OnlyBucs

507460686D010 wrote: Here's the scouting report of the two prospects obtained in the Marte deal from Keith Law's article in The Athletic:



"The Pirates took some risks here, but in terms of future potential, they did well, as both prospects coming back have significant upside. Liover Peguero is a super-athletic 19-year-old who’s already made huge strides developmentally since Arizona signed him, going from someone who was probably headed to the outfield to a very likely long-term shortstop. He’s an aggressive hitter who doesn’t walk or strike out very often, putting the ball in play over 71 percent of the time last year while hitting .326/.382/.485 between two short-season levels in 2019. He makes a lot of hard contact, despite a small hitch that gets his hands a bit low and deep before he brings the bat head forward; this might be part of why he hit the ball on the ground over 50 percent of the time last year. He does have strength, and projects to future power if he can put the ball in the air more. It’s the kind of tool package that could make him a top 5 prospect in the Pirates’ system in a year, depending on what he does at Greensboro, where he’ll play the whole year at age 19.



Brennan Malone was a first-round talent last year who has a good chance to develop into a mid-rotation starter. He’s already at 92-95 mph with a low-80s slider that is his best pitch right now. He has a fast arm and compact arm action with good extension over his front side, although his fastball didn’t miss high school bats the way I expected it to do. He could start in low-A, but unless his stuff changes, he might be better served starting out in extended spring training and then going to short-season instead as he works on fastball command and his changeup. I think the emergence of lefty Blake Walston, who is fast becoming one of Arizona’s top pitching prospects, right before and after the draft made the Diamondbacks more willing to part with Malone."



Sounds like BC got some potential high-end talent back in the deal. It would seem that he's aiming for 2022-2023 for this rebuild to start coming to fruition, so I'd expect to see more talent in this age group to be targeted in future trades. As for not getting Varsho, reportedly the D-backs were not willing to trade him, and at 23 years of age BC may well have considered him not of the age group he's targeting anyway.
Very few teams not run by Neal Huntington are willing to trade top prospects these days. Varsho has already excelled at AA so AZ won't give up a productive prospect so close to being ready for MLB. A lot can happen between age 18/rookie league and the majors. It's a risk to trade for prospects at that very early stage but it's probably the best way to get decent prospects these days because once they become productive at higher levels their organization will refuse to trade them. We can only hope the BC regime is better at developing their prospects through the system than NH was.

Return is a joke by industry standards.  2 19 year olds, outside all top 100 lists.



Just have to hope the insiders are wrong, which they often are.



Nothing else to go by when you grab 19year olds though.   Glad we sent 1.5 million.  I'd like to see 30 million dollars lit on ? on opening day.

This will be a good trade down the road for the Pirates. These things are true:



Marte just had, arguably, his best season. It was a really good time to trade him.



The Pirates were not going to win again in his time here in Pittsburgh.



The two prospects may not be top 100, but that's because top prospects are skewed to older and more established prospects. From all accounts (other than yinzers on message boards), both of these prospects are really high upside type players. These are exactly the type of players the Pirates should be shooting for. It is very possible that both of these kids are top 100 prospects in the next few seasons, if not by the end of next season.

735E53424554430300310 wrote: Here's the scouting report of the two prospects obtained in the Marte deal from Keith Law's article in The Athletic:



"The Pirates took some risks here, but in terms of future potential, they did well, as both prospects coming back have significant upside. Liover Peguero is a super-athletic 19-year-old who’s already made huge strides developmentally since Arizona signed him, going from someone who was probably headed to the outfield to a very likely long-term shortstop. He’s an aggressive hitter who doesn’t walk or strike out very often, putting the ball in play over 71 percent of the time last year while hitting .326/.382/.485 between two short-season levels in 2019. He makes a lot of hard contact, despite a small hitch that gets his hands a bit low and deep before he brings the bat head forward; this might be part of why he hit the ball on the ground over 50 percent of the time last year. He does have strength, and projects to future power if he can put the ball in the air more. It’s the kind of tool package that could make him a top 5 prospect in the Pirates’ system in a year, depending on what he does at Greensboro, where he’ll play the whole year at age 19.



Brennan Malone was a first-round talent last year who has a good chance to develop into a mid-rotation starter. He’s already at 92-95 mph with a low-80s slider that is his best pitch right now. He has a fast arm and compact arm action with good extension over his front side, although his fastball didn’t miss high school bats the way I expected it to do. He could start in low-A, but unless his stuff changes, he might be better served starting out in extended spring training and then going to short-season instead as he works on fastball command and his changeup. I think the emergence of lefty Blake Walston, who is fast becoming one of Arizona’s top pitching prospects, right before and after the draft made the Diamondbacks more willing to part with Malone."



