Throughout the off-season, Neal Huntington has said that Pedro Alvarez will be the starting first baseman for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Meanwhile, there have been some rumors about how the Pirates could still trade him. A specific rumor came up last week, saying the Pirates and Marlins discussed an Alvarez-for-Nathan Eovaldi deal.
That deal sounded too good to be true. Eovaldi has amazing stuff, with one of the hardest fastballs in the game. He’s under control for three more seasons. Meanwhile, Alvarez is under control for two years, is coming off a down year, has never played first base, and at his best is just a three outcomes guy. It’s not that Alvarez is bad when he’s at his best. He averaged a 2.7 WAR between 2012-13. But Eovaldi was a 3.0 WAR pitcher last year, and could be in line for more improvements, since he’s only going to be 25 next year. If I had a choice, I’d make the Alvarez/Eovaldi deal (assuming it’s realistic, which I don’t think it was), and sign someone like Michael Morse to play first base.
It seems the Marlins feel the same way.
Source confirms: Morse in agreement with #Marlins, two-year contract, pending physical. @JoeFrisaro first with news of deal.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 16, 2014
That’s why the rumors never made sense for either side. The Pirates could have traded Alvarez, but would have needed to immediately replace him with a first base option. And if they felt they were better off making a trade and replacing Alvarez with an external option, then why wouldn’t the Marlins just skip the trade and make that external addition themselves?
It’s possible the Pirates were thinking about dealing Alvarez. I just think it would have been incredibly difficult for them to do so.
