Ho-hum, yet another series wasted at Miller Park.  YEAH — we’re on to Cinci where we can be assured some wins, especially when we toss a lefty at them like with Maholm Monday.  As for how Daniel McCutchen will fare, the Reds can mash right-hand pitchers pretty good, especially at their park, but I’m guessing few – if any – of the Reds have ever seen him, so he’s expected to do well through the order at least once, if not twice.  After that….?? And what’s really funny is this – the Reds actually hit southpaws better than they do righties.. just not Duke and Maholm.  We’ll see how it goes.

The Brewers series exposed some glaring holes in our proposed future defense.  We already knew Milledge does a poor Bay imitation, we already knew Cedeno wasn’t Jack Wilson and Bixler is a step down from Cedeno, and we already knew Moss and Jones are liabilities in right.  What we didn’t expect to see is all of them have relapses in the same series, much less LaRoche and McCutchen adding some fanfare. 

And is it me or am I dreaming that we are pitching inside heat more and more and batters are wailing them into the corners like they were drilling balls back through the box?  The Brewers are a good fastball hitting club anyway but we’ll have to watch this in the Reds series because our over shifts in left and right have become the differences in many of the games lately.  I count four of our last nine losses lost because of the over shift where if we had played straightaway we should have turned doubles into singles and some singles into outs.  I mentioned about six weeks ago that Varsho and Fox needed to review their data and make some changes.

–

Let’s talk about the Doumit situation.

First, we need to call a spade a spade in two regards:

1.  From everything we’ve read we’re led to believe Doumit has had this festering pissed off itch since the trades began, or more than a month.  That means for about 20% of the 2009 season he’s been running around with a chip on his shoulder.  So why didn’t/couldn’t management diffuse the problem once it initially cropped up?  Right, it’s pretty obvious they couldn’t because, not only was Doumit pissed off AT management, he obviously felt some anger towards the field staff as well or he would have listened to them.  Plus remember, we heard everyone from Chuck Tanner all the way down to Gary Varsho spending way too much time trying to comfort this guy.  Way too much. 

2.  What the hell is the deal with Paul Cobbe’s representation?  I mean, come on, here’s Doumit whining like a spoiled rotten brat just one month after we watched another Cobbe player – Freddy Sanchez – hobble around the diamond for several months whining like a spoiled rotten brat.  Are we going to see the same thing from Phil Dumatrait and Jesse Chavez down the road since they are also Cobbe clients?  Is this the ‘Cobbe treatment’ we are seeing where the players go soft and whine so they get jettisoned out of Dodge?  I really wonder..  I really wonder. 

To me it’s black-and-white.. Doumit is under contract to play baseball for the Pittsburgh Pirates to the best of his ability every time he takes the field.  He owes the fans that, he owes the PBC that, and he owes the game of baseball that.  No less, he owes it to himself.  I personally couldn’t give a rats ass whether or not Doumit likes it in Pittsburgh or whether he feels he was lied to or cheated along the way.  That’s irrelevant to me. If he has an addendum in his contract that will allow for relief if he feels he’s been taken, then he needs to go about business the right way and let his agent press a complaint to the player’s association or the courts.  Not bitch and whine like some five year old wanting a piece of candy right this second. 

How weak.

But it’s also just as obvious to me that we have a massive communications problem in our front office because we’ve watched wayyyyyyy too many episodes of poor relations under the last two front offices, and it continues today as I speak.  From Perry Hill and Joe Kerrigan, to Ryan Doumit, Nate McClouth, and Andrew McCutchen, to several field staff in development last year and now some grumbling this year and others leaving while still under contract, it’s more than obvious Neal Huntington needs to hire someone who can put out fires.  Not his way, but the baseball way.  Tanner and Lajoie certainly aren’t getting it done, but they shouldn’t be asked to either.  How about Bob Walk as AGM and allow him to review contracts and talks as well?  Somebody needs to do something to tame all the calls of the ’he said this’ ridiculousness.

–

Since I spoke above about agents, here’s another interesting development.  Have you noticed how many players we have lost the last few years that were under the control of old school, high powered agents?  Quite a few.  Sure, we had to rebuild so they would have been lost in the shuffle anyway.  Ok, I’ll give you that. 

