OnlyBucs

And when will this management team or somebody in this organization step up and try and change something or do something different in attempt to put some kind of end to this current death spiral this team has been on in the last 5 weeks. I mean are they just going to keep running the same garbage out there night after night and expect things to get better because it’s not going to happen. So since changing both the GM and Manager are not an option for this team since both the owner and Coonelly gave them 4 year extensions here are a few options.



1. Gut this team and start trading guys and have some balls for a change if your Huntington and admit you are rebuilding. I’m talking about JHay, Jordy,Freese, Cervelli and I’d shop Polanco at this point and see what I can get for these guys. You aren’t winning with these players now and even if you keep all of them around for the foreseeable future you aren’t going to win with them down the road. So start trading guys and see what you can bring back in return and in the process save some money which Bob Nutting gets giddy the most about.



2. DFA guys that have no business being on this team and start calling guys up and change things up on this roster. Rodriguez needs to go period. Enough is enough already. Please DFA him and his 5 million dollar a season salary. He isn’t important to this clubhouse and keeping him around isn’t going to translate into this team all of a sudden winning games cause Of his presence in the clubhouse no matter how many times Huntington says so. DFA him and call up Kang and put him in the lineup somewhere and maybe even call guts like Newman or Kramer up or Bostick and trade guys like Jordy and Harrison and plug these guys in their place or some kind of combo of these players. And start playing Austin Neadows everyday in the lineup and run him into the ground to see what you have  until seasons end.



3. My final thing on my short list is  Shake things up in the rotation some. Now their aren’t many options you can do at this point but here are two you can do and have nothing to lose in doing so since you’re not going anywhere and the season is over. Call Kingham back up and pitch him in the rotation every 5th day starting now until seasons end. By doing this I DFA or try and trade Ivan Nova and his contract and get whatever I can for him. Next, put Tyler Glasnow in the rotation these final 85 games or so and give him 10-15 starts between now and seasons end. It’s time to take the training wheels off Glasnow and see what he has once and for all as a starter. He has shown improvement this season and an ability to pitch in high leverage situations and get guys out. I don’t know who you take out of the rotation in his place but I do know Glasnow should be pitching in the rotation every 5th day it’s time for that to happen.



So there you have it. These aren’t changes that are going to set the world on fire for this Pirates team but at least it’s something  and a few good suggestions if anything. I mean how long or how many more games do they have to keep losing here before they finally do some kind of major shakeup and try something different?? They are 10-23 in their last 33 games which is pathetic, they went from 9 games over .500 at 26-17 to 4 games under .500 at 36-40 in a 5 week span and have won 10 games in 5 weeks which is very hard to do. They are 9 games out of 1st place  6 games out of a wildcard spot and won’t make up neither of those deficits. So if you’re or going to not fire upper management or coaching staff members this is what you have to do to try and fix things and at least show the great Pirates fans in this town that you actually do give a damn and are committed to something. Because right now this management team and organization overall is committed to nothing right now besides lying and alienating the fan base. The attendance is god awful right now even on the weekend games and will only get worse the more this death spiral continues into the summer. So I don’t expect any of this to actually happen at all but I do know that you cannot lose this many games in a 5 week stretch and sink further and further near last place in this division and stay status quo and make no changes and not admit there are problems on thus team. Changes need made and moves need done. Do it now before things totally get out of control and it’s too late.

1)  They can't trade polanco for anything (valuable) now.   



2) SRod will be released soon, they got past his bobblehead day.  Hurdle starting him and playing him the full 9 innings (rare) is the nail in the coffin that this was done BECAUSE OF MARKETING.   Fans were joking that they wouldn't release SRod until the 23rd because of the bobblehead day, but it turned out to be true.  A sad, sad day for the org.



3) Glasnow is closer to belonging in AAA than he is in any ML starting rotation.  He's actually showing signs that his wildness and lack of secondary pitches can play in the bullpen.    It's a very bad idea to put him in the rotation.  He will get shelled worse than anything we're currently running out there. (4-4.50 ERA) and it's about as close to a 100% guarantee as could exist in baseball.    The "training wheels" have been off him over and over and over again.  He's not a starter. He's already pitched in the rotation every 5th day. He's done it for 2 long stretches and failed worse than any pitcher I've ever seen over those stretches



The starting pitcher with the best ERA and FIP right now is actually sitting in Indy, Nick Kingham.    The rotation is still lower-middle of the road in the NL.  It's not any worse than when the Pirates were winning.   The bullpen has pretty much held it together recently.



