I'm as critical of GMBC as anyone and think he should be fired yesterday. However, Skenes needed time in AAA. He barely threw his changeup in college. His split change is still a work in progress, and he had never worked on 5-days rest before. No one knew, prior to the season, that he was going to completely dominate AAA from the first pitch. Having him start the season in Pittsburgh would have been highly irresponsible IMO.
The real question then was wait for super 2 or call him up when he was ready regardless of financial concerns. He is clearly ready now, and the Pirates opted for this route. Whether they meant this as a good faith gesture or as a panic-button move to save Cherington's job, it will always count as a good faith gesture. If they sign him to a long-term deal, it was the right move. If they trade him in his arb 2 year, it was not. Time will tell.
I love how you make seemingly terrible financial decisions seem like that somehow benefits the fans. Creating a super two does not benefit the fans one iota, getting no extra pick due to his performance doesnt help us either. Common sense be damned isnt beneficial to the team whatsoever.im not really sure what the benefit is of bringing him up now unless i misconstrued something in the article. Do we lose a year of control? I think thats probably the most important as theres basically no way wed be able to afford him if he lives up to expectations
I share your concerns, mostly because this GM has not shown himself competent in any area of managing this team. However, there is a strong possibility that it is a good faith gesture on the part of the Pirates, which they will point to later in contract negotiations. Good faith with a potentially generational talent is not a bad thing.
Who pissed in your cheerios this morning. It's a good breakdown, it isn't like Ethan called him up, that decision was the GM's. The teams true reason will most likely never be fully known, I hope they are being honest with the fans and the player about boxes checked. This is the second time this year they didn't go by timeline or financial manipulation to promote a top prospect, I for one can respect putting the best players on the field.
Now if they can just try to improve the teams most glaring weakness (scoring runs), we might be witness to a turnaround to a competitive team.
Your first sentence. "I love how you make seemingly terrible financial decisions seem like that somehow benefits the fans."
First "I love how you" You direct the focus on the writer, when he does a good breakdown of service time. You know, what the articles title implies and is about.
Second "seemingly terrible financial decisions seem like that somehow benefits the fans" It does on the vast majority of fans.
Attendance will be much larger for Skenes debut than a normal Saturday game.
Television ratings will be much larger than normal. Locally and nationwide.
There's only a small number of fans that even think about service time, super 2 and even coming in top 2 in ROtY, I know, I'm one of them. I don't disagree with you on the financial implications of super 2 or Skenes ending up top 2 in ROtY and the extra year of cheap team control. The problem is with the plan "check the boxes" from the organization. Skenes looks ready, he has supposedly "checked the boxes" if they were to hold him down it would look bad to the majority of fans and to the player ("Pirates just being cheap, not trying to win").
I disagree Ethan. As I said in another thread, the extra 6 starts we gain this year for Skenes will cost the Pirate 10-20 million dollars later because of the extra year of arbitration. They will likely trade him 2 years earlier now.
I think it u it s a very unwise use of limited resources for little gain.
Perhaps you can do an assessment of how much more high quality players get when they have 4 years of arbitration cs 3.. I think it is a significant amount.
We’ll see. If his 4th year arb is at least 20-25 million, I can’t imagine he’ll be a Pirate. Winning or not. And if the 3rd year is 15 or more, this team will not like it. All for the 30-35 extra innings now. On a terrible team.
Whether he is dealt or not, that extra year of control has a whole hell of a lot of value in terms of what you are getting back in a trade. Quite literally, another year of Skenes is a top 50 ML prospect, and that is HUGE.
Of course they wont like it. Regardless it depends on where the team is at that point. Cole wasnt pitching well for us which was our own fault, but thats why he was traded when he was instead of waiting till at least seeing where we were the next trading deadline. If that next to last year, we are sitting 60-60. Yeah, hes probably getting dealt
Not if you lose it with the PPI (I’ll grant this one to you, because they can probably manipulate things so this doesn’t happen). PPI aside, the years of control are meaningless IMO, because it’s still contingent on them being willing to pay the arbitration salaries as a super 2. Do we really think they are going to wholesale change how they do business? Where’s the money coming from? They couldn’t get rid of Cole quick enough after his arbitration award, according to the Athletic reporting.
