If I had to guess I’d say Santana is still on the bereavement list, and Holderman will be sent down when he is back. Glad to see the Peguero promotion. Maybe someone in the analytics department is looking at Kiner-Falefa’s defensive metrics.
12:07 Konnor Griffin seems to have gotten off to a good start with the bat in his first season. If he continues this, does he shoot up the rankings and become a top 20 prospect by end of year?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:07 The K's need to come down for that. 30% is mucho
12:03 When does Bubba Chandler come up? Not sure there is much more for him to prove in AAA at this point. Probably not Skenes level good, but level below good?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:04 If I had to bet, I'd say he comes up late enough to retain rookie eligibility next season.
Feel free to delete this if its in bad taste, but I'm stuck with the allegory of a fan getting so belligerently drunk that he swan dives off the Clemente Wall at the mere sign of life from the Pittsburgh Pirates offense.
20-year-old from South Allegheny that had one too many and decided to do something stupid. I've certainly been there, but thankfully not to the point of bodily harm.
How is a 20-year-old drinking beers and dumping them over his shirtless body inside of PNC Park?
20-year-old Catch, or my buddies couldn't get beers at the games. I'd imagine someone is going to have to open their wallet.
The national story I read very carefully neglected to mention that he was probably roaring drunk. And the Athletic has a story about what a great kid he was in high school. No mention of pouring beer over his shirtless body.
"Witnesses told TribLive that Markwood was excited the Pirates were rallying and had taken off his shirt and poured beer on himself before McCutchen's at bat."
Yeah. Drunk or no... foolish or no... the whole thing is still tragic. I think that we all did stupid stuff when we were young. Hopefully this does not cost him his life or ability to move around.
I had Yordan Alvarez in a league last year. Solid as a rock, except in the month of May he had me worried only having 4 RBIs in over 100 at bats. The other months he had between 14 and 19. Interesting read though.
Adames and Santander taking the nosedive immediately after signing nine figure contracts is one of those moments where I can legitimately put myself in the shoes of a GM/Owner and question whether I would pull the trigger.
Both easy guys to stay away from in fantasy league. Both guys have dollar figures that it didn't make sense for the Orioles or Brewers to re-sign. That being said, I think the Orioles miss him and the Brewers really miss Adames. Adames might actually be one of those guys that are better than what the numbers show. The Giants are 6 games above .500. But his contract is just insanely stupid. More of the reason to try to get a couple extra years out of Oneil Cruz ASAP, unless it is too late already.
Free agents are so much like prospects. You don't know, until you know, how prospects are going to develop and handle major-league opposition. With free agents, you never know how they are going to age. It's really variable with these guys in their 30s. Cutch is still very productive at 38, and some other guy just falls apart at 31. How do you know when signing a guy to a multiyear deal when that moment comes? And it often seems to come immediately. There aren't many slow declines in the age of the 95 MPH fastball. There is just... can catch up... next day... can't.
I was listening to the Fan this morning and they mentioned that Skenes’ arm slot is different this year. I am not usually able to watch the games so this is not something I have personally observed and this is the first time I have heard anyone mention it. Is this true?
You hit all the highlights. Those games down around Uniontown on Sundays were crazy. $1000 into the pot before the flop every time. Was there a Chuck there? I don't remember, but if he was one of those guys, then I agree Chuck > Ed. I lost about $1500 in one pot out in Homestead one night.
Lol... you don't know the half of it. One night... way back... I'm playing in the Italian game up on the north side, and the one old gangster say to the other, "Didn't know you were out. All the old crew is in jail now." They then proceeded to list off the time served and charges of everyone they knew... all hitmen doing 20 to life. Loved playing with those guys though. Very gentelmanly... just don't owe them money and be polite and things were good.
We're waiting for Super 2 date to pass at this point. It would be foolish to bring him up with only a couple more weeks to go that would save Bob significant arbitration money.
When MLB pitchers start studying video on him, it will be a new experience for him. I think he needs a lot of at bats. As far as every other part of his game, he is elite.
