Pirates Talk: Iwamura, Ankiel, Wilson

My guess is that if Huntington were honest he'd admit that the deal was made so that the Pirates can flip him near the deadline and end up with something better than Chavez. Not a bad thing for them to do.

If nothing else, at least Huntington shows the team he's trying something to improve the club. Losing 41 of our last 59 games was brutal on the mentality of our younger guys. I know Iwamura won't turn the team around alone. But maybe it instills something into the team. Other than the obvious fiscal reasons, I'm a fan of the trade. But even had they still had Chavez's salary and a league minimum 2nd Baseman as opposed to Aki's salary, I doubt it would alter the allocation of whatever resources the Pirates would use.

Kansas City has been 'investing in the current product' for a long, long, time and look where it's gotten us.

I wonder if part of the reasoning here by Huntington is that it puts the Pirates in play in the Japanese/world market -- that is, it's a kind of long-term positioning move.

Otherwise, I don't understand Huntington's interest in Iwamura, although I don't think it's a bad move.

"Kansas City has been 'investing in the current product' for a long, long, time and look where it's gotten us."

That's because Kansas City has invested in bad players. Betancourt, Jacobs, and Farnsworth have almost no value to a major league team. Iwamura is league average.

"If Iwamura does excellent he improves the team by 2-3 wins. That won't change anyone's opinion of the club. It won't put more people in the stands. It won't sell more concession items.

I'm willing to bet that if you looked at attendance (as an example) you would find that teams didn't experience a measurable improvement when adding 2-3 wins over their previous seasons.

The only good thing about a deal like this is Iwamura plays well and becomes a solid trade piece at the deadline. If you can get back something better than Chavez then it's a win. Otherwise this was an ill-conceived plan."

Not only that, but now Iwamura will potentially take away at-bats in the 2B/3B spots from Pedro Alvarez, Andy LaRoche and Delwyn Young, primarily, which prevents them from making additional developments during the period of time when the time doesn't necessarily need high-quality production.

It wasn't an awful deal for Pittsburgh, but rather, I just found it to be odd. Iwamura is a good player, and Chavez isn't particularly good in relief, but he was decent and he has good power stuff so there's some upside, and he's under control all the way through 2014.

It was a clear win-now move for a team that has 100% committed to the future, and unless Iwamura becomes a hot commodity at the trade deadline, this seems to be an odd move for the Pirates to make.

As far as I can tell, it would make more sense to let Young, LaRoche and Vazquez share the 2B/3B spots until Alvarez takes over at third, presumably with LaRoche moving over to second base.

"1. Andy Laroche will start at third base, I don't see him getting any ab's taken away.

Right, but before the Iwamura trade, there was talk of moving LaRoche over to second base, with the idea of having Vazquez play third until Pedro Alvarez takes over there.

"2. Pedro Alvarez won't be in Pittsburgh until July at the earliest. Let's wait until he gets those ab's taken