OT: Raise the Jolly Roger: New season of plundering begins

metalan2

Registered User
May 30, 2008
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So when can Skenes come up to not burn a year? I know July, but it would be utterly ridiculous to leave him there until then. I don't doubt it'll happen though.
 

Empoleon8771

Registered User
Aug 25, 2015
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Redmond, WA
Skenes is going to be up in like 2 weeks, especially with seeing where his pitch count is being stretched to at this point.

He'll have 1 or 2 more starts where he'll be stretched to like 90 pitches and then he'll come up.
 

ImporterExporter

"You're a boring old man"
Jun 18, 2013
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Skenes actually hittable today, but still only gave up 1 ER over 4.1, 7 K's to just 1 BB.

Nick Gonzales hitting over .400 now. Hit a dinger. Get him up over Triolo please.

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Rossi Rat

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Feb 14, 2016
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Just not nearly good enough offensively.
Too many black holes in this lineup. Like Hayes and Reynolds I guess are our best hitters and they’re pretty good but not great, not even all star level really. Getting what, .260 - .270 and 10-25 or so HR’s from them? Meh.

Then there’s Tellez who just flat out sucks and Davis is probably a bust. This franchise can’t afford to bungle an overall #1 pick this badly. Nor could they afford to bring a bum like Tellez in at a position of need. At least Santana helped keep them afloat last year.
 

sovietsanta87

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Jan 3, 2013
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Too many black holes in this lineup. Like Hayes and Reynolds I guess are our best hitters and they’re pretty good but not great, not even all star level really. Getting what, .260 - .270 and 10-25 or so HR’s from them? Meh.

Then there’s Tellez who just flat out sucks and Davis is probably a bust. This franchise can’t afford to bungle an overall #1 pick this badly. Nor could they afford to bring a bum like Tellez in at a position of need. At least Santana helped keep them afloat last year.
I think Davis’s problem is more mental than physical. But this organization can’t develop a reliable hitter to save their ass. There was an expectation that Reynolds was going to put up borderline mvp numbers when he signed. Also an expectation that Cruz would be a 30/30 player before his injury. And that Hayes would be a reliable bat in the five or six spot. None of that happened. And while Cherington was focused on drafting his 80th high school arm and 29th undersized middle infielder, he completely ignored corner positions with players that have projectable power.
 

ImporterExporter

"You're a boring old man"
Jun 18, 2013
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I think Davis’s problem is more mental than physical. But this organization can’t develop a reliable hitter to save their ass. There was an expectation that Reynolds was going to put up borderline mvp numbers when he signed. Also an expectation that Cruz would be a 30/30 player before his injury. And that Hayes would be a reliable bat in the five or six spot. None of that happened. And while Cherington was focused on drafting his 80th high school arm and 29th undersized middle infielder, he completely ignored corner positions with players that have projectable power.

I absolutely detest the Mitch Jebb type picks in rounds where you should be focused on finding run production.
 

Empoleon8771

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Aug 25, 2015
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Redmond, WA
I think Reynolds and Hayes are both performing how you want them to be performing and how they're paid to be performing. With Reynolds, you want him to be hovering around a 125 OPS+ while playing passable defense. With Hayes, you're want him to be hovering around a 110 OPS+ while playing elite defense. Both guys are generally in that area, so I have a hard time complaining about them.

But I think the team absolutely deserves criticism for the development of Cruz and Davis. With Davis, I think it's a problem of him just being in his own head, so there's a limit on what the Pirates as a team can reasonably do with him. But Cruz looks lost at the plate and has seemingly made no progress from where he was at 3 years ago. He still can't hit lefties, he still can't take walks, he still strikes out a ton and he's not hitting for enough power to make up for that.

I think it's unacceptable this team isn't trying anything to get the offense out of a funk. I'm not even referring to making a trade there, but they have options for adjusting how they're using players to try something new. Three really easy changes I see are:

1. Call up Gonzales and demote Triolo to a bench role.
2. Play Olivares as the everyday LF/RF and demote Suwinski to a bench role.
3. Play Bart as the starting C and Davis as the backup.
4. Play Joe as the everyday 1B and demote Tellez to a bench role.

You don't even need to do all 4 of them, even 2 of them would likely help. But they're just not doing anything.
 
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Rossi Rat

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Feb 14, 2016
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I think Davis’s problem is more mental than physical. But this organization can’t develop a reliable hitter to save their ass. There was an expectation that Reynolds was going to put up borderline mvp numbers when he signed. Also an expectation that Cruz would be a 30/30 player before his injury. And that Hayes would be a reliable bat in the five or six spot. None of that happened. And while Cherington was focused on drafting his 80th high school arm and 29th undersized middle infielder, he completely ignored corner positions with players that have projectable power.
Good points. Everyone has been up in arms about Skenes getting up here, but he can be like Jared Jones down to getting minimal run support. So it’s not like he’s going to save us or anything.

Some people want us to be like the Orioles since they’re kind of a similarly maligned franchise who has turned it around but they’ve already lapped us and are continuing to do so. Look at their development, new ownership and their lineup - smacking the **** out of the ball and mostly young guys doing it. Hell, they have the #1 prospect in baseball up and off to one of the worst starts ever and they’re still one of the best teams in baseball anyway since everyone else is so good. And I’m sure he’ll be fine, he’s not in the Pirates’ system.
 

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