Skenes is not Cole, and it is not the Pirates' business model that is totally at fault for the Cole debacle. Cole's agent was Boras. Boras takes his clients to free agency no matter what. It is his business model. A major reason that I wanted the Pirates to draft Skenes over Crews was because Skenes does not use Boras and Crews does.
Skenes comes from a military family with generations of service. Think what you want about the military, but that speaks to the idea of putting things, like loyalty, ahead of one's self. If the Pirates are fair to Skenes and make an earnest effort to be competitive, there is every possibility they can keep him in Pittsburgh for many years.
Skenes, even if signed at the end of 2024 would be 20M plus to buy out even 1 year of free agency, and that simply isn't going to happen. Boras or no Boras. We would have NO money to sign any position players if we tried to sign either of them.....we have Cruz to worry about if he pans out.....and we have a lot of major league holes to fill this team as its built cannot compete and you can't keep singing 1 year deals at first base and right field forever.
There’s a lot to unpack there. There’s the idea of what constitutes “fair.” Whether the Pirates can afford what’s “fair” under their budgetary constraints. As I’ve pointed out, they’ve already committed a fortune (for them) to Reynolds, Hayes and Keller. And whether it makes sense for them to invest such a sum in a pitcher.
There won’t be a lot of overlap with Skenes (if they signed him to an extension in a few years) with Keller/Reynolds/Hayes (who’s contract is so low it’s basically irrelevant). Reynolds isn’t signed to eleventy years. It’s a hefty amount for them, but it isn’t Miggy Cabrera like either.
The last year of Reynolds' contract will be the first post-arb. year for Skenes and Jones. The conclusion of Hayes' contract coincides with the beginning of Skenes and Jones post arb. Keller's contract expires in their 2nd arb. years. I think they are in pretty good shape to keep both Skenes and Jones long term if both are productive and healthy. They will need some actual hitters in the minors though... now and for the future. None of the 3 have no-trade clauses and all three are producing value consumate with their deals... i.e. have trade value.
There is nothing preventing the Pirates from moving either of those 3 now or in the future if they need budget room for Skenes or Jones. BTW... trading Hayes probably would be the first move that I would make if I were sitting in Cherington's seat.
I care more about a plan that produces sustainable winning, division championships, and hopefully a World Series. After all, we can all agree the Angels owner tries really hard too
While I'm not sure trading whoever they did for Giolito for example is apples and oranges, I think there was value to that endeavor and personally didn't dismiss it out of hand.
You have to try. The Pirates haven't for at least 4 years now. That's certainly not more fun to follow.
If that appeals to you, that’s fine. As fans we all have different ideas of the course we want our team to chart. But that doesn’t appeal to me. I want results. I don’t think that what they are doing now, trying or not, is going to lead to tangible results. And I’ll even question the trying aspect of it: After claiming the “build” was over, and now we are trying to compete, you add Rowdy Tellez, MAT and Grandal to an offense full of holes. That’s not really trying. Especially, when you compare what they did, to what the Reds did in a similar sized market. In light of that fact set, calling up Skenes up now, seems like it’s meant to distract from money not spent now, as well as money they won’t spend later.
Maybe that’s a lesson they learn this offseason. That it’s better to use the limited FA dollars at your disposal towards 1-2 players, rather than sprinkling it around to a half dozen players. Granted, they should have known this before but some GMs are slow learners.
I question if this isn’t a Nutting thing, which is part of what feeds the skepticism I’m voicing here. They’ve operated that way in free agency since the Littlefield years. It always seems like they are hoping to hit the lotto by lucking into the right set of budget free agents. It probably doesn’t help that it worked once (2013).
I think Skenes being on a limited innings count is what will keep him from finishing top two for the ROY. He's not even 22 years old yet and he's currently at 102 innings behind last year's total. With harder innings expected in the majors, he's likely not passing 130 innings for the Pirates in a best case scenario. He would need help from other players struggling, which you really don't want to see if one of them is Jones, who can get you a draft pick
I’m so fed up with treating these guys like they’re China dolls. Clearly limiting innings and pitches isn’t having the desired effect. Some experts even believe it’s making injury more likely.
Skenes is a Clydesdale in the Don Drysdale, Nolan Ryan mold. He is built to go long and hard. I say let that horse run!