Last night was kinda typical. They were facing a pitcher who’s totally dominating the FSL with a very good slider and command. KG was completely fooled by the SL first time up and came nowhere near making contact. Second time, first or second pitch, he just barely got under it and hit a long, extremely high fly to left. Just the tiniest fraction and that would have landed in the next county. Third time he grounded to third.
Point is, he’s seeing stuff he’s never seen before and he IS adjusting. It’s nothing like Shalin Polanco, who’d be fooled by the same pitch nine times in a row. He DOES need time. Even if his OPS goes over 1.000 next week, he needs to keep seeing the different stuff professional pitchers can bring.
What chaffs me about keeping Chandler down there this long is not only do the Pirates not care about putting the best team on the field all year long they also seemingly don’t want Bubba to challenge for ROY because it could cost them. They seem to want to take away any joy that a fan could have in the team. Perhaps we would like to see Pirates win the award in back to back years!
Like do fans honestly believe the front office is literally sitting around a table on Federal Street debating transactions until they settle on" let's f*ck 'em".
I mean, imagining them sitting around Federal Street debating transactions until they settle on “Fuck ‘em” is kind of a compliment compared with the plausible alternatives.
I know we all believe physiology is just a bunch of liberal bullshit (somebody please get my Always Sunny reference before feeling offended) but I'm willing to guess they're thinking about the fact that Jared Jones is as close to a Bubba comp as could possibly be found and will have spent longer on the injured list than active roster by the time he touches the mound for the first time this year.
I absolutely was in the "f*ck yeah" crowd when they called him up last April and let him air it out max effort until he broke, but we seem to be in the reaping phase at the moment and it's much less fun.
Yes that is sports. No one in the front office knows what is going to happen in the future. It was obviously the right move to bring up Jones and I’m glad they did. It is the right move to bring up Bubba. Would we rather they blow their arms out in AAA?
My point about ROY is not that they are actively sitting in the front office thinking of ways to screw the fans, but their corporate/calculated/overly cautious “years of control” attitude spoils the fun of baseball. They’re a small market team. So what! Put the best team on the field. Spend some money. Cycle through some lean years and enjoy it when it is going well. Let Bubba pitch up here. If he wins ROY and it influences how much we need to pay him, who cares. Our calculating ways is getting us nowhere.
I can respect your point of view, but personally I hope they are keeping him down for the extra year of control. I want to see a talent like his in a Pittsburgh uniform for as long as possible.
Waiting for super 2 doesn't yield an extra year of control. You already get that by waiting a month. It just gives an extra year of non-arbitration instead of arbitration. Hindering the team and development of a player to avoid paying 20% of an estimated salary over league minimum is nothing more than pointless penny-pinching.
Seeing that Chen got 11 whiffs reminded me that Kiley gave an updated top 10 for each team yesterday and Chen was 10th and Kiley added this comment: "Chen is dealing and he has good feel and off-speed stuff, but his fastball velocity is still well below average."
It may depend on whether you're a glass half-empty or half-full person as to whether Chen being a top 10 prospect is a bad ("well below average" velocity) or good ("dealing") thing.
I'd rather talk about Hunter Barco rocketing up to #4 and Bubba Chandler taking the crown for best arm in minor league baseball than the one bizarre outlier.
I'm excited about Barco. I like our top 4 a lot, as all of us do (Chandler, KG, TJ, Barco). I'm intrigued by Sanford and hopeful about Ashcraft. Then there are the breakout candidates like Rivas, though I've been burned by similar players before. There just doesn't seem to be enough depth in the system given how many older players we have on the roster--where are we going to get enough help to contend in even year 7 of the rebuild (Termarr may be ready but he's just one) or year 8 (Griffin, but that seems at least a year early)?
Yes. This is the point that I have been making. There is not enough there to target a "window" this year, next year, probably even the year after. I get that they have pitching depth, but they need to fil 3 rotation spots and 4 bullpen spots, so they need all of these pitchers to be contributors at the MLB level.
