Without a top-top pick and with a weaker draft class, I hope the Pirates find ways to be more creative. This is likely to be a year where they'll want to hunt for Solometo types.
Man, you sure don’t want an off day when you’re 5-0 with a run differential that fully reflects the record.
In a strange way, tomorrow is a big game for me. Keller vs. Williams. Should be a piece of cake. But these are precisely the games that the “old” Pirates seemed to lose every damn time. Are these really the new Pirates? I will be heartened if they keep it up and take care of business.
I see that! Seems like an odd trade. Doesn’t do much but free up a spot on the 40-man. Seemed like there were other avenues to do so instead of parting with your 20th ranked prospect, but what do I know haha
I hadn't thought about the alternative choices, I admit. I like Selby, but the premium always has to be on younger leftie pitching.
I will note that Fangraphs rates Selby modestly higher (40+ FV vs 40 FV). Also, Selby is more likely to help the team this year since he's more likely to play during a pitching apocalypse.
I mean . . . meh. Neither guy makes or breaks the post-rebuild so I guess. Not my favorite move, but it's marginal in the big picture.
This is strange to me in that I thought there were hard deadlines for when decisions about players on waivers needed to be resolved, and that we had passed that deadline given the announcements about CSN and Sanchez.
I'm curious to have this resolved, not so much because I'd worry about losing Wolf (though he was ranked surprisingly high in several prospect rankings), but simply to better understand why delays happen for the next time we have someone interesting in DFA-limbo.
Agreed. It threw me for a loop to see decisions on Sanchez/CSN, but not Wolf.
I also agree with your assessment on Wolf. I don’t view him as a player you absolutely can’t/shouldn’t part with, but he was a prospect that was the main return in the deal with San Diego and could’ve been starting depth this season. Had more potential than other arms on the 40-man. I would be surprised to see him go unclaimed.
Looks like the Altoona roster dropped last night. No Termarr Johnson or Jack Brannigan. Looked back at it, less than 40 games in High-A for Brannigan, so I GUESS that makes sense. Although still not a fan. Termarr I was ok with starting in Greensboro, at least to start the year.
Wish they would go ahead and release everything and not wait till last minute.
Are all the rosters out? My disappointment is eased somewhat by having the opportunity to see them both at the end of May (assuming they are still at Greensboro). For some reason Greensboro and Asheville are in separate divisions so I only get one chance a year to see them. I missed Henry Davis a few years ago because he was either injured or promoted.
Not technically. Someone tweeted out what looks to be the Altoona program with the roster on it. No Brannigan, no Termarr, no Andres Alvarez to a lesser extent.
They also had Brenden Dixon listed as an outfielder, which was interesting.
Individual teams do their own releases ahead of MiLB.com, which is always lagging. Indy and Altoona are obviously more on the ball than the class A teams.
Gents... is the roster we are referencing from the Curve's official site or elsewhere? When I go to their site I only count 20 rostered players so that can't be right.
The whole BC Front Office has been that way since Day 1. The only thing I can figure is that they figure the less the public knows, the less complaints aimed in their direction. After all, why should Pirate fans know anything until it is made public?
I don't remember them talking too much about Shim last year in the usual injury report, so I guess I wouldn't hold out too much hope we are going to hear anything. Wish they would. They've been overly secretive about him since signing him
The Pirates are in first place with the best record in baseball. (I like the way that rolls out.)
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It's a rainy Tuesday here in these overcast mountains of central Pennsylvania. It is so overcast here almost all of the time that children think, when you ask 'em in kindergarten what color the sky is, that the sky is gray. We take it for granted and we curse the heavens. We drive down to the Sheetz and pay $3.71 for a gallon of gas when my Jeep Gladiator with the max tow package only gets 20 miles per gallon on a good day. And I'm sure the Saudis are making a lot of money. But, you know? I bet those guys wish they'd discovered water.
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Thing is we can get kind of down in these hills because the sky is always gray... and winters last six months in a good year. So it is with ambivalence that I look out my picture window on the verdant, wet, grass with songbirds singing in the hedges in the pouring rain.