I wouldn't believe anything I read about injuries. they can say what is/is nor causing injuries it's all BS because if they knew what was they'd quit doing that.
To do a accurate study on pitcher injuries you'd need MRI's of all pitchers in MLB from the time they started being pitchers until today. You'd also need a to control so many variables (exercise, sleep, diet, etc) that any "study" on pitcher injuries I could poke 100 holes in it.
I think you're absolutely correct on how they will limit his usage. He could be limited to 75 pitches or 5 innings in games with 4 days rest. They may go to a 6 man rotation or skip a start here and there after longer outings.
I can see Jones getting around 160 innings +/- and Skenes around 120 innings +/-.
Six-man rotation is definitely possible. Jones has to be on some limit as well, though higher than Skenes. Plus I think they want both of them pitching all season instead of getting shut down once they reach a limit. A six-man rotation would help that process
Our bullpen cant handle that, our starters dont pitch deep enough into games. Perez and falter are generally 5 innings pitchers. Contreras and ortiz cant pitch 2 innings 4 games a week. If you can get a quality 6 from these guys consistently on 5 days rest then do it, but i see no data to back that up.
I'm not going to worry about the bullpen over pacing the young 1-2 starters on the team. Fill in minor league players when you need innings, problem solved. You wouldn't even be short-handed if you handled it right. No one has been overused to this point, so you're worrying about 3 1/2 months before you can expand the bullpen, with an All-Star break in the middle to reset. Heck, with days off throughout the season, you can skip starts for someone like Falter and use him as a long-man one day instead. Jones/Skenes still go every six days on a routine.
John, its May 10th, of course noone has been overused yet, and quite obviously we aren't pitching one man short in the bullpen because we aren't currently USING a 6 man rotation. Don't tell me you are blind to the effects of a overtaxed bullpen over the course of the season, how many years in a row have we seen the top high leverage bullpen guys falter in the 2nd half? Bednar has been about the only one whom hasn't, because HE hadn't been overused. If the purpose here is to compete in August and September (because what else would even be the point of bringing up skenes) then doing a 6 man rotation is completely at adds with that decision. If you want to disagree with me, then please let me know where I'm wrong? Do you think we have a heap of high leverage quality relievers just chillin' in AAA, because we don't.....and I sure as hell don't think you'd like to make the case that Fleming, Ortiz, and Contreras can be trusted in the 7th and 8th innings of games where we have a lead.
As I pointed out with Jones, the cumulative effect of both of these decisions is going to cost them millions of dollars and guarantee they are traded more quickly, thus shortening whatever minimal competitive window exists with these two. For the benefit of winning 10 weeks and five weeks of what looks like, at least right now, meaningless games.
Quite honestly, I don’t care one lick about 5-6 years from now. I care immensely about them trying to win today. Having Jones and Skenes in the rotation now might make the difference in them being a playoff team or not this year.
Them breaking tradition by not manipulating service time is a step in right direction. Maybe the next step is signing a FA to a multi-year contract? Maybe even one who can bolster the lineup. I know…crazy talk!
Totally get the sentiment. In an ideal world you’re 100% right. But I think the sentiment somewhat glosses over the reality of culture with this team. Part of the problem is, this might be sooner than 5-6 years. I could see them refusing to pay the salary for both as soon as Arb 2. While this team today doesn’t appear to be a playoff team, perhaps in 2-3 years that changes and we are forced to trade one, or both, as part of a self imposed payroll constriction. After all, they already spent what for Nutting, is Ohtani money on Reynolds, Hayes and Keller. Where’s the money going to come from to keep these guys too?
Breaking tradition with service time is a relatively meaningless gesture if it isn’t combined with commensurate payroll increases, a willingness to make hard choices, finding cheap talent to backfill the holes created by paying to keep these guys, etc etc etc.
Part of this is I also think we have a difference on whether this is a playoff team. I don’t see how they score anywhere near enough runs to make the playoffs, let alone make a deep playoff run.
That’s a totally fair point, but we had butts in the seats from 2013-2016, and we saw how that turned out. Sure they spent some money in 2015 and 2016, but if they spend to similar levels when these guys are arbitration eligible, that’s not nearly enough to accommodate existing payroll obligations plus these guys arbitration salaries, plus other needs.
