continued support, criticism and nagging will hopefully get this horrible situation turned around and help build a winner for the organization and its fans! I do think current management has at least sparked discussion, renewed hope with the improvement of the minor league system and got rid of some apathy toward the organization!
A journalist should strive to be an outlaw
The key element you are missing is that media that makes you think and come to a conclusion ON YOUR OWN is better than a controlled or non-investigated story. Free society’s don’t control their media they offer choices and from those select channels you can draw your own conclusion. Controlled society’s such as China, Iran or North Korea control all aspects of media including television and internet. In a controlled society no thoughtful opinion can be formed unless one has access to either internal or external information not being presented by the controlled media. Media outlets in free society’s that fail to complete investigative journalism on political "stories or viewpoints" might as well be in a controlled society. These outlets such as CNN do a disservice to free citizens, but these free citizens are slowly awakening and not taking the word of the "free media" at face value. The point is not whether you agree with FOX or MSNBC it is the fact that they are at least challenging the validity of political stories and attempting to hold liars accountable on both sides.
Journalism ought to serve the interests of truth and fairness. Balance as we normally define it does not assure truth or fairness. At best it assures that acceptable opinion will be aired in a timely and direct way. This norm would be adequate if Americans and their politicians were virtuous. But virtue is in short supply. Knaves and fools are words that best describe the DC elite today. The best journalists have always been political outlaws, even in the best of times. We are not living through the best of times, though.
As for the Pirates and the current front office,I’ve long believed they have chosen to follow a rational path that can, with luck, produce a championship contender for Pirates fans. This is, to my mind, the least we can expect from an ownership regime, and it easily exceeds the efforts produced by the McClatchy partnership.
Steve Z
steve z
I completely agree with you on your final premise: I just reached it through a different prism. In my opinion, the Pirates are much better off today than they were five years ago, but is that good enough to keep this once proud franchise in the city five years beyond the next collective bargaining agreement. The agreement will probably force teams to increase payroll regardless of attendance and could altogether put an end to the luxury tax. If this happens an uncompetitive team in a small market like the Pirates will have to relocate out of necessity! I think with current management the team will begin to turn it around and become a competitor in 2012-2013. The problem is a lot can happen during that period, but at least the franchise is no longer on a one way track to oblivion via forced relocation!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What is the right path for setting dialogue.
Next to last paragraph says basically that DK could set the dialogue about the team back on the right path. What are you saying?
In a roundabout way I think I “get” what you’re writing about, but there’s a lot of words pretty much wasted IMO.
That’s quite possible. When I finished it I knew I was being provocative, but I wasn’t sure I had totally sorted out all the issues involved. Hence the disclaimer in the first paragraph.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 1:50 PM EST up reply actions
I was a little confused reading Dejan's article
He explicitly says he is not complaining about complaints, and it’s pretty obvious that he’s making his overall point this:
Rather, I am using this to point out that polar opposites on the opinion spectrum can look at the exact same situation — in this case, a month of game stories — and see two totally different things.
But that isn’t the feeling I got from the rest of the article. It sounds to me that Dejan is frustrated that he is unable to “call out more of the Magical Job Fairy Stuff,” and that he would like to.
Great work
Charlie. Another piece of work that is right on the money.
I'm getting hard on myself, sitting in my easy chair.
Nailed it
I have to say this is probably the best post you have ever written. I cannot agree with you more about the whole balanced journalism nonsense. The use of some kind of “Golden Mean” to provide balance is nothing more than a fallacious folly. I live in Youngstown (what a surprise) OH, and I am inundated with Indians talk around here. They consistently make fun of me for being a Pirates fan, yet I am quite confident that they will not have a better year than Pittsburgh. The funniest thing I hear is that they always complain that that the Pirates trade away talent for prospects. They really haven’t had much to say this year, though, considering they had a huge fire-sale this past year
Fans are clingy complaining dip****s who will never ever be grateful for any concession you make. The sooner you tune out their shrill, tremulous voices, the better you'll be.
Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw
And also considering
Their Colon for Lee/Sizemore/Phillips trade is a big reason they almost won the pennant two years ago.
I really don't read
Dejan’s coverage much, but in some of what I’ve read, if you read between the lines, he DOES call out BS. You don’t have to announce “The manager is a bonehead” to get your point across. If you quote the manager saying “Player X is doing a great job, he’s gritty and hustles and is a great presence in the clubhouse,” and follow that by writing this:
Player X is batting .215/.260/.310.
Then you haven’t stated an opinion, you have just stated facts, but the halfway intelligent fan knows you know the manager is spouting BS. But a lot of people will only read and believe the praise. But that doesn’t mean there wasn’t implied criticism, just that not everybody got it. Let’s face it: Any team’s fan nation, in any sport, is not the brightest possible collection of humanity one could assemble. I would guess a wander through the Heinz Field parking lots on Steelers gamedays would confirm this assessment. I can only imagine the kinds of screeds someone like Bouchette has to wade through to find an intelligent nugget.
I think it’s also worth noting that many people seem to think the CoonHunt management team has to be perfect., that if the Bay trade is a bust then everything they’ve done is a failure. This conveniently ignores the fact that EVERY GM makes deals that bust, simply because you can’t win ‘em all. Also, that even when everything goes right, stuff can still go wrong. Littlefield of all people made five cheap free-agent signings one year and EVERY ONE OF THEM turned out well, great, even. But through a combination of other factors and one other dumb move he made, the team was a loser anyway. And then those assets weren’t really cashed in very well (although we accidentally wound up with Freddy for I think it was Suppan). We couldn’t turn a cheap Reggie Sanders having a great year into even a prospect or two? Really?
I don’t know where I’m going with this, just kind of rambling. But I’m really glad that in the otherwise dead week between Christmas and New Year we have baseball talk going on at all.
Dejan does a very good job with his piece,
and I think this is point is especially relevant about the Pirates:
My own approach — and, really, I have no choice — is to look at each decision case by case and, over time, to form a more general assessment. To me, given the long-term scope of what this management hopes to achieve with its veterans-for-prospects trades and two quality drafts, that general assessment is still not in sight.
Read: If the Bucs don’t put together a winning club by 2012 at the latest, Dejan, along with most dedicated BD posters, will be calling for major changes within the Pirates’ organization again because sufficient time will have passed to give a grade to Neal Huntington and others on their job performances over the course of several years.
It bears repeating that the Bucs have only had 2 drafts and international signing periods under FC/NH, and we can’t pass any sort of definitive judgment on most of the trades that have happened on their watch yet.
A few other thoughts:
Like bucdaddy says above, Dejan “DOES call out B.S.”. Obviously as the Pirates’ beat writer he’s not going to say everyone and everything sucks each and every time they lose. He seems to establish a good rapport with most players which, common sense dictates, is esential for him to do his job well.
We need to give the club a few more years to see how the drafts, international signings, renewed emphasis on scouting and development, trades etc. work out.
And, ultimately, this question will have to be answered: Will the Nuttings pony up the dough to attempt to put a winner on the field when some of the other pieces are in place?
It seems like many on BD don’t expect a top-notch to be in place until at least 2012.
I think this is reasonable, and will also be an appropriate time to say whether NH/FC/ and the rest of the organization through these years has done its job or not.
I'm surprised Charlie's band doesn't get into trouble
with stealing the "FOX’ name and all.
Maybe they made a deal with Glenn Beck that each band member would buy a copy of his new books.
Seriously, kudos to Charlie for his usual outstanding writing and analysis.
I think he'd make the argument
that FOX is an acronym for “Fully Operational X,” which sounds like a graphic novel. Nevertheless, many years ago there was a pretty good punk band called Thorazine that enjoyed a few moments in the limelight by getting sued by the maker of that particular pharmaceutical.
Yeah, we were calling ourselves that well before “FOX News” was a political signifier. And the name is not intentionally related to the FOX network.
I was about 14 or 15 when I made it up. It doesn’t make any sense.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 1:53 PM EST up reply actions
One other thing
A lot of fans seem to think the point of trading is to screw the other guy. That’s nice if it works out that way, like the Nady trade did, but one thing I recall from waaaay back in the day when I covered the team for a year was Tanner saying that’s not the case. You really want the trade to work out well for both teams, so the team you traded with will want to deal with you again. The amazing thing to me about Beane is that even after “Moneyball” came out and it clearly described how he effed over … was it Minaya? Whoever the Mets GM was at the time and for whom Beane projected nothing but contempt — was how he still gets people to trade with him, and how he still seems to clean up.
Anyway, not many deals are going to work out that way, obviously, but if you went into every deal with a “how can I f*** this guy?” attitude as opposed to, “how can I get what I want and give up as little as I can, but still make the other guy happy?” you’re not going to get many phone calls on July 31.
Steve Phillips or a Duquette, iirc. Minaya came in way after Moneyball.
Honestly, one of the reasons Minaya has been given so much rope in NY is that his predecessor was Littlefield-bad (just as DL was given rope because Cam had seemed so bad). I don’t think the Mets have had a good GM since Dallas Green replaced whoever put together the ’86 team.
As I remember it, Beane was talking with Minaya when Minaya was still the GM of the Expos. I think he was trying to swing a three-way deal with the Expos and Red Sox.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 2:30 PM EST up reply actions
The Sox got Cliff Floyd, the Expos got Seung Song and Sun-Woo Kim. Very lopsided deal, so it’s easy to see why Beane tried to stick his nose in there.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 4:23 PM EST up reply actions
since we are discussing moneyball
anyone know what happened to jeremy brown? I know he retired but from his stats, its not obvious why…
by BurgherKing on Dec 30, 2009 12:23 PM EST up reply actions
Maybe that's what I'm thinking
But there was a GM in the book whom Beane pretty clearly thought was a fool and whom the book pretty clearly made out to be a fool, and my memory says it was Minaya, so yeah, if he was with the Expos then that’s who I think I mean.
bucdaddy
When you think about, all the things you mention happened to Dave Littlefield.
Teams f***** him in trades, got what they want, gave up as little as possible, and then his #1 beneficiary, the Cubs, made DL happy by making him a scout, so he can do what Marge Schott said scouts do which is get paid to sit and watch games.
It should be pointed out that
Not all of Littlefield’s moves were terrible. Some turned out pretty good. Bay, Freddy, Jack, Nady and Adam LaRoche were all obtained through pretty good trades. In fact, Huntington will be doing pretty well if players equal to those develop from his trades. Now, Littlefield followed a failed draft strategy and there were other trades that worked out decidedly worse. But there were actually positive aspects of his trades. Thank God, because the Pirates would have been in even worse trouble.
by MarkInDallas on Dec 29, 2009 11:44 AM EST up reply actions
Wait, what?
1) Jack was acquired by Bonifay, not Littlefield.
2) The Freddy trade was an example of Littlefield getting saved from himself by circumstance. The initial version of the trade had us sending Sauerbeck and Mike Gonzalez to Boston for Brandon Lyon and Anastacio Martinez. We only got Freddy because Lyon failed his physical, and reversing it entirely was a non-option as Sauerbeck had already pitched for the Red Sox at that point.