All of their serviceable position players start arb. next year, are in arb., or are on guaranteed contracts. They are not a young team. They will need to overhaul the lineup top-to-bottom. Johnson alone is not going to do this.
You have to look further ahead to Johnson and Griffin and hope some of these A-ball lottery tickets pan out. Get the pitchers established, sort them out into roles, and then wait a year or two for hitters to start arriving. This is not going to turn around in the next 18 months, sorry to say.
It seems like a very unbalanced system. We could have an elite rotation by the end of this season, but other than Cruz, Bart, and Reynolds, just few impact bats and none on the way anytime soon. Maybe it will work, but that puts a lot of pressure on our starters.
I think this is putting way too much on the system itself. Nobody, nobody, builds a playoff team internally.
Even the vaunted Orioles hitter dev juggernaut went out and signed Tyler Oneil and Gary Sanchez last winter. They also brought in Dylan Carlson and Ramon Laureano.
The system is fine but shouldn't be expected to do more than anyone reasonably can.
Right, nobody does. But with minimal spending on free agents and Ben's poor track record on trades, we have to place more hope on our system than some orgs.
So, our system is fine relative to all systems but maybe not fine relative to what we need to contend.
Neal did it, but through skill or luck, probably a combination, was able to bring in A.J., Liriano, Melancon, Martin, Cervelli...to this point Ben hasn't had that kind of success bringing in help from the outside.
That is sort of my point. With all the guys hitting arb. and on guaranteed contracts, there won't be any money to fill the holes. With the Pirates, you need 6 or 7 guys filling major roles who are still pre-arb. The Pirates will have 3 or 4 after this season, once Cruz goes into arbitration.
Chen feels like a poor man Quinn Priester. Some of the secondary stuff is interesting, but the 30 grade fastball gonna get beat to hell too often, especially when the command isn’t there.
Well I was leaning to half-empty thinking someone with well below average velocity being ranked 10th is not much of an endorsement of our system (of course that's consistent with Kiley's previous ranking of our system).
Yea system isn’t what it was, I think having Chen show up on a top 10 is more of an outlier.
That’s one outlet that’d have him in the top 30, maybe even more (can’t remember what FanGraphs had him if they him)
I get it to an extent, if u value floor over upside. Chen probably at the very least is a depth option. Might not be a good one but he’s probably someone the pirates could turn too in an injury heavy season.
Maybe can’t say that about some of the others in system in the lower levels
This may be too critical, but the whole bottom half of Kiley's top 10 doesn't inspire a ton of hope of impact players. Of course that's part of the reason the system has been ranked in the bottom third of MLB:
Yorke--I like him but don't think he'll be a significant upgrade at 2B over Gonzales.
Harrington--I may be overreacting to his brief time with the Pirates, but a #5 seems a best-case scenario. I was a big fan before, so again probably an overreaction.
Burrows--I'm thinking reliever and even if he's a good one, that minimizes his potential impact.
Sanford--There's a lot to like. Ideally, though, the system would have enough players having proven themselves in professional ball that a player like Sanford would be in the teens. But no real complaint here.
Do you think Chen could add a couple ticks if he was a once through reliever? Having multiple secondary pitches that he can locate is intriguing but he'll get exposed with the fastball probably in Indy a second time through the order.
I just can't see him as a starter but think he could be a good once through reliever working backwards.
Agreed and I'm even more put off by the change to monthly system updates for every team in the league.
They're telling us they can provide legitimate scouting of every prospect for every team in baseball and come up with an honest account of ups and downs to that scale?
In another ESPN article, Schoenfield graded each team's April and I'm sure nobody is surprised that we got an F (on pace to lose 99 games). Somewhat relevant to how our top 10 prospect list looks is that he notes that "They're not even a young team, with five of their nine regular position players 30 or older."
I see that Pirate draftee Gunnar Hoglund is going to start today for the A's. Glad to see he made it to the big leagues. It must have been quite the journey.
