There was a nice post on BrewCrewBall comparing the strengths of the teams contending for the NL Central. That post is here. The author considered putting the Pirates in there, but didn't (which is a stance I can't help but agree with, even if my rose-colored glasses see a contender). However, it is a good job, and it provides us with a place where we can go check out the Bucs relative strengths and weaknesses, which made me decide to write a fanpost after quite a while.

Here's my breakdown of where the Pirates players slot into the rankings provided on that list:

C: Molina > Doumit > Lucroy > Hanigan

1B: Votto = Fielder > Replacement 1B/ Pujols >> Bucs

2B: Weeks > Phillips > Walker > Schumaker

3B: Rolen > Freese > Alvarez/D'Arnaud > Mcgehee

SS: Cedeno, Theriot, Janish > Betancourt

LF: Holliday, Braun > Gomes > Presley/Tabata

CF: McCutchen > Rasmus > Stubbs > Morgan/Gomez

RF: Bruce, Berkman > Hart > Bucs

Please note that I haven't included the exact rankings provided by the BCB guys-- the projections are my own, and are based only on what I think the projection will be for the rest of this year.

Also, does someone want to take a shot at doing the equivalent for SP? I found it very hard to decide how to rank the Bucs starters among themselves. We have, essentially, a bunch of #3-#5s who are easily bottom in the #1 starter, possibly above Arroyo for #2 starter, and our strength might be in the #4/#5 area.

However, the position player comparison was interesting to me, in that we weren't blown out by the other teams for the most part. What really hurts us, though, is that we don't have those big bats-- Fielder, Weeks and Braun are so significantly better than anyone we have that even a huge trade splash isn't going to get us there...

Still, if we stay in the NL Central race, it might be worth checking back to see if this list rearranges itself...