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The coffee is yet good. The day is early and it has not gone to hell yet. That's a backhanded blessing, to be sure. The house is a mess and the new kitchen floor is half done. The stone patio out back is mostly mud and that goddam stump will not budge out of the center of the project. I have drilled holes in it and filled it with fuel and burned it time and time again... but it is as obstinate as these overcast, rainy skies.
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So it is with modest pleasure that I turn my attention first thing to BucsOnDeck. You know? For some years now, the Pirates have completed this otherwise dreary picture with being an abysmal baseball team and it seems at times that's all we can expect. If it's gonna rain, it's gonna rain. Eeyore and Schleprock have nothing on Pirate fans, ESPECIALLY mountianous, wet, untanned ones.
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But our current team seems keen to have a start just like last year that turned to mud halfway through. Our dour expectations of another losing season seem to have dimmed temporarily as of April Fool's Day. Lest we remember only a year ago when a brief spate of winning made us all drunk with the harlot's tease of ... JOY...
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I forget. We started out a house of fire last season. And here we are again. With pitchers nobody wanted and with first basemen and catchers that couldn't catch and no real defensive outfielders and ... Was that us? Crying like that before the season started?
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We appear now to have a real GM... that is a "Genius Manager."
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These message boards are the glue to a dreary existence. If not for BucsOnDeck, the situation would indeed be dark. That said, what do I see? A ray of light from on high as morning breaks. Is it the sun? And the Pirates are the East? The sky is blue, and golden, and goldarn it it's time to spread some CARROTS ON THE HOUSE!!!!!
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ONE (1) sweet, delicious baby carrot for Brian Reynolds who went 2 for 5 with a double and 3 rbi while extending his on base streak to 33 games (jinx).
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TWO! (2) Two Connor Joe, who led the cavemen from the batrack with a 2 for 4, a run and a double and 2 rbi.
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And THREE! (3) orange divinities for M. Gonzalez for five innings of one run baseball, making the free agent pitcher's market look as absurd as it was expensive this past winter.
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Fresh rutabegas for the rest of the hitters who collected 15 hits and, what?, Five? doubles? I guess if yer not gonna hit 'em over the wall, you can leave dimples in the fence.
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No foolin' on April 2. A ray of hope exists. Can you believe it?!
________________________________
"Hey. Dis is ideal. Dry as a bone. What more could a rabbit want?"
Back when the Pirates had their last winning season, I called it and started a countdown as you see here. Might have been on P2. But it takes some effort and some stick-to-it ness. Love the bucs... Love the crew around here... Just my way of making it more fun.
So Jones is lined up to pitch the home opener against one of the best lineups in baseball. Can't wait to see it (especially after only seeing highlights of his debut due to family activities).
Story to follow: Skenes is supposedly throwing a sinker type pitch with a splitter grip their calling a sprinkler. It's coming in at 90-91 and has a changeup like effect. He threw 16 in his first start. If that becomes a good 3rd pitch to go with the FB and slider than get him in the rotation when he he's 5 innings every 5 days
One of the things the Pirates have done very well is find Bullpen pieces that were dead in the water with other teams and find themselves with the Pirates. For 2024, two that I like are RHRP Ryder Ryan who was unable to break through with Seattle, and the second is LHRP Josh Fleming, who struggled while pitching for the Tampa Bay Rays. For today a look at Fleming.
For TB Fleming threw a 4 Seam, Sinker, Slider, and Changeup. Since joining the Pirates he has dropped the 4 seam, and has reduced usage of the Slider from 22.1% down to 1.7%. After not throwing a Cut FB in 2023, he is now throwing it 39% of his pitches with the Pirates. He still throws his Sinking FB 40%, and dropped Changeup usage from 29.1% last year to 18.6% with the Pirates. A SSS, but his K% has increased from 4.35 to 8.10; his BB% has decreased from 3.31 to 2.70. His ERA has dropped from 4.70 to 2.70, and his FIP has dropped from 5.66 to 2.74. So, instead of being a reliever very few teams pursued after being DFA'd from the Rays, he is becoming a strong relief option for the Pirates. Great FO work
Excellent first story of the day so thank you, im strange, no kidding right🤦♂️. But i dont really pay attention to MiLB, till mid April, im on the wrong blog, right🤣🤣... But can I slip in a favorable comment on the Mlb team? Well here i go, i really think, though we have the usual suspects ripping on him exhaustingly so every day (boring, lol), that Shelton is a quality manager, I love how the team seemingly is 'with' him, fights hard even in down years and down games, not afraid to use analytics (important), and keeps everyone involved/playing...Listen, im not saying Shelton is whomever you fell in love with as a kid as a manager, but he seems worth supporting, until he is not🤷♂️🤷♂️
My 11-year old and I trekked to Cooperstown last weekend to visit the Hall of Fame (his first time) and to spend too much money in the various memorabilia stores that line Main Street.
