It's plain criminal that this incompetent organization allowed Cruz to flounder defensively at ss for years, made him continue to flounder through his injury recovery and then told him to go play out there when the season was 3/4 over. Seeing him out there reminds us all how moving him there a couple years ago would have solved one of the outfield problems and opened up an infield slot for the multitude of infielders they've kept trying to play in the outfield. How do these people still have a job? I will keep asking that question until they don't.
It's kinda funny that he's made 2 throws, his first throw to home the second throw to third and other teams are already being overly cautious on running on his arm. Neither throw got the runner but were close enough to put doubt in their minds to send runners. The 2 times recently were a slide to catch a fly ball was appropriate, Cruz and Cook looked natural doing it. His reads and routes have looked very good so far and he really seems to enjoy it out there. I'm optimistic that he's going to become elite in center.
We still need a third baseman, shortstop, and a RFer to go with your first baseman. Take Chapman‘s money and Taylors plus McCutcheon plus rowdy money and get a real power hitter.
I think you mean LF because Reynolds is in right in this scenario. Yes, that’s why I said that’s the bones of a good team. It isn’t finished. Unfortunately a lot depends on Hayes, and if he comes back from the injury or if he won’t recover.
Are any big power hitters going to be in the FA picture? They’re going to have to make trades. But I do agree they should abandon the drips and drabs FA approach and target 2 players to short term deals in the 2-3 year range.
Is Yorke a ROY candidate? If so, we should want him up at the start of the season and getting a couple of weeks of major league ABs now to help him prepare.
If he's not quite in that tier, then why start his clock now when even waiting 2-3 weeks next season will ensure that we have him for six years beyond '25?
Of course we don't know what he's capable of, but that's why I go back and forth on whether we should call him up now. Two weeks now would be valuable experience but also might have negative consequences later.
If I was running things, though, I'd call him up and move IKF to a utility role so Yorke, Gonzales, and Triolo would get the most playing time. But it wouldn't be an easy decision.
Do we really believe that the "clock" thing should really be a thing? So few players actually are superstar players that I think this is really a bunch of nonsense - especially in the case that if the player really is a superstar then he might get 1 or 2 in ROY and gain a full year anyway. Besides, in Nutting world under Cherington - who cares when the team doesn't improve anyway?
I think they should bring up Yorke, if he has a great 2 weeks or so at the mlb level, it might push him back onto top 100 prospect rankings. He'd need to be ranked to get the PPI pick. It shouldn't cost the pirates an option. If he doesn't hit well, it'll still be beneficial in his development on knowing what to work on. The only reason for not bringing him up is playing time. The organization has an abundance of players that 2nd base is their primary position or their 2nd best position.
Personally I would like to see Gonzales and Yorke get the most playing time at 2nd. Triolo and Gonzales get most of the time at 3rd.
Peguero and Triolo get most of the time at short. Yorke probably should get a look at 1st base as well.
It's tough to find playing time for those 4 at the same time, but they need to find out who are major league players and who's not.
The pirates need to find a left handed bat or 2 this off-season, they're way too right handed in the infield going into 2025. (Triolo, Hayes, IKF, Williams, Gonzales, Peguero, Yorke, Joe and Cook) left handed Bae.
Totally agree here, especially the part about giving Yorke some opportunity at 1B. I think that could be his long term position given his perceived limitations in the field. Not your typical power corner stick, but I think he could be a very productive bat in this lineup. Sometimes just making contact and putting the ball in play is half the battle, also doesn’t hurt that he can find ways to get on base.
I would think Pirates 2025 ROY candidates begin and end with Bubba Chandler. A 60 rated fastball and change up combination to go with a 50 rated slider has the makings of him having instant success if he tightens up his command.
As for Yorke, hitting for a .986 OPS in Indy doesn’t mean he will hit for even a .750 OPS in Pittsburgh. Just ask Henry Davis, Bae, and Endy to name a few. Maybe he’s an outlier, but odds are against a hitter coming up and performing well nowadays compared to a Pitcher.
