Kuzul

In creating a winning team, as the Rangers have, it’s not just who you have on the team, but who you DON’T have. One reason that the Rangers are in the ACLS in 2010 is because they had dumped a number of talented players that nevertheless could have hurt the team.

Some of the better trades were those of older players for younger talent with greater potential.

As Leslie Monteiro earlier pointed out, one of these deals was that of Mark Teixeira and Ron Mahay for five people, of whom the current players are shortstop Elvis Andrus and reliever Neftali Feliz.

Although there are question marks about Jarrod Saltlalmacchia, the prospects, Beau Jones and Matt Harrison will provide additional value over time.

It is seldom that one player, even a star, is worth five reasonably good ones, and Teixeira, who has been “high maintenance” from his 2001 signing, was not the exception. Teixeira was a good enough player by himself, but wasn’t a leader or team player that inspired others.

The importance of leadership was illustrated by the long-forgotten Russo Japanese War of 1904-05 (largely a naval conflict in the Far East). In sinking a Russian battleship, the Japanese drowned a capable Admiral who was worth “five battleships.” (The Japanese had only four, which meant that the lucky sinking probably won them the war.)

Andrus and Feliz play key roles in an area in which the Rangers have traditionally been weak; defense. It’s true that Teixeira was a gold glover, but that just represented strength (at first base) where it wasn’t need so much.

The Rangers were losing too many games from the mound (especially late innings), and up the middle.

As “stuck” as Texas used to be for pitching, one of the pitchers NOT worth retaining was Vicente Padilla. He was a moody individual who pitched well at some times and not others.

As such, he was typically paid the upper end of the $5 to $10 million range through which his value varied from one year to the next, sometimes one month to the next (annualized).

Moreover, his demeanor on and off the field did not help Texas’ reputation as a well-run club, and the Rangers did well to let the Los Angeles Dodgers have him in 2009.

Another good dump was that of starter Kevin Millwood, whose annual ERA has been around 5.00 for most of the past half decade, making him a drag on the team, but which declined to the mid-3s in 2009.

Then he was traded for Chris Ray, who could put up a similar showing for less money, (and Ben Snyder). Ray was re-traded for veteran Bengie Molina, who plays a key defensive position, catcher.

The Rangers are fortunate in having a crop of emerging pitchers at one time; Colby Lewis, much improved from a two year stint in Japan, and Tommy Hunter, a talented second year hurler.

Even releasing Alex Rodriguez was no great loss. He is a slugger, but that is not exactly a scarce commodity on the offensively-constructed Rangers team. His replacement is All Star Michael Young, a very good player who is not quite the caliber of Rodriguez.

Fan Graphs values A-Rod as being worth $5 million a year more, just a bit more than one win. On the other hand, Rodriguez is being paid $15 million a year more than Young.

With the savings, the Rangers can purchase a great deal more than one win, for instance, by using it to hire (for the season), and possibly retain Cliff Lee.

And in trading for veteran Cliff Lee, the Rangers gave up not only Justin Smoak, but three prospects, including the ethically challenged Josh Lueke. Whether or not Lee stays, this deal would have done the Rangers a lot of good.

And Lee is someone that the Rangers should do the utmost to retain. For the first time in ages, the team had a respectable rotation with C.J. Wilson, Colby Lewis, Tommy Hunter, and other inserts such as reliever Scott Feldman and still-green Matt Harrison.

But having Lee at the head would make a pretty good rotation great. Not only is he a strong pitcher in his own right, but he has making a positive impact on Wilson, Hunter, and others.

With so many relative newcomers and or retreads on staff, having good leadership on the mound would probably do much more for the Rangers than for more most other teams. This IS a case where one player could impact several.

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The New York Yankees need a fourth starter for the ALCS. But the one they named was wrong. It should not have been A.J. Burnett, but rather Ivan Nova.

Nova, whom the Yankees refused to trade, was a major reason that they didn’t get Cliff Lee from the Mariners midseason. He has since justified their retaining him. Except for one very bad start that skewed his respectable 4.50 ERA upward, he has been quite a serviceable pitcher both as a starter and a reliever. And he’s only 23, in his first season.

There is a very good reason that Nova was the “not Lee.” Cliff Lee is a very good pitcher in the present. But Nova could be the pitcher for the future. That’s why he was rightly put in the “untouchable” category earlier reserved for the likes of Phil Hughes and Joba Chamberlain.