But take a look around at the recent drafts and trades we have made – there aren’t many big agent names in the group.  For instance, in the 2009 draft there were a couple exceptions – Evan Chambers (SFX) and Tony Sanchez (ACES) are two of the more obvious.  But when you look down the list of players we took, one thing stands out like a sore thumb – lower rung agencies were advising many of our draftees.  Then look at our current system and you’re overwhelmed by the number of players represented by the same type of agencies. 

It’s almost as if that has become part of our recent acquisition strategy.  Something to think about under the Coonelly regime.

–

So who comes off the roster tomorrow to allow McCutchen on?  Probably better put, who goes on the DL?  My wild guess?  Bixler to Indy and Clement on the DL retroactive a few days.  Update, I see Dejan announced Bixler was sent back to Indy.  Either Bautista is released or Clement put on the 15-day is my wild guess.

–

So we’re calling up Neil Walker but he won’t get much playing time, huh?  Gee, that makes sense.  Andy LaRoche certainly needs all the AB’s he can get but considering Walker’s position, there’s no reason for him not to get a few consistent AB as a utlity guy.

–

And Brad Lincoln is taking McCutchen’s place on the World Cup team?  What an honor.. to be asked to sub.  Hey, at least he made it though.  Now let’s all pray his arm stays attached.  As for Alvarez, he’ll be a monster in this action.

–

And just so you know I’ve been watching, we’re doing a lot of talking about Doumit’s inattentive play recently but has anyone other than me had a stopwatch on Milledge running to first lately?  Pathetic.  But he continues to play while Doumit was benched despite good hustle down the lines (and, BTW, still up around 3.5 pitches per AB).

Go figure that one out.

–

21 losses in a row in beer town.  Un-freaking-believable.

If you like to bet, Zach Duke pitching on the road is always a gamble.  But Zach Duke pitching on the road at Miller Park is as sure a bet as there is – he always loses.  Friday night was no exception.   He rode into the park having started 8 games there with a career 0-5 record and a 6.35 ERA.. and hit the showers after 3 innings with a bloated 7.38 ERA. 

Ouch.

Well, that’s what happens to Duke everytime he faces a good hitting club – he gets whacked around.  Put him in a small park against good hitters and he gets mauled.  See the box for Friday night.

And as hittable as Parra was you have to wonder why we didn’t bury him early on.  He was throwing batting practice stuff but we were so pull-happy we beat everything to the ground.  Into outs.  Over and over and over.  Even keying on his weak fastball didn’t help, although the pure fastball hitters we have in Milledge, Jones, Pearce, and McCutchen went 7-16 overall.  Nobody else could square up on him.

Unbelievable. 

But how about our pen?  A one-hitter over five and that included some guys pretty hittable too like Bootcheck, Bautista, and Jackson.  Still, they got the job done.. we just lacked a little more punch.  It was nice to see the effort though, especially being down 5-0 after the first inning. 

–

Andrew McCutchen is locked in baby.  He’s turning on everything from plus sliders to heat up and in.. you name it, he’s crushing it.  Now you have to wonder if it might be worth moving Young to the top of the order, then Milledge, then McCutchen?  He’s wasting away leading off.

–

Hart vs Gallardo Saturday night.  Wash, rinse, repeat (ie: see above about Zach Duke).  This time though, don’t expect as many runs scored.  What a great night to nail Braun.  Oopps.. did I say that?

–

Doumit hurt, huh?  His name had been flying around the circuit as being claimed on the wire, but that could be old news by now.  I assume Huntington pulled him back if he was claimed.  He hasn’t looked 100% since coming back off the DL although his swing started to look like it was getting stronger.  But I’ve also mentioned here a few times over the last month that he’s been taking an unusually high number of body shots, so who knows what is ailing him.  I’m guessing we’ll hear from Dejan tonight.

Bottom line, he HAS to be moved out from behind the plate or he HAS to be dealt. 

