2019 Pittsburgh Pirates Season Thread

Postby **willeyeam** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:27 pm

Taillon is done. for. the. year.
more proof that he is the most disappointing draft pick of the GMNH era

easy now

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_P ... raft_picks

Postby **willeyeam** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:31 pm

on a different tangent, how can you botch so many top 10 picks? it's unreal

Hermansen
Benson
JJ Davis
Bobby Bradley
Van Benschoten
Bullington
Maholm
Lincoln
Moskos
Sanchez
Taillon - not totally botched yet

WOOF

Postby **Morkle** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:32 pm

lol Van Benschoten.

Postby **willeyeam** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:40 pm

that list has a career WAR of 24.7 - Maholm and Benson were each around 12 and Taillon has 7.9.. you can do the math on the rest. Manny Machado is at 36 so far

Postby **MrKennethTKangaroo** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:47 pm

At least pedro led the league in home runs and aquitted himself well in the NLDS

Taillon has been good for the most part but never dominant for a meaningful period of time and hurt

Postby **Morkle** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:50 pm

Non Pirates related, but Cole threw 101mph his last start after 100 pitches, IIRC. Dude has a monster arm, and turdy personality.

Postby **Dickie Dunn** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 1:51 pm

I enjoyed this quick article. Automate the strike zone.

https://www.bucsdugout.com/2019/7/8/206 ... tes-season

Postby **LITT** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 2:13 pm

lol Van Benschoten.

Postby **Troy Loney** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 2:55 pm

Saw some dunce from the fan is at the all star game and threaded a bunch of clips of him asking AL all stars about Josh Bell. Just a bunch of cliches, I mean, not sure what you''d expect. But then he asks a follow up question to Gerrit Cole about what he thinks about this ~hot pirates' offense. Cole is just like "the **** would I know/care".

Postby **Morkle** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 3:30 pm

Par from the course from the Fan. I'm sure tomorrow the rubes on the morning show will use it as a discussion point to how much of a clown Cole is.

Postby **DigitalGypsy66** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 3:40 pm

There was a twitter account - PiratesUmp - that used to live tweet out horrible calls (both ways). Very instructive, but they stopped at the end of last season. Probably a bot, but it was good. I should probably try to figure out to use the Statcast API and program one myself.

Postby **shafnutz05** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 9:37 pm

I liked the old home run derby format (10 outs) much better. It is boring watching a guy swing for four plus minutes.

Postby **meow** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 10:27 pm

That post hasn’t aged well

Postby **willeyeam** » Mon Jul 08, 2019 10:34 pm

This is the best derby ever

Postby **Morkle** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 8:41 am

So I fast forwarded through the first round, minus Josh Bell.

I think I'd like it if it was an hour/hour and a half and they did the semis and finals on TV.

It was exciting at the end though, that's for sure. Vlad JR. is a beast.

Postby **MrKennethTKangaroo** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:21 am

im pretty sure most humans would be gassed after 96 swings of a bat

Postby **Troy Loney** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:32 am

Nothing like a hot streak heading into the ASB to bring out the delusional pirate fan base.

P2 cites injuries as the primary thing that's gone wrong for the Pirates in 2019. No, injuries just simply exposed the depth problem. As most of the Pirate malcontents were pointing out, the pitching depth was bad. And while you don't anticipate a string of injuries to all occur at once, you can't blame injuries when you have no depth. I was an optimist, but I saw the depth issues, but was just hoping for health, but in that case, you can't complain about injuries when the issue is depth.

Of course the Pirates have no interest in extending Corey Dickerson, not sure why Perotto has to out that obvious fact out there.

Josh Bell is not going to sign an extension, and Will Craig is not going net the Pirates any pitching in a trade.

Postby **Morkle** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:46 am

If Josh Bell isn't going to sign an extension, why would you trade Will Craig at all?

Postby **willeyeam** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:47 am

yes and no - if that onslaught of injuries didn't happen I think it's safe to say we'd be looking at a 1st place team right now. It's indisputable that the depth wasn't there, but how many teams could overcome that many injuries? I don't know.. it's not a simple thing to look at.

Postby **Troy Loney** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:52 am

If Josh Bell isn't going to sign an extension, why would you trade Will Craig at all?

Because he's kind of a scrub.

Postby **Morkle** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 9:59 am

But isn't he the only other first baseman in the system?

Postby **robbiestoupe** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 10:13 am

Source of the post Vlad JR. is a beast.