3) The Nady deal was a terrible one from a value perspective. We gave up Ollie (a highly desirable commodity at that point, despite his struggles in Pgh) AND an above-average reliever in Roberto Hernandez AND the two compensatory draft picks Hernandez brought with him, in exchange for an average-ish OF/1B.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 12:54 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
True
I had forgotten about Jack being a Bonifay guy and probably much of my opinion of acquiring Nady has to do with what Huntington was able to do with him. I would say Nady gained value whereas Perez did not.
I haven’t forgotten the happy accidents of those other trades, but none the less, I’ll stand by my contention that if Huntington has received the same value of players back that Littlefield received – however it happened – that we’ll be doing pretty well. So far, there’s really no guarantee that Andy, Ohlie, Tabata or Morton will ever have a 4+ WAR season like all of those players did.
by MarkInDallas on Dec 29, 2009 5:27 PM EST up reply actions
My favorite part
“I’ll stop here.”
(5 paragraphs ensue)
Just kidding. This is good stuff. Everything I know I learned from Bucs Dugout.
Proceed from Here
It is, actually, not at all clear that what Huntington and Coonelly are doing will work. There is, for example, the fact that they’ve shown no real ability to construct a bullpen. Their concept of “internal value” seems at times to be almost dogmatic, and it may get them into trouble if the team reaches the point where a couple extra million spent on a veteran really could make a big difference. Huntington and Coonelly have talked a great game about Latin America but so far haven’t signed a prospect there for more than a few hundred thousand bucks. And then, of course, there’s the giant, honking and totally legitimate question of whether the Pirates will really open the checkbook once they’ve built a good core of competitive young players. Those things are all fair game, and to the credit of Bucs fans everywhere, they’ve all been pretty widely discussed. We’ll be further along, though, when we don’t have to deal with so much Magical Job Fairy stuff along the way.
Charlie, this paragraphs sets some points from which to proceed. These topics will remain good points of argument for at least the next several years and most likely beyond that. Those, as well as a few others (like, what is this management team’s approach to health/safety/nutrition as this seemed to be lacking within the DL regime and was pointed out by several players/agents), are the points that DK should be tracking and, in a perfect world, the points which deserve PG editorials.
Maybe this article is DK’s attempt to ease people into this…alas, probably not.
Actually
I think that DK has said a lot of the things that Charlie says here. I think that DK’s volume, by necessity, is so high that it can be hard to focus on the recurring themes.
Let me put it this way: when I started coming here, the difference from the PBC Blog was stark, but the difference from DK’s writing and positions was not (obviously more seamheadery here, but that’s a method of analysis, not a different subject of analysis).
Editorials
I agree, DK has stated these, but he has never summed them up (i.e. what are the things we should be looking at to develop our general assessment when it comes due?). I also think, as has been stated in several comments on here already, that DK NEEDS to take on some of these horrible editorials from his own paper. I understand he cannot respond to someone like Smizik or the editorial board directly, but he can at least start the discussion into the topics they harp on.
However, let me state for the record that DK is BY FAR the best Pirates beat writer (or writer in general) around. And just like the current FO — I expect perfection, but accept mistakes now and again because no one is without them.
I think that, when the new management first came in and DK was doing a lot of stories directly on them, he covered this ground more or less directly (no links, but I’m pretty sure he wrote things to the effect of “if you don’t see X within 3 years, then things are going wrong;” he certainly talked a lot about the barren system and plausible timelines for improvement), and I think that he’s sort of reflected back on those, but never explicitly.
Which comes back to dread journalistic convention. We’d be better off if DK could write outright pieces laying out expectations and assessments, but that crosses a line in his head, even though he’ll allude to such things.
Ok silly question
I don’t have a problem with waiting for them to rebuild the minors. I don’t have an issue with giving this management time to build a winner. All I would like to hear is a timeline, i.e. we plan on winning 82 games in 2012. Whenever, I just would like to see a plan in motion.
I’d lose a lot of confidence in the management if they did that. That’s because it would operate as a “promise” to succeed by year X, but the problem is that even if the Pirates did everything right there’s still no guarantee of success. If some of our young players don’t pan out, management would feel compelled to do what Dave Littlefield did back when PNC opened and blow money on free agents in the hope we’re competitive. Then we’re right back where we started from.
Good article, by the way.
by CptnAwesome on Dec 29, 2009 12:52 PM EST up reply actions
Timelines
Two things:
1) Winning 82 games should never be a goal of the team. That always seemed to be the goal under DL and it’s counterproductive to producing a competitive team.
2) The FO is never going to give a specific timeline b/c there’s no benefit to doing so. People would just say that they are admitting that we’re not even trying to win for the next couple years. Instead i would look at the talent they’re assembling and at what point you think those players will be able to consistently produce at the major league level. 2012 is probably a safe estimate for when the team should have a roster talented enough to win more games than it loses (assuming players develop as well as i hope they will), with an outside shot of a lightning-in-a-bottle-year in 2011.
The major holes that the 2012 roster will still have are SS and a #1 starter on the pitching staff. I don’t know if D’Arnaud will be ready by then, and if he is, i assume it will be his rookie year. As far as a #1 starter, I doubt that anyone with that potential in our system will be ready by 2012, though i’ll keep my fingers crossed for a break out star.
The biggest problem...
…with calling out the loonies on their loony-ness is that there are a hell of a lot of them, and the P-G is in the business of selling newspapers, not the business of telling people what they don’t want to hear. As tight as things are in that industry right now, he probably doesn’t have the luxury of pissing off a large part of their subscriber base by pointing out that they’re morons, even if he wanted to (which he may not, anyway).
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 12:59 PM EST via mobile reply actions
The Former Core (Bay, McLouth, Wilson, Sanchez, etc)
Hi Charlie,
I’d like to comment on this statement from above:
That core, the one featuring Jason Bay, Jack Wilson, Freddy Sanchez, Adam LaRoche and Xavier Nady, was given multiple opportunities.
I respectfully disagree with this statement that I often see in various blogs and message boards regarding the Pirates.
I think it is important to remember that core was never really properly supported with sufficient impact players, or major league quality depth to be in a position to compete. The team payroll during the time that core was together was usually the 3rd lowest in the game ranging between $40M and $50M. Unfortunately we will never know if they could have competed if the club had spent another $25M or so to give them the additional pieces they needed to compete.
I don’t think we are going to see any core that can compete in this day and age if it is hamstrung with a $40M or $50M payroll budget.
Just food for thought.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 1:24 PM EST reply actions
Where I disagree with that assessment
Is that given the barren state of the farm system at the time, the only avenue for the Pirates to add talent was through free agency, and $25M really doesn’t get you a whole lot in FA; no more than 2 or 3 impact guys.
You also have to consider that even getting those impact players to come here would be a feat. As Vlad has pointed out before, the Nationals offered more money to Mark Teixeira than any other team, but he ended up in New York. That’s because he wanted to win, and New York provided a better place to do that. Also remember when we couldn’t sign Rocco Baldelli and Daniel Cabrera and Wil Ohman despite offering them more money, longer-term contracts, and (in the case of Baldelli) a chance to start. And those aren’t even impact players.
Until we can build from within, there’s no way we can build from without.
http://fanhuddle.com/pittsburghpirates
The Marlins were competing quite well last year...
…with a payroll in that range.
In order to be a legitimate competitor with a low payroll, you need to have star/superstar-level talent that’s cost-controlled. The Marlins have done a good job of this over the course of their run, with Cabrera and Hanley and Uggla and Johnson and Nolasco.
With the sole exception of pre-knee-injury Bay, none of the players in our “core” that you cite approach that level of excellence. They’re good complementary players, but no more. Hamburger Helper, as opposed to actual meat. Spending in order to buy more Helper wouldn’t have actually improved our position significantly.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 1:51 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
Comes back to pitching
And all those one-year wonders. If Benson or Wells had even partially fulfilled their potential and Ollie had repeated his great year, suddenly you’re looking at a reasonably solid rotation along with a pretty talented offense (I’d note that both Ollie and Benson were strikeout pitchers who wouldn’t have been hurt by the weak D).
Point being, you’re right that it’s unrealistic to think that the Pirates could have simply bought the kind of A-level talent they needed to turn that Hamburger Helper into a decent meal; what’s maddening is that the talent they did have kept going bad.
That's a function of depth.
Not all of your prospects are going to
pan out. You need to have redundant options in the farm system to account for that expected rate of failure, and Creech’s drafts were always too shallow to allow us to do so.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 4:25 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
No Doubt
But, as I’ve said before, the Bucs have had an astonishingly long streak of everybody failing to pan out*. ARam is probably the only real exception – a highly-projected prospect actually becoming a star (albeit still a second tier star, at best). The closest they’ve come to a guy coming out of nowhere is guys like Maholm and McLouth who topped out at pretty good but not great.
With their bad drafting, it’s not a surprise that they haven’t had several stars develop; what is surprising is that they’e had basically none.
- As you may recall, a few years back DK cited a study that showed that pitchers in the Pirates system have been no more likely than anyone else’s to get injured; it’s just been that every one with any promise has gotten injured
I was afraid of that
Was it Duke? One of their moderately-successful pitchers was a later-round pick (in contrast with all of the first round blowouts). Anyway, my point is that, while it’s not entirely surprising that none of the first round picks hit big, it’s simply bad luck that (basically) none of the later-round guys did, either. And you can’t really pin it on talent evaluation, either – Piazza was a courtesy pick and turned into the best-hitting catcher in history. It wasn’t because the Dodgers are brilliant, it’s because that kind of thing* happens – just not to the Pirates in the last 18 years.
- Extreme example, of course; that exact kind of thing doesn’t happen much
couldn’t have told you without checking- Duke was a 20th round pick, just checked. Not really sure how the pirates drafted under Creech, in terms of strategy, but if they didn’t do their scouting well, I don’t see why late rounds pick should get lucky for them.
It might become more of a crapshoot as we go deeper into the rounds, but some part of the luck is still knowing what to look for- for all you know (and I don’t), they might have just randomly picked one.
I don’t think anyone who gets lucky with a 20th round pick does so because of their own virtues as a talent evaluator; if there were real, observable talent, then that player would have gone in the first 570 picks. I mean, it’s certainly possible to be better or worse at discerning marginally-talented players, but the reality is that, once you get past the first 5-10 rounds, every player is a longshot.
Put it this way – the Dodgers picked 61 players ahead of Mike Piazza, every single one of whom was a worse baseball player than he was. If the Dodgers “knew what to look for”, they wouldn’t have waited for 1389 players to get picked first. A crapshoot’s a crapshoot, and the difference between 1:1300 odds and 1:1350 odds isn’t enough to buy a stick of gum.
