By Jake, on July 18, 2010, at 10:43 pm |
I wasn’t able to watch Sunday’s game but from the box score and recaps it seemed like a fun day at the park. Our ponies are all going right now and we all hope it carries forward down the path. We know better but, for now anyway, let’s enjoy the little run of good fortune which we’ve come accustomed to seeing a week or so after the break the last few years.
Nice to see Maholm shut down the Astros to just three hits. Anytime that happens there has to be some good defense behind him so I wish I had seen the game to witness it firsthand. What a monster Milledge has become this year with men on base – he’s simply filthy. Little good it’s done in the win column but still.. I wonder if he’d make a good 4th outfielder who could come off the bench swinging ala Young? You can’t leave him out there in right field with no power and no arm.. something has to give.
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So McCutchen went down, huh? I guess I’m glad I didn’t watch the game or I might have had a coronary. Taking his place in CF was Tabata? Oh my.. that’s a disaster just waiting to explode. I talked about this very scenario at the beginning of the year - that we didn’t have a credible defensive replacement for McCutchen and now we’re going to witness it firsthand.
On the one hand I think it’s a good thing – Tabata doesn’t project enough power to remain a left fielder and the only way we can muster enough trade value on him is to peddle him as a true-blue center fielder at the major league level. So give him a couple of times through the rotation out there and let’s see if he can learn to read the spin of the ball, the depth of the hit, and run some good routes. But I think I already know the answer to this question and I think you’re going to see the answer over the next week.
I don’t expect McCutchen to come back soon only because I feel like he had been playing with a lingering injury the last 3+ weeks. I suspect we’ll see him shut down for a week or more. That’s just a wild guess.. and I suspect that would change if Tabata makes a fool of himself out in center, but I don’t think he’ll be that bad.
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“Multiple sources said Friday that neither general manager Neal Huntington nor Russell is in immediate trouble, but those same sources expressed a strong sentiment that the current 10-game homestand could be influential as it relates to Russell and his staff.” — Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 17, 2010
… the current 10-game homestand.. ????
WTF?
The organization has become fractured at the top over the last year (actually, it’s always been fractured since Huntington was hired but that’s a different story) and the distance between sides has steadily grown. Today that group includes so many people it isn’t funny from influential season ticket holders, to folks within/around the organization, and even, as Ken Rosenthal pointed out recently, at least one owner. This isn’t a small group of fans or bloggers talking - it’s now a major tug of war.
Dejan’s ten-day wrap is silly – nobody I’ve talked to could care less if Russell and his troops win all ten, or ten of the next twenty. Wins aren’t relevant — fundamental responsibility and organizational accountability are fueling the desire for change. Simply put, too many have witnessed and heard too much to ever change their minds that John Russell needs to be shown the door.
But it’s not that simple.
You see, Neal Huntington and Frank Coonelly want Russell right where he is because he’s a devoted manservant to them. And Bob Nutting probably hasn’t gotten involved because — as we have witnessed since 2003 — Nutting seems clueless about baseball operations. I’m not saying he’s stupid – I’m saying he leaves those problems to Coonelly. But, as some have suggested, Coonelly has his own agenda – being the next Commissioner. My gosh, what would happen to that goal – or even to Frank’s executive career - if he came out and admitted he made a mistake in 2007 putting this “dream management team” together? He’d become the laughing-stock of baseball considering all the ridiculous statements he’s already made about them, don’t you think? He’s stuck between a rock and a hard place and not likely to make any waves/moves unless the entire fan base starts to become one collective pain in the ass.
That leaves Huntington to fire him but Russell has defended Huntington internally so much it has cost him credibility within his own field staff. Huntington is going to show his loyalty to Russell as long as he can and I assume that means until at least the end of the season – perhaps even to the end of his contract.
Unless someone above him pulls the plug.
Dejan is probably right in one regard – we have a front office full of executives and PR people who are probably praying this team runs off a string of wins playing fundamentally sound baseball so all this talk goes away. But it’s not going to.. the division is just going to keep getting larger imo.
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Update 11:49 PM — after posting this I started going through my e-mails and saw that quite of few of you sent me a link to the PG’s pay site where Dejan broke down part of Huntington’s Sunday media gathering. He reported, in part:
“Earlier, on his weekly radio show, Huntington strongly rejected the Post-Gazette report Saturday — citing multiple sources who declined to be identified — that the current 10-game homestand is critical for John Russell. “When you hide behind imaginary sources that aren’t going to go on the record, you can say anything you want,” Huntington said.”
I agree with Huntington on this one. As I said above, the 10-day window is indeed meaningless to those I have spoken to that want change.
But check out ole’ Neal losing his shit over such a meaningless post by Dejan. Not only did Huntington make a fool of himself, he made the org look bad too. I told you about the rift between these two last year and I figured sooner or later it would blow. Looks like the boiling point has been reached.
Huntington would have made an outstanding AGM.
’nuff said.
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Will there be token trades involving Andy LaRoche and Ronny Cedeno soon??? Oh man, I could go on and on but I’ll stop right here.
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Brewers are coming in town for a four-game set and they have been hitting the ball well lately too. Unfortunately for them, Capuano takes the mound in game one and if we don’t light him up like a Western Auto Store at Christmas time, our guys need a new profession. Karstens hasn’t looked that sharp recently and I think all the back and forth between starting and relief is starting to take its toll on him, but since he had a little extra time off during the break, I’m looking for a good game from him.
Gallardo is evidently coming off the DL Thursday to pitch against Ohlendorf and the nod has to go to Gallardo in that game – rust or not, Lincoln against Bush is an easy Bush win on paper especially since Lincoln will be throwing right behind Karstens, and I’ll tip my hat toward Wolf Wednesday. On paper, three of four to the Brewers. The only thing that can change that is if our guys get too big a big head after hammering Capuano.
If they do.
Oh.. and I’d hit Braun at least once in the series. LOL
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I was 3-0 in fantasy action during the limited week.. one team is now 12-3. Unbelievable.
By Jake, on July 8, 2010, at 12:40 am |
6-3 Astros, top of the ninth, two outs, Walker at third, Jones at first, and up comes the Pirates hope of the future – Pedro Alvarez. He looks at a hanging slider for strike one, swings through a slider away for strike two, and then embarrassed himself with an off-balanced, open-shoulder swing at a slider well off the plate for strike three and the Pirates lost yet another game.
