7-5-23 – By Gary Morgan – @garymo2007 on Twitter
Ahh, nothing like a West Coast trip to ensure the Pirates do things we don’t see when they play earlier for us.
Question 1
Gary, to what extent is a computer (analytics) creating or greatly influencing the lineups these days? – David Pegram
There really isn’t much in baseball that the analytics department doesn’t at least provide a report for, but the manager still has the final say.
A perfect example is really how Derek Shelton handles on boarding prospects. Analytics surely showed him that Henry Davis belonged in the top of the order, but lacking MLB analytics, Derek recoils and puts him lower because that’s what old school Derek learned to do with kids.
To his credit, he didn’t make it last a month, but sometimes it takes the analytics and the manager’s eye a bit of time to “agree” if you will.
There are systems where the lineups are almost 100% generated, but the Pirates aren’t one of them. They still leave that power and decision making in the hands of the on field staff.
Now, does that mean Ben Cherington never sees a lineup as compared to what was analytically generated and ask for a change? On game day, yes, he won’t interfere. Next day though, I’m sure they compare notes, and I’ve heard as much.
The final bit of this, most old school baseball people (including me) won’t like. Analytically speaking, lineups, specifically the order in which they bat, doesn’t matter beyond the number of expected at bats. Anyone who’s watched a lot of baseball in their lives seem to firmly believe the order is crucial.
Again, that’s where I land too, but as baseball continues to rely more and more on numbers and such, we’ll see more and more oddities, at least to us.
Question 2
Crews /Skenes compared to Cutch/Strasburg. Knowing their history and if they were the same, would you rather have Crews/Cutch or Skenes /Strasburg. – Scott Nelson
The yinzer in me sees a Cutch comp and finds it very difficult to answer anything other than that. Cutch has certainly had an impact here, and he’ll finish his career likely just short of the Hall of Fame.
A whole lot of what makes Cutch, Cutch, is his personality, his passion for the city, his ability to carry the face of the franchise tag for a decade plus. Scott, I’m not sure you can draft that, and I’m equally sure you can’t expect it. For that reason I can’t factor in anything I know about Cutch beyond what he’s done on the field.
Strasberg helped deliver a World Series, but we can’t ignore his injuries which much like comparing Cutch to Crews, I can’t assume the litany of injuries, I can’t assume the want to be the face of a franchise vs looking to get right back out when FA hits.
On the surface an easy question, and without thought my heart says Cutch 100 times over. My head gets involved and it’s really hard to turn away someone who you could legitimately have open every playoff series for you in a given year.
Honestly, super happy I don’t have to make this call, but I still lean Crews, slightly.
Question 3
Once Hayes is back off the IL, what do we do with Triolo? He is making a really good case to stay with the team once Hayes is healthy. – John @JGor492 on Twitter
He is having a good introduction to the Bigs for sure, but first things first, when it comes to third base, Hayes is superior. Analytically speaking and honestly, the eye test too.
There was a play against the Brewers that Jared backed up on to get a better bounce. He fielded the ball and didn’t have time to throw out the runner. Hayes knows everything out there, including how fast every baserunner is. He’d have charged that ball instead, knowing that retreating meant a single regardless but charging he might just get it and make the throw. That isn’t showing up on a box score, and technically he did nothing wrong.
I say that and I can honestly say Triolo could step in and be the 3rd or 4th best 3B in the National League by the end of the season.
The thing about Jared though, he has defensive skill all over the place. SS, CF, 1B, 2B I honestly think his greatest value might be that he can legitimately play a ton of places, if not at a gold glove level, at least a very very comfortable level.
The bat is a scary close comp to Hayes, minus a bit of exit velocity but probably a bit more contact upside.
Jared won’t steal Ke’s job, but he absolutely could get him more rest, and absolutely could earn himself a Josh Harrison type role, except even better defensively.
Despite his size, the power has just never shown itself, but I still think he can find a way to pop 10 or so along with a bunch of doubles and triples.