The homegrown core of the Yankees rotation is still Andy Pettitte (for now), Phil Hughes and now Ivan Nova. Of the three “hired hands,” CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Javier Vazquez, only Sabathia has more or less worked out. Two-fifths of the earlier rotation was a question mark, and it came from the experienced pitchers. 

Some years ago, the future Yankees rotation was something like Chien Ming Wang, Phil Hughes, Joba Chamberlain and Ian Kennedy, among others. Of these, only Hughes has become the present, with Wang having collapsed, Kennedy having been traded and Chamberlain been sent to the bullpen.

Besides Kennedy (who pitched well for the Arizona Diamondbacks this year), the Yankees also traded away Ross Ohlendorf (along with Jose Tabata, Jeff Karstens and Dan McCutchen), for a two-month “rental” in Xavier Nady plus reliever Damaso Marte. Ohlendorf could have been a full-time starter, and Tabata a fielder by now (although the other two represented no loss, being players more typical of Pirates than Yankees).

Worse yet, the Bombers traded a promising prospect, Arodys Vizcaino (plus the declining Melky Cabrera) for Vazquez, after a late season surge put him into the Cy Young conversation. He pitched nowhere that well this year, albeit in the American, not National, League.

The core of the Yankees for the past 15 years has been Jorge Posada behind the plate, Derek Jeter at shortstop and Mariano Rivera as a closer. More recently, they were joined by Robinson Cano at second and (until he was traded), Melky Cabrera in center field. At one time, the “backbone” of the Yankees team was “up the middle,” with the corner positions being filled by hired hands.

Some would say that in the postseason, you need your most experienced hands. The flip side of that is that you need to give experience to get experienced players.

And it was T Boone Pickens, the American oil man that defined a veteran as an 18-year-old rookie who has survived a month of campaigning. That said, there is no better month for Nova to become a veteran.

A medieval philosopher once opined that if you must lose a battle, it was better to lose with an army of “native sons” than with an army of mercenaries. The reason was that your (surviving) native sons would fight for you another day, with greater experience, while the mercenaries wouldn’t.

With the ability to buy almost any player, the Yankees have unfortunately overvalued veteran players from other teams and undervalued homegrown players. After having done so too often in the recent past, refusing to trade Nova for Lee was a good first step in reversing course. They should have followed up by putting Nova in the postseason rotation where Lee would otherwise have been.

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With John Russell gone, the top priority is now on selecting a new, hopefully winning, manager for the team. There are several good candidates, some of whom have strong Pittsburgh ties.

That should not be a litmus test, but could be a useful tiebreaker, if aptitudes are otherwise comparable.

The early favorite is Eric Wedge. He certainly has “ties,” although they’re not necessarily Pittsburgh ties. He worked with Neal Huntingdon when the latter was in Cleveland, which is to say that they’d be reunited. That’s fine, if the Pirates have made a firm decision to keep Huntingdon. But if that’s not the case, and Huntingdon leaves, Wedge might be a misfit.

Another candidate is Phil Garner, who actually was on a World Series winning team, in 1979, which is to say, as a Pirate. He’s now managing the Houston Astros, but reportedly wants to come back to Pittsburgh. Given that he won a National pennant with a normally weakish team, he might be the objectively strongest candidate.

Ken Macha is a native Pittsburgher from Monroeville, who was made available, first by the Oakland A’s, and more recently by the Milwaukee Brewers. Those are borderline winning teams that might represent the Pirates’ “next stop.”  From a professional point of view, he is a “technician” who will execute strategy set by others, and not lock horns with Huntingdon.

Andy Van Slyke and Tony Pena are former Pirate players with managerial experience, although they may be less obviously qualified than some of the others.

Even players should be considered for their Pittsburgh ties, if only because that might make them easier to sign during their free agent years.

We did well to draft Neil Walker, whose father, Tom, was a close friend of the late Roberto Clemente. The father was slated to go on that ill-fated flight with Clemente on New Year’s Eve, but was spared when Clemente refused to let him go.

Likewise, the Pirates should have drafted Kyle Drabek, son of Doug, in 2006, rather than Brad Lincoln. Drabek is a better pitcher than Lincoln, and in addition, has a Pittsburgh tie.

As a “tiebreaker,” it might have made sense to trade for Andy LaRoche in 2008 while his older brother Adam was on staff. But in this case, that wasn’t a good idea because it wasn’t really “close.” Both LaRoches were easily superseded by other, better candidates.

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The Pittsburgh Pirates have a starting rotation (with the possible exception of James McDonald) that would be kindly described as “undistinguished.” They do, however, have strong late-innings pitchers in Joel Hanrahan and Evan Meek.

