2010 MLB Thread

[coolmoors]

Derrek Lee hit his 300th homerun a couple days ago.

[LeBronShaq09]

I cant wait for Strasburg tonight!
He's dominated so far

[dfreely]

Edwin Jackson pitched the fourth no-hitter this season last night. It was probably as poorly as you could pitch a no-hitter, if that makes any sense. 149 pitches (only 79 for strikes), gave up 8 walks, a wild pitch and hit a batter.

[packrat]

First and foremost, forgive me for quoting myself...

Try being a Pirates fan! 17 years in a row with a losing record... But I have high hopes they will finish at .500 this year.

I've given up on this hope. Just the other day they demoted two more guys (Justin Thomas and Jason Jaramillo) but have not yet replaced one of them on the 25 man roster. They also just re-acquired Brian Bixler, whom they traded for a guy that didn't pan out and is also in Triple-A. They have more holes in their roster than Swiss cheese. Just about everyone they traded for in the off-season is in Triple-A right now. Unbelievable.

I think management has had too much drugs. Or maybe not enough.

[dfreely]

Just noticed the Pirates have two former Mets handling the outfield.. they were actually traded for each other if I remember correctly. Too bad neither is hitting like it's 2008.

Do the Pirates at least have a good farm nowadays? I've only heard about Alvarez, but there's gotta be more than that right?

[coolmoors]

Bob Sheppard and George Steinbrenner have both died. RIP.

[packrat]

Do the Pirates at least have a good farm nowadays? I've only heard about Alvarez, but there's gotta be more than that right?

Other than Alvarez, they recently promoted Jose Tabata and Brad Lincoln from AAA Indianapolis. Alvarez could have used a little more seasoning in AAA though.

Yeah, the Pirates farm system is pretty decent and has a few prospects that could possibly make an impact. Probably the most promising at this point would be catcher Tony Sanchez. Unfortunately he took a fastball to the jaw and is out for the rest of the year. There is also Chase D'Arnaud pitching in AA who is supposed to be pretty good. Other guys include Argenis Diaz (borderline) and Gorkys Hernandez. I've seen Hernandez play and didn't see anything special, but he's not bad either.

Not sure who you are talking about when you mentioned two former Mets playing in the outfield. Milledge is one, who's the other?

[dfreely]

Ryan Church. He was originally with the Nationals, but the Mets traded Milledge for him a few years back when they got tired of Milledge's attitude/work ethic. Church was actually a really good hitter (.300 batting, .500 slugging I think) but then he got those concussions and wasn't the same again.

I've always wondered why the Pirates never went into full rebuilding mode. Sure, it'd mean a few more horrible losing seasons (they're already used to that anyways..), but that seems like the only way they'll put together a consistently winning team.

[coolmoors]

The Braves have traded Yunel Escobar for Gonzalez of the Blue Jays....

[packrat]

The funny thing about that trade is that the Blue Jays DFA'ed reliever Ronald Uviedo in the process to make room for the guys they traded for on the 40 man roster. The Pirates just traded him away about a month ago and now maybe they can claim him back. We'll see how that pans out.

I didn't know Church played for the Mets. Funny how that works out.

As for the Pirates and their rebuilding mode, I think they are now pretty much resting on their laurels. They traded a bunch of guys for prospects last year and have since been spending most of thier money on the draft, working from within the farm system to try to build a team that can compete in the coming years. They are trying to copy the model of teams like the Tampa Bay Rays, who had recent success of working from within to build a contender.