OT: Raise the Jolly Roger: The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow

[Brandinho]

I think the truth about McLouth lies somewhere in between, to be honest. Replacement level fourth outfielder? I can't agree with that. He was worth 3.8 WAR in his last 197 games as a Pirate. He was worth 5.1 WAR over parts of 5 seasons that he played in Pittsburgh. He was worth 1.7 WAR in his first 84 games in Atlanta. That's 6.8 WAR in his first 5 seasons in the majors, with only two of those being full seasons. That isn't replacement level. That isn't a fourth outfielder.

I do think that his All-Star appearance caused a lot of people to have a skewed view of his ability, but he was a perfectly solid starter until he suffered an astonishing collapse during his age 28 season that may have been due, at least in part, to injuries. I do think it's fair to say we should have received more than we did in that trade.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

They basically got the same amount of WAR from Morton that they did from McLouth if you want to use all of his years in that manner. Replacement fourth OF is certainly hyperbolic, but he was never a player of any pedigree and was playing over his head even before his big season. Maybe he was a solid starter with the steals as a part of his game, but he was always pretty fringey, and I think you can make a strong argument that he was traded at the exact right time if you want to be extra favorable towards Huntington.

Morton took a long time to get ready and even then couldn't iron out all the kinks in his game. Locke was mostly backend filler, but not categorically different from what basically every MLB team has in that position, and he did this for a team without a ton of pitching depth. He's an easy target for hatred, but that's still nothing to sneeze about.

I'm not exactly sure how to assess the claim that the Pirates should have gotten more. In what determinate sense was that possible? We got three mid-grade prospects from a pretty decent farm system. If we're going to rewrite the trade or talk abstractly about how that was a wasted opportunity, then I don't see it as any different from giving credit to Huntington for shipping off McLouth before his value fell off a cliff. Injuries played some part in his decline, but he was never even anywhere close to the brief player he was for that all star season. Injuries played no small part in Morton's struggles... we could go on and on.

It wasn't a great trade but it wasn't a disaster. The Pirates certainly ended up winning it, more or less by default, even if they didn't manage to turn anybody into a true core asset. I don't see the point in continuing to rehash a trade that was practically ten years ago. It's perfectly valid to raise doubts about Huntington's ability to turn Cutch or Cole into a good group of players, there's certainly a good amount of evidence for that. But it's not like the Nate McLouth trade is some decisive argument. Huntington has been inconsistent in his trades, and if we're going to lump Niese in as speculative "futures," then things get a lot more generous for Huntington, because you get to give him Cervelli and Rivero just to name two quick ones.

The book on Huntington is just more mixed than most people would seem to want. I think his biggest weakness as a GM overall has been in his inability to really bring the right supplementary players in, either via free agency or trade. I think he's proven to have a generally good eye for young talent, and when it comes to trading Cole or Cutch, we are talking about something entirely new that he really hasn't been tested with yet.

 

[Dread Pirate Roberts]

Taillon is dealing today, but he's thrown a lot of pitches. Gonna be done after 5 innings in all likelihood.

That was his first start back after cancer, right? He wasn't quite on Lemieux's level, but who is? I'll take it.

Cutch crushed that. Two homer day for him.

Baseball is so much more fun when your team at least has some good players to root for. Love Taillon and Cutch!

I just don't know why people can't seem to let go something like the McLouth trade.

I only brought it up because Jeff Locke was mentioned. If someone had mentioned Andy LaRoche, we'd be talking about the Bay trade, and if for some incomprehensible reason the name Robinzon Diaz had come up, we'd be talking about the Bautista trade. When it comes to Huntington trading away good MLB players for bad returns, there are a lot of incidents to choose from.

It's the epitomy of yinzerism to harp on this. Neither Morton or Locke worked out especially well, but they ended up contributing about the same as McLouth did in his brief flash of productivity, and for stretches were better than that.