But the Pirates have unexpected pitching strength where one would least expect it in a core of middle inning relievers who can pitch long.

Dan McCutchen, who’s one of these relievers, was a last-minute substitution for Paul Maholm on Friday night. He is someone with a “final inning” problem, with the fifth being the inning he’s likely to crumble.

So management started him for four innings in which he gave up only one run, then used another long-middle reliever, Chan Ho Park (who got the win) to blank the Marlins for three frames. If put up by one man instead of two, the combined seven-inning one-run performance would have been worthy of a Cy Young candidate.

Charlie Morton pitches well about half the time. Like Zach Duke, he has a “first inning” problem. He’ll sometimes give up as many as 10 runs in the first and/or second inning.

But if he doesn’t, and settles in, he’s likely to pitch well for the rest of the start. With one such (but low paid) person on staff, we don’t need another one in Duke.

Basically, Morton has to be lifted early (first or second inning) or late (after five or six), but seldom after three or four. Long relievers are an important part of the strategy of using him. On some other night, McCutchen will be the middle reliever who gets the win.

The back of the Pirates rotation, Jeff Karstens and Brian Burres, are basically long middle reliever types who have nonetheless been pressed into service as starters. They can do the job, at least on a good night, but need more backup relief than most.

If the Pirates have McDonald, Ohlendorf, Maholm and Morton all in the rotation, Karstens, Burres, and McCutchen can contribute one starter and two long relievers between them.

Park, who’s now aged 37, probably won’t be signed for another season. A younger hurler, Chris Resop, claimed off waivers on the same day as Park, might serve this turn, however.

James McDonald, originally “typecast” as a reliever, has turned out to be the most durable (longest lasting), and potentially the best of Pirate starters.

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On a good night, Zach Duke can out-duel the likes of Cy Young-winners Johann Santana or Roy Halladay. On a bad night, well, last night’s nine-run outing against the Florida Marlins was all too “good” an example of such.

Do these extremes net out, or is one more important than the other in determining Duke’s worth to the Pirates?

Matt Shetler nailed it when he suggested that Duke be NON-tendered and not brought back in 2011. While Duke isn’t exactly the worst pitcher around, Shetler rightly pointed out that Duke IS about as bad as a VETERAN pitcher will likely be.

Put another way, someone with Duke’s experience should be decidedly better than struggling rookies and near-rookies like Brad Lincoln, Dan McCutchen, and Charlie Morton. Except that he isn’t.

Age might not be the issue here; length of service is. Brian Burres is actually older than Duke. But in addition to making much less than Duke, Burres appears to be a late bloomer with less experience who has finally hit his stride and is on an upcurve appropriate for someone of his experience level (Although he’d be more convincing if it had taken place five years earlier).

On the other hand, Duke was an early bloomer that entered a long term decline. Duke was the Pirates’ great hope as of 2005, when he got off to a sensational start (an ERA of 1.81 for a half season).

But even then there were signs that things weren’t as good as they seemed. At that time, Duke’s  FIP (a “sabermetric” ERA estimated by home runs, walks, and strikeouts), was more like 3.00. That suggested that he was a strong pitcher, but not the Cy Young contender he initially appeared to be.

Then 2006, 2007, and 2010 were all worse than the preceding years. This pattern was interrupted by an aborted rebound in late 2008 and early 2009. Injuries over the year took their toll.

But the main problem is that Duke has less speed and power than the average pitcher, so he needs to use finesse and “location” to get outs. This was an advantage in the early going, when no one knew him. But he’s now a tired subject, because unless he’s at his very best, he’s eminently hittable.

So where does Duke now stand? Based on ERAs to date, the Pirates’ 2011 rotation should be James McDonald, Ross Ohlendorf, Jeff Karstens, Brian Burres, and Paul Maholm. Maholm makes the cut, Duke doesn’t (If one used FIPs, one would put Maholm ahead of Karstens and Burres, and possibly Ohlendorf).

As a third year “arbitration” player, someone of Duke’s seniority would probably command a salary of over $5 million. That would suggest that he’s a serviceable, though moderately below average starter. But he’s actually now of “replacement,” not below average, caliber. A low budget team like the Pirates can’t afford this from one of their highest paid players.

Suppose Duke were willing to take a pay cut to $1-2 million. Could he be brought back as a reliever/situational starter? Not really, because his profile is all wrong.