Jim Leyland said that a big league manager can at best win you 10 games on his own (I’m paraphrasing). Sounds anodyne until you realize that 10 wins in the show is usually the difference between playing in October and watching from home.
Once we were in the Plaque Gallery at the hall, I wandered over to the wall where Leyland’s plaque will sit. Prior to being inducted, inductees sign the backer their plaque will be mounted on, and the bare signed backer stands on the wall for some time in lieu of the eventual plaque. I stood and stared at Leyland’s signature and remembered his time as Buccos skipper: how much I adored him as the Pirates began their ascent in the late 80s; his quip that the 86 Mets weren’t *that* good — after all, the Pirates had beaten them once; how hollow I felt in 1993 as the TV panned to him cupping cigarette after cigarette in the dugout while watching his team that had just been gutted take a righteous pounding; and of course The Slide.
1992 NLCS, Game 7. For some time in my arrogant youth I blamed Leyland for the Pirates’ collapse in the 9th inning of that franchise-altering game. While Drabek had not performed well in the Pirates’ postseason to that point (like all their stars, sadly), he had been masterful in that game, pitching an 8-inning shutout. But he appeared to be out of gas by the 9th inning.
Was Leyland wrong for leaving him in? Should he have given him a shorter leash? Maybe and maybe. If the Pirates had won, Leyland would have been praised for having the guts to stick with his guy. That inability to go back in time and run a counter factual is something that plagues so many coaches and managers in all sports. Just ask Pete Carroll.
It’s always risky to apply current day thinking to events a generation ago. And there’s so much that went wrong in the last couple innings that, if it doesn’t, the whole outcome changes.
If Lind doesn’t make that error on Justice’s ball (and it’s just an out), does Drabek stay in after the walk to Bream? With first and third and one out? I’d say probably not. In which case, if the rest of it played out as it happened, Atlanta pulls to within one on the Giant sacrifice fly, Belinda’s walk to Berryhill puts two on with two out…and the Bucs go to the series on Hunter’s pop up.
Something I’d forgotten about…in the top of the eighth, King hit a double to right with Merced on first who got thrown out at the plate. What if Merced is held at third? Do the Bucs add an insurance run?
A second thing is that the lineups seem more stable. Of course they should change things up against righties vs. lefties, but it's been nice seeing guys in the same roles (top of the order, middle, bottom).
He's always seemed good about getting along well with players; if he's now better at just letting players play instead of constantly tweaking things and then giving credit where credit is due, then he's fine and perhaps good.
I'd counter that with it would seem to be harder for a player to impress in a "tryout" if every game they're at a different spot in the lineup or, as was true in some cases, playing a different position 2-3 times per week.
I do agree, though, that Shelton wasn't good at developing players and may be just fine now that the majority of our lineup doesn't need much development.
He had shit players and a lot of them. Castillo, VanMeter, Hoy Park, Kai Tom, Mitchell, Marcano, Castro and on and on...These are not good ball players. Nobody has developed them as they've bounced around the league. They played multiple positions just to get them in the lineup.
Guys like Suwinski, Davis, Hayes, Connor Joe, Triolo, Keller, Bednar, and on and on have been properly developed. Those a huge Dev Wins.
I think it's a stretch to credit Shelton for developing Davis, Hayes, Joe, and most of the others you cite.
And if a manager/coaching staff was poor at developing players, of course they're going to look like bad players. For some of those players in your first group, they came to the majors with potential. Did they not realize that potential because they never had the talent to begin with or because they had a coaching staff that was learning on the job? Probably some of both.