I actually wasn't even mad at the time that they traded the guy. I was hoping they'd trade him at winter meetings after his All Star year. I wasn't attached to him, and the team was hopeless, so I figured, might as well get some value. (Spoiler Alert: they didn't get any value.) I'm only "harping" on it because you insist on purveying utter fictions like these.

What you don't seem to understand is that you are objectively wrong about this. Neither Morton nor Locke were positive contributors to the Pirates. There were never stretches during which they were better than McLouth at his best. Even a cursory look at any norm-referenced stat, rate or counting, and this is readily apparent.

bWAR, Pirates Career: McLouth 5.1, Locke 0, Morton 0. If you subtract McLouth's awful second stint here and add in Morton & Locke's batting value, it's McLouth 5.3, Locke -.5, Morton -1.5, but then I'm parsing statistics...

bWAR, Peak Seasons: McLouth 2.4, Morton 1.9, Locke 1.1

bWAA (wins above average), Pirates Career: McLouth 0, Locke -5.3, Morton -6.4. In his first stint, McLouth had .5 wins above average.

bWAA, Peak Seasons: McLouth 1.1, Morton .6, Locke -.2. By this measure, Morton had exactly one above-average season in Pittsburgh, and Locke never had one. McLouth had four.

OPS/ERA+, Pirates Career: McLouth 106, Locke 86, Morton 86. In case you don't know how this stat works, it's like IQ. Higher numbers are better and 100 denotes average.

OPS/ERA+, Peak Seasons: McLouth 124, Morton 109, Locke 101. By this measure, Morton and Locke each had one above-average season in Pittsburgh, while McLouth had three. At 116 and 110, those other McLouth seasons were better than Morton's and Locke's best, as well.

It is an objective fact that McLouth was a better player for the Pirates than either Morton or Locke, regardless of whether you want to look at their total production or their respective peaks. I don't know what it is that makes you think other wise, if Morton and Locke are your Fleury or you just have some especial hatred in your heart for Nate McLouth, but your assessments of the players in question are exactly backwards from the objective truth as borne out by statistical facts. Maybe your memory of the young McLouth has been colored over by the 2012 version? 2012 McLouth was worthless, but the young version was a productive player.

Pitchers don't often work out. Especially in Morton's case, there were an infinite amount of mitigating factors. It's the nature of pitching in MLB.

Don't you dare start making excuses for Charlie Morton. Don't you dare. The factor in him not working out was the fact that he was a soft ***** who turned into jello every time a runner got on base. Morton was what some people think Gerrit Cole and/or Tyler Glasnow are.

Huntington's strength has always been in overall organizational perspectives

This is the kind of gobbledygook that gets spouted by people who think CEOs are important people to be admired, or the CEOs themselves. It doesn't get opposing hitters out, and it can't hit the ball over the fence. It doesn't mean anything. In War & Peace (and I'm both summarizing and paraphrasing heavily) it says that the success or failure of a corporate body is based entirely upon the collective performance of the real people who are on the ground doing the actual work. Any evaluation of general managers starts and ends with the people they bring in and the people they ship out.

His assessments of already somewhat capable MLB talent leaves a lot to be desired. I fully grant that his hands are tied by Nutting in free agency, and that MLB free agency is so irrational that it's not really fair to judge him in that respect. His MLB assessment has sometimes been quite solid, as in the case of Joyce, Nicasio, to an extent Jason, Cervelli quite a while ago, etc., but the Niese trade was a complete flop, and we had an infinite revolving door of first basemen for years.

You're forgetting that the trade of Walker is the exact problem I'M TALKING ABOUT, his inability to get anything of value when he trades established major league talent that play high-volume roles. (in other words, not trading the old closer for the new closer, which he clearly does quite well). He hasn't gotten anyone of significant value yet when he has traded a regular player or a starting pitcher, and he had a lot of chances.

You're also forgetting that the secondary cause to the Pirates becoming real contenders (after Cutch's MVP level play) was bringing in guys like A.J. Burnett, Russell Martin, Francisco Liriano, and Edinson Volquez, all longtime veterans who played well for the Pirates. Heck, he brought in Vance Worley as an MLB vet who pitched miles better than either Morton or Locke. He also makes good deals for veterans at the deadline, going all the way back to Wandy Rodriguez & Derek Lee, and coming up through guys like Marlon Byrd and J.A. Happ.

