The Pittsburgh Pirates are 18-5 in their last 23 games as home favorites of minus-151 to minus-200, which is important to consider when making your MLB picks on Friday as they take on the Colorado Rockies at PNC Park.
Courtesy of SBR Forum, the Pirates are minus-165 favorites in the pro baseball odds, with the betting total sitting at seven in the market.
Let’s take a closer look at this National League matchup from a betting perspective, while offering up a prediction along the way.
The Pittsburgh Pirates trail the St. Louis Cardinals by just half a game in the National League Central and they have a 4.5-game lead over the Cincinnati Reds in the NL Wild Card race. The Bucs have every right to be thinking big down the stretch.
With those high hopes comes the reality that the team must seriously consider tightening up the roster for the final two months of the season.
Pittsburgh has been active on the rumor scene and deals could be coming soon. Here’s a look at the latest news:
Alex Rios Could Be the Right Fit
David Kaplan of CSN Chicago tweeted that the Bucs and Chicago White Sox are seemingly getting close to a deal that would land Alex Rios in Pittsburgh.
Rios has a no-trade clause but is apparently willing to waive it to play for the Pirates. He is having a very solid season for a bad White Sox team. He’s hitting .272 with 12 home runs, 49 RBI and he’s also stolen 22 bases.
Rios would be a definite upgrade over the young Jose Tabata in right field.
A Pirates outfield of Starling Marte, Andrew McCutchen and Rios would be solid. We’ll see if the Bucs and White Sox can close the deal.
Giancarlo Stanton Is a Long Shot
While Rios may be the more practical option for the Pirates, the team is apparently still sending out feelers on a player who could make a bigger splash down the road.
Per Joel Sherman of the New York Post, the Pirates are among the teams that have been regularly checking on the availability of Giancarlo Stanton from the Miami Marlins.
Up to now they have been turned away, but a change of scenery could ignite Stanton’s bat. He’s struggled this year in a lineup that has been monumentally horrible. He’s hitting .262 with 13 home runs this year, but at 23 years old, Stanton still looks like he’ll be one of the majors’ premier power hitters over the next 10 years.
Prying Stanton away from the budget-conscious Marlins is worth exploring.
Bud Norris Could Be On the Way
It seems as though the Houston Astros are close to dealing starting pitcher Bud Norris. Per Dayn Perry of CBS Sports, Norris has been scratched from his scheduled start.
Jeff Passan of Yahoo! Sports tweets he expects Norris to be moved soon and names the Pirates as a likely landing spot.
The 28-year-old is only 6-9 with an ERA of 3.93, but in a pitching-starved market, he’s become a fairly hot commodity. If the Pirates can walk away with Rios and Norris, they will have strengthened their ballclub.
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Pittsburgh Pirates closer Jason Grilli was placed on the disabled list, but his absence won’t derail the team’s playoff chances.
Grilli left in the ninth inning of the Pirates game against the Washington Nationals Monday with a right forearm strain.
While it’s not thought of as anything major, any arm injury tends to worry fans.
In response to the move, the Pirates called up Victor Black, who is a ridiculous reliever prospect. In 2013, he has a 2.31 ERA and 51 strikeouts in 35 innings for Triple-A Indianapolis. He also is averaging 13.1 strikeouts per nine innings and 3.94 strikeouts for every walk.
According to ScoutingBook.com, Black has filthy stuff and is a future closer.
But the fact that Black is being called up is not the only reason why the Pirates’ playoff chances aren’t derailed.
Deep Bullpen
The Pirates have one of the deepest bullpens in all of baseball.
They have a record of 21-11 with 36 saves, a 2.77 ERA and 303 strikeouts in 341 innings pitched.
Those numbers are among the top in the league with only Baltimore ahead in saves (39), Atlanta ahead in ERA (2.66) and Arizona ahead in wins (22).
One way they’re reaching those numbers is by keeping opponents to a .212 average and only allowing 21 of 109 (19 percent) inherited runners to score.
