There's been some discussion about the quality of system Huntington inherited from Dave Littlefield. Prompted predominantly by DK's recent assertion that it wasn't actually as bad most remember. He listed some of players in the system at the time who've gone on to be contributors in years since: Cutch, Walker, Marte, etc.

In the comments section of the FanPost discussing Tim Williams' analysis of DK's blog poster a commenter mentioned that he wasn't convinced the Pirates system was as bad we remember and wanted some tangible proof:

I would like to see the 2007- 2012 cumulative ML WAR of the players in the system in 2007 versus other systems.

Vlad tabulated the cumulative WAR of the other teams in NL Central. The Pirates came in 5th, in front of the Astros. I was curious to see how they fared against all 29 teams.

Here's how I went about about tabulating the numbers. Per Vlad I only included players with positive WAR totals. Players eligible for inclusion were those who entered the 2007 season with rookie eligibility and spent time in the minor league system during that season. The only player who met that criteria I didn't include was Josh Hamilton (although as you can see the Reds hardly needed him). If a player was traded during the 2007 season their WAR was attributed to the club who received them (ex. Elvis Andrus). If a player was traded in the offseason their WAR was attributed to their original club (ex. Adam Jones). The goal was to compare the playing field when Huntington took over, using the same criteria for every team. If I missed anyone feel free to chime in. Here are the results. individual player WAR for each team are listed as a comment below, as well notable players who just missed the cut:

1. Reds - 90.6

2. Rays - 82.1

3. Braves - 80.6

4. Yankees - 79.5

5. Diamondbacks - 76.1

6. Rangers - 73.7

7. Brewers - 72.7

8. Red Sox - 66.9

9. Rockies - 68.4

10. A's - 64.2

11. Cardinals - 61.6

12. Giants - 59.7

13. Cubs - 59.6

14. Dodgers - 59.0

15. Padres - 58.2

16. Angels - 54.5

17. Indians - 51.0

18. Twins - 49.7

19. Tigers - 43.3

20. Royals - 42.6

21. Mariners - 40.1

22. Blue Jays - 39.8

23. Mets - 39.8

24. Nationals - 39.2

25. Pirates - 39.0

26. Orioles - 33.2

27. Marlins 30.0

28. White Sox - 28.8

29. Astros - 28.7

30. Phillies - 14.8