As for the first base thing, that problem began long before Huntington arrived. I think the last good first baseman they had might be Pops Stargell.

Neal can find MLB talent. He just trades it away for crap later.

I'll grant fully that there are plenty of reasons to be skeptical about NH, and skeptical about the potential returns for Cutch or Cole. Dealing with prospects is also very tenuous. There is a substantial amount of luck involved unless you are trading somebody like Chris Sale, and even then, the White Sox need Moncada to really hit his full potential. I just can't fathom the point of crucifying him for trading a fringe 3rd/4th outfielder from a team going nowhere for two young pitchers. I don't see the neat narrative about Huntington being unable to trade for future talent that you see trying to advance.

The main reason to be skeptical to be skeptical about the potential returns for Cutch and Cole is that Huntington gets bent over when he trades MLB regulars and starters. His five or six worst trades of his career all involve that formula of trading away a regular or a starter and getting nothing (or sometimes worse than nothing) in return.

This is exacerbated by the fact that Cutch is my favorite Pirate since Saint Clemente himself. He's kind of my Fleury, except that he's actually been as good as his fans say (1 MVP, 4 Top-5 finishes, 6x ASG). No matter what they get for him, I won't be happy that he'll be playing elsewhere. But knowing ahead of time that they're going to end up with the next Jeff Locke or Gorkys Hernandez (-1.5 WAR as a Pirate) is excruciating.

I think he's been a lot more inconsistent with the trades and supplementary moves to the MLB team that he's made, whereas he's been very good at building up the whole organization and committing the team to maximize what is has to work with.

He's been consistently bad at building up the organization through trades of regulars and starters. He added some Latin American signings and hits on the occasional draft pick, but most of the best Pirates during his tenure have been veterans he brought in from outside and guys that Littlefield drafted (McCutchen and Walker). Also, you got a big wad of CEO-babble on the end of that sentence.

 

[Brandinho]

They basically got the same amount of WAR from Morton that they did from McLouth if you want to use all of his years in that manner. Replacement fourth OF is certainly hyperbolic, but he was never a player of any pedigree and was playing over his head even before his big season. Maybe he was a solid starter with the steals as a part of his game, but he was always pretty fringey, and I think you can make a strong argument that he was traded at the exact right time if you want to be extra favorable towards Huntington.

They didn't, though. Morton was worth negative WAR. Over the course of 7 seasons, he put up -0.6. That's comically awful. Sure, a lot of that is because he was worth -2.4 WAR in 2010, but even if you remove that year, he was only worth 1.8 WAR over those 7 years. If you remove his best (1.6) and worst (-2.4) seasons, he was worth 0.2 WAR. That's still really, really poor.

Sure, we can look back in hindsight and say that we traded him at the right time, but that doesn't change the fact that he was a reasonably valuable asset (a decent starting outfielder who made an All Star game and was still somewhat young) who we received absolutely no value for. Locke was also worth negative WAR during his time in Pittsburgh. When you combine Morton's -0.6 WAR and Locke's -0.1 WAR (Hernandez was worth 0 WAR), you could make the argument that we'd have been better off giving McLouth away for nothing. What was the opportunity cost of having two trashcans in our rotation for 7 years and 6 years, respectively?

Morton took a long time to get ready and even then couldn't iron out all the kinks in his game. Locke was mostly backend filler, but not categorically different from what basically every MLB team has in that position, and he did this for a team without a ton of pitching depth. He's an easy target for hatred, but that's still nothing to sneeze about.

Negative WAR. Both of them put up negative WAR. They were below replacement level. They also took up two spots in a rotation that could have gone to somebody else, somebody who might have had a chance to make something of themselves.