Some of the weaker Pirate pitchers such as Dan McCutchen, Jeff Karstens, and even (to a certain extent) Paul Maholm, have what I call a “last inning problem.” That is, they will pitch well for X innings, then crumble in the X plus first. In that case, managing them consists of determining what X is, and keeping them within that limit.

Duke, on the other hand, has a “first” inning problem, the first could well be his worst. If he survives it and settles down, he can pitch well for most of the remainder of the game. Last night, he didn’t.

In a starter, this is acceptable in a mild form (the Duke of early 2009). He’ll give up one or two runs in the first two innings, no more than one more by the sixth, and possibly work the seventh or eight.

But this is unacceptable in a reliever, for whom the first inning is usually the last inning. If such a person gives up a run, say every other time he takes the mound, that leads to probable defeat.

Duke was the star of a promising but ill-fated (2006) rotation consisting of himself, Paul Maholm, Ian Snell and Tom Gorzelanny. The latter two had to be sent down to the minors, then traded away (although Gorzelanny is now prospering in his home town of Chicago).

It’s now time to say goodbye to Duke (and absorb Maholm into the new rotation mentioned above.) In doing so, the Pirates will say goodbye to what has been a major liability for the past half decade, and hopefully move on to a new start.

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The Pittsburgh Pirates have compiled a 100-plus game loss record in 2010 that is unenviable even by recent standards. Yet this represents a mix of the truly awful and semi-respectable.

There are now signs of hope for their play in some divisions, particularly their home in the National League Central, which is arguably the weakest division in the majors.

The Pirates have “arrived” against the Chicago Cubs with a 10-5 season result, as good as can be reasonably hoped for.

If they had won more close games, they COULD have had winning seasons against the Milwaukee Brewers and Cincinnati Reds, with say, 9-7 tallies instead of the 5-11 and 6-10 results actually achieved.

The Pittsburghers came to St. Louis 5-7 against the Cardinals, so in theory, a sweep could have made them 8-7 for the season series. Except that it wasn’t going to happen in Busch Stadium when the Pirates have the worst road record in Major League Baseball. It might have happened if the Bucs had won two or three close games earlier in the season.

Houston has been the Pirates’ bugaboo, although more victories in close games could given the Pirates six or seven wins (out of 15) instead of four.

The Pirates have also shown signs of life out west.

They beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 4-2 and the Colorado Rockies 4-3 in their respective season series, and went a reasonable 3-4 against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Throw in their 2-4 record against the San Francisco Giants, and the Bucs are actually .500 against these four western division teams.

But they were blanked by the Padres, from time to time the West’s strongest team, 6-0. No other National League team has done this, although some American League teams did so in the Pirates’ atrocious Interleague series.

Almost as bad has been Pittsburgh’s performance versus the National League East. Against its weaker denizens, they’ve won one game apiece at home against the Washington Nationals, New York Mets, and Florida Marlins. The first two season series have been concluded with tallies of 1-5 and 1-6 respectively, but the 1-3 record against the “Fish” do not include four season-ending games on THEIR turf.

The tally against the Atlanta Braves is 3-3 at home, and 0-3 in Turner Field for 3-6 on the season. Surprisingly, the Pirates have done the best against the division-leading Philadelphia Phillies, winning three games at home (out of four) and splitting two road games.

Even so, with the Bucs already down a game in St Louis, one win out of four in the coming series in Sun Life Stadium would be “sufficient,” two would be surprising, and three or more would be stupendous.

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CC Sabathia has five more years to go. At least as a Yankee. For $23 million a year. Unless HE doesn’t want to (given his player’s option to quit after two more years).

Unless he’s the team’s answer to Jamie Moyer or Phil Niekro, he won’t be worth $23 million in his seventh year. More to the point, he hasn’t been worth $23 million in this, his SECOND year, according to FanGraphs. More like $18-$19 million year to date.

Sabathia IS the best pitcher with the New York Yankees. But he is doing so on a curve with aging hurlers like Andy Pettite and AJ Burnett. Meanwhile, a youngster named Phil Hughes is coming up fast, and is running neck and neck with Pettite for the second most productive pitcher.

In fact, Sabathia peaked at 7.5 WAR (wins above replacement) in 2008. Since then, his performance has fallen at about one and half WAR per year, a faster rate of decline than the older Pettite. At this rate, he’ll be a replacement player by the end of year five.

These issues come about because of two fundamental facts of baseball: 1) Players work at controlled wages for six years (seven for Sabathia, counting a one year contract extension) and 2) the average baseball player peaks at age 28. A third fact derives from these two: players negotiate their free agent contracts based on what they did around age 28.

