Help is Still Out There, but the Pirates Options are Dwindling

7-28-24 – By Gary Morgan – @garymo2007 on Twitter

It’s a hard time of year to write or talk about the Pirates.

Fans are worked into a lather by radio hosts and others who have little to no idea about who they’re asking the Pirates to get, let alone who they’re asking them to trade for them. There’s no analysis, just an endless parade of former GMs who have decades of being completely wrong under their belts, or hosts who’d rather be watching guys in shorts pushing sleds on a field in Latrobe than talking Pirates just mail it in and spew platitudes about how often prospects fail like that’s the only part of the equation.

I’ll do it anyway, but only because the truth shouldn’t ever be something to fear. If you don’t want to read my stuff because I’m not just telling you Bob Bad, Cherington Dumb, sorry, that’s a you problem, not me. Being only ok with being told what you want to hear has at least in part created the environment that turned our political system into a good vs evil perpetual battle, regardless of which side you believe to be which.

Once people have made up their minds, they tend to not want to hear anything else.

Now apply that to trade season. You’re told a player like Jazz Chisholm will fix your team, in fact, if they don’t get him, they don’t care!

He’s been taken off the board, some will pivot to the next ultimatum candidate that carries the weight of determining whether they tried or cared or whatever, others will rail on Jazz for the duration.

The truth is, he’d improve the team, just nowhere near as much as fans want to believe. No, I didn’t want him, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to try to sell you on him being worthless. I just didn’t believe he’d help enough for what he’d cost.

The package the Yankees sent and the reporting that the Pirates lost because the catching prospect they offered (Henry Davis) wasn’t as attractive as Agustin Ramirez was to the Marlins tells me two things. First, the Pirates disagreed with me and went after him with a package that had every chance of winning, and second, the perception of Henry Davis, or at least his ability to stick behind the dish is all but written in stone for more than a few clubs, Miami included apparently.

Some fans just want to see something they consider a win on it’s own. In other words, they want to win a deal over other teams, but they forget how quickly that celebration turns into criticism of a desperate GM who reached for help but spent for HELP. Fans get guided to and caught up in the contest that is finalizing a trade, and it becomes more about the hunt than it does the prize. You forget after chasing down your target, hey, this thing is dented.

This isn’t about hugging prospects. It’s not about overvaluing anyone who’s here currently. It’s about honestly looking around the league.

I just don’t love anything out there. I’d take some guys, hell, I’d have taken Jazz, I for sure would have taken Randy Arozarena, they’d help, but you have to not only be willing to offer the right package, you have to have it.

The perfect storm is a center fielder who is already established and good as an MLB player, with term, meaning he’d remain a Pirate for at least 2025 too, but 2026 would be even better, and it would be tremendous if they didn’t need to be platooned. Oh, it’d also be cool if they at least consistently played, if they have a vast injury history, you probably haven’t solved this issue.

Jazz Chisholm fit some of those stipulations and so does Luis Robert Jr, neither fit all of them.

That’s ok, sometimes that’s the best you can do, and in that case, you go for one and hope whatever aspect of your wish list they were missing, they either surprise you and overcome or you accept that close is as good as you’re going to get.

Sounds to me like they did with Jazz, just came up short. Robert is a different animal, one that requires not only being ok with the prospect cost, but his “term” comes with the privilege of paying his 15 million dollar salary in 2025, and picking up his options the next two years for 20 apiece. He’s plenty talented enough for that, but he also hasn’t stayed healthy.

Will the Pirates go get someone to help them before the deadline, I remain convinced yes. Will it be one of these guys that were clearly the biggest names on the board? Well, it sure won’t be Jazz right?

At the same time, this team is beat up. Bryan Reynolds is out of Bereavement, and could be back as early as today or Monday. Rowdy Tellez has back spasms, but looked like he was prepared to give it a shot if an emergency cropped up in last night’s game.

