Paul Meyer has the recap.
One thing I don't get is the persistent criticism of the Pirates fans and Pirates media for their "infatuation" with Jack Wilson. We like Jack Wilson, for sure. Wilson is one of the most-quoted players in the clubhouse, yes. We get his version of events often. But I doubt Wilson would agree that we have a blind eye for his gaffes. Read the recap and see if you agree.
So he quit to relax and smoke weed. That's what I'm reading right here. If we all didn't know that Ricky was retiring to smoke dope and be an idler, we'd see a much different response to his decision to get out early. More people would admire it.
A few years ago I had a meeting with a retirement counselor about how much I needed to put away every month. She asked, at what age would you like to retire? I said I don't know, 65 or 70, and she spit out her coffee. Most people say 50, she said. I'm young enough to not know what I'm talking about. Most of you people hope to retire early.
Football is such a brutal, body-destroying sport, I won't be surprised if early retirement doesn't become a lot more common among the highly-paid superstars. Barry Sanders was the first and Ricky Williams won't be the last. Seriously, once you had four million in the bank, would you play one more year and risk serious injury so you could retire with six million instead? How much is enough? I could retire right now on one million.
Free agency is still a pretty new thing in baseball and football. We haven't seen the last major change in the game that will be wrought by the rise of individualism among highly-paid American professionals. The middle of the twentieth century, with its memory of the Great Depression, its celebration of modest expectations, and its respect for stable careers and jobs that grew with the employee, was very kind to professional baseball and football. It was good for the team. Today, what could be more obsolete than the company man? In this era of looted pension plans, you're just a sucker - the most loathsome kind of fool - if you are so naive to think that your loyalty to one employer will be rewarded. The team player today is adept only at joining the ad hoc.
Considering that free agency was long overdue when it was first introduced, we can expect the rapid pace of related change to continue. There will be no more sports teams where the owners, front office people, and players all feel like one big family. That's gone forever. And the team concept will continue to erode. Especially as we pervert our appreciation of team sports with games like fantasy baseball or fantasy football.
The only thing that will preserve the tradition of single-team careers is a shortening of the average career. Some lucky and healthy baseball players will stick around into the 40s because the game can be so much easier on the body. And if the game and the travel become easy for you, why retire? If they don't have much health, however, why should the highly paid stick around into their 30s? Take Chipper Jones or Ken Griffey for example. Or J.D. Drew or, in a few years, Jose Reyes. How long will they stick around to risk further damage to their already crippled bodies?
Before long, guys like them will retire early to enjoy their money and their body in their wealthy retirement. Before long, football fans will expect players to retire after a few highly-paid years. And, when it's no longer shocking, the fans will idolize them for it. Because they, too, would do the same thing if given the chance.
It's a battle of fifth starters as the Pirates close out this series with the dread team from Atlanta. It's a day game after a night game so perhaps Noonie and House will get a start somewhere.
If you're going to the game and plan to sit in the outfield, make sure you bring your glove. Thomson has been pretty easy to hit this season.
3:45pm ... grumble.
John Perrotto has his summary of the state of all things Benson.
I don't feel too qualified to make judgments since I'm sure we only learn about 2% of the overall picture through the media. I'll just sit back and wait for something to happen. And not be surprised if nothing happens after all. An 83-win season would have a lot of value for the team in terms of ticket sales, and Benson would be a big help in the drive toward that goal.
If Mike Restovich and Mike Ryan are the best the league will offer for him, then the rest of the league can go to hell. I know the Cool Kids on the web all think Benson's a "proven mediocrity," but the GMs around the league should know better.
This is the best case I've seen about the Cowher extension.
For me, it was a no-brainer. I didn't give it much thought. Of course you extend him.
Mac should apologize for the unprofessional comment. That ain't right. Few teams are so well served by their beat writers, and Mac has no right to question a reporter's professionalism over one story that got out of hand and embarrassed him and some other people.
And why the touchiness about the possibility that a frustrated twentysomething ballplayer would get upset with his boss? Is there a single GM in the league who is only loved, day in and day out, by his players? Of course they'll get mad at him sometimes.
That said, the players have their point - read this for an example - but all this is garden-variety grumbling about a garden-variety careless comment. And none of this is the fault of a beat writer.
Get some sleep, you Pirates people.
Steve Novotney interviews Rob Mackowiak, who discusses his season to date as well as his thoughts about the future.
Tonight two aces square off at PNC.
After winning five straight starts, Russ Ortiz stymied the Bucs in Atlanta in his last start. It was a day game after a night game and Mac started some of the usual backups. Tonight Ortiz should see our best and brightest.
Paul Meyer's new Q & A is up.
The buzz in it shows that Pirate fans see some light on the horizon. They know the promised land lies over the next hill.
I'm inclined to take Littlefield's side of this. We expect the players to try hard; they don't get points for that. Wells has not been the ace this year. You are what you are, as Tony LaRussa says (I think that's a LaRussa line), and the players have to be mature about it. No one is attacking his character or questioning his heart if he says the Pirates need to get more out of their ace if they are going to win a championship.
That said, Littlefield has been pretty blunt in his assessment of the team as lacking. I read those comments as putting some spine in his demands for particular kinds of players: we need them, he's saying, we have to have them. They are a lot like the comments Jim Duquette made about not trading his "first-born son": you can't have them, he said, we won't give them to you. Littlefield can't expect the players to go along with whatever stance he's taking as he negotiates with other GMs for the best players he can get. These guys are living in the moment and no team can roll like this without believing they could beat up some teams in the playoffs.