Sabathia was a “high school” player signed by the Cleveland Indians at age 18. He then spent three years in the minors before being called up by the Cleveland Indians in 2001. The club controlled him for six years to 2007, and  purchased his first free agent year 2008 (by “frontloading” salary in his earlier years), the year he turned 28. At that point, he could charge what the market would bear.

In 2008, he was worth $33 million (FanGraphs). Everyone “knew” that was his peak, so it was really a question of guessing his decline trajectory. Suppose it was to something like $30, $27, and $24 million in the first three years, with the fourth more or less breakeven. Then the surpluses over $23 million in the three front years would compensate for the deficits in the back years.

In fact, Sabathia’s decline has been more than DOUBLE this pace, meaning that his performance went “underwater” in year two, rather than year four. The best one can hope for him is that he, like Jason Giambi, will earn more than his salary in three of his first four years, producing a break even result over the whole time. But that would just mean that the team would have to “carry” Sabathia in the last three years. During his last three years, Giambi was basically an average player being paid a star salary.

And one might not expect Sabathia to do as well as Giambi. Dishonorable as it was, Giambi did improve his performance with steroids. And pitchers tend to wear down faster than position players. Third, Sabathia may have a worse weight problem than Giambi.

The Toronto Blue Jays made a similar mistake when they granted Vernon Wells a contract almost as rich as Sabathia’s based on his age 28 year. In a business where peaks and valleys are the norm, signing a player at his peak is a lot like catching a falling knife. We won’t know for another few years if Sabathia is an example of this. But the early indications are that he is.

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I was sorry to see Jack Wilson and Freddy Sanchez traded away last year and not just because they were good players and all around great guys. It’s because they were Pirate loyalists who would have been willing to play on the team for less than they appeared to be worth on the open market.

An important consideration for the low-budget Pirates.

(FanGraphs valued their performances at between eight and nine million dollars in 2009, a level that Sanchez, but not Wilson, has maintained in 2010. Sanchez is playing for six million and Wilson for five million a year with their new teams, about one million more than the Pirates offered them.)

This trade came with a silver lining: The emergence of Neil Walker at second base, who has personal ties to the Pirates, specifically to Roberto Clemente before he was born.

Walker’s father was a personal friend of Clemente’s and scheduled to accompany him on that ill-fated flight to Nicaragua. At the last minute, Clemente told Walker’s father not to go, not only sparing the father, but the future son. Here is the making of a future Pirate loyalist.

I did not want us to trade for Jose Tabata two years ago, because of his, or rather his (then) wife’s personal problems. But Tabata worked through those problems with his team behind him, and to the surprise of yours truly, has become a productive player.

He was reported by the press earlier this year as being “happy” in this role. Perhaps these “warm and fuzzy” feelings would cause him to sign contract extensions toward the end of his club controlled years.

With the benefit of hindsight, it might have been a mistake to draft Brad Lincoln in 2006, but that was almost beside the point.The real issue was that the draft class included Kyle Drabek, son of former Pirate pitcher Doug.

Assuming that he was truly first round draft choice caliber (and subsequent events have proven that he is), Kyle should have been drafted, almost without regard to the other candidates, on the theory that his father’s connection with the Pirates might have turned him into a loyalist.

One group of potential loyalists are older players. There are a number of players who began their six club controlled years in their late twenties, like Garrett Jones. They will become free agents toward their mid-30s, close to retirement age for such people.

Provided that their “late blooming” status makes them worth keeping, these are players that could retire as Pirates, possibly with one or two years of contract extensions into their free agent years.

That’s one reason why I did not want to see (then) 29-year-old Nyjer Morgan traded last year. With the benefit of hindsight, he should have been traded, but for something better than Lastings Milledge. (Unless the argument was that this deal was a “loss leader” to get Joel Hanrahan.)

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Jose Bautista used to be a problem for the home team, when that team was the Pittsburgh Pirates.

But now that he has found his stride, or rather his bat, in Toronto, it’s now his opponents that are wondering if they have a problem.

He’s looking at 50 or more home runs this year. This seems like a “high water mark,” at least for now, but even if he regresses to say, 30 to 35, he will still be a dangerous long ball hitter.

He’d just be in front of the “pack” (think Josh Hamilton of Texas, a hard-hitting team, or Mark Teixeira, formerly of Texas, now a Yankee) instead of way ahead.