The elephant in the room is that this offense is an embarrassment to the game over the past 30 games, we're last in almost every meaningfully predictive offensive category in the NL.   dead last.  15th.  or in some cases 14th.   Offense.  is. terrible.   



We are basically making more errors, than we are extra base hits.   Position player futility at it's finest! 

It's possible that the Pirates are in no hurry to switch Kingham out with Williams or Kuhl because he's still on the cusp of being super two eligible with his service time. 



They've demonstrated that Meadows is staying and that means he's guaranteed to get a 4th arbitration year.    Meadows coming up and literally leading this baseball team offensively since Mid-May, is going to end up costing the team about 10 million over the next 6 years through additional arbitration (magnified 3 times).  If Kingham gets that 4th year too we would have 2 super two players on the same arb schedule.  Bob would have an additional 15-18 million spread out over 6 years all for a couple months of additional ML time by Meadows and Kingham on a lousy baseball team.   



Kingham also isn't exactly a guarantee to be better than Williams or Kuhl either, especially over 2-3 starts in question until we get to the trade deadline (and Nova can be moved).

I think there will be minor cosmetic changes. TBMTIB has repeatedly demonstrated that winning is not a priority. So I don't see wholesale changes being made in an attempt to win either now or in the future. Their primary priority is to keep spending low and the secondary priority is spin control to try to keep fans interested in a losing team by pretending they're oh so close to turning it around and being competitive with the big boys. Just wait 'til next year! Again.



So I expect minor changes. S-Rod will likely be released as there just can't be a market for him. They'll have to eat that salary (about half of what's left on his 5.75 mil this year) but they have to pay it anyway and his replacement (Frazier or Moroff or Newman or Kramer) will make the minimum. So all they're really losing is that additional minimum salary for his replacement for half a season. Freese has some value and an interested team wouldn't hesitate to pay the rest of his 4.2 million this year. And his replacement is another minimum salary guy, which would recoup most of the money they eat on releasing S-Rod. They'd move Nova if they could and bring up Kingham. But otherwise I don't see any changes in pitching. This is the young, inexpensive pitching staff Nutting dreamt of with all but 2 pitchers (Nova and Vazquez) at or barely over the minimum. And as much as they struggle, NH will spin that this is a bridge/transition/competitive/anything but a rebuild and fans will be excited to see these young pitchers develop into stars next year. Or the year after that. Two years tops. Ok, maybe three. This is how they operate. It's fun to think of what changes might make a significant impact. But the reality is they don't operate that way.   



EDIT: Oops, I forgot about Kang. He would be a replacement for either Freese or S-Rod. That would be the biggest move they would make.  

3E373F2E205A0 wrote: It's possible that the Pirates are in no hurry to switch Kingham out with Williams or Kuhl because he's still on the cusp of being super two eligible with his service time. 



They've demonstrated that Meadows is staying and that means he's guaranteed to get a 4th arbitration year.    Meadows coming up and literally leading this baseball team offensively since Mid-May, is going to end up costing the team about 10 million over the next 6 years through additional arbitration (magnified 3 times).  If Kingham gets that 4th year too we would have 2 super two players on the same arb schedule.  Bob would have an additional 15-18 million spread out over 6 years all for a couple months of additional ML time by Meadows and Kingham on a lousy baseball team.   



Kingham also isn't exactly a guarantee to be better than Williams or Kuhl either, especially over 2-3 starts in question until we get to the trade deadline (and Nova can be moved).