Of the 45 save opportunities, the Pirates have only blown nine for an 80 percent success rate. They lead the league with 60 holds. Combine that with the 36 saves and you have 96 of 105 save situations (91 percent) converted.
Mark Melancon has been leading the charge everywhere with 26 holds and a 0.97 ERA.
Add in Justin Wilson’s six wins (all in relief), eight holds and 1.86 ERA, and you have the makings of a good bullpen.
The loss of Grilli hurts a little, but not as much as one might think, especially considering what the Pirates still have.
What They Must Do
While no changes are needed for the bullpen, the Pirates still have to look for a little more offense.
According to Bleacher Report writer Benjamin Klein, Pittsburgh should target a player that can “…preferably play first base and hit with power and consistency…”
Maybe someone like a Paul Konerko or Justin Morneau, although there are no rumors linking either to Pittsburgh.
Regardless, the Pirates need a little more help in the power department as Andrew McCutchen and Pedro Alvarez can’t be the only ones hitting bombs.
If the Pirates can bolster their offense—combined with their excellent starting and relief pitching—there’s no doubt they’ll be a favorite in the playoffs.
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If I had myself a private audience with the Pope of the Tigers, Jim Leyland, I’d pretty much just have one question for him.
The question wouldn’t be about his team’s bullpen, or why his catcher can’t hit or what the deal is with that 3-9 record in extra innings. I wouldn’t ask about Nick Castellanos’ potential, or what we should expect from Bruce Rondon or why his catcher can’t hit.
The subject wouldn’t be his smoking or whether Miguel Cabrera is the best he’s ever seen or why his catcher can’t hit.
I’d have one question, and it would go like this.
“What was it like when the Pittsburgh Pirates were winners?”
Leyland ought to know. He remains the last Pirates manager to guide the Bucs to a winning record. It happened in 1992, before Bill Clinton was elected president—the first time.
The Pirates were three-time defending National League East division champs after the 1992 season. The World Series eluded them all three years, but they were a pretty decent group of ballplayers, led by none other than Barry “Before and After” Bonds.
Leyland was a young 47 in the 1992 baseball season. His voice wasn’t as gravelly. Sports talk radio wasn’t nipping at his heels. From 1990-92, Leyland’s baseball year would go like this: Win the division, lose in the playoffs. That was pretty much it.
In 1993, the Bucs finished below .500, at 75-87. Pittsburgh baseball fans probably figured ’93 was a bump on the log, a blip on the screen, a good old fashioned fluke.
It turned out to be a 20-year bump/blip/fluke.
The Pirates became the Keystone Kops of baseball. They were the National League’s Washington Generals. Baseball’s version of the Los Angeles Clippers.
Leyland was fired after the 1996 season, on the heels of four straight losing seasons. His successor was none other than Gene Lamont, Leyland’s coach on the Tigers for the past eight years. Lamont lasted four years as Pirates manager, and he gave way to Lloyd McClendon, who also has been on the Tigers’ coaching staff since 2006.
Cue the spooky music.
So will the Pirates only be losers for as long as Leyland, Lamont and McClendon are together with the Tigers? Is there some sort of curse? Because we all know that sports fans love a good curse.
If the Pirates are cursed, it’s been the curse of poor drafting, questionable trades and free-agent busts.
The past 20 years of losing records have been deserved. You don’t play 162 games and call your end result an aberration. And you especially don’t lose for two decades and blame it on outside forces.
The Pirates have been losers since 1992 because they haven’t had very many good players. And they haven’t had very many good players because they haven’t done a good job of beating the bushes—in this country and elsewhere—in finding them.
The few so-called stars that the Pirates have had since 1992 have all eventually bolted Pittsburgh for greener pastures—which has been just about any team you care to name—or have been traded in lopsided deals.
So it’s been 20 years of win totals in the 60s or 70s—which is appropriate, because prior to Leyland’s arrival as Pirates skipper in 1986, the last time the Pirates enjoyed real success was in the 1960s and 1970s.