Yep, never know until given the opportunity - ask Nick Gonzales about the first time up. NG has been a surprise to me this year in that he continues to hit, even though the K/BB rate is still up around 5/1. Just think of how special his numbers would be if he was a 2/1 rate guy and had the other 3 AB's to provide more hits.
Chandler or Harrington could be the best ROY Candidates in 2025.
Gonzales has been improving, which is nice to see. However, his Statcast numbers are still below average to average across the board and a 310 xwOBA just doesn’t cut it. I would like to see him regain some of the patience (?) he had throughout the minors and at a minimum double his BB rate. This would go a long way to pushing his xwOBA up. If he could improve on hitting the breaking stuff, he’d be a beast. Funny that he would have over 2x more home runs in a handful of parks in MLB, just a fun tidbit.
Yes, for whatever reason we see a number of cases where a hitter looks great in AAA and struggles in the majors. Other team's fans surely think the same, but in most (all?) cases, they can point to at least a player or two who made the jump relatively seamlessly. We could make that case for Cruz, but it seems that there should be more than just one over the past 5-6 years.
With 9 games left against KC, Milwaukee, and the Yankees, 11-5 seems out of reach but you never know, especially given that by the time we play Milwaukee and the Yankees, they may have nothing to play for and may be resting/limiting their top players to get ready for the postseason.
Does BP have two meanings - Bullpen and Batting Practice?
It's easy to get off track when you are young and doing as much as you can to try to earn a regular slot in the lineup. Very impressed with how Triolo worked his way out of his first half problems. Lowered his hands a bunch and his head is much steadier from the ready to contact.
I don’t think folks give enough weight to Cherington’s practice of blowing off half the roster. That’s why they’ve been so bad the last six weeks. They have a core playing well, but when half the roster belongs in AAA, 2-3 players are going to eff up in every game. That’s why they keep losing seemingly winnable games.
They’ve handed around 1500 PAs to guys below replacement level. Of all of Cherington’s many failures, the refusal to try to find anywhere near 26 players who can help the team win is the biggest. They’re still half a roster away from being good. Is there a shred of evidence that Cherington can fix that, or that he’ll even try?
From yesterday's PG article on Cherington saying he expected Shelton to be back:
Will Lawton, who previously served as the Pirates’ director of pro scouting, will be re-signed to a different role in baseball operations, per sources. The director of research and development role was previously held by Sean Ahmed, who resigned from his position, as confirmed by sources.
“They just happened to come roughly at the same time,” Cherington said. “I do believe that it’s an opportunity for us overall in baseball operations to continue to strengthen and improve. I’m excited about that. We’ve made a good amount of change across baseball operations in the last several years. Change is going to be constant. This is the change that’s happening this year.”
If we're trying to find reason to be optimistic about potential moves, perhaps these two changes will lead to better decisions. At least it gives me hope that we won't fall for a Tellez-type signing again where we're committing a starting position to a player who has never shown that he's better than replacement level.
If there's an over 30 veteran who had a solid season a year or two ago but has been at or below replacement level since, you can bet that BC will be handing him a $3 - $5 million, one year contract!
My optimism lies in the fact that Huntington never really showed the capacity to pull off an offseason like he did between '12 and '13 prior to or after that fateful winter.
Sometimes the pieces just fall together.
In comparison to the Pirates, KC has Bobby Witt and the Chicago White Sox going for them. That's about it.
They're 12-1 against the White Sox and exactly .500 against Major League Baseball teams.
Great point. National writers should be pointing this out. This year beating up on the White Sox is a sure path to contention if you play them 13 times.
Actually, they're two games over against everybody but CWS, which is a lot better than six under.
Anyway, you can play that game with any team. Take away the Marlins and CWS, and the Pirates are 16 games under .500.
