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P2Daily: An Embarrassment of Riches

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We’ve all seen the rankings of farm systems and the Pirates have certainly done well.  The prospect writers and publications ranked them anywhere from first to sixth.  But we all know that system rankings don’t necessarily lead to the desired end, which is championships.

I’ve tried bolstering my optimism by finding other data points besides the opinions of the prospect mavens.  Anything that implies the Pirates are doing things right this time.  Lately that’s meant comparing the overall makeup of the current system to other Pirate systems of the past two decades.  Last week that amounted to a positional breakdown of the Pirates’ Baseball America top 30s since 2001.  Tomorrow it’ll be a look at the origins of the top 30s over the years, whether prep, junior college, college or international.

Another thing we all know is that adding talent to the system is only part of the task.  There’s also development.  In my opinion, though, development really has two aspects.  One is the obvious one:  coaching and other preparation.  The second is the process of integrating a prospect into the major league team.

That latter one can be much tougher than you’d think.  Take the case of Aramis Ramirez.  He was an elite hitting talent who shot to AAA at age 19.  He got a hurried callup due to injuries in mid-1998 and, naturally, struggled.  So the Pirates sent him back to AAA in 1999 and he tore the place up.  The Pirates, though, in the aftermath of a disappointing 1998 season, had become incredibly rookie-phobic, so they left him in AAA all year long.  Incredibly, they weren’t even going to call him up in September until Ed Sprague broke his hand.

With Sprague gone, Ramirez seemed a lock to play third in 2000, but noted arm- and rookie-shredder Gene Lamont was so terrified of having to play Ramirez that he even made an offseason trip to Puerto Rico to beg Wil Cordero to play third.  That didn’t work, but Lamont did everything he could to undermine Ramirez during the season.  He platooned Ramirez with the immortal Luis Sojo, batted him at the bottom of the order, and pinch hit for him whenever he came up in a key spot, even in the middle innings.  Lamont’s efforts succeeded and Ramirez went back to AAA at mid-season.  Finally, in 2001, new manager Lloyd McClendon had the sense to put Ramirez in the middle of the lineup and leave him there, and the result was a big season.  Unfortunately, in 2002, McClendon insisted on having Ramirez play through an ankle injury and he slumped.  The next year, Dave Littlefield, at the behest of Harry Frazee Kevin McClatchy, presented the Cubs with the gift of Ramirez, Kenny Lofton and the absence of Jose Hernandez.  These escapades are recounted in a documentary movie covering Littlefield’s Pittsburgh tenure, Plan 9 from Outer Space.

Of course, even if they tried, the Pirates couldn’t possibly replicate their Ramirez dips**ttery today.  At a minimum, that’d require at least three Kyle Starks and a Larry Doughty or two. But the whole affair, which cost the Pirates what could have been at least two more productive seasons before the trade, shows how many things can go wrong if a team lacks the commitment to play a prospect and stick with him.

This season will present the Pirates with questions of commitment, as well as decisions as to whom.  They have a lot of major league-ready prospects, more than they can commit to.  Not making a decision can be worse than making the wrong one, so they’re going to have to make choices.  Here are some major decisions:

**Oneil Cruz presents the Aramis Ramirez situation all over again.  He’s a huge talent who, at some point soon, is going to have to be in the lineup.  The question is how long the Pirates wait to “find out” about Kevin Newman and Cole Tucker.  How long do they put off the inevitable?

**Then there’s the raft of utility infielders the team has assembled:  Rodolfo Castro, Hoy Park, Diego Castillo and Tucupita Marcano, with Ji-Hwan Bae potentially joining them during the season.  Will the Pirates block them with another veteran AAAA guy?  (So far, so good.)

**Second base presents the same situation with the same players.  This time, though, the question is whether Newman and/or Tucker will be the barrier.

**Then there’s the outfield.  Do the Pirates give chances to the prospects they’ll have at AAA, even if they may not be quite ready, or do they continue playing weak-hitting infielders in the outfield?

**And the rotation:  How quickly will the Pirates weed through their legion of would-be fifth starters, with the real building blocks not far behind?  (A collateral question is whether the Pirates go heavily with two- to four-inning pitchers as a way of making these choices.  They have a ton of starting candidates and exactly two relievers who’ve shown they belong in the majors.  They could go with something like a piggybacking approach, which they’ve used for years in the low minors to sift through pitching prospects.)

Looming over all these interesting questions is the awful specter of the Manfred Lockout (“Lockfred”).  We all know the Pirates won’t be good this year, but if the team is winning to confront the choices they need to make, it could still be a fun season.  There’ll be losses, but there’ll also be moments like Cruz going to one knee to hit a bomb, or Roansy Contreras posting a scoreless start.  And this could, or should, be the team’s most interesting spring training in many years.  If it happens.

Pirates Prospects Spotlight

Demographics of the Pirates’ Prospects Over the Years — Positions

Check out part one of this series, with part two being released tomorrow!

Wilbur Miller
Wilbur Miller
Having followed the Pirates fanatically since 1965, Wilbur Miller is one of the fast-dwindling number of fans who’ve actually seen good Pirate teams. He’s even seen Hall-of-Fame Pirates who didn’t get traded mid-career, if you can imagine such a thing. His first in-person game was a 5-4, 11-inning win at Forbes Field over Milwaukee (no, not that one). He’s been writing about the Pirates at various locations online for over 20 years. It has its frustrations, but it’s certainly more cathartic than writing legal stuff. Wilbur is retired and now lives in Bradenton with his wife and three temperamental cats.

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