Managers, like all of us, hopefully get better with experience. One thing that seems better is that in his first couple of years, Shelton seemed too quick to take credit or give credit to his coaches when players did well and to blame players for not "executing" when things didn't go well, even when they were put in difficult positions to execute (e.g., having to learn a new position while trying to get established). Starting last year and more so this year, he seems to credit players first.
Let's not let 5-0 cloud our vision too much. It's the game strategy, ie. bunting (which analytics doesn't support very often), running on contact at 3rdB with less than 2 outs, (with Cruz as possible exception), not holding a runner rounding first base to wait and see if throw home is cut off, trying the high school 1st and 3rd play
to try and score, etc. Yes, hopefully he, Rabelo, Brock are still learning.
I didn't have that big a problem with the Pirates' aggressive baserunning against Miami, especially since most of it was directed against the LFer de la Cruz and Josh Bell. Both are significantly below average defensively with poor to sub average arms. Seems like good scouting to me, and the Marlins got lucky that those two guys made a couple plays that they do not often make.
Where Bell was playing with IF in made it maybe an 80' throw to catcher. IIRC he made that throw 3 times in the same game. He did not make a good throw in the following game. It's just not good odds.......1 out of 4, 25% success rate.
Our fundamentals need to improve but I don't know if that's a reflection on Shelton, the base coaches, or our developmental staff. It seems that we have given up too many outs on the base paths and are lucky that it hasn't cost us a game or two yet.
Thanks Ted.. I fell victim of an exhaustive debate yesterday and regret it as the final take was really an overall baseball strategy complaint (can be a fun debate and in hind site I got that point of the argument) but it was presented as Shelton was dumb for doing what 1000 of the last 1000 managers would have done(or not done in this case). He is not perfect and may be below average, but it is also amazing how a manager becomes good with a good team. Reference: Joe Torre 'dumb' Braves manager to Joe Torre genius Yankee manager.
Agreed. While the “use your best guys in the toughest situations, no matter the inning” is a good theory, it really doesn’t take into account the longevity of a season. If the Bucs are stuck in a bunch of close games early in April, there are going to be times when they’re going to have to trust pitchers farther down the totem pole in tough situations. Otherwise, you’ll burn out all of your best guys by the all star break.
I’d also add that as fans, we’re not privy to availability of guys or stages of availability. There’s a lot we don’t know. Nevertheless, I would prefer to see more flexible thinking by Shelton. Especially because he has more bullpen pieces that allow him to be flexible.
I'll confess (first step is admitting you have a problem), I look forward to the minor league roster assignments more than I should. But as we Bucco nerds know, it can be telling on where some prospects stand and maybe how they improved / hurt their standing over the off-season. Go Bucs.
That 9th inning didn't go well for Honeywell. Four runs, 5 hits.
Wolf back to SD for AA SS Kevin Api bardo. 21 year old.
The pirates draft pool is just over $14 million.
Sounds like a lot of creativity to me
Without a top-top pick and with a weaker draft class, I hope the Pirates find ways to be more creative. This is likely to be a year where they'll want to hunt for Solometo types.
Man, you sure don’t want an off day when you’re 5-0 with a run differential that fully reflects the record.
In a strange way, tomorrow is a big game for me. Keller vs. Williams. Should be a piece of cake. But these are precisely the games that the “old” Pirates seemed to lose every damn time. Are these really the new Pirates? I will be heartened if they keep it up and take care of business.
They’re gonna lose some games. At some point. Even games where the matchup says they shouldn’t. Baseball be that way.
162-0 or GTFO /s
No word yet on whether Jackson Wolf was claimed or not? Would like to see him sneak through
Traded to San Diego
I see that! Seems like an odd trade. Doesn’t do much but free up a spot on the 40-man. Seemed like there were other avenues to do so instead of parting with your 20th ranked prospect, but what do I know haha
The other team has all the leverage when they know your alternative is to waive him and get nothing.
It's a good deal in that context, even if the odds of any payoff are low.
I don’t disagree with the move once they already made the decision to move on from him. Just personally would’ve rather parted with Selby than him
I hadn't thought about the alternative choices, I admit. I like Selby, but the premium always has to be on younger leftie pitching.