Every division has a last-place team. If you replace CWS with a merely crappy team, like the Pirates, on average you'd be replacing the 12-1 with something like 7-6 or 8-5. KC is legitimately maybe 8-9 games over .500, which is far above Cherington territory.
Idk man, that’s a bit harsh. Moore botched their rebuild pretty badly. His drafting/development was pretty poor and was panned by the Athletic, and he held onto numerous guys like Whit Merrifield, basically receiving nothing. Their rebuild is basically BWJ, an aging but still very good Salvy, a few complimentary pieces and then spending some actual money on real ball players this past off season.
Not only that their farm system is in really rough shape. I could easily see this being a one year blip where everything comes together around Witt and then goes south for a few years.
Nice to see Nick Yorke second in the Exit Velocity Top 5 in the system with a 107.9 mph single. Biggest hit though was his 104 mph 2 run HR of 424' to dead center. Since coming to the Pirates at the trade deadline he is carrying a .986 OPS in 136 AB with 17 doubles, 2 HR, and 25 RBI. Sees the ball well and makes positive contact indicated by the 14 BB/26 K. Based on his 155 PA, that would work out to be rates of 9.0% BB/16.8% K.
Following Yorke's HR to dead center, CF Jack Suwinski hit a 401', 103.5 mph HR to LC for his second RBI of the night. He and SS Liover Peguero had RBI's in the 3rd, and that was pretty much all the runs the Pirates needed with the Quality Start from Thomas Harrington.
Dominic Perachi with a good start to finish his season at AA.
It's plain criminal that this incompetent organization allowed Cruz to flounder defensively at ss for years, made him continue to flounder through his injury recovery and then told him to go play out there when the season was 3/4 over. Seeing him out there reminds us all how moving him there a couple years ago would have solved one of the outfield problems and opened up an infield slot for the multitude of infielders they've kept trying to play in the outfield. How do these people still have a job? I will keep asking that question until they don't.
okay seriously guys, how fun is it to watch Oneil Cruz man centerfield?
Just spent my lunch hour watching all his Film Room clips on autoplay. gonna go smoke a cig.
It's kinda funny that he's made 2 throws, his first throw to home the second throw to third and other teams are already being overly cautious on running on his arm. Neither throw got the runner but were close enough to put doubt in their minds to send runners. The 2 times recently were a slide to catch a fly ball was appropriate, Cruz and Cook looked natural doing it. His reads and routes have looked very good so far and he really seems to enjoy it out there. I'm optimistic that he's going to become elite in center.
love those observations, Mel!
Jackson Merrill is gonna finish up this year with about 5 fWAR in CF off of a wOBA around .340 and 5 UZR.
Cruz is currently running an expected wOBA of .343 and to my eye after watching them both has every bit the athleticism and skill.
I truly think we're looking at a 5 WAR player next year.
Cruz in CF, Reynolds to right, Bart behind the plate, Cutch at DH, trade for O’Hearn or Lamont Wade…the bones of that team ain’t bad
We still need a third baseman, shortstop, and a RFer to go with your first baseman. Take Chapman‘s money and Taylors plus McCutcheon plus rowdy money and get a real power hitter.
I think you mean LF because Reynolds is in right in this scenario. Yes, that’s why I said that’s the bones of a good team. It isn’t finished. Unfortunately a lot depends on Hayes, and if he comes back from the injury or if he won’t recover.
Are any big power hitters going to be in the FA picture? They’re going to have to make trades. But I do agree they should abandon the drips and drabs FA approach and target 2 players to short term deals in the 2-3 year range.
Hayes is burnt toast.
I hear that. Let’s build around our young staff with some real MLB hitters
Yep, maybe even higher WAR if it all comes together.
Dude, I know. How f*cking cool does he look out there?
Best part is he is having a blast...like a caged animal finally let loose.
You guys have some sexual undertones wrt how you talk about Cruz, seriously. It's very weird.
Yeah, we're the weird ones.