It's not getting lucky, exactly
Teams like all the guys they pick. They wouldn’t pick them if they didn’t. A whole lot of guys chosen in the late rounds have just as much upside as guys taken on the first day. They drop because they’re lower-percentage bets overall: The kid wants too much money and might not sign, or wants to go to dad’s alma mater, or has a particular mechanical defect that may or may not be correctable, or blew out his knee the week before the draft and faces an uncertain rehab, or got into some trouble with the law and might not be disciplined enough to make it, or is just flat-out stupid and might not absorb instruction well, or any one of a dozen other things. Those guys are all low-percentage bets relative to early picks, but all have at least a chance of paying off, and it’s easy to tell the difference on day 2 between a good scouting director (like White) and a bad one (like Creech). The former produces guys like Duke and Snell and Bautista and Walter Young, while the latter produces a lot of seniors who sign for 12 grand and get released before AA.
by Vlad on Dec 30, 2009 9:41 AM EST via mobile up reply actions
Gotcha
It’s the difference between guys who have a ~1% chance and guys who have a ~0.5% chance – neither one is likely to make it, but when you’re picking 50 of them every year, it adds up to a Mackowiak every other year and sometimes a Duke vs. a Polcovich every 4 years (at best).
There’s still luck involved – unless Creech is literally trying not to pick decent players, his once-every-fourth-year guy could be a Duke just as well as a Mackowiak – but the odds are so long that even a small change in relative likelihood means another year of getting literally nobody from the late rounds.
Plus, of course, it’s getting late-round guys who are good enough to at least be plausible AA trade pieces to sweeten a deal and/or be useful organization guys.
Exactly.
And there’s another benefit: Even if your late-round picks are generally going to fail before they get to the majors, better scouting means that more of those picks fail at a higher level, i.e. become decent organizational filler at AA and AAA, keeping you from having to chase down as many minor league FAs to fill holes and giving you less-sucky options if you need emergency injury replacements.
Part on topic; part off topic
I’d disagree with Vlad that Bay was a star level player in his prime. I think the last legitimate stars the Pirates had were Kendall (pre-wrist injury) and Giles.
Perhaps this is a matter of semantics and how we define “star”, but I view Bay in his prime as a good complementary player, but he was too streaky to be a star. I think a team needs to have 2 stars and several good complementary players (like Bay or Jack Wilson) to compete for a division title or better.
As for Dejan, I don’t know the man personally and feel no need to “defend” him. That said, he is nothing short of a god-send for Pirates fans.
As for the media’s approach, I take this issue seriously because I spent a good deal of time in the media. There are no easy answers and the polarizing media culture that dominates today is largely a disservice in that many reports with agendas proclaim themselves to be neutral. Ultimately, I think that the charge for journalists should be objectivity and neutrality as to the subject, but that does not preclue a journalist from exercising neutral judgment in discerning (filtering?) which information/points of view to include in the report. To the contrary, neutral objectivity requires a level of discernment.
The problem with this topic is that I could go on and on. I will refrain from doing so after one more point: In many ways, sports is the last bastian of honest journalism.
Good day.
Nothing wrong with being streaky.
You still put the same number of runs on the board either way.
Before he got hurt (i.e. when he could still play some defense), Bay was a 5 or 6 win player. That’s star-level production.
by Vlad on Dec 30, 2009 9:46 AM EST via mobile up reply actions
Just a note
Fans (in all sports) are probably too streak-obessed, just from human nature. But I think that Pirates fans are probably a bit too streak-focused because it’s been so long since we’ve had a team where a streaky player could hide (actually, the legendary 2008 first-half team was an exception). For most of the past 17 years, if our best offensive player slumped, the entire offense slumped with him because we never had another guy who could pick up the slack from a Bay or a Giles. Good teams have enough star-level players that the streaks are hardly noticeable.
That said, I don’t think it’s true that a streaky player is exactly as useful as a more consistent player; I just don’t think that you can measure the difference (far too many confounding variables).
Bay's streaks
I’m not doing any sort of statistical analysis, but I always felt like Bay was the best player in the league for about a month stretch of any given season, but exceeding ordinary the rest of the season. He would “carry” us to a respectable record for a month, but then did little to enhance a poor team the rest of the year.
Just my perception, but as JRoth said, that depreciates his value in my eyes.
Good day.
OK, but when?
Charlie,
One additional comment today….
or blames Huntington and Coonelly for their inability to magically transform a thoroughly trashed organization into a World Series team within a month of being hired.
Putting the fact that they inhereted a last place club and that there is only one direction to go but up ……
I can accept the “Rome wasn’t built in a day” explanation however tell me when we can expect a winner. Give me a timeline and then be willing to be accountable if it isn’t met.
There are not too many jobs in the world today that allow for poor performance for an indefinite period time.
The Coonelly and Huntington front office inhereted a last place club and it has remained there. If the idea is that they needed to get the house in order, fine. But when is it reasonable to expect them to begin producing improved results on the field?
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 1:35 PM EST reply actions
This is just my opinion, but I think we’ll see improvement at the MLB level starting midway through next season. That’s not to say that 2010 will be a winning season, but that we will likely see some progress.
I’m going out on a limb, but I think 2011 will be a winning season.
http://fanhuddle.com/pittsburghpirates
2011 could be a winning year, but that might be a best-case scenario. I won’t be freaking out if they don’t have a winning team by that time.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 1:57 PM EST up reply actions
Just wondering
Would you freak out if they’re losing 90 games in ‘11 (not counting injured stars, etc.)? Having watched a lot of talent fail or flame out in Pittsburgh over the past 15 years, I’ll be awfully antsy if the ‘11 team isn’t at least knocking at the door of .500.
2011? – That would be nice.
But honestly, I think I should have phrased my question differently.
I’m not as concerned with the specific year the club begins winning, be it 2011, 2012, 2013….as much as I am about seeing the club put the stake in the ground and actually start building a club that can be percevied as an eventual winner. – Like was becoming evident in 1987 when Thrift began drafting and acquiring the likes of Bonds, Bonilla, Van Slyke, Drabek, etc.
Sure we have Alvarez, but much of the rest is just question marks.
The other aspect is, if the year isn’t 2011, or 2012, or 2013……how many years does it take to pull the plug on a FO and move on? By 2011 Coonelly and Huntington will have been in the job 4 years. Do they get 5? 6 years? How long is reasonable.
I ask these questions simply because though I agree their strategy is signficantly different that Littlefields, I think they have made many mistakes in executing their plan and I see no difference in terms of commitment to winning.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 2:27 PM EST up reply actions
Drabek
I would argue they are putting together a core comparable (not directly, one-for-one, but similar in strategy) to the ‘87 team. They are missing a Drabek, but then again, pitchers are such fickle beings — there could be a Drabek in the farm now, but we wouldn’t necessarily know it (plus, I’m a bit too young to remember, but was Drabek considered a can’t-miss ace from his early minor league years on? Somehow I doubt it).
I’d say they are missing a Drabek and a Smiley.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 2:56 PM EST up reply actions
Maybe I’m overly generous, but I would like to see them get six years.
A major issue that the current FO has had to face is the fact that it’s not 2002 anymore — more teams now realize the value of younger, cheaper players, and it’s not quite as easy to fleece an opposing GM of his prized prospect as it was even just a few years ago. That’s why it’s (so far) just Alvarez and bunch of question marks — the only way that the current FO really could go about acquiring top-shelf talent is to draft it. And unfortunately, this year’s draft was basically Strasburg, Ackley and a bunch of wild cards. You can argue whether Sanchez was the right choice, but it’s not like they were passing up BJ Upton again. As for getting talent through trades, the current team inherited essentially one All-Star level player — Bay. It’s not like they had a Lee or a Halladay to dangle out there for a premium return. So I guess I’m just saying that I’m willing to give this group a little bit of time to completely re-stock.
It is astonishing
How fast the worm turned on trading vets for prospects. I mean, this is something that’s been ubiquitous since the dawn of free agency, and was common for decades before that, and it’s ground to a halt in just a handful of years (as have huge contracts for aging sluggers and signings of Type A FAs). Nowadays you need to have absolute Grade A talent on offer to attract anything but mid-grade talent in exchange.
Exactly...
The issue the current FO faces is that it’s just trying to do business the same way that most of the rest of MLB is — invest in cheap, controllable talent. The only problem is, the rest of MLB had a head start while we were drafting guys like Moskos or Bullington. So really, in my mind, we either have to be patient while NH / FC play catch-up or else ask for them to discover the new market inefficiency, as Zduriencik appears to be trying to do regaring undervalued defense.
But the only difference in our drafting since the days of Moskos and Bullington is Alvarez. – One player.
Tony Sanchez was an admitted reach the same way Moskos and Bullington were, and for the same reason.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 2:59 PM EST up reply actions
Not exactly, though — this year’s was a weaker-than-normal draft — there weren’t any sure-fire guys there after Strasburg and Ackley, and while Sanchez may have been a reach, he wasn’t to the same degree as the previous guys, who weren’t even projected first-round talents. You can also look to all of the above-slot signings in subsequent rounds, which never would have happened under Littlefield. Again, it’s debatable whether the right picks were made, but I think there’s definitely an increased willingness to spend more (at least in the draft) to acquire more high-ceiling talents.
I was hoping for Matzek...
but i can understand the feeling that they wanted a ‘safe’ pick with Sanchez, and then basically threw a lot of above-slot money at the wall hoping one of those pitchers will stick. With no available ‘sure-fire’ talents, this strategy made sense. It also doesn’t hurt that Sanchez signed quickly and performed extremely well.
You got it — I would have preferred Matzek, as well, but am happy with a spread-the-wealth approach. There wasn’t a $6 million man there for us to take, really, so why not try to get maximum value with your budget?
I also liked getting a solid C. Even if Doumit is still with us in 2011 / 2012, he’s a virtual lock to miss >25% of the season with an injury
I definitely agree the club is spending more across the draft, particularly on the above slot guys.
But two counters to that I offer are, even though they spent the most money on the draft this year, they actually signed the fewest number of picks in all of MLB.
The other thing is, while the spend on the draft has increased, along with the spend on the Latin American talent budget, and on the Academy, all that collective spend has been offset by payroll reductions. Penny for penny.
No more money has been spent overall and there has been no change in the clubs financial commitment to winning.
They are simply spending the same amount, or less, in different ways.
I’d say I think the strategy and discipline to that strategy has been a big improvement over Littlefield and his methods, but I still think that in time we are going to find it is not enough to produce a winning club, let along a championship caliber club.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 3:13 PM EST up reply actions
The problem with that viewpoint is that is assumes the current total money spent is fixed at some value (which we really don’t know) from now until the end of time. However, you won’t really know that until the team is ready to spend money on the ML payroll. It has been stated (Charlie did so above) that spending money when the time is right (e.g, do we sign Cutch beyond his arb years? do we try to keep Alvarez? do we trade for Sabathia-type in the stretch run if that is what we need) is a HUGE question and you can’t answer it until you reach or approach it.