Pirates just called up Peguero, sent down Stratton, and did not activate Santana from Bereavement list. Strange.
Hard to imagine Shelton playing Peguero, certainly not over IKF or Frazier.
Ahh, IKF is hurting.
If I had to guess I’d say Santana is still on the bereavement list, and Holderman will be sent down when he is back. Glad to see the Peguero promotion. Maybe someone in the analytics department is looking at Kiner-Falefa’s defensive metrics.
From my eye test, Peggy is more flashy and more likely to make the spectacular play. Kiner-Falefa is more reliable on the routine play.
The BC aide who calculated that 76 > 76 also showed that IKF > Ozzie Smith.
Justin
12:07 Konnor Griffin seems to have gotten off to a good start with the bat in his first season. If he continues this, does he shoot up the rankings and become a top 20 prospect by end of year?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:07 The K's need to come down for that. 30% is mucho
What I've noticed more than the strikeouts is the walks. 20th out of 282 qualified A-ball hitters.
Kid's gonna swing his way up the ranks that's for sure.
I noticed that as well. Might struggle with OB% if he can't draw BB's vs low A arms
Jeb
12:03 When does Bubba Chandler come up? Not sure there is much more for him to prove in AAA at this point. Probably not Skenes level good, but level below good?
Eric A Longenhagen
12:04 If I had to bet, I'd say he comes up late enough to retain rookie eligibility next season.
Feel free to delete this if its in bad taste, but I'm stuck with the allegory of a fan getting so belligerently drunk that he swan dives off the Clemente Wall at the mere sign of life from the Pittsburgh Pirates offense.
20-year-old from South Allegheny that had one too many and decided to do something stupid. I've certainly been there, but thankfully not to the point of bodily harm.
How is a 20-year-old drinking beers and dumping them over his shirtless body inside of PNC Park?
20-year-old Catch, or my buddies couldn't get beers at the games. I'd imagine someone is going to have to open their wallet.
The national story I read very carefully neglected to mention that he was probably roaring drunk. And the Athletic has a story about what a great kid he was in high school. No mention of pouring beer over his shirtless body.
"Witnesses told TribLive that Markwood was excited the Pirates were rallying and had taken off his shirt and poured beer on himself before McCutchen's at bat."
https://triblive.com/sports/pirates-fan-who-fell-from-above-clemente-wall-identified-remains-in-critical-condition/
Oof, that's honestly a shame. 20-yr NMR would slug 'em in the parking lot and sober up by the 7th inning stretch.
Yeah. Drunk or no... foolish or no... the whole thing is still tragic. I think that we all did stupid stuff when we were young. Hopefully this does not cost him his life or ability to move around.
For sure. Didn’t mean to imply otherwise, but his state at the time is a key part of the story.
Maybe I'm guilty of misery loving company but I found this to be a good read:
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/yordan-alvarez-and-the-replacement-level-bunch/
Sure enough, there’s Phamine. Birdbrain usually avoids this list by signing guys who’ve already tanked.
truly a remarkable track record of futility.
I had Yordan Alvarez in a league last year. Solid as a rock, except in the month of May he had me worried only having 4 RBIs in over 100 at bats. The other months he had between 14 and 19. Interesting read though.
Adames and Santander taking the nosedive immediately after signing nine figure contracts is one of those moments where I can legitimately put myself in the shoes of a GM/Owner and question whether I would pull the trigger.
Both easy guys to stay away from in fantasy league. Both guys have dollar figures that it didn't make sense for the Orioles or Brewers to re-sign. That being said, I think the Orioles miss him and the Brewers really miss Adames. Adames might actually be one of those guys that are better than what the numbers show. The Giants are 6 games above .500. But his contract is just insanely stupid. More of the reason to try to get a couple extra years out of Oneil Cruz ASAP, unless it is too late already.
