2018 Pittsburgh Pirates In-Season Thread

[Dickie Dunn]

I have zero problem with what Musgrove did. I'd hope every pitcher on that staff would have done the same thing. It's a free pass, but it's a relatively harmless situation in a 5-0 game. The wild pitch, Freese error, terrible pitching by Santana that followed is what lost them the game, not a dude getting plunked after their pitcher hit Harrison and threw above Meadows' head. I mean ****, the D'Backs beaned SRod (unfortunately not hard enough to end his career) to lead off the 9th inning while sporting a 4 run lead. Deadspin, which as a whole seems to hate sports most of the time, likes to get on their holier than thou soap box about the "unwritten rules" of baseball. **** that **** that's how sports work.

The bigger issue now (are there any big issues at this point? this team sucks and is going nowhere) is that Harrison is day-to-day along with Cervelli, which means the Pirates will start SRod at 2B and go with a three man bench because putting someone on the DL for 10 days means Nutting would have to pay 26 MLB salaries instead of 25.

[shafnutz05]

Deadspin, which as a whole seems to hate sports most of the time, likes to get on their holier than thou soap box about the "unwritten rules" of baseball. **** that **** that's how sports work.

This is correct. Deadspin seems to delight in tearing down the structure and mores of the sports they "follow". It's tiresome. Blaming a lead-off runner for giving up a 5-0 deficit? K.

[willeyeam]

i mean there was a whole shtstorm about not hitting anyone a week or two ago so it's whatever. damned if you do damned if you don't.. that surely wasn't the reason for blowing that

[count2infinity]

Buccos gunna buc...

[willeyeam]

What the f

[dodint]

Any stretches against the White Sox coming up?

[Dickie Dunn]

This is for the best. Being completely out of it by the trade deadline removes all potential for GMNH pretending to compete and doing something stupid, like not trading Mercer or Cervelli or Dickerson or Harrison or Kang, not calling up young guys and playing them, etc.

[MrKennethTKangaroo]

This is for the best. Being completely out of it by the trade deadline removes all potential for GMNH pretending to compete and doing something stupid, like not trading Mercer or Cervelli or Dickerson or Harrison or Kang, not calling up young guys and playing them, etc.

You say this as if gmnh has actually pretended to compete in the past two trade deadlines (when they had a punchers chance of making the playoffs) let alone the years they were actually contenders. This team is chronically vaginal and/or cheap and/or afraid at the trade deadline. If this team was still lingering a few games over 500, there is no way GMNH would trade for anything worthwhile at the deadline. He would say something along the lines of “well we aren’t that good so its not worth trading assets for a team that isnt that good” and then the team would flame out and gmnh would play the i told you so card.

Ziese, who is generally an idiot, was right last night when he went on and on about how the pirates need their best 25 guys on the roster and the best 8 in the lineup every day. Kingham shouldn’t be in Indy and there shouldn’t be a 4 man rotation in the outfield. And SRod shoulnd’t be on the team.

And would it kill gmnh to at least try to find someone off of effing waivers to shore up the bullpen

[MrKennethTKangaroo]

snider polanaco has 3 home runs in his last 180 plate appearances. He also has 40 strikeouts and 6 GDP in those 180 plate appearances. Nice.

[Morkle]

And would it kill gmnh to at least try to find someone off of effing waivers to shore up the bullpen

Absolutely. His/Hurdle's response to your suggestion is to "stop playing fantasy baseball."

[Dickie Dunn]

This is for the best. Being completely out of it by the trade deadline removes all potential for GMNH pretending to compete and doing something stupid, like not trading Mercer or Cervelli or Dickerson or Harrison or Kang, not calling up young guys and playing them, etc.

You say this as if gmnh has actually pretended to compete in the past two trade deadlines (when they had a punchers chance of making the playoffs) let alone the years they were actually contenders. This team is chronically vaginal and/or cheap and/or afraid at the trade deadline. If this team was still lingering a few games over 500, there is no way GMNH would trade for anything worthwhile at the deadline. He would say something along the lines of “well we aren’t that good so its not worth trading assets for a team that isnt that good” and then the team would flame out and gmnh would play the i told you so card.

Ziese, who is generally an idiot, was right last night when he went on and on about how the pirates need their best 25 guys on the roster and the best 8 in the lineup every day. Kingham shouldn’t be in Indy and there shouldn’t be a 4 man rotation in the outfield. And SRod shoulnd’t be on the team.

And would it kill gmnh to at least try to find someone off of effing waivers to shore up the bullpen

Kenny you ungrateful marsupial. GMNH went out and acquired SRod on August 5th of last year. WHAT MORE COULD YOU POSSIBLY WANT!?!

"Pretending to compete" in this context is the continued refusal to full on tank/play young guys. It's not like attendance can actually get any worse, so maybe they'll embrace it as a cost savings measure this year. This teams window closed as soon as management refused to spend money after the 2015 season. The sooner they decide to rebuild the better. I wanted Cutch gone before he turned into a Kyle Crick/Bryan Reynolds shaped pumpkin. I wasn't in favor of the Dickerson trade, but if they decide to trade him they should be able to get a net positive return. This team never gave Alen Hanson a fair shot (instead playing junk like Phil Gosselin), and he's batting 318/352/667/1019 with more HRs than Josh Bell in a "last man off the bench" role in SF. **** like this continues to happen on a daily basis:

The #Pirates have played three players at shortstop this season:

Jordy Mercer 87 wRC+
Max Moroff 79 wRC+
Sean Rodriguez 65 wRC+

The Pirates have two Top 15 prospects in Triple-A that can play shortstop. Both are 24 years old. Could it hurt?

Whatever. TLDR: Trade everyone. Call up young guys Put **** like Glasnow in the rotation. Start Moran against every LHP until he figures out how to hit them. See what you've got for the future because the present isn't going to accomplish anything.

[shafnutz05]

Related to the conversation of Chris Davis having the worst season ever possibly...can anyone tell me which Pirate position player had the lowest season WAR of any Pirate in history? Here's a clue: It was in the last 25 years

No cheating.

[willeyeam]

interesting, they would have had to have a decent amount of playing time to make that bad of an impact. hmm

[willeyeam]

rod barajas

[count2infinity]

For a single season or through their tenure as a pirate?

I'll guess Lyle Overbay.

[willeyeam]

oh man looked it up i can't believe he was that bad in only 165 ABs

[shafnutz05]

The correct answer is....

Jose Guillen in 1997 (-3.1 WAR)

https://www.bucsdugout.com/2017/1/7/142 ... 997-season

[count2infinity]

Hmm... insteresting. Who was the dude just before Freddy Sanchez? He played in the mid 2000's. I remember him making an all star game and then being really bad for a while.

[shafnutz05]

Hmm... insteresting. Who was the dude just before Freddy Sanchez? He played in the mid 2000's. I remember him making an all star game and then being really bad for a while.

You're not thinking of Jack Wilson are you? He wasn't up to his 2004 standards but he wasn't that bad I thought.

[count2infinity]

No, not WIlson. It was a foreign dude. Let me look it up. It's gonna bug me if I don't.

[count2infinity]

Jose Castillo was who I was thinking of. No terrible seasons, but no real stellar ones either.

[willeyeam]

my research showed Aki Iwamura as being the lowest WAR.. where'd you find your answer?

[willeyeam]

ahh Fangraphs I see

[shafnutz05]

my research showed Aki Iwamura as being the lowest WAR.. where'd you find your answer?

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/chris-d ... ason-ever/

[willeyeam]

https://twitter.com/ESPNStatsInfo/statu ... 97089?s=19