So essentially, they’re being smarter with their money — I don’t have a problem with that. What FA’s would you have them sign this offseason to improve their win total by 20+? I would argue that there were really only 3-4 “impact” guys available this offseason — Holliday, Bay, Lackey, maybe Figgins. We weren’t going to beat out Boston for Lackey — do you really think that, assuming that a miracle occurred and we were able to sign Bay and Hollday for a combined $30 million annually, they would suddenly make us a 90-win team? We still lack a #1 or even a #2 SP, and there isn’t one available. My point is, no amount of spending this offseason was going to make us a contender.
1) do we really need 40 guys with marginal talent? organizational filler can be found anywhere and you don’t have to get it through the draft. I would much rather sign 20 or so guys with legitimate talent. Quality over quantity.
2) I’m not too concerned about the payroll of our ML roster right now, b/c there’s no one worth paying a huge chunk of money. This question for the future. I do however find it concerning (as Charlie mention in the original post) that we don’t have any marquee signings out of Latin America. Like the draft this is a cost effective way to get top shelf talent. No question NH shat the bed one the Sano deal, and though i feel it was as much the agent’s fault as NH’s, i hope that it was just a rookie mistake that will be rectified in future dealings.
Why does the number of picks signed matter?
They only have a limited amount of playing time available in the low-level affiliates. Adding a few more senior signs who could sit on the bench and pick splinters out of their asses wouldn’t have improved the quality of the draft class at all.
by Vlad on Dec 30, 2009 9:49 AM EST via mobile up reply actions
Every draft class produces a surprise
The number of draft picks signed matters because every draft class produces a surprise player here and there. Albert Pujols was a 13th rounder and Mike Piazza was a 62nd rounder. For a club that is basing it’s entire furture on the farm system, the PBC needs everything it can get from it’s drafts. Both quantity and quality. I don’t like the reach for Sanchez, but I do like the above slot strategy, although they need to work out a more efficient approval process with the Commissioners office. Plus, it’s not like another 5 – 8 signed picks would cost a great deal, relatively speaking. Given how they’ve reduced the MLB team payroll, it certainly should be affordable.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 30, 2009 10:36 AM EST up reply actions
The problem with your criticism on this point is that
The Pirates specifically took more high school pitchers than they expected to sign because they knew these guys would be tough signs. So they didn’t know how many of the top guys they were going to be able to sign.
They had groups of guys that they were going to fall to if one or more top guys went unsigned. If they had signed all of them, they wouldn’t have any place for them to pitch. There are just a limited number of starter spots. Already, they are doubling up on starts in the low rounds and have had to accommodate a greater number of starters than it’s usual to have.
You're not listening.
Short of adding another affiliate, there wasn’t going to be playing time for many more guys than they signed. If they’d added five senior signs, even if one of them had been a diamond in the rough, that guy would have gotten 100 AB and then been released at the end of the season to make room for next year’s draftees.
that only covers two drafts.
Also, many would argue the sum total of the 2009 draft vs. the days of Moskos and Bullington is what should be compared, not the top pick (even though, while many though Sanchez was a reach, he is looking every bit the top 5 pick he was selected as).
Sanchez’s fast start was definitely encouraging however lots of guys have good years in the minors.
Junior Ortiz won the AA batting title as a 20 year old and went on to become a career backup.
One good minor league season does not a major league career make.
It was absolutely encouraging, but not a lock that Sanchez is destined for greatness.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 3:20 PM EST up reply actions
I'm probably as skeptical of Sanchez as anyone here...
…but the process and philosophy behind his selection was entirely different than it had been under DL.
It’s a question of strategy v. tactics. DL’s strategy (minimize cost, and focus on immediate readiness over ceiling) was garbage, so it produced poor results. Huntington’s strategy is good, and if the Sanchez pick fails, it will be a tactical failure from a blown player evaluation, which is a totally different animal.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 4:33 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
No, you're wrong.
The current administration has been very aggressive about drafting and signing above-slot players in later rounds, guys like Von Rosenberg and Cain and Inman. We probably added more guys in that mold last year than DL and Creech did in all of their drafts combined.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 4:28 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
There was Owens, and Brandon Holden, but I don’t think there was much else, and even those two signings pale in comparison to the ones for Von Rosenberg and Cain.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 4:39 PM EST up reply actions
times have changed
It is much more difficult today to trade for high-end prospects than in 1987. The Pirates have sucked for years because of incomprehensibly bad decisions. At some point, back luck piled on as well. It is shear bad luck that at the time the Bucs get a front office that finally has a clue at how to build a franchise the trend makes that more difficult than ever.
Good day.
So True
The landscape has changed all over the place. Younger players are held in much higher regard. That’s why it’s hard to compare now to 5 years ago, let alone the Pirates of the late ’80s. My earlier comment on Drabek, for example — how many people even knew who he was until he debuted in Pittsburgh? There was no BaseballAmerica (at least in web form), no FanGraphs, no Primer, no BB-Ref, no Baseball-Cube, and on and on.
Littlefield got six years so it is not out of the question Coonelly and Huntington will too.
I sure hope Charlie and those of you who are convinced these guys are on the right path because it is could be fatal to this organization and MLB in Pittsburgh if this regime has be terminated come year 6 or 7 and another has to try to figure out how to build a championship caliber club with $30M or $40M.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 2:58 PM EST up reply actions
Fatal to MLB in Pittsburgh?
Hardly. If the ‘40s and ’50s didn’t kill this franchise, nothing will.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 4:38 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
on question for you NH
who would you rather have than NH/FC? YOu seem to agitate against their whole MO, but would it really be productive to get rid of them at this point?
To me, around 5-6 years for the FO is reasonable. I don’t think even management proponents such as myself would argue for an unlimited leash for NH/FC no matter what happens.
by Adam Reynolds on Dec 29, 2009 4:55 PM EST up reply actions
Thrift...
When Thrift was hired as GM, he had a loaded minor league system and a major league team with some young talent. On the day he was hired the Pirates had Barry Bonds, Bobby Bonilla, John Smiley, Jose Lind, Orlando Merced, Sid Bream, RJ Reynolds, Bob Walk and Rafael Belliard. He acquired Andy Van Slyke, Mike LaValliere, Doug Drabek, Bob Patterson and Gary Redus in trades. He drafted Tim Wakefield, Randy Tomlin, Stan Belinda, Jeff King and Moises Alou. So I think that in general, he came in to a much better situation than Neal Huntington did, as far as talent in the minor league system and the trade environment around major league baseball.
I think Huntington has a much more difficult uphill climb than Syd Thrift did in 1985.
by IAPiratesFan on Dec 29, 2009 8:49 PM EST up reply actions
I think most people expect improvement by 2011.
And I think that in regard to accountability, even those of us who support NH’s approach to rebuilding the org. are holding him accountable. While I like the approach he’s taken, the players he’s acquired at the minor-league levels have to produce. If not, Huntington is ultimately accountable for that.
It usually takes college draft picks...
…about three years to reach the majors, and high school picks four to five hears. As such, I think that at a mnimum three-to-five years would be necessary before we’d have any real idea whether the team’s approach to drafting and player development was likely to bear fruit (though there may be hints sooner, of course). And make no mistake, all other details of baseball operations are secondary to drafting and player development, when it comes to building a winner.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 1:55 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
Balance
I can understand the anti-management group. They’re casual fans who have endured 17 years of failure. They’re angry, impatient and suspicious. However, I personally find the Pollyannas who support everything management does much more irritating. The current head office seems to have a good plan, and there are encouraging signs, but, at the same time, they’ve made mistakes. Yet, if you criticize those mistakes, that optimist faction will jump on you and accuse you of being a fool who is against everything good and right in the universe and possibly even a Cleveland Browns fan. So, I agree with Dejan, there should be a middle path where you call the good things good and the bad things bad and it’s the end of the flippin’ world.
It's difficult to know how to take this...
…without knowing exactly which moves you consider to be mistakes, and why you consider them such.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 1:57 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
The second you list an example, then the discussion becomes about proving/disproving that particular item is a mistake rather than the basic point of whether or not there should be a middle ground between the “We’ll Never, Ever Win!!” Chicken Littlefields and the “We’re Winning the World Series in 2011!!!” Pollyanna Bensons.
But this is what I’m talking about—there are plenty of Pirates fans saying the team will never win, but who are the ones saying we’ll win the Series in 2011?
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 2:19 PM EST up reply actions
The original article is about the P-G boards, and those people definitely exist there. You’ll probably see posts from people saying they’ll win it all in 2010, which is just plain bonkers. I think the folks who write and post to these kinds of blogs tend to be more in the middle, while the P-G boards and the folks Dejan has to deal with represent the extremes of the discussion.
you’ll also see plenty of posters here (even NH/FC boosters) who question if the Pirates will ever win another championship. You’ll generally see more of a consensus here about the organizational direction and the imperitive for sytemic change after 15 losing seasons. The last two were all but a given, even without the 2008 shakeup.
Until (or unless) the Pirates are in a position to deal in reverse — ie prospects for a key piece needed for a postseason run — all of the speculation about scouting prospects, drafting and developing young players will require some patience to reach an objective conclusion. But as younger acquisitions mature and develop, that critical should focus should sharpen over time.
The financial side is the real mystery, because sometimes cost cutting moves are simply good baseball moves. Other teams, big and small market, dump overvalued contracts all the time, and the trick is to avoid such contracts to begin with. Some people assume avarice drives all of these moves, which I doubt but can’t really prove one way or the other because of the lack of transparency in MLB finances. Conversely, if Yankees fans saw the profits the Steinbrenners have earned over the past decade, they’d be pissed that they waited until 2009 to lard their payroll with the absolute cream of the free agent crop.
Ultimately the Pirates would not have been hurt financially by paying Capps for a season, but lots of people on both sides of this debate are unwilling to accept this as baseball decision — anti FO folks assume dump and even many FO sympathizers feel Capps value was in trade. I’m willing to let it go as a baseball decision and let the results speak for themselves in time.
by chicos_pants on Dec 29, 2009 3:28 PM EST up reply actions
So, name calling is ok, but intelligent discourse is totally out? You might want to consider that the Pollyanna’s, as you put it, are just smarter than you.
"I choose to gamble with my life
Twice the risk, four times the prize
Nothing knocks me over"
by lighthouse913 on Dec 29, 2009 8:55 PM EST up reply actions
pollyannas?
I think calling out the so called “pollyannas” is actually a pretty good example of the kind of “both sides are guilty of this,” that Charlie’s post is calling out. Really, who are these “pollyannas?”
I read this blog, Only Bucs, WHYGAVS, and Buccofans pretty regularly, and I really can’t name you one regular contributer who reflexively supports absolutely everything NH and company does. Yes, a lot of people, myself included, think that the current management team has a pretty good idea of what it’s doing, and tends to be supportive, but the emphasis there is on “tends.” It doesn’t mean that we blindly accept every move as it comes. If you read, for example, the comment streams about releasing Capps, you’ll see an awful lot of questioning.