It's palpable yep. Bunch of old white dudes leering at Oneil Cruz in the OF. *Just look at that buck!*
Not sure what you consider old, but we're in our mid 40's. The fact you are bring sex into this is what is incredibly odd.
Pirates have a unicorn of an athlete, and we enjoy watching him play baseball.
You need to get out more as you come across as very socially awkward.
How cool looking is he bro?! What a caged animal. So loose! What a freak?!
Genuinely the loosest I can remember him. Looks like an absolute freak, too. Three steps and he's in the Notch.
Bucs are 70-76 with 16 games left.
They've got to go 11-5 the rest of the way to break .500, which was where Da Wabbit saw them ending up.
Beat 'Em Bucs.
-Wabbit
Is Yorke a ROY candidate? If so, we should want him up at the start of the season and getting a couple of weeks of major league ABs now to help him prepare.
If he's not quite in that tier, then why start his clock now when even waiting 2-3 weeks next season will ensure that we have him for six years beyond '25?
Of course we don't know what he's capable of, but that's why I go back and forth on whether we should call him up now. Two weeks now would be valuable experience but also might have negative consequences later.
If I was running things, though, I'd call him up and move IKF to a utility role so Yorke, Gonzales, and Triolo would get the most playing time. But it wouldn't be an easy decision.
Do we really believe that the "clock" thing should really be a thing? So few players actually are superstar players that I think this is really a bunch of nonsense - especially in the case that if the player really is a superstar then he might get 1 or 2 in ROY and gain a full year anyway. Besides, in Nutting world under Cherington - who cares when the team doesn't improve anyway?
I think they should bring up Yorke, if he has a great 2 weeks or so at the mlb level, it might push him back onto top 100 prospect rankings. He'd need to be ranked to get the PPI pick. It shouldn't cost the pirates an option. If he doesn't hit well, it'll still be beneficial in his development on knowing what to work on. The only reason for not bringing him up is playing time. The organization has an abundance of players that 2nd base is their primary position or their 2nd best position.
Personally I would like to see Gonzales and Yorke get the most playing time at 2nd. Triolo and Gonzales get most of the time at 3rd.
Peguero and Triolo get most of the time at short. Yorke probably should get a look at 1st base as well.
It's tough to find playing time for those 4 at the same time, but they need to find out who are major league players and who's not.
The pirates need to find a left handed bat or 2 this off-season, they're way too right handed in the infield going into 2025. (Triolo, Hayes, IKF, Williams, Gonzales, Peguero, Yorke, Joe and Cook) left handed Bae.
Totally agree here, especially the part about giving Yorke some opportunity at 1B. I think that could be his long term position given his perceived limitations in the field. Not your typical power corner stick, but I think he could be a very productive bat in this lineup. Sometimes just making contact and putting the ball in play is half the battle, also doesn’t hurt that he can find ways to get on base.
well said, Mel.
I would think Pirates 2025 ROY candidates begin and end with Bubba Chandler. A 60 rated fastball and change up combination to go with a 50 rated slider has the makings of him having instant success if he tightens up his command.
As for Yorke, hitting for a .986 OPS in Indy doesn’t mean he will hit for even a .750 OPS in Pittsburgh. Just ask Henry Davis, Bae, and Endy to name a few. Maybe he’s an outlier, but odds are against a hitter coming up and performing well nowadays compared to a Pitcher.
Yep, never know until given the opportunity - ask Nick Gonzales about the first time up. NG has been a surprise to me this year in that he continues to hit, even though the K/BB rate is still up around 5/1. Just think of how special his numbers would be if he was a 2/1 rate guy and had the other 3 AB's to provide more hits.
Chandler or Harrington could be the best ROY Candidates in 2025.
Gonzales has been improving, which is nice to see. However, his Statcast numbers are still below average to average across the board and a 310 xwOBA just doesn’t cut it. I would like to see him regain some of the patience (?) he had throughout the minors and at a minimum double his BB rate. This would go a long way to pushing his xwOBA up. If he could improve on hitting the breaking stuff, he’d be a beast. Funny that he would have over 2x more home runs in a handful of parks in MLB, just a fun tidbit.
