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

[DJ Spinoza]

Yeah, I mean to his credit I guess, he clearly is able to directly interact with some players and/or agents to get the videos he has gotten, but this seems like a pretty clear "predict it before it happens" case.

I've still been thinking that Cruz has a small shot to actually make the team, because unless we keep him in Indy until July, he figures to have a solid chance to negate that manipulation by playing well. I think there's probably enough ways to get him into the lineup pretty often, though I expect what the Pirates will end up saying is that Tucker has played too well and they want Cruz to have consistent at-bats while getting experience in the outfield.

It still seems like he could easily play 5 days a week, but the situation would be a lot cleaner if we trade Newman. My guess at the overarching plan might be to see if we can move Newman earlier on in the season, while perhaps getting further looks at Park, Allen/Alford, and Tucker, with the possibility of jettisoning 1-2 for Castillo and Cruz if a trade does happen. That said, it's still hard to shake the idea that Cruz hitting like crazy in MLB will make any service time manipulation a total moot point.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

LOL, guess I was wrong about Kody, or he really guessed right.

Predictable, and predictably disappointing. Seems like they didn't want another week of him playing well to make the decision look worse.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Yeah, I mean to his credit I guess, he clearly is able to directly interact with some players and/or agents to get the videos he has gotten, but this seems like a pretty clear "predict it before it happens" case.

I've still been thinking that Cruz has a small shot to actually make the team, because unless we keep him in Indy until July, he figures to have a solid chance to negate that manipulation by playing well. I think there's probably enough ways to get him into the lineup pretty often, though I expect what the Pirates will end up saying is that Tucker has played too well and they want Cruz to have consistent at-bats while getting experience in the outfield.

It still seems like he could easily play 5 days a week, but the situation would be a lot cleaner if we trade Newman. My guess at the overarching plan might be to see if we can move Newman earlier on in the season, while perhaps getting further looks at Park, Allen/Alford, and Tucker, with the possibility of jettisoning 1-2 for Castillo and Cruz if a trade does happen. That said, it's still hard to shake the idea that Cruz hitting like crazy in MLB will make any service time manipulation a total moot point.

How would he negate the manipulation?

 

[Empoleon8771]

Poverty franchise doing poverty franchise things.

I had a slim bit of hope that they would start him in the MLB this year based on the potential draft pick for winning ROY, but I was just being an idiot when thinking that. This cheap ass organization will have him sit in the minors until they can milk another year of service out of him.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

How would he negate the manipulation?

The new CBA stipulates that any player who finishes in the top-2 of voting for rookie of the year is granted a full year of service time.

That's why I think they will drag their feet as long as possible. If he's up after a few weeks, he's got basically as good a chance to win ROY as he does if he makes the team. The only quasi-logical angle I can see is if we are working on a Newman trade and don't want Cruz looming to make us lose leverage, but that's a pretty big stretch.

I don't think simply trying to wait until he'll be Super 2 eligible makes much sense. I think it's much more, "fully punt on three months of him so that you gain the full extra year and cross your fingers he doesn't clown AAA or start crushing immediately in MLB."

 

[Empoleon8771]

Oh magic conch, what did the MLB lockout accomplish to enhance parity in the MLB?

 

[ChaosAgent]

The new CBA stipulates that any player who finishes in the top-2 of voting for rookie of the year is granted a full year of service time.

That's why I think they will drag their feet as long as possible. If he's up after a few weeks, he's got basically as good a chance to win ROY as he does if he makes the team. The only quasi-logical angle I can see is if we are working on a Newman trade and don't want Cruz looming to make us lose leverage, but that's a pretty big stretch.

I don't think simply trying to wait until he'll be Super 2 eligible makes much sense. I think it's much more, "fully punt on three months of him so that you gain the full extra year and cross your fingers he doesn't clown AAA or start crushing immediately in MLB."

Reynolds finished 4th in NL ROY in 2019 and we would be over the moon if Cruz replicated that. I doubt it.

 

[Scandale du Jour]

I was expecting it, still disappointed.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

Reynolds finished 4th in NL ROY in 2019 and we would be over the moon if Cruz replicated that. I doubt it.