I will admit that the so called “optimist faction” will “jump on you” if you present something insupportable as a given fact. Is that a bad thing?
by brooklynpirate on Dec 29, 2009 2:01 PM EST up reply actions
An observation
On a blog/comment board with a lot of regulars, there’s a tendency to sort of conglomerate the conversation into a single voice, which can be misleading.
On Bucsdugout, there’s a general consensus that current management is doing things right. So, while there’s probably not a single commenter here who would defend every single FC/NH move, there are at least a handful who will defend any given move. As a result, I think there’s a sense that there are pollyannas here because, if you cite any given “bad” move, someone will defend it (and usually strongly – on the internet there are no weakly-held opinions).
The key is to realize that it’s not the same people – Vlad doesn’t like 100% of what NH does, WTM doesn’t, Charlie doesn’t. But, on any given move, the odds are decent that one of them (or another prominent commenter) will like it, which makes it seem that “Bucsdugout” always defends NH. But there’s no such thing as “Bucsdugout” – it’s just a bunch of people with a broad variety of positions.
Really great piece, Charlie. I think there was some discussion of this in a comment stream last year at some point, but it is always good for it to be noted that the idea of “balanced” journalism — that each “story” has two sides — has allowed an incredible amount of verifiably incorrect information to take root in our culture. (I appreciate that this is a sports blog and that you’ve kept it non-partisan, and I’ll do the same, but I will just say the that one side the political spectrum is vastly more guilty of this than the other.)
As it pertains to Dejan’s article: I think he’s a pretty great sportswriter, for the most part, but I do think he kind of panders at times to the stupids, and I would really, really like to see him take on the ridiculous editorials about the Pirates that his paper occasionally disgraces itself with.
Dejan's views regarding polarization
I agree with Dejan’s observation that it seems anymore that participating in Pirate related blogs and messageboards has become either a pro-FO, or anti-FO proposition these days, with very little ground in between.
However, from the view point of an active participant on Dejan’s blog, I think he fails to recognize or admit that he personally has enabled and in some cases encouraged this phenomena to a certain degree.
Dejan’s should have simply stuck to enforcing the Post Gazette’s stated blog posting guidelines, regardless of what camp the poster resides in.
He didn’t do that.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 2:09 PM EST reply actions
I'll add to the praise
Well done, Charlie.
I want to note that just a week or so ago we had another go-round with “does DK inject his opinion?” and I think that Charlie’s article explains why he should be doing that, at least in some way.
I would just like to say
That I’ve read this story and the one related to it and all the comments, I just don’t have much to add at this point.
Jason Bay
SI is reporting that Bay has come to terms on a 4 yr deal with the Mets.
I think this is a horrible fit and one Bay will come to regret.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 2:54 PM EST reply actions
you must mean the Mets
Bay will happily make $80M (with the 5th option year, which is supposed to be fairly easily obtainable), and sail into the sunset, if Citi field messes with him!
Would that I had...
…the opportunity to regret making $66M.
by Vlad on Dec 29, 2009 4:42 PM EST via mobile up reply actions
I'd rather ....
Earn $60M and have a legitimate shot at the post season vs. $66M and little chance at the post season.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 4:44 PM EST up reply actions
Says the person who likely has no chance of making either
Its easy for you to claim how much you would leave on the table for a chance (not a guarantee) of winning a postseason title; you’ve never been placed in the position of having to choose, and you likely never will. It’s far different when you are the one faced with the choice of trading $6 million for the chance of winning a piece of jewelry. To you, it’s a fantasy; to Bay, it’s a job.
Formerly known as Econolodge
I must disagree
except with the point that we’re unlikely to ever be able to be given such a choice.
Firstly, $6m out of $66 is about 9-10% so it is not like it is a massive difference (all subjective). Secondly, in 500 years (to pick a number) you’re correct; it will just be a bit of jewellery, but for the chance to be on a WS team, it could make a difference to one’s self esteem and get them respect for the rest of their life if it pays off.
I would take the chance, how much does someone need to set themselves up for life these days anyway?
by BlindSquirrel on Jan 3, 2010 10:37 PM EST up reply actions
Oh, good grief
This is the Mets we’re talking about here, not the Royals. What are the odds that a New York team filled with stars is still going to be bad in five years? Will the Wilpons just let things fall apart? Not likely…
by Vlad on Dec 30, 2009 9:54 AM EST via mobile up reply actions
Are you familiar with the history of the Mets, Vlad?
And I’m not talking 1962. After the Miracle Mets group, they had one good group of guys in 25 years. They’ve already gotten the best out of the current group – if not for unlikely collapses, they’d have reached the playoffs 3 years in a row, and if not for an unbelievable series by Suppan, at least 1 WS. But they’ve not developed a good young player since Wright/Reyes, and the system is barren. I think they’re unlikely to be in the playoffs more than once during Bay’s tenure.
I mean, you’re completely right that the Mets are not the Royals, but as a lifelong Mets fan, I can’t help but laugh bitterly at the idea that there’s no way the Mets could be a bad team.
I'm not saying there's no way the Mets will be bad.
I’m saying there’s no way the current Mets roster will be bad for all of the next five years. When was the last time a NY team went five straight years without contending?
The 2010 Mets roster is basically the same team as the 2008 roster that won 89 games. They’re missing Delgado, and they’ve still got a hole at catcher, but it’s easy to retrospectively gloss over the holes on the 2008 team. It only had three solid starters – Maine missed significant time, Pedro missed significant time and was pretty lousy when he pitched, and they were patching with guys like Nelson Figueroa and Jason Vargas and Tony Armas. The corner OF situation was patchwork the entire way, thanks to Alou’s injury, with two positions divided relatively evenly between two productive hitters (Church and Tatis) and two unproductive ones (Easley and Endy Chavez). The bench was pretty lousy. The primary setup man (Heilman) totally self-destructed. Etc.
If the Mets add a catcher, a SP, and a decent 1B like LaRoche, which they very well might, I could easily see this team making a strong run at the WC next year. Look at the other top NL teams from last season: The Braves lost Vazquez. The Marlins are trying to offload Uggla (and his money). The Dodgers are bleeding from every orifice. Etc.
Good Grief is right...
When you look at the status of the Mets organization.
Minaya has cobbled together an expensive roster that has no chance of competing because it lacks pitching and their farm system is barren.
It’s going to require a great deal of work to turn that mess around once they pull the plug on Minaya.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 30, 2009 10:38 AM EST up reply actions
He isn't done signing players yet.
They probably add at least one more SP this offseason. And the farm, while in the bottom half of the league, isn’t Houston-level barren. Fernando Martinez and Jon Niese both have very good shots at being significant contributors in 2010, and guys like Havens and Ike Davis and Wilmer Flores would have enough trade value to bring back a significant contributor, if necessary.
I don’t love where they are right now, but the Red Sox aren’t exactly a slam dunk, either, with Tampa and the Yanks as strong competition.
OK, compare it to a real life example....
If you were looking for a job and had two offers:
Job Offer 1: $50,000 per year from a company located in NY that occupyies the # 4 spot in their industry in terms of marketshare and there are rumors that a change in leadership may occur in the coming year if the company does not produce better results.
or
Job offer 2: $45,000 per year from the perceived market leader, offices located in Boston or Seattle, and organizational leadership is stabile.
I take Offer # 2.
It’s all relative.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 29, 2009 5:07 PM EST reply actions
Big difference...
Bay’s contract is guaranteed, mine wouldn’t be. I doubt he cares all that much if there’s a leadership change — it’s not going to change his paycheck, nor (likely) his playing time. Plus, the team he’s going to has a strong core, at least offensively, of Beltran, Reyes, and Wright, which is enough to be competitive in the NL East, or at least for the wild card. Maybe Wright doesn’t rebound, and maybe Reyes and Beltran get hurt and miss most of the year again, but I’d bet he’s willing to take that chance.
not sure offer #2 is too clear
1. A lot of people would love the opportunity to be part of a rising team- when you are on the top (or close to it), its easier to go down than up. How much can you contribute to the leader? They already have most of the things in place, and need you less, and therefore, might value you less. If I had an offer from a #4 company, I’d think that I could be the one making the difference in taking it to the top. If they also gave me the best financial offer, super!
2. Instability in leadership affects coaches/personnel a lot more than players. Bay’s contract would be guaranteed, and he’d have a fair bit of job security (as much as you can expect, anyway).
3. Really, baseball is a business. 10% is a significant raise, and given that Bay’s definitely in the 2nd half of his career, it’s fine if he chooses to maximize the money. The Mets are not that bad (think 2007/08 when they inexplicably choked), and can spend money to get better.
It is all relative. For example, you’re ignoring the fact that this is likely Bay’s one and only shot at a mega buck contract. If he’s even still playing after his Mets contract expires he’ll likely be playing for one year deals by that point. He might even regress to the point of taking minor league deals with an invite to spring training.
The role of a journalist is to be balanced and objective.
That’s the first thing journalism majors are taught in school. To be balanced and objective. That’s how American journalism has been for more than a century. They are suppose to report the news and let the public come up with an opinion on it. An idea that originally was invented to save space for advertisements has become the standard for American journalism.
A columnist writes his/her opinions on issues. That’s fine. But don’t expect a journalist to express opinions in their work. They’re not suppose to.
My own approach — and, really, I have no choice — is to look at each decision case by case and, over time, to form a more general assessment. To me, given the long-term scope of what this management hopes to achieve with its veterans-for-prospects trades and two quality drafts, that general assessment is still not in sight.
^ That might be the best thing I’ve read concerning the Pirates in a while. ^
Exactly.
If you write an article about the shape of the earth, you don’t have to give equal time to people who think it’s flat, in the interest of even-handedness.
by Vlad on Dec 30, 2009 9:56 AM EST via mobile up reply actions
That may be Job #1, but...
I notice that CNN ran a story last week entitled “Was Jesus Rich?” The article focused on the theory of a kook preacher who said the Bible shows that Jesus wasn’t poor at all but received valuable gifts at his birth and that his underwear was so expensive that the soldiers gambled for them after his death.
Then they gave almost equal time to a professor of religion who said the guy was an obvious idiot.
The CNN comparison is very good as it relates to Pirates discussion, as stated above.
CNN tries to be balanced, but it’s a terrible approach. Because although both Republicans and Democrats lie, the Republican lies have been bigger and more egregious lately (death panels, birthers, the president is a secret Muslim, etc.). CNN gives Republican lies the kid gloves approach to try to make sure they aren’t accused as much of being too liberal, when they need to give viewers the facts regardless of what side they benefit.
Similarly, the idea that Huntington is a failure for not having a playoff team already needs to be torn apart not given “balance”.
I think Dejan has done a slightly better job of this recently than a few months ago, when I was extremely critical on this blog of him for pandering to the most unfair critiques of Huntington/Coonelly.