Sounds like BC got some potential high-end talent back in the deal. It would seem that he's aiming for 2022-2023 for this rebuild to start coming to fruition, so I'd expect to see more talent in this age group to be targeted in future trades. As for not getting Varsho, reportedly the D-backs were not willing to trade him, and at 23 years of age BC may well have considered him not of the age group he's targeting anyway.
Very few teams not run by Neal Huntington are willing to trade top prospects these days. Varsho has already excelled at AA so AZ won't give up a productive prospect so close to being ready for MLB. A lot can happen between age 18/rookie league and the majors. It's a risk to trade for prospects at that very early stage but it's probably the best way to get decent prospects these days because once they become productive at higher levels their organization will refuse to trade them. We can only hope the BC regime is better at developing their prospects through the system than NH was. 


Good point Bobster. The two 19 year olds may very well end up in the Top 100 list in a year or two. However I do wish that BC targeted catching and LH starting pitching as our system is barren for those two key positions

What I find somewhat amusing as well as sickening was in this process, we heard the Muts and SD balk at acquiring Marte because of the high cost. BC was asking for Nimmo as part of a package from the Mets who I think is mediocre. I would assume BC was asking for Campusano and a pitcher from SD. Meanwhile, our last GM throws Meadows, Glasnow and a good pitching prospect to Tampa for a declining Archer. Where was this high price hesitation from NH?



Mainer brought up Vazquez. NH screwed the pooch here. He was asking for Lux, not really a big need. We needed a C and a P from them. A good pitching prospect not named May or probably Gray and Ruiz would have sufficed. Then we have not only our catching prospect, but probably our starting catcher after the ASB.

We have zero evidence that BC didn't ask for Varsho. We also have no evidence that AZ was willing to trade him. Add the fact that he is also the only C prospect in their top 30. Add the fact that, as pointed out by someone before, he's 23 and headed to AAA. He's a bit ahead of the lower level prospects BC appears to be building around.



As much as we need a C, we need TOR pitching prospects much more. A serviceable C can be signed for affordable money (a la Chirinos) if/when we need one.

I always temper any enthusiasm by remembering who our owner is....that being said Malone is 19 going on 25, mature kid, big arm, both are rated reasonably high so will be interesting to see how they develop. they will have to draft a good catcher, catchers if they are good sometimes advance quickly so there is hope that one can be had with one of the first 3 picks this summer. I know if someone wanted to knock our socks off Bell would be moved easily considering it is just a matter of time till he is priced out of the Burgh. he needs to be a DH anyway and would be more valuable to an american league team, plus watching him play first can be brutal at times.

4A4D5B535D4A0D01785F55595154165B5755380 wrote: Marte should have been traded three years ago.   For some reason Neil valued Marte much higher than he was worth.  There are two years left on a $24M contract for a 3.0 WAR player that’s been nailed for PEDs and regularly takes plays off. 



The Pirates shed $24M and got two Middlin prospects.  If the Pirates wanted more they needed to pick up a significant part of Marte’s contract.  They can’t send Marte AND $22.5M to the Dback and expect a huge return. 



I’ll say it again - Marte should have been traded instead of Meadows. I wish there was more in return.  But I’m just glad his lazy butt has moved on.


Couldn't agree more. I wasn't a Marte fan. His laziness and low baseball IQ really bothered me. He could've been a much better all-around player had he chosen to apply himself more consistently.



The trade bothers me in that the prospects are so far away from reaching Pittsburgh, if they ever do. The further away a prospect is, the more that can go wrong to derail his career. I was really hoping for player(s) who were major league-ready.

NH's approach was to look for players who are major league ready. That's how you get Moran at third and Gonzalez at wherever. That's also building a 500 team. If you want to improve you have to have higher ceiling talent and the only way you get that is to take players farther from the majors. Only in the rarest situations are GM's willing to trade high-ceiling players ready for majors (and a goof there can get you fired - witness NH). I like the idea that Cherrington is willing to go for it, even as I realize it means two years of watching younger players learn at the ML level (on the other hand, some of them may surprise us).

247264707F65757E736456717B777F7A3875160 wrote: Marte should have been traded three years ago.   For some reason Neil valued Marte much higher than he was worth.  There are two years left on a $24M contract for a 3.0 WAR player that’s been nailed for PEDs and regularly takes plays off. 



The Pirates shed $24M and got two Middlin prospects.  If the Pirates wanted more they needed to pick up a significant part of Marte’s contract.  They can’t send Marte AND $22.5M to the Dback and expect a huge return. 



I’ll say it again - Marte should have been traded instead of Meadows. I wish there was more in return.  But I’m just glad his lazy butt has moved on.


Couldn't agree more.  I wasn't a Marte fan.  His laziness and low baseball IQ really bothered me.  He could've been a much better all-around player had he chosen to apply himself more consistently.



The trade bothers me in that the prospects are so far away from reaching Pittsburgh, if they ever do.  The further away a prospect is, the more that can go wrong to derail his career.  I was really hoping for player(s) who were major league-ready.


I posted this before about having a discussion with a well-known scout at the time about evaluating young baseball talent . I asked him how he did it. His response was they need to be a high-end five-tool player then you hope like hell that they perform. SO Ben better be right since Marte was out biggest chip to play. I guessed a rebuild was coming but I was hoping it would take less time then 3 or 4 years .