It's hard to say anything with too much certainty, but Reynolds' competition was Alonso, fully healthy Soroka, and Tatis. Cruz's figures to be guys like Stott, Ruiz, and maybe Hunter Greene? Predicting rookie performance is way easier said than done, but it seems pretty viable that if Cruz were to come up in May sometime and stay healthy, he'd have a strong shot at performing as well as any of these guys.

The conclusion I am drawing from this is that they are betting against him: slow start to the year in AAA while rotating between shortstop and OF = slow-roll any promotion until June or July. Now that he's actually in AAA, unless he starts destroying the ball and makes no mistakes on defense, there are plenty of excuses to be found to keep him there: we want # innings in the OF, we need consistency on defense and at the plate, we want him to play consistently in MLB when the time comes, etc., etc.

I think we all pretty much expected this between 98% and 100%, so not sure there's much of a sense in piling on. But I think this is an egregiously bad look. We're rightfully a joke because of the payroll, made no attempt to extend our star player, and now are completely flouting the "inventive" that should help a "small market" team (picking up the extra draft pick) as we head into the season committed to losing. "Player-centric culture" my ass. Only thing to do now is hope he does show up ASAP and makes this decision look even worse.

I'm very pessimistic, because I think the new rules put in place actually incentivize teams who are committed to service time manipulation above all else to double down even worse. I'd be surprised if he's in Pittsburgh before June, but I hope I'm wrong.

 

[ChaosAgent]

It's hard to say anything with too much certainty, but Reynolds' competition was Alonso, fully healthy Soroka, and Tatis. Cruz's figures to be guys like Stott, Ruiz, and maybe Hunter Greene? Predicting rookie performance is way easier said than done, but it seems pretty viable that if Cruz were to come up in May sometime and stay healthy, he'd have a strong shot at performing as well as any of these guys.

The conclusion I am drawing from this is that they are betting against him: slow start to the year in AAA while rotating between shortstop and OF = slow-roll any promotion until June or July. Now that he's actually in AAA, unless he starts destroying the ball and makes no mistakes on defense, there are plenty of excuses to be found to keep him there: we want # innings in the OF, we need consistency on defense and at the plate, we want him to play consistently in MLB when the time comes, etc., etc.

I think we all pretty much expected this between 98% and 100%, so not sure there's much of a sense in piling on. But I think this is an egregiously bad look. We're rightfully a joke because of the payroll, made no attempt to extend our star player, and now are completely flouting the "inventive" that should help a "small market" team (picking up the extra draft pick) as we head into the season committed to losing. "Player-centric culture" my ass. Only thing to do now is hope he does show up ASAP and makes this decision look even worse.

I'm very pessimistic, because I think the new rules put in place actually incentivize teams who are committed to service time manipulation above all else to double down even worse. I'd be surprised if he's in Pittsburgh before June, but I hope I'm wrong.

Wait until you're right until you say it's an egregiously bad look. He rakes in April in AAA and doesn't come up by May 3rd or whenever, sure.

I think you're also way too optimistic about Cruz being an immediate impact rookie. He's going to take a lot of time to adjust to the MLB level. If he becomes the monster you're envisioning it won't be for 3-4 years.

 

[ImporterExporter]

We also need to temper expectations for Cruz. Yes, he's got alien ability/mega ceiling but he's by no means a sure thing. I think he'll struggle to hit quality ML pitching, at least initially. People are going to change speeds a lot, and pitch him away, as he's susceptible to that direction. Now, the difference is he's got a reach longer than just about any other player out there so he can still get to some pitches that others wouldn't.

Shelton and company clearly don't believe he's a lock at SS. I've seen the fairly consistent errors on routine ground balls and that's not lost on the coaching staff, like it or not. They're not going to put a guy at SS who isn't fielding the position consistently. You're already behind the curve with a low budget team, you can't afford to have even below average D at that spot. We don't have a lineup yet that can overcome errors there. That much I do believe strongly in.

With that being said, I think he can play SS, but he needs to clean up the mistakes. I have no issue with them giving him reps in the OF and even working him around the IF as well (namely 3rd and 1st).