I'm not exactly sure how to assess the claim that the Pirates should have gotten more. In what determinate sense was that possible? We got three mid-grade prospects from a pretty decent farm system. If we're going to rewrite the trade or talk abstractly about how that was a wasted opportunity, then I don't see it as any different from giving credit to Huntington for shipping off McLouth before his value fell off a cliff. Injuries played some part in his decline, but he was never even anywhere close to the brief player he was for that all star season. Injuries played no small part in Morton's struggles... we could go on and on.

Morton was 26 when we acquired him. He was actually closer to being an AAAA pitcher than a legitimate prospect. Hernandez was well thought of in Detroit's system and even made the Futures Game, but I distinctly remember his value trending downward by the time we acquired him. He was always very fast and strong defensively, but it was becoming more apparent that his bat wasn't developing and the Braves rightfully shipped him off. Generally it isn't a good sign when a guy gets traded twice in a year and a half. Essentially, the deal hinged on Locke and, for a while, he did look like a nice prospect. Sadly, he never got right mentally and couldn't handle the pressure of pitching in the majors, nor was his stuff of a high enough calibre to compensate for that.

How you should assess the claim that we should have got more is simple. We traded a fairly valuable starter - not an amazing player, but a legitimate starting outfielder. We receiving nothing of value in return. Obviously, that's looking at things in hindsight, but how else does one evaluate a trade? NH received a pitcher who wasn't really a prospect nor an established major leaguer, the sinking ship that was Hernandez's prospect status and a decent prospect who could have been a 3 or a 4 if he weren't a spastic in exchange for McLouth. I repeat, he should have done better.

It wasn't a great trade but it wasn't a disaster. The Pirates certainly ended up winning it, more or less by default, even if they didn't manage to turn anybody into a true core asset. I don't see the point in continuing to rehash a trade that was practically ten years ago. It's perfectly valid to raise doubts about Huntington's ability to turn Cutch or Cole into a good group of players, there's certainly a good amount of evidence for that. But it's not like the Nate McLouth trade is some decisive argument. Huntington has been inconsistent in his trades, and if we're going to lump Niese in as speculative "futures," then things get a lot more generous for Huntington, because you get to give him Cervelli and Rivero just to name two quick ones.

I don't see how you can really say we won that trade. If anything, both teams lost. McLouth flopped hard after a good half season in Atlanta and we received three players who accounted for negative WAR as Pirates. It wasn't a disaster - that'd be reserved for trades like A-Ram for Bobby Hill, but it was still a bad trade. NH failed to maximize the value of McLouth and, even if that value wasn't great, it was surely higher than what we received.

Neither Cervelli nor Niese were futures, by the way. I know you didn't claim the latter to be, but they were both 29 year old reclamation projects. One worked, one didn't. I'm also not using either to praise or slag off NH, I just had to chime in because I think there were some significant misconceptions about McLouth and the trade with Atlanta. Anything else is beyond my purview at the moment.

The book on Huntington is just more mixed than most people would seem to want. I think his biggest weakness as a GM overall has been in his inability to really bring the right supplementary players in, either via free agency or trade. I think he's proven to have a generally good eye for young talent, and when it comes to trading Cole or Cutch, we are talking about something entirely new that he really hasn't been tested with yet.

The Jason Bay trade was all sorts of terrible and it had some strong similarities to the McLouth trade. Once again, NH traded the most valuable asset for a bunch of assets who were declining in value even before we acquired them. That's probably the closest comparison to a potential McCutchen/Cole trade, even if it isn't perfectly like for like.

 

[Dread Pirate Roberts]

Neither Cervelli nor Niese were futures, by the way. I know you didn't claim the latter to be, but they were both 29 year old reclamation projects. One worked, one didn't.

They traded Neil freaking Walker to get Jon Niese. That doesn't really make me feel any better about the probability that Huntington will acquire anything of value the next time he trades players with similarly large roles.

 

[Brandinho]

They traded Neil freaking Walker to get Jon Niese. That doesn't really make me feel any better about the probability that Huntington will acquire anything of value the next time he trades players with similarly large roles.

