Here's to the Next 17 Years!

As most of you probably already know, the Pirates clinched their record 17th consecutive losing season on Monday following a 4-2 loss to the Cubs. It seems nothing's gone right for the Pirates since that devastating loss in Game 7 of the 1992 NLCS, and Pittsburgh's season-long fire sale suggests that the streak could hit 20 unless some young Pirates develop quickly and simultaneously in the next couple years.

So how do small-market franchises like the Pirates, Royals, and Nationals compete? Joe Posnanski has some ideas. As always, Joe P's piece is a damned good read, but with apologies to Joe, I think my favorite part of his article this time 'round is actually a link: "How David Beats Goliath" is one of the most enjoyable New Yorker essays I've read in a long while (which is saying something), and it's food for thought for a beleaguered small-budget ball club. And as Justin Bopp's recent BtB post illustrates, a small-market club can get a lot of bang for its bucks if it makes smart (and lucky) investments or manages to exploit inefficiencies in the market (as Sabermetricians have attempted to do since time immemorial).

#17 is all but in the books now, Pittsburgh front office. It's time to do something gutsy and innovative. Hire Bill James. Bat your best hitter second. Scout soft-tossing control artists. Put together a team of banjo-hitting defenders that makes the Mariners outfield look like Little Leaguers trying to shag flies in a 30 mph crosswind. Sign a golden retriever. But don't simply stay the course and doom your fans to 17 more years of "rebuilding."

Comparing Pirates Aces

Only one team remains in my WAR-based analysis of NL Central aces of the last half century: the Pittsburgh Pirates. Once again, I had to do some digging to find my four candidates. Two were obvious: Doug Drabek, whose brilliant 1990 campaign is an early formative baseball memory of mine, and Dock Ellis, charter member of the Shrine of the Eternals and subject of some of the great baseball stories of the '60s and '70s. Once I bolstered my Pirates knowledge with a bit of research, I realized that to round out my final four I need look no further than the Bobs: Bob Friend and Bob Veale. Both were excellent pitchers who get overlooked because, with the exception of Friend's World Champion Pirates of 1960, their teams were mediocre to terrible. But, as I hope to show, they were extremely valuable on the mound during their tenures in Pittsburgh.

Because Friend started pitching before my available WAR data (his rookie year was 1951, but Sean Smith's WAR database begins with 1953), he gets short shrift in this analysis. But, once each pitcher's seasonal WAR is graphed in descending order, it becomes pretty obvious that Friend was still far and away the most valuable Pirates pitcher of the past half century:

Friend easily outpaces the rest of the Pirates pitchers on my short list. His 48.2 Pirates WAR is likely low by 2-3 wins since neither his 1951 nor his 1952 season is accounted for (which, by the way, is why I haven't included a career WAR graph as I have in previous posts), but Veale's 26.8 is the next highest total, and he's not even close. Veale surprised me, actually. I expected him to beat out Drabek, which he did (26.8 to 21.8), but I expected Drabek's peak to be higher. Basically, I figured that Drabek burned a bit brighter but not for long enough, when in fact Veale's Xth best year beat out Drabek's Xth best year every single time. Impressive.

Unfortunately, Ellis surprised me, too. I was really pulling for Dock to make a better showing than the 14.5 WAR he put up as a Pirate. But he just didn't produce like the other three men on my list (though I will say this for Ellis: how many stories do people tell about Bob Friend throwing at every single batter he faced in order to motivate his team?).

Next up: the final "battle royale" between the top pitchers from each team. Gibson! Jenkins! Higuera! Oswalt! Rijo! Friend!

Numbers! Graphs! Unicorns! Exclamation marks!

Yovani: "I got this guys."

Milwaukee Brewers 1 Pittsburgh Pirates 0

While Yovani Gallardo was busy striking out 11 Pirates and giving up only 2 hits and a walk, his teammates were busy getting shutout by Ian Snell despite getting 4 hits and 4 walks and only 5 strikeouts. So in the bottom of the seventh Yovani decided to do it his damn self and crushed a pitch into the left field stands.