Meanwhile i dont care about this season at all because we obviously cant hit. I really dont understand where your brain is. We need substantial roster changes to win with these pitchers, and that doesnt happen during the season on small market teams.
Seriously, I’m sick to death of arguments that boil down to, The Pirates shouldn’t act like a major league team now because they won’t act like a major league team later.
Do the right thing now. If it gets screwed up later because Nickels won’t do the right thing then, that’s on him. Just add it to the zillion other ways he’s screwed up this franchise. Refuse to do the right thing now and Nickels still won’t do the right thing later. Then you’re 0-for-2 instead of 1-for-2.
Wilbur, I agree with you 99% of the time. But not this time. Calling up Skenes for 30 extra innings that will in the end cost ~20 million$ for a franchise that will not spend resources is not smart. They aren’t winning this year.
(Of course you’re right, but this is the team that attached to top 100 prospects to rid themselves of Liriano’s slightly onerous salary, and allegedly waited a day to make a roster to save $30,000)
Exactly. This is the reality. We cannot afford to extend them both and theres zero reason for skenes to do it. Jones may be a possibility. Skenes is smart and he bets on himself
there were two paths:
1) start season in the majors
2) wait until after super two
Now we wasted innings in AAA and might lose a year of control OR he'll get 4 arbs and we won't be able to extend him.
I'm as critical of GMBC as anyone and think he should be fired yesterday. However, Skenes needed time in AAA. He barely threw his changeup in college. His split change is still a work in progress, and he had never worked on 5-days rest before. No one knew, prior to the season, that he was going to completely dominate AAA from the first pitch. Having him start the season in Pittsburgh would have been highly irresponsible IMO.
The real question then was wait for super 2 or call him up when he was ready regardless of financial concerns. He is clearly ready now, and the Pirates opted for this route. Whether they meant this as a good faith gesture or as a panic-button move to save Cherington's job, it will always count as a good faith gesture. If they sign him to a long-term deal, it was the right move. If they trade him in his arb 2 year, it was not. Time will tell.
So you’re saying 9 days and he’s past Super 2. Not 19. Not 99.
Lolololol this is so ridiculously dumb.
He didn’t say that.
To be safe it would be around a month later.
No, that's not the case
I love how you make seemingly terrible financial decisions seem like that somehow benefits the fans. Creating a super two does not benefit the fans one iota, getting no extra pick due to his performance doesnt help us either. Common sense be damned isnt beneficial to the team whatsoever.im not really sure what the benefit is of bringing him up now unless i misconstrued something in the article. Do we lose a year of control? I think thats probably the most important as theres basically no way wed be able to afford him if he lives up to expectations
We? Are you a Nutting?
scott. just stop embarassing yourself. We have enough mindless morons as fans in this city, I expect more from you
I share your concerns, mostly because this GM has not shown himself competent in any area of managing this team. However, there is a strong possibility that it is a good faith gesture on the part of the Pirates, which they will point to later in contract negotiations. Good faith with a potentially generational talent is not a bad thing.
Who pissed in your cheerios this morning. It's a good breakdown, it isn't like Ethan called him up, that decision was the GM's. The teams true reason will most likely never be fully known, I hope they are being honest with the fans and the player about boxes checked. This is the second time this year they didn't go by timeline or financial manipulation to promote a top prospect, I for one can respect putting the best players on the field.
Now if they can just try to improve the teams most glaring weakness (scoring runs), we might be witness to a turnaround to a competitive team.
Just tell me what about my comment was inaccurate....
Your first sentence. "I love how you make seemingly terrible financial decisions seem like that somehow benefits the fans."
First "I love how you" You direct the focus on the writer, when he does a good breakdown of service time. You know, what the articles title implies and is about.
Second "seemingly terrible financial decisions seem like that somehow benefits the fans" It does on the vast majority of fans.
Attendance will be much larger for Skenes debut than a normal Saturday game.
Television ratings will be much larger than normal. Locally and nationwide.