–

Your 2010 Pittsburgh Pirates:  Milledge, McCutchen, Jones, LaRoche, Cedeno, Young, Pearce, and Doumit (maybe).

Don’t expect many changes.

Tie game, 10th inning, one out, men at first and third, Howard in the box with Werth on deck.. we need a ground ball double play.  You’re Joe Kerrigan – what do you tell Dumatrait to do?

Throw a first-pitch fastball middle-in to Howard to get ahead, you say?  Unnnnnnhhhhhhhhhhhh… you just lost the game.  So did the Bucs.

I was hoping to see a walk Howard to get to Werth (1-10 career vs Bucs) who has hit into as many double plays as Adam Dunn has this year because, hey, Howard and Werth aren’t exactly the two fastest guys in the game, you know what I mean?  Didn’t happen.  I suppose that’s understandable though because Dumatrait hasn’t exactly been a ground ball pitcher this year by any means and Russell really didn’t have anybody left in the pen to get one.

Too bad.

Nice game pitched by Paul Maholm all the same.. he deserved the win.  And maybe it’s time to move Doumit back to the #4 hole because we sure need some punch there.

–

What a blast by McCutchen Tusday night for the walk off!  I’m hearing the media say it was the “win of the year.”  Imagine that.  Matt Capps has major problems and Neal Huntington needs to drop the closer title from his name and let him start pitching the 8th inning again when rosters expand.  Or, put him on the DL.

–

No Sano, huh?  It’s not like we really expected him to end up a Buc?  Perhaps that changes down the road.  Perhaps.

–

Here’s a nice series at the Neiman Journalism Lab at Harvard on how “the media tables are turning in the world of sports, where the subjects of coverage are becoming the creators of coverage — and what implications those shifts have for the rest of the news business.”   Good stuff, and partially explains why there seems to be so much hostility between beat reporters and MLB writers.

What led me to Neiman was an article on how one newspaper is charging more for their online content than they do for the printed version.  That’s what the Newport Daily News is doing.  They will still have some material free like blogs and events, but their main content is behind a pay wall.  I love the idea.. it makes sense.  The problem they will have is that none of the other newspapers will follow suit so it will fail.  But if the ASNE ever got their act together and put a plan together that everyone would follow, local free content would dry up and newspapers would again be flush. 

–

Pirates pitching rover Troy Buckley isn’t GOING to resign, he ALREADY resigned – he’s gone…

“Touted as one of the top collegiate pitching coaches in the nation..”

OMG.

“I think for his.. future that Long Beach State was the right fit for him.”

No doubt.

“Buckley was serving a three-year commitment to the Pirates as the minor league pitching coordinator but is moving back to California after only two years.”

Released early for bad behavior?  Ouch.

–

Anybody else notice the proliferation of gambling money MLB clubs are taking in?  Watch any Pirates broadcast and Bob Walk will give you his tips of the game brought to you by some gambling casino.  And we keep Rose out?  Puh-lease.

–

So just where the heck are we based on my preseason schedule analysis?

We are 52-72 with six games to go in August.  Oddly enough we were 36-41 at the end of June (+5 wins over my expected) and 44-58 at the end of July (+1 win).  Anyway, despite all the wholesale housecleaning, we’re right on schedule to end the year with 95 losses. 

As expected.

So Kevin Hart lost another game, huh?  Yeah, I can’t wait to see him pitch in Milwaukee next week either.  Oh-boy.  And our Sunday lineup couldn’t hit Homer Bailey, huh?  Now that’s sad.  I’ll be honest, when I saw Milledge batting 4th, I didn’t even bother to turn the game on..  I just walked away cussing John Russell.  I’m glad I did.  Oh well, it was nice why it lasted. 

Now back to reality.

–

Man, I only wish I had been able to attend the weekend series with all the old timers in town.  One day soon.. one day soon.  It was nice reading some of their quotes about the current rebuilding process.. some aren’t buying into it all, some are, but more importantly to me is that a few of them had enough guts to stand up and say what they did feel.  Too many of our old timers won’t do that.