Pittsburgh has seen its share of bad baseball. The Pirates teams of the 1950s were mostly dreadful. Joe Garagiola, who played on some of those horrid Pirates teams in the ’50s, used to while away many minutes of dead air in his broadcasting career recalling those years, when Pittsburgh was home to the absolute worst that baseball could offer.
Then came the resurgence in the 1960s, starting with the 1960 World Series win over the mighty New York Yankees. The Pirates fielded pretty good teams throughout the decade, then continued winning in the 1970s, adding two more world championships to their total (1971 and 1979, both against Baltimore).
The well ran dry until Leyland took over and built the Pirates into a mini-dynasty from 1990-92. Actually, it was more of a National League East dynasty, but it was still pretty impressive.
The Pirates, in recent years, have teased their fans into thinking that the string of losing records may be ending.
In 2011, the Pirates were 54-49 on July 28. They trailed the first place Milwaukee Brewers by just 1.5 games in the NL Central (where the Bucs moved in the mid-1990s when baseball re-jiggered itself). August was nigh and the Pirates were in the thick of things!
You heard it all back then as giddy writers and fans had visions of the playoffs dancing in their heads. The ugly duckling was turning into a swan and all that rot.
A 10-game losing streak ensued, and just like that, the Pirates were the Pirates again. They were 54-59 and had sunk to fourth place, 10 games out. They finished 72-90, which was how they usually finished. The only difference was the 103-game tease that accompanied it.
In 2012, the Pirates did it to their faithful again.
July 28 once again was the team’s undoing.
In a spooky coincidence that only the Pittsburgh Pirates could pull off, the Bucs for the second consecutive year saw their high water mark come on July 28. For on that date in 2012, the Pirates were 58-42 and just two games behind the first place Cincinnati Reds. This was even better than 2011’s 54-49 on July 28.
Again, Pirates fans had cause to believe that the streak of losing seasons, which at this point stood at 19 years, was about to end. The 2012 Pirates had some players, most notably star center fielder Andrew McCutchen, who was being mentioned in league MVP talk.
So naturally, the Pirates stumbled and bumbled their way to a 21-41 finish (9-22 after August 29), to end up at 79-83.
The streak of losing seasons reached an even 20.
Have you looked at the standings lately? Pirates fans sure have, and you can forgive them for being as doubting as Thomas.
As I write this, the Pirates are 56-38. Someone named Jason Grilli (remember him?) was just on the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine, for his closing exploits and for his role in leading a terrific bullpen that calls itself The Shark Tank.
July 28 is eight days away.
Something tells me that Pirates fans will be watching the remainder of this season with one eye closed. Also appropriate, given their logo is a pirate with an eye patch.
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Though he won both of them, Gerrit Cole barely looked like a major league-caliber pitcher in the first two starts of his career. If it was more of the same in his third start, it was going to be all too easy to demand that the Pittsburgh Pirates return him to Triple-A as soon as possible.
What Cole, the No. 1 overall pick of the 2011 draft, delivered on Friday night against the Los Angeles Angels was not more of the same. Though he failed to put an exclamation point on the end of it, he at least made his message easy to decipher.
“Yeah, I belong here.”
Cole’s latest start was easily his best yet. He held the Angels to two earned runs over six and one-third, allowing four hits, a walk (his first) and a home run (also his first). The Pirates won 5-2, giving Cole a perfect 3-0 record.
Bear in mind that Cole did this against a hot team. According to FanGraphs, no team in baseball had scored more runs over the previous seven days than the Angels.
But the best part? Cole struck out five hitters. He had struck out only three in his first two starts combined, and those five strikeouts are a fine testament to how well Cole pitched.
The velocity was certainly there. Jeff Passan of Yahoo! Sports will gladly tell you all about it:
The velocity was great, but what was even better was that Cole’s hard stuff was actually as overpowering as the velocity says it should be for a change.