High emotion is good when the team is winning. More fuel for the right kind of fire.
Raise your hand if you once owned this album. Hard to believe Ratt is still touring.
This post has nothing to do with baseball or the current standings or anything like that, so I apologize for wasting your time. As you were.
Brandon Linden has launched a new Pirates site, GreenWeenie.com. Drop in and cheer him on.
If you need help with the allusion in the title, enjoy these "Gunnerisms" of Bob Prince and read a fuller history in this biography of Danny Whelan.
We just saw this guy Paul Byrd and beat him.
...10pm ... all hail Rob Mackowiak. That guy is a keeper.
Two more for a glimpse of the Promised Land.
Steve Novotney catches up with Mac and finds him scratching his head about the 2004 schedule.
Anyone else catch Lanny's rant (on KDKA) last night about how everyone uses the expression "games under" incorrectly?
When someone says the Pirates are three games under .500, I take that to mean they have to win three games to get back to .500. Lanny would say the Pirates are one and a half games under .500 because if they had won one and a half games instead of losing them, then they'd be .500.
Lanny, why are you surprised that people prefer to look forward and think in terms of whole numbers? I was more irritated than amused because I had so many questions in my mind about the game. We need those guys to be our eyes. It must be hard to grind out play-by-play for game after game after game, so I don't want to sound too hard on Lanny, but sometimes he makes his job harder than it needs to be. All we want to hear is straight-up plain description of what's going on. Instead of some rant about semantics and how all the world but you is stupid, I'd so rather hear something like, "Wright adjusts his cap. Now he's scratching his balls. None of the Atlanta outfielders are moving. The fans on the left side of the upper deck are all wearing the same color t-shirt. Looks like a school group. They have the Andy Warhol picture of Jason Bay on the jumbotron now. Wright adjusts his cap some more. OK, now he's set. Here's the pitch . . . "
Tom Veil observes:
if interleague games were not counted, the Pirates would be in 2nd place in the NL Central and in 2nd place in the Wild Card standings
The NL Central standings would look like this:
STL 52 35 0.598
PIT 45 40 0.529
CHC 45 42 0.517
CIN 45 43 0.511
HOU 42 45 0.483
MIL 40 46 0.465
But every game counts so we live with that 2-10 interleague record.
Ken Rosenthal's latest Inside Dish shows some love for our man Mack:
Pirates IF/OF Rob Mackowiak, a former 53rd-round draft pick, began the week with 14 home runs in 309 at-bats. Mackowiak held his own batting third after 1B/OF Daryle Ward was injured, and few players can match his combination of skills. Not only is Mackowiak a left-handed hitter with power, but he also is an above-average runner with a right fielder's arm.
Charlie is blogging about Doug Manishevitz, a guy Rosenthal describes as a good fit with the Red Sox. Looks to me like the Twins want to move salary and open up some lines of playing time for other guys. Plus Doug has been underachieving. He has had tendon damage in his left wrist and he just came off a DL stint to get him healthy. He could be primed for a short burst of quality play for someone - it looks like a good buying opportunity if you believe in buying low and selling high. Necessity never made a good bargain and the Twins have some necessity to unload Mientkiewicz.
Like Charlie, I'm not sure Mientkiewicz is a great fit with the Pirates. Yes, he's left-handed and he fields very well and so he'd fit with the plan of adding guys that fit PNC and fit a rebuilding around starting pitching. On the other hand, he just signed for two years and he's owed $3.75M for 2005. I don't know how much DL will have to spend next year but we can only assume it's about the same amount as he had to spend this year. So it seems like a lot for the Pirates to throw after a first baseman with little power and a recent injury history that reminds me of Pat Meares. If I was Dave Littlefield, I'm not sure I'd want to come home from the mall with such a huge purchase after giving so many lectures on the limitations of the family's monthly budget. Can you see it? "Hi, honey, I'm home. Guess what . . . I got a great deal on an oriental rug that is going to be perfect in the living room . . . can you believe it was 50% off just because of this teeny-tiny tear down the middle? I'm sure your mom can sew it up and make it good as new and it only cost three thousand dollars."
Doug could be going somewhere else as part of a series of trades or a multi-team trade. The Twins want to lose him. GMs are bargain-hunters so he's probably getting a lot of interest around the league. The Pirates have shown interest in the past, but I do believe DL was asking about him before the Twins signed him to that big deal this past February. These days, other teams can better afford him.
...the good people at Bat-Girl are already mourning Doug's loss. Apparently, many fans in Minnesota love their Doug and don't want to see him go.
The Bremerton Sun reports on Jason Bay's success for their readers in the Pacific Northwest.
We just saw the Braves and they have continued to play well since we saw them last.
They'll start Jaret Wright, Paul Byrd, Russ Oritz, and John Thomson in this four-game (weather permitting) PNC homestand. The Bucs sold a ton of tickets this past weekend and I hope they sell a lot of tickets this week, too, though some heavy rain will discourage long commutes. The team has been responding to the "jolt" of the recent large and rowdy crowds and they'll need all the joltin' they can get as they finish this homestand.
Jaret Wright is the frontrunner for the Comeback Player of the Year. He was hurt a lot with the Indians and brought into Atlanta on a one-year, 850K contract. We all thought he'd wind up in the bullpen but he's churned out 19 starts this year.
