OnlyBucs

Dog, it sounds like your definition of "trying" just means fielding a team. They needed to upgrade a rotation that lost Burnett and Happ and also had the underwhelming Morton and Locke. Keeping Locke and adding Vogelsong snd Nicasio hardly demonstrates they were trying to improve the pitching. They needed to upgrade at 1B. Adding Jaso to convert from catching with no power hardly demonstrates trying to improve 1B. The moves didn't work? Of course they didn't. How could they? By your standard, they could have replaced players with mannequins and you'd still insist they were trying because they bought the mannequins.

12222E3535282F0C203232410 wrote: So the question is, are the Pirates better with:



OF: Polanco, Marte, Bell,

1B: Goldschmidt (or comparable)

And some type of pitching lose (Cole or Glasnow/Williams, etc)



-OR-

OF: Marte, Cutch, Polanco

1B; Bell

And we keep all of our pitching




or move Cutch, keep Bell in OF and bring up Osuna

a lot of people aren't on Osuna and say Bell has more power...that, though, is not evident in the careers thus far



Understand that Bell got $5 million to sign...that is probably the reason for him getting more of a push...

I must be missing something. Can someone explain why AZ would trade a very productive Goldschmidt who they have for 3 more years for a total of about 34.5 mil for Cutch coming of a disturbingly bad year with 2 years of control for a total of 28.7 mil? Is Dave Littlefield now running the show in AZ?

5A777A6B6C7D6A2A29180 wrote: I must be missing something. Can someone explain why AZ would trade a very productive Goldschmidt who they have for 3 more years for a total of about 34.5 mil for Cutch coming of a disturbingly bad year with 2 years of control for a total of 28.7 mil? Is Dave Littlefield now running the show in AZ?


Bob, I'm missing it too, so you're not alone.

The Pirates are 'trying' to be competitive on the cheap. This year they failed badly. The relevant dollar figures can be found here: http://onlybucs.net/board/cgi-bin/onlyb ... 1472830377



With the 9th highest operating income in MLB and the 25th highest payroll the Pirates' desire for "financial flexibility" superceded their desire to win a championship. The fact that they made some serious errors in evaluating personnel can be understood as part of the vicissitudes of baseball, but their plan to rebuild a starting rotation that had just lost 3 of their 5 starters from a 98 win season with reclamation projects and bargain basement long shots is the most damning thing about the the lack of priority this organization places on winning a championship.

The team on the field is capable of being an 85+ win team except for the rotation.  The rotation was pitiful this spring, as was the majority of the bullpen. 



The players are just a bunch of demoralized zombies now.  Waiting for the offseason.



Players packed it in weeks ago. Cutch has been playing like a fool sine April.  The FO had a terrible offseason, followed up by an embarrassment of a trade deadline.



The season has been an epic failure.  The Pirates are losers. 

7551454D48240 wrote: The Pirates are 'trying' to be competitive on the cheap. This year they failed badly. The relevant dollar figures can be found here: http://onlybucs.net/board/cgi-bin/onlyb ... 1472830377



With the 9th highest operating income in MLB and the 25th highest payroll the Pirates' desire for "financial flexibility" superceded their desire to win a championship. The fact that they made some serious errors in evaluating personnel can be understood as part of the vicissitudes of baseball, but their plan to rebuild a starting rotation that had just lost 3 of their 5 starters from a 98 win season with reclamation projects and bargain basement long shots is the most damning thing about the the lack of priority this organization places on winning a championship.
I agree but I don't even think they made serious errors in player evaluation. They kept a proven failure in Locke in the rotation and added has-been Vogelsong and never-was Nicasio to the staff. They needed a 1st baseman and added a catcher with no power (Jaso) to fill the void. There's no way the FO expected substantially more than these projects were able to provide. Rather, it looked like the FO was saying that this was the best they could do with what they were willing to spend and then they hoped for a miracle that these subpar players would do more than anyone had a right to expect. To their credit, they acquired Freese and Joyce but these were bench players not requiring a lot of salary. It's a different story when trying to obtain starting pitchers or a first baseman as they don't come cheap. But I really don't think they erred in evaluating what these players would do. They simply were not going to spend for better players.