Obviously it's a bummer we're going to have to wait. I'm obviously not surprised but it still sucks regardless. My hope is he and Roansy are fantastic through the first few weeks and really put the screws to the coaches/FO to get them up before late May. If they play well and still aren't up until the 3rd or 4th week of May, then I'll be very pissed. Again, not surprised but pissed by that point.

 

[ChaosAgent]

We also need to temper expectations for Cruz. Yes, he's got alien ability/mega ceiling but he's by no means a sure thing. I think he'll struggle to hit quality ML pitching, at least initially. People are going to change speeds a lot, and pitch him away, as he's susceptible to that direction. Now, the difference is he's got a reach longer than just about any other player out there so he can still get to some pitches that others wouldn't.

Shelton and company clearly don't believe he's a lock at SS. I've seen the fairly consistent errors on routine ground balls and that's not lost on the coaching staff, like it or not. They're not going to put a guy at SS who isn't fielding the position consistently. You're already behind the curve with a low budget team, you can't afford to have even below average D at that spot. We don't have a lineup yet that can overcome errors there. That much I do believe strongly in.

With that being said, I think he can play SS, but he needs to clean up the mistakes. I have no issue with them giving him reps in the OF and even working him around the IF as well (namely 3rd and 1st).

Obviously it's a bummer we're going to have to wait. I'm obviously not surprised but it still sucks regardless. My hope is he and Roansy are fantastic through the first few weeks and really put the screws to the coaches/FO to get them up before late May. If they play well and still aren't up until the 3rd or 4th week of May, then I'll be very pissed. Again, not surprised but pissed by that point.

But also, let the record show that I'm not upset that my team manipulates service time.
We would not have had Andrew McCutchen in 2014-2015 had we not manipulated service time.

I'm upset my team doesn't pay players.
I'm upset that service time is a thing.
But having said that, since service time IS a thing I'm not mad my team does it.

If they wait until June-July, I'm not sure how I'll feel. Like, I'll hate that part of the calculus is the Super 2 which is related to not paying players. But if the Service Time is the overriding factor have at it.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

The reason I am saying that it's a bad look is pretty simple: based on performance in spring training, Cruz deserves to make the team. From the very beginning of his tenure, Cherington has talked about wanting to be a player-centric culture. Actions speak louder than words and the actions of not taking a player who can impact the game like Cruz can with you to Pittsburgh are actions that scream a few things everybody already knows extremely loudly.

Cruz never had a chance to make the team out of spring training. In fact, the weird timing of this demotion, with two filler pitchers just a few days after other prospects were demoted, also speaks to this fact. The Pirates didn't want him playing in more games this week and making their pre-decided plan look even worse than it does.

I don't think it requires any commitment to how good Cruz might or will be to say this. They could take Cruz with them to Pittsburgh, see what he can do, and adjust the situation accordingly. If he struggled and they thought he was overmatched, it's easy to send him down. These days, most teams basically treat AAA as a holding pattern for depth guys, guys who are blocked, or guys who have struggled and aren't going to be rostered by a competing team. I don't think Cruz has anything to prove at AAA, and this spring he's probably had 1 bad at-bat and 1 fumbled error in the field.

 

[ChaosAgent]

The reason I am saying that it's a bad look is pretty simple: based on performance in spring training, Cruz deserves to make the team. From the very beginning of his tenure, Cherington has talked about wanting to be a player-centric culture. Actions speak louder than words and the actions of not taking a player who can impact the game like Cruz can with you to Pittsburgh are actions that scream a few things everybody already knows extremely loudly.

Cruz never had a chance to make the team out of spring training. In fact, the weird timing of this demotion, with two filler pitchers just a few days after other prospects were demoted, also speaks to this fact. The Pirates didn't want him playing in more games this week and making their pre-decided plan look even worse than it does.

I don't think it requires any commitment to how good Cruz might or will be to say this. They could take Cruz with them to Pittsburgh, see what he can do, and adjust the situation accordingly. If he struggled and they thought he was overmatched, it's easy to send him down. These days, most teams basically treat AAA as a holding pattern for depth guys, guys who are blocked, or guys who have struggled and aren't going to be rostered by a competing team. I don't think Cruz has anything to prove at AAA, and this spring he's probably had 1 bad at-bat and 1 fumbled error in the field.

