#JerryMealsSaysItsSafe: Pittsburgh Pirates (2012-?)

[goosedennis]

The odds for the Pirates did not look very good. After a 57-105 record in 2010, the Buccos were expected to improve by about 8 games in 2011, with the over/under for wins set at 66.5. One of the few bright sides pre-2011 was having a full season of Jose Tabata, Pedro Alvarez, and to a lesser extent, Neil Walker. Then April started.

The Pirates got April off on the right foot, winning their 5th straight Opening Day matchup. They went 25-28 through April and May.

Then June happened. Normally the "June Swoon" is what kills the Pirates each year.




Year
June Record



2001
12-15



2002
11-15



2003
10-14



2004
9-19



2005
11-16



2006
8-20



2007
12-15



2008
12-15



2009
14-13



2010
6-20



2011's June record was the best it has been since before anything on this table. They went 16-11 through the month of June, raising their record to 41-39, just 2 games back from the Cardinals/Brewers tie for first place. On July 8th, arguably the most symbolic home run for the Pirates in the decade was hit.

This home run was so incredibly symbolic, not because it was McKenry's first MLB home run, but because it was a rags-to-riches story, just like the Pirates. McKenry had played in 6 MLB games prior to his stint here in Pittsburgh and amassed a whopping 9 plate appearances. I was at that game and it may have been the most thrilling game of baseball I have ever seen the Pirates play (sans the Brian Giles walkoff grand slam on July 28, '01). On the last day before the All-Star Break, the Buccos beat the Chicago Cubs 9-1, moving within 1 game of the division lead.

Andrew McCutchen, Joel Hanrahan, and Kevin Correia were elected to the All-Star Game, and the only player to not have an opportunity to play was Correia. Long are the days when we would get an All-Star just to have one, a la Zach Duke. On July 15th, 2011, something monumental happened.



Yes, your Pirates, who had not been above .500 at July 15th since July 15, 1997, were in first place, tied with the St Louis Cardinals. And who could ever forget this immortal song?


On July 18th, the Pirates took sole ownership of the first place spot in the National League Central division.

]The Official Site of Major League Baseball | MLB.com: Video Playback

The first two thoughts to pop in my head after I saw that the Pirates were anywhere near first place at this time of the year were both Acid related. The first thing that popped in my head when I saw the above picture was "I thought .20 was Cabrera's BAC."

Sportspickle came out with this gold article.

The Pirates stayed within 1 game of first place each day until July 26th, and I think everybody knows what happened that night/morning.

After the entire #JerryMealsSaysItsSafe fiasco, in which I was so livid I woke up my neighbors by screaming at the TV, the Pirates' pitching staff cooled down and the Pirates went into freefall mode.

The Pirates went 19-42 for the rest of the season and attendance fell and fell and fell until the very end of the season when the gimmicky "Fan Appreciation Day" thing took place. Okay, I went there too, but that's because I got a $20 club level seat.

[goosedennis]

To :
SS Tyler Pastornicky
SS Jack Wilson
SP JJ Hoover
SP Arodys Vizcaino

To :
LF Jose Tabata
MR Evan Meek

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The Pittsburgh Pirates have signed Cuban defector Yoennis Céspedes to a 3-year, $38,410,000 million contract. In order to free up a spot in the outfield for Cespedes, the Pirates had to trade one of their 4 outfielders. They felt they could get the best return for Jose Tabata, and they did. Tyler Pastornicky, Jack Wilson, JJ Hoover, Vizcaino were sent to the Pirates in exchange for Tabata and reliever Evan Meek.

[goosedennis]

Opening Day Preview

After a disappointing 72-90 record in 2011, the Pittsburgh Pirates are poised to improve on that record in the new year. Their offseason was headlined by the signings of catcher Rod Barajas, shortstop Clint Barmes, and outfielder Yoenis Cespedes, who are all looking to help the team in 2012. But where do the Pirates rank positionally? The following preview posts look at just that.

Catcher
Team rank: 28th. Organizational rank: 22nd. Overall rank: 23rd
After Ryan Doumit, Chris Snyder, Eric Fryer, Dusty Brown, and Wyatt Toreagas all got injured in 2011, Michael McKenry was acquired in a trade from the Boston Red Sox in June. McKenry hit a .222/.276/.322 slash line in 180 at bats with the Pirates. This offseason, the Pirates did not want to get stuck with McKenry starting again, so they signed Rod Barajas, previously of the Los Angeles Dodgers, to a 1-year, $4.5 million contract with a team option for 2013. Barajas hit .230 with the Dodgers, with an on-base percentage of .287 and a slugging percentage of .430. His OPS was league average, having an OPS+ of 100. What makes him a great upgrade over McKenry is his fielding. McKenry had a fielding percentage of .987 in 2011, with a range factor per nine innings of 7.11. While that is acceptable defense from a player who never started in the Major Leagues until 2011, Barajas makes him look like a 12 year old trying to play MLB baseball. His fielding percentage was .997, 3 points away from 1.000, and his range factor per nine innings was 8.58. While Barajas is not the Pirates' Joe Mauer, and he is nowhere close, he is still a decent stopgap until Tony Sanchez can hopefully recover from his jaw injury in 2010 and fully develop to the potential the Pirates believed he had when taking him 4th overall in 2009.

