I'm usually an almost every inning guy either live or on replay. I haven't watched a game in a week and don't feel like I've missed anything. I've followed them for over 40 years and remember staying up late in my basement bedroom tuning into KDKA late at night for the west coast games on my clock radio after the local Midwest AM stations signed off late.
My favorite player in the 80s was Tony Pena and I learned the value of trading a player for a good return when Van Slyke, LaValliere and Dunne played well after the trade. I miss those trades. My first three years of college were bittersweet with three straight playoff appearances. I still followed them for the 20 years in the wilderness before 2013 when my kids watched with me. Those years are long gone.
I've just about had enough. How many times can you beat your head against the wall, trying the same thing over and over yet expecting different results. I could hope for new management, new coaching, or a different owner but I just don't see it happening. Other teams try to win while the Pirates go dumpster diving, try for a never-coming future and give platitudes. Maybe I should change my worldview and start desiring equity in MLB. Grade inflation for Pirate players is getting old.
Maybe I'm just tired tonight after a long week but maybe I'm just about through with this team. Over the last decades it is like an addiction I could never conquer. Maybe now is the time.
Syd Thrift was a magician. Almost clairvoyant eye for talent. Kind of amazing he didn’t replicate what he did for the Buccos somewhere else after those little bureaucrats in then”ownership group” got rid of him.
Thrift was so far ahead of everyone else in baseball. He was talking about the physics of pitching and hitting, spin rates, launch angles, and so forth decades before these things became all the rage. He was obsessed with how the eye perceives the ball out of the pitchers' hand and the supreme importance of vision and training vision. He studied leads from first for months: how to optimize the lead to put pressure on the defense; read a pitcher's move to home; and force throws to first. To this day baseball has not caught up to him in many things. Not only did he build the Pirates last winning team, he also built the entire Royals' philosophy of baseball, and the organization has basically followed his guidelines to this day through multiple GMs and 3 owners. I sure wish the Pirates could find the next Syd Thrift.
💯 Keep meaning to order Syd Thrift’s book from Amazon before it’s no longer available.
Sometimes in my more masochistic baseball moments I think of The Slide as divine retribution for the Pirates getting rid of Thrift, since Thrift had seen something in Sid Bream back when Bream was still bouncing back and forth between the Dodgers and their AAA team, never hitting better than .198 for Los Angeles. As you may recall, Bream was acquired by the Buccos as a player to be named later in a 1985 trade with LAD for Bill Madlock, and in Bream’s first year with the Pirates he hit .268 and led the NL in 1B assists.
The Pirates losing like this and playing badly should not come as a surprise, and if it does then I suggest you get your head out where the sun doesn't shine...Their play is exactly as it has been for a number of years maybe somewhere around 25 of the last 30 years or so...but whose counting...
Get a grip they will play better but they are still a long way from being a competitive team and all those salary and player dumps and getting basically nothing in return, and all those bad drafts example just look at round 1 just pitiful...
My bad…. The other night I posted 11 down but 140 to go in error and did not change it ….. I freakin jinxed them… that is where they sit now.. I humbly apologize to the Bucs and the rest of the fans here for inadvertently extending the streak……….
The bats will heat up at some point soon, but Cruz needs to have a stretch in Indy because his all around game right now is awful. I'd have him learn first base while taking advantage of Alika Williams and Triolo looking like potential long term MLB players and bring Bae up as the replacement lefty.
It's also incredibly frustrating that the Pittsburgh media and fanbase refuse to acknowledge the Cutch dilemma. He's becoming a huge elephant in the room regarding roster construction and Shelton's hideous line ups.
If they do option him, it is well past the time that he learn on OF position. His defense at SS is insupportable. This has been well-known for 4 years, and they have done nothing about it. It is high-time to tell Cruz... it is OF or nothing.... pout all you want.
First base not OF. Did you see his effort at a pop-fly today? Huge wing span will help him scoop wayward throws... I can only see a repeat of Polanco if he's sent to the OF.