Because he ran into 2 fastballs out of 9 at-bats?

I dunno, man. Newman (lol) launched a bomb today. Tucker's been good. Castillo is probably making the squad. They probably have to give Park another chance and Chavis is somewhere floating around (right?)

I can't get upset about this.

 

[bigdaddyk88]

Cruz has 6 AB in AAA and like 50 above AA he isn’t ready no need to rush him. Let him play every day you still have to sell tickets this summer. I do wish they would approach Keller and Hayes again with an extension. It would help get the mlbpa off their backs. Sign Tahean or Happ to a 8 million dollar deal. Keller 5/40 Hayes getting close to the Marte extension with Arizona

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I think it's absolutely right that we have to see what happens, but I think messing around with the outfield is already a kind of strategic mistake. The only real approach that I think is justifiable is hoping Newman is off to a hot start and can be flipped for something half decent, and then Cruz is promoted to play most of his innings as an MLB shortstop. Even if he can play a passable corner OF, it's somewhat of a waste compared to how much he changes the equation if he's Aaron Judge with speed who is also mostly an everyday shortstop. And the 2022 Pirates are going nowhere! There's no real reason to screw around that much with this outside of calculus about pre-arb years and arbitration years where there's no reason to think he'll still be around in 5-6 years.

If you want to get really doom and gloom, there's a logic to this that involves the inevitability of moving Reynolds for some package this summer, given that we're so concerned about protecting some kind of window that keeps being pushed into the future. I won't go that far, but I'll also say that I'm 50/50 at-best on Reynolds sticking around.

I'll just reiterate that I think this decision means it's pretty naive to think Cruz will just need to be in Indy for 3-4 weeks if he performs well. If he's really good, I think the June 3rd weekend homestand is the absolute earliest we see him, and I wouldn't be surprised if that date is bumped until after the all-star break or trade deadline. Unless he is utterly dominating the league and Newman regresses defensively, they now have every excuse in the world not to promote him until as late as possible, and if the only real concern is gaining the extra year of service time, they'll use up every single one of them.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Cruz has 6 AB in AAA and like 50 above AA he isn’t ready no need to rush him. Let him play every day you still have to sell tickets this summer. I do wish they would approach Keller and Hayes again with an extension. It would help get the mlbpa off their backs. Sign Tahean or Happ to a 8 million dollar deal. Keller 5/40 Hayes getting close to the Marte extension with Arizona

I am leery about offering Ke'Bryan anything until he shows he can hit a ball into the air to Left-Left Center Field again. You have to stop taking middle-middle fastballs and grounding out to 1st.

 

[bigdaddyk88]

I am leery about offering Ke'Bryan anything until he shows he can hit a ball into the air to Left-Left Center Field again. You have to stop taking middle-middle fastballs and grounding out to 1st.

I understand and he will probably want to prove he can hit for more power to get more money. It’s only to get the mlbpa off their backs. We know it took from 2011 to 2017 to actually go from 40 million to 110 million and that was done by extending our guys

 

[ChaosAgent]

I understand and he will probably want to prove he can hit for more power to get more money. It’s only to get the mlbpa off their backs. We know it took from 2011 to 2017 to actually go from 40 million to 110 million and that was done by extending our guys

I mean, kind of.

The team made a lot of external acquisitions (Liriano, Burnett, Martin, Volquez, Daniel Hudson, Ivan Nova) who would have like each been this current team's highest paid player LOL.

The way to get the MLBPA off our back would have been acquiring outside pitching.

Hayes' price for me right now would be like 7/$60M. I'm way too scared by how terrible, unable to pull the ball, and locked up he looked at the plate last year. A 2-WAR, defense-only 3B outcome is still on the table unfortunately and until he clears that we can't give him bigger money.

I'd rather give Cruz $100M honestly.

 

[ImporterExporter]

I'm punting any extension to Hayes until we see how he looks now that he's seemingly back to 100%. He looked AWFUL hitting for much of last season. I think the wrist was a big reason, but it was bad. Of course his D makes him valuable regardless but he may just end up being a depth player if he can't figure out the hitting. You don't give up gold glove D, but I'm hoping to see him closer to 800 OPS than 600.