Cole got eight whiffs in his debut against the San Francisco Giants. According to Brooks Baseball, seven of those came on 64 fastballs, which doesn’t add up when one considers just how hard Cole is capable of throwing a baseball.
Against the Los Angeles Dodgers his last time out, Cole got only four whiffs. Brooks Baseball says he once again threw 64 fastballs and got only three whiffs with those. That made it a grand total of 10 whiffs on 128 fastballs through two starts.
The only proper reaction to something like that: Befuddlement.
Against the Angels, however, Cole got a total of 10 whiffs. The raw data at Brooks Baseball says he got nine of those on 77 fastballs, but this is a case where I’m not inclined to trust the raw data. It looked to me like Cole was mixing up his pitches a lot better than that, with his slider being particularly effective.
We know at least one was. Don’t we, Baseball America‘s Ben Badler?
Elsewhere, I wouldn’t be surprised if a couple of the “fastballs” Cole threw need to be reclassified as changeups. A good changeup from Cole, after all, has the velocity of most other good fastballs.
Regardless of how the pieces fall into place, there’s no denying that Cole was absolutely in control through the first six innings of the game. He flashed dominance in his first two starts, but he actually was dominant on Friday night.
Until the seventh inning, anyway. Cole gave up a leadoff home run to Albert Pujols to start the seventh inning, and that seemed to rattle him. He immediately followed his first career homer with his first career walk to Mark Trumbo, and then he gave up two straight bullets. The first ricocheted off him and became an out, and the second went into center field for an RBI.
Had Cole cruised through the seventh like he had cruised through the first six innings, he would have turned in one of the top performances by a Pirates hurler this year. As it is, the game score of 61 that he earned is a new personal best.
From here, keeping Cole at the major league level isn’t going to be an easy call for Pirates general manager Neal Huntington. He told Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com that he was looking to see both dominance and staying power from Cole. He wasn’t sure he had seen either in Cole’s first two starts, and understandably so.
Huntington surely saw the dominance on Friday night, as the rest of us did. But after what happened in the seventh inning, he may not be entirely convinced he’s seen the staying power yet.
There’s also business to consider.
Ron Cook of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette may be justified in wondering if the Pirates acted too soon and called Cole up before the Super Two cutoff. Huntington may be inclined to send him back down to Triple-A for a week or two just to be safe.
Then there’s the looming logjam. A.J. Burnett, Wandy Rodriguez, Jeanmar Gomez and James McDonald are all on the disabled list, but the Pirates’ official website says Gomez and McDonald could be back soon. Their pending returns could combine with Cole’s clock status to force Huntington’s hand.
But the Pirates need to be real here.
Cole has considerably more upside than both Gomez and McDonald, and their rotation would be something legitimately scary if Cole were to be well established by the time Burnett and Rodriguez are ready to come back. The three of them would look mighty good next to a resurgent Francisco Liriano and a quietly excellent Jeff Locke.
The Pirates have built their success this season around strong pitching. In a day and age when pitching rules, they’d be wise to do everything in their power to stay headed in that course. They have a better chance of doing that with Cole as a regular contributor in their rotation than they do with him as a part-time contributor.
Keeping Cole right where he’s at could indeed cost the Pirates a few bucks in the long run. But in the short run, keeping him right where he’s at could be a deciding factor in ending their postseason drought.
It’s worth the sleep they might lose for the Pirates to find out—for I’d say the drought has gone on long enough.
If you want to talk baseball, hit me up on Twitter.
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The Pittsburgh Pirates have to be thinking that all they need to do is keep their heads above water until the All-Star break. The fear that another late-season collapse is impending can’t be weighing on their minds.
The Bucs, who fell 4-1 to the Reds last night in the first game of a four-game set, have been fighting through adversity all year. Pitchers have been dropping like flies, each individual bat has seen peaks and valleys and the bullpen has been heavily overworked.
With all these things going wrong, it’s amazing that the team is 12 games above .500, but they are.
