Weekly Mailbag: Rotation competition, Greensboro as affiliate, who steps up in bullpen?

Another weekly mailbag answers all your questions.

Lee Young: Who wins the 4th and 5th spots among Roansy, Ortiz, Priester, Falter, Wolf, Fleming, Opener (like we did end of last year)? If I left any suspects out, feel free to add them.

I know they said Fleming would get a chance to start, but I think he begins the year in the bullpen as the long-man.

Bailey Falter and Roansy Contreras will get the longest looks since they don’t have any remaining options.

If I had to pick someone right now (with a disclaimer that Ortiz pitches an hour after this will post), I’d go with Contreras and Priester to fill out the rotation. Ortiz and Wolf get sent to Indianapolis, but Falter doesn’t make it.

Now the Pirates seem to be high on Falter, so you could probably flip him and Fleming but right now I’d choose the latter.

The opener option is interesting, and you could almost see a scenario where they go back to that, especially if Falter wins a spot. Here and there a bullpen style game isn’t the worst of things, but entering a season with that worked into the rotation can’t be the best way to go about things.

Gary Morgan (@garymo2007): Do you feel Greensboro can can continue being a long term affiliate? It feels like a near constant caveat everyone has to place on a prospect that the numbers might not be real?

When I was on the ‘412 Double Play’ podcast, I mentioned that I don’t like the idea of putting ‘Greensboro’ and ‘breakout players’ in the same sentence, especially when it comes to hitters.

It’s been too easy to get burned by the results put up by some hitters at that ballpark.

In an ideal scenario the Pirates find a new affiliate for their High-A team, whenever that is possible, but unless they get out of the South Atlantic League altogether, most ballparks lean ‘hitter friendly’ anyways.

I think the best thing to do is just rework how we evaluate players at that level. If we can do that, it’d make it easier to forecast which prospects may be ‘real’ and who might struggle in Double-A.

It is worrisome that some of the hitters could be changing their approach at the plate, selling out for more power, to maximize their numbers in Greensboro but that’s ultimately up to the Pirates to step in and put a stop to it.

Pillsbury Joeboy (@jpbucco): If Morea is out long-term, who does that open the door for on the 26 man?

If we are talking strickly from the Non-Roster players, I think Hunter Stratton has a leg up on everyone right now. I talked about Stratton a bit before the games started and in my recent ‘observations’ article.

I thought he was a ‘sleeper’ of sorts only because he wasn’t on the 40-man roster. I realized that it was an uphill battle and it was more likely he’d start in Indianapolis, but could be one of the first call ups when a player is needed.

It’s too early to speculate on Moreta, but if he were to miss enough time to be moved to the 60-IL and moved off the 40-man, Stratton would be my choice right now.