I will note that Fangraphs rates Selby modestly higher (40+ FV vs 40 FV). Also, Selby is more likely to help the team this year since he's more likely to play during a pitching apocalypse.
I mean . . . meh. Neither guy makes or breaks the post-rebuild so I guess. Not my favorite move, but it's marginal in the big picture.
This is strange to me in that I thought there were hard deadlines for when decisions about players on waivers needed to be resolved, and that we had passed that deadline given the announcements about CSN and Sanchez.
I'm curious to have this resolved, not so much because I'd worry about losing Wolf (though he was ranked surprisingly high in several prospect rankings), but simply to better understand why delays happen for the next time we have someone interesting in DFA-limbo.
Agreed. It threw me for a loop to see decisions on Sanchez/CSN, but not Wolf.
I also agree with your assessment on Wolf. I don’t view him as a player you absolutely can’t/shouldn’t part with, but he was a prospect that was the main return in the deal with San Diego and could’ve been starting depth this season. Had more potential than other arms on the 40-man. I would be surprised to see him go unclaimed.
Looks like the Altoona roster dropped last night. No Termarr Johnson or Jack Brannigan. Looked back at it, less than 40 games in High-A for Brannigan, so I GUESS that makes sense. Although still not a fan. Termarr I was ok with starting in Greensboro, at least to start the year.
Wish they would go ahead and release everything and not wait till last minute.
I’d bet some of these guys move up fairly early. Jack does have some serious contact issues.
Are all the rosters out? My disappointment is eased somewhat by having the opportunity to see them both at the end of May (assuming they are still at Greensboro). For some reason Greensboro and Asheville are in separate divisions so I only get one chance a year to see them. I missed Henry Davis a few years ago because he was either injured or promoted.
Not technically. Someone tweeted out what looks to be the Altoona program with the roster on it. No Brannigan, no Termarr, no Andres Alvarez to a lesser extent.
They also had Brenden Dixon listed as an outfielder, which was interesting.
Individual teams do their own releases ahead of MiLB.com, which is always lagging. Indy and Altoona are obviously more on the ball than the class A teams.
Gents... is the roster we are referencing from the Curve's official site or elsewhere? When I go to their site I only count 20 rostered players so that can't be right.
There was some sort of release by the team, apparently a program. It’s not online.
P
Ashcraft
Case
Chandler
Chen
Dombkowski
Ford
Gau
Junker
Linarez
Mattson
Meis
Samaniego
Solometo
Sullivan
Yean
C
Gutierrez
Hendrie
Shockley
IF
Acuna
Beer
Cheng
Glenn
Jarvis
Shackelford
OF
Bowen
Dixon
Fraizer
Tres Gonzalez
Scott
Thank you! And now realize you said one comment prior that Milb was not accurate. Reading comprehension failure on this end... it WILL happen again.
I didn’t see this, but it’s disappointing.
I'll email you the list. Not sure of the validity, but seems legit.
We still don't know the contract details for Shelton correct? I'm not sure what the point is of that secrecy.
The whole BC Front Office has been that way since Day 1. The only thing I can figure is that they figure the less the public knows, the less complaints aimed in their direction. After all, why should Pirate fans know anything until it is made public?
Just one more day until we learn about Shim's injury (Wed. injury report). Or has it leaked out yet?
I don't remember them talking too much about Shim last year in the usual injury report, so I guess I wouldn't hold out too much hope we are going to hear anything. Wish they would. They've been overly secretive about him since signing him
Must be HIPAA that applies to South Korean players!
5 down. 76 to go.
The Pirates are in first place with the best record in baseball. (I like the way that rolls out.)
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It's a rainy Tuesday here in these overcast mountains of central Pennsylvania. It is so overcast here almost all of the time that children think, when you ask 'em in kindergarten what color the sky is, that the sky is gray. We take it for granted and we curse the heavens. We drive down to the Sheetz and pay $3.71 for a gallon of gas when my Jeep Gladiator with the max tow package only gets 20 miles per gallon on a good day. And I'm sure the Saudis are making a lot of money. But, you know? I bet those guys wish they'd discovered water.
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Thing is we can get kind of down in these hills because the sky is always gray... and winters last six months in a good year. So it is with ambivalence that I look out my picture window on the verdant, wet, grass with songbirds singing in the hedges in the pouring rain.