Early in the season, the past was close behind. For two straight years, the team has collapsed in the worst way down the stretch of what appeared to be promising seasons, and now they have to prove that they can hold it together for six months. The prevailing thought within the organization is play tough early, get the starters back and hit our stride by late July.
Well, that didn’t really go as planned, but it somehow has turned out better. Somehow, some way, without getting consistent hitting and with a constantly changing starting rotation, the team is competing in the National League.
The following stretch could determine the team’s fate. A major losing streak now, while pitchers A.J. Burnett and Wandy Rodriguez watch from the sidelines, could take the spark out of a team that is glowing with confidence and hungry to prove everyone wrong.
The beauty of the current situation is that all the team has to do is keep on doing what they have been doing all year and everything will be OK.
Entering Tuesday, the Bucs have a total of 23 more games and four days off before the All-Star break. Only six of those games are against teams who are currently above .500 (Cincinnati and Oakland) and the rest are all against teams that are eight games under .500 or worse, excluding Philadelphia (34-37).
If the Bucs can play .500 ball until the All-Star break, they’ll be as poised as anyone heading into the dog days of late July and August to make a pennant run.
The team’s current rotation consists of breakout lefty Jeff Locke, veteran lefty Francisco Liriano, rookie phenom Gerrit Cole, rookie no-name Brandon Cumpton and the oft-injured and frequently disappointing Charlie Morton. Liriano, Locke and Cole project to be in the rotation for the rest of the season and the near future, while Morton and Cumpton are out to show that they belong in in the big leagues.
The offense, which scuffled last night against Reds pitcher Mike Leake, is still a giant mass of moving pieces. Anyone on the roster can start on any random day, as bench players like Gaby Sanchez, Alex Presley, Mike McKenry and Brandon Inge all get crucial starts and at-bats. The Pirates have an offense-by-committee approach, and the team is hoping that Pedro Alvarez can stay hot until the break and that guys like Russell Martin, Neil Walker and Garrett Jones can come up with some big hits in clutch situations.
The team has lost a total of four series since losing their first two in the first week of the season. Since losing consecutive series to the Brewers and Nationals in late April/early May, the team has gone a solid 23-14.
The team’s mentality has to be the same as it was the beginning of the year: Take every series seriously and look at them as self-contained entities. The team has been swept only one time since the first week of the season and if they can keep that number at one during this stretch, it’s a victory. If Cole, Locke and Liriano keep pitching the way they have of late, the team should have enough to persevere through the adversity.
Charlie Morton (0-1, 3.60 ERA) makes his second start of the season Tuesday night against Matt Latos (6-0, 3.08 ERA).
Last night, the Bucs started lefty Alex Presley in right and batted him second, while Jordy Mercer started at shortstop. Presley and Mercer both had hits yesterday, so don’t be surprised if Hurdle pencils them into the lineup again tonight.
Andrew McCutchen was hit last night right on the little “c” on the back of his jersey, but it wasn’t the first time this year the two teams have taken shots at star players. Brandon Phillips was plunked earlier in the year and missed several games as a result. Look for the bean-ball to be a storyline again with these two rivals.
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Gerrit Cole showed the MLB why the Pittsburgh Pirates drafted him No. 1 overall in the 2011 MLB Draft, dominating the San Francisco Giants for 6.1 innings on Tuesday night.
Apart from throwing 99 mph multiple times, striking out his first batter, hitting a two-run single and recording 13 consecutive outs from the second inning through the sixth, Cole energize the Pirates fanbase, and we saw it all come out on Twitter.
Cole’s highly anticipated debut couldn’t have come against a better opponent. Not only was he at home, but he was facing the defending World Series champs and their former Cy Young winner, Tim Lincecum.
New on ESPN.com: Gerrit Cole has a date with the Freak. #pirates #sfgiants espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id…
— Jerry Crasnick (@jcrasnick) June 11, 2013
You’d expect the kid to be nervous with so much pressure on him, but he came right at Gregor Blanco to start the game, striking him out on three pitches.