Cruz definitely needs playing time. Shelton would in no way be giving it to him if he remained up. Newman is his pet and will be here at least through the AS break. My hope is his bat heats up for the first few months, he plays upper tier D and we get a lottery ticket or 2 for him in July, thus opening SS to Cruz for the rest of the season. So let Cruz play every day in Indy for a month and then call him up.

 

[ChaosAgent]

I'm punting any extension to Hayes until we see how he looks now that he's seemingly back to 100%. He looked AWFUL hitting for much of last season. I think the wrist was a big reason, but it was bad. Of course his D makes him valuable regardless but he may just end up being a depth player if he can't figure out the hitting. You don't give up gold glove D, but I'm hoping to see him closer to 800 OPS than 600.

Cruz definitely needs playing time. Shelton would in no way be giving it to him if he remained up. Newman is his pet and will be here at least through the AS break. My hope is his bat heats up for the first few months, he plays upper tier D and we get a lottery ticket or 2 for him in July, thus opening SS to Cruz for the rest of the season. So let Cruz play every day in Indy for a month and then call him up.

We'll see if it was just the wrist.

To me he looked like he'd taken going the other way to its extreme and like, physically built a barrier where he couldn't pull a baseball. Maybe the wrist was the driver there, but it was messed up. No good hitter is incapable of hitting a dinger out to their pull side. Hayes is still up there hitting 100 mph exit velo grounders to 1st lol.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

Yeah, the closest thing I can muster to some measure of optimism in the face of the inevitable is that we want consistent playing time for Cruz and are being cautious about his experience, despite the way the front office talked about AAA last year.

In the literal sense, the benchmarks are probably as follows: 2.5-3 weeks down will mean he's still eligible for Super Two but that we've gained the extra year for sure. If we want to avoid Super Two (which is what I'm betting is priority #1), it's an inexact science but a conservative estimate is 10-15 days into June.

At the very least, the Pirates actions will tell us a lot. Inexplicably putting him into a less meaningful defensive position gives them enormous leeway to fudge when he is ready, but it's still likely to be the case that if the bat plays in AAA like it should, he can force the issue. Put differently, if he continues to hit for the first three weeks of the minor league season or so (April 5-24 is 18 games, going to May 1 is 24 games), the excuses to keep him in AAA will be few and far between, and there's a big gap between then and when he'd safely be cleared from Super Two.

My money is on not seeing him until mid-June, but I hope I'm wrong. Guess I'm glad I tacked on MiLB to my MLB.tv subscription. AAA Opening Day is in a week.

 

[ImporterExporter]

I can't see him in AAA into June, unless he's sucking or the team is somehow contending that long. I don't expect anyone coming up in mid to late May winning ROTY, short of them going nuclear, which could happen, though the odds are heavily against it. And again, there is at least compensation now where there wasn't in the past.

This year was still going to largely be about the minor leagues anyway. So many guys to hone in on below the ML level.

Next year is when I expect some traction above AAA, and certainly in 2024. If we're not on the right track at the ML level by at least 2024, I'll be calling for heads along with many others I assume.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I don't know -- the other thing that hasn't been mentioned today is that we had already yanked him from playing shortstop a week ago, and he was batting mostly 6th or 7th in the lineup. 5th the other day was the highest iirc.

These aren't the actions of a team that wants its player to succeed.

Also, there's no compensation for Cruz if he wins ROY. He has to be on the Opening Day roster in order to get the complementary pick. Now, if he comes up at any point and finishes in the top-2 for NL rookie of the year, he is awarded the full year of service time, which means he won't even be a Super Two player. Barring no extension, the options are:

1) No rookie of the year, kept down until after Super Two: 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 Pre-Arb, 2026, 2027, 2028 Arbitration

2) No rookie of the year, kept down a few weeks but called up and eventually is Super Two: 2022, 2023, 2024 Pre-Arb, 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028 Arbitration

3) Rookie of the year, irrelevant when called up: 2022, 2023, 2024 Pre-Arb, 2025, 2026, 2027 Arbitration

The Pirates are definitely aiming for #1 or #2, and #3 is the worst-case scenario for them because it negates the manipulation and makes him eligible for free agency after 6 years, which is how the rule is supposed to work but is de facto 7 years due to team practices.