Ke’Bryan Hayes hasn’t been right all year. Nick Gonzales either got himself a severe cramp yesterday or hurt his lower half last night.

Point is, they are playing a team that’s right where they are, and they’re doing it with half their current offense tied behind their backs. A trade isn’t fixing that.

Doesn’t mean they shouldn’t make one, just means getting one guy based on who’s available publicly, isn’t righting this ship. They need to get healthy and quick. They need to get their starting rotation back to it’s strongest state, and quick.

And fans need to remind themselves this isn’t 1992, they’ll be in this again in 2025, even if they fall short in this campaign. For me, you never miss a chance to get into the dance if it’s there. More accurately, you shouldn’t ever miss an opportunity to add if you have the hardest thing to build already on your roster, a pitching staff. Even if you own a crystal ball, you have no way of knowing how many times you’ll have Jared Jones, Mitch Keller and Paul Skenes together as a unit throughout their tenures as Pirates.

I don’t need to remind you how often Jameson Taillon and Gerrit Cole overlapped do I?

So if you have a chance, by all means, fire the damn cannon. Just remember, there isn’t a player out there who turns this into more than a good swing at it. That’s ok, and a big part of why so many would prefer this not be rentals brought in, they’d like to see this move help the franchise for more than what could wind up being a fruitless effort, instead helping the club into the next season at the same time.

That’s the want, now all they need is willing partners, and the right prospects to close the deal.

Even if the Pirates had never uttered the word “competitive” or “compete for the division”, with 58 games left and sitting at .500, fans would be right where they are, ready to bolt on. The management put their own expectation into this story by telling us what it was, good on them, and to their credit, they haven’t backed off of it.

Now it’s up to them to fight the reality that is this current trade board and either get creative to snag someone that hasn’t been talked about, reach a little for a guy who mostly fits, convince a team that isn’t excited about moving someone to do so or overtly fail to add anyone of significance.

This season has already been a step forward, clearly, but Pirates fans haven’t been able to really ingest it because before the season even started their sights were set by the club higher than just improving.

There is no prize for finishing second, so missing on Jazz if that indeed was their top target as it appears probably hurts. In a normal year, I’d tell you they should just pivot to choice number 2, this year, that just isn’t as clear as you’d hope.

Almost a month ago I told you all in 5 Thoughts that I didn’t ultimately think the A’s would move any of their pieces because they have to live on their Vegas timeline. That club has to be at a certain point by the time they open that new joint. I was told I was making excuses for the Pirates failing, but what I was really doing is reminding you in 2021, the Pirates wouldn’t just trade anyone either, they had specific pieces available, not everyone and their mother.

That’s all there is to it, a league with a ton of teams that are kinda sorta in it, trying to buy players from teams that are either in their positions due to a ton of injury and/or intentionally playing youngsters trying to decipher who is and isn’t a part of this thing.

They will add. I promise, it will underwhelm, even if it helps.

But I could have, and did tell you all of this about the landscape months ago.

That’s not an excuse, Ben is the GM, he needs to find a way, that’s the job, if he doesn’t, nothing I mentioned will matter or excuse the failure. A GM doesn’t get to list off reasons for failure, they instead will come out and try to paint the picture they chose this path. They’ll never directly tell you how close they came to trading someone, they’ll never directly tell you what was asked for, they’ll instead turn inward and tell you some vague messages about why nothing out there made sense for them, or why what they have in a position is suddenly enough. I mean, they won’t even directly tell you how restrictive the owner is about adding payroll, even now, despite his public statements. That’s part of why Jazz was so realistic, he added virtually nothing to the payroll this year and would remain reasonable in 2025.

When the deadline passes, the Pirates will likely have added some pieces that you don’t consider big enough and it’s on them to be right when they do.

Just don’t forget, they don’t need players to become competitive, they need players to become more competitive than the handful of teams right there with them.

They’re better than they’ve been, headed in the right direction, that’s just not enough for fans who haven’t seen a winning record in 8 years.