His numbers are pretty good on the year but it's easy to see a few weaknesses. A right-handed power pitcher, he's been vulnerable to lefthanded batters this year (.283 / .371 / .420). He's also had a real problem with the stolen base the last few years - opponents have had success in 30 of the 32 attempts he's seen since the start of 2002. On the whole, though, he's been consistent and effective. He's the subject of feel-good stories worth reading.
Rain, rain, go away.
I saw this last night on ESPN:
NY YANKEES 1ST
-Top of the 1st inning
-K Lofton doubled to center.
-D Jeter sacrificed to pitcher, K Lofton to third.
-G Sheffield singled to center, K Lofton scored.
-A Rodriguez reached on infield single to third, G Sheffield to second.
-J Posada hit by pitch, G Sheffield to third, A Rodriguez to second.
-H Matsui hit sacrifice fly to center, G Sheffield scored.
-B Williams flied out to left.
Jeter gives away an out to move a runner in scoring position to third base. The ESPN analysts praise him for it and start to talk about "productive outs" and the wisdom of getting an early lead. No one mentions that Lofton would have scored from second on Sheffield's single.
Jack Wilson did this exact same thing on a Wednesday in late June::
PITTSBURGH 1ST
-Bottom of the 1st inning
-J Kendall hit a ground rule double to deep right.
-J Wilson sacrificed to pitcher, J Kendall to third.
-R Mackowiak singled to right, J Kendall scored.
-C Wilson popped out to third.
-J Bay reached on infield single to third, R Mackowiak to second.
-R Simon walked, R Mackowiak to third, J Bay to second.
-T Redman singled to right, R Mackowiak and J Bay scored, R Simon tagged out at third.
Mac came out and let everyone know that he didn't order the bunt, that it was all Jack Wilson, and we all agreed it was a boneheaded play and an example of the way Jack needs more work on some parts of his game.
The Pirates are often abused for their smallball tendencies by half-interested and half-informed writers who mainly devote themselves to more fashionable teams. So let's get this scenario straight. Even though Jeter did it and was praised for it on baseball's biggest stage, that was nonsense and Jeter was a bonehead for dropping down that bunt. Right?
Mac said that describing the Bucs last weekend.
Oliver Perez looked good on Friday. There should be a few more stars on that hat though. And the Saturday stripes were winners too.
What do you think of the 1979 uniforms? They're audacious by the current standard. And I like to see the Pirates getting insolent with the rest of the league.
From the end of John Perrotto's recap:
Mackowiak got it and the Pirates completed the sweep on a weekend in which they honored their last World Series-winning team from 1979 and drew a season-best 100,417 for the series."It's great to be a Pirate right now," Bay said. "It was just a great weekend all the way around."
Good time to be a fan, too.
Remind me to pick up my Jason Bay jersey the next time I'm in Pirate outfitters.
Steve Novotney talked with Mac about Willie Stargell and the way the game has changed since he was our man at first.
Highest level of Pirate killings in more than a decade. For real. It's kinda scary.
The Braves should stay out of the water this week.
My wife really likes this show which is all about this team that goes home and sweeps out all their shit and redecorates and then decides it's an all-new home and now they will go forward and kick ass and be the great winners they always thought they could be in that home.
She's always turning on TLC to look for Maternity Ward or Labor and Delivery or anything where women have babies and graphic C-sections and so forth, and that's all she finds, Clean Sweep.
This has nothing to do with today's tremendous victory so I'll wrap it and end the post now.
Milan Simonich reports on the movement in Washington, D.C., to have the Expos relocated there as the Grays.
I'm still hoping the Expos become the Las Vegas Explorers but, if they move to DC, I'm sold on this proposal.
A DC team should be the Grays. That town sees too much in terms of black-and-white. The Grays could remind them to find a middle ground.
Visit their website, Remember the Grays, where they have a petition going.
Check it out. Pirates have scored 432 and allowed 427 on the year.
Some writers get excited about "run differential" and regard it as the best predictor of future success. It's another measure, I think, but one that's more descriptive than predictive.
G'damnit, five back again. If the Bucs lose tonight and slide to six back again, I'll pull some of my hair out.
The Reds send some of the usual suspects to the mound in this series.
Acevedo is a little guy (for a pitcher) who is pretty close to leading the league in home runs allowed. The only thing holding him back is ineffectiveness; he trails only Matt Morris, Eric Milton, and Greg Maddux in HR allowed.
Aaron Harang has been pretty effective since we saw him last. He's a huge goon who doesn't strike out lots of guys. Craig Wilson should be happy to see him.
Brandon Claussen is a 25-year-old finesse lefty the Reds got from the Yankees. He has pitched seven good innings. New to the league, he could have continued success as hitters try to figure him out. Fans attending Sunday's game are in for a treat since they'll be able to compare Sean Burnett against comparable rookie starters.
I doubt I'll be back until Monday, but those doubts mean little since a week ago I was doubting I'd be back before the end of the month. Let's go Bucs.
I guess Bobby Cox isn't getting Kris Benson:
"You hear a lot of rumors about him going to other places, and you can see why," Atlanta manager Bobby Cox said after watching Benson stifle his team Wednesday night. "Scouts seeing him [Wednesday night] would have liked him an awful lot." Benson allowed five hits in eight innings against the Braves. "He throws strikes and attacks hitters," Atlanta catcher Johnny Estrada said. "He's got a live fastball and a good slider, and he pitches inside a lot. And he kind of 'short-arms' the ball. A lot of guys were coming back to the dugout saying they were having trouble picking the ball up."
That's from Paul Meyer's notebook. Speaking of Paul Meyer, I think I missed his Q&A this week. We'll catch up with it next week. Those things are great.