The Pirates media department quickly fired up the spin machine and spit out a press release indicating the Bucs middle of the order went a robust 6 for 11 with 2 walks and 3 runs scored, Daniel McCutchen pitched a four-hitter over 5 innings, and gonna’ be All-Star Evan Meek was hitting 98 on the stadium gun. In the morning the casual fans will read that crap and start thinking – hey, maybe we are getting better while completely ignorant to the facts that over the last 28 games the Bucs:
– have averaged just 3.07 runs per game – by far the fewest of any club;
– offense has the fewest total bases and second fewest hits in the game;
– defense has committed the most errors during that period (24 in 28 games but in reality is probably more like 54 in 28);
– pitching staff have the fewest strikeouts in the game and batters have the third highest.
Now you can argue that events like Alvarez whiffing with two on and two outs in the 9th is related to his youth and that down the road that may not happen so much.. ok, fair enough. But tell me why we are getting completely dominated from one end of the spectrum to the other. I hear you – you are saying it’s because we are so young and we’re developing at the major league level. I see.. so then, answer this question..
Then why is our total 2010 production just 25% better than what we expect from a 25-man roster made up of replacement level players? And to be more blunt, how is it that, in the last 30 days, the team’s production is barely sniffing that 25-man replacement level status?
If you thought we had problems after the trades last year while scoring just 3.6 runs per game over our last 73, well, you are now witnessing a 15% decrease in run production since that time and each thirty days that ticks off the clock we’re losing more and more production. Over the last 156 games we’ve scored just 531 runs for a 3.40 per game average, over the last 61 games 3.11 runs, and over the last 28 games 3.07.
If we assume the league average is 4.32 runs per game (700 runs scored per year), and we’re at 3.07, how much better can each of these player produce over the next three years as they develop? 2% per year? 4%? 6%?? And while these players continue to get better, should we also assume the league pitching will remain neutral during that period? By that I mean, should we assume none of the clubs will be improving their pitching over the next three years? If they will be, how much will that potentially retard our youth’s growth?
All things being even, the probability the current Pittsburgh Pirates general 13-man position player roster improves their yearly run production 20% over the next three years is probably close to one-billion to one. That’s especially true the way the roster, and short-term replacements, are constructed – we’re a doubles oriented system from Pittsburgh to the GCL. Everywhere you look we have speed and below average power, to save a few. In fact, we’re a doubles oriented system with mostly poor defensive skill sets and no impact pitching anywhere in the system to speak of. Morris might be an exception but he’ll have to prove to me he can pitch at this level before I believe it. Maybe one day Taillon will too, if he’s ever signed. And perhaps one or two come forward to meet expectations as middle of the order guys one day. Perhaps.
But there is no way Bob Nutting will ever go out on the free agent market and buy top shelf pitching. Forget it. Nor is he ever likely to spend for the big bop free agent bats. So the Pirates are taking as many pitchers as they can grab hoping to one day be able to trade arms for bats (think Rays plan that never worked). Problem is, they passed up a lot of impact pitching to this point. And impact bats. And impact development staff. And impact scouts. And, and, and…
I don’t care how much of an optimist you might be, you still have to look at reality. Reality says our run production is falling off the shelf, our error rate in the system is increasing at an alarming rate, our system wide injury rate is skyrocketing, and we don’t have any impact players left in our system save, perhaps, Morris.
And here’s another simple point to ponder outside of the poor evaluations and assignments (like Walker) this front office has made in the last 18 months. Let’s talk about basic organizational philosophy a second. John Russell recently said:
“I know a lot of fans criticize me for not yelling and screaming, but I can’t do that,” Russell said. “We’ve got a lot of young kids who are just getting their feet wet in the major leagues. The last thing they need is me yelling and screaming at them.” — my emphasis
WTF?
The entire minor league system is run like a Marine basic training camp preparing boys to go to war. They are yelled at, screamed at, every second they are under intense supervision, they have to put t-shirts in certain places in their locker, they have bulletin boards humiliating players who don’t meet standards, and they are forced to hear and do things they never thought possible. Then there is Russell’s philosophy in Pittsburgh where he babies his troops and look what happens – they do what they want to do. It’s gotten so bad in Pittsburgh that Varsho has become so frustrated he’s gone out of his way to let it be known he won’t tolerate the fluff any more.
Yet it continues on a nightly basis.
There is so much wrong with this organization right now it makes Dave Littlefield days look like Jimmy Leyland world series days. I agree we’re in a rebuilding stage, but not the kind you thing we’re in. No, the only thing we’re rebuilding is the Nutting’s bank account after they bought out partners.
Who. Is. Kidding. Who?
How the Player’s Association could ever give their stamp of approval to this rebuild is a disturbing revelation and bad for the game. Perhaps they did it knowing Nutting was finally spending every penny he could get a hold of to buy out all the partners leaving him in total control and debt free and ready to take on the world? Fat chance he ever spends it on this organization outside of Dana Eveland and Sean Gallagher types (Billy Beane rejects). And there is even a fatter chance guys like Alvarez and McCutchen will ever allow them to spend it on any more than one free agent year, if they get lucky enough to get even one.
Ok.. enough of the rant. The big picture? Our stats are tanking like a lead ball in water and even if everyone picks it up some, we’re only likely to just get back to July 2009 levels. We need talent, we don’t need any more talk out of the side of front office mouths. The only way to get talent it to go pay for it.. take a chance, go spend $20MM to a club needing cash and wrestle one of their big corner OF contracts away. There are opportunities.
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On the Sean Gallagher acquisition, it’s just another move by the Pirates who are desperately trying to find back of the order starters to fill in so they can deal the few chips they have left. It’s not a deal that will make any difference at all and you can expect to be just as frustrated when he pitches as with Ohlendorf, Morton, McCutchen, etc, etc, etc, etc,..
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We’ve now allowed 10 home runs in the last 6 games. Ouch.
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What’s wrong with this picture?
What you don’t see is Ronny Cedeno who just flew out of the picture to the right trying to grab an errand Doumit throw while Bourn was stealing second. What you do see is that Doumit threw the ball to the wrong player who shouldn’t even be anywhere around the bag.
That’s about as confusing as this play:
What the…
That’s Doumit trying to save his life on a Meek slider that he expected to be a fastball. These two were so out of whack during the entire time Meek was on the mound, Meek stepped off like three or four times and Doumit make at least one trip out to talk to him — right before Meek threw this pitch with the bases loaded.
We just rock on defense baby.
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So what’s up with Moskos getting stretched out again? I assume this means the Pirates front office feels he can be the next Lopez for us? What a disaster. Why remove him from closing out games if he was excelling at it? I’m not sure I see Moskos having value as a 7th inning pitcher, and I’m not a big believer in having a left specialist on an NL staff. Hanrahan has been filthy lately but he’s injury prone and I still say Meek looks rough around the edges.
But what do I know?
