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 Posted: Sat 15:55, 31 Aug 2013 Post subject: Adrian Beltre make sense for Pirates-spun4 |
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Adrian Beltre make sense for Pirates
The Pittsburgh Pirates have some things going for them. They may be one of the two least valuable teams in baseball,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], they might play in the sport's fifth-smallest market,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], and they may endure all of the woes that come with holding the record for many consecutive losing seasons inside a major American sport, but they don't spend a great deal, and as with other low-end ball clubs they have the aid of rich cousins.
As the exact numbers would be the subject of a colorful dispute right now, it's thought that, like several other major league teams, the Pirates -- who we're using because an instance study based on how a struggling team can boost its fortunes on this winter's free-agent market -- take in more money from central baseball than they spend on big league players. There's two sources of cash here. The first is a fixed amount of cash that every team draws from the sport's national broadcast contracts, online revenues and so on; another is a transfer of cash from wealthy teams with the luxury tax. Baseball zealously guards exact figures, but a conservative estimate from several years ago place the Pirates' income from just these two sources at $50 million to $60 million -- a lot more than their payroll in each of the past two seasons.
More important for the Pirates, though,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], is they aren't wasting these funds. They owe a hair under $15 million to players under agreement for 2010, none making even $5 million. They also have several arbitration cases approaching, which inside a worst-case scenario might end up costing them $10 million. Include another $7 million approximately to pay for the minimum salary for each remaining roster spot which leaves them,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], if they hold their Opening Day payroll where it has been going back 2 yrs, with about $18 million to spend.
A team with that much available isn't everything bad off. Free agents are relatively cheap these days. Over the last few years more teams have begun using the kind of basic cost-benefit analysis to acquisitions that the dry cleaner uses to determine if you should buy fancy new equipment; the current recession also has teams unwilling to invest, and there are even some not entirely insane claims of quasi-collusion from agents and the players' union. All this has driven player prices down. At this point, in fact, one wonders when the smart play for teams like the Pirates might not be to visit out and obtain some of those middling veterans that they have been counseled to avoid for many years.
Take as a given that the Pirates can't and won't contend next year,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], which having traded off basically almost all their veterans associated with a value over the last year and a half, the best they are able to do is placed themselves up to avoid an 18th straight losing season -- if things break well on their behalf. Signing pitchers is probably out; even a mediocre starter such as Jason Marquis or Doug Davis would chew up half their available money without meaningfully increasing the team. What then,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], to complete?
The first order of business would be to evaluate how good the team is. Pittsburgh's pitching is fairly dire. According to the Bill James Handbook,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], the rotation projects to pitch 779 innings having a 4.46 ERA. Two points here: One is this implies that the bullpen would need to pitch about 665 innings of 3.89 ERA baseball for the Pirates simply to have average pitching. Another is that if you add Marquis and Davis that number goes down to 499 innings in the same ERA. In other words,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], the team's pitching problems aren't the kind that may be solved despite more income than they have. What they need to complete is protect,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], develop and obtain the most out of the young pitchers they've, nearly all of them fly ball pitchers with iffy stuff.
Which brings us for their position players. Combining offensive projections from Baseball Projection and career defensive numbers from Fangraphs, both conveniently denominated in runs below or above average per 150 games, the Pirates' lineup at present rates out at about five runs substandard while hitting and 25 runs substandard in the field. Those are miserable numbers,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], however they are also a lot more easily addressed than the team's pitching woes.
Take shortstop, in which the Pirates' nominal starter is Ronny Cedeno, who projects to be worth 18 runs below average using the bat and it has, in his career, been worth six runs below average with the glove at shortstop per 150 games. Replace him with free agent Adam Everett, a much more miserable hitter but a fantastic defender, and also the Pirates overcome between 10 and 15 runs per 150 games -- and Everett made just $1 million last year.
Similarly, the Pirates plan to run Lastings Milledge in an outfield corner, seemingly while he used to be a prospect. Milledge projects at two runs substandard like a hitter, and the stumbling outfield play has been worth 10 substandard in his career. Cheap defense-first players such as Austin Kearns and Joey Gathright wouldn't cost a lot more than Everett, plus they, too,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], would represent a potential improvement of Ten to fifteen runs.
Finally, at third the Pirates will have Andy LaRoche, an old top prospect with the Dodgers who projects as a basically dead-average player with slightly above-average defense this season. He isn't an issue, but he might represent a solution. The Pirates do not have a solid first baseman; LaRoche, were he moved there, would probably be a substantial asset defensively, enough to carry an average bat because of the needs from the team. That will open third base for free agent Adrian Beltre, a tremendously underrated player who has been worth about 14 runs per 150 games above average in his career and who'll likely come relatively cheap this winter,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], given how a bit more superficially impressive players for example Bobby Abreu happen to be signing for recently.
Put all that together and the Pirates would project at about minus-25 runs offensively -- a whole lot worse compared to present iteration -- but at about plus-40 defensively, enough to rate in the top 5 teams in baseball. In all such a number of signings would represent an optimistic swing of four or five wins,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], leave enough remaining to sign a starter or perhaps a couple of cheap relievers, and provide the team's dodgy young pitchers their finest possible opportunity to succeed. And it would do all of this if you don't take serious playing time from any young player the team needs to develop (even Milledge might be assured lots of playing time included in an outfield rotation), costing draft picks or assuming any dead weight in long-term contracts.
The point here isn't the Pirates have to do a. Previous regimes made far too much of a botch from the draft and player development for there to be any easy answers here, and also the team just does not have the young pitching or the money to engineer a monumental turnaround the way in which teams such as Tampa Bay, Seattle and Texas have recently. You also have to laud dedication to experience the likes of Milledge and LaRoche if only to see what they've.
Still,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], even before looking at the coming flood of non-tendered veterans, it's clear that there are lots of cheap help on the market for just about any team that wants it, help cheap enough for the Pirates. And if that's so, there is no team that can't meaningfully help itself this winter. Baseball may not have an amount playing field,[link widoczny dla zalogowanych], there is however little excuse for any team to not enter next spring more respectable than now.
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