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The coffee is yet good. The day is early and it has not gone to hell yet. That's a backhanded blessing, to be sure. The house is a mess and the new kitchen floor is half done. The stone patio out back is mostly mud and that goddam stump will not budge out of the center of the project. I have drilled holes in it and filled it with fuel and burned it time and time again... but it is as obstinate as these overcast, rainy skies.
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So it is with modest pleasure that I turn my attention first thing to BucsOnDeck. You know? For some years now, the Pirates have completed this otherwise dreary picture with being an abysmal baseball team and it seems at times that's all we can expect. If it's gonna rain, it's gonna rain. Eeyore and Schleprock have nothing on Pirate fans, ESPECIALLY mountianous, wet, untanned ones.
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But our current team seems keen to have a start just like last year that turned to mud halfway through. Our dour expectations of another losing season seem to have dimmed temporarily as of April Fool's Day. Lest we remember only a year ago when a brief spate of winning made us all drunk with the harlot's tease of ... JOY...
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I forget. We started out a house of fire last season. And here we are again. With pitchers nobody wanted and with first basemen and catchers that couldn't catch and no real defensive outfielders and ... Was that us? Crying like that before the season started?
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We appear now to have a real GM... that is a "Genius Manager."
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These message boards are the glue to a dreary existence. If not for BucsOnDeck, the situation would indeed be dark. That said, what do I see? A ray of light from on high as morning breaks. Is it the sun? And the Pirates are the East? The sky is blue, and golden, and goldarn it it's time to spread some CARROTS ON THE HOUSE!!!!!
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ONE (1) sweet, delicious baby carrot for Brian Reynolds who went 2 for 5 with a double and 3 rbi while extending his on base streak to 33 games (jinx).
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TWO! (2) Two Connor Joe, who led the cavemen from the batrack with a 2 for 4, a run and a double and 2 rbi.
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And THREE! (3) orange divinities for M. Gonzalez for five innings of one run baseball, making the free agent pitcher's market look as absurd as it was expensive this past winter.
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Fresh rutabegas for the rest of the hitters who collected 15 hits and, what?, Five? doubles? I guess if yer not gonna hit 'em over the wall, you can leave dimples in the fence.
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No foolin' on April 2. A ray of hope exists. Can you believe it?!
________________________________
"Hey. Dis is ideal. Dry as a bone. What more could a rabbit want?"
-Wabbit
Im loving this new bit Wabbit, keep it up and 4 carrots to you!
It's actually an old bit.
Back when the Pirates had their last winning season, I called it and started a countdown as you see here. Might have been on P2. But it takes some effort and some stick-to-it ness. Love the bucs... Love the crew around here... Just my way of making it more fun.
Not related to this thread, but heres a fun article on jones: https://blogs.fangraphs.com/lets-all-get-irresponsibly-excited-about-jared-jones/
162-0 incoming!
So Jones is lined up to pitch the home opener against one of the best lineups in baseball. Can't wait to see it (especially after only seeing highlights of his debut due to family activities).
Thanks for sharing.
Best FB in baseball!
Combined with an elite slider!
Maybe, just maybe, this is the year where we can have nice things.
Easy there, slugger.
Knocking on all of the wood!
Story to follow: Skenes is supposedly throwing a sinker type pitch with a splitter grip their calling a sprinkler. It's coming in at 90-91 and has a changeup like effect. He threw 16 in his first start. If that becomes a good 3rd pitch to go with the FB and slider than get him in the rotation when he he's 5 innings every 5 days
I think they're calling it a splinker not a sprinkler.
https://twitter.com/AramLeighton8/status/1774992817229566002?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
boy he's sluggish for an athlete
Skenes? Just a lot of limbs.
One of the things the Pirates have done very well is find Bullpen pieces that were dead in the water with other teams and find themselves with the Pirates. For 2024, two that I like are RHRP Ryder Ryan who was unable to break through with Seattle, and the second is LHRP Josh Fleming, who struggled while pitching for the Tampa Bay Rays. For today a look at Fleming.