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Here’s yet another national media publication telling their readership the Pirates are a joke. What’s funny about this one is that it is written by a guy who covers tennis, so even national publications seem to be assigning the “PIrates suck’ stories to lower level reporters now.
And how about this FanGraphs post on the Gorzelanny giveaway? Ok, it’s written by a kid who doesn’t really seemed very dialed-in to everything Pittsburgh, but still he made a couple of good points.. Huntington did give up on him.
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Maybe Oswalt will blow a gasket and we’ll find a win behind Ohlendorf?
Had to make you laugh somewhere in this post.
By Jake, on July 2, 2010, at 11:04 pm |
When your team ERA is under 1 over a four game stretch, you are going to win some games and that’s what the Pirates have done – win games.
Despite poor fielding and ridiculous risky chances taken, many of which happened to have worked the last few days.
Despite poor fundamentals on the base paths.
Despite hitting 0.018 points above the Mendoza line during the run.
Despite averaging 2.05 runs per game.
And most importantly, despite the pitching staff throwing cases of watermelons over the plate during the period.
Thank the statistical mean for our last few wins. As they say, everything cycles.
Oh, I suppose you can also throw in some cold batters in Chicago, a stiff wind blowing in at Wrigley, a Phillies team that seems jinxed at PNC, and two days of Phillies batters chasing an obscene number of offspeed pitches out of the zone they have rarely done this year.
Honestly, we are a pathetic looking group of baseball players on the diamond. Our third baseman has very little lateral range and now can’t even throw the ball consistently, our shortstops have a bit more range and have a bit more glove, but aren’t even league average defenders over the last month of play, our second basemen are targets on pivot plays waiting to be punched out cold and their footwork reminds me of Craig Wilson’s two left-feet approach, and who knows what has happened to Jones lately.. can’t keep his eye on the ball, he refuses to extend to grab poor throws, and he hasn’t picked many out of the dirt in quite a while. Throw in Milledge leaving his feet every other play while throwing every ball over relay men, McCutchen flat-out dropping balls, and throwing to wrong bases, Doumit with pop times exceeding 2.2…
Even if all these problems get 50% better, over a 162 game schedule we’re going to lose 10 – 20 games just from poor defense.
We can’t afford that margin of error with the roster we have. And least us not forget that we had one of the league’s top defenses behind average to better than league average pitching while also cranking out 725 runs scored before we starting blowing up the roster, and we still lost 90+ games.
So why does our short-term plan include fringe to average defenders, a doubles oriented offense, and below average starting pitching? And, how many people out there believe that is the combination that will eventually lead to more wins than losses down the road?
I certainly don’t.
Even if we assume we regain some of the arms that are being surgically repaired, or guys like Morris perform as advertised, and the entire group performs at least at league average rates, they are still all pitch-to-contact guys who will rely on their defense to make plays behind them. I hope you aren’t in the camp that believes Andy LaRoche can be turning 125 double plays per year in 2012. Are you?
Houston, we have a significantly larger problem than anybody is even considering. And don’t look to the minor leagues for any short-term help because there isn’t any there worth talking about.
What we truly have is a mixed bag of nuts and some of those are already cracked and exposed. Without adding some professionals to this roster who can hit, catch, and throw the ball, this rebuild will end up just like all the others – one big screwed up mess.
Now, who out there believes Bob Nutting will cough up $30MM in additional player salary in an attempt to at least field a somewhat more competitive team? Hmm.. I don’t see one single hand — and I shouldn’t because not one fan believes in the man. Yet some of you believe in his management team as if they are separate from Nutting.
I don’t get it.
Our short-term plan is totally screwed up and has been ever since we started dealing. Neal Huntington took his office and clearly stated his intention – his risk taking would come in the accumulation of lower level talent he amassed during his rebuilding trades. That is exactly what he should have done..
But he didn’t.
Instead, he brought in major league ready talent to fill a roster so Bob Nutting didn’t have to spend money on the free agent market during the rebuild. Instead of taking back a Lastings Milledge, we should have taken back two or three “A” prospects in A-ball.. instead of Andy LaRoche we should have demanded two more “A” prospects in the lower levels, instead of taking on Ohlendorf et al from the Yankees, we should have demanded Grade A lower level talent.
And taken our risks in developing that talent.. not LaRoche, not Ohlendorf, not Milledge, and not Tabata.. no matter what their contributions are or ever will be. Simply put, the sum of the performance the 0-3 MLB talent we received back can never exceed the sum of the equivalent lower level youth we should have received because, all things being equal in scouting and development, our haul would have been significantly more talented.
At least it should have been given the nature of value.
This is where Neal Huntington and the new regime failed in this rebuild. It can’t possibly succeed because they turned over the talent they had for the wrong return. I don’t care how much any of you like or dislike the trades because that’s not the point.. the point is, if Nutting had spent free agent money to fill his roster during the rebuild, and had Huntington proceeded with his long-term plan as he initially stated of seeking higher quality lower level talent instead of the 0-3′s he took back, our system should be stocked with impact talent right now instead of a lot of average guys who may or may not make it (Morris being the exception to the rule). Throw in the last three drafts on top of that talent and our system would be one of the most stocked in the game.
But it’s not.
If you can’t rebuild with additional compensatory draft picks, you have to rebuild risking with lower level impact probable prospects. By taking back as many 0-3′s as we did, we saved Nutting a crap load of cash in the short-term but also dramatically lowered our chances of a successful rebuild. Sure, Nutting has spent $8MM per year in his draft allocation budget to help the rebuild, but that’s peanuts compared to the $30MM+ he should have been spending on player salaries to field a roster after dealing all his veterans for youth. Had he spent both the $30MM plus the $8MM, we would be well into a decent rebuild. On top of that, Alvarez and Lincoln wouldn’t have had to be rushed up and we could have saved at least one year of McCutchen’s clock.
Instead, we have no impact talent in our minor league system now that Alvarez is in Pittsburgh, albeit Morris is the next best thing.
Now here’s the thing – any owner in their right mind would probably have fired Frank Coonelly, John Russell and Neal Huntington by now. By all accounts they have failed significantly worse than many of those losing their jobs around the game have. But it’s more than that – the fans lost their faith in them too. Instead of saying ‘I believe in this group’ as they did in the beginning, the fans now say ‘I’m willing to give them more time’ but many of those fans are now even abandoning that position.
But the owner hasn’t pulled the plug because he has a stable of ‘yes men’ willing to work paycheck-to-paycheck to save Nutting every dollar they can. Nutting doesn’t want to let these guys go – my gosh, that would require him having to hire new people who will want Nutting to spend money because that is what it will take to turn this whole thing around.