If you recall, I thought his glove was good enough in Spring to potentially mitigate not having a true backup SS. When Hayes returns, I could easily see him sliding over there and holding it down until Cruz is ready. If his bat warrants it.
Question 4
When Choi does come back who goes down? And how much longer should it be until we see Endy Rodriguez and Quinn Priester? – Tyler Hernley
I don’t know what they’ll do when Choi returns mostly because I’m not sure what they’re looking for from him. They seem to want him to be able to play 1B more than he was, but I don’t know if that means 2 weeks or 2 days. At this point, might want to just hang out for the ASB.
I think Marcano and Castro are the primary low men at this point. Backtracking to the point above with Hayes potential return, they’ll still have plenty of guys to play MI so I’d assume one of them, and possibly whichever one didn’t go for Hayes who also might be directly following the ASB.
Endy I truly think could be any time now. He’s started hitting now, and the catching, according to team officials is ahead of Henry.
For him, I think he needs to replace one of the catchers, and I’m sure it’ll be Delay. When? It’s so hard to say, but it’ll be this year barring injury.
Priester, my friend this is all about consistency. Both on his part and guys like Roansy, Ortiz, Oviedo, Bido. Let’s see how it plays out but you can already see Bido getting exposed a bit for instance.
Question 5
How soon before the @Pirates call up @liover_peguero , will he be the every day 2B and will Endy Rodriguez get the call up after the Future Stars game? – Frank Rao
I kinda answered the Endy part in Question 4.
Liover is making his case and just got his call up to AAA. I could see him getting a call, but they’d have to be sure they could afford him playing time, and if he did, it’d likely be at SS primarily, but 2B is always an option.
How soon? I’d do it now, I’ve seen plenty of Marcano and Castro for now, and a run of Peguero and Gonzales at SS and 2B respectively could really help understand our pieces heading into spring. I highly doubt they’ll agree with me here, and honestly I kinda get it, kids coming up to sit is not ideal and calling him up right now would certainly cause that.
Question 6
With the youngsters doing fairly well at the moment in the lineup, what can possibly be done to help the rotation? – James Littleton
A time machine?
The Pirates as you well know have only 2 veteran arms in their rotation. There just isn’t much to be done about it short of a trade. Anyone they call up like Priester, Jones, Nicolas, they’re all going to have the same issue, being kids and not being named Spencer Strider.
Consistency is the biggest problem with kids, and nowhere is it more glaring than in the middle of the field on a raised mound.
I can look at Ortiz’ last start and think he needs to go get some fine tuning, but I’d have to ignore the start before where he shoved for 8 innings. Oviedo has been a workhorse prone to a blowup here and there. Roansy is mired in the pen but looking better recently and actively stretching his way back out and Bido, it probably was never fair to see him long term. In fact, I believe when he came up I said he’d take 4-5 turns in the rotation before the league figured him out. Still think he has a bright bullpen future, but he’s easily the first pick to get flipped for a prospect.
If they are in fact “in it” as we approach the 3rd week of July I’d imagine the best thing to do would be to acquire a starter. I’d prefer that starter have a few years left of team control, but that simply might not be there.
Talent is coming, experience isn’t. Internal solutions in my mind aren’t there.
Question 7
I’d love to talk about bullpen depth and maybe a bullpen ranking for innings 6 to 8. I know, the least sexy topic ever, but it’s on my mind. – steelcitydw on Twitter
They’ve tested the depth considerably already, considering they only have 3 remaining members of the pen from opening day.
Guys like Yerry De Los Santos, Cody Bolton, Carmen Mlodzinski, Angel Perdomo, have all stepped in with varying levels of success. I mean, see question 6 for why that might be. They still have Colin Selby, JC Flowers, Cam Aldred, Travis MacGregor, and could even revisit Underwood and DeJong if they like.
Point is, they have options that would be better than waiver claims and the like. Andre Jackson whom they just acquired from the suddenly bullpen arm starved Dodgers is interesting too.