Great column today from Gene Collier.
I know at least one family of Steeler fans who'd like to leave Honolulu and live in Pittsburgh.
Many people who have lived in less free societies love America because only in free societies can the patriotism be optional. That's another thing to add to Ron Cook's latest.
Generally speaking, you won't find politics or off-topic posts here because we believe you came to this site for one reason. And it would dilute your enjoyment to find something else here. A fan is a person who goes where the fans go when the fan has a spare dollar or a spare hour. The more diverse the crowd of fans, the better I think. Sports should bring people together. If you start to put conditions on being a fan - you also have to support this, or you also have to believe that - then you are working toward a more homogenous group of fans and it will be less fun (because less surprising) to go and join that group of fans.
How's that for a ass-backwards explanation for a homogenous blog?
You people can fight all you want in the comments, and maybe we'll join in, but we won't make readers feel that certain political beliefs are a prerequisite for getting in the door and getting a good seat for the action and a good cup of good beer.
Thus spoke Moses:
"Who gives a shit if you're second, third, fourth, fifth or sixth? If it ain't first, it ain't first," he said.
Place in the standings is not as important as overall win and loss record. I trust Mac senses the danger in this comment, though. You can't let the players think there's no difference between winning 67 and 73 and 76 games. Each win makes the final record exponentially better. Winning courts winning. Speaking of which, I'd like to see some winning this weekend.
[Ed. note: I restored the profanity. Mac seems to like the word "shit" so I put it in there for the bleep of the Trib editors. Mac can thank me later.]
This is better for the grumblers who get upset because his wife calls in to the radio. Steve Novotney has the story.
The Pirates play a night-and-day with Atlanta and then it's bring on the nappy Reds.
The Braves are beating up the rest of the NL East, winning about 2 of 3 against division opponents to date. They are hot, coming off a 7-3 stretch, and they just split a pair with Philadelphia. Last night's game went to extra innings so we hope they're still tired when the ump cries, "Play ball," tonight.
Atlanta sports a dangerous lineup. Rafael Furcal, that speedy middle infielder, often leads off. Little Giles is back to play the sparkplug in the two hole. An improbably healthy J.D. Drew has been cleaning up from the third spot. He's among the league leaders in HR, R, BB, OBP, and SLG. Next comes the 2004 edition of Chipper Jones, which has been pretty maimed and ineffective against right-handed pitching. Then Johnny Estrada, the Prince of Doubles, and Andruw "Gold Club" Jones. Andruw is no Dorian Gray and I don't know, but, you ask me, he looks like that fast living has taken its toll. The Braves also get tremendous production from two platoons. Adam Laroche and John Franco man first and Eli Marrero and Charles Thomas, a recent call-up who's been fantastic, alternate in the outfield.
Kris Benson couldn't ask for a better audition. GMs all over the league will want to see if he can carve up a lineup that is about as good as any in baseball. Atlanta counters with Paul Byrd, who has missed a lot of time with injury.
Tomorrow it's Kip Wells and Russ Ortiz, Atlanta's 11-game winner.
Speaking of Jason Bay, he has five Ks in his last seven at-bats. The ROY competition is still wide open for sure.
Time for another sit down with the good king of quality hitting, Randall Simon?
Maybe Bay will sit tonight for Alvarez.
Sean Burnett has pitched forty-five innings and given up zero home runs.
Jose Mesa has allowed one in forty innings; Brian Meadows has allowed one in forty-four.
I do believe Sean Burnett leads the majors for most innings without a home run allowed. Say what you want about the lack of strikeouts, the lack of gopher balls also deserves notice.
Jason Bay may have some competition for ROY before the year is done.
Mike Gonzalez: seventeen innings, twenty strikeouts, four walks, ten hits. Throws left-handed too.
If he can do that for fifty or sixty innings, then I think we have a closer.
Stolen bases are one of those things - like the hit-and-run or the sacrifice bunt - that we associate with the National League style of play. They've taken a beating, too, from many serious and many more amateur sabermetricians as old-fashioned and more exciting than genuinely useful.
Look at the MLB standings for steals, however, and you see that the five teams with fewer than 30 steals are all members of the National League. The Rockies, the Cubs, the Astros, the Gents, and the D'Backs trail the big leagues in steals. How can so many NL teams abandon the steal?
The Pirates have 39 steals - the same number as Texas. Going into last night, they were tied with Boston at 38.
Mac and DL often talk about finding better players. It's no secret that they hope to make better players. One area that needs work is the steal. The Pirates have only converted sixty percent of their chances this year. They have to do better than that. The Mets, Philadelphia, Seattle, Anaheim, and Cincinnati are all converting 75% or better.
Who needs to get better? Jason Kendall (8-for-15, 53%) and Bobby Hill (0-for-3, 0%) are the only players with three or more attempts and a lousy success rate. Rob Mackowiak is 10-for-13. Redman hasn't had as many attempts as we expected from him going into the season, but his success rate isn't so bad that a good steal or two won't make it look a lot better.
The East is locked up and the only doormat there, Montreal, has been playing better of late.
The contending teams are bunched up near .500. Put Florida or New York in the NL Central and they are 12 games out of first. New York is fading - they've won only 3 of the last 10 - and they have Ty Wigginton injuring Mike Piazza between unlikely home runs. Florida and Philadelphia will play 11 of their remaining seventy games against each other.
Looks to me like the NL wild card is sure to come out of the West.