I'm not as optimistic as some about Kingham. When he made his near perfect debut, he was leaving so many pitches over the plate I couldn't understand why the Cardinals weren't trying to tee off on him. And in a few of his subsequent starts, those same pitches were getting hammered. I see the same thing with Musgrove. Like Kingham, he throws strikes and gets ahead of hitters. Or hitters tee off on those strikes. It's a very risky way of pitching. It's great when those hittable strikes are taken or fouled off or hit right at someone. But in 2 of his last 3 starts, he's looked more like the Musgrove who had a 6.12 ERA as a starter last year and gave up 95 hits in 78 innings. I think Kingham and Musgrove are similar. But they might as well find out in this lost season. I'm sure they could deal Nova and open a spot for Kingham. Seems like the logical thing to do. But I have my doubts as to how Kingham will do on a regular basis.

I don’t think they will do anything any time soon. I don’t think Rodriguez will be released until maybe the All Star Break which is still 3 or 4 weeks too late in my opinion. He should be DFA today later this morning when he is hitting .148 overall and something like .090 against right handed pitching. This management team is a combination of ignorant, oblivious to the obvious, in denial, and incompetent all in the same breath. They will continue to think what they are doing is right in this current  death spiral they are in now of 10-23 in the last 33 games and do nothing. Can’t wait to hear what moronic and  insulting comment Huntington will make today on his radio show in regards to the current state of the team. How many more fans can you alienate and piss off today Neal??

3E373F2E205A0 wrote: 1)  They can't trade polanco for anything (valuable) now.   



2) SRod will be released soon, they got past his bobblehead day.  Hurdle starting him and playing him the full 9 innings (rare) is the nail in the coffin that this was done BECAUSE OF MARKETING.   Fans were joking that they wouldn't release SRod until the 23rd because of the bobblehead day, but it turned out to be true.  A sad, sad day for the org.



3) Glasnow is closer to belonging in AAA than he is in any ML starting rotation.  He's actually showing signs that his wildness and lack of secondary pitches can play in the bullpen.    It's a very bad idea to put him in the rotation.  He will get shelled worse than anything we're currently running out there. (4-4.50 ERA) and it's about as close to a 100% guarantee as could exist in baseball.    The "training wheels" have been off him over and over and over again.  He's not a starter.   He's already pitched in the rotation every 5th day.  He's done it for 2 long stretches and failed worse than any pitcher I've ever seen over those stretches



The starting pitcher with the best ERA and FIP right now is actually sitting in Indy, Nick Kingham.    The rotation is still lower-middle of the road in the NL.  It's not any worse than when the Pirates were winning.   The bullpen has pretty much held it together recently.



The elephant in the room is that this offense is an embarrassment to the game over the past 30 games, we're last in almost every meaningfully predictive offensive category in the NL.   dead last.  15th.  or in some cases 14th.   Offense.  is. terrible.   



We are basically making more errors, than we are extra base hits.   Position player futility at it's finest!  I still want to give Glasnow one more chance to pitch as a starter and see what he can do. Keeping him as a 6th or 7th inning guy at this point now in the season when you are out of it is a waste of time. I still think he has good enough stuff when he has his pitches going to be an effective starter at some point. The Pirates don’t have many other options right now at this point that had the kind of pedigree that Glasnow had coming up through the Minor League’s. Give him one more chance to start somewhere between 10-15 games to close out the year and if he still falls on his face and can’t figure it out then I have no problem moving on and doing whatever they want with him. At this point though you gotta give him another run at starting and see what happens. The season is pretty much over and you have nothing to lose at this point in doing so so do it.

This is classic. Since May 31, our pal S-Rod has:



* 1 hit (1 for 23 for .043)

* 5 errors

* 11 strikeouts



I think he needs to start today at SS to give Mercer a rest. Jordy has played 3 days in a row and must be exhausted.

Yea those numbers say it all CB. Like if they aren’t going to seriously release Rodriguez for Kang these next few days after seeing how terrible he has been recently not just at the plate but in the field as well then when are they gonna release him?? This whole thing with Sean Rod is bizarre and mind boggling. No other team in baseball would be doing this with a guy playing this bad.

I don't expect them to do any trading until the end of July. They certainly could trade someone today if they wanted to - it's just that they would be the ones desperate for the trade to go through. You don't want to be the desperate one in any trade. At the end of July there is at least the possibility some team will think Nova would be that final piece to get them that wild card spot.