And Nutting has NEVER shown a propensity to spend any money outside of major league acquisitions where he was taken to the cleaners, like with Matt Morris or Iwamura.
Nothing has changed folks – we need ownership who will spend to field a competitive product. All this rebuilding crap over the last three years has gotten us nowhere because it should have been going on year-after-year anyway since we are a smaller market club.
We’re going nowhere.. spinning our wheels.. all for the sake of Nutting’s bank account. It’s 2003/2006 all over again folks. Get back out your yellow t-shirts.
After you finally wake up, that is.
By Jake, on July 1, 2010, at 11:45 pm |
The story of the day was that D’backs GM Josh Byrnes was fired and Jerry Dipoto is taking over as the interim GM. While there is a lot of speculation that Byrnes will be heavily pursued at the end of the year, I’m not so sure. Dipoto will likely become the next GM and start hiring old-school baseball men to fill the rank and file instead of the bean counters Byrnes built around him.
It’s EXACTLY the same move Frank Coonelly needs to make but seemingly doesn’t have the balls to pull off.
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Have you been reading the daily minor league press releases which provide highlights of the previous days games?
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I guess someone was reading my mind when I was writing my post this morning because one of the things I thought about was why Alvarez wasn’t being sandwiched between Tabata and McCutchen to get him some better pitches to see. Then tonight there he was. Hardly a traditional two-hole hitter, Alvarez won’t stay there long but it is a great way to try to jump-start him. I love the decision.. good thinking out-of-the-box stuff.
Phillies fans are probably up in arms that they couldn’t get to Daniel McCutchen. I know I would be if I was one. He was very hittable but commanded his fastball well and attacked batters. Tip of the hat to him for his aggressiveness. His defense blew chucks behind him (Bucs 80 errors is the most in the NL now) but we have so many rookies and guys out of position some poor play is to be expected. Andrew McCutchen leaving his feet in the 8th in a one-run game isn’t expected, however. What a bonehead play he made on Rollins fly ball he had to come in on. Meek was able to wiggle out of the jam but he shouldn’t have been in such a stressful position to begin with.
The more you watch our young infield, the more you see how badly we miss Perry Hill. Alvarez with an error backing up on a ground ball he should have come in for – and then taking it off the side of his body instead of squaring up to field it, poor LaRoche at second makes DY look like a pro over there, and Jones is proving Pirates fans wrong about his defense game after game.. he’s not gloving simple throws anymore. Tonight he took his eyes off a simple one-hop throw from LaRoche and it went right past him. LaRoche was charged with the error but it was a gloveable ball Jones should have had. Then Jones turned and fired home and bounced one in front of Doumit’s feet.
Just ugly defensive baseball. And here’s the thing, anybody who thinks LaRoche will stick at second must not be watching his footwork or his pivots. It’s going to take years for him to ever make the transition the way he looks right now. It’s just not going to happen and he’s going to be dang lucky if he doesn’t get injured. Think Freddy Sanchez when he was run over by a steamroller a few times which eventually put him on the DL here. But you have to like his arm – man, the running game comes to a dead halt when he gets a relay, huh?
Isn’t it strange that opposing teams play just as sloppy as we do?
After Meek recorded the last out in the 8th he was pumping his fist to his mitt and walking off like he just won a playoff game or something. You have to love the competitive nature of our guys even though they are a bazillion games out.
And was anybody else sweating bullets when John Russell came out of the dugout in the 9th with two outs to talk to Dotel? Visions of Jim Tracy came to mind and all the blown saves that occurred right after such a trip.
Good game.. not tight, not pretty, but won fairly and that’s all that matters.
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“How about Michael Main for Ryan Doumit??” — Jake on January 6, 2010
Anybody remember reading my post? He was one of the guys I really liked in the 2007 draft behind Porcello. Today he was shipped off to the Giants with a reliever for Bengie Molina. I called for the Bucs to go get Molina years ago when he became available because, to me, he’s a captain — a leader. He’s exceptional at reading batter habits, knows the league hitters real good, has an excellent reputation with the umpires, and has one of the highest ‘out of strike zone’ called strike ratios in the game. He’s a pitcher’s delight, to say the least.
The fact that the Rangers shipped off Main for Molina is a bit surprising to me, however. Main had been fighting viral problems and was said to be getting close to 100% again and was already promoted to double-A.. at 21! That’s pretty aggressive movement for a high school draftee who missed nearly an entire year. The kid has an electric arm but he’s very raw. I’m guessing the Rangers did the deal so they could get cash from the Giants to pay for Molina’s salary.
Five months after my post it’s just amazing to me that Neal Huntington wasn’t able to work out a deal with Nolan Ryan to get Main in our system. I’m guessing Huntington wanted southpaw Martin Perez — if they even talked, which I don’t know they did. Perez is really, really good but if we were shipping cash with Doumit…
We missed a deal here, but maybe there’s a reason why..
Buster Olney’s article today at ESPN involved him asking more than a third of the GM’s in the game to anonymously snitch on their peers regarding deal making traits and guess which categories Neal Huntington was listed in?
“TOUGHEST GMs TO MAKE A DEAL WITH
Neal Huntington, Pirates (1) “It feels formal talking with him, to the point of being uncomfortable.”
The (1) behind his name indicates that one GM rated him there. Olney’s article continued..
“GMs WHO ARE THE BIGGEST CARD PLAYERS
Huntington (3) “I like him, but you don’t ever feel at ease. He’s a good person, but he’s just very polished, well-spoken, to the point where it’s tough to know what’s really going on.”
One-quarter of the GM’s interviewed agreed with that rating. That’s a major blow when one of your peers tell you they don’t feel comfortable dealing with you.
If you recall some earlier posts on this subject I had mentioned that the knock on Huntington internally was that some felt he was unapproachable within his own organization. And now this.
But it’s not just Huntington – it’s all around the organization. Gossip around the players is that this is how John Russell is, scouting director Greg Smith is a loner at times around his peers, Frank Coonelly has become another ghost of Bob Nutting, and around the farm system Kyle Stark isn’t exactly known as an easy guy to deal with.
It’s like they all lack confidence and can’t get past stage one of basic team building concepts as a group. This is just one of the reasons I’ve personally called on ownership to make better decisions as we head toward the second-half of this rebuild.
We need stronger personnel. Or did I say that before?
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So what’s happened to Dejan over at the Post-Gazette? I never see any content from him outside the paywall anymore.
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Satchel Price (I have no idea who he is but the way his article is written it reeks of a Cubbie fan) at Beyond the Boxscore laid out his vision for the Pirates 2013 lineup card and if you are in for a good laugh, go check it out. That’s a 600 runs scored lineup with a pitching staff likely to give up 850 or more. And there is no possible way Taillon would ever be in Pittsburgh in two years.. or three years.. much less four years, and unless Alderson grows new tools, I’ll be surprised if he’s still in the org in three years. As I said, it’s a funny read.