Hard to say until we see their actions, but unless Bryson Stott or Keibert Ruiz goes absolutely crazy, it would seem like rookie of the year is pretty wide open, especially a top-2 finish. I get not wanting to be overzealous with what Cruz would do over 120 games or so, but projection systems like him and he has been locked in with the opportunities we gave him this spring.

Between all these factors, I think we'll try to avoid Super Two and hope that he can't insert himself into the rookie of the year race. If anything, the Pirates actually have set themselves up to get egg on their face: if Cruz does have enough time to get into the ROY race, then all the manipulation is for nothing and we don't even get the pick that is supposed to be the "incentive" not to do this.

There is a viable world where the Pirates want to see Cruz do some things in AAA and get more OF experience under his belt, but outside of just kinda waiting to end up needing to do those same things in MLB, I find it hard to put much faith in that. The only way I see the Pirates negating all of this is if Cruz signs some kind of an extension early in the season which makes all the service time stuff moot, but that also sets the bad precedent of "sign an extension or we'll manipulate your service time." In the end, the Pirates have his inexperience above AA to fall back on, but I think they'd be doing the same thing if he had not gotten hurt and had played a similar amount of games in AAA as Torkelson, Greene, and Witt.

 

[ChaosAgent]

I don't know -- the other thing that hasn't been mentioned today is that we had already yanked him from playing shortstop a week ago, and he was batting mostly 6th or 7th in the lineup. 5th the other day was the highest iirc.

These aren't the actions of a team that wants its player to succeed.

Also, there's no compensation for Cruz if he wins ROY. He has to be on the Opening Day roster in order to get the complementary pick. Now, if he comes up at any point and finishes in the top-2 for NL rookie of the year, he is awarded the full year of service time, which means he won't even be a Super Two player. Barring no extension, the options are:

1) No rookie of the year, kept down until after Super Two: 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 Pre-Arb, 2026, 2027, 2028 Arbitration

2) No rookie of the year, kept down a few weeks but called up and eventually is Super Two: 2022, 2023, 2024 Pre-Arb, 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028 Arbitration

3) Rookie of the year, irrelevant when called up: 2022, 2023, 2024 Pre-Arb, 2025, 2026, 2027 Arbitration

The Pirates are definitely aiming for #1 or #2, and #3 is the worst-case scenario for them because it negates the manipulation and makes him eligible for free agency after 6 years, which is how the rule is supposed to work but is de facto 7 years due to team practices.

Hard to say until we see their actions, but unless Bryson Stott or Keibert Ruiz goes absolutely crazy, it would seem like rookie of the year is pretty wide open, especially a top-2 finish. I get not wanting to be overzealous with what Cruz would do over 120 games or so, but projection systems like him and he has been locked in with the opportunities we gave him this spring.

Between all these factors, I think we'll try to avoid Super Two and hope that he can't insert himself into the rookie of the year race. If anything, the Pirates actually have set themselves up to get egg on their face: if Cruz does have enough time to get into the ROY race, then all the manipulation is for nothing and we don't even get the pick that is supposed to be the "incentive" not to do this.

There is a viable world where the Pirates want to see Cruz do some things in AAA and get more OF experience under his belt, but outside of just kinda waiting to end up needing to do those same things in MLB, I find it hard to put much faith in that. The only way I see the Pirates negating all of this is if Cruz signs some kind of an extension early in the season which makes all the service time stuff moot, but that also sets the bad precedent of "sign an extension or we'll manipulate your service time." In the end, the Pirates have his inexperience above AA to fall back on, but I think they'd be doing the same thing if he had not gotten hurt and had played a similar amount of games in AAA as Torkelson, Greene, and Witt.

I think you are just way overselling his chances of winning ROY.

There's gonna be some pitcher who comes up and puts up a 2.something ERA. Cruz and his 25 dingers and .810 OPS aren't gonna sniff that.

But idiosyncratically, if Cruz is good enough to win ROY it means we really, really need to Service Time manipulate him.