Yes, but methinks he will not age well in baseball terms. I hurt my back watching him swing - it seems he uses mostly upper body/torque and a quick bat. His dad I remember having one of the longest swings, but equally as lethal.

Postby **MrKennethTKangaroo** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 10:19 am

But isn't he the only other first baseman in the system?

bell is under the pirates control until 2023. plenty of time to come up with an internal option or to find something on the open market

Postby **Morkle** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 10:27 am

Ah, I was thrown off as to why he wouldn't sign an extension. Why would you sign an extension this far away from FA, when you have the potential to make mega money, given his trajectory.

Postby **Dickie Dunn** » Tue Jul 09, 2019 10:33 am

Dickie Dunn is Concerned About our Top Prospects:

None of the teams above short season A ball played yesterday, which eliminates all of my regularly featured players. 2018 2nd round pick Braxton Ashcraft started for West Virginia and got lit up, just like every other game he's appeared in since being drafted last year, so that's fun. This year's first round pick Quinn Priester started for the GCL Pirates and had a solid showing. TL's team of destiny, DSL Pirates 2, won 5-3 and are now 26-6 on the season.

Since there's nothing remotely interesting going on and there was a brief discussion about this franchise's terrible track record with first round picks I wanted to take a deeper look at some of the recent (and not so recent) draft years:

2014
Cole Tucker, Connor Joe, Mitch Keller, the dearly departed Trey Supak, and Jordan Lulow were the Pirates first five picks in this draft, which honestly doesn't seem to terrible. Alex McRae (10th) and Montana DuRapau (32nd) have also made appearance for the Buccos, though both are bad. The best player selected by the Pirates in this draft was Paul DeJong, who was taken in the 38th round, decided not to sign, was taken in the 4th round by the Cards the following year and is now an All Star SS with a career line of 261/326/471/797 in 310 games. **** me.

2015
Newman, Hayes, Kramer with the first three picks, which again is pretty not bad. Hughston was the 3rd round pick and was once highly thought of but fizzled out in Bradenton last year and was released this offseason. Tanner Anderson (20th) and John Bormann (24th) have made MLB appearances for the Buccos, with Anderson now in Oakland. Waddell (5th), Brubaker (6th), and Marvel (36th) also came from this draft, as well as Christian Kelley (11th), who the team seems to like as your stereotypical all defense, not bat minor league catcher.

2016
The Will Craig draft. He's probably a dud but there was really no one of high note taken soon after him. Bryan Reynolds was taken 59th overall by SF and HR Derby champ Pete Alonso was taken 64th. Buccos took Nick Lodolo 41st overall and offered him $1.75MM, well above slot. He decided to not sign and was taken 7th overall in this year's draft by the Reds, getting a $5.43MM bonus. Good on him. In general, this draft is a dud. Any recognizable names are just organizational players. Hartlieb (29th) is the only guy from this draft to play in MLB, which seems like a quick turnaround for the Pirates.

2017
Baz (RIP) was taken first, Jennings (2nd) sucks, Mitchell (2nd) has a ton of natural power but K issues and is all bat, Uselton (2nd) has sucked and apparently has some attitude issues, Busby (3rd) either Ks or hits a HR and isn't particularly good in the field. Stafford (5th) is another defense first catcher though his bat is decent. Bolton (6th), Oliva (7th), Wieman (8th), Madris (9th), Manasa (11th), Sharpe (14th), Martin (17th), and Glendinning (21st) have all been mentioned before.

Other than Mitchell the top of this draft has gone bust, but the later rounds provide some kind of potential for something useful, especially Bolton who looks to be the best prospect out of this group.

2018
We all know about Swaggerty, Gunnar Hoglund didn't sign and got lit up at Mississippi this year so **** him, Ashcraft was mentioned earlier and Connor Kaiser (3rd) can't hit. Herman (30th) was the big surprise last year; his average is down this year but his power numbers are up. Swaggerty, Ashcraft, and Herman are the only guys worth looking at from this draft. Everyone else is a complete mess of suck and low minor league levels.

2019
It's too early to tell anything with these guys, but Priester (1st) as been good, Siani (2nd) 241/389/241/630 hasn't been terrible, Triolo (2nd) 220/277/492/768 looks to have some pop, Jase Bowen (11th) 316/409/474/883 (chose the Buccos over his MSU football scholarship) has an impressive slash line, as does Aaron Shackelford (14th) 315/413/556/968.

After looking at all of this, I think our scouting and drafting strategies might suck.