By Jake, on June 28, 2010, at 1:44 am |
I’m hearing that Frank Coonelly may have finally figured out he made a mistake in extending Neal Huntington and John Russell. That’s the possible good news. The bad news is, it doesn’t look like Coonelly is going to make any changes in the immediate future.
Now for my own opinion –
Bob Nutting and Frank Coonelly were the victims of a brilliant stratagem played out by Neal Huntington back in September 2007 which — in part – led to Huntington landing the GM position. It was such an oddball hire that many in the baseball community were surprised and, as word of the stratagem circled the game, quite a few people were shocked at how it all played out. A few even angry.
One thing that was odd about Coonelly’s GM selection was that Neal Huntington wasn’t exactly known as a “strong” baseball man… good perhaps, but not strong. One prior front office person told me during the GM search: “[Frank's] very likely to hire a strong baseball guy as GM to complement his own skill set, since that’s his greatest weakness.” So after Huntington was hired, Chuck Tanner was brought in as Huntington’s consultant and later Bill Lajoie was also added in the same role — both men being “strong” baseball men to help raise Huntington’s bar.
As the years have unfolded it has become clear that neither Tanner nor Lajoie enjoy a strong voice in Huntington’s circle and consequently many of Huntington’s decisions have resulted in staggering losses for the organization, as well as ownership.
When we look back to Coonelly and Nutting’s decision to hire Neal Huntington, you can’t help but to wonder how much the “John Hart influence” had on their decision to select him. For those that don’t remember or know, Hart had rebuilt the talent devoid Cleveland Indians in the 90′s and lead them to six division titles and two world series appearances. Among the men that had groomed under Hart during their run were Neal Huntington, Josh Byrnes, Mark Shapiro, and Paul DePodesta.. all very educated men and somewhat sabermetrically inclined.
And all of them catastrophic failures in a GM leadership role up to this point except for Shapiro, who was also the beneficiary of Dan O’Dowd (Hart’s top lieutenant) and John Hart’s network when he succeeded Hart as the club’s GM. As the story goes, when Shapiro was interviewed by Hart in 1992, Hart outlined his “Blueprint for Success” for rebuilding the Indians and Shapiro bought in and was hired. Seventeen years later, Huntington and Coonelly unveiled a similar plan – the Pittsburgh Pirates Blueprint in late 2009.
But there is a huge difference in the two blueprints — Hart surrounded himself with exceptionally strong baseball men and listened closely to what they had to say. In Pittsburgh, Neal Huntington surrounded himself with few good baseball men, many unproven rookies, others who are neither rookies nor ever been very good baseball men, some paycheck guys, and, it appears, all the while refusing to listen to the few strong baseball men he had at his disposal. But there is also one other huge difference… the stratagem Huntington played out in 2007 had come back to haunt him.
The Pirates Blueprint — to me — represents a public relations ploy instead of a meaningful set of goals undertaken to achieve a desired result. It’s pretty, it’s well thought out, but it’s unachievable with the personnel in place in development, in scouting, and in our front office.
Simply start by looking at the Pirates 25-man roster and their recent play.. it’s not that they are losing at historical rates, it’s the way they are losing.
“[John Russell] has evidently lost the respect of his players.” – as told to me by an ex front office person on June 27, 2010.
The problems began in the offseason when management, including John Russell, blamed the players for underperforming after the deadline trades. The players took exception to management’s account believing, as one person close to the players put it to me, they ‘never had a fighting chance’ with the roster they had to play with. The problems escalated when the players learned there would be no infusion of capital to bring in additional veteran talent – it was up to them.. a core group of guys who had never played together before. Even then the players took it all in stride and did the best they could but ran up against a mental and physical brick wall more often than not because every pitch of every game had become stressful.. their margin of error was too fine.
Then management started to come at them demanding a little bit more, next players who were obviously management ‘buds’ were starting to infuse their own opinions on the group, and it has grown to the point you see today. They are one very frustrated group of young men trying to perform day-in and day-out at levels well beyond their natural abilities while management wants even more. The team isn’t a ‘team’ anymore – it’s become a divided group.
Something has to change.. it’s broke, it’s busted, it’s out-of-order.
Frank Coonelly has a real problem. While it’s easy to fire John Russell and that might solve some of the immediate internal problems while also putting the fans at ease for a short period of time, it’s not going to solve the bigger issue he has of a rebuild that is out of control. He and Bob struckout in September 2007 and it’s taken too long to realize just how badly they missed putting the bat on the ball.
Coonelly’s first order of business has to be ownership’s interests and I think we see that playing out with Lincoln and Alvarez still in Pittsburgh. And perhaps that is exactly what woke Coonelly up - that his new development system was unable to take Lincoln and Alvarez to the next level forcing him to start their clocks to finish them off at the risk of failure? Ownership has given Coonelly a plan and all we can do is guess at what it says, but I suspect at the top of that list is the word ‘credibility’ because without it, there won’t be any fans.
Coonelly’s second order of business should be to take control and show the remaining fan base that he has enough vision to see not everything is going as drawn up three years ago. I would suggest that he start forcing Huntington to run all opportunities through Lajoie and Tanner with a majority rule type of governance, and the final decision then sent to his office for review. Once the August 15th signing deadline has passed, Coonelly needs to immediately terminate Huntington and start the process of finding a talented GM who passes the sniff test, not the Hart test.
In the meantime, the players have to be held accountable while at the same time be able to see light at the end of the tunnel too. John Russell should have been fired a month or more ago and having him held over like this only shows weakness by Coonelly and the Nuttings. Now isn’t the time to be showing weakness. Varsho is the obvious interim solution and then let him make his own decisions from there.
The worst thing Connelly and Nutting can do right now is continue their apathy. Striking out is one thing, refusing to get back in the box is quite another.
By Jake, on June 20, 2010, at 10:29 pm |
Random thoughts of a Pirates fan –
Ah, so Pirates fans are back with visions of sugar-plums dancing in their heads having witnessed two straight victories. Long forgotten is the fired perogie, the 25-44 record, or lies from the altar.. they are all distant memories as the fans retreat back into ‘this regime hasn’t had enough time to be properly evaluated yet’ mode.
Just as Bob, Frank, and Neal hoped they would.