In this morning's USA Today, the Steelers are listed as three point favorites in the home opener. That is going to change I think.
We'll be taking the Steelers.
Hard to believe someone would open his mouth to even suggest such a thing.
Pops hails from Earlsboro, Oklahoma. Shall we cancel a four-game PNC homestand to play games at Earlsboro High?
People often use the "m" word to describe things McClatchy has done lately. Hyperbolic? You decide. Steve Novotney makes the case here.
Chuck Finder breaks down a recent study by the Philadelphia-based Center for Sport Psychology describing the different fans of different areas. Finder has a little fun ventriloquizing the Pittsburgh fan as an illiterate moron. This is ironic since an ESPN study praised Pittsburgh's fans for having the country's highest "Sports IQ."
Overall rankings of such things are stupid, really stupid, but the information revealed in the details of such a study can be illuminating. Unfortunately, I can't find a copy of the study on the web though it looks like every sports page in America has their own take on what the study says about the fans of their region.
The 24-year-old Brad Eldred struck out 97 times in 334 at-bats.
Strikeouts are less of a worry with power guys since they don't shorten up with two strikes. But one in a three is a lot for a 24-year-old in A ball, don't you think?
For the AA Reading Phillies, 24-year-old first-base slugger Ryan Howard has 117 strikeouts in 346 at-bats.
After 90 games, the Bucs are still banging against a ceiling of six games under .500. If they finish there, of course, they repeat last year's record of 75 wins. They have to do better than that. Hopefully they avoid another losing streak and start another winning streak after treading water for half a week or so.
Livan Hernandez is a 6'2", 240-pound right-handed horse. The man routinely throws a ton of pitches but he averages under 16 per inning. Jason Schmidt and Curt Schilling have similar numbers on the season and per inning. This means that Livan runs up his pitch count for the season by (a) being effective and (b) staying healthy. He's hit hard sometimes but he's rarely injured. It's not clear to me what he's doing on the Expos. He could be grade A trade bait on a team with Montreal's record. Last April he signed a three-year, $21-million deal with Montreal and there he is today.
After throwing a complete-game shutout against the Blue Jays, Hernandez was pounded in back-to-back starts against the Braves. He allowed thirteen earned runs in six and a third innings. He should be primed to rebound tonight.
Sean Burnett could use some help from his infielders tonight. Any chance Simon sits against the big veteran righthander?
It could happen. Starkey doesn't think so, but it could happen. I think it comes down to Wells or Benson and right now, I'd keep Benson. Who cares what Jack Wilson says.
While Torres enjoys his vacation waits out his suspension, I wonder what movies he's catching with his wife.
Kill the line about the Pirates not playing or wanting to play rookies. It's not true, as John Perrotto reports.
After an All-Star break vacation (from the web at least), Steve Novotney is back with a report on second-half things.
Halleloogy - the AP reports the Pirates will host the 2006 All-Star game. Lots of coverage of this all over the usual Pirates outlets.
By 2006 we should have what, three, four, five, or six starters in the All-Star game?
The Cardinals are looking for right-handed relief help (second story right now, "Redbirds focus on middle relief"). I'm sure other teams are looking at him as well.
Mesa does best when handled consistently and respectfully. No bringing him in for "work" in non-save opps, no mouthing off about him doing what you'll say he'll do in the newspapers. He's been great as a Pirate and for that reason, I hope he sticks around.
Mac acknowledges him as a closer-in-waiting.
Do you think the Pirates will (a) bring back Mesa for 2005, (b) hire another "Proven Closer" for about $1M to do it in 2005, or (c) let Torres handle the job?
...Torres has eight years of MLB experience and he's making 775K this year. If he closes the last two months of the season, he'd be due for some kind of raise to come back next year. I could be wrong, but I don't think he's signed for 2005.
Still has a lot of work to do on that on-base percentage, however. He hit .274 in June and he's hitting .300 in July but the OBP hasn't crossed .300 for the same period. Not good for someone the team half-expects to hit leadoff.
One thing at a time, I guess.
Daryle Ward had a baby. We look forward to seeing what his pop can do when he comes back from his rehab assignment.
Hard not to like Bob Dvorchak's recap today.
Billy Koch's response is pretty classic and classless:
"Nothing against him, but he's not a home run hitter," Koch said. "Give up a home run to a slap hitter with a tie score, it's not good. What's that? His second career home run?"
Ten in a row at home goes down like a tall drink of water after wandering months and years in the desert. If you look at the win-loss records of all the teams in the NL Central, Pittsburgh stands out, in a bad way. Very heartening to see this changing and changing fast.
Joe Rutter reviews the recent history of the Pirates in the second half. I expect 83 wins by the end of the second half. This team can do that.
Smizik on the Giles deal. Bay's batting eye is discriminating. His .370 OBP is tremendous, and his little career (300 AB) OBP of .393 is even better. Giles's OBP was stupendous, of course, but Bay is no Jack Wilson in the hurry-up-and-make-contact department.
No one expects him to continue this pace. He's no Ruth, no Kiner. But the Pirates will settle for what he is: A likely Rookie of the Year and a cornerstone for the future.
It's great knowing Jason Bay will be around for at least a few more years. If you're looking to get a Pirates jersey and don't know what name to choose for the back, look no further.
We could keep this guy Kris Benson. To hell with all-you-can-eat B prospects. We got plenty of guys who can compete for bench spots in 2005. Why drop big coin on Kip Wells when Kris Benson is pitching like we knew he could? Give the man a fair-market-value one-year contract for 2005 and watch Peter Gammons call him Cy Young next March.