Free agents are so much like prospects. You don't know, until you know, how prospects are going to develop and handle major-league opposition. With free agents, you never know how they are going to age. It's really variable with these guys in their 30s. Cutch is still very productive at 38, and some other guy just falls apart at 31. How do you know when signing a guy to a multiyear deal when that moment comes? And it often seems to come immediately. There aren't many slow declines in the age of the 95 MPH fastball. There is just... can catch up... next day... can't.
couldn't have said it better.
I was listening to the Fan this morning and they mentioned that Skenes’ arm slot is different this year. I am not usually able to watch the games so this is not something I have personally observed and this is the first time I have heard anyone mention it. Is this true?
I trust Statcast more than jabroni's on the Fan and the data says his arm angle is only 3 degrees different.
I’ll wait until I hear what Big Ed from Homestead has to say on the topic.
Made me chuckle 🤭
I used to play cards with a guy named Ed from Homestead. I would take his opinion over that of China Paul,
Chuck from Uniontown > Ed from Homestead, just saying
Love Chuck!
Chuck is a soldier. The man could be dying in hospice and he’d still call in to the postgame to ream the Pirates for horseshit play.
You see fans like that, with that kind of devotion, and it just is infuriating they can’t get their shit together.
You hit all the highlights. Those games down around Uniontown on Sundays were crazy. $1000 into the pot before the flop every time. Was there a Chuck there? I don't remember, but if he was one of those guys, then I agree Chuck > Ed. I lost about $1500 in one pot out in Homestead one night.
You're lucky that's all you lost if you were in Homestead.
Lol... you don't know the half of it. One night... way back... I'm playing in the Italian game up on the north side, and the one old gangster say to the other, "Didn't know you were out. All the old crew is in jail now." They then proceeded to list off the time served and charges of everyone they knew... all hitmen doing 20 to life. Loved playing with those guys though. Very gentelmanly... just don't owe them money and be polite and things were good.
Chuck from Uniontown is the guy!
LOL
Very minute, maybe 1/2 inch.
Headline on today’s BA newsletter:
“Bubba Chandler has little left to prove in the minors.”
We're waiting for Super 2 date to pass at this point. It would be foolish to bring him up with only a couple more weeks to go that would save Bob significant arbitration money.
I think they’ll call Griffin up before Chandler.
Yes, to Greensboro for sure.
No to Pgh. He’s gonna pass all the levels.
If KG is not in the opening day roster I’ll quit the Pirates….
When MLB pitchers start studying video on him, it will be a new experience for him. I think he needs a lot of at bats. As far as every other part of his game, he is elite.
Last night was kinda typical. They were facing a pitcher who’s totally dominating the FSL with a very good slider and command. KG was completely fooled by the SL first time up and came nowhere near making contact. Second time, first or second pitch, he just barely got under it and hit a long, extremely high fly to left. Just the tiniest fraction and that would have landed in the next county. Third time he grounded to third.
Point is, he’s seeing stuff he’s never seen before and he IS adjusting. It’s nothing like Shalin Polanco, who’d be fooled by the same pitch nine times in a row. He DOES need time. Even if his OPS goes over 1.000 next week, he needs to keep seeing the different stuff professional pitchers can bring.
Oh I agree. My tongue is firmly in cheek here!
Is there still a defined super 2 date or do they use a formula now?
Formula as far as I know.
What chaffs me about keeping Chandler down there this long is not only do the Pirates not care about putting the best team on the field all year long they also seemingly don’t want Bubba to challenge for ROY because it could cost them. They seem to want to take away any joy that a fan could have in the team. Perhaps we would like to see Pirates win the award in back to back years!
Is this a serious-not-literal comment?
Like do fans honestly believe the front office is literally sitting around a table on Federal Street debating transactions until they settle on" let's f*ck 'em".
I mean, imagining them sitting around Federal Street debating transactions until they settle on “Fuck ‘em” is kind of a compliment compared with the plausible alternatives.
lol, harsh but fair.