In the eight years I have been hammering this organization from the discussion forum at pirateball.com to the blog, I’ve never witnessed such disregard for reality by the fans. For instance, five of their top nine picks from the 2009 draft are either out on the DL, have been on the DL, or have or are experiencing significant injuries including their #1 pick Tony Sanchez and #2 pick Victor Black. Their highest rated high school arm in the 2008 draft, Quinton Miller, also on the shelf. In fact, more that a dozen young pitching arms bit the dust in one form or another over the last 6 months alone.
But the fans call that ‘normal’ — they have come to accept that pitchers routinely break down in the Pirates system.
It’s not normal at these levels, nor is it normal to make a trade for players with significant health problems and not subject the player to at least a physical like the Pirates did with Iwamura. I suppose you could probably add Morton, Hart, and Ascanio to the ‘no-health-check’ lost assets as well.
No, instead it’s too easy to look at the Altoona Curve and fantasize about the hope of the future since that club is 20 games above .500. Listen closely to the fan chatter and you might hear how Justin Wilson has magically found 4 MPH on his fastball and now he’s for real, or how Rudy Owens is the next coming of Nolan Ryan, or even how Derek Hankins has become the fans #3 starter possibility in 2012.
Never mind that Owens only has two-pitches worth talking about – an average fastball and an above-average hook; and never mind that Wilson’s command reminds many scouts of Oliver Perez, or that Hankin’s command brings back memories of Bruno Haas from old-time scouts. The fans don’t care – all they think about is that if a minor league team is 20 games above .500, they must be damn good.
Not once does it enter into their minds that the other teams could be that bad.
Feeding all these dreams are media reports like the recently released Pirates top ten prospect list at Baseball America where they listed:
1. Tony Sanchez C
2. Bryan Morris RHP
3. Starling Marte OF
4. Chase D’Arnaud SS
5. Tim Alderson RHP
as the top five guys. Imagine that, Tony Sanchez, who has allowed 52 stolen bases in the 38 games he has caught and had been shut down to a DH role with a shoulder injury, is said to be the Pirates top prospect. Funny thing about Sanchez, he has a .660 OPS away from his home park to go with the shoulder problem. Ouch.
And look who is the Pirates #3 prospect – Starling Marte who just had surgery to remove his hamate bone on his left hand. Maybe it all comes back for him in a year or two to be our next fourth outfielder one day, maybe it doesn’t. But there’s no questioning the problems #5 Tim Alderson has – his velocity has been in the mid-80′s lately, his slow hook had become more of a batter’s practice pitch, and, well, he’s just getting hammered by right-hand batters and has no projection at this point, much less as the Pirates fifth best prospect even considering his young age. d’Arnauld has a lot of problems on the field as well as in the box so he’s not a very likely top five candidate either.
The only prospect BA even remotely got right in my book was Morris and somehow they projected him below Sanchez. My gosh, if Morris is worse than Sanchez then this organization is in serious trouble.
That list seems crazy nuts, but you can see one reason why the fans are avoiding reality.. they aren’t listening any more. It’s as simple as that. This week they learned the President of the Pirates had lied to them in an online chat but most of the fans dismissed it as ‘internal policy’ and no big deal. Last I knew, the fans are the ones paying the bills on Federal Street – are they not owed the truth? And if the truth couldn’t be spoken, why didn’t Coonelly just say it’s against internal policy to discuss such matters. At least that’s understandable.
Busted, Coonelly and the Pirates played it off as if the fans didn’t matter to them. Like Bob Smizik noted in his Sunday column, not one of them apologized for deceiving all of major league baseball, much less Pirates fans. It’s an unbelievable story but the fans don’t seem to get it.. to them it’s ‘business as normal’ on Federal Street because that’s what they are used to – being misled.
Reality as a Pittsburgh Pirates fan means having to hope Bob Nutting will spend money to keep McCutchen before he leaves after 2015, Alvarez before he leaves after 2016, and all that two years before the high school pitchers recently drafted have any prayer of impacting the major league team – if they ever do. The sad part about that is, there isn’t a prayer in hell of this roster or farm system – in the condition it is in now – ever producing enough talent to compete before the young arms get here and the probability McCutchen and Alvarez will want to stick around on a losing club will be about as close to the odds of you winning the lottery next week.
I said this in 2003, said it again in 2005, hammered it in 2006, and I’m going to hammer it again now – the fans need to wake up. It’s not about how well Huntington may or may not be doing, it’s not about Coonelly either, it’s all about Nutting control and until that one aspect changes, there is little true hope for Pirates fans.
Go to the bank on it.
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Brad Lincoln escaped another catastrophic start thanks to some very poor approaches at the plate by the Indians. He’s going to get rocked down the road and has no business being in Pittsburgh. And the more I see Pedro Alvarez the more I realize how poor a decision it was to bring him up. Both these guys need to be in 3A. Now the question becomes, how long will it take the Pirates to figure out they made these mistakes? Or, will they ever and just leave them here no matter what happens?
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The Rangers series is a blow out on paper. They have a few pitching problems right now but those boys are swinging the bat so expect to see some high runs allowed games. Look for Doumit to be showcased at first in at least one game. Just a hunch.
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Anup Sinha over at Bucs Prospects talks about the potential cost of our first ten picks in the draft, if we can get them signed that is. His account mirrors what I am hearing too, that there’s already some talk that Taillon may not sign with the Pirates. Perhaps that’s nothing but leverage play but it’s the same type of chatter I heard about Sano which came to be true.
One account I heard last week suggested that the Pirates wanted to take Machado but the Pirates somehow got wind that the probability of signing Machado was next to nil so that’s why they ended up taking Taillon. I don’t know how accurate that account is but I’m betting it’s close. If it is, then Taillon and his advisor know it too so I’m guessing it’s going to take stupid-stupid money to get him signed, if they can.
Look for the Bucs to spend ridiculously high over-slot sums to get average guys signed at the upper levels. Not because the prospects are worth it, but because it’s the Pittsburgh Pirates.
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Fantasy league action? 3-0 on the week and have one team that’s running 10-1 now. Unbelievable.
By Jake, on June 19, 2010, at 11:43 pm |
Happy Father’s Day to all you pops out there! I’m traveling Sunday so I’m enjoying an early celebration with the family and this will be short.
First, the Pittsburgh Pirates announced Zach Duke has an elbow problem and won’t make his next start, then iconic Pirates AP beat reporter Alan Robinson came out with a blistering critique of Frank Coonelly, and then the Pirates finally won a baseball game behind the support of Dick Groat, Bill Mazeroski, and Vern Law Saturday night after a pre-game ceremony that highlighted the 1960′s Pirates.
Oh, and Pedro Alvarez got his first major league hit and rbi.
What a day.