Just a warning to anyone out there that if this blossoms into a full-fledged political discussion, I might shut it down. I know I started it, but still.
by Charlie Wilmoth on Dec 29, 2009 7:52 PM EST up reply actions
Appreciate the Article...
..and keeping the baseball discussion going during the drab hockey/basketball months, but….
…a big problem with journalism in the past decade or so has been the tendency of journalists to achieve “balance” (they even try to do this?) by presenting both sides (Where??) of an argument without evaluating what either side is actually saying…..
Leads to my well-thought out response….
Ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho (gasp) ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho (gasp) ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho (gasp) ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho!
But seriously folks...
…I think this is the same point I was trying to make with my three-part series, albeit with a slightly earlier version of the Pirates. In short, although we had one or two or six good competent players (Giles, Ramirez, Kris Benson, John Van Benschoten), they were not enough to carry the dregs – whether they be at 2B, the bullpen, or the 2-5 starting spots in the roation – that fleshed out the rest of the 25-man roster. And we were draining our farm system in the process of getting to 70 wins.
JVB?
that’s a big call… Wasn’t he a bust? Or am I thinking of someone else?
by BlindSquirrel on Jan 3, 2010 10:57 PM EST up reply actions
The value moderation
I think the CNN comparison is not apt. The problem with CNN (even as it was described here) is not that it is trying to be balanced, it is that it is shallow (which, sadly, sells better than in-depth analysis). The idea that you cannot have indepth analysis without a predisposed opinion is simply inaccurate. Indeed, the ability to withdraw these emotional predispositions is what draws me to sabermetrics integration into baseball evaluations.
Conversely, I think the pro-management vs. anti-management approach (or Fox vs. MSNBC, if you prefer) is that the interpretation of events becomes almost absolutists in nature, and suddenly the opposing approach is always wrong and is unable to provide anything of value to the construction of a successful baseball team or an effective and appropriate government.
Sincerely, a proud and vocal moderate.
You build a home from the foundation up, not from the roof down.
Misrepresentation
Charlie, if it was your intention to be fair and balanced, you missed completely. Your portrayal of the “anti-management” could not have been more wrong. As there are a number of people in that camp who unrealistically want a 100 million dollar payroll or a playoff contenting team, there is a large group of fans who know neither are possible in 2010. But despite that are still very, very doubtful about the Pirates’ ability to win moving forward. And those doubts are based on previous actions by the ownership group or mistakes they’ve seen from Neal Huntington and Frank Coonely since arriving on the job. If you are anyone else is interested, I’m happy to discuss in detail those mistakes which I believe are a solid foundation for someone being of the opinion this management group is not going to succeed.
But to paint those of us in the anti-management picture as you did, was truly irresponsible. It disappoints me to see you not give the critics more credit for being smarter than that.
Actually I think Charlie’s intention was to encourage you to share your examples of what you believe to be mistakes of the front office.
The main problem right now with the dynamic between the pro- and anti-management camps is that the anti-management camp doesn’t make a whole lot of sense most of the time. The bulk of the criticism aimed at Neal Huntington and Frank Coonelly either demands that the Pirates make some doomed, kamikaze run at contention right now, or blames Huntington and Coonelly for their inability to magically transform a thoroughly trashed organization into a World Series team within a month of being hired.
I guess that could be interpreted as a broad portrayal of the “anti-management camp” to include people still frustrated from Bonifay and Littlefield, as well as someone like yourself. But I thought Charlie was clear that it’s just frustrating to listen to people criticize the current front office for 1) past management’s errors and 2) not taking actions that would pretty obviously be detrimental to the organization.
I don’t think the “anti-management camp” was meant to lump in someone with a reasonable argument that the current regime’s plan will not succeed. That said, I’d be interested to hear what you regard to be mistakes by NH and FC.
Unfortunately
You’re the one who missed the point as DITO pointed out below. Discussing missteps is fine, railing on about stuff that isn’t smart or logical in any baseball capacity is where too many words are wasted.
Point Not Missed
I didn’t miss the point. Charlie clearly suggested the anti-management crowd was irrational and illinformed. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have said “the anti-management camp doesn’t make a whole lot of sense most of the time”. And it’s my contention there are plenty of folks in the anti management crowd armed with very intelligent and thought out criticisms of NH and FC. People may disagree with those criticisms, but they are based on fact and logic, not some irrational crying for a playoff contender in 2010. And because Charlie took that stance, his article is nothing more than proving how polarized the fan base is. His transparent bias clearly came out as he irresponsibly described the fan base who doesn’t share his opinion.
Not being sarcastic
And I don’t consider myself a management fluky, but I’d like to hear the cogent arguments against the general direction that FC/NH are taking us.
Good day.
Direction is fine
The general direction is not the problem. It’s primarily the execution. But here is a bullet point of my criticisms:
1. Finances continue to be an issue despite being told they won’t. Now I’m not suggesting they increase payroll to 80 million or go out and sign Matt Holliday, but there are a few instances where their “internal values” are blatantly too rigid. The first example is obviously Matt Capps. Not signing one of your own players who not only experienced as much success as any current Pirate, but would be under financial control for another two years and was still only 26 years old over $500,000 doesn’t make sense. Even if Capps had pitched exactly like he did this season, what’s the harm? But there was a nice reward had the Pirates been willing to take a very small financial risk. The second example was the drafting of Tony Sanchez. Sanchez is a nice player and obviously had a solid season after signing. But there’s no way you’ll convince me the Pirates liked him better than a number of pitchers still on the board at #4. They clearly like him AND his price tag more than the number of high ceiling pitchers still on the board. So once again, the Pirates were unwilling to risk money for potentially high reward pitchers. The third example is their unwillingness to dip into the FA market when there have been bargains to be had. Adam Dunn being a perfect example of this. Dunn was paid 8 million by the Nationals this year. Or roughly the same amount the Pirates will be paying Imawura, Crosby, and Vasquez. Those are three marginal to bad baseball players that not only will not improve the 2010 Pirates, but do absolutely nothing to make them better in 2011 and beyond. Dunn not only provides a bat they sorely miss, but a valuable trading chip, or possible comp pick.
2. NH’s continued philosophy of quantity over quality. As I understand his thinking, the problem is that when you increase the quantity in the return on your trades, you decrease the quality. And you end up with a number of prospects and players who are mediocre at best, rather than good. Considering the lack of top end talent on the Pirates, I’m not sure this philosophy is going to turn into a winner. Sure, this approach spreads the wealth and eliminates the chances of the trades being complete busts, but I don’t think it accomplishes the real goal of getting impact players. And it seems NH is adverse to taking such risks.
3. During the Pirates three most important negotiations, it appears they’ve been in over their head. First with Pedro Alvarez, as if it wasn’t for a gift by MLB, Alvarez not only would not be a Pirate, they would not have received a comp pick. And they risked all that simply so they could play tough with Boras. The second instance was with Sano. Once again they proved they are not competent when it comes to negotiations and it was their refusal to leave Sano and his family alone that led to him signing with another organization. And the last instance was their complete miscalculations on bonuses for this year’s first round picks. As mentioned earlier, they selected Sanchez because they were scared off by the price tag of a number of other highly rated pitchers. However, those guys ended up signing for as little as 1.5 million more than Sanchez, not the 5 million many predicted
4. It seems NH gets credit for simply being better than Dave Littlefield. As this is true, it doesn’t make one a good GM. Hell, a monkey could do a better job than Littlefield. So as he’s made improvements over his predecessor, I’m not sure taking a club filled with C- prospects and loading it up with C+ prospects is the solution to making this team a winner in the near future.
There are others, but those are the big ones. Again, people can disagree with my points, but I feel comfortable knowing full well my criticisms have much, much more merit than those complaining because the Pirates will not be good in 2010. And they have much more credibility than Charlie suggested in his poorly written piece.
Excellent comments.
All fair questions. – I share many of the same thoughts, but you communicated them better than I have.
Good job.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 30, 2009 1:40 PM EST up reply actions
- Capps- the Pirates didn’t feel Capps was worth the $3-4M, and feel they can replace what he gave the Pirates, with perhaps Hanrahan and Meek, or through FAs. 2010 will tell whether they were right or not. There’s significant concern about Capps arm regarding the Jim-Tracy-abuse. A lot of people felt Capps should have been retained, but the other side of the argument should be apparent, and at this point, no one can tell which one is right.
Draft- As far as I can tell, Sanchez has looked every bit the #4 pick so far. Add in the fact that pitchers from high in the draft flame out pretty consistently, and that they would have wanted 4-5M, and you should see why it makes sense. The FO decided they would take top 3 round talent in ZVR and Cain with late rpicks so as to get them for around $2.5M, and bolster it with Stevenson, Inman etc who all got above slot bonuses, and it gives you a better shot. We could have drafted a Matzek or Purke for $5M and then signed organization filler ala Littlefield. Again, we need a couple of years to know if this was the right way to go or not. It’s certainly not clear that the draft was not a good one.
- Not sure about the Alvarez gift but even if it was, I dont know why you should care. He is a Pirate, and that should be good enough. It’s a pity negotiations with Sano went as they did. We really have very little to go on. If he’d signed, then you’d have said “Thank NH/Gayo for pestering his family.”
We’ve seen some highly rated pitchers in the past, and wouldn’t like to see them again. Also, if a draft pick signs for $2 M after being the 15th pick, that has no bearing on what he would have demanded as the 4th pick.
- A lot of the prospects picked up might have been undervalued, and NH is hoping he found such prospects, primarily because the talent he had wasn’t good enough to do any better. The top prospects will hopefully come from the draft, but people like Lorin, Harrison, Locke, Morris are the kind we have to hope will break out and become solid players. Its not like NH had top players to trade- remember he only had the core of a 95 loss club!
Besides, the ones acquired dont seem to be doing too bad, and calling them C- is a stretch- Alvarez, Ohlendorf, Morton, Tabata, Alderson etc (There you have 3/5 of a starting rotation, and a power hitting IF and a solid 4(?) tool OF).
ugh
dont know why the numbers are messed up (could be typoes, maybe some kinda autoformatting). should have been 1, 3 and 4.
Well....
First off, I do think the things Charlie pointed out are legitimate:
There is, for example, the fact that they’ve shown no real ability to construct a bullpen. Their concept of “internal value” seems at times to be almost dogmatic, and it may get them into trouble if the team reaches the point where a couple extra million spent on a veteran really could make a big difference. Huntington and Coonelly have talked a great game about Latin America but so far haven’t signed a prospect there for more than a few hundred thousand bucks. And then, of course, there’s the giant, honking and totally legitimate question of whether the Pirates will really open the checkbook once they’ve built a good core of competitive young players.
You mention some of them, which is cool, but you don’t provide the best examples in some of the cases.