This Gerrit Cole fella can bring some major league cheese. 96, 96, 99 thank you very much strike out.
— Corey Pronman (@coreypronman) June 11, 2013
Funny enough, it wasn’t Cole’s arm that really got fans excited right away. Obviously the kid’s stuff is unreal, but he really got the crowd going when he hit this two-run single to drive in the first two runs of the game.
Barmes has 3 more RBI’s than Gerrit Cole (2) for the season. He should be ashamed of himself.
— 10th Player! (@JerseyBuccoFan) June 12, 2013
Gerrit Cole should be batting ahead of Clint Barmes.
— #7 (@catfur7) June 12, 2013
It’s rare to see a player strike out his first batter and hit a two-run single in his first at bat, but those became two of many headlines throughout the night as Cole began to settle in.
As he worked his way back to the top of the Giants’ order Blanco was up again.
I’m sure it’s going to be different this time now that Gregor Blanco has seen three Gerrit Cole pitches (assuming he actually saw them).
— Andrew Baggarly (@CSNBaggs) June 11, 2013
I doubt he saw any of the pitches. I mean, c’mon. Would you have seen this 99 mph fastball for the K?
At any rate he ended up getting out again.
Cole really got into a groove in the middle innings, and everyone took notice.
Gerrit Cole has held the Giants scoreless through the top of the 4th… Still 2-0, Pirates.
— Buster Olney (@Buster_ESPN) June 12, 2013
Gerrit Cole with 39 strikes and 9 balls through 4 innings. Hard to beat that for fastball command. #pirates
— Jerry Crasnick (@jcrasnick) June 12, 2013
Gerrit Cole is CRUISING. Nine pitches, five pitches, ten pitches. Three straight perfect innings after that roughish start.
— Pat Lackey (@whygavs) June 12, 2013
You don’t see Buster Posey look bad in an at-bat very often, but he just struck out on an off speed pitch in the dirt from Cole.
— Buster Olney (@Buster_ESPN) June 12, 2013
13-straight #SFgiants have been retired by Pirates starter Gerrit Cole.
— San Francisco Giants (@SFGiants) June 12, 2013
Cole was impressive and notched his first big league win on the start.
Standing ovation for Gerrit Cole, who leaves in the 7th with a 5-1 lead. Gotta be impressed he didn’t issue a single walk in debut start.
— Andrew Baggarly (@CSNBaggs) June 12, 2013
Gerrit Cole wins #Pirates MLB debut, against the defending World Series champs no less.Let’s Go Bucs!
— Joe Stunkard (@fatherof8js) June 12, 2013
However, Twitter was far from done with him, as he had his first press conference, and this kid is a clown.
Gerrit Cole meets with the media after tonight’s game. twitter.com/Pirates/status…
— Pittsburgh Pirates (@Pirates) June 12, 2013
Watching Gerrit Cole talk to the media… dude’s actually hilarious.
— Emmy (@emmyohhh) June 12, 2013
“I wasn’t nervous before the game, and I was kinda nervous about not being nervous.” -Gerrit cole
— alex orseno (@orsenoctopus) June 12, 2013
Gerrit Cole: “Bases loaded in the second, I was like, ‘I better make a pitch — or we’re screwed.'”
— Chris Adamski (@BuzzsawPGH) June 12, 2013
I love the way Gerrit Cole talks he’s just like “yea if I gave up a hit we were screwed” he just seems real on top of himself haha
— aj bove (@aj_bove) June 12, 2013
The Pirates have found themselves and ace for the future, and the fans sure took notice of him on Tuesday night, practically naming him mayor of Pittsburgh.
Gerrit Cole is going to be a stud.. Loved to watch him pitch in person for the first time!
— Luke Kochka (@LukeKochka) June 12, 2013
Raise it baby!Gerrit Cole is the real deal. 6 2/3, 0BB, 2R. #bucsbooth #BattlinBuccos
— Tom Farmar (@tomfarmar) June 12, 2013
Gerrit cole is the real deal
— Waymond (@WarrenGross) June 12, 2013
Amazing game. Wtg bucs!! Hail to Gerrit Cole!!