There's also a common theme between some of the guys we've been discussing and Niese - NH traded for a guy whose value was on the downswing. Niese was once very solid, but he was coming off a Morton-esque year. Advanced metrics painted an even grimmer picture. It's almost like NH doesn't understand that you don't accept reclamation projects in exchange for legitimate producers. I had no issue whatsoever with trading Walker, but Jon Niese? Ugh.

 

[NewAgeOutlaw]

They traded Neil freaking Walker to get Jon Niese. That doesn't really make me feel any better about the probability that Huntington will acquire anything of value the next time he trades players with similarly large roles.

So they traded an above average hitter who is an absolutely terrible fielder at 2nd for a pitcher in his prime years who was a solid 3rd starter for 3 of the 4 seasons before the trade. Niese was 28 or 29 at the time and as far as anybody knew 2015 was just an off year. He could have just as easily returned to his 2012-2014 form. It's comical to describe him as a reclamation project. He had 1 bad year that followed 3 good years.

A bad deal for sure, but far closer to fair value than most people think because they have the benefit of knowing that Niese was going to completely fall apart the next year.

The Bay trade the Bucs got 2 well regarded prospects who didn't pan out, which happens all the time.

The McClouth trade is a flash in the pan for 2 below average 5th starters.

In the ultimate move of hindsight bias, you mention Bautista even though he only became the player he is through a huge career turnaround that even the Blue Jays didn't see coming.

None of these trades worked out but the thing is you make the moves before you know if they will pan out. The fact is when you trade away major league talent the return is usualy prospects and prospects, no matter how well regarded, are crapshoots.

I don't see how any of those trades are comparable to what NH could potentially get for Cutch. Bay is the most valuable piece in any of the trades you mentioned and Jason Bay in 2008 was not worth nearly what Cutch is at the moment.

 

[Winger for Hire]

I never thought I'd have to see this much ink spilled over Mate McLouth ever again... as if Walker doesn't bring my blood pressure up (who's spent pretty much as much time on the DL as he has on the field since leaving the Pirates).

It should also be noted that moving Nate the Great opened up CF for Cutch to come up and take a full time role. We're really getting twisted up over a completely average OFer (again).

It's possible DPR is actually Sean Burnett with the way he is longing for Nate.

Funny thing is this trade was really the first time I really noticed that Adam LaRoche was actually an insane man...

"There ain't a guy in here who ain't [ticked] off about it," said first baseman Adam LaRoche, according to the report. "It's kind of like being with your platoon in a battle, and guys keep dropping around you. You keep hanging on, hanging on, and you've got to figure: How much longer till you sink?

"It's fine. Heck with it. We're not the GM. We don't run the team. If they feel like it's the best move for three or four years from now, great," LaRoche said, according to the report. "Unfortunately, that does me no good. I've still got to be in here telling guys it's going to be fine with Nate gone. Well, you can only do that for so long until guys just kind of ... well, they know."

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I have lost track of exactly what the argument is over McLouth. It's extremely difficult to try and make an argument and have the fences constantly moved around to fit a narrative we can't seem to establish. Are we assessing the trade in the total abstract, or retrospectively? If it's the former, this will be my last post on the matter unless some real claims are put forward about a better determinate move.

I'm happy to leave it at both teams losing the deal, especially with the absolute inability to give a determinate answer to the question of who else the Pirates should have acquired for him. They got three mid-grade young players who basically did not work out to varying degrees and at varying times. I don't have the time or interest to argue with DPR if he's going to waffle about the lack of a first basemen since Willie Stargell since it doesn't fit his narrative. It's genuinely hard to understand claims about Jon Niese being "futures"; it seems more likely and straightforward to just admit that he has made some very good moves, and some very poor moves.

I was looking at fWAR when I made the claims that I did. Regardless, I'm happy to back down from the idea that the Pirates won the trade (both teams lost if you judge retrospectively; to judge independently of results, we are still in absence of determinate claims about what the Pirates should have done differently from acquiring three mid-grade prospects, the definition of a crap shoot), and more generally, to reiterate for yet a third time, perfectly happy to admit that there are several genuine reasons to be skeptical about Huntington's ability to get the best value in trades.