1. Finances continue to be an issue despite being told they won’t. Now I’m not suggesting they increase payroll to 80 million or go out and sign Matt Holliday, but there are a few instances where their "internal values" are blatantly too rigid. The first example is obviously Matt Capps. Not signing one of your own players who not only experienced as much success as any current Pirate, but would be under financial control for another two years and was still only 26 years old over $500,000 doesn’t make sense. Even if Capps had pitched exactly like he did this season, what’s the harm? But there was a nice reward had the Pirates been willing to take a very small financial risk. The second example was the drafting of Tony Sanchez. Sanchez is a nice player and obviously had a solid season after signing. But there’s no way you’ll convince me the Pirates liked him better than a number of pitchers still on the board at #4. They clearly like him AND his price tag more than the number of high ceiling pitchers still on the board. So once again, the Pirates were unwilling to risk money for potentially high reward pitchers. The third example is their unwillingness to dip into the FA market when there have been bargains to be had. Adam Dunn being a perfect example of this. Dunn was paid 8 million by the Nationals this year. Or roughly the same amount the Pirates will be paying Imawura, Crosby, and Vasquez. Those are three marginal to bad baseball players that not only will not improve the 2010 Pirates, but do absolutely nothing to make them better in 2011 and beyond. Dunn not only provides a bat they sorely miss, but a valuable trading chip, or possible comp pick.
1. The Capps situation is well documented, and I don’t disagree with bringing it up as a worry. He may have been worth less or more and probably should have been tendered just to be sure. I won’t judge it entirely until next season because we need to see what happens with Capps and what happens with the bullpen arms that come in this year. It’s not a big deal now because he wasn’t going to make a big difference, but it could be a big deal down the line once the team is closer and they choose not want to spend an extra $500 thousand to retain or sign someone who could help them — Capps would have been signed simply as a trade chip rather than to help the team make a run at the playoffs so it’s slightly different.
The Sanchez pick could still look bad in the long run. He had a hot start after signing and we’ll have to wait and see how his strikeout numbers look once he gets to Double A to really get a feel for how good he can be. As for making you believe the Pirates wanted him at four over anyone else, you’re right I can’t make you believe that because neither of us really knows where they had Sanchez on their big board. Nevertheless, I don’t disagree with the strategy behind the pick because it’s not like they went cheap in the Draft, they just signed a guy around slot rather than having to wait until near the deadline to sign a hard-to-sign pitcher, which may have cost them a chance to get a couple of the other later-round arms to sign. I would think you’d be better off arguing that a position player ranked above Sanchez was not picked rather than a young pitcher. They would have drafted a slam-dunk pitcher like Stras, but otherwise, it seems like the management group does not want to take a pitcher early because of the attrition rate. Young pitchers are a risk in an already risky field of drafting. I think getting a lot of them rather than zoning in on one big one is the right thing to do, especially when you rely on the Draft for a majority of your core talent. You can’t miss in the first round when you’re the Pirates, and it’s not like every young pitcher the Pirates picked in the last era was terrible. As one example, Bullington should not have been drafted over Upton, but there were certainly outlets who pegged him as a Top 5 pick — even if DL classified him as a number three starter soon after. So getting a bushel of young arms later in the draft certainly passes the logic test, and they have shown they don’t shy away from price tags in general when it comes to the Draft so I don’t see why the money thing should be a concern. Maybe you don’t like the philosophy of not taking the super-risky pitcher for a potential payoff, but that’s a pretty big crash-and-burn scenario for a team that can’t afford the crashing or the burning. In this case, they may still crash with Sanchez and still have some payoffs due to multiple high-upside pitchers who might pan out rather than just the one.
And I saw NuttingH point out above why not just sign 5-8 more guys who also may have come in above slot because it would let’s say only cost about 3-4 million more? Baseball Prospectus did a great piece on this thought process a bit ago, which you should read if you can (subscription required I presume):
As for free agency bargains, Adam Dunn is not a “perfect example.” I could easily argue he’s overpaid because he is such a horrific fielder that all the good he does with his high on-base percentage and power is nearly negated because he’s such a liability when not at the plate. He really come in at around a 1 WAR because of that fielding. In comparison, Iwamura comes in around a 1-2 WAR because he’s not a mess in the field. Plus, LaRoche was a lock at first base and they had to see what they had in Moss in RF because he had a solid minor league track record. I’m not defending Vazquez or Crosby because they were signed for small amounts and are there for bench roles. Overall, I would say they should not be looking at long-term fixes in free agency because they just are not really there for the most part unless you sign some big-name guy for a nice chunk of change. Plus, when you sign someone with the main purpose of trading him, that’s not really a great idea in the grand scheme of things because it may hurt your ability to negotiate. As one example that is a bit better than Dunn (and also deals with another bad team), Gil Meche was signed in Kansas City for $55 million, and that’s somewhat worked out for them even though Meche was an injury concern who was still pretty raw. I say that because he figured it out for a couple years before regressing/being injured this year. Either way, the Royals have not been substantially helped out by Meche and have murdered themselves in free agency in recent years as well — not to mention Meche’s contract is getting more expensive each year and now he’s more of a risk.
2. NH’s continued philosophy of quantity over quality. As I understand his thinking, the problem is that when you increase the quantity in the return on your trades, you decrease the quality. And you end up with a number of prospects and players who are mediocre at best, rather than good. Considering the lack of top end talent on the Pirates, I’m not sure this philosophy is going to turn into a winner. Sure, this approach spreads the wealth and eliminates the chances of the trades being complete busts, but I don’t think it accomplishes the real goal of getting impact players. And it seems NH is adverse to taking such risks.
I’m a little perplexed by this point. If NH could get Buster Posey for Freddy Sanchez, I’m sure he would do it, but teams do not want to give up their blue-chip prospects unless they are getting back a blue-chip player, and even then it’s rough. It took Roy Halladay for the Phillies to give up two top-five prospects in their system — the Pirates did not have any Roy Halladays to trade away. Now, if you’re saying they should get one 7-10 player in a system rather than three top-20 guys, then I guess you could argue that, but unless you’re targeting someone like a Nick Hagadone (coming off injury, great arm, still huge upside) in the Victor Martinez deal from last year, it seems logical to get a couple more guys rather than one 7-10 guy in the other team’s system who would not end up being an “impact” talent anyway. I don’t really see how you can be upset with the Jack Wilson trade as an example of the quantity over quality, especially because the Pirates minor-league system was a mess and did need depth and talent. Since Snell and Wilson were not impact guys anyway, it’s not like the Pirates could have snagged one of the Mariners top prospects. In the Nady trade, they got an impact talent with a character issue, as well as some depth. In the Giants trade, they got a top prospect who had hit a bit of a wall (and got him for a non-impact guy and injury risk in Sanchez). But even in the Sanchez case, if Alderson does not work out, the Pirates get nothing out of the trade and that’s not good for a team like the Pirates (or any team for that matter). The Bay trade was another depth and impact talent trade, but to this point it has not worked out that well. Point being, if there is a potential impact talent in someone’s system, even when they’re a risk, they’re not exactly easy to get for what the Pirates had to trade. But, as I pointed out, Tabata, Alderson and Clement are good examples of risky guys who could be impact talents.
3. During the Pirates three most important negotiations, it appears they’ve been in over their head. First with Pedro Alvarez, as if it wasn’t for a gift by MLB, Alvarez not only would not be a Pirate, they would not have received a comp pick. And they risked all that simply so they could play tough with Boras. The second instance was with Sano. Once again they proved they are not competent when it comes to negotiations and it was their refusal to leave Sano and his family alone that led to him signing with another organization. And the last instance was their complete miscalculations on bonuses for this year’s first round picks. As mentioned earlier, they selected Sanchez because they were scared off by the price tag of a number of other highly rated pitchers. However, those guys ended up signing for as little as 1.5 million more than Sanchez, not the 5 million many predicted
A lot of the blame does go to Boras for the Alvarez situation. He pulled a maneuver a the deadline to try and get some extra cash for Alvarez — and eventually did get a little extra — but at the expense of how quickly his client could get to the MLB and start making real money more rapidly. I don’t really think this was a management blunder in any big way, especially when Boras tried to do the same thing with multiple clients that year.
There are people to blame on both sides of the equation when it comes to Sano. I think you would be better off talking about the lack of a massive signing in Latin America rather than targeting Sano specifically because the Pirates were never given a chance to up the ante with Sano. I’m not absolving Mayo and co. for not realizing Sano’s agent would get so upset about Mayo being close with the family, but it’s not cut and dry. I do think the Sano ordeal is overblown in that his price tag was getting rather bulbous, and those signings for multiple millions almost never work out in Latin America.
And, once again returning to the Draft, it seems like many teams didn’t call Matzek’s bluff correctly, since I assume that’s who you are talking about specifically in this case. Again, I don’t really know if the Pirates would have signed Matzek even at the price he ended up getting because their philosophy seems to be go with the hitter unless it’s a once-in-a-decade talent like Stras that early in the draft. So, again, I would say it’s smarter to discuss the philosophy rather than the price tag. Pedro was a number-one talent so they went through the crazy process, Matzek was not, so they didn’t want to potentially have to deal with the same thing — at least that’s how I perceive it.
4. It seems NH gets credit for simply being better than Dave Littlefield. As this is true, it doesn’t make one a good GM. Hell, a monkey could do a better job than Littlefield. So as he’s made improvements over his predecessor, I’m not sure taking a club filled with C- prospects and loading it up with C+ prospects is the solution to making this team a winner in the near future.
This is not really an arguable point because you have one feeling about the prospects, I have another. I will say that DL left a team that had no impact guys and no depth. In this case, maybe the Pirates system is not entirely top heavy yet — it’s hard to be top heavy after just two drafts because guys are still developing and you don’t really get a great feel for who the big-time guys might be yet (sans special cases like Alvarez) until they get a bit closer to the MLB. Still, unlike the past, it’s not a bad thing to have 20 C+ guys who could turn into B players or even A players in the coming years rather than 10 C players and then a ton of guys with no potential. The Pirates need a ton of bodies going forward, and so they might even be in worse shape if they had two Alvarez players and Littlefield’s system after that, rather than having one Alvarez and a bunch of guys who could turn into something special.
And, like I said in the How? comment, you really seemed to have read a couple lines of Charlie’s blog post, made up your mind he was attacking you personally and then didn’t care to actually read the whole blog, but whatever.
Seems like revisionist history here....
A lot of the blame does go to Boras for the Alvarez situation. He pulled a maneuver a the deadline to try and get some extra cash for Alvarez — and eventually did get a little extra — but at the expense of how quickly his client could get to the MLB and start making real money more rapidly. I don’t really think this was a management blunder in any big way, especially when Boras tried to do the same thing with multiple clients that year.
Coonelly and Huntington violated the collective bargaining agreement by agreeing to a contract with Alvarez after the contractual deadline and then attempted to process it through the system.
Then Boras called them on it, Coonelly attempted a juvenile “Johnny did it too” strategy and through other clubs under the bus.
Ultimately faced with losing Alvarez and the compensatory pick the following year Coonelly had to cave in and give Boras everything he was asking for….a major league deal and an additional $600,000.