There's only a small number of fans that even think about service time, super 2 and even coming in top 2 in ROtY, I know, I'm one of them. I don't disagree with you on the financial implications of super 2 or Skenes ending up top 2 in ROtY and the extra year of cheap team control. The problem is with the plan "check the boxes" from the organization. Skenes looks ready, he has supposedly "checked the boxes" if they were to hold him down it would look bad to the majority of fans and to the player ("Pirates just being cheap, not trying to win").
I wouldn’t waste your time with him, Mel.
This breaks it down fairly decently IMO, you’re actually losing a year (or maybe even more) of both, to get a few weeks now.
Not Skenes, they already have contractual control for 6 additional years at this point
I disagree Ethan. As I said in another thread, the extra 6 starts we gain this year for Skenes will cost the Pirate 10-20 million dollars later because of the extra year of arbitration. They will likely trade him 2 years earlier now.
I think it u it s a very unwise use of limited resources for little gain.
Perhaps you can do an assessment of how much more high quality players get when they have 4 years of arbitration cs 3.. I think it is a significant amount.
I disagree with this, we aren't going to trade him with 2 years left if we are a winning team. If we aren't who cares.
We’ll see. If his 4th year arb is at least 20-25 million, I can’t imagine he’ll be a Pirate. Winning or not. And if the 3rd year is 15 or more, this team will not like it. All for the 30-35 extra innings now. On a terrible team.
But I hope you’re right.
Whether he is dealt or not, that extra year of control has a whole hell of a lot of value in terms of what you are getting back in a trade. Quite literally, another year of Skenes is a top 50 ML prospect, and that is HUGE.
Of course they wont like it. Regardless it depends on where the team is at that point. Cole wasnt pitching well for us which was our own fault, but thats why he was traded when he was instead of waiting till at least seeing where we were the next trading deadline. If that next to last year, we are sitting 60-60. Yeah, hes probably getting dealt
It just got way more expensive
Not if you lose it with the PPI (I’ll grant this one to you, because they can probably manipulate things so this doesn’t happen). PPI aside, the years of control are meaningless IMO, because it’s still contingent on them being willing to pay the arbitration salaries as a super 2. Do we really think they are going to wholesale change how they do business? Where’s the money coming from? They couldn’t get rid of Cole quick enough after his arbitration award, according to the Athletic reporting.
Skenes is not Cole, and it is not the Pirates' business model that is totally at fault for the Cole debacle. Cole's agent was Boras. Boras takes his clients to free agency no matter what. It is his business model. A major reason that I wanted the Pirates to draft Skenes over Crews was because Skenes does not use Boras and Crews does.
Skenes comes from a military family with generations of service. Think what you want about the military, but that speaks to the idea of putting things, like loyalty, ahead of one's self. If the Pirates are fair to Skenes and make an earnest effort to be competitive, there is every possibility they can keep him in Pittsburgh for many years.
Skenes, even if signed at the end of 2024 would be 20M plus to buy out even 1 year of free agency, and that simply isn't going to happen. Boras or no Boras. We would have NO money to sign any position players if we tried to sign either of them.....we have Cruz to worry about if he pans out.....and we have a lot of major league holes to fill this team as its built cannot compete and you can't keep singing 1 year deals at first base and right field forever.
There’s a lot to unpack there. There’s the idea of what constitutes “fair.” Whether the Pirates can afford what’s “fair” under their budgetary constraints. As I’ve pointed out, they’ve already committed a fortune (for them) to Reynolds, Hayes and Keller. And whether it makes sense for them to invest such a sum in a pitcher.
There won’t be a lot of overlap with Skenes (if they signed him to an extension in a few years) with Keller/Reynolds/Hayes (who’s contract is so low it’s basically irrelevant). Reynolds isn’t signed to eleventy years. It’s a hefty amount for them, but it isn’t Miggy Cabrera like either.
The last year of Reynolds' contract will be the first post-arb. year for Skenes and Jones. The conclusion of Hayes' contract coincides with the beginning of Skenes and Jones post arb. Keller's contract expires in their 2nd arb. years. I think they are in pretty good shape to keep both Skenes and Jones long term if both are productive and healthy. They will need some actual hitters in the minors though... now and for the future. None of the 3 have no-trade clauses and all three are producing value consumate with their deals... i.e. have trade value.
There is nothing preventing the Pirates from moving either of those 3 now or in the future if they need budget room for Skenes or Jones. BTW... trading Hayes probably would be the first move that I would make if I were sitting in Cherington's seat.
