Fifth Avenue Forum

Despite my problems with his dad I've always been in favor of giving Jacob Stallings a shot.

Polanco and Bell sunk this team this year, full stop.

Polanco's downgrade and inability to improve is an anchor.

I think this is now the second year in a row where I've seen this "sunk" a team stuff used as a reason. At some point, it's on management to actually do something. The players are what they are, and I don't expect anything less with the money being used on the field.

C is above average at the moment.

Very above average actually. Everyone else sucks. I'm 100% on board with trading Dickerson. Not because of anything to do with money or roster space, but these 2 months are so far out of the ordinary, I have little doubt he's going to come back to earth. They made a good move, now turn that into even more imo

I'd think Dickerson isn't really due for much regression. He's at about career OPS now - just his power is down and his average is up. His Ks are so far down that it seems he's really made a decision to go for contact over power which is odd since it's what I thought the pirates used to want and had been drafting for but had this year gotten onboard with the launch angle thing

LF: Above-Average (Dickerson)
CF: Above-Average
RF: Below-Average
1B: Below-Average
2B: Below-Average
SS: Below-Average
3B: Average
SP: Average
RP: Average
C: Average

Using BR's Wins Above Average for total position:

LF: 5/30 - significantly above average
CF: 9/30 - above averagish?
RF: 27/30 - diarrhea
1B: 27/30 - also diarrhea
2B: 17/30 - average?
SS: 27/30 - go away Jordy
3B: 20/30 - below average
SP: 9/30 - above average?
RP: 21/30 - below average
C: 1/30 - second coming of Jesus

Using Fangraph's WAR by Position:

LF: Dickerson - 10/26 - above average
CF: Marte - 7/25 - above average
RF: Polanco - 19/21 - should be forced to live in State College
1B: Bell - 22/24 - somehow Ian Desmond and Chris Davis are significantly worse
2B: Harrison - 17/30 - didn't qualify so needed to adjust to 140 PAs; averagish
SS: Mercer - 22/27 - I don't know what he's paid but I know it's too much
3B: Moran - 17/24 - meh
SP: Taillon - 46/89, Nova - 59/89, Williams - 63/89, Kuhl - 80/89 - whole bunch of meh
RP: Vazquez - 39/180, RichRod - 56/180, Santana - 66/180, Crick - 97/180, Brault - 115/180, Glasnow - 119/180, Feliz - 141/180
C: Cervelli - 1st - totally on the juice again

Feliz is terrible but in general the individual WAR for RPs was much higher than I expected while the WAR for the SPs was much lower. Biggest takeaway from any of this time wasting I just did is that Moran is a mixed bag of mediocrity. His BABIP, BB%, and K% are all above average for the position, but his ISO of 141 is 20/24 and is even below average for the middle infield. On top of that, he's bottom of the barrel defensively for the position. I don't know how much use there is long term for a 3B who is bad defensively and provides zero power.

Good stuff.

All I can say about Moran is he's 25 and had 18 HR is 302ab in the PCL last year with a .245 ISO. He may still develop/show power over the next few years. I haven't watched this year to see his D but I heard his arm was good?

He's certainly more accurate than Pedro.

Good stuff Dickey

Wow, I never realized how futile the Pirates pitching has been since forever. I am aware of their inability to acquire/draft/produce first basemen, but starting pitching? Not that the Cy Young is the best barometer...

The 2018 draft was conducted this week. Of the Pirates’ 41 picks, 17 were pitchers joining an organization that has produced the fewest Cy Young Award winners of any team in existence since 1956, the first year baseball gave the thing out; just two (Vernon Law in 1960, Doug Drabek in 1990). I mention this partly because the Dodgers have produced 12 Cy Young winners, and partly because 10 pitchers have, by themselves, won more Cy Youngs than the Pirates, but mostly because, of all the macro- and micro-pitching philosophies in play over the past 60-plus years, few have served the Pirates all that well.

http://www.post-gazette.com/sports/gene ... 1806080143

A buddy of mine had a convo about that. If I remember correctly not counting Bert Blyleven there is not a single Pirates pitcher in the Hall of Fame.

Drunk Ho is up to Indy now

I hope he fails and washes out of the league.

That had to be the most losery loss in recent franchise history, right?

Wtf happened last night

Pirates happened.

Lost 17 of last 23.

Feels more like a 70 win team than anything. Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Pitching costs them at least 10 games that a team would win under normal circumstance.

I think I'm going to hit the over before All-Star break if I haven't hit it already.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Source of the post Just sell off the assets and let's start the process over.

Pittsburgh Pirates in a nutshell

Maybe those players should have waited longer than 3 weeks into the season to complain on instagram that people didn't think they were going to be any good.

*twiddle*

Maybe those players should have waited longer than 3 weeks into the season to complain on instagram that people didn't think they were going to be any good.

It's truly a shame that Austin Meadows will eventually be broken mentally and probably physically by how bad this baseball team and management is.

https://deadspin.com/unwritten-rules-le ... 1826756979

The Diamondbacks were toast. Joe Musgrove was dealing for the Pirates, allowing Arizona just four hits through six as Pittsburgh sat on a 5-0 lead. “We were lying flat,” D-Backs manager Torey Lovullo said. And then the Pirates had to go and put a leadoff batter on. Retaliation, you know. Unwritten rules of baseball and all that.

Braden Shipley hit Josh Harrison in the top of the seventh, the fifth HBP in a game between two teams with a history of beanballs. Rather than wait for a relatively safe moment to retaliate—with two outs, or, like, tomorrow—and rather than retaliate by, uh, winning the game—Joe Musgrove plunked Chris Owings to lead off the bottom half. As long as you know what you’re risking here, Joe.

“That’s how the game is played,” Musgrove said of retaliating. “You’re willing to go out and hit somebody, you’ve got to be willing to deal with might come with that, putting the leadoff runner on base, especially late in the game like that. You don’t want to start a rally.”

I think blaming Musgrove and the bean ball as opposed to the 9 preventable runs that followed is a little seeing the forest for the trees.

Right. They didn't give up the lead then, they again pitched it away later.