624F42535445521211200 wrote: The Pirates are 'trying' to be competitive on the cheap. This year they failed badly. The relevant dollar figures can be found here: http://onlybucs.net/board/cgi-bin/onlyb ... 1472830377



With the 9th highest operating income in MLB and the 25th highest payroll the Pirates' desire for "financial flexibility" superceded their desire to win a championship. The fact that they made some serious errors in evaluating personnel can be understood as part of the vicissitudes of baseball, but their plan to rebuild a starting rotation that had just lost 3 of their 5 starters from a 98 win season with reclamation projects and bargain basement long shots is the most damning thing about the the lack of priority this organization places on winning a championship.
I agree but I don't even think they made serious errors in player evaluation. They kept a proven failure in Locke in the rotation and added has-been Vogelsong and never-was Nicasio to the staff. They needed a 1st baseman and added a catcher with no power (Jaso) to fill the void. There's no way the FO expected substantially more than these projects were able to provide. Rather, it looked like the FO was saying that this was the best they could do with what they were willing to spend and then they hoped for a miracle that these subpar players would do more than anyone had a right to expect. To their credit, they acquired Freese and Joyce but these were bench players not requiring a lot of salary. It's a different story when trying to obtain starting pitchers or a first baseman as they don't come cheap. But I really don't think they erred in evaluating what these players would do. They simply were not going to spend for better players. 




I'm not sure about your conclusion about evaluation. I think they expected more from Niese (in part just because supposedly the Bucs defense would be better than Mets). I think they expected Jaso to do better because PNC would be a good park for a left handed hitter. He also posted an OPS of 767 in Oakland in 2014 so they probably expected at least that much from him this season. They got totally lucky with S-Rod and Joyce.



I agree that they couldn't have expected much from Vogelsong but they may have thought Nicasio was going to develop under the Searage magic.



Regardless of why though the Bucs need to approach this off season differently if they expect the team to improve. If they only spend 100 million to 105 on payroll next year the team won't have much of a chance at all and the players will know it too.

They took a chance on the Rotation. It was a weird strategy. Did they really think Niese was going to be that bad. He wasn't worse or much worse than Morton coming in. The same with Vogelsong. I wonder what would have happened if Vogelsong was in the rotation the whole time? Vogelsong wasn't worse than Morton either. Burnett wasn't replaced by either guy. Nicasio failed as a starter but had a nice season before to think he could do it. Happ was replaced by Nova. Nova has done just as well as Happ since they had the same time period. Then the call up of Taillon to complete the rotation. That was the plan. (I can't explain Locke over Vogelsong for most of the season)



What failed was Liriano and Cole, to an extent. Liriano was awful. Just awful. He went from the staff ace to not belonging in the majors. Cole didn't repeat or improve, kind of rare for a guy of his caliber.



They just need one guy to show up in Niese, Vogelsong (not really given a chance) and Nicasio. None did. Liriano failed. Cole was average or just a little above. Taillon couldn't save the whole rotation.



I would have loved to sign a veteran to a nice deal. Happ doing so well for the Blue Jays makes everything look worse too. Did people really expect him to be a Cy Young candidate?



I hope they learned their lesson. They need to replace Liriano still as he was part of the 2017 plan. Cole, Liriano replacement, Taillon, two young guys could be a solid rotation. Then you have the Glasnow call up at mid-season.

This thread has strayed from Josh Bell and a real concern about him going forward. His defense is terrible. Although a short season, his UZR/150 this year is somehow even worse than that put up by Alvarez last season. He hits better, thankfully, but his fielding has been so atrocious that his bWAR is -.1. fWAR is better but only .2. He's young, but he's starting to look like a DH. That may be why they are giving him some time in RF. They may have to consider trading him to get equivalent talent pitching.