–

If the Bucs win more than one-in-five the rest of the way, they almost certainly would not claim the right to pick #1 in the 2010 first year draft.  That assumes the Nats play at least .400 baseball the rest of the way which is about as probable as the Pirates playing .200 baseball the rest of the way.  The way the schedule breaks down for the five worst teams, I estimate we’ll finish the year with the 4th pick once again.

So much for adding Mr. Harper to the system.  But have faith, the 2010 draft looks stocked with quite a few talented high school players who are headed to college so we should be able to easily spend another $8M on some talent.

–

So Jack Wilson left his thoughts in the PG Sunday, huh?  What a class act he is.. he waits for the 1979 festivities and then lays out his pathetic letter.  Typical spoiled rotten Jack Wilson..

Sorry, but I’m soooo glad you are no longer in Black and Gold Mr. Wilson.  Have a tubular life dude.

–

And Mike Felix was charged with a DUI Thursday night/Friday morning, huh?  I mentioned here a few months ago that State College has been hard to handle for our young men — last year a player was caught with a fake ID, now Felix.  And trust me when I say this.. we have one hell of a party group between State College and our West Virginia Power club. 

Read the article slowly and then answer this question – why was Felix charged with TWO counts of DUI?  Maybe I’m reading the article wrong but, how can someone be charged with two counts of DUI from a single drunk episode assuming the officer arrested Felix after the initial stop?  Doesn’t make sense to me unless they let him go, he was then found driving again, and then charged a second time.  You think?  If so, and if he blew a .19 and was released the first time, that officer needs to be fired.

Kudos to the PSU Daily Collegian – the public has a right to know the truth.

And it was nice to see that the Pirates said Felix wouldn’t play Friday night.  Oh-man.  Heck if it was me, the young man would be on the suspended list.  Evidently we didn’t learn our lesson last year.

–

Jenifer Langosch over at MLB.com talked about Sunday’s Neal Huntington show and remarked that she believes Clement will be called up in September so he can work with Perry Hill at first base.  That’s a great sign, an excellent move, and also makes me continue to wonder — would Huntington make that move if he felt Hill will be resigned?  I’m not sure.  It’s looking more and more like Hill may not be be back in 2010.  I hope I’m wrong.

Langosch couldn’t provide the proposed AFL players because evidently Huntington didn’t want to disclose the names yet.  I think winter ball has almost become passe, especially as a pitcher in the AFL or playing in Mexico.  That’s a shame because so many could take a step forward with the experience.

I liked Huntington’s answer on Tabata being called up — “With Jose, we’ve got some other things planned for him this off season that take precedence over 10 games in September.”  That’s a good move in my book.  The young man has to be still reeling mentally with his family issues. 

–

McCutchen as Rookie of the Year?  Talk in the circuit is that his name is starting to get mentioned more and more but there are some that believe he has a lot more to prove since he’s a mid-season candidate.  Don’t look for him to get serious consideration unless he goes off on a .350/.450/.650 clip, steals 20 more bags, and has lots of highlight catches in the outfield the last 40 games.  Again you have to wonder, if Huntington didn’t have to bring the young man up until September, would he have earned the title in 2010?

–

We lost minor leaguer Todd Redmond when we dealt for Tyler Yates and it was one of the trades I lost my cool over (e.g.: Gorzelanny, Bay, Ramirez, and Torres).  Well, Redmond is in 3A right now with the Braves and he’s starting to string together some impressive strike out numbers.. every second or third game he’s whiffing 6 or more.  In his last 50 innings – 9 starts – he’s only allowed 14 earned runs for a 2.52 ERA and has gone 5-0.

Ouch.

–

“You Score as the Bucs Score”

“For every run the Pirates score during the three game series, fans will receive one dollar off the purchase price of Left and Right Field Box seats for the series against the St. Louis Cardinals at PNC Park Friday, September 4 through Sunday, September 6. For example, if the Pirates score 15 total runs in the three designated Phillies games, fans will be able to purchase Left and Right Field Box seats for only $9, a savings of $15 off the regular price of $24, to see the Pirates battle the Cardinals at PNC Park. Tickets will be available for purchase starting at 9 a.m. on Friday morning, August 28 at pirates.com/howmanyruns, the PNC Park box office and by calling 1-800-BUY-BUCS.”

