Sign Juan Cruz

by Charlie Wilmoth on Apr 23, 2010 11:37 PM EDT

The Royals for some reason released Juan Cruz today. Cruz has the potential to help a battered Pirates pitching staff immediately; he was disappointing last year, but he was a strikeout machine for the Diamondbacks for two years before that, and this year he has struck out seven batters in 5.1 innings, allowing two runs. He did walk four batters and allow a bunch of inherited runners to score, but there doesn't appear to be anything wrong with him, and the Royals make enough bad decisions that I don't think we need to worry much about another shoe dropping here.

Cruz is also the sort of pitcher I would think Neal Huntington would be interested in even if the Pirates' pitching issues weren't so dire--he has electric stuff that he has at times had trouble controlling. The Royals should be on the hook for Cruz's contract minus the league minimum salary, which means that he's essentially free talent. It wouldn't surprise me at all to see the Bucs pursue Cruz, and I think the two parties have an excellent match of need and opportunity.

UPDATE: This was probably one of my stupider recent posts. Now that we've awoken from the nightmare that is Hayden Penn, the Pirates' bullpen hasn't actually been all that bad. They've had some really poor innings from Joel Hanrahan, but he probably deserves a bit of slack for returning from injury, and he's too interesting to cut anyway. Octavio Dotel and D.J. Carrasco have had poor ERAs, but reasonable peripherals. (Dotel has given up two homers so far, which is bad, but that's more of a sample-size issue than anything else.) Evan Meek has been great and Jack Taschner has actually been fine. That leaves Brendan Donnelly and Javier Lopez, who've both struck out fewer batters than they've walked but have mostly kept runs off the board. I wouldn't object to replacing Lopez with Cruz, but now that I look over things more carefully I'm not sure even that is a slam dunk. Moving Carrasco to the rotation until the Pirates find a legitimate fifth starter is one possibility, but that too is a stretch. Thanks to the commenters who pointed out the error of my ways. I just thought "twenty-run loss-->bad pitching-->free talent." It wasn't any more complex than that. I can do better.

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Go for it

if it keeps us from losing 20-0 ever again I’m all for it

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by WVPiratesfan on Apr 24, 2010 12:01 AM EDT reply actions

In fairness, he’s also been a walk and flyball machine for the past few years.

by Adam Reynolds on Apr 24, 2010 12:07 AM EDT reply actions

Yep, I concur

Put him on the 25 immediately and if you have to sneak him through waivers after ten days try to do it. The only issue is, the 20 run game aside, the bullpen has been okay, so which of the five righties are you going to move.? Obviously not Dotel, Donnelly, Meek or Hanrahan (unless DL for some reason). That leaves Carrasco who is the long man. (Meek, clearly our best pitcher at this point, shouldn’t be in a long man role. Two innings here and there, sure. But, not coming into a game in the 3rd or 4th.)

So, there really is a roster issue.

by David Todd on Apr 24, 2010 12:09 AM EDT reply actions

I don’t see who he’d replace on the big league team either. As minor league depth? Sign him up.

by Adam Reynolds on Apr 24, 2010 12:15 AM EDT up reply actions

YES!

Geez, anybody is better than the crap we’ve been running out there lately. Heck, where’s Phil Dumatrait?

by mspirate on Apr 24, 2010 12:15 AM EDT reply actions

We have options...

we could cut Taschner or use Carrasco as the 5th starter until someone esle steps up.

by Slick1 on Apr 24, 2010 12:31 AM EDT reply actions

You said it yourself, Charlie.

Cruz would be free talent. No risk, decent reward. He is better than Taschner.

by Suffering Buc on Apr 24, 2010 1:38 AM EDT reply actions

The pen so far has been around average by the peripherals (18th FIP, 15th xFIP). There’s been some bad luck baked into the performance. The starting pitching has no such excuse, as they’ve been MLB-worst no matter which measuring stick is used.

Actually, there has been a little bit of bad luck with the rotation, as the 8.13 ERA is not represented in the 6.40 FIP or 5.27 xFIP. All three of those numbers are worst in the majors, though. They have to go at least 5 or 6 innings in a large majority of starts and get quality starts, or it’s going to be a long, brutal year. I don’t expect that of the fill-ins, but at least for the regulars (Duke, Maholm, Ohlendorf, Morton) to go deeper.

by Adam Reynolds on Apr 24, 2010 4:24 AM EDT reply actions

Don’t drink and blog, Charlie.

I’d also be fine picking up Cruz but he’s not going to make the team a lot better (as Charlie pointed out in his correction).

I made most of my life decisions at a Foghat concert... I stand by them.

by Chester J Lampwick on Apr 24, 2010 12:31 PM EDT reply actions

Anyone's better than Hanrahan

I’m know I’m in the deep minority here, but sooner or later I think his decent stretch with Pgh last year is going to be seen as an anomaly. It’s not even a reaction to his work in the 20-0 game, I just don’t think he has a quality fastball beyond its velocity.

by azibuck on Apr 24, 2010 1:54 PM EDT reply actions

he hasn’t done it for a few years, but why not try plugging cruz into the rotation? his career splits are pretty similar for starting and relief… might be no better than kevin hart, but the options right now look pretty bleak…

by Captain Easychord on Apr 24, 2010 2:00 PM EDT reply actions

I guess I agree with the consensus that he’s not a clear upgrade over what we have in Pittsburgh right now, but I certainly think he makes sense as a AAA pickup: the depth we thought we had there has proven to be illusory, what with neither Hart nor Lincoln showing they’re ready for prime time, and us being forced to turn to Burres (I know that was partly a timing, issue, but still). We need a (spare) 5th SP more than another BP guy, but I’m no longer convinced that the next RP or two in line are actually going to be replacement level (iirc Chulk has been good, but I think a couple of the other NRIs have been surprisingly bad, and are no longer viable MLB options).

by JRoth95 on Apr 24, 2010 4:59 PM EDT reply actions

He clearly makes sense as a AAA pickup. The question, to me, is whether he can do better than that with another team. I’m sure there’s some team out there that can use a legit MLB reliever right now.

by Charlie Wilmoth on Apr 24, 2010 5:27 PM EDT up reply actions