To make a run they’ll have to upgrade, but to survive the innings count, I think they’re ok. Things have started to settle from that really horrible stretch, and that’s a good thing. The Rotation pushing them for more innings with regularity though, not so good.
Question 8
What does our IF look like once Cruz returns? – Mike Teti
Mike, this is super hard.
No way to know what Cruz will be capable of when he returns. I don’t mean he’ll forever be less than he was, but SS at the MLB level might require a level of healing not possible in one season.
In Questions 3 and 5 I touched on some of these moving parts and never mentioned Cruz once. That was purposeful, because until I have a reasonable target date for return and a reasonable expectation he’ll be capable of playing his position in 2023, it’s impossible to know.
Now if you just want an educated guess of how the team would like it to go, Hayes 3B, Cruz SS, Gonzales 2B would be my guess. Will it wind up being this, too much has to happen yet to know.
Question 9
Does it makes sense for the Pirates to sell off their Vets even being outside looking in of the playoff picture? Seeing the energy the youth have brought with them does it make sense to bring up a few more, Rodriguez to Catch and maybe Nunez for 1B? – MZylinski on Twitter
I’ll go a step further, you’ll 100% see more prospects brought up. That’s what this year is all about. Getting debuts done, and at least partially forming the 40-man before December forces decisions on the club.
I’m sure you’re just tossing out ideas with Nunez, so I’m not going to go into some bank of reasons he doesn’t enter the conversation quite yet, suffice to say, he’s not really pushed a decision into existence.
All that aside, yes, I think it makes some sense to move on from at least one of Santana or Choi, especially with Endy & Triolo being capable of 1B play. I don’t think they’ll have room to move Hill unless they collapse entirely, they’ve just suffered too many injuries to give away his innings. Hedges I have a hard time believing they’ll find a buyer, but moving on could be in the cards come August anyway.
Cutch isn’t going anywhere.
Bluntly, there isn’t much more beyond that to move from the veterans.
Question 10
What is the highest upside of Nicky G? – Casey @HercyJerky on Twitter
Man Casey, here we go.
MLB Pipeline grades almost every prospect in the draft and here’s how they grades out Gonzales.
Scouting grades: Hit: 60 | Power: 45 | Run: 55 | Arm: 55 | Field: 50 | Overall: 55
And as a frame of reference, here are Dylan Crews’ grades.
Scouting grades: Hit: 70 | Power: 60 | Run: 60 | Arm: 55 | Field: 55 | Overall: 65
One is seen as a generational talent, and one is Nick Gonzales.
Nick’s ceiling is an All Star player, according to his scouting grades and while his prospect status suffered as he worked in the minors, these grades don’t change until players reach the top of their playing days arc and begin the trip back to earth.
Now, that’s all based on original scouting, once players start on their path, you’ll see things adjusted a bit as far as expectations go. I still think All Star is a fair cap but I think it might be a bit much to feel just being “very good” is a failure.
Question 11
Is Dauri Moreta getting overused or is he just coming back down to earth? – BigE97 on Twitter
I don’t think he’s being overused, in fact the team has on a couple occasions this season identified his mechanics slipping and burred him even as fans were left scratching their heads.
In fact the rest of the pen being awful for a stretch forced them to ignore Moreta’s issues this time and keep pushing him out there.
That slider of his is a unicorn pitch. The action, nobody in the league throws a slider that does that.
Problem is, his other offering is a fastball, a fastball with enough velocity, but not enough movement to keep people off it, especially when they just sit on spin and spit on everything else.
The slider is incredible, but the way he uses is, don’t swing, if he throws it 5 or 6 times in an at bat, 4 will be balls.
He either needs to be pinpoint with his heater on the black or he needs another pitch with a similar tunnel that creates some deception. For instance introducing a cutter could fool hitters into thinking they see a slider, but it never breaks as much and he gets some panic swings and bad takes. I’m not sure that’s an in season thing though.
He was a project when they got him, and this season they’re kind of discovering what the plan will be in the off season.
