OT: Raise the Jolly Roger: Sell the Team

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WheresRamziAbid

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OK, and where do they get those revenue numbers? I assume the Cardinals aren't opening up their books to random websites. GIGO.

Oh theyre certainly estimates. Absolutely prone to error. But the concept that the Cards are doing something with their spending that the Pirates arent has never and will never pass the smell test. The difference between the Pirates and Cards is revenue and i dont believe anyone with half a brain will dispute that
 

DJ Spinoza

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Pretty interesting piece on some new metrics:

Pitching Scores: Power, Command, and Stamina - Baseball Prospectus

Not too shocking to see Kuhl at the top of that list for power pitcher score, given how hard his fastball was and that his second pitch is a slider. Hopefully he's been watching Verlander tape all winter. I know I've been consistently very harsh on him, but he might be one of the players I am most interested in following in spring training. He has a 1-2 punch that can clearly get him success, and the big question to me is going to be whether he develops enough of an ability to work a third pitch into the mix, and generally pitch to guys instead of throw at them, in order to round out his game. Eno Sarris has brought him up a bit, and I was able to get a question into him during a recent FG chat about it. He mentioned that when Kuhl is ahead in the count, he locates his curveball less middle-middle, but still not quite on the edge or otherwise. Being able to get more consistent deception either from that or a changeup is going to make a lot of difference whether Kuhl is just kinda an ok backend guy or something more. He certainly has the makeup to be an under the radar breakout guy.

I'm relying a bit on a shaky memory here, but he was fairly consistent as a lockdown pitcher for 4+ innings on numerous occasions last year. You add a crucial six outs to that mix, combined with the heat, and he'll get a lot of hype pretty quickly. The obvious caveat here is that last year was his best K/9 ever, and was by no means elite. Part of the equation of being a power pitcher is getting a lot of Ks, and so for him to really take another step forward, I think he needs to continue evolving into a slightly different kind of pitcher than he was coming through the system. When you add to this fact that this kind of pitcher is sort of at odds with the basic organizational philosophy of the team, it seems much less likely, but this is the kind of overall shift that we really need to see the team try and do.
 

DJ Spinoza

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What Could Brandon Nimmo Become? | FanGraphs Baseball

Eno lays down another case from the metric-oriented about the potential upside of Nimmo. He does make some leaps in setting things up I think, but also strikes a balance by noting the different ways you can look at his combination of talents. I'm sold enough on the possibilities that I would be fine with a swap, especially if it came with a lottery ticket. Harrison is 31 in July. He might be a 3-4 win player for the next few years, in which case, it's hard to see the tradeoff definitely being worth it, especially when a short-term solution via free agency probably gives you what Nimmo would, and you have Meadows and a host of others towards the top of the minors, not to mention Luplow or Osuna. But if you take the under on Harrison, and he's more of an "intangibly important" 1.5-2 win player, then I'd rather see what kind of player Nimmo turns into with a little more playing time and a stadium that might reward a pull player. Moroff, Kramer, or Newman could replace that kind of output more easily, but if you think he's really a 4 win player, then there's no reason to trade him for what Nimmo might become, especially when you also factor in that you might be able to get more at the deadline in any case.

One of the Pirates blogs is pushing the idea that we should sign CarGo. Seems a bit farfetched and more of a gamble than somebody like Cabrera, but my thinking is more or less why not. Throw a penance into this weak market and see what happens. CarGo is probably the most intriguing as far as a guy who might want to establish some more value and would be more flippable at the deadline if he does.

BTW, the Minor League Ball prospect list should be coming out any day from what it sounds like.
 

Winger for Hire

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In related news:

Pittsburgh Pirates owner Bob Nutting is the high bidder for the Charleston Gazette-Mail, West Virginia's largest newspaper, according to a story on the newspaper's website. The Gazette-Mail's owners agreed earlier this week to take Charleston Newspapers into Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Maybe he'll sell the team and go back to his first love?
 

DJ Spinoza

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Pittsburgh Pirates Top 20 prospects for 2018

Overall a pretty positive assessment from Sickels. The top end is a little thin, I think due in large part to some of the recent graduations and Meadows' injury. If Meadows were more consistent/less injured, and/or Glasnow was more than a huge question mark, then I think there might be even more reason for some optimism with the system, but so it goes. It's nice to have quite a good stable of depth, but as we have noted recently, the Pirates have not done too well at producing dependable mid-range talent from within. This crop looks like it might mark a change in that, and there are enough players close to the majors that this could start showing as early as next year.

Beyond the big wild cards like Hearn and Cruz, I think some of the more important guys to watch this season are Tucker, Baz, Sanchez, and Mitchell. All besides Tucker are very young, and could be risers, and Tucker stands to start getting major hype if he keeps doing what he's doing/improves a bit. If the latter happens, that would be monumental from the system, since SS is really the most difficult spot to produce, and having someone enter the core by 2019/20 who is a potential impact player there would be crucial.
 

