The Perfect Storm

Brian Cartwright, who writes over at Statistically Speaking, has improved on Tom Tango's Marcel projection system, thanks to a conversation about Jason Bay, Xavier Nady and the Devil Rays' prospect Reid Brignac, who was one of the players the Pirates were probably seeking in trade negotiations with the Rays.

Cartwright contended that Andy LaRoche and Brandon Moss projected to be more productive offensively than Brignac, and thus he goes on to take TangoTiger's Marcel projections to the next level.

It's heady stuff, but really interesting for those that have an eye on what kind of sabermetric tools the Buccos' front office is most likely using to evaluate players.

Poetry in Motion

The charts in this article put together by Dave Studeman over at The Hardball Times is probably the coolest thing that I've seen in the last few weeks.

Take a look at the National League chart. That little blue dot you see bouncing around the bottom of the graph as it goes from 1997 (the Freak Show year) through 2007 is a certain Pittsburgh team. And no, that's not a good thing.

Who Made Coup?

Jim Callis of Baseball America took a look at the draft class post-signing, and came up with 5 draft "coups" for the first ten rounds (1-10), and another five for the second ten (11-20). Your Pittsburgh Pirates showed up not once, but twice. This is the world we live in? (h/t to PBC Blog for the link.)

4. Robbie Grossman, OF, Pirates (sixth round, $1 million, No. 49 on BA Top 200)
Athletic switch-hitter adds to Pittsburgh's burgeoning outfield talent.

3. Quinton Miller, RHP, Pirates (20th round, $900,000, No. 158 on BA Top 200)
He shows flashes of a low-90s fastball, plus slider and average changeup.

If memory serves, Miller is the guy that was lured away from North Carolina (surely by the $900,000 among other things), and Grossman was the highly touted high schooler who fell to the Pirates in the sixth round because everyone thought he was going to college (at the University of Texas, I think). Perhaps money can actually buy love?

On a side note, ShysterBall (who lives in my hometown of Columbus, OH) is reconsidering his opinion of PNC Park after reading a New York columnist's review following the Mets-Buccos series.

Morgan Promoted

You'd like the circumstances to be better, but OF Nyjer Morgan was promoted from Indianapolis today to take the roster spot of Doug Mientkiewicz, who was placed on the bereavement list because his wife, Jodi, is undergoing heart surgery at Allegheny General.

Mientkiewicz is eligible to come off the list on Friday. As someone who has had several family members have major heart surgery in the Pittsburgh area (also at Allegheny General), I hope for a speedy recovery for Mrs. Mientkiewicz.

In happier news, the club avoided the sweep thanks to Steven Pearce, who hit a bases loaded single in the eighth to break a 2-2 tie on the way to a 5-2 win over the Mets. Paul Maholm pitched well again, but the win went to Sean Burnett, his first since 2004, after he bailed out Tyler Yates with two out and the bases loaded in the top of the eighth.

Third baseman LaRoche the Lesser went 2-3 with a walk, 2 R and 2 RBI, and John Grabow picked up his fourth save.

Uncle Charlie

Derek Carty at the always relevant Hardball Times has a great article up on perhaps my favorite pitch, the curveball.

I'm obligated to link to anything that uses pitch f/x since I enjoy it so much, so this is today's portion. If you ever want to explore the pitch f/x world as it applies to active major leaguers, I highly recommend the tool that Josh Kalk put together: Go Here.

Say Hey, Pedro.

The long, national nightmare is over: Pedro Alvarez is your newest Pittsburgh Pirate.

There's some really nice insight from Dejan in that post, and really, I can't say enough good things about the job that guy does on a day to day basis. He makes the Trib guys look like amateurs by comparison.

To begin, I'm willing to say that this might just signify the end of the low-spending Pirates.

To wit:

Alvarez's bonus, part of a minor league contract, far exceeded the $4 million the Pirates paid to pitcher Bryan Bullington, No. 1 overall in 2001. More striking, it was part of total spending on this 32-player draft class that approached $10 million, a figure made possible when owner Bob Nutting early last month authorized a significant increase. That total included $8,166,000 on players in the top 10 rounds and an additional $900,000 yesterday to lure the 20th-round pick, pitcher Quinton Miller.

That not only was a record for the Pirates, but also was roughly $2 million more than any major league team spent on the draft last season. The high last season was the New York Yankees' $7,655,000.

The Pirates spent more money in the draft than anyone else?!?! Be still, my heart. And even better, check this out:

The Pirates, according to one person intimately familiar with those talks, never budged off their number, and Boras' call came at 11:58 to accept.

Only certain people know whether or not that's true, but it's good to hear at least that senior management set a (by all accounts reasonable) number, stuck to it, and Super Agent Scott Boras saw the logic in that. Say what you want about Boras, but the guy is a great agent who knows how to take care of his clients, and he never passes on a good deal.

And perhaps the best quote of all:

"Bob Nutting has made a commitment to provide the club with the tools and resources necessary to return the Pirates to the greatness that this organization has achieved so often in its rich history," Coonelly said. "He has further demonstrated that commitment by his active involvement throughout this process and by providing us with the significant dollars necessary to sign Pedro Alvarez. We had to reach to sign Pedro and Bob was fully supportive of our decision."

