I think it’s pretty clear that the Pirates are going with these guys at short because of the difficulty in obtaining young shortstops. It’s pretty easy to find a guy who can field but can’t hit, like Luis Cruz or Argenis Diaz, and sometimes you can find a guy who can hit but can’t field the position at a major league level, like Brendan Harris. But young shortstops with the potential to do both may be the hardest commodity in baseball to acquire. There’s a reason the Yankees gave up Jose Tabata for Nady but the Rays wouldn’t give up Reid Brignac for Bay.

I don’t think Dejan is necessarily criticizing the team for not finding somebody else, though. I only understood him to be saying that there’s more of a hole at short than anywhere else. There’s somebody who stands a reasonable chance of turning into a legitimate regular at every other position, especially if you take Alvarez and Tabata into account. I wouldn’t say Cedeno and Crosby have no chance, but the odds are probably much lower with them than at any other position. I think that’s all Dejan was saying.

His point was simply that it wasn’t really right to say that the Pirates had “only” two holes to fill – I think it’s safe to say that, this offseason, Cedeno was treated, both by the FO and by fans, as a no-brainer incumbent, which is a stretch for a guy with a career OBP of .280 (!).

I mean, I take Charlie’s argument completely – if you’re looking for easy WAR to pick up, 2B was much lower hanging fruit than SS – but I don’t think DK needs to identify a list of likely signings/trades in order to be allowed to note that our presumptive SS for 2010 has, uh, flaws.

[Funny aside: without thinking, I looked up Roger Cedeno’s numbers. He had a nice season for the Mets in ‘99, when they made a great run at the Braves, and he’s always stuck in my head for that reason, even though he was otherwise mostly a stiff]

Gremlins

What makes you think 2B is an equal or larger gap?

Let’s see.

If Cedeno bombs, they have a 7 yr. major league veteran in Crosby as a fall back position.

When they dump Iwamura I am not convinced that moving a guy who has played a grand total of 13 innings at 2B to the position will yield immediate positive results.

his OPS regressed to his career average. He wasn’t tired, he was simply coming back to reality.

That people love to talk about bats for positions, right up until they feel like badmouthing someone, at which point they talk about OPS+, as if it makes sense to compare MI bats against OF bats.

Come on, people.

The Twins are a funny example. In 2001, the year they jumped into contention after many years of struggling, their payroll was $24M, lowest in the majors. That same year, Oakland won 102 games with baseball’s second lowest payroll. So what you’re arguing is that the Pirates should NOT do things the way the Twins and A’s did.

Drayton McLane ($1.4B), who’s got the Astros well-positioned to control last place for the next decade. Tom Hicks ($1B), who over-leveraged himself to the point of bankruptcy and had to sell last week. John Fisher ($1.2B), the primary owner of the notoriously free-spending A’s. Not to mention Peter Angelos, who’s almost as clueless as he is prone to interfering in baseball operations, and David Glass, who probably still has all the nickels he got as a child from the tooth fairy…

You really want to trade Nutting for one of those guys?

they wanted Wilson and offered him an extension. They did offer him more than $4million per year because at his age he is a severe injury risk. Wilson does not provide value if he is not on the field. I love how everyone that hates Nutting can look at sound baseball decision and keep using the same damn two words: SALARY DUMP!!! NH valued what Wilson brought to the table but in the end he was satisfied with the return he received. So, IMO, you’re wrong the move was made to build up the organization.

It was made for two reasons: to make Snell someone else’s problem, and to get back the young players that were their return in the deal.

Is that the trade where the Bucs sent Seattle enough money to cover for Wilson and Snell’s salaries?

Right now, we really don’t have much of an idea as to what the team’s needs will be in 2012/2013. As such, picking for need is a poor idea. Maybe we take Colon because we think he’ll fill a need, and then D’Arnaud and Cunningham have breakout seasons, and all of a sudden we don’t need a shortstop anymore.

It was like that last year, until Dustin Ackley started hitting for power.

$10M is way over!

hahahahahahaha!

X-man is the Cubbies’ albatross now.

Nady has had two TJ surgeries which is unprecedented for a position player. Who knows if he can even play the field anymore. I’m kind of surprised he got that much.

and I liked him a lot. I think there is a lot of potential there. As stated above Lynchburg was a very aggressive assignment. This will be an important year for him but I wouldn’t right him off yet.

Not until the end of March, which is two friggin’ months away.