And huzza Jason Bay, our 2004 Rookie of the Year. Step aside, Ryan Madson and Akinori Otsuka, and let the man come through. And don't talk to me about Kaz "Alligator Arms" Matsui.
Give 'em hell, Buccos, and make them like it. Send 'em home all sad and sore. A good winning roll about now would do wonders for all the fans here, there, and everywhere.
Cruise the links on the right-hand side. There's lots of good stuff over there.
I'll be back. I'm not sure when, but it will be before the end of the month at the latest.
A.J. Burnett missed nearly all of 2003 after Tommy John surgery. He's been back for eight starts this year and he's been excellent. He's not striking out a batter per inning like he did before the surgery, but he's been just as effective as he has cut down on his walks. Looks like he's trying to go deeper with fewer pitches as part of his ongoing rehab. He's 27 and he'll be eligible for free agency next year. None of our current Pirates have seen him before so he'll have that advantage. Kris Benson starts for the Pirates and he has been effective against the current Marlins.
We just saw Pavano before the break. He was good for six and didn't factor in the final decision. The Pirates counter with Kip Wells.
Brad Penny weighs somewhere in the Randall Simon range and can be worn down. He throws very hard, has a bunch of pitches, and has been outstanding overall this year. Oliver Perez slips into the third starter's spot to face Penny. He didn't fare so well against this team last week, so here's hoping he does better this time.
Not one of these Marlin starters are signed for 2005.
I will be back before the deadline, but maybe the Pirates will make a trade while I'm away. So here's a generic response.
Wow, I'm surprised/a little disappointed/mildly overjoyed. Best of luck to the departing players.
Let's see if the new guy(s) can play a month without blowing out a knee/elbow/ankle before we get too excited about what they can or can't do.
It's not sensible to judge any trade in hyperbolic terms right when it happens, so I won't do that.
Story here. He's telling reporters that teams offering star players can choose between medium, large, and jumbo collections of scrub players.
It's pretty clear, he doesn't want to make a trade and he doesn't want to look pessimistic or timid. By holding out such "bargains" he can blame the other guys when the top-quality players go to other teams for top-quality prospects.
John Perrotto has a report.
Question of the day: What will Craiggers make in arbitration, assuming his second half is as good as his first?
David Ortiz money?
Who had the bright idea to give the Pirates this night off? We'll have to settle with looking in at the competition.
The Cardinals beat the Reds, 7-2, and still lead the division by seven games. They are twenty-some games over .500. Angry man Matt Morris was OK for six before handing the game over to the usual suspects. Edgar Renteria, possibly embarrassed by his not-up-to-Jack-Wilson-standards play in the All-Star game, had a shitload of hits. Say what you want about their run differential, the Reds are still five games over .500. With Wily Mo Pena working his way into a can't-bench starting gig, the Reds will turn that run differential around in a few games.
The Cubs beat the Brewers, 4-1. One of their young starters--I forget his name--left the game with some kind of discomfort in his elbow. Unfortunately, they just moved Jimmy Anderson to Boston so they'll have to look elsewhere for starting depth if the kid is out for a while. Glendon Rusch came in and pitched a bunch of innings in relief. The Cubs are eight over .500 and own second place. The Brewers are three over and sit in fourth.
The Astros and the Pirates had the night off.
I had a hard time reading Ron Cook's piece on Jack Wilson because the thought of Pat Meares and Kevin Young makes my skin crawl.
It's hard not to like a confident kid with bad teeth and a wife who works as a waitress. Cook's description of the hazing Wilson endured in his rookie season makes me sick. Hopefully the team is not repeating this behavior with the new guys. If there's one thing a manager ought to be able to do, it's crack down on that kind of nonsense.
We can't forget that the players are competitors. They form cliques and haze rookies because they exhaust themselves competing with one another. Competition within members of a team can be healthy if the terms of promotion are transparent and related only to performance that translates into winning. Competition between members of the same team can also be stupid and self-destructive. Ridiculing Jack Wilson because his wife is a waitress would seem to fall into that category.
I remember the game Mike Prisuta describes in his column about "Tanner's commitment to the abstract" in 1979. I also share a bit of his sense that Mac may play it by the book a bit too often. It makes a lot of sense to attack another club methodically, to have the discipline to adhere to that method, and to attack weaknesses in another club. But, like Josh Fogg, a manager without the best stuff can only be most effective when he has the other team on their heels.
When a method becomes predictable, it provides an opportunity for the opposing team to focus on their more obvious weaknesses. It's easier to get better, too, when you know how you'll be tested by another club. When a relief pitcher has dominated right-handed hitters and just struck out one of your best lefties, sometimes you have to attack his strength and smack him with the unexpected or he'll his continue his good work toward improving the obvious weakness everyone expects you'll test.
In football, I always admire the coaches who attack another team's strength. Say team B has a strong D-line but the worst secondary in the league. And team A has a fairly balanced offense. All week long everyone expects team A to attack team B's secondary. A good coach might see that as an opportunity to do the opposite. Team B opens with nickels and dimes with new wrinkles they've worked on all week, but team A opts instead to run right at them. When this works, team A has 100 yards rushing and ten points before team B realizes team A came to run.
Or you'll see an offense take an unconventional approach that appears to succeed because the defense can't adjust. Remember when the Patrios came out and threw something like 30 straight passes on the Steelers? They couldn't adjust.