— Lisa Ficca (@lficca) June 12, 2013
Cole gave the fans what they wanted, and now we’ll have to wait five days before we see if he can do it again.
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Pitch counts, innings limit…they’re all terms we’ve heard over the last year.
From Stephen Strasburg to various rookies in the big leagues for the first time, managers and general managers alike have taken an interest in saving the arms of their young players.
However, when it comes to Pittsburgh Pirates manager Clint Hurdle, pitch counts are something he doesn’t pay attention to, according to David Manel of bucsdugout.com.
My approach in terms of pitches, actually we were having a conversation today, I’m not paying attention to the number of pitches anymore, the rest of the year, for anybody. I’m serious. Just so you know.
It’s going to be about the barrel of the bat on the other team. The times men get on base. How they handle the stretch situation. Whether duress picks up or anything like that.
I want to make sure we have nobody looking at the rear view mirror at 95 pitches thinking ‘I’ve only got so many left.’ That’s out the window. Gerritt’s in that group as well. I mean, just pitch. If you want to have a goal. Some of us men need goals. Pitch seven full innings and we’ll figure it out after that what our next step is. That’s where we’re going.
What makes this interesting is the fact that it was said only a few hours before top pitching prospect Gerrit Cole was set to make his debut.
Some would call Hurdle crazy for making that statement. After all, you have to monitor a pitch count so a pitcher’s arm doesn’t fall off…right?
However, I think Hurdle may be onto something.
The Strasburg Example
Last year we saw the Washington Nationals virtually baby Strasburg. And in some cases they did it this year, before he went on the disabled list.
Strasburg has yet to pitch a complete game in his career and didn’t go more than seven innings in 2012.
Throw in the fact that he was on an innings limit and it was something that was always in the back of his mind.
As he got closer to his limit, his performance went down.
In his final start of 2012, Strasburg only went three innings and gave up five runs. Although he hadn’t reached his limit of 160 innings, they shut him down because it was in the back of his mind.
Then Washington, which had been the best team in baseball during the regular season, lost in the divisional round to the St. Louis Cardinals.
Strasburg could have pitched in at least one of those games and there might have been a difference.
Washington babied Strasburg and it ended up biting them in the butt.
Hurdle Has it Right
Hurdle understands the Pirates might not be in the position they’re in later in the future.
Even with how good the Pirates farm system is, there’s no guarantee they’ll be in the thick of things next year.
That’s where the Nationals messed up.
Washington general manger Mike Rizzo, assumed there would be great days ahead of the Nationals and Strasburg, according to the Washington Post‘s Adam Kilgore.
We’ve got a lot of bright and happy days ahead of us watching Stephen Strasburg pitch. This is something that he’s going to have to accept that it’s on his best behalf, and we’re going to move on from here.
As we can see, the Nationals aren’t in the thick of things this year and they may have wasted an opportunity last year.
Hurdle is not taking that chance.
If Cole is the best pitcher, then he’s going to pitch. It doesn’t matter what others think in terms of how many innings he’s pitched or pitches he’s thrown.
Cole is a competitor, like many others. If he feels like he can go, then why stand in his way?
Pittsburgh has a legitimate shot at not only making the playoffs, but going to the World Series. Cole will play a large role in that.
Why take away an opportunity he’s earned just so you can “save his arm?”
Your goal is to win a World Series. If you’re in the thick of it this year, then why worry about a pitch count, only to hope that you’ll be in the same position next year?
Baseball is about the present. Managers keep their jobs based on the results on the field, not the potential their team has in the future.
So, who cares about a pitch count? Let them do what they get paid to do.
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It’s a debut many Pittsburgh Pirates fans have anxiously been awaiting since the 2011 MLB draft.