“Regression” is likely to take place, partly because of the laws of statistics and partly because opposing pitchers will adjust to him. Now that he’s a threat, instead of just a fluke, they’ll pitch him more carefully.

Even so, their options are limited.

Bautista, a right-handed batter, hits most of his home runs to left field, a minority to left-center, and NONE to the opposite field. That suggests that pitchers should try to offer him opposite field balls, to his outside.

That’s easier said than done. Most pitchers pitch better to batters’ insides (which is why the conventional wisdom is to put up right-handed pitchers against right-handed batters and left-handed pitchers against left-handed batters).

If they pitch to the outside, they’re likely to give up walks, something that Bautista is good at drawing. Defying the above conventional wisdom, it’s now LEFT-handed pitchers that pitch better to Bautista, because his outside is their “inside.”

Likewise, most pitchers prefer to pitch low. That’s a bad strategy against Bautista, who likes to “lift” balls for pop-ups. His vulnerability is high pitches, chest- or even shoulder-high, like the ones that got him ejected from a game against the Yankees after he protested the umpire’s calls.

Pitchers may adapt to Bautista. But after they do, they would have to “revert” for other batters. Or a team may use a left-handed reliever against Bautista and then need to switch to a right-hander against the next batter. The confusion that could occasionally result could be a plus for Toronto.

As well, if pitchers can adapt, so can Bautista. In some ways, an outside pitch may be easier to hit, or at least “leverage,” because it doesn’t have to be “rebounded” like an inside pitch. The outside pitch is at least partly headed toward right field.

Although he doesn’t yet have the knack, Bautista can learn to guide the ball to the opposite field using his bat. That may even come naturally to him someday, because he won’t have to use as much power (he has enough to hit home runs, but perhaps less than the average slugger).

While maintaining his long ball pace, Bautista has started hitting more singles in the second half, thereby raising his batting average, formerly his Achilles heel. That seems to be because he is striking out less.

However many home runs he actually hits, Bautista is now a credible home run threat. Opposing pitchers can probably limit his home runs, but only by making concessions in other areas, like walks.

Bautista’s OBP (on-base percentage) is now approaching .400 and could exceed this mark next year if pitchers pitch “shy” to him. To take this concept to an extreme, pitchers could hold his home runs to ZERO—by giving him an intentional pass every time he shows up at the plate for a 1.000 OBP.

Most opponents would like to “solve” Bautista. Some will succeed better than others. But they will all find that there are no easy solutions to a multifaceted offensive player.

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In most years, the Pittsburgh Pirates would be fortunate to have one breakthrough pitcher. This year, they may have found two. And neither of them were Pirates at the beginning of the year.

Neither James McDonald nor Brian Burres were highly regarded by their former teams. McDonald was traded to Pittsburgh with an outfield prospect (Andrew Lambo) for all of reliever Octavio Dotel in July.

Burres was released by his former team, the Toronto Blue Jays, before being signed by the Pirates in January. (At least we got something back from them for giving them a future star named Bautista.)

The reason they both have very good potential, despite ERAs still in the fours, is that Burres and McDonald pitch well at home. Burres’ ERA in PNC Park is 2.32, and McDonald’s is 2.55. (The latter’s “home” ERA is higher only because of his stint in Los Angeles; this factor also raises his overall ERA (4.09) above his Pirates’ ERA (3.50)).

The reason that they can both be considered breakthrough pitchers is because they have each pitched one brilliant game on the road. McDonald pitched eight innings of shutout ball in the New York Mets’ Citifield. Burress did nearly as well, allowing only one run in seven innings at Cincinnati. Now we know that they can pitch well outside of PNC park. Or at least what their ceiling is.

The last year in which the Pirates acquired two relatively promising starters was in 2008, when they acquired Ross Ohlendorf and Jeff Karstens for reliever Damasco Marte (attributing JoseTabata and Dan McCutchen to Xavier Nady). Three, if you consider the fact that Paul Maholm had something of a breakout that year.

Burres, Karstens, Maholm, McDonald and Ohlendorf (in alphabetical, not rotational, order) might be our rotation for 2011. With Dan McCutchen, Brad Lincoln, and possibly Charlie Morton waiting in the wings in reserve. Probably not Zach Duke, who seems to be regressing.

If Andrew Lambo amounts to anything, the acquisition of him and McDonald for only Dotel might be the best deal since the Cleveland Indians traded Bartolo Colon for Cliff Lee and Grady Sizemore (in effect).

And Burres was a “freebie” (signing). So, too, for that matter, was Dotel.

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