I know we all believe physiology is just a bunch of liberal bullshit (somebody please get my Always Sunny reference before feeling offended) but I'm willing to guess they're thinking about the fact that Jared Jones is as close to a Bubba comp as could possibly be found and will have spent longer on the injured list than active roster by the time he touches the mound for the first time this year.
I absolutely was in the "f*ck yeah" crowd when they called him up last April and let him air it out max effort until he broke, but we seem to be in the reaping phase at the moment and it's much less fun.
Yes that is sports. No one in the front office knows what is going to happen in the future. It was obviously the right move to bring up Jones and I’m glad they did. It is the right move to bring up Bubba. Would we rather they blow their arms out in AAA?
My point about ROY is not that they are actively sitting in the front office thinking of ways to screw the fans, but their corporate/calculated/overly cautious “years of control” attitude spoils the fun of baseball. They’re a small market team. So what! Put the best team on the field. Spend some money. Cycle through some lean years and enjoy it when it is going well. Let Bubba pitch up here. If he wins ROY and it influences how much we need to pay him, who cares. Our calculating ways is getting us nowhere.
I can respect your point of view, but personally I hope they are keeping him down for the extra year of control. I want to see a talent like his in a Pittsburgh uniform for as long as possible.
Waiting for super 2 doesn't yield an extra year of control. You already get that by waiting a month. It just gives an extra year of non-arbitration instead of arbitration. Hindering the team and development of a player to avoid paying 20% of an estimated salary over league minimum is nothing more than pointless penny-pinching.
so serious, not literal. I can appreciate that.
Any reports on Jebb's CF defense?
I think it’s been fine. The speed helps. Still a work in progress but seems fairly natural(ish lol) out there
Jebb Gems?
Seeing that Chen got 11 whiffs reminded me that Kiley gave an updated top 10 for each team yesterday and Chen was 10th and Kiley added this comment: "Chen is dealing and he has good feel and off-speed stuff, but his fastball velocity is still well below average."
It may depend on whether you're a glass half-empty or half-full person as to whether Chen being a top 10 prospect is a bad ("well below average" velocity) or good ("dealing") thing.
I'd rather talk about Hunter Barco rocketing up to #4 and Bubba Chandler taking the crown for best arm in minor league baseball than the one bizarre outlier.
I'm excited about Barco. I like our top 4 a lot, as all of us do (Chandler, KG, TJ, Barco). I'm intrigued by Sanford and hopeful about Ashcraft. Then there are the breakout candidates like Rivas, though I've been burned by similar players before. There just doesn't seem to be enough depth in the system given how many older players we have on the roster--where are we going to get enough help to contend in even year 7 of the rebuild (Termarr may be ready but he's just one) or year 8 (Griffin, but that seems at least a year early)?
Yes. This is the point that I have been making. There is not enough there to target a "window" this year, next year, probably even the year after. I get that they have pitching depth, but they need to fil 3 rotation spots and 4 bullpen spots, so they need all of these pitchers to be contributors at the MLB level.
All of their serviceable position players start arb. next year, are in arb., or are on guaranteed contracts. They are not a young team. They will need to overhaul the lineup top-to-bottom. Johnson alone is not going to do this.
You have to look further ahead to Johnson and Griffin and hope some of these A-ball lottery tickets pan out. Get the pitchers established, sort them out into roles, and then wait a year or two for hitters to start arriving. This is not going to turn around in the next 18 months, sorry to say.
It seems like a very unbalanced system. We could have an elite rotation by the end of this season, but other than Cruz, Bart, and Reynolds, just few impact bats and none on the way anytime soon. Maybe it will work, but that puts a lot of pressure on our starters.
I think this is putting way too much on the system itself. Nobody, nobody, builds a playoff team internally.
Even the vaunted Orioles hitter dev juggernaut went out and signed Tyler Oneil and Gary Sanchez last winter. They also brought in Dylan Carlson and Ramon Laureano.
The system is fine but shouldn't be expected to do more than anyone reasonably can.