For TB Fleming threw a 4 Seam, Sinker, Slider, and Changeup. Since joining the Pirates he has dropped the 4 seam, and has reduced usage of the Slider from 22.1% down to 1.7%. After not throwing a Cut FB in 2023, he is now throwing it 39% of his pitches with the Pirates. He still throws his Sinking FB 40%, and dropped Changeup usage from 29.1% last year to 18.6% with the Pirates. A SSS, but his K% has increased from 4.35 to 8.10; his BB% has decreased from 3.31 to 2.70. His ERA has dropped from 4.70 to 2.70, and his FIP has dropped from 5.66 to 2.74. So, instead of being a reliever very few teams pursued after being DFA'd from the Rays, he is becoming a strong relief option for the Pirates. Great FO work
Fleming is underrated. You heard it here first.
Excellent first story of the day so thank you, im strange, no kidding right🤦♂️. But i dont really pay attention to MiLB, till mid April, im on the wrong blog, right🤣🤣... But can I slip in a favorable comment on the Mlb team? Well here i go, i really think, though we have the usual suspects ripping on him exhaustingly so every day (boring, lol), that Shelton is a quality manager, I love how the team seemingly is 'with' him, fights hard even in down years and down games, not afraid to use analytics (important), and keeps everyone involved/playing...Listen, im not saying Shelton is whomever you fell in love with as a kid as a manager, but he seems worth supporting, until he is not🤷♂️🤷♂️
My 11-year old and I trekked to Cooperstown last weekend to visit the Hall of Fame (his first time) and to spend too much money in the various memorabilia stores that line Main Street.
Jim Leyland said that a big league manager can at best win you 10 games on his own (I’m paraphrasing). Sounds anodyne until you realize that 10 wins in the show is usually the difference between playing in October and watching from home.
Once we were in the Plaque Gallery at the hall, I wandered over to the wall where Leyland’s plaque will sit. Prior to being inducted, inductees sign the backer their plaque will be mounted on, and the bare signed backer stands on the wall for some time in lieu of the eventual plaque. I stood and stared at Leyland’s signature and remembered his time as Buccos skipper: how much I adored him as the Pirates began their ascent in the late 80s; his quip that the 86 Mets weren’t *that* good — after all, the Pirates had beaten them once; how hollow I felt in 1993 as the TV panned to him cupping cigarette after cigarette in the dugout while watching his team that had just been gutted take a righteous pounding; and of course The Slide.
1992 NLCS, Game 7. For some time in my arrogant youth I blamed Leyland for the Pirates’ collapse in the 9th inning of that franchise-altering game. While Drabek had not performed well in the Pirates’ postseason to that point (like all their stars, sadly), he had been masterful in that game, pitching an 8-inning shutout. But he appeared to be out of gas by the 9th inning.
Was Leyland wrong for leaving him in? Should he have given him a shorter leash? Maybe and maybe. If the Pirates had won, Leyland would have been praised for having the guts to stick with his guy. That inability to go back in time and run a counter factual is something that plagues so many coaches and managers in all sports. Just ask Pete Carroll.
It’s always risky to apply current day thinking to events a generation ago. And there’s so much that went wrong in the last couple innings that, if it doesn’t, the whole outcome changes.
If Lind doesn’t make that error on Justice’s ball (and it’s just an out), does Drabek stay in after the walk to Bream? With first and third and one out? I’d say probably not. In which case, if the rest of it played out as it happened, Atlanta pulls to within one on the Giant sacrifice fly, Belinda’s walk to Berryhill puts two on with two out…and the Bucs go to the series on Hunter’s pop up.
Something I’d forgotten about…in the top of the eighth, King hit a double to right with Merced on first who got thrown out at the plate. What if Merced is held at third? Do the Bucs add an insurance run?
Freaking baseball, man…
Or if Van Slyke doesn’t fly out in the 7th with bases loaded…
The Berryhill AB was bullshit. Belinda hung a backwards K on him and got hosed by that replacement ump.
But yes, freakin baseball indeed. Football may be a game of inches, but baseball’s a game of millimeters.
So many what-ifs in those last 3 innings.
And Bream took a huge lead off second. A pickoff play would have had him dead.
That’s a great take Tedwins! I totally agree with you!!