Doubt it will make anyone feel any better but the Astros just got shut out by a rookie pitcher for the Nats making his second career start and are now 7-16.
Well... they fired their league-best GM because of the "sign-stealing scandal," which is a bunch of nonsense because every team in the league tries to steal signs and it was ubiquitous at that time. The Dodgers, IMO, were the biggest cheaters in that respect. Their HOF manager retired, and all of the best people on Luhnow's were scooped up by other organizations. Just goes to show that the front-office and front-line field management matter.
Pretty sure I spent a chilly night at Wrigley Field in the previous decade watching the Pirates clinch a playoff spot while Nutting was owner. It might seem light years ago, but it deffo happened.
Do not understand how BC can show his face around town allowing Shelton and his gang of incompetents to permit this entire team to sleep walk through game after game. This crap has happened several times ever for the last 4-5 years and nothing has changed other than the faces of some players.
Who is accountable for an entire team struggling to play basic fundamental baseball? Completely lost at the plate, subpar defense. Absolutely nothing interesting about this team right now.
This isn’t a good team, but I refuse to believe they’re this bad. I know it’s still early, but something has to give.
No one is accountable for the product on the field. So long as no relief pitchers date 13-year-old girls, there is no accountability in this organization for anything and has not been since Nutting became the principle owner. When he took the job, Cherington said that he wanted to work in a low-stress environment. That tells you all you need to know. Nothing is going to change, and they are this bad.
This is what's most depressing, the lack of accountability for putting a winning team on the field. Nutting doesn't care, Williams doesn't know, Cherington is happy just to have a job, and Shelton thinks as long as players like him, it's all okay.
Welp adminsky here. Just some very discouraging ball being played, im sure better days are ahead (cant get much worse) but the team not even just losing but playing shitty baseball is so tough to swallow
This game is a microcosm of why this team just cannot win. Just horrendous situational hitting; thrown out running the bases repeatedly; absolutely mindless bullpen management (using your most reliable reliever as a mop-up guy after a AAA reliever blows the game open trying to get out of a jam); bonehead defensive plays resulting in unearned runs. If Cherington wants to die on the hill of this coaching staff.... then he needs to actually die on that hill.
So... Shelton gives away the game by bringing in a AAA pitcher with 2 men on and 1 out. Good thing he is saving our best bullpen arms for the game... sometime in May... when we have the lead in the 8th inning.
Lol... good point. Heineman (whom the Red Sox have to use as a DH, so depleted are they) is a switch hitter. Fleming is a groundball, double play kind of guy. He has also been the Pirates most reliable reliever. Why not Fleming to get you out of the jam?
Also... I would point out that 2 of the 3 batters following Heineman are lefties... so not only does Shelton bring in a AAA pitcher to get him out of a jam... he also has him facing lefty vs. righty in every AB (since the Sox PH a lefty for Heineman).
I don't think that Bart did a very good job handling him today... TBH. He was better with Davis. He didn't have the good movement again on his cutter. When this is the case, Davis has him work up in the zone more and use his curve as an out pitch. I think he threw one, maybe 2 curves today.
I'm usually an almost every inning guy either live or on replay. I haven't watched a game in a week and don't feel like I've missed anything. I've followed them for over 40 years and remember staying up late in my basement bedroom tuning into KDKA late at night for the west coast games on my clock radio after the local Midwest AM stations signed off late.
My favorite player in the 80s was Tony Pena and I learned the value of trading a player for a good return when Van Slyke, LaValliere and Dunne played well after the trade. I miss those trades. My first three years of college were bittersweet with three straight playoff appearances. I still followed them for the 20 years in the wilderness before 2013 when my kids watched with me. Those years are long gone.
I've just about had enough. How many times can you beat your head against the wall, trying the same thing over and over yet expecting different results. I could hope for new management, new coaching, or a different owner but I just don't see it happening. Other teams try to win while the Pirates go dumpster diving, try for a never-coming future and give platitudes. Maybe I should change my worldview and start desiring equity in MLB. Grade inflation for Pirate players is getting old.