Getting to watch a team's best players while they actually try is obviously a benefit to the fans.
I don't know about you, but I may not be alive in 2030. Such long-term thinking for a sports team isn't all that logical.
I care more about a plan that produces sustainable winning, division championships, and hopefully a World Series. After all, we can all agree the Angels owner tries really hard too
While I'm not sure trading whoever they did for Giolito for example is apples and oranges, I think there was value to that endeavor and personally didn't dismiss it out of hand.
You have to try. The Pirates haven't for at least 4 years now. That's certainly not more fun to follow.
If that appeals to you, that’s fine. As fans we all have different ideas of the course we want our team to chart. But that doesn’t appeal to me. I want results. I don’t think that what they are doing now, trying or not, is going to lead to tangible results. And I’ll even question the trying aspect of it: After claiming the “build” was over, and now we are trying to compete, you add Rowdy Tellez, MAT and Grandal to an offense full of holes. That’s not really trying. Especially, when you compare what they did, to what the Reds did in a similar sized market. In light of that fact set, calling up Skenes up now, seems like it’s meant to distract from money not spent now, as well as money they won’t spend later.
Maybe that’s a lesson they learn this offseason. That it’s better to use the limited FA dollars at your disposal towards 1-2 players, rather than sprinkling it around to a half dozen players. Granted, they should have known this before but some GMs are slow learners.
I question if this isn’t a Nutting thing, which is part of what feeds the skepticism I’m voicing here. They’ve operated that way in free agency since the Littlefield years. It always seems like they are hoping to hit the lotto by lucking into the right set of budget free agents. It probably doesn’t help that it worked once (2013).
I think Skenes being on a limited innings count is what will keep him from finishing top two for the ROY. He's not even 22 years old yet and he's currently at 102 innings behind last year's total. With harder innings expected in the majors, he's likely not passing 130 innings for the Pirates in a best case scenario. He would need help from other players struggling, which you really don't want to see if one of them is Jones, who can get you a draft pick
I’m so fed up with treating these guys like they’re China dolls. Clearly limiting innings and pitches isn’t having the desired effect. Some experts even believe it’s making injury more likely.
Skenes is a Clydesdale in the Don Drysdale, Nolan Ryan mold. He is built to go long and hard. I say let that horse run!
He's Secretariat for cry'in out loud!
TWSS
BA just ran a piece saying these innings limits aren’t reducing injuries.
I wouldn't believe anything I read about injuries. they can say what is/is nor causing injuries it's all BS because if they knew what was they'd quit doing that.
To do a accurate study on pitcher injuries you'd need MRI's of all pitchers in MLB from the time they started being pitchers until today. You'd also need a to control so many variables (exercise, sleep, diet, etc) that any "study" on pitcher injuries I could poke 100 holes in it.
I think you're absolutely correct on how they will limit his usage. He could be limited to 75 pitches or 5 innings in games with 4 days rest. They may go to a 6 man rotation or skip a start here and there after longer outings.
I can see Jones getting around 160 innings +/- and Skenes around 120 innings +/-.
Six-man rotation is definitely possible. Jones has to be on some limit as well, though higher than Skenes. Plus I think they want both of them pitching all season instead of getting shut down once they reach a limit. A six-man rotation would help that process
Our bullpen cant handle that, our starters dont pitch deep enough into games. Perez and falter are generally 5 innings pitchers. Contreras and ortiz cant pitch 2 innings 4 games a week. If you can get a quality 6 from these guys consistently on 5 days rest then do it, but i see no data to back that up.
I'm not going to worry about the bullpen over pacing the young 1-2 starters on the team. Fill in minor league players when you need innings, problem solved. You wouldn't even be short-handed if you handled it right. No one has been overused to this point, so you're worrying about 3 1/2 months before you can expand the bullpen, with an All-Star break in the middle to reset. Heck, with days off throughout the season, you can skip starts for someone like Falter and use him as a long-man one day instead. Jones/Skenes still go every six days on a routine.