A second thing is that the lineups seem more stable. Of course they should change things up against righties vs. lefties, but it's been nice seeing guys in the same roles (top of the order, middle, bottom).
He's always seemed good about getting along well with players; if he's now better at just letting players play instead of constantly tweaking things and then giving credit where credit is due, then he's fine and perhaps good.
Easier to do those things when tryouts at the MLB level are over.
I'd counter that with it would seem to be harder for a player to impress in a "tryout" if every game they're at a different spot in the lineup or, as was true in some cases, playing a different position 2-3 times per week.
I do agree, though, that Shelton wasn't good at developing players and may be just fine now that the majority of our lineup doesn't need much development.
Wait....what?
He had shit players and a lot of them. Castillo, VanMeter, Hoy Park, Kai Tom, Mitchell, Marcano, Castro and on and on...These are not good ball players. Nobody has developed them as they've bounced around the league. They played multiple positions just to get them in the lineup.
Guys like Suwinski, Davis, Hayes, Connor Joe, Triolo, Keller, Bednar, and on and on have been properly developed. Those a huge Dev Wins.
I think it's a stretch to credit Shelton for developing Davis, Hayes, Joe, and most of the others you cite.
And if a manager/coaching staff was poor at developing players, of course they're going to look like bad players. For some of those players in your first group, they came to the majors with potential. Did they not realize that potential because they never had the talent to begin with or because they had a coaching staff that was learning on the job? Probably some of both.
We're getting a first look at how capable Shelton could be with a roster of competent baseball players, and so far it's going very well.
Managers, like all of us, hopefully get better with experience. One thing that seems better is that in his first couple of years, Shelton seemed too quick to take credit or give credit to his coaches when players did well and to blame players for not "executing" when things didn't go well, even when they were put in difficult positions to execute (e.g., having to learn a new position while trying to get established). Starting last year and more so this year, he seems to credit players first.
Let's not let 5-0 cloud our vision too much. It's the game strategy, ie. bunting (which analytics doesn't support very often), running on contact at 3rdB with less than 2 outs, (with Cruz as possible exception), not holding a runner rounding first base to wait and see if throw home is cut off, trying the high school 1st and 3rd play
to try and score, etc. Yes, hopefully he, Rabelo, Brock are still learning.
I didn't have that big a problem with the Pirates' aggressive baserunning against Miami, especially since most of it was directed against the LFer de la Cruz and Josh Bell. Both are significantly below average defensively with poor to sub average arms. Seems like good scouting to me, and the Marlins got lucky that those two guys made a couple plays that they do not often make.
Where Bell was playing with IF in made it maybe an 80' throw to catcher. IIRC he made that throw 3 times in the same game. He did not make a good throw in the following game. It's just not good odds.......1 out of 4, 25% success rate.
Our fundamentals need to improve but I don't know if that's a reflection on Shelton, the base coaches, or our developmental staff. It seems that we have given up too many outs on the base paths and are lucky that it hasn't cost us a game or two yet.
Thanks Ted.. I fell victim of an exhaustive debate yesterday and regret it as the final take was really an overall baseball strategy complaint (can be a fun debate and in hind site I got that point of the argument) but it was presented as Shelton was dumb for doing what 1000 of the last 1000 managers would have done(or not done in this case). He is not perfect and may be below average, but it is also amazing how a manager becomes good with a good team. Reference: Joe Torre 'dumb' Braves manager to Joe Torre genius Yankee manager.
Agreed. While the “use your best guys in the toughest situations, no matter the inning” is a good theory, it really doesn’t take into account the longevity of a season. If the Bucs are stuck in a bunch of close games early in April, there are going to be times when they’re going to have to trust pitchers farther down the totem pole in tough situations. Otherwise, you’ll burn out all of your best guys by the all star break.
I’d also add that as fans, we’re not privy to availability of guys or stages of availability. There’s a lot we don’t know. Nevertheless, I would prefer to see more flexible thinking by Shelton. Especially because he has more bullpen pieces that allow him to be flexible.
Another fav feature is back!
I'll confess (first step is admitting you have a problem), I look forward to the minor league roster assignments more than I should. But as we Bucco nerds know, it can be telling on where some prospects stand and maybe how they improved / hurt their standing over the off-season. Go Bucs.