Maybe I'm just tired tonight after a long week but maybe I'm just about through with this team. Over the last decades it is like an addiction I could never conquer. Maybe now is the time.
Syd Thrift was a magician. Almost clairvoyant eye for talent. Kind of amazing he didn’t replicate what he did for the Buccos somewhere else after those little bureaucrats in then”ownership group” got rid of him.
Thrift was so far ahead of everyone else in baseball. He was talking about the physics of pitching and hitting, spin rates, launch angles, and so forth decades before these things became all the rage. He was obsessed with how the eye perceives the ball out of the pitchers' hand and the supreme importance of vision and training vision. He studied leads from first for months: how to optimize the lead to put pressure on the defense; read a pitcher's move to home; and force throws to first. To this day baseball has not caught up to him in many things. Not only did he build the Pirates last winning team, he also built the entire Royals' philosophy of baseball, and the organization has basically followed his guidelines to this day through multiple GMs and 3 owners. I sure wish the Pirates could find the next Syd Thrift.
💯 Keep meaning to order Syd Thrift’s book from Amazon before it’s no longer available.
Sometimes in my more masochistic baseball moments I think of The Slide as divine retribution for the Pirates getting rid of Thrift, since Thrift had seen something in Sid Bream back when Bream was still bouncing back and forth between the Dodgers and their AAA team, never hitting better than .198 for Los Angeles. As you may recall, Bream was acquired by the Buccos as a player to be named later in a 1985 trade with LAD for Bill Madlock, and in Bream’s first year with the Pirates he hit .268 and led the NL in 1B assists.
The Pirates losing like this and playing badly should not come as a surprise, and if it does then I suggest you get your head out where the sun doesn't shine...Their play is exactly as it has been for a number of years maybe somewhere around 25 of the last 30 years or so...but whose counting...
Get a grip they will play better but they are still a long way from being a competitive team and all those salary and player dumps and getting basically nothing in return, and all those bad drafts example just look at round 1 just pitiful...
They may never win again... please win next game
My bad…. The other night I posted 11 down but 140 to go in error and did not change it ….. I freakin jinxed them… that is where they sit now.. I humbly apologize to the Bucs and the rest of the fans here for inadvertently extending the streak……….
The bats will heat up at some point soon, but Cruz needs to have a stretch in Indy because his all around game right now is awful. I'd have him learn first base while taking advantage of Alika Williams and Triolo looking like potential long term MLB players and bring Bae up as the replacement lefty.
It's also incredibly frustrating that the Pittsburgh media and fanbase refuse to acknowledge the Cutch dilemma. He's becoming a huge elephant in the room regarding roster construction and Shelton's hideous line ups.
xwOBAs below 300 are not potential long term MLB players.
What is Jackson Holliday's xwOBA?
I don't think you understand the meaning of 'potential' or limitations of SSS.
Yeah, my definition of potential doesn’t include hope.
Or potential.
Cruz is out of options.
I thought he has one remaining option?
He may. I have zero but roster resource has one.
No wonder Tim Williams went mad if this is how you gaslight!
I thought you were better than making shit up, WTM.
Seriously? I may have it wrong, although there've been a couple times when I had this stuff right and roster resource had it wrong. Try to grow up.
The above was a joke - hence the exclamation point - but you ARE always very quick to correct us mere mortals.
Cruz needs to go to Indy tomorrow.
If they do option him, it is well past the time that he learn on OF position. His defense at SS is insupportable. This has been well-known for 4 years, and they have done nothing about it. It is high-time to tell Cruz... it is OF or nothing.... pout all you want.
First base not OF. Did you see his effort at a pop-fly today? Huge wing span will help him scoop wayward throws... I can only see a repeat of Polanco if he's sent to the OF.
Maybe Cruz can get an “Injury” that will necessitate the max rehab assignment……
Cutch too.
Bae and Nick Gon promoted tomorrow please BC.