I expected the win, I expected Alvarez to finally find some turf, and I expected more problems with Duke:
“Here’s another tidbit on Duke — in his June – July starts since 2008 he sports a 5.74 ERA, a 4-13 record, and allowed 167 hits in 130 innings of work. Some fans were wondering if he has been intentionally throwing bad leading up to the deadline. This year – the year he is almost surely on the block – he sports a 7.04 ERA in June. And his trade value now is what?” Jake, June 17th
What I didn’t expect was Alan Robinson tearing into Frank Coonelly. Robinson didn’t dig very deep to put that article together because of all the additional gaffes by Coonelly and the Pirates front office, but it was enough to send a clear and convincing message to his former employer – Ogden Nutting. From spies in the press box to outright deceit, the Pirates are – once again under Frank Coonelly – in the middle of a public relations nightmare.
And there’s even more to come.
John Russell and Neal Huntington might be ’Fired Men Walking’ but, imo, Frank Coonelly and his cultish internal processes has created a paranoid society within the Pirates organization which has become bad business for major league baseball, not to mention this club. Coonelly’s quickly become one of the worst executive officers in the history of this organization and his policies, management style, and decision-making have come under attack by the Pittsburgh good old boys. Few survive such attacks.
Now, do Bob and Ogden Nutting have the balls to correct their mistake?
Don’t count on it.. denial is contagious on Federal Street.
By Jake, on June 18, 2010, at 11:39 pm |
“I’ve been keeping track, and the Pirates have yet to come back to either tie or win a game in which they’ve trailed by three or more runs. In other words, if they fall behind by three runs at any juncture of the game, they have yet to even come back and tie that game, however temporary, let alone win it.” – New Bucs reader from Pittsburgh
The Bucs certainly had a chance to bust that bad luck charm Friday night but, once again, failed to produce. Down 4-0 as they came to bat in the bottom of the 7th, Walker singled, McCutchen walked, and Jones singled thru the right side loading the bases with no outs. Church then crushed a line drive double into the notch clearing the bases and drawing us within one.
The Indians brought in southpaw Perez to relieve Carmona and I pulled out his pitching card and saw left hand batters are wailing this guy to a .390 tune this year. My heart started to beat just a little faster as Alvarez stepped into the box thinking it was his time and he hit a fly ball to medium depth center for the first out. Doumit came up dragging his .188 BA from the right-side and the situation screamed for Russell to go to Young, but it never happened. Doumit unproductively popped out meekly to short for the second out. The Indians then got a bit more serious and brought in Herrmann and he got Cedeno to fly out to left to end the inning.
Almost, but not quite.. but hasn’t that been the storyline of the year?
Tabata doubled hustling with one out in the 8th which provided another opportunity but Walker and McCutchen both made outs to end that opportunity as well.
Maholm pitched a good game keeping the ball down and had put together a two-hit shutout through six. It all fell apart in the 7th on a hot, muggy night with his pitch count nearing 90.
Peralta doubled opening the inning, Duncan flied out, and then Hernandez ground one through the right side that Church was quick to the ball on and that held Peralta at third. First and third and one out and Donald came to the plate. 1-0, 2-0, 2-1, the bench sensed a squeeze so they had Maholm throw to first and sure enough, Peralta was breaking for the plate, Maholm went out of the zone for 3-1, and then came in away and Donald hit it toward first. Jones saw it coming his way and did the best humpback whale dive impression you will ever see in your life which allowed the ball to go right under his glove into right scoring Peralta. Here’s the play:
So at this point it should have been two outs, one run in, and a runner at second then Maholm struck out Carmona for what should have ended the inning.
But, noooo..
With two outs after Carmona struckout, and two runners on, Crowe hammered a line drive through the left side for an rbi single, Choo smashed an rbi single through the right side making it 3-0, and then Hanrahan came in and Santana lined a 2-0 offering off the right field wall scoring Crowe while Choo got thrown out at home on the play.
Four runs scored – three runs after the Jones no-play. I mean, look at the play in the picture – you can see Hernandez has already taken at least two steps, Maholm has already landed and started to break towards first, and then there is Jones with his half-step lean job falling toward the ball in a quaint dive. Jones’ slow reaction on the play opened the door and the Indians took advantage.
Kerry Wood dragged his 8.03 ERA to the mound in the 9th to close the game out and Jones flied out, Church ground out, and Alvarez…
.. whiffed baby.
And so ends another tale of the hapless Pirates.
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McCutchen made a nice play in the 5th coming in hard and diving to catch Crowe’s falling liner. But earlier in the inning Donald golfed a line drive over McCutchen’s head and he nearly tracked it down but the ball went off his glove and Donald had a double. He was eventually stranded.
Neil Walker flashed some leather with a great far-ranging play to his right and throwing off-balanced in the air, he gunned down Crowe. Later in the 9th Walker had a chance to turn two but ate Cedeno’s relay when he saw Hafner sliding hard toward him. Crowe had hit that ball to short rather slowly so there might not even have been a double play chance, I don’t know. But you could see Walker was a bit preoccupied with Hafner coming at him and Walker not really having good technique yet receiving relay throws and getting out of the way while turning two.
Church and Walker also teamed up to nail Choo at home in the 7th to end the inning. It’s nice seeing Walker’s fairly decent arm out there as a relay. I’ve also said this a few times – it’s nice seeing Church patrolling right because he’s saving us some runs with his defensive play. Friday night he even had a clutch hit scoring three which makes it even better but if he gets consistent at bats, I think we’ll see his average climb back to the .260 range. While he’s not a fan favorite, he’s well worth the defensive runs saved in my book. DFA Milledge and send him down to Indy - nobody is going to claim him.
There were a couple of other great managing decisions in this game that stood out to me. In the fourth, Walker singled leading off the inning and then the bench ordered him to steal second with Carmona on the mound and McCutchen at the plate. He was out by a country mile plus another country mile. It was the second time the bench called for Walker to steal this year with Cutch up and less than two outs and both times he was nailed. I understand taking a little risk but when you have a team unable to score runs, you can’t run yourself into outs. Poor, poor managing.
In the 7th after Maholm gave up the leadoff double, I thought it was appropriate to pull him. He was pitching a good game but there had been some well-struck balls in the previous two innings indicating they were starting to see him better. As I noted above, Maholm should have been out of the 7th with just one run given up so it was one of those damn-if-you-do, damn-if-you-don’t type of decisions. But it was a hot muggy night, Maholm’s pitch count was climbing, and with the harder hit balls the previous innings, it just seemed to me it was a good exit time for him.
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I loved hearing this tidbit tonight after the game – the Pirates have lost eight of twelve by two or fewer runs. Yeah, but many of the teams fielded their “B” lineups during the stretch behind some good pitching which turned out to not be too good at the time. Plus, our starters have a 5.90 ERA last ten games and we’re hitting a season high .230 over that period but generating a season low 2.8 runs per game. We might have been close in the box scores but we didn’t deserve to be close in most of those games.
