90 Comments

Reds finished ahead of the Pirates and fired their manager.

Cards went 83-79 and are doing a "planned overhaul of both the player development department and minor league system."

Pirates fail for the fifth straight season to finish better than 10 games under .500 and their GM thinks everything is going perfectly.

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Sep 30·edited Sep 30

I thought MLB scrapped the winner take all play-in game.....lol, how bizarre three teams are "in" but only 2 get to play each other twice to eliminate 1 of the 3! Mark this date in history right along with the SF earthquake WS of 1989. Or the 2020 neutral field WS due to Covid.

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Sep 30·edited Sep 30

I remember writing for the Pirates to be a playoff team this year, they needed to score approximately 80 more runs than the 692 runs they scored last season. Instead they put together a team that only scored 665 runs.

Hopefully tomorrow we read about how BN has decided to reboot the organization by replacing BC and DS, but I’m not expecting it. The only stat BN cares about is EBITDA.

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He cares about interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization too.

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He cares about the B, I, T, D, and A, but not nearly as much as the E.

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Right! Until we have a middle tier offense rather than 28th ranked, the playoffs will remain a dream only.

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Sep 30·edited Sep 30

And then…..depression set in…….bummer that they lost tonight but the Bucs did win the last series of the season. Maybe they put a little bad juju into the Yankees and see them have an early end to their post season in the first round. Sad when the Bucs are done for the year but I am excited for this offseason. I have been posting on these boards since before the 23 season was over that this offseason would be the one for bigger adds to have a legitimate chance to compete this year. Time to find out how correct in my thinking is/was. Anticipating an interesting hot stove season. Bummer that the games ended with #76 in da books.

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Go Tigers!

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Yep, my first team to root for 😁

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That L feels the right outcome for this season.

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Another last place finish in the NL Central.

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Is that last place for Cherington every season but 2013 World Series? 9 last place finishes and 1 World Series?

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Sep 30·edited Sep 30

St. Louis was last in the Central last year. 1 WS, 1 next to last in division and the rest last place in division, 7 times I think.

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Ah, had forgotten that. Pretty, pretty abysmal still. Not sure Cherington deserves 1 of 30 jobs in baseball.

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Sep 30·edited Sep 30

He doesn't.

Littlefield's winning percentage as pirate gm .432 Cherington's .415.

Pirates need to win 82 next year to get close or pass him.

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Unless there are 30 jobs titled, Clubhouse Attendant, Latrine Specialist.

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And the countdown begins for when Shelton and Haines are canned.

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It's incredibly fitting, with GMBS insisting that the team has improved, to finish with the exact same record as last year.

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Despite winning the lottery to get a 5+ WAR pitcher, which speaks to how poorly he put together the rest of the roster.

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It's worse than that. They added Skenes, Jones and Bart. They got Cruz back and he took a step toward becoming the hitter they've hoped. And they got Ortiz straightened out. That's a huge group of additions, yet they didn't improve. It's a perfect illustration of what I've argued many times is Cherington's habit of simply blowing off large parts of the roster. You can't explain it away by saying they just needed a few more hits to fall, or there was some bad weather, or whatever prattle Shelton delivers in the post-game. It was a massive failure.

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This.

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Also, they finished a lot farther out of a playoff spot this year (14 games vs. only 7 last year). So if the goal is to make the postseason, then they lost ground on the rest of the NL.

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Last year the pirates were next to last in the division, dead last this year.

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Cherington is worse than Littlefield and Littlefield was horrible.

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I realize this is kind of a silly argument to have, but no one was worse than Littlefield. Really. Maybe I focus too much on the draft, but he made such a hash of the raft of high picks that he had. I’ll never forget his drafting Bullington and saying that his ceiling was a #3 starter, with the first overall pick! He took a guy who at least had a chance to be a dynamic hitting right fielder (Van Benschoten) and turned him into a total failure as a starter. He drafted Moskos at #7 overall, and turned him into a LOOGY.

And his trades! He gave away ARam and Benson. Enough said.

This is recency bias. Littlefield was the worst Pirates GM in my lifetime and it’s not even close.

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Sep 30·edited Sep 30

This is Cherington's second go around, Littlefield was hired mid season and really wasn't qualified to begin with. Cherington's winning percentage as the pirates gm is .415. Littlefield's is .432. Paraphrasing Bill Parcells "Your record says what you really are." They are both horrible but Cherington had prior experience and has a worse winning percentage than Littlefield as the Pirates GM.

As far as trades they both suck, but Cherington hasn't had a trade even close as good as the Giles for Bay, Pérez and PTBNL. While Cherington has given away Marte, Musgrove, Bell and Tallion as well as Holmes.

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Aw, Mlod. The one reliever who hasn't blown up this year waits to the last day

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Jesus, why is Bart calling those pitches? Obviously Carm doesn't have it today.

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I guess Chappie can pitch 9th. He's only tossed 17 pitches last two days, plus warmups. If he's not being re-signed, use every ounce of that arm you can.

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Sep 29·edited Sep 29Liked by Anthony Murphy

Feels like an average bucco weekend at my place. No power.

Insert George Oscar Bluth saying c'mon.

https://bi.org/en/bi-characters/gob-bluth

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author

Hope ur doing well and the power gets back on soon.

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Any update on when you might get it back?

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Nah. But dude down the way inverted a bunch of car batteries so I washed some dishes. And blew up an air mattress. Beauty is that my kids and the few on the road think it's like last day of school daily. Despite being home schooled. Thanks for asking.

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Good on you for homeschooling.

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Hey, the kids don't get snow days, let 'em play in the mud! Seriously, hope you get back to normal soon. What a sad disaster to your west.

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It will. Not trying to play a victim to the Mother. Just humbling and refreshing how things play out. Spend a lot of time up there. F In Hell makes want to cry.

Hope we sign a Lyle overbay in his prime this off-season

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Have to say, other than that horrible PC Richard whistle after opponent Ks, I do like the random music selections Yankees use that aren't the standard canned crap at every other stadium. Where else you gonna hear In-A-Gada-Da-Vida?

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I was thinking how much better their music was when hearing This Girl just before the game began.

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That jam can last 5 innings when Skenes is dealing.

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The White Sox won. So even though they have the most losses in the modern era, they're still not the worst team, finishing 41-121 (.253). The '62 Mets were 40-120 (.250).

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Incredibly, there are worse owners than Nuttin. CWS, Marlins and A’s, for sure. Probably Rox, too. Heavy competition for Upper Class Twit of the Year.

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Reinsdorf’s not worse than Nutting. Jerry loves the game but it’s the game from 40 years ago and he sucks at being an owner and won’t back away and let pros run his team. Nutting is nothing more than a con-man and a bloodless muppet.

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Nutting's only got the second most losses since he took over control

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So will the Braves and Mets agree to split their DH so both make it? I doubt it, but what a strange final day that will be.

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Sep 29·edited Sep 29

That 2nd game is gonna be under intense scrutiny.

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Yeah, but the team that’s clinched would need to rest their top pitchers, right?

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Sure, there will be a ton of reasons for the winner to rest players. None of which will prevent conspiracy theories, rumors of fixing, etc etc etc.

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More likely, the winner of game 1 will simply use their b team to rest their best players for their game the next day, which won’t make Dbacks fans happy.

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I'm thinking they will play most of their fully healthy position players and sit those dinged (I know..everybody this time of year qualifies) but it is the pitching that will be a challenge. How do you burn pitchers in a game that is now meaningless?

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barts with an ops back above .800

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