D'oh! I didn't know that.
That makes the DH logjam even more of a problem, IMO. Cruz needs to hit his way out of this funk.... but his D is just not up to scratch as a MLB SS.
Doubt it will make anyone feel any better but the Astros just got shut out by a rookie pitcher for the Nats making his second career start and are now 7-16.
Well... they fired their league-best GM because of the "sign-stealing scandal," which is a bunch of nonsense because every team in the league tries to steal signs and it was ubiquitous at that time. The Dodgers, IMO, were the biggest cheaters in that respect. Their HOF manager retired, and all of the best people on Luhnow's were scooped up by other organizations. Just goes to show that the front-office and front-line field management matter.
I know the Pirates will never make the playoffs as long as Nutting owns the team but can they at least be more competitive.
Pretty sure I spent a chilly night at Wrigley Field in the previous decade watching the Pirates clinch a playoff spot while Nutting was owner. It might seem light years ago, but it deffo happened.
I should've said they would never win a playoff series.
Until they do.
Do not understand how BC can show his face around town allowing Shelton and his gang of incompetents to permit this entire team to sleep walk through game after game. This crap has happened several times ever for the last 4-5 years and nothing has changed other than the faces of some players.
He shows his face to collect his paycheck. Nothing else going on here.
Who is accountable for an entire team struggling to play basic fundamental baseball? Completely lost at the plate, subpar defense. Absolutely nothing interesting about this team right now.
This isn’t a good team, but I refuse to believe they’re this bad. I know it’s still early, but something has to give.
They are this bad. We need to stop pretending that they will ever be good. Not as long as Nutting is owner.
No one is accountable for the product on the field. So long as no relief pitchers date 13-year-old girls, there is no accountability in this organization for anything and has not been since Nutting became the principle owner. When he took the job, Cherington said that he wanted to work in a low-stress environment. That tells you all you need to know. Nothing is going to change, and they are this bad.
This is what's most depressing, the lack of accountability for putting a winning team on the field. Nutting doesn't care, Williams doesn't know, Cherington is happy just to have a job, and Shelton thinks as long as players like him, it's all okay.
Could not have said it better.
Welp adminsky here. Just some very discouraging ball being played, im sure better days are ahead (cant get much worse) but the team not even just losing but playing shitty baseball is so tough to swallow
Stall ball will put us all to sleep
This game is a microcosm of why this team just cannot win. Just horrendous situational hitting; thrown out running the bases repeatedly; absolutely mindless bullpen management (using your most reliable reliever as a mop-up guy after a AAA reliever blows the game open trying to get out of a jam); bonehead defensive plays resulting in unearned runs. If Cherington wants to die on the hill of this coaching staff.... then he needs to actually die on that hill.
Circus came early this year to Pittsburgh
So now once we score one run we could switch the channel to watch something enjoyable…..
So... Shelton gives away the game by bringing in a AAA pitcher with 2 men on and 1 out. Good thing he is saving our best bullpen arms for the game... sometime in May... when we have the lead in the 8th inning.
What best bullpen arms?
Lol... good point. Heineman (whom the Red Sox have to use as a DH, so depleted are they) is a switch hitter. Fleming is a groundball, double play kind of guy. He has also been the Pirates most reliable reliever. Why not Fleming to get you out of the jam?
Also... I would point out that 2 of the 3 batters following Heineman are lefties... so not only does Shelton bring in a AAA pitcher to get him out of a jam... he also has him facing lefty vs. righty in every AB (since the Sox PH a lefty for Heineman).
That was a struggle for Perez, was not painting the edges today, and the ump really helped him or
it could have been worse. And without Triolo's web gem with bases loaded.
I don't think that Bart did a very good job handling him today... TBH. He was better with Davis. He didn't have the good movement again on his cutter. When this is the case, Davis has him work up in the zone more and use his curve as an out pitch. I think he threw one, maybe 2 curves today.
Somehow the Pirates managed 3 hits that inning and still failed to score.