I hear you, but I give NickyG the benefit of the doubt that his aggression is intentional and warranted.
I think he knows at this point he just not gonna hit breaking stuff, so he just effin hunts the first fastball he can get his bat on.
Limiting, absolutely, but it might be the only way he becomes an average-ish hitter.
Would a new (actually competent) hitting coach, be able to help some of these guys like Nicky G at the ML level?
Yes, for whatever reason we see a number of cases where a hitter looks great in AAA and struggles in the majors. Other team's fans surely think the same, but in most (all?) cases, they can point to at least a player or two who made the jump relatively seamlessly. We could make that case for Cruz, but it seems that there should be more than just one over the past 5-6 years.
I think they're worse than average but maybe only by a hitter or two. If one of Gonzales or Davis were to step in and mash this looks a lot different.
Jack produced right away but folks understandably don't seem to give much credit there since he's fallen off a cliff.
When we starting lumping guys like Bae into "disappointments" I think it really skews the reality here.
But I thought all of our prospects would hit the ground running!
11-5 to get to 81-81
doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things. But it would be nice to have a non-losing season.
Still guessing they finish 78-84
With 9 games left against KC, Milwaukee, and the Yankees, 11-5 seems out of reach but you never know, especially given that by the time we play Milwaukee and the Yankees, they may have nothing to play for and may be resting/limiting their top players to get ready for the postseason.
Here’s an interesting pair of factoids:
Pirates starters are 5th in MLB in win probability added, well ahead of 6th place Houston.
The bullpen is 27th.
If you look at the way KC is built, Pirates aren't far off.
They're built around BWJ becoming a 10 WAR monster and pitching.
Not suggesting Cruz becomes a 10 WAR monster, but 5+ with some BP help and they could be right there in '25.
Difference - the money KC spent on real free agents last offseason. Not likely in the 'Burgh.
Does BP have two meanings - Bullpen and Batting Practice?
It's easy to get off track when you are young and doing as much as you can to try to earn a regular slot in the lineup. Very impressed with how Triolo worked his way out of his first half problems. Lowered his hands a bunch and his head is much steadier from the ready to contact.
In this context it's bullpen.
I don’t think folks give enough weight to Cherington’s practice of blowing off half the roster. That’s why they’ve been so bad the last six weeks. They have a core playing well, but when half the roster belongs in AAA, 2-3 players are going to eff up in every game. That’s why they keep losing seemingly winnable games.
They’ve handed around 1500 PAs to guys below replacement level. Of all of Cherington’s many failures, the refusal to try to find anywhere near 26 players who can help the team win is the biggest. They’re still half a roster away from being good. Is there a shred of evidence that Cherington can fix that, or that he’ll even try?
Until proven wrong, I’m convinced BC has no interest in the Pirates being good. He’s striving for slightly above average as the team’s ceiling.
A few good moves could make the pirates very competitive in 2025. Cherington making those types of moves is slim to none.
From yesterday's PG article on Cherington saying he expected Shelton to be back:
Will Lawton, who previously served as the Pirates’ director of pro scouting, will be re-signed to a different role in baseball operations, per sources. The director of research and development role was previously held by Sean Ahmed, who resigned from his position, as confirmed by sources.
“They just happened to come roughly at the same time,” Cherington said. “I do believe that it’s an opportunity for us overall in baseball operations to continue to strengthen and improve. I’m excited about that. We’ve made a good amount of change across baseball operations in the last several years. Change is going to be constant. This is the change that’s happening this year.”
If we're trying to find reason to be optimistic about potential moves, perhaps these two changes will lead to better decisions. At least it gives me hope that we won't fall for a Tellez-type signing again where we're committing a starting position to a player who has never shown that he's better than replacement level.