Gallardo is rocking right now. Unfortunatly NL Central Stage favorite R.J. Swindle got sent down to Nashville when the Brewers activated Trevor Hoffman. He only got one appearance with the Brewers while he was up. We wish him the best of luck and hope to see him thoroughly infuriating hitters soon.

Pittsburgh Pirates PWMBA: Andy LaRoche

If you take the time to research Andy LaRoche you will find a lot of articles with phrases like "failing to live up to the hype" and "lackluster major league career." Also, thanks to me now, there is an article that links "Andy LaRoche" and "punching babies."

LaRoche joined the Pirates late last year as part of the Manny trade. His first year and a half with the Dodgers were unimpressive to say the least (OPS of .671 and .641, EqA of .245 and .231). It is therefore not surprising that the Dodgers were willing to let him go despite good minor league numbers (OPS 2006 AA: .901, 2006 AAA: .950, 2007 AAA: .987). LaRoche was on a fast track to becoming LA's solid third base starter but instead everyone is trying to figure out what went wrong.

The trade to Pittsburgh brought LaRoche to his brother Adam's team, which (as I'm sure the Pirates management thought) in addition to being a good marketing tool might also help Andy relax and work out some of his problems. Initial indications are that this has not happened as in 49 games with the Pirates in 2008 he posted a line of .152/.227/.232. In addition all fielding metrics I have seen indicate that LaRoche has been an average to below average fielder at third base as well.

So what did go wrong? Well for one thing LaRoche was very unlucky in 2008. His cumulative BABIP for the year was 0.177. His LD% was 15.6 so it can be expected that his BABIP will be higher this year. In 2007 his BABIP was .294 and his LD% 18.6, much more in line with expected ratios. The real shock though is his apparent loss of power. In his total minor league career of 495 games LaRoche has posted a .517 SLG, and his lowest total for a complete year (excluding 2003 when he played 6 games as a 19 year-old) was .428 last year in only 45 games. LaRoche's highest SLG year in the majors was .312 in 2007 in 35 games. LaRoche seems to have a good batting eye and takes a good amount of walks (1 in every 8.6 MLB PA).

Hopefully LaRoche was able to work out his problems this past offseason. Most projections seem to think he will bounce back and get his BABIP up around the .265 area. His problem will be getting his power back up, and these same projections all predict him to have what would be his highest MLB SLG year. I see one problem with this: PNC park has been a low HR ballpark for the past several years and although it has in a couple years been favorable to the hitter for hits, the rate was never above 1.118 in the last five years. It is therefore difficult to expect LaRoche to get a boost in power numbers from his home stadium.

LaRoche may continue to develop as a hitter but it would be hard to expect him to post numbers similar to his minor league numbers that made him a hot prospect. It is also reasonable to expect his defense to be average at best. I would expect that LaRoche will continue to be slightly below average and therefore fit in well with the Pirates.

FA FA FA: Pittsburgh Pirates

Pittsburgh Pirates (67-95)

Significant FAs: Doug Mientkiewicz (1B/3B)

Significant Gaps: SP, LF, RF, SS, 3B

The Pittsburgh Pirates face significant hurdles this upcoming season. While they don't lose any significant free agents, this past season saw trades that lead to the departure of Jason Bay, Xavier Nady, and Jose Bautista. The return on these players include many prospects that will not be ready for a callup to the majors in the immediate future but also some players that will be immediate starters in the Pirates lineup/rotation, mainly Andy LaRoche, Brendan Moss, and Jeff Karstens.

The Pirates' pitching staff is the biggest weakness on the team. In 2008, the team posted a team ERA+ of 81. The only starter who pitched more than 10 games with an ERA+ over 90 was Paul Maholm. They desperately need some help and while Jeff Karstens has some decent minor league numbers (1.26 WHIP, 7.47 K/9) he has only pitched in 24 games over three years in the majors. The Pirates need some more quality two and three starters in order to be able to compete in the Central. The Pirates should attempt to sign someone like Mark Hendrickson (1.45 WHIP, 89 ERA+ career) or Jason Jennings (1.55 WHIP, 97 ERA+). They may also want to gamble on a player like Mike Hampton (1.43 WHIP, 109 ERA+; so many injury issues that Mike Hampton is a euphemism for injury issues) or Bartolo Colon (1.33 WHIP, 112 ERA+; probable Mike Hamptons). Their strongest starting pitcher prospect, Brad Lincoln, is coming off of Tommy John surgery so he will need much more rehabilitation work before he will be ready.