The whole scene was a far cry from last year, when former general manager Dave Littlefield and his scouts bypassed a Boras client - Georgia Tech catcher Matt Wieters - and drafted reliever Danny Moskos fourth overall, drawing outrage from the public. The bulk of that was aimed at Nutting, but multiple accounts since then support the notion that it was a baseball decision rather than a financial one, despite what now has become apparent is a great gap between the two prospects in terms of talent.

There are no chimeras here, no chicanery, no ifs, ands, or buts about it: The Nuttings put up the money to fund the largest spending on a draft class in this organization's history. Of course, the criticism of them as low-spending cheapskates will come again next season if the major league roster doesn't change, simply because the players they have now don't cost much money. That of course isn't bad when you produce, but when it's been 16 seasons...

Anyway, not to go completely overboard, but this is a great signal that the changing of the guard is actually something different this time around. Pedro Alvarez was perhaps the best talent in the draft, and is easily the best player they've drafted since Andrew McCutcheon, and Bob Nutting and Frank Coonelly made sure that he was brought into the fold. Who are these Pirates? I'm not familiar with these kind of moves.

What's perhaps most interesting is how Coonelly had little regard for the slotting system that he tried to enforce while working for the Commissioner's office. Many were concerned that he would be unwilling to put up the necessary cash to sign talented draft picks for fear of going "over slot value," but when you give the 20th round pick almost a million dollars, that puts the speculation to bed, so to speak.

All in all, this is a great day to be a Pirate fan. I'm on my way to Houston to see the Astros play the Diamondbacks at Minute Maid Park, but I'll be back tomorrow with more. Go Pedro!

Bayes' Theorem and Andy LaRoche

Victor Wang over at The Hardball Times put together a great article today on Bayes' Theorem and applied it to Pirates' third baseman Andy LaRoche.

There's a lot in there that's pretty difficult to completely understand, so I won't try and pick apart all the gory details, but you should be relieved to read this part:

So given LaRoche’s minor league track record, he has a high probability of becoming an everyday player but a low chance of being a star. While this type of prospect might not seem too valuable, an everyday player cost controlled for six years is immensely valuable as Laroche’s surplus value using this Bayesian analysis coming into 2008 was $40 million. Making some basic assumptions about what Laroche could be expected to be paid, PECOTA had Laroche worth around $50 million in surplus value coming into 2008. So it’s good to see that the Bayesian system has a similar rating with PECOTA.

The CW doesn't like it when you trade a player of Jason Bay's caliber for four players, and none of them turn out to be super-stars, but the CW also doesn't understand how valuable it is to have productive, cheap, major league players. It's how Oakland in particular has been successful over the last ten years, despite not having a lot of (if any) marquee players.

More to come on the surprise demotion of another third baseman, Jose Bautista.

Draft Deadline Approacheth.

Buster Olney took a break from writing about the Yankees/Red Sox/Cubs/Angels to chime in on the ongoing Pedro Alvarez negotiations (ESPN Insider).

He says:

Does it make sense to walk away from guaranteed millions to play independent league ball or return to college for another year, while assuming the risk of injury or diminished performance (see Matt Harrington) will damage your value?

I just don't see it. I hope Alvarez signs.

As much as I'd love to remain as optimistic as Buster (and others), I'm still 50-50 at best on whether or not a deal actually gets done. It's absolutely the right thing to do to avoid paying ridiculous amounts of money to Mr. Alvarez and his agent (the Dread Pirate Boras), and I won't necessarily fault Frank Coonnelly and/or Neal Huntington for walking away from a bad deal, but they need to find a way to sign this guy, too.

In other draft pick news, Tanner Scheppers, the second round pick out of Fresno State who is recovering from a shoulder injury, was at PNC Park yesterday to throw 25 pitches for assembled dignitaries in order to show his relative health and perhaps sign a deal before midnight Friday.

Nothing really surprising there, except this towards the middle:

Freddy Sanchez and Jack Wilson - the National League's top double play tandem - sat out another game yesterday.

...(record scratch)...

I'm not trying to disparage my own team (most of the time), but in what universe, exactly, are Freddy Sanchez and Jack Wilson the National League's best double-play tandem? Offensively, defensively, or otherwise? Offensively, especially given Sanchez's performance this year, just about everyone is better, especially Hanley Ramirez and Dan Uggla, but also reigning NL MVP Jimmy Rollins and some guy named Chase Utley. Defensively, Adam Kennedy and Cesar Izturis are probably better, as are Troy Tulowitzki and whoever is playing second base that day. That's just off the top of my head.

Screw it, just take a look at the numbers (h/t to Baseball-Reference.com, and Baseball Prospectus, as always):

Offense:

Freddy Sanchez: .249/.271/.347, 66 OPS+ (!!!!) among NL second basemen. -11.1 VORP, by far the worst among NL second basemen. That's "terrible, god-awful, miserable, never should be in the top of the lineup, or the lineup at all" bad.