If Cutch is traded, we'll assess it when it happens. I'm not sure what Neil McLouth has to do with it; if anything, Huntington was too defensive to move Cutch over the winter, by holding out for Robles ++, and recent weeks have borne out favorably to his patience.

 

[NewAgeOutlaw]

Man, I might have to reconsider my opinion on the dumbest personality in baseball. It's been Harold Reynolds for quite awhile but Adam LaRoche is making a play for the title for sure.

 

[TNT87]

Baseball is so much more fun when your team at least has some good players to root for. Love Taillon and Cutch!

One thing that really stands out to me in regards to Taillon is his demeanor on the mound when things get shaky. He is so calm and cool. I wish some of that would rub off on Cole. It's unfortunate that Taillon's career has been hit with injuries and cancer. Hopefully all of that is in the past now. His curveball is so freaking good.

 

[Brandinho]

I have lost track of exactly what the argument is over McLouth. It's extremely difficult to try and make an argument and have the fences constantly moved around to fit a narrative we can't seem to establish. Are we assessing the trade in the total abstract, or retrospectively? If it's the former, this will be my last post on the matter unless some real claims are put forward about a better determinate move.

I'm happy to leave it at both teams losing the deal, especially with the absolute inability to give a determinate answer to the question of who else the Pirates should have acquired for him. They got three mid-grade young players who basically did not work out to varying degrees and at varying times. I don't have the time or interest to argue with DPR if he's going to waffle about the lack of a first basemen since Willie Stargell since it doesn't fit his narrative. It's genuinely hard to understand claims about Jon Niese being "futures"; it seems more likely and straightforward to just admit that he has made some very good moves, and some very poor moves.

I was looking at fWAR when I made the claims that I did. Regardless, I'm happy to back down from the idea that the Pirates won the trade (both teams lost if you judge retrospectively; to judge independently of results, we are still in absence of determinate claims about what the Pirates should have done differently from acquiring three mid-grade prospects, the definition of a crap shoot), and more generally, to reiterate for yet a third time, perfectly happy to admit that there are several genuine reasons to be skeptical about Huntington's ability to get the best value in trades.

If Cutch is traded, we'll assess it when it happens. I'm not sure what Neil McLouth has to do with it; if anything, Huntington was too defensive to move Cutch over the winter, by holding out for Robles ++, and recent weeks have borne out favorably to his patience.

I think the main takeaway is this - there seems to be a common theme amongst NH's bad trades, that he receives players who are trending downward in value. It's not simply that they turn out to be busts in retrospect, it's like he's investing in stocks after the bubble has started to burst. If you look at a lot of NH's good trades, they're reclamation projects of sorts. Nova, Cervelli, Hanrahan, Melancon, Burnett, etc. My worry is that he doesn't vary his approach enough when he's giving away the most valuable asset in the trade. McLouth and Walker aren't worth getting upset over now, but they still illustrate why I'm nervous about what we might receive for McCutchen.

 

[Gunnar Staal]

Man, I might have to reconsider my opinion on the dumbest personality in baseball. It's been Harold Reynolds for quite awhile but Adam LaRoche is making a play for the title for sure.

Well, he WAS the guy that pouted since his 15-year-old son couldn't be in the clubhouse at every waking moment.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I can agree with that, even while holding out McCutchen as categorically different than most other situations he has had to face (maybe Bay is similar, as noted above). I would certainly be extremely nervous if the main target for a Cutch trade wasn't either prospects or young, highly touted prospects who have just broken in. If we're going to just ship him for some kind of value play, it's hard to see how the best move wouldn't be simply keeping him through the end of the contract and hoping you get the MVP version or something just a little under the MVP version.

Any Cutch deal in my mind is trying to cull from the top prospects of a given team. It's very possible that he won't be able to command that, but if Cutch continues hitting in the way he has been, I'm betting that some kind of bidding war will ensue, because that version of Cutch is drastically better than anything else available. We'll see.

