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OT: Raise the Jolly Roger: Congrats to the Houston Cheaters on their win

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DJ Spinoza said:
Yeah, I think Baez is probably a pretty good comp for him, with maybe the small caveat that he has different kinds of right-tail outcomes due to the power. Obviously Baez had multiple 30 HR seasons, but Cruz has easy 35-40 HR power in that bat if he stays healthy, and to at least an extent this is true while also running a K-rate that's too high (though for that reason, he may not end up in a position to actually follow through on the power if he were sent down next year, etc.).

Another caveat/wrinkle is that Baez basically never walked, whereas Cruz is actually putting up a walk rate that is more than Baez's (bad) career best. Whether Cruz will tick the walks up is a big question, I think. Because of the nature of the minor leagues and also some injury history, there isn't a huge swath of consistent data, but he ran an excellent 12.1% BB-rate in AAA this year, and a similar one in a smaller sample of games when he first got to AA in 2019.

If he runs an ok 7% or a little more, which is where he's at now, then he'll still be a very quality contributor, with the big other question being the SLG. Batting average is almost totally a meaningless thing to look at with him. Getting the chase and in-zone contact rates in good shape, along with ticking up some walks, and thereby vaulting that SLG another 100 points or so will put him comfortably in the top 10 or 15 of power hitters, with the insane raw power probably showing up with more HRs than nearly everyone, including some guys who are better pure hitters who would outslug him (for example, guys like Jose Ramirez, Rafael Devers, or Mookie Betts, all of whom run tremendous K rates that he isn't going to reach).

In the end, the other comp here besides Baez is simply Tatis, I think. It's all pretty exciting, and I think there's an underrated total 2022 season under the hood of his totals, if you account for early bad weather in AAA + a slow, disappointing start, along with pretty run of the mill rookie batter struggles. I don't think we should ever get in the habit of dreaming on just one slice of data, but Cruz's cumulative totals between now and the end of the year loom pretty large, IMO.

And of course, this is all to say nothing of the fact that he's consistently done what almost every armchair spectator (who didn't watch him in the minors...) thought he couldn't do, namely play SS with complete competence and actual defensive upside.
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I'm finally beginning to see Cruz adjust and maybe even learning to hit. So I can now agree with you on process improvement for Oneil.

DJ Spinoza said:
I don't mean this in a passive aggressive way, but have you watched him regularly? He has occasionally made some errant throws, and then within the same game, including yesterday, he fires a number of perfect throws later in the game.

So I don't think you are totally wrong, but I don't quite think it's the yips. It's a less than ideal part of the package that you can probably live with for the most part and then perhaps need to eventually think about having a defensive replacement for late, close games that really mean something.
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I'm still on the bandwagon that Cruz needs to let it rip every time. If he does that, I think he eliminates 75% of his throwing errors.
 
DJ Spinoza said:
I don't mean this in a passive aggressive way, but have you watched him regularly? He has occasionally made some errant throws, and then within the same game, including yesterday, he fires a number of perfect throws later in the game.

So I don't think you are totally wrong, but I don't quite think it's the yips. It's a less than ideal part of the package that you can probably live with for the most part and then perhaps need to eventually think about having a defensive replacement for late, close games that really mean something.
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Yips aren't going to afflict you on every single throw. Pedro 2014 wasn't missing every throw. But enough.

That Cruz dirtballed a throw in a crucial bases loaded situation but then was fine when the pressure's off...IDK, means something.

I also don't want to have to have some defensive wizard at 1B. That should be a bat first position. I shudder to think of Cruz throwing to 2019 Josh Bell instead of Chavis, though I'd make the trade in a heartbeat because Chavis sucks apparently (and disappointingly).
 
Gallatin said:
It's always so surprising to me how few fans want to play Moneyball. I want my team to be creative & efficient in taking every advantage available to a small market team.

I want Cruz for 7+ seasons. Same with the other guys. Why do we constantly complain when the Bucs play it smart? Otherwise I often agree with your opinions.

It feels lonely to be one of the only folks here with a modicum of patience sometimes ....
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If they kept him down until May, or even just a few weeks into April, they would have him for the 7 full season loophole that's in the current CBA. It's a question of paying for an extra year or arbitration or not at that point, and if he did get promoted and then sent back to AAA to work on some things, the service time could work out that Super 2 would be negated anyways.

More importantly, I do not think it's simply smart to approach these questions in a blanket manner. Decisions need to be more clearly justified with the player's development in mind. At best, the Pirates sent extremely mixed signals by having him get a brief cup of coffee in September last year and then absolutely managing things so that it was a foregone conclusion that he would not make the team out of spring training.

We can argue about whether or not he was "ready" (an extraordinarily nebulous idea) coming out of spring training, but I don't think it's debatable that they went into the season fully intent on keeping him in AAA until the Super 2 deadline was comfortably passed. Circumstances forced a different and I would say even more stupid path with Contreras.

