There are almost no words for how stupid and bad this makes them look. I don't want to just bash Horowitz, but this is a guy who was already kind of fringy given his age, position, and what else be brings to the table given both of those things. The best case scenario with him was that he'd give you an above average wRC+ for dirt cheap over 3 seasons or so at the top of the order with the power needing to be found elsewhere in the lineup.
This injury throws that into question and makes the already farcical offseason somehow look even worse. I am genuinely and honestly at a loss for words.... things were already awful, beyond bad, laughable, even by the Pirates' own already bad standards, and now this?
The only way I can really see to save some face in this situation is simply to fire Cherington into the sun right now, in an unprecedented way in February or March right before the season (it would never happen), which would at least given the replacement cover for the bad season that is about to take place. The scenario is just so absurd on the face of it that I genuinely feel like I am crazy to type it out for the umpteenth time this winter (along with everybody else): we got handed a literal cheat code, playoff series winner at the impossible position for any team regardless of budget size, and we just didn't do absolutely nothing.
It's more likely than not that the driving reason is that Bob Nutting didn't want to spend any more money on the team. But if that's not true in even a half-assed way -- i.e., Nutting would have been ok taking the "risk" to up the payroll by a lousy 15-20M -- then the only conceivable "good" outcome here is to scapegoat this pathetic loser of a GM. He is worse than Dave Littlefield.