I suppose they mean well but, really now.. we face Joe Blanton Tuesday, Cole Hamels Wednesday, and JA Happ Thursday.  Well what do you know, no Cliff Lee.  Like that matters, huh?  I’ll take the over on 5 runs and the under on 10 for the series. 

I wonder why they didn’t offer that promotion against the Reds…  ??  LOL

That’s Stargell, Madlock, Robinson, Moreno, and Foli slapping butt cheeks together after a win in 1979.  Or, so it looks.  And you have to wonder, would Chuck Tanner have allowed such behavior? 

I’m guessing not.

Sure, it’s a game and while we are young and obviously still a bit immature, it is nice to see the guys have some fun despite a pathetic record hanging over their heads.

Morton pitched a good game against a lineup that featured more triple-A players than major leaguers.  The fact he gave up six hits and three walks while only striking out three is a bit embarrassing, but hey, we’ll take it.

Micah Owings was so hittable it wasn’t funny.  Ask Ryan Doumit.  Poor Ry, he can’t buy a hit despite hammering the ball all over the field the last week.  And I mean hammering.  Line drive here, shots nearly off the top of the fence there, scalding drives back through the box.. nothing is falling.  But he continues to take body shot after body shot behind the dish and lately has started taking shots off the body in the box too.  He just can’t win. 

But what about Milledge’s new found home run power?  That’s the second one in the last week.  Too kewl.  I’ll won’t hold my breath until he hits another, but at least I’m glad they moved him down in the order which is something I had been asking here to see. 

The Reds are flat and Dusty Baker is not what I would call an exciting manager to have around youth.  Give him vets and he can manage with the best, but with youth his club falls apart at the seams. 

Duke Saturday night.  Another sweep headed our way?

–

Can you believe the two clubs fielded 18 players with a combined salary of less than $12M in this game?  The Bucs were around $5.25M.  Wow.

–

Here’s a quick look at a few stats through play August 19th (Wednesday) using my PITCH f/x database. 

The first chart is ball in play results by count with assigned base run values to each event to get a feel for how many runs we were above or below the median (which does not include the Pirates) of the other clubs in the game.  For instance, the top of the chart shows our hitting and if you look for the ‘Home Run’ row you’ll see we have hit 34 fewer home runs than expected, I assigned each home run a 1.4 base run value, and that equated to -47.6 runs on the year short from the median of the other 29 clubs.

Obviously, that’s a lot of missing runs.  We expect part of that playing half of our games at PNC Park, but certainly not 34 short.  Interestingly, all the doubles and triples we’ve been hitting this year haven’t helped to put enough runs on the board.  We still have three doubles and 1 triple more than the average MLB club but that’s negated by the lack of singles (-15).  Overall, just the ball in play data suggests -75.5 runs off the average MLB club.

One quick glance stat – look at our out rate production in a 1-2 count!  Now look at the 11 more line outs than the average club on the same count!  Pretty unlucky, huh?  Yeah, we’re a ground ball machine.

On defense we have a different problem — we’re giving up too many doubles and triples and that’s absolutely killing us.  Perhaps what Dan Fox needs to help Varsho with is a defensive alignment by count scheme because it sure seems to me like earlier and later in the counts we need to be playing a tick deeper, and more straight away.  33 extra doubles and 15 extra triples are off the charts high.  Give them the single – defense the extra bases.

Overall, our pitching has kept us close.. just 24 runs off the MLB median thanks largely to the larger park we play in. And when we combine our hitting with our pitching we see we’re at a 51.5 run deficit.  We were actually 68 runs off after the 19th so my base run numbers are kind of close, although shown just for a reference. 

Quick glance stat – look at the advantage we have when the opposing batter puts a ball in play on the first pitch.  That’s what I call out’ville.  Throw the first pitch as a ball and you better throw the second one a ball too because if you groove it, it’s going to get hammered.  That’s why we are seeing so many 2-0 counts.. I’m betting Kerrigan has told them to forget about throwing pitch #2 down the middle.