TNT87

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In related news:

Pittsburgh Pirates owner Bob Nutting is the high bidder for the Charleston Gazette-Mail, West Virginia's largest newspaper, according to a story on the newspaper's website. The Gazette-Mail's owners agreed earlier this week to take Charleston Newspapers into Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Maybe he'll sell the team and go back to his first love?

Please never tease me like that again.
 

Winger for Hire

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I really think the Pirates are going to try bullpenning this season.

ETA:



And Smoker has 2 more options left, so he's easily sent to Indy if he doesn't break camp with the team.
 
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TNT87

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DJ Spinoza

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I really think the Pirates are going to try bullpenning this season.

ETA:



And Smoker has 2 more options left, so he's easily sent to Indy if he doesn't break camp with the team.


Yeah, it seems like a good low key card to play. IF we do bullpenning, one of the keys is going to be utilizing guys with options in order to have enough depth to pull it off. I still think it's a stretch... the game is moving in this direction, but it's extremely disadvantageous for players who want to make money in free agency, and the speculation I've always read is that you'd basically need 5 teams to collude and decide they'll try it together. I think going full-on into it is kind of impossible, especially since the labor situation is already starting to look very bad from the players perspective.

However, I wonder if we might see something that approximates bullpenning in certain ways. I'd be interested in thinking more about how feasible this kind of an idea is, especially since we aren't going to get any more interesting news for several weeks, it seems. All that I really have in mind is taking an approach where you are much more aggressive with the hook after two turns through the lineup for certain pitchers. To an extent, teams already kind of do this with their #5 starter. Taking an old friend under consideration, if you look at Morton's game log, twelve starts were less than six innings, and thirteen got into the sixth inning, with a handful of those reading 7 or 7.1. Now, obviously, that's just kind of par for the course with a backend starter, and it helps things considerably when your fifth starter never flames out with less than 5 innings. But as I recall, in part due to his pitch count, Morton was often simply only tasked with pitching 5 innings, and then you had the bullpen take over.

Essentially, all this might really boil down to is trying to have very good middle relief, and using it more often. Try and spread out your more dependable innings eaters (though whether we will have any is worth pausing to debate), and then for two or three turns through each rotation, assume you will only get five innings, and plan bullpen usage accordingly. It's here where I think a slight bit more strategy enters the mix. Depending on who we are talking about, maybe there's a combination with an almost designated sixth starter who you try to use for a four inning closer for one situation - just as an example, maybe Glasnow plays off somebody in this role, etc. Where it becomes a bit more feasible to me is how you deploy Rivero. Especially now that he doesn't need to worry about stacking up saves to make money in arbitration, he should absolutely be used in leverage situations, up to and including a situation where you put him into the sixth or seventh inning of a one-run game fresh, and either use him to close it out, or close - use him to get through the hard part of the order, use him until you add some cushion runs late, etc.

These might just be different ways of framing how good it is to have a bullpen as a weapon, and I think ultimately it comes down to what kind of surrounding cast will be there with Rivero. If two or three of Crick, Feliz, Neversaukas, Leathersich, Glasnow, Musgrove, Kingham, Holmes etc can play this role, then you have some reasons for optimism. Add in Kontos, and hopefully using somebody like Schugel to get out of jams, and maybe we'll see a bullpen like we used to have. A whole bunch of ifs involved, but that's basically always the case with the bullpen, and it's definitely pretty clear that the whole entire bullpen can make a pretty dramatic difference for a mediocre team.
 

DJ Spinoza

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Eno is leaving FanGraphs.

Anyone hear anything about where he's landing?

Wonder if he's going to go to The Athletic? Haven't followed closely, but they've been stacking up the hires, and I don't think they have too much in the way of analytics... if so, I might finally cave and just pay for a subscription.
 

DJ Spinoza

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I think he was already writing for the SF arm of The Atlantic.

Yeah, I missed that, so who knows? Maybe just stepping aside for time commitment reasons or something?

We're 11 days from spring training. You figure something has to give in the next couple of days, but it's also pretty easy to imagine that a bunch of these veteran OFs (among others) still won't have jobs two weeks from now.
 

DJ Spinoza

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... every rumor and report from sources is like a meta-commentary on the whole offseason.
 

DJ Spinoza

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With Frazier going to the Mets, you have to assume Harrison is a lock to stay until the deadline at least. Maybe the Yankees will shift a bit, but I don't see it.

Pretty good value for the Mets... have to wonder if this is what a player in relative demand can get, how little it would cost to get one of these OFs. Of course, if you are in the shoes of one of the OFs, it could make sense to just wait things out even further, and see if there's an injury in spring training or an early season injury. But it's probably a risky prospect to go into the season with nothing.

At the end of the day, I still like Maybin on something that's maybe incentive laden and with an option year. I wouldn't be horribly upset with Cabrera, but OF defense would become a huge problem, especially if you have a day where Marte is flanked by Frazier and Cabrera or something. I think the most likely thing will be no additional moves at all. There's no IF spot currently, and really one job in the outfield, and probably the desire to have Frazier and somebody like Luplow getting at-bats.

I just think the OF is a different story if you are pretty much banking on Meadows to arrive by midseason, or even if the other starters don't have so many question marks. Maybin or somebody would bring question marks to an extent, but there is an abundance of capable 2-win players sitting out there fore free.
 

WheresRamziAbid

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With Frazier going to the Mets, you have to assume Harrison is a lock to stay until the deadline at least. Maybe the Yankees will shift a bit, but I don't see it.

Pretty good value for the Mets... have to wonder if this is what a player in relative demand can get, how little it would cost to get one of these OFs. Of course, if you are in the shoes of one of the OFs, it could make sense to just wait things out even further, and see if there's an injury in spring training or an early season injury. But it's probably a risky prospect to go into the season with nothing.

At the end of the day, I still like Maybin on something that's maybe incentive laden and with an option year. I wouldn't be horribly upset with Cabrera, but OF defense would become a huge problem, especially if you have a day where Marte is flanked by Frazier and Cabrera or something. I think the most likely thing will be no additional moves at all. There's no IF spot currently, and really one job in the outfield, and probably the desire to have Frazier and somebody like Luplow getting at-bats.

I just think the OF is a different story if you are pretty much banking on Meadows to arrive by midseason, or even if the other starters don't have so many question marks. Maybin or somebody would bring question marks to an extent, but there is an abundance of capable 2-win players sitting out there fore free.

This is such a weird and interesting off season. The last time this happened we were able to steal some quality FA's including...

Stairs (1.8 WAR)
D'Amico (2.1)
Tavarez (1.1)
Suppan (2.6)
Sanders (3.0)
Lofton (1.8)

for under 5 million TOTAL.

Crazy times, am i right.
 

Winger for Hire

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I like it as a depth signing. I still would want to give Luplow a bulk of the early playing time.

I just can't really get to the point where I can see the Pirates really contending this season. There's just too much that needs to exceed expectations and break just right.
 
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DJ Spinoza

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If I recall correctly, he has a pretty good arm, but I don't know much else about his defense. I don't particularly like the idea, but the depth was so thin that doing nothing could be a catastrophic move. He had some good spurts with the Phillies last year, but his upside is basically replacement level/average depth guy. On a minor league contract, sure, but it doesn't do anything to really improve the team except by default. He's consistent and useful enough offensively, but adds to the no-power scenario whenever he's playing.

One factor which may have figured into the picture is that he's used to playing a part-time role, which almost definitely opens up at-bats for Luplow and others assuming he does make the team. And perhaps signals some confidence that Meadows will indeed be up by June or July.

I just can't really get to the point where I can see the Pirates really contending this season. There's just too much that needs to exceed expectations and break just right.

Yeah, I agree. The other options are basically upside plays with slightly higher ceilings. Maybe you can get more from a contender if you are shopping Melky Cabrera at the deadline, but if Nava is hypothetically having a good season, he's maybe even more valuable since he'll be owed almost nothing. There isn't a ton of difference in terms of a stopgap for one year between Nava, Dyson, Cabrera, Maybin, etc. Cabrera is clearly the best offensively of the bunch, but he'd be an enormous liability in PNC Park's outfield. Nava is a capable 4th OF who has maybe a bit lower ceiling than a 2 win player.
 
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ResignCraigAdams

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What's the rotation gonna be like? (No particular order. Just guessing.)

Taillon
Nova
Kuhl
Williams

Glasnow?
Brault?
Kingham?


I really just am intrigued to see how the pitching will turn out. Got some decent young arms. I doubt Glasnow or Brault will put it together but should be interesting to watch.
 

WheresRamziAbid

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What's the rotation gonna be like? (No particular order. Just guessing.)

Taillon
Nova
Kuhl
Williams

Glasnow?
Brault?
Kingham?


I really just am intrigued to see how the pitching will turn out. Got some decent young arms. I doubt Glasnow or Brault will put it together but should be interesting to watch.

Dont forget Musgrove i think he has the inside track.
 
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DJ Spinoza

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I think that Kuhl and Williams are highly likely to be penciled in, and the last spot probably comes down to Glasnow vs. Musgrove, maybe with one of those other guys factoring in if they have a strong spring training. I think the Pirates should just totally make it a competition beyond Taillon and Nova, but it'd be a bit unfair to Kuhl and Williams who were capable backend guys last year.

I'd just give the fifth spot to whoever has the best spring, and then be quicker with the hook on the starting jobs if for example, somebody is faltering and Musgrove/Glasnow is in the pen but looking good. Musgrove and Glasnow have higher ceilings than the others. I still like Kuhl for the backend of the bullpen if he doesn't get a third pitch figured out, but I think I was unfairly harsh on him down the stretch. If he keeps it up, he'll maintain as a useful #3/4 type... we just need whoever the #5 pitcher is to emerge as much more than that, and for Taillon to take an additional step forward.
 

Winger for Hire

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PECOTA out today..

upload_2018-2-7_10-15-5.png


I don't see much to quibble about with these, other than I think the Rox might be a bit low (personally I think the NL West goes LA, Col, SF, Ari... with Col, SF, Ari all basically separated by a win. I'm high on the Rockies bullpen building).
 
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