The reason that I think this is both the player's development in general and also, even from a cynical point of view, having options and years of control doesn't matter one damn bit if you play so many games that the end result is the player taking multiple years to really adjust or never quite clicking with their ceiling (or even worse, them falling into one of these traps and then being traded to a better organization who gets them right).

I don't think things are quite this extreme, but I also don't think we should shy away from the fact that a monomaniacal focus on service time flirted with having 2022 be a wasted season for the player who is inarguably the biggest key to the rebuild working out. Roansy wasted a bunch of innings at a level he doesn't need to pitch at in a year where he needs to be making real adjustments against MLB hitters while building up his arm.

Even setting aside the player development question, I think it's also just extremely marginal what kind of savings path we're actually talking about. I look at it like this: on the one hand, the team could have avoided playing games at all, and maybe the season shakes out slightly differently and you are investing alongside Hayes in a big contract to make him a franchise player for the next 10 years. That makes any service time manipulation a moot point. On the other hand, if you are going to slow roll it and capitalize on his pre-arb years, then even if he gets 4 arbitration years, you are saving something like 5-10-15M over the course of a couple of seasons and trading him for his final couple of arbitration years anyways.

In other words, I think the strongest cynical argument is to simply secure the 7th year of control, but that happens by forcing the player down for 25 days of service or so. After that, we're just talking about cheapness plain and simple, especially given the complete lack of any payroll commitments beyond the utter pittance Hayes will get. Strategically, I just don't see a reason to justify this kind of blanket approach, and I think it's only compounded when you overtly state and also act on a philosophy which says AAA isn't really much of a developmental league.

In the end, the main priority should be on getting the player to the level you need him to be. Despite the games, there's still an optimistic path that this is happening with Cruz, especially if he can show he's made some positive adjustments which stick over the final weeks of this season. We won't ever know what 8 extra weeks could have meant to his current MLB prognosis or the kind of player he is throughout 2023.
 
DocEmrickSkitters said:
Yips aren't going to afflict you on every single throw. Pedro 2014 wasn't missing every throw. But enough.

That Cruz dirtballed a throw in a crucial bases loaded situation but then was fine when the pressure's off...IDK, means something.

I also don't want to have to have some defensive wizard at 1B. That should be a bat first position. I shudder to think of Cruz throwing to 2019 Josh Bell instead of Chavis, though I'd make the trade in a heartbeat because Chavis sucks apparently (and disappointingly).
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I just think it's pretty hasty to conclude this. Pedro obviously wasn't every throw, but it was way more frequently than anything we've seen from Cruz, and I associate the yips more with completely yanking the throw and being nowhere close. The errant throws from Cruz have been a little tough for a 1B to handle, and only once maybe he's airmailed it over the 1B's head. That's going to happen -- Tatis and everyone else does the same.

The value he adds / will add from the SS position is too immense. There's also a genuine question about who might replace him, in any case. Peguero has projectability, but he's making the same kind of errors in AA that Cruz did and his bat is lagging since his cup of coffee in MLB.

I don't think it's totally impossible that Cruz moves off the position or moves off it part-time, but I think you basically have to have him penciled in for the same kind of role of a Tatis or Baez who is the everyday SS that DH's partially in order to rest while keeping the bat in the lineup. It's actually a shame that so far in AA, Triolo is a total wizard defensively with good bat to ball and some pop, but can't seem to play a plus SS. He'd be the guy who I'd like to project as the super utility bench option as early as June or July next year.
 
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DJ Spinoza said:
If they kept him down until May, or even just a few weeks into April, they would have him for the 7 full season loophole that's in the current CBA. It's a question of paying for an extra year or arbitration or not at that point, and if he did get promoted and then sent back to AAA to work on some things, the service time could work out that Super 2 would be negated anyways.

More importantly, I do not think it's simply smart to approach these questions in a blanket manner. Decisions need to be more clearly justified with the player's development in mind. At best, the Pirates sent extremely mixed signals by having him get a brief cup of coffee in September last year and then absolutely managing things so that it was a foregone conclusion that he would not make the team out of spring training.

We can argue about whether or not he was "ready" (an extraordinarily nebulous idea) coming out of spring training, but I don't think it's debatable that they went into the season fully intent on keeping him in AAA until the Super 2 deadline was comfortably passed. Circumstances forced a different and I would say even more stupid path with Contreras.

The reason that I think this is both the player's development in general and also, even from a cynical point of view, having options and years of control doesn't matter one damn bit if you play so many games that the end result is the player taking multiple years to really adjust or never quite clicking with their ceiling (or even worse, them falling into one of these traps and then being traded to a better organization who gets them right).