Neal Huntington’s first move over this winter?  He has to find no less than one power bat since Pedro Alvarez isn’t going to be a difference maker in the power game for a couple of years down the road.  Our youth will continue to add a few more every year, but we need a veteran masher from free agency.

–

Here’s another chart — this one shows you the number of pitches thrown by our pitchers 90 mph or higher this year and what the result of the pitch was.  Then I compared our outcome on those pitches to the NL median (again without the Pirates included) since the AL is a completely different animal in this regard.

As you can see, we throw 3 – 4% fewer fastballs at 90+ mph than the average National League pitching staff does and that’s despite all the power arm additions by Huntington to this staff.  Not only that but those that we do throw are more likely to not be in the zone than other NL clubs, or more hittable.

 The chart below sorts home and away columns by the percentage of all pitches thrown that are 90+ mph, home and away.  Look at the Dodgers and Rockies - wow.  And funny thing, teams with the larger parks don’t necessarily throw more heat in their park.  That’s a study for another day.

Now that was sweet.

I’m one of the few guys who believes ‘in the vicinity’ plays at second base should not be called in the game and the reason is pretty obvious if you watch the clip below.  The Brewers had a runner at first and one out when Braun hit a grounder back to Ohlendorf who fielded it and threw to Young covering second.  Young received the throw and then threw on to first a tick too late to double up Braun who was hustling down the line.

The problem was, Young never touched second base.. in fact, his feet weren’t even ‘in the vicinity’ of the bag, and interestingly second base umpire Bob Davidson didn’t make the out call on the play.  But when it was all said and done, Young’s footwork earned the club an out.

That play significantly changed the dynamics of the game because, with Prince Fielder up at the plate, Braun was then picked off first to end the Brewers threat.  Had Davidson made the correct call at second, there would only have been one out with Counsell at second and Braun at first and I think it’s safe to say Fielder would have had his at bat.  And as if to add insult to injury, when Fielder did come up in the second, he hit a home run.  Sure, who knows what would have happened had he batted in the first, but that’s irrelevant to me.  What matters is that the correct call is initially made.

Here’s the video (that’s Bingo the clown in the background – one of my old 78′s I am porting to a DVD for my son):

Considering the Brewers had a big inning started, and considering Davidson was right smack on top of the play to see Young miss the bag, if I was a Brewer fan I would be raising cain because that one call might have altered the entire game.  Might have.  If nothing else, it certainly altered the first inning for the Brewers.

If umpires are going to be evaluated on balls and strikes, then they also need to be evaluated on the calls they make on the field and ‘in the vicinity’ calls need to just go away.  IMO, it’s been bad for the game for decades and it’s time MLB steps up and eliminates it.  Let’s see more credibility in the game.

–

Nice win for the Bucs.. we hit the ball, we made some nice plays defensively, we got a few calls from Davidson, and Ohlendorf got quite a few calls from home plate Damien Beal, and, as I mentioned the other day, some of the ‘bad luck’ we had been carrying around is now turning into ‘good luck’ thanks to old Mr. Regression. 

I have to admit I didn’t expect Ohlendorf to pitch as well as he did.  I knew he had been tough at PNC but I never expected him to get an obscene strike zone the size he got Tuesday night (some called strikes had to be 4″ off the black).  Chalk one up for the good guys.  Had he been forced to throw more in the zone, I think his result would have been a tick different.  But that’s just a guess. 

And how about Milledge and his home run (also in the video above)?  Hey, no ridiculous trot around the bases (although he did slow up coming down the third base line), no stupidity in front of the other team, just business as usual.  That was good to see.  He and Andy LaRoche are prime examples of guys who are a few years from seeing good power numbers come their way. 

Parra didn’t fool anyone and you can’t help wondering where the Brewers would be if they ever spent to get some real arms.  I’m just glad they don’t.  The Bucs are essentially knocking out the Brewers run at the division in the series and nothing makes me happier than to see that.  Well, knocking LaRussa out would make me happier but I don’t think that’s going to happen this year. 