When an unconventional approach doesn't work, the coach looks like an idiot. Perhaps it's easier to think of examples from football, where games happen only once per week and are surrounded by so much more expectation.
Mac is not a perfect machine in the dugout, but there have been times where I've thought the predictability of his matchups weaken their edge. During the losing streak, for example, there were times when Mac was shrugging his shoulders and saying we had all the matchups we could have wanted. No doubt when the Pirates get on their next long winning streak we'll see some crazy decisions paying off here and there.
Paul Meyer reports on some farther-away guys in the minors. Bonifay is a bit old for AA but who knows what he'll become. Ray Sadler was a good acquisition.
Richard A. Mathews of the inimitable OnlyBucs.net has this column praising G. Ogden Nutting as a Pirate fan and successful businessman. FWIW, Mathews writes that Nutting was a "long-time family friend" to "young Kevin" while Smizik reported last year that the two were only brought together through a third party.
As the Pirates come back to PNC Park, I remember the end of Gene Collier's July 5 editorial:
"Absolutely," McClendon said when asked if this homestand will really mean something when the next one starts July 16. "I know this team has tried hard to win at home and to win the admiration of the fans. They're very satisfied when the fans are up cheering and I know it means a lot to them."
Our pleasure, Mac. It would be great to see them shake off that San Juan series with some crowd-rousing play this weekend.
It's bush league to fire your manager in the middle of a season. It's disgraceful and cowardly. If he was that bad, or that clearly not the right guy, he should have been fired last November. What's the excuse? Has Jimy developed an uncontrollable crack-smoking habit in just last few months? They are scapegoating him so they can change directions without looking weak. If I was an Astros fan, I'd be embarrassed for my team. My condolences ...
... I spoke too soon. If they're going to get Phil Garner, no condolences necessary.
All kinds of fun in Paul Meyer's new Q&A.
I do believe said Charlie Wilmoth has a blog, Value Over Replacement Blog. The title alludes to a one-stat measure of a player's overall offensive value relative to the "freely available" replacement talent. It's created and published by Baseball Prospectus. I'm no fan of one-stat measures of ability and sometimes I wonder how freely available replacement talent truly is, but c'mon, it isn't right to complain about everything no matter how surly I'm feeling about that series in San Juan. The VORP stat has value and I recommend it for your reading pleasure.
Some interesting things in those VORP rankings. Craig Wilson trails Brian Giles by a small margin in right field. Jack Wilson leads the NL in VORP. He has more than twice as much VORP as Edgar Renteria. This could be what Roger Clemens was grousing about when he took the mound yesterday.
At Charlie's blog I see he's arguing with the wind about his position on J.J. Davis.
We've gone over this here. Shorter Rowdy: the development of no one player is worth more than the development of the team as a whole. I'm cheering for J.J. Davis. I hope he goes 2-for-4 with a home run and a stolen base in his next big-league start. But he has to earn PT the way the rest of the guys earn it. I could go on and on but he's injured and headed to Nashville so it's all academic right now.
Go read the rest of Charlie's blog. He is pretty devoted to the Pirates so he's my kind of guy. The take on J.J. appears to be the weak link in his patter.
I think we all know what happened at the All-Star game. Roger Clemens took the field and was rattled by the sight of Edgar Renteria at shortstop. I didn't see the first inning but I'm sure he was cursing and mumbling to himself as he realized that Jack Wilson probably wouldn't play behind him at all.
Next McKeon, conscious that the Marlins open the second half in Pittsburgh, kept Jack until the sixth inning in some kind of bound-to-fail attempt to diminish Jack's self-worth. Edgar Renteria is a great player, but the NL All-Stars would have been better served by subbing in Jack Wilson ASAP. If you are like me, when lesser NL All-Stars were swinging and missing pitches, you were thinking, "Jack Wilson would have hit that pitch." And when Edgar Renteria missed those ground balls and botched that double play, you were saying to yourself, "Jack Wilson would have made that play."
So, it all boils down to Jack McKeon selfishly seeking an minor advantage in this weekend's series at PNC Park. Shame on you, old man. Yet another reason why it's hard to get excited about an exhibition game in the middle of the season.
Last Saturday I sat in an Eat-n-Park and read all the papers while Rowdietta slurped down mac-n-cheese. I read a column by someone (can't remember who, can't find it online) that said if you are going to lose, lose big time. The argument ran that there's no more shame in losing 100 games than there is losing 81.
This is not true in baseball, especially for the Pirates. Winning 81 is far better than 80 is far better than 79 is far better than 78 is much, much, much better than 61. Every stinking win counts right now.
Winning teams start winning before anyone expects it. A team must court winning every day if they expect winning to come and stay with them for any extended period of time. Even a blind squirrel will find a nut now and then. Even rotten teams will string together winning streaks or win dramatic games against high-quality opponents over the course of a season. Streaks and individual dramatic wins signal nothing about the improvement of a team that goes beyond the fact that the team won another game. Only by pressing always - and through all moods; the pressing can't be the kind that turns into monotonous depression or single-mindedness - will the team be ready for winning as quickly as possible.
In other sports, the draft can offer some compensation for losing a lot. Not in baseball. Tanking on purpose to greatly overpay Matt Bush is no way to rebuild a franchise.
For the Pirates to build a new dynasty, they have to find, develop, and acquire better and - most important - winning ballplayers. Then they have to increase their attendance to increase revenue to the point where, if they have the wisdom, they can recognize and retain their best players. I'm not going to get into what the team's profit margin ought to be or how much more the team could probably afford to spend on payroll. All I know is the team is not selling out every game and they could be selling out every game and they will sell out every game when they win and win and win and win some more.