Jack Wilson: .271/.319/.331, 85 OPS+ among NL shortstops. 1.7 VORP, meaning he's played just above replacement level when he's played at all. The only consolation is that Brian Bixler (-6.9 VORP) and Luis Rivas (-3.3 VORP) have actually played worse.

Defense:

Freddy Sanchez: He's still got well above average range for a second baseman, as his range factor indicates (5.21 RF9 vs. 4.82 LgRF9), and he's only made 7 errors, but his FRAR (fielding runs above replacement) for the season is at 0, and his FRAA (fielding runs above average) is at -21. That speaks for itself.

Jack Wilson: J-Dub also has above average range (5.10 RF9 vs. 4.43 LgRF9), but his FRAR is only at 9, and his FRAA is a stunning 0. Again, when he's played this year, it's been at replacement level. It boggles my mind that people don't understand why teams aren't throwing the Pirates three good prospects for this guy.

Feel free to email the Trib and let them know how ridiculous this homerism looks to even mildly intelligent people.

Craig Hansen and Pitch f/x

David Golebiewski, a man with a truly Pittsburgh-esque name and a Duquesne student, wrote a piece for Driveline Mechanics (an extremely interesting pitching blog) where he took a look at the Pitch f/x data for Pirates' reliever Craig Hansen to perhaps determine whether or not Mr. Hansen would be as successful as the Red Sox hoped when they drafted him.

His conclusions aren't particularly pretty, but not entirely hopeless either. He finds that basically:

1. Hansen has below-average movement on his fastball, which gets hit hard despite an average speed of 95 MPH, particularly by left-handers.

2. His sometimes devastating slider is just that: crippling at times, hanging at others.

3. He might want to throw his changeup more often, particularly to left-handed batters, simply to give them something else to think about in the hopes of reducing that .315/.401/.476 line against lefties.

Given that he wasn't the centerpiece of the Jason Bay trade, I'm comfortable agreeing with David's conclusion that the chances for Hansen living up to his high potential are far less than 50-50. Let's hope at least that he can become a mostly reliable middle reliever to set the table for Matt Capps.

Ryan "The Real Deal" Doumit

Eric Seidman writing at FanGraphs has an entry up today on perhaps the second-best offensive catcher in the NL, our own Ryan Doumit.

Seidman concludes (as would any reasonable person) that Doumit is due for a regression to the mean, but only a slight one at this point, which will probably leave him with 18 HR and an .866 OPS for his final season stats.

Considering he spent another chunk of time on the DL this year, that's nothing to sneeze at. It's no wonder the beat reporters have been including talk of the club signing Doumit to an extension in the off-season, along with teen hearthrob Nate McClouth.

Sea Change

Anyone wondering whether or not Neal Huntington knows what he's doing will be encouraged by the last line from Dejan's game story today:

The Pirates' 455 walks are the most in the National League, third-most in Major League Baseball.

Get on base, and the runs will come. Someone owes hitting coach Don Long a drink or fifty after this season is over. The job he has done with the offense this year has been nothing short of remarkable. Now, if pitching coach Jeff Andrews could turn some of the terrible starting pitching around, we might actually have a real baseball team on our hands.

For now, I'll take what I can get. Things are getting better, right? .....Right?

Neyer Weighs In

It's a poorly kept secret that Rob Neyer is one of my favorite baseball writers, given that he is one of the few at ESPN who embrace the statistical side of baseball with both zest and vigor. I was hoping that he would write more at length about both deals, but he gave us some words today regarding the Bay/Ramirez trade. (ESPN Insider required)

To wit:

I'll note a slight sea change here; it's not until recently that a GM would publicly credit statistical analysts. In fact, many GMs didn't even want the
public to know they talked to statistical analysts at all.

I wasn't thrilled with the Xavier Nady deal, from the Pirates' perspective. Jose Tabata's star seems to have fallen (though of course he's still young).

But I love the Jason Bay deal. When you trade a great (or near-great)player, you have to get back a player who's got a real chance of being great. In Andy LaRoche, the Pirates got that player. The Pirates could have kept Jason Bay for the rest of this season and all of next season at a reasonable price. After that he'd have been gone as a free agent. They'll control LaRoche's contract through 2013, and if you could assign a dollar value to Bay through 2009 and LaRoche through 2013, LaRoche would come out way ahead.

The Pirates also picked up Brandon Moss and Craig Hansen, who both have non-zero chances of becoming useful major leaguers for at least a few years. And Bryan Morris, while still a long ways from the majors, immediately becomes one of the Pirates' top pitching prospects. All of whom make the package the Pirates got for Bay significantly more valuable than what the Rays were supposedly offering.

Neal Huntington still has plenty of work to do. But he's on the right
track.

Amen to that.

The Wizard

Great article from JoePo today on Greg Maddux, the only Brave from my lifetime besides John Smoltz that I've ever liked.

I'm on the road in the greater Ohio Valley this week, and I might visit the Great American Ballpark this weekend, since I've never been there. Exciting times. I'll do my best to say something worthwhile in the near future.

Also, much love to Xavier Nady, who had 6 RBI in the Yankee's 14-9 win over the Angels yesterday.