I don't think things are quite this extreme, but I also don't think we should shy away from the fact that a monomaniacal focus on service time flirted with having 2022 be a wasted season for the player who is inarguably the biggest key to the rebuild working out. Roansy wasted a bunch of innings at a level he doesn't need to pitch at in a year where he needs to be making real adjustments against MLB hitters while building up his arm.

Even setting aside the player development question, I think it's also just extremely marginal what kind of savings path we're actually talking about. I look at it like this: on the one hand, the team could have avoided playing games at all, and maybe the season shakes out slightly differently and you are investing alongside Hayes in a big contract to make him a franchise player for the next 10 years. That makes any service time manipulation a moot point. On the other hand, if you are going to slow roll it and capitalize on his pre-arb years, then even if he gets 4 arbitration years, you are saving something like 5-10-15M over the course of a couple of seasons and trading him for his final couple of arbitration years anyways.

In other words, I think the strongest cynical argument is to simply secure the 7th year of control, but that happens by forcing the player down for 25 days of service or so. After that, we're just talking about cheapness plain and simple, especially given the complete lack of any payroll commitments beyond the utter pittance Hayes will get. Strategically, I just don't see a reason to justify this kind of blanket approach, and I think it's only compounded when you overtly state and also act on a philosophy which says AAA isn't really much of a developmental league.

In the end, the main priority should be on getting the player to the level you need him to be. Despite the games, there's still an optimistic path that this is happening with Cruz, especially if he can show he's made some positive adjustments which stick over the final weeks of this season. We won't ever know what 8 extra weeks could have meant to his current MLB prognosis or the kind of player he is throughout 2023.
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If you don't think Super Two matters to small market franchises, well we have a basic disagreement on how to run a team. Which is fine. I'm no Nostradamus.
 
DJ Spinoza said:
I just think it's pretty hasty to conclude this. Pedro obviously wasn't every throw, but it was way more frequently than anything we've seen from Cruz, and I associate the yips more with completely yanking the throw and being nowhere close. The errant throws from Cruz have been a little tough for a 1B to handle, and only once maybe he's airmailed it over the 1B's head. That's going to happen -- Tatis and everyone else does the same.

The value he adds / will add from the SS position is too immense. There's also a genuine question about who might replace him, in any case. Peguero has projectability, but he's making the same kind of errors in AA that Cruz did and his bat is lagging since his cup of coffee in MLB.

I don't think it's totally impossible that Cruz moves off the position or moves off it part-time, but I think you basically have to have him penciled in for the same kind of role of a Tatis or Baez who is the everyday SS that DH's partially in order to rest while keeping the bat in the lineup. It's actually a shame that so far in AA, Triolo is a total wizard defensively with good bat to ball and some pop, but can't seem to play a plus SS. He'd be the guy who I'd like to project as the super utility bench option as early as June or July next year.
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I think if Cruz is an .800 OPS shortstop, we can deal with a throwing error every 4th game. If he's a .675 OPS guy that just hits moonshots, it's a little harder to deal with.

I don't think any potential 1B we have in the system matches Chavis' ability to scoop the baseball as we saw last night. Nunez is average at best I heard defensively. Maybe if/when Davis moves to 1B he'll be very good defensively.

Baez is a reasonable comp for Cruz, and during his peak years added a ton of value.
 
Gallatin said:
If you don't think Super Two matters to small market franchises, well we have a basic disagreement on how to run a team. Which is fine. I'm no Nostradamus.
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I think the disagreement between us is that I'm saying the payoff is too marginal to follow it as an absolute rule. To put it all another way, let's set aside any designs on long-term contracts or anything like that. This is Cruz's Age 23 season, and assuming Super 2, he will have Pre-Arb for three further years, Age 24, Age 25, and Age 26. From a team perspective, this is terrific, because there's a decent likelihood that the final Pre-Arb year there is his peak, even if he could be able to maintain it for a few years.

If he isn't Super 2, then it's the same thing, but you'll have to pay more money starting in the Age 26 year, i.e., 2025. Even if he's Kris Bryant level good in his final Pre-Arb year, there are pretty firm limits on the exact bump that his pay is going to get. But if the cost of securing the big financial savings of the 3rd Pre-Arb year instead of a 4th Arbitration year is that his Age 24 and Age 25 seasons aren't as good as they could be, is it really worth it?

In these scenarios, we have to assume that the hugest weight of the actual money he will be paid in his arbitration years will not be paid by the Pirates. You either trade him mid-2026 with 2.5 years left for an enormous ransom, or look at doing the same that winter, or mid-2027.

It's definitely fair to say that the possible decision on extending him and buying out arb + free agent years isn't as binary as I am making it seem, and is something that could be pursued either this upcoming offseason or in another year or two. But once we introduce those hypotheticals into the equation, then the service time games were basically a moot point anyways, though having the additional pre-arb year also introduces more financial leverage for the team.