Right, nobody does. But with minimal spending on free agents and Ben's poor track record on trades, we have to place more hope on our system than some orgs.
So, our system is fine relative to all systems but maybe not fine relative to what we need to contend.
Neal did it, but through skill or luck, probably a combination, was able to bring in A.J., Liriano, Melancon, Martin, Cervelli...to this point Ben hasn't had that kind of success bringing in help from the outside.
That is sort of my point. With all the guys hitting arb. and on guaranteed contracts, there won't be any money to fill the holes. With the Pirates, you need 6 or 7 guys filling major roles who are still pre-arb. The Pirates will have 3 or 4 after this season, once Cruz goes into arbitration.
Or #3.
Chen feels like a poor man Quinn Priester. Some of the secondary stuff is interesting, but the 30 grade fastball gonna get beat to hell too often, especially when the command isn’t there.
Was surprised Kiley had him so high
Well I was leaning to half-empty thinking someone with well below average velocity being ranked 10th is not much of an endorsement of our system (of course that's consistent with Kiley's previous ranking of our system).
You're probably overthinking this one a bit. Kiley is good, but there's no way Chen is a top 10 prospect in this system.
Poor man Priester is a good comp. Remember Dario Agrazal?
Chen makes Harrington look like Aroldis Chapman.
Yea system isn’t what it was, I think having Chen show up on a top 10 is more of an outlier.
That’s one outlet that’d have him in the top 30, maybe even more (can’t remember what FanGraphs had him if they him)
I get it to an extent, if u value floor over upside. Chen probably at the very least is a depth option. Might not be a good one but he’s probably someone the pirates could turn too in an injury heavy season.
Maybe can’t say that about some of the others in system in the lower levels
This may be too critical, but the whole bottom half of Kiley's top 10 doesn't inspire a ton of hope of impact players. Of course that's part of the reason the system has been ranked in the bottom third of MLB:
Yorke--I like him but don't think he'll be a significant upgrade at 2B over Gonzales.
Harrington--I may be overreacting to his brief time with the Pirates, but a #5 seems a best-case scenario. I was a big fan before, so again probably an overreaction.
Burrows--I'm thinking reliever and even if he's a good one, that minimizes his potential impact.
Sanford--There's a lot to like. Ideally, though, the system would have enough players having proven themselves in professional ball that a player like Sanford would be in the teens. But no real complaint here.
Chen
We hoping for a Jeff Karstens outcome from Harrington?
Yes that's too critical.
Do you think Chen could add a couple ticks if he was a once through reliever? Having multiple secondary pitches that he can locate is intriguing but he'll get exposed with the fastball probably in Indy a second time through the order.
I just can't see him as a starter but think he could be a good once through reliever working backwards.
Maybe. Perhaps. Don’t think the jump would be enough tho
FG has him 30th, as a 35+.
Still don’t think that warrants a top 10 ranking
Agreed and I'm even more put off by the change to monthly system updates for every team in the league.
They're telling us they can provide legitimate scouting of every prospect for every team in baseball and come up with an honest account of ups and downs to that scale?
Quit lying to us and admit you're a content farm.
Respect the hell outta Kiley but yea, ESPN is 100% content farming here
Monthly updates you are just riding hot/cold streaks off box scores. Zero actual evaluating.
I’m sure he’ll reach out to some sources but that still doesn’t feel like enough
In another ESPN article, Schoenfield graded each team's April and I'm sure nobody is surprised that we got an F (on pace to lose 99 games). Somewhat relevant to how our top 10 prospect list looks is that he notes that "They're not even a young team, with five of their nine regular position players 30 or older."
Exactly what I’ve been saying. Blows apart the rebuilding excuse.
If you go by weighted avg age, the Pirates have the fifth oldest group of hitters in MLB, quite a bit older than the next younger team.
I see that Pirate draftee Gunnar Hoglund is going to start today for the A's. Glad to see he made it to the big leagues. It must have been quite the journey.
So many injuries. Glad he finally got the call