The only way this happens here is winning. You have to win at home so fans leave thinking, "How soon can I get back to the ballpark?" Manny's pork sandwiches can sustain us through occassional losing. Only winning keeps baseball at the front of the fans' mind. And, just as important, a team also has to win on the road so they can roll into town with a head of steam. Fans generally decide to attend games and then plan their attendance a few days in advance. Winning on the road gets the fans excited and creates some anticipation for the next homestand.
No one expects the Pirates to win every game, but you can only go to (or watch, or listen to, or read about) so many lost games before you start thinking about the Steelers or fishing or Spider-man or the girls of Maxim or whatever it is that usurps the place of baseball in that small handful of diversions your average hard-working fan can afford.
So win, win, win. Every win is huge, and all wins are equally important and dramatic and necessary in the long run.
I expect we'll see a deal or two after the game tonight. No one wants to announce some deal and have that compete for coverage with the game and the home run derby. Poor form. Any deals tomorrow or later this week probably won't involve the Pirates. That's my hunch. What's yours?
Ed Eagle induced Mac to hand out some midseason grades. In Mac's defense, he doesn't appear to have given much thought to each subject.
That said, I take issue with the generous grades. If the goal is to win a world championship, you have to reserve the A marks for performance that gets you into the playoffs. The B marks should go to wild-card contention performance, the C marks for .500 play. The Bucs are too far below .500 to earn grades that average any better than D.
So I'll grade them like this. Hitting, C plus. Fielding, baserunning, other such things, F. Starting pitching, D minus. Bullpen, D.
If the players want better grades for what they've done so far, they can take that performance and go dominate some beer league. A C grade has to be more difficult to earn at this level, and the players should understand that the manager is not running them down or stunting their development when he tells it like it is. You are what you are, and this current crop of Pirates are pretty far below .500.
They've had some great games and they are great people, but you guys are losers until you win. And there's no excuse for not winning at least half your games. Overall I'm giving them a D for the first half. There are bright spots and I am optimistic about the possibility of much better performance in the second half. The Pirates do not "suck" and they are not "worthless" or "hopeless" or "going nowhere." There can be dignity in low grades for a team working hard to get better. But you are what you are and until they are .500, they can't expect "B" grades for much of anything.
...John Perrotto is also a bit too generous in my judgment. It's hard to decide if you grade a player relative to your expectations for him or relative to the demands of his role in the system. For example, Tony Alvarez and Jose Castillo get "C"s from Perrotto because, I think, his expectations are pretty low given that they are rookies. If the goal is winning a championship, grade by the demands of the role. Alvarez hasn't done much as a fourth outfielder, and since his playing time is limited, we'll pass on nailing him with any grade but incomplete. Castillo gets a D or an F, though. He hasn't played like a second baseman on a winning team. I don't disagree with the decision to keep him around and fast-track his development, but admit it, his play this year hasn't helped to get the team above .500. Redman has been an F, Wells has been an F, and Craig Wilson has been a C. The gaudy numbers are nice but he has to figure out how to distribute those numbers more consistently. Your clean-up guy can't slump like he has without seriously hurting the team's immediate chances.
Brian O'Neill's latest on the subject of Jack Wilson strikes me as wise in several respects. For one, players on losing teams shouldn't get impatient with the front office for contract extensions. Win some games and then we'll talk. That would be my attitude. If that creates resentment, fine. Get the selfish asshole off the team. Players that want to put the cart before the horse can play somewhere else.
For two, the hullabaloo about Wilson not drawing walks is foolish so long as he maintains a .340 OBP. I have only a pitifully slow dial-up connection available to me this week as they remodel the $4.2M Rowdy estate (yeah, right) so I'm not going to find and link to the pre-season editorials I generously shared with the world on this subject. A .340 OBP from Jack Wilson was something of a dream then, and we'll love it now. If you had to choose between getting your .340 OBP on a .240 BA or a .330 BA, which would you choose? You'd be a fool to choose the former.
Anyone who thinks they look smart predicting that Jack Wilson won't finish the year with a .330 BA - for whatever reason, be it his walk numbers, the quality of the pitching he has faced, or his astrological sign - is self-deluded. One might as well predict that it will snow before Halloween. All the talk about Wilson's high BA being a "house of cards" makes the author look foolish and worse, so stubborn they're unable to see some good where it's evident in abundance. You get nothing but negative style points if you (a) are a non-fan writer with a national audience and (b) are so resentful that Wilson didn't live up to your pre-season predictions that (c) you can't restrain yourself from kicking a team when it's down with your dime-store prediction that Jack Wilson probably won't finish the season with a .330 batting average. Why not go for broke and predict he won't finish the year with a .400 batting average? If he finishes the year with a .290 batting average and an OBP that is below the top of the league's range of team averages (about .340), then you can get out your pen and stick it in the ribs of Pirates fans if you are still so insecure about the public's lack of undying respect for the wisdom of your pre-season predictions.
Huzza Jack Wilson. I don't give a damn about the All-Star game since I fail to see how his nomination will improve on our current place in the standings. And I don't care to re-sign Jack Wilson or anyone while the team is so disgracefully far below .500. All that said, Jack Wilson has made a huge improvement at the plate this year and I'm sure the improvement is here to stay.
Now tell me how a team can have such a quality shortstop and be so low in the standings.
With the Pirates off until Friday, it's a good time to give it a rest, so I won't be posting much the rest of the week.