–

I think it’s time to end the Steve Pearce experiment.  He has a decent glove for first but he can only hit mistake fastballs and that’s it.  It’s time for him to be released.  Past time.  He’s taking too may AB away from Moss.

I heard about Perry Hill working with Milledge at first base.  If he can make that transition that would be an outstanding move.  He’s horrid in the outfield and doesn’t show any future promise there at all.

–

Lots of e-mails wanting me to either grade the final draft or talk about it.  You can’t grade anything right now except the amount of money spent and as we all know, that’s even more worthless to use as a measuring stick than the prospect reports we’ve read on the newbies. 

It’s nice we spent some money but to be quite blunt, we weren’t the only club that went after high school talent wanting to head off to college, and there really isn’t a whole lot of exciting stuff in the talent we did land.  I see a lot of pitchers with ‘pitchability’ as their middle name instead of ‘power’ arms, and I see quite a few ‘huh??’ type players too.  When I look at who was taken in other systems and compared our 23 guys to them, I think we were in the last half of impact talent taken.  Certainly the last half of ‘risky’ impact talent.

I warned everyone about this last winter and I’ll warn everyone once again – the Pirates rebuilding process will only go as far as Neal Huntington’s ability to hire quality baseball men to develop the talent they add into the system.  That becomes especially true now since they have passed on drafting impact talent in favor of signability.  I can’t stress this point enough.

I warned you that our field staff in the system were on too short of a leash, I warned you that our quality major league staff were on too short of a leash, I warned that our quality rovers were on too short of a leash, and I warned you that we were too inexperienced in the lower levels of our scouting ranks.  You are starting to hear some of those warning flags come to the surface now in the form of Perry Hill and Joe Kerrigan – will they sign on for another year, or won’t they?  Over this coming winter you’re going to see more of the warning flags come to the surface too.

Neal Huntington and Kyle Stark HAVE to find and sign men who are 100% commited to their cause – the challenge of turning a losing organization into a winning one, no matter what self sacrifice it takes to accomplish that goal.  They can’t be inked to one-year deals – they have to be signed for multiple years. 

So if I had to grade the draft that would be easy for me – we get an F because, after two years and wholesale changes, we still don’t have a development system in place that can make a difference getting these draftees ready for the bigs.  Until that changes, unless we start drafting Strasburg type of players, it really won’t matter who we put in the system because, in the end, we’ll have too high of a failure rate because that’s what history tells us happens to systems like ours.

(Edit 10:20 PM Monday eve..  the final score was 9-5 Pittsburgh not 8-5 Bucs as I had projected.  LOL   So if you waited late for the rich and famous that use BoDog to make their mistakes before you got in, you just pocketed 14%.  Not a bad haul for one night.  Now keep your money in your pocket the rest of the series.  * hint *.  Man I love this game.) 

If the Brewers expect to have a chance to play meaningful baseball in October, they need to sweep the Pirates.  Bad.  If the Pirates expect to make a meaningful run at next year’s #1 draft pick, they need to be swept.  Bad.  So what’s really going to happen?

Vegas sees this series as a blowout while thinking Wednesday’s game could get rained out.  Every sports junket wizard has the Brewers rolling over the Pirates all three games.  Even Pirates fans are planning to avoid the big screen the next three days because they took enough of a butt whipping over the last week to last a decade, so why add insult to injury?

Well guess what?  Ole’ Jake thinks game 1 is ours.  Believe me, it’s not because we’ve been playing good baseball on Monday, that’s for sure (1-5 last 6 albeit 7-7 on the year), and it’s not because we have a rich history of beating the Brewers, because we don’t (.324 winning percentage last 55 games against them), and it sure isn’t because we have our “A” game going, because, man, we’re looking around for our “C” game much less anything better (15-36 last 51 games played for a robust .294 winning percentage).

No – it’s much deeper than all that.. it’s called regression.  Oh, plus a few other intangibles.

Yes, I know the Brewers have been absolutely mauling right-hand pitching lately and, yes, I know we have Kevin Hart taking the mound, but you know what?  While most of you have probably been turning off the games early over the last week, I kept watching the misery and I saw some good things.  For instance, even though Doumit might not be seeing very many pitches lately, he stung the ball even though they went for outs.  Same with McCutchen, and a few others. 