Top right-handed pitching prospect Gerrit Cole will finally make his MLB debut Tuesday night against the San Francisco Giants, according to the Pirates’ official Twitter account:
Cole, who was the top overall selection in that draft, has been solid for the Indianapolis Indians at the Triple-A level this season, going 5-3 with a 2.91 ERA, 1.05 WHIP and 47 strikeouts in 68 innings pitched.
In his season-and-a-half at the minor league level, he’s gone 14-10 with a 2.84 ERA, 1.15 WHIP and 183 strikeouts in 200 innings. Not too shabby at all for the vaunted youngster.
The Pirates have been quite good this season, currently 36-25 and second in the Central Division. The starting pitching trio of Jeff Locke, A.J. Burnett and Wandy Rodriguez has been solid if unspectacular, while the bullpen is arguably the best in baseball, with closer Jason Grilli as the league leader in saves with 23.
Oh, and the Pirates lead all of baseball with 10 shutouts this year. From Elias Sports Bureau (via ESPN):
The Pirates’ 2-0 win on Friday was their major league-leading 10th shutout of the season. Pittsburgh reached double-figures in shutouts in its 61st game this year, the quickest that any big-league team has done so since 1989, when the Angels got to that total in their 46th game. It’s the fewest games that the Pirates have needed to record their first 10 shutouts in 105 years! The 1908 club notched its 10th shutout in game No. 57.
Now, the team will add Cole to an already solid rotation. It’s enough to get Pirates fans excited that a postseason berth could be on the horizon, and the playoff drought could come to an end after 20 seasons.
Then again, the team looked like a wild-card contender through July last season before collapsing in August and September.
But with Cole now reaching the majors with the potential to be a franchise ace for years to come—as well as some promising prospects still waiting in the minors—things are looking up for this Pirates team. If Cole steps in and shuts down the Giants, well, you can bet there will be a whole lot of optimism in Pittsburgh on Tuesday night.
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Another example of the baseball card collector’s “holy grail” is on the auction block. Just a few weeks after a T206 Honus Wagner tobacco card brought $2.1 million, another one of the 1909 rarities is up for bid.
New Jersey-based Robert Edward Auctions is offering the card once owned by actor Charlie Sheen. Just over a week into the bidding, it stands at $330,000. Graded PSA 1 (poor), the card shows wear, but has quite a story behind it.
In the 1990s, Sheen loaned the Wagner and several other vintage cards from his collection to the All Star Café in New York. It was a popular attraction at the sports-themed restaurant and apparently too tempting for a pair of chefs.
Two of them, along with a manager, plotted to steal the card and replace it with a copy. Their idea worked for a while and they tried to cash in by selling it to New Jersey dealer Alan “Mr. Mint” Rosen. The trio, however, got greedy. They stole an uncut sheet of 1934 Goudey cards that included the scarce Nap Lajoie card. They cut up the sheet and tried to sell the individual cards to avoid being discovered.
This time, though, it wasn’t as easy to replace the original, and when the theft was discovered, law enforcement agencies swooped in and the thieves were eventually arrested. The stolen cards, including this Wagner, were turned back over to Sheen, who later sold it—along with the majority of his collection.
The card has been in private hands for a while and was sold by the same auctioneer in 2009 for $399,500.
Virtually each time a Wagner card has sold, it’s gone on to bring a higher price the next time it hits the market—regardless of condition. In fact, lower-grade T206 Wagner cards are highly sought after by investors and those putting together complete sets of the ever-popular set that was issued inside various cigarette brands from 1909-11.
Wagner asked that his card be pulled from production, and that wish was granted early in the production process. It’s estimated that fewer than 75 may exist.
Popular, avidly collected and just downright cool, not all T206 cards are valuable. So many were made that common players and lesser-grade Hall of Famers can be had for less than $100 in lower grades. The set includes multiple cards of Hall of Famers like Ty Cobb, Walter Johnson and Christy Mathewson.
The auction, which also includes minor league cards of Babe Ruth and Joe Jackson in addition to the famous Wagner card, closes May 18.
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