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Dejan Kovacevic spent a little time talking with Bob Nutting Friday and these two points stuck out to me:
DK: On 11-game losing streak, 20 games under: BN: “I’m frustrated but also shocked. Angry. Surprised at where we are…”
DK: If he’s frustrated, why no changes above the player level: BN: “I think it’s better not to discuss staffing changes as a public forum. I honestly believe that’s counter-productive. But I also believe that we have the right people in place, and I believe in the people in place so long as they are moving us forward in the direction we need to go. As soon as we don’t believe in those people, that’s when you make a change.” ( my emphasis )
I was impressed that Bob Nutting spent a few minutes with Dejan.. it was needed to clear the air. I was also impressed that he said he was angry because that’s not a typical Nutting word. But the fact he was surprised at where his club is at just reconfirmed that he remains too removed from baseball operations to ever be able to see outside the blinders he has always worn. The knock on the Nuttings in my book has always been that none of them have one iota of a clue how to manage a competitive sports team and they have been taken to the cleaners believing in the advice handed to them from poor baseball people.. people who have agendas the Nuttings didn’t see coming.
The problem with all that is, the man they picked to lead their organization is micromanaging their club to the ground and they refuse to open their eyes and acknowledge they made a mistake. When they hired Coonelly and agreed to allow him to hire Huntington knowing full good and well major decisions would be pressed through Coonelly, the Nuttings expected their organizational asset base to grow significantly larger than just through draft allocations.
No owner could possibly be happy with the short-term plan executed during the trades.. they were mostly unmitigated disasters and its left this club short on short-term talent which they didn’t expect to see happen. Not only that but the failed short-term plan now requires them to hold on to assets that obviously should have been dealt away because they can’t afford the losses trading some of these devalued players or the scrutiny of more salary dumping which should be done.
And that’s why we saw one simple article on a GM’s extension blow into a huge event requiring the chairman of the board to step up and issue what amounts to an apology for the organizational blunder.
Nothing has changed with all this, and nothing will change. The Nuttings seem content to run 1.2MM fans through the gates while praying their player development system starts to churn out talent in a few years. It’s not likely to happen because they don’t have the right people in place. It’s most likely going to come down to the players in the organization to – once again – take it on their own to force the change and that leads us right back to where we were when Leyland walked away.
This organization remains in a vicious cycle.
By Jake, on June 18, 2010, at 12:12 am |
E6 .. E3 .. E8 .. no offense, poor pitching, very little motivation. Therein lies an abstract view of the Pirates 11th straight loss. Yawn.
It all started with Mr. Ohlendorf who went to Washington still trying to find command of his off speed pitches this year. Thursday night he found some command but Sox batters swang at only 6 of them that I counted – the rest lazily missing the plate or were hung so bad even the batters were surprised. In fact, I don’t think he threw more than six off speed pitches to left hand batters all night long and one of those plunked Vizquel.
So Ohlendorf was left naked having to live on his fastball and that ‘aint a good thing. In all, 7 of 17 at bats that put his fastball in play went for hits (.412 BA). He threw a total of 87 pitches and allowed one hit every 10 he threw and one run every 17. There were the typical rocket launched projectiles our infielders couldn’t handle, there were numerous shots into the outfield our guys ran poor routes on allowing a gazillion extra bases, and there were even some incredible “look what the hell I found in my mitt” plays made by our defenders.
But the bottom line was that Ohlendorf looked even worse than his last time out when I proclaimed him DOA. It’s time to send Mr. Ohlendorf back to the DL to give his arm a rest. But in reality, Mr. Ohlendorf needs to check his makeup and make a decision if he really wants to play baseball or if he wants to go tag sheep.
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There were so many fundamentally poor plays it isn’t even worth going into them all. Alvarez made a couple of nice plays including one lateral play to his right that he bounced off the ground after catching, as well as handling a couple of crushed balls in flight toward his head or body he snagged attempting to defend himself. I especially liked the way he came in hard on Kotsay’s little dribbler in the 9th which he handled well. No, I won’t talk about the shots that actually went right past him - that wouldn’t be fair, all things considered.
At the plate we looked pathetic all night long with the biggest crunch job being at least 30% of all our two-strike swings were swing and misses. Buehrle is a good pitcher but he’s not that good. Why we sat back and allowed almost half of our at bats to get to 2 strikes was surprising in and of itself. But anyway..
We got a little artificial life in the 8th down 5-1 when LaRoche doubled off Santos, Tabata was walked, and Walker beat out an infield hit to load the bases. McCutchen then hammered a line drive into left scoring LaRoche, Thorton came in and gave up a sac fly to Jones making it 5-3, and Milledge singled through the right side scoring Walker and pulling us to within one run. Up to the plate strode Alvarez and he..
Whiffed baby.
Just like he did in the..
Seventh baby.
But in the fourth he out did himself.. with one out and men at first and second, he hit a rocket to Konerko at first which promptly went into a double play. The fact it was double play wasn’t all that surprising to me.. it was the fact he actually put wood on the ball that amazed me the most. Good job PA. Kidding aside, until he gets that first hit out of the way life won’t be fun for him.
Ah heck, I’ll tell you he also struck out in the second too..
Just missed that sucker, huh? Yeah.. by about half a foot!
I noticed Thursday night that Ryan Doumit has a new receiving style with Ross Ohlendorf.. notice the coy peek through the webbing of the mitt:
Man, are we a mess right now. By the way, did I mention Jones hit his 15th double of the year in the 4th? That’s right, it was a smash off the center field wall center fielder’s mitt.
Ok, enough is enough.
We played poor, we lost again, and now our GM’s daddy is coming in town who we all know wants to help the Pittsburgh Pirates anyway he can so we can expect a few wins over the next few days.
Right?
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So all the heat we’ve been putting on Frank Coonelly caused him to blink today by coming out of the closet and announcing he guaranteed severance pay extended Russell and Huntington last winter.
They say it happened in October but I’m not so sure about that because I happen to have internal correspondence from one VP in mid-November 2009 that indicates no extension had been given yet. Of course, since they were deceiving everyone, I suppose this is a lie too.
Tisk.. tisk.. lying to the media and fans is really a bummer man. How much lower can this ship sink if you can’t even be honest?
Well, they dug their own grave and now have to lay in it. It’s a shame Fox Sports had to break this story on them but, you know what, its past time this little clique is broken up.
The hot plate is just warming up baby.
And, no, I’m not going to waste my time responding to Frank’s lame PR release. You already know the real deal.
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