We’re going to score some runs off Villanueva.. go to the bank on it.  And we’re going to score more runs off the Brew Crew bullpen.  Go to the bank on that too.  So it boils down to this in my mind – can we score more than Hart is going to give up, because he is going to give up some runs.  I think we can.. I think we will.

And I think it will be the kind of loss that sends the Brewers into a clubhouse meeting after the game. 

Now back to our regularly scheduled pessimistic post.

Are you kidding me?  Our guys come out every game looking like they are on 50 mg of Valium (uh, where’s the ball man?), our President is rolling around looking over everyone’s shoulder like they really have a chance of losing a chance to play with this pathetic roster of misfits, our field staff appear to be lost in space, our advance scouting is lost in space, and the only game plan we have is to go out and pretend we’re ballplayers.

And we have to play the Brewers in three who have been raking out almost 9 runs per game last five no thanks to a slugging percentage output two-and-one-half times the Pirates output, and we have to put on the field a group of guys who have managed a collective .187 batting average and .557 OPS over the same five games while our pitching has allowed a .612 SLG/.391 OBP/1.003 OPS?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.  Yeah baby, like, we really have a chance, huh?  R U kidding me?

It’s a classic tale of two potential outcomes.. on paper Vegas is more than right.. I see an 85% probability we get schooled once again this entire series.  85%!  That’s ridiculously high. 

But that’s why I started this post off with the optimist view because that’s where I am.  I honestly think we have a chance at game one IF — read my lips — ** IF ** – Kevin Hart doesn’t self destruct because of his last outing, and that very possibly could happen.  I just don’t think it will. 

Look for an 8-5 type Bucs win with the Brewers scratching their head wondering what the heck just happened knowing they could have gained a game on the Cardinals who are likely going to be handed their own schooling in LA.  

If Hart does implode early, then turn the set off folks because it’s going to get very, very ugly. 

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Those that asked – I think Strasburg signs.  And no, I’m not looking toward the 2010 draft because there isn’t anything there that can help this club in 2010, 2011, 2012, or 2013.  Why worry about it?  If we get Harper, we get Harper.  If we get Sano (talk is heating up now that we might indeed land him), then we get Sano.  That’s great.  But we have some serious issues to work through long before any of those guys will help us.

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Dejan linked to Cory Giger’s piece on Pedro Alvarez where he explained he believes Alvarez won’t be brought up because of business reasons (putting off arbitration one year), but I don’t buy that excuse.  It very well may be the organization will take that path, but when you consider Alvarez’s commercial value today versus five years when there (hopefully) will be a more competitive product on the field, then it’s a no-brainer – you bring him up now and sell all the tickets you can. 

And the reason for that is pretty simple to me.. if you buy into the belief Bob Nutting is going to spend down the road to keep franchise type players, then you have to believe the Pirates are going to want to extend Alvarez in 2012 which can/will control for the additional year cost in his overall package.  But if you buy into the theory that Nutting is not going to pay to keep Alvarez once he exits arb, then Giger’s piece makes more sense because the Bucs will want to keep him buried to keep him around for that extra year before he departs.

And there’s another reason to bring him up today that is even larger, in my book.  What happens if Perry Hill isn’t around when Alvarez does come up?  Better put, do you believe Hill’s replacement – whenever that may be – can be anywhere near as good as Hill?  I certainly don’t considering last year we had.. had.. who did we have??  So what is the future value price of Alvarez spending no less than 30 – 45 days exclusively with Hill versus a potential nobody?  Off the charts.

There’s no excuse for him sitting in 2A.  He came out of a strong program in a strong division – he can handle the bigs right now.  All this talk of waiting to get one additional cheap year is the kind of stuff that has hurt us in the past.. it almost took McCutchen out mentally, it has taken others out of the game mentally, and now we’re pushing the envelope on Alvarez.  No-brainer, I say bring him up.

But they won’t.

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Photo credit: Dejan Kovacevic - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

I can’t figure out why I keep thinking of Kevin McClatchy when I look at that photo..