Rowdy Tellez isn't part of the problem nor is he part of the solution.
Do a fishbone analysis on the 2024 Pittsburgh Pirates...
The root cause will point to Suwinski, Hayes, Davis, Bae, Edward De La Olivares.
Especially considering when you were counting on ~6 Wins from Jack & Key.
If there's an over 30 veteran who had a solid season a year or two ago but has been at or below replacement level since, you can bet that BC will be handing him a $3 - $5 million, one year contract!
I guess you can get some solace at looking at how objectively worse KC was last year.
If I'm Ben and I have the roster he has, I'm licking my chops. If I'm Williams & Nutting and he f*cks this up, he's out the door after '25.
Although a year behind Huntington in the rebuild, I'd probably rather have this roster than the one NH had going into '13.
Sometimes I wonder what Huntington would do with this roster.
Should be out the door now. Bring in folks with the competitive juices to push.
My optimism lies in the fact that Huntington never really showed the capacity to pull off an offseason like he did between '12 and '13 prior to or after that fateful winter.
Sometimes the pieces just fall together.
In comparison to the Pirates, KC has Bobby Witt and the Chicago White Sox going for them. That's about it.
They're 12-1 against the White Sox and exactly .500 against Major League Baseball teams.
Great point. National writers should be pointing this out. This year beating up on the White Sox is a sure path to contention if you play them 13 times.
Because I love weird baseball stats...
-the 2024 Royals have outscored their non-White Sox opponents by 52 runs over 134 games and the White Sox by 43 runs over 13 games.
-the 3rd place Minnesota Twins, also, are 12-1 against the White Sox and a game *below* .500 against Major League Baseball teams.
-the 4th place Tigers are 9-1 against the White Sox and four games below .500 against Major League Baseball teams.
The level of futility here is truly remarkable.
It is incredible that the Chi Six have only won 33 games.
If Cherington pulls a rabbit out of his hat like NH did in that particular off-season, the Pirates will run away with the Central.
I don't think he needs to have a historical off-season like that.
Actually, they're two games over against everybody but CWS, which is a lot better than six under.
Anyway, you can play that game with any team. Take away the Marlins and CWS, and the Pirates are 16 games under .500.
Every division has a last-place team. If you replace CWS with a merely crappy team, like the Pirates, on average you'd be replacing the 12-1 with something like 7-6 or 8-5. KC is legitimately maybe 8-9 games over .500, which is far above Cherington territory.
"Every division has a last-place team"
True, but not every division has a team worse than your average AAA team.
So Friday we get to see what an actual rebuild looks like.
Idk man, that’s a bit harsh. Moore botched their rebuild pretty badly. His drafting/development was pretty poor and was panned by the Athletic, and he held onto numerous guys like Whit Merrifield, basically receiving nothing. Their rebuild is basically BWJ, an aging but still very good Salvy, a few complimentary pieces and then spending some actual money on real ball players this past off season.
Not only that their farm system is in really rough shape. I could easily see this being a one year blip where everything comes together around Witt and then goes south for a few years.
Can we please see Yorke to finish the season. The dude does nothing but hammer the ball, let's see if it plays in the bigs
Nice to see Nick Yorke second in the Exit Velocity Top 5 in the system with a 107.9 mph single. Biggest hit though was his 104 mph 2 run HR of 424' to dead center. Since coming to the Pirates at the trade deadline he is carrying a .986 OPS in 136 AB with 17 doubles, 2 HR, and 25 RBI. Sees the ball well and makes positive contact indicated by the 14 BB/26 K. Based on his 155 PA, that would work out to be rates of 9.0% BB/16.8% K.
Following Yorke's HR to dead center, CF Jack Suwinski hit a 401', 103.5 mph HR to LC for his second RBI of the night. He and SS Liover Peguero had RBI's in the 3rd, and that was pretty much all the runs the Pirates needed with the Quality Start from Thomas Harrington.
Dominic Perachi with a good start to finish his season at AA.