John, its May 10th, of course noone has been overused yet, and quite obviously we aren't pitching one man short in the bullpen because we aren't currently USING a 6 man rotation. Don't tell me you are blind to the effects of a overtaxed bullpen over the course of the season, how many years in a row have we seen the top high leverage bullpen guys falter in the 2nd half? Bednar has been about the only one whom hasn't, because HE hadn't been overused. If the purpose here is to compete in August and September (because what else would even be the point of bringing up skenes) then doing a 6 man rotation is completely at adds with that decision. If you want to disagree with me, then please let me know where I'm wrong? Do you think we have a heap of high leverage quality relievers just chillin' in AAA, because we don't.....and I sure as hell don't think you'd like to make the case that Fleming, Ortiz, and Contreras can be trusted in the 7th and 8th innings of games where we have a lead.
This^
As I pointed out with Jones, the cumulative effect of both of these decisions is going to cost them millions of dollars and guarantee they are traded more quickly, thus shortening whatever minimal competitive window exists with these two. For the benefit of winning 10 weeks and five weeks of what looks like, at least right now, meaningless games.
Quite honestly, I don’t care one lick about 5-6 years from now. I care immensely about them trying to win today. Having Jones and Skenes in the rotation now might make the difference in them being a playoff team or not this year.
Them breaking tradition by not manipulating service time is a step in right direction. Maybe the next step is signing a FA to a multi-year contract? Maybe even one who can bolster the lineup. I know…crazy talk!
Totally get the sentiment. In an ideal world you’re 100% right. But I think the sentiment somewhat glosses over the reality of culture with this team. Part of the problem is, this might be sooner than 5-6 years. I could see them refusing to pay the salary for both as soon as Arb 2. While this team today doesn’t appear to be a playoff team, perhaps in 2-3 years that changes and we are forced to trade one, or both, as part of a self imposed payroll constriction. After all, they already spent what for Nutting, is Ohtani money on Reynolds, Hayes and Keller. Where’s the money going to come from to keep these guys too?
Breaking tradition with service time is a relatively meaningless gesture if it isn’t combined with commensurate payroll increases, a willingness to make hard choices, finding cheap talent to backfill the holes created by paying to keep these guys, etc etc etc.
Part of this is I also think we have a difference on whether this is a playoff team. I don’t see how they score anywhere near enough runs to make the playoffs, let alone make a deep playoff run.
The money is going to come from butts in the seats. Skenes, Jones, and wins will bring butts to the seats.
Jeesh, is that so hard to understand?
That’s a totally fair point, but we had butts in the seats from 2013-2016, and we saw how that turned out. Sure they spent some money in 2015 and 2016, but if they spend to similar levels when these guys are arbitration eligible, that’s not nearly enough to accommodate existing payroll obligations plus these guys arbitration salaries, plus other needs.
Meanwhile i dont care about this season at all because we obviously cant hit. I really dont understand where your brain is. We need substantial roster changes to win with these pitchers, and that doesnt happen during the season on small market teams.
Yeah because hitters never show improvement when the weather warms up.
You may think you know what’s going to happen the rest of this year, but the fact is, you don’t.
I say try to win now.
you can say whatever you want, it doesn't make it a logical or sound conclusion
Or they could just...keep them
Actually trying is always the most important thing, and it isn't right to the players to play around with them like they are some widget
Keep them?! KEEP THEM??!!
Seriously, I’m sick to death of arguments that boil down to, The Pirates shouldn’t act like a major league team now because they won’t act like a major league team later.
Do the right thing now. If it gets screwed up later because Nickels won’t do the right thing then, that’s on him. Just add it to the zillion other ways he’s screwed up this franchise. Refuse to do the right thing now and Nickels still won’t do the right thing later. Then you’re 0-for-2 instead of 1-for-2.
Wilbur, I agree with you 99% of the time. But not this time. Calling up Skenes for 30 extra innings that will in the end cost ~20 million$ for a franchise that will not spend resources is not smart. They aren’t winning this year.
(Of course you’re right, but this is the team that attached to top 100 prospects to rid themselves of Liriano’s slightly onerous salary, and allegedly waited a day to make a roster to save $30,000)
Exactly. This is the reality. We cannot afford to extend them both and theres zero reason for skenes to do it. Jones may be a possibility. Skenes is smart and he bets on himself
Lol. You should apply for a writers job at Saturday Night Live.
Thanks for the clarity.