In fact, I'd probably go as far as to say that the team might be making a calculated risk overall, in the sense that there are multiple ways that it could be in their interest for him to have big ups and downs in his rookie season. For starters, it likely avoids him finishing in the ROY mix and screwing all this up. It also keeps the team on track for another high pick, though here obviously I doubt it would matter much if he were replicating Harris' season. But finally, it maybe positions him for a less "risky", low ball type offer from the team in the winter. I would not be surprised if that's the long game here -- letting him play through a lot of struggles and hoping he finishes up on a strong note, then proposing something fairly similar to what Hayes got to see if he bites.
 
Looks like Davis has been activated for Altoona and Sabol gets the bump to Indianapolis. I guess he can ride out the season there without it being much of an issue, but neither Heineman nor Delay seem like much of a solution at catcher, so it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to get Sabol up in September and see what he can do. If he can hit, he might be a bench possibility for next year, but I would guess it's more likely that he'll be squeezed from a 40-man spot and reserved as depth in AAA. Delay strikes me a little bit as having some inside track for a backup job, but it's also something that could be decided in a position battle in spring training.

Obviously, Endy + Davis are the far more interesting C prospects, and if I understand correctly, Sabol's defense doesn't stand out in any way, and if anything is the opposite, so he might be a DH/1B/corner OF type who needs to keep mashing and get an opportunity. But, given what we're rolling out there now, he's someone I'd rather see for some ABs in September.
 
In the grand scheme of issues with the Pirates, whether Cruz came up in April-May-June-July isn't on the list.

It's mostly the .250 baseball, the regressing minor league system outside of Endy and the inability to find functional baseball players even accounting for the scrap heap element.

Cruz is Cruz. Boom/bust player with a huge range of outcomes. Very little has changed with his outlook.
 
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As if we needed more bad news, Chandler was extremely wild and didn't make it out of the first. At one point, trainers came out and talked to him for a good while, but he stayed in to give up a flyout, another walk, and a double steal. He then walked another guy and was pulled. Hard to tell if it's huge injury red flags or if his control was just terrible. Hopefully the latter.
 
DJ Spinoza said:
As if we needed more bad news, Chandler was extremely wild and didn't make it out of the first. At one point, trainers came out and talked to him for a good while, but he stayed in to give up a flyout, another walk, and a double steal. He then walked another guy and was pulled. Hard to tell if it's huge injury red flags or if his control was just terrible. Hopefully the latter.
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He has 24 walks in 37 innings and hasn't hit well in Bradenton. Yet another good story gone.

You can see how the minors have regressed to the 8th-10th spot despite the brain trust claiming they have added talent.
 
I think the system has not taken a step forward this year, but I'd say that Chandler's situation is only soured if he's hurt in some way. He's been really dominant at times in Bradenton, and the rawness of his game has also been pretty apparent. I think his fastball is pretty comfortably the best pitch in the system, and an excellent foundation to keep building on. He has feel for other pitches, too, so something like TJ would be catastrophic.

Altoona put on a hit and discipline parade tonight for a huge inning. A bunch of guys working deep counts and taking walks with the bases loaded until Gonzales smashed a double to the wall.
 
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Good work from Cruz there. I don't want to make excuses for the first AB, but I don't know how much of it is Haines' pitching philosophy... he needs to be roaring and ready to crush the 2-0 pitch in that first AB. Regardless, good to see him aggressive and convert the RBI, especially after Alexander painted a backdoor slider to get ahead 0-1.
 
Gonzo is .292/.426/.479/.905 since coming back to AA after missing 2 months.

Great news is he's mashing but also walking at a 17% clip w/K's down to just 22%. Obviously we're talking 60 PA's but the contact and patience is great to see.

Also, Gorski hit a homer in his first rehab game back. Got to keep an eye on him the rest of the year and next spring as potential power bat.
 
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Great stuff from Keller, not only in terms of the Ks and general results, but also to show that he's fully healthy. Hopefully Brubaker gets back into the saddle after the paternity leave and they can continue to shoulder quality innings down the stretch.
 
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Great start from Keller.

Cruz has done well aside from the bewildering 1st AB.

Just hit Hayes 9th already. Honestly I would have considered PHing Vanmeter there. Hayes doesn't have it offensively and I don't think it's likely to get better. Need to hire the right voice for him (probably not his father) and hope it works.
 
Well, it was good I guess.

Hayes again offensively blew it. The guy might be a .600 OPS guy legitimately. Good eye but a terrible swing.

Edit: I'm also reconciling myself to this potential loss. CDJ may get it done still.
 
I do like the idea that Cruz should just let it rip every time. Throwing looks more instinctive.

Great play by Castro as well. Raise it!
 
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