Question 12
Not a question, but would love to hear your thoughts on Luis Ortiz. How he’s been handled this season, where have the K’s gone/why he is so hittable, how long he should stay in the rotation short term and long term, etc. – Nick Cammuso
I’m genuinely happy someone asked.
For one thing, his velocity is down and more than I think the team would like. He still has it, he just doesn’t draw on it.
Part of this is the Pirates plan to keep him in games longer, and ultimately keep him in seasons longer. They’d also like to see him harness control, and I mean pinpoint control of his fastball, which simply isn’t going to happen at 98-101 for Ortiz. He’s proven that out already both here and in the minors, but it’s important for a guy like this to be able to summon it on occasion.
That takes maturity and you see Keller do it on occasion in his starts. When he really needs it he has 98-99 in his back pocket and it’s just enough to keep guys off it when they’ve seen 95-96 all game long.
The alternative with Ortiz is to allow him to just do what he wants and potentially give you 4-5 innings.
His changeup has developed quite well, but without the high end velocity he doesn’t’ have the movement or deception on his heater to directly attack MLB hitters. We’ve already seen them start having him introduce a 2-seam, but bluntly Nick, I’d like to see a cutter.
What’s happened to his movement is typical. It’s the very reason guys ramp back on their top end for velocity, to command where it lands.
Now, to your point, I can’t say for sure. Are we convinced after his last start he stinks, or are we convinced because of his outing before where he shoved for 8 innings he’s got it in there? Probably both if we’re just counting Twitter.
I see Bido as their main issue moving forward, at least as it concerns considering calling up another prospect starter, but as Roansy seems to have figured some things out and is actively stretching back out in the pen, you could see him being reinserted and that could cause a couple moves, maybe a trip to the pen of his own.
As far as their handling of him, I’m not sure I have much blame to toss their way. They’ve lost 3 starters, all at least projected to get MLB innings this year and were largely forced into calling up Ortiz who in reality is not going to learn much more at the AAA level.
He may end up back there anyway, but I don’t think they’ve “screwed him up” I think this league is just really friggin’ good, and if you show up to a gun fight with a knife, here’s hoping you know how to use it. To his credit, he really seems to know how to use what he has, just not consistently, and he can’t afford his two top offerings to be off even slightly.
With experience comes margin for error. Gonna need to see him work through it, and ultimately develop a way to command his velocity or create spin on his offering. Using the changeup more could help as well, but for all I know it’s reason for effectiveness could very well be simply not using it much.
Question 13
Has the league shifted to disregard high K profiles infavor of high P/PA? How can fans discern the difference between a guy striking out more because they see so many 2 strike counts and a guy that just sells out and can’t lay off bad pitches? – Adam Yarkovsky
You mean beside watching all the games I’m sure Yark.
Yeah, the league at least as it comes to executives value OBP a hell of a lot more than they hate strikeouts, and analytically speaking, OBP goes up more with long at bats than K’s do.
How can fans tell the difference? No substitute for watching really. I can honestly say, I don’t think the Pirates have anyone I’d consider a chronic overswinger, they tend to be patient to a fault although recently we’ve seen a trend of them swinging earlier.
Jack is a great for instance, he sees a ton of pitches, doesn’t chase much, but when he does, he looks silly trying to protect a part of the plate the pitch never touches. He K’s, but it’s more from taking a pitch too close most often. I’m not sure aside from looking at logs and doing a bunch of math you’re going to “see” how he’s striking out without seeing it in the real world.
The old rule about 30% K rates and stuff like that, let’s just say so long as the BB% is where it needs to be and they do damage when they connect, probably a “good” player, at least as it comes to perception.
Will fans ever buy in? Eventually.
As broadcasts slowly transition to OPS more and more I think you start to sell it as less of a nerd thing and more of a mainstay. Will it ever replace AVG? It won’t for me, I’m sorry I’m all about Luis Arraez in his hunt for .400. That to me is a valuable player and the funny thing is if the Pirates don’t like that type of player, they sure do acquire a bunch of guys who probably should be looking to be more like that and less like Jack.
Steel City Pirates 