[goosedennis]

First Base
Team Rank: 23rd. Organizational Rank: 18th. Overall Rank: 24th
After the 2010 season in which the Pirates went 57-105, the Pirates knew they had to find a first baseman, as Garrett Jones wasn't working. After looking around, the Pirates found their man: Lyle Overbay. Overbay was signed to a 1-year, $5M contract on December 14th, and appeared fine for a few weeks and Spring Training. However, Overbay ended up earning some pretty nasty nicknames, such as "Overpay," "Overhaul," "0-For-The-Day," and "Fat, useless first baseman," after hitting a mediocre .240 with an OBA of .300 and a slugging percent of .333 in the first half of the season. Shortly before the trading deadline, the Pirates traded for Derrek Lee of the Baltimore Orioles and his first game would be on August 1st. In Lee's Pirates debut, he hit 2 home runs, which was eerily similar to Shawn Dunston hitting 2 home runs in his Pirates debut in 1997, the closest the Pirates had gotten to .500 since 1992. Overbay would end up being Designated For Assignment on August 1st, and ultimately released on the fifth. Lee would fracture his wrist blocking an errant pitch from former teammate Carlos Marmol. When Lee came back, he was en fuego. A triple-slash of .337/.398/.584 is impressive, even if it is in just 28 games. The Pirates decided not to extend Derrek Lee, whether it's because of his injury history, including bizarre injuries such as the collapsing chair incident and what happened when he high-fived a teammate, or because of his age doesn't matter because it leaves the Pirates with what they had in 2009: Garrett Jones.

[goosedennis]

Okay, I've decided to just start the season now. This post will later be edited with position previews

[goosedennis]

April Update (MLB)

After winning their Opening Day game against the Cubs in Wrigley, the Pirates lost 7 of their next nine, falling to 3-7. However, they shut out the Brewers 4-0 after an off day and started a 4-game streak to get them to .500. To end the month, they lost a series against the Miami Marlins 2-1 but took 2 out of 3 against the Washington Nationals.

Yoenis Cespedes, who the Pirates signed to a 3-year, $38,410,000 million contract in January, won the NL Rookie of the Month award after hitting a .272 average with an on-base percentage of .330 and a slugging percentage of .402 with 4 doubles and 2 home runs. Despite winning the RotM award, Cespedes feels that he has a lot to work on.
"I'm striking out too much," said Cespedes. "I think I struck out twenty times so far and that's too much." And his 20 strikeouts in 92 at bats (21.7%) is way too high for anybody's taste.
"He needs to stop swinging at pitches out of the zone!" said Pirates hitting coach Gregg Ritchie. "We're going to start working on his pitch recognition. I think I have a pretty neat drill to do so: I'm going to throw tennis balls at him in batting practice with numbers 1-25 on them. If he swings at an odd-numbered pitch, he has to run two laps around the stadium."

The pitching for the Buccos hasn't exactly been great. Their ace, Erik Bedard, has thrown 25.1 innings so far this season in 5 starts -- 5 innings per start -- and has an ERA of 4.62. Their best starter has been Charlie "Ground Chuck" Morton, who has an ERA of 2.88 through 25 innings in 4 starts this season.



The thing keeping the Pirates in games this season has been their batting. Their cornerstone, Andrew McCutchen, has been absolutely fantastic this season, hitting a triple-slash line of .325/.426/.610 with 6 homers and 16 ribbies. Garrett Jones, who everybody thought completely sucked, has been impressive as well. Jones has a .294 batting average with an OBP of .333 and a slugging percentage of .706, including 8 dingers and 16 RBI like McCutchen.



Here's a quick view of the Pirates' leaders.



Despite their mediocre 11-12 record, the Pirates are only 2.5 games back due to the departures of Pujols and Fielder. The two teams ahead of the Bucs are the Cardinals (13-9) and the Reds (13-10). The Milwaukee Brewers, who lost Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun (for 50 games), are in last place with a record of 9 wins and 14 losses.