Pirates batters posted a team OPS+ of 99 this past year. This is really not that bad and would be very good for them coming into this season considering Freddy Sanchez and Jack Wilson had poor years (.271/.298/.371, .272/.312/.348 respectively) and they could hope for some more production from the two of them. However the team OPS+ of 99 includes Jason Bay (137), Xavier Nady (144) and Jose Bautista (95, but his replacement, LaRoche, was a staggeringly bad 24). Their likely replacement for Jason Bay is Brandon Moss, a good prospect (.287/.355/.460) but he has not had much production in the majors (.249/.312/.437, 261 AB). Replacing Xavier Nady I wouldn't be surprised to see Steven Pearce get significant playing time in RF. While his production in the majors (.266/.313/.412, 478 AB) has been poor, he has some monster numbers in the minors (.290/.361/.519) and may just need the chance to turn it around (or maybe he's pissed that those monster numbers didn't translate into a major league job in 2007, I don't know). Regardless, it may be wise for the Pirates to add a veteran OF to step in should one or both of these young players fail to perform. Moises Alou (.303/.369/.516, 42 years old next year and possible health hamptons), Eric Hinske (.254/.335/.438), Greg Norton (.252/.339/.427) or Brad Wilkerson (.247/.350/.440) would be good additions to the roster, although admittedly I don't know how any of these individuals would react to being offered a part-time job in the Pirates' outfield.

The Pirates' infield is pretty solid with Doumit, LaRoche, Sanchez, Wilson, and LaRoche (yeah, another one). Sanchez and Wilson, as I said, are coming off of bad years but I would expect them to be given the chance to bounce back in 2009. Even though I say this, it should be noted that while Freddy Sanchez played significantly below his career numbers in 2008 (.271/.298/.371 2008 vs. .300/.336/.417 career), Jack Wilson didn't significantly perform below his career numbers (.272/.312/.348 2008 vs. .269/.312/.375 career). I expect him to be given a chance to play up to his 2007 numbers (.296/.350/.440) however there are rumors that they could look to trade him. If this is the case and the Pirates don't receive a SS in return (or even if they do depending on the quality), they should look at Nomar Garciaparra (.314/.363/.525) despite him being all Mike Hampton and find a decent quality SS (Alex Cintron) to fill in if there is a problem.

Of the remaining players, the weakest and only player that they could look to improve on is Andy LaRoche (3B). While it's cute as hell that two brothers are playing in the same infield, Andy LaRoche's major league numbers (.184/.288/.272, 316 AB) are a cause for concern. He has some powerful minor league numbers (.294/.380/.517) and the small sample size probably is a major factor, and honestly the move to Pittsburgh to play with his brother may show dividends in improved numbers due to more comfort or some other anecdotal thing that I can't possibly look up. He should get a chance to play but the Pirates should have a backup plan. They traded Jose Bautista which takes away one option. They may want to try to retain Mientkiewicz (.271/.360/.405 career).

So the Pirates should be looking primarily at starting pitchers, emphasis on the plural. While it would be nice to land a big name pitcher this offseason, i.e. Randy Johnson or Derek Lowe, they have too many holes to fill and should instead focus on signing multiple pitchers that could be decent starters, i.e. Hendrickson or Jennings, or possible gamble on pitchers that have had All-Star years but recent problems, i.e. Hampton, Colon or Penny. A good outfielder to provide insurance to the young bats currently patrolling the outfield would be a good idea as well. SS and 3B are positions that they could improve on however honestly their efforts should be pitching before anything else and to enter into a bidding war for a quality infielder could take away team funds from acquiring pitching closer to league average.