Seems like Boras was the clear winner and not only did Coonelly come out on the short end of the settlement, he put his integrity in question by violating the collective bargaining agreement.
by Nutting Hostage on Dec 30, 2009 3:35 PM EST up reply actions
Exactly
That’s precisely how it went down, Nutting Hostage. And despite the Pirates eventually signing Alvarez, I don’t understand how anyone can excuse the Pirates’ actions. It would be like having your 16-year old son driving 50mph past an elementary school at 2:30 and thinking it was okay because he didn’t run over any 8 year olds.
But more importantly, I didn’t intend to list my critcisms in order to rehash the arguments. I’m assuming we’ve all been down that road and can simply agree to disagree. But my point was to illustrate how those critical of NH and FC have valid reasons for being critical. Something Charlie seemed to ignore in his initial post. And I’m not sure why so I’m left to conclude it’s because those valid criticisms conflict with his agenda. I guess it’s just much easier to suggest all the critics are simply irrational, while attempting to say those supporting NH and Co are correct.
I think it was more like driving through a school zone at 18 mph, and a kid’s parent complained. From my understanding, it wasn’t the first time MLB allowed a team to negotiate a few minutes past the deadline. Thus, the Pirates took advantage of that. Boras just decided he wanted to take a stand against it because he didn’t like that specific deal.
I don’t mean to speak for Charlie, but I’m pretty sure he is encouraging thoughtful discussion from those that disagree with the front office. That would be productive. The problem is that much of the logical discussion gets drowned out by a mass of anti-Nutting rants that, like he said, don’t make much sense.
Your argument that the Pirates should have went after Adam Dunn is productive. There’s logic to it. But viewpoints like it often get drowned out by nonsense arguments, like referring to the Nyjer Morgan trade as a salary dump.
Pittsburgh Lumber Co.
http://mvn.com/pittsburghlumberco
It wasn't even close to the first time.
Boras himself had negotiated post-deadline deals (with MLB-approved extensions) with Hosmer in the same year, and with Borbon in the season before, to name just two examples.
Boras raised the objection that he did with Alvarez in order to take a low-percentage shot at getting him declared a FA (and opening up a potentially huge payday). That shot was unsuccessful, and in the long run, I think it will actually turn out to have been a counterproductive strategy for him. Boras likes to stall negotiations until the last minute in order to maximize his clients’ leverage, but with the new hard deadline in place, he’s greatly increased his clients’ chances of losing a big $ deal to a logistical snafu in the future.
You keep railing this point home
Yet Charlie clearly never said he thinks people who disagree are irrational. He was calling a sect of the people who disagree irrational because their arguments are based on a fantasy world.
I would also agree with the 18 mph comment by Bandi.
I keep rallied at point because it’s relevant. Charlie wrote a piece in which he described the entire anti-management crowd as irrational. And by doing so, he was not only inaccurate, but irresponsible. Just because someone isn’t squarely in NH’s corner and defending every move the man makes, doesn’t mean they expected the Pirates to reach the playoffs in 2009. On the contrary. One could be equally logical about the amount of progress truly expected in just over 2 years and be critical of several moves made by the organization. And it’s Charlie’s obvious avoidance of this that frustrates me.
Is...
The main problem right now with the dynamic between the pro- and anti-management camps is that the anti-management camp doesn’t make a whole lot of sense most of the time. The bulk of the criticism aimed at Neal Huntington and Frank Coonelly either demands that the Pirates make some doomed, kamikaze run at contention right now, or blames Huntington and Coonelly for their inability to magically transform a thoroughly trashed organization into a World Series team within a month of being hired.
The above quote what is making you put on blinders to the whole point of the blog post? Because that quote is as close as he gets to calling you an evil rotten human who does not deserve to breathe the same air other Pirates fans do — or at least that’s the way you seem to be taking it.
Yes
When someone claims people who are critical of Pirate management “don’t make sense most of the time”, fails to acknowledge the validity of their criticisms, and doesn’t remotely paint the pro-management in the same bad picture, I take great offense.
Charlie says "most of the time", which is true.
There are certainly many valid criticisms that can be made of Huntington’s negotiating skills. I have made those myself, but for some reason the anti-Nutters don’t even hear me apparently when I make those criticisms. They only hear my “unadulterated praise” of the FO.
The claims that don’t make sense are that Nutting “doesn’t care about winning”, “will never provide enough money to win”, “is pocketing millions at the expense of the quality of the product on the field”, “had sole control of the team going back many years” and “owes it to the taxpayers to put a winning team on the field at any cost because they built him PNC Park”.
Like it or not, these claims dominate much of the anti-Nutters discourse, and I’m sorry, but anyone who believes these things is not a rational human being. There is zero evidence to back any of these claims up and plenty of evidence to back up the contrary.
If you personally don’t believe these things and feel like your voice of rational dissent is being discounted because you are being lumped into the group that continually spouts these inanities, then you should be blaming people like NutHo for reducing the level of discourse to the absurd, not Charlie for complaining about it, and you can neutralize any bias against your posts simply by making intelligent points that don’t reference Nutting as “The Great Satan”.
To be blunt...
…you’re coming off as somewhat irrational in your persistence on this particular point, right now.
Intellectually dishonest summation.
Boras had been perfectly happy to agree to post-deadline contracts (with MLB-approved extensions) in past seasons, with Julio Borbon’s post-deadline deal with Texas in 2007 being a notable example of this. If Boras had a moral objection to the practice, he would have complained at that time, if not sooner. He only complained WRT Alvarez because he was unhappy with the particular dollar figure that was agreed upon in that particular negotation, and the post-deadline status of the deal was a peg on which he could potentially hang a legal protest. If that was a violation of the CBA, it was a violation on the basis of common consent and common past practice, both by Boras and by the industry as a whole.
Pointing out that other clubs have routinely done the same thing isn’t a juvenile strategy – it’s a logical attempt to point out that the practice has been, at worst, a widespread “open secret” for years.
The “additional $600k” is largely an accounting fiction. The original deal called for Pedro to receive his original $6M signing bonus in two payments, half up-front and half one year later. The revised deal had a larger total signing bonus, but its disbursement was split across four years, not two, and as a result actually had a lower value in present-day dollars (due to the discount rate over the intervening years). The only real benefit to it was to Boras, in that it allowed him to claim to potential client recruits that he got a bigger deal for Alvarez than any other player in the draft, whereas the raw $ figure of the prior deal had ended up lower than Posey’s.
How?
Charlie clearly says:
he should call out more of the Magical Job Fairy stuff, so that the rest of us can talk to each other without navigating through so much of the “I’M DONE WITH THIS TEAM” and “IT’S A CULTURE OF WINNING, SRSLY” stuff that litters many online discussions.
That’s the anti-management stuff he’s talking about that is silly, not that anti-management people are stupid.
I don’t know exactly which percentage of the anti-management crowd is rational and what percentage is irrational. But I do know there are plenty of rational people in the anti-management crowd.
Put it this way, what if someone had said the reverse. “The pro NH supporters don’t make sense most of the time”. And then I commented how is was true because those people would have applauded NH for releasing Matt Capps and equally applauded NH had he re-signed Capps. Don’t you think the crowd of fans who think NH is doing a fine job would be offended by that? I think so. And rightfully so. Because as there are fans who clearly support any and all decisions made by NH, there are plenty who are supporters who objectively evaluate each decision.
In fact, that is what I am accused of all the time
Even though I have not even said that releasing Matt Capps was the right thing to do. Still, I am labeled as an FO apologist – even by DK himself – simply by explaining that the RATIONALE for releasing him IF THE FO’s EVALUATION OF HIS SKILLS PROVES TO BE CORRECT was sound.
That is, if Capps is better than he was in 2009, but still not worth $3.5M, then there’s no point in treating him as an asset, because he’s the same as an upside down house or car. At that point you are chasing good money after bad and you will never recover your investment.
The point is that MOST of the very vocal voices who spout the anti-Nutting lunacy that I described above simply refuse to acknowledge these kinds of reasoned arguments, whereas MOST of the people who do not believe or spout those unreasoned beliefs are very happy to engage in discussions based on logic.
If someone had said the reverse...
…they would have been incorrect, as that is not true.
As such, the remainder of your comparison is invalid.
It would appear
It seems you don’t appreciate being label irrational. And I respect that. So then why is it acceptable for Charlie, a purportedl respected blogger, allowed to do exactly that to the anti-managment crowd?
And that’s been my beef the whole time. It was never my intent to argue the points of my criticism, but only to illustrate there’s a great deal of logic and rational behind them. And it seems that point is lost on Charlie and many others here. And when Charlie does so while writing a piece on polarization, he’s doing nothing more than furthering that divide by being unwilling to acknowledge those who perhaps share a differing opinion as “not making sense”.
He didn't label the anti-management crowd as irrational
He said most of their discourse centers around positions which have no logical basis in fact. And that is absolutely correct. In fact, most of the people who are most vocal cling to beliefs that can not be defended with logic and they don’t even try. They just shout louder and louder and turn to ridicule instead.
Whether you do or not, most of the vocal anti-management crowd does believe that the Pirates could have contended with the position players they had in 2008 if Nutting would have just opened his wallet in 2009 and would have paid for some big name free agent pitchers.
They believe Nutting doesn’t provide enough financial resources to the team and that he is pocketing millions in profits.
They believe the Pirates “cheaped out” on Tony Sanchez, just the same as they cheaped out on Danny Moskos.
They believe the McLouth trade was a salary dump.
They believe that all Huntington has done is trade away valuable all stars and takes back scrubs and worthless junk. They believe the Bay trade is one of the worst trades of all time and shows that they can never be successful.
None of these positions have any basis in logic, and yet, these are in fact what MOST of the anti-management crowd says.
If you don’t say or believe these things, then Charlie did not label you as irrational. Why should you be upset at Charlie for calling irrational discourse as it is? Shouldn’t you be more upset at the people who refuse to be rational, regardless if they share some of your opinions or not?
If you want to be taken seriously, simply voice serious and rational opinions. I, for one, would absolutely welcome that.
If it was never your intent to argue the merits of your criticism...
…then why did you bring it up? And how are we then supposed to distinguish you (who are purportedly rational) from other reactionary anti-management critics (who are not)?
If you want anti-management positions to be more respected, your best course would be to condemn (and potentially silence) the irrational people who hold anti-management positions, and thus increase the signal-to-noise ratio of that end of the dialogue.
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
Recent FanPosts
Baseball Nation Recent Stories
In Association With
Big League Stew - MLB - Yahoo! Sports
- WANT: The Sid Bream sliding bobblehead (complete with Mike LaValliere and Randy Marsh!)
- Adrian Gonzalez is going to hit a home run Thursday night, according to Adrian Gonzalez
- Rich Thompson, the modern-day Moonlight Graham, gets another shot with the Rays
- Gary Sinise’s first pitch was not worthy of an Oscar
- Photo: Yu Darvish gets a big head, lowers his ERA to 2.60