 

[Brandinho]

I can agree with that, even while holding out McCutchen as categorically different than most other situations he has had to face (maybe Bay is similar, as noted above). I would certainly be extremely nervous if the main target for a Cutch trade wasn't either prospects or young, highly touted prospects who have just broken in. If we're going to just ship him for some kind of value play, it's hard to see how the best move wouldn't be simply keeping him through the end of the contract and hoping you get the MVP version or something just a little under the MVP version.

Any Cutch deal in my mind is trying to cull from the top prospects of a given team. It's very possible that he won't be able to command that, but if Cutch continues hitting in the way he has been, I'm betting that some kind of bidding war will ensue, because that version of Cutch is drastically better than anything else available. We'll see.

Agreed. It's difficult to peg McCutchen's value because it's impossible to predict how other GMs view his performance this year. One would think that somebody out there buys into his 2016 being a blip on the radar, which means you're getting a very good hitter for 1.5 years at an affordable rate. His current offensive performance isn't much worse than when he won the MVP award, so the only mitigating factors are that he's no longer a viable center fielder and he's not locked into a below market contract for much longer. We won't get a package like the Sox got for Sale, but we also shouldn't settle for anything less than legitimate prospects or cost controlled young players, as you said.

 

[Pick87your71Poison]

Cole right back at it like he never missed a beat. I dunno what clicked a few starts ago for him but it is impressive.

 

[DanielPlainview]

He's on pace to give up around 40 HR. Yowza

 

[DanielPlainview]

Oh man. Horrendous call. This is the sort of thing that unravels Cole.

 

[gtpeli2]

Josh Bell has become a pretty darn good first baseman.

 

[Coastal Kev]

Went to the game on Sunday and our old fart of a manager sat Cutch and Harrison. The only player my fiancé wanted to see and Hurdle sits for a nearly packed house. He couldn't wait one more day until they were at Philly? I hate this organization. So arrogant while accomplishing next to nothing.

 

[Pick87your71Poison]

Well at least Cole settled in after a very shaky start and not looking very sharp for a while. Ends up with a quality start, 6 IP, 2 ERs, 8 Ks after he struck out the side swinging in the 6th to end his day.


Now we get to watch the bullpen come in and do what they do best.

Polanco with a nice toss to home plate to get Nava and end the seventh.

 

[DanielPlainview]

Nice win. Too bad the Brewers and Cubs won too.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

Fairly solid, if meaningless, win. The Phillies stadium is truly horrendous. Such a huge quantity of terrible seats, a totally mailed in concourse area, industrial backdrop. To top it off, there are wooers in Philly, and they manage to be worse than the ones in Pittsburgh. Is this a national phenomenon or some kind of Pennsyltucky thing?

Would be nice for a couple of offensive players to catch fire heading into the weekend in order to generate a bit more false hope about the team.

One thing that I think is pretty clear is just how much the team misses Cervelli when he's out. Diaz has better pure skills in certain areas, but he still has a good bit to learn. They can amount to a pretty good combo I think.

Nicasio has definitely amped up his value for the deadline, but moving him means giving up basically any chance to finish off games smoothly where the pitcher isn't getting into the eighth inning. If you can get a mid-grade prospect, you probably have to take it, but I don't know if I'd bother for anything less than that.

 

[NewAgeOutlaw]

Went to the game on Sunday and our old fart of a manager sat Cutch and Harrison. The only player my fiancé wanted to see and Hurdle sits for a nearly packed house. He couldn't wait one more day until they were at Philly? I hate this organization. So arrogant while accomplishing next to nothing.

The organization is arrogant because Hurdle doesn't manage based on who your fiancé wants to watch at a particular game?

 

[Coastal Kev]

The organization is arrogant because Hurdle doesn't manage based on who your fiancé wants to watch at a particular game?

Lol....... You should win an award. They are arrogant because they were about to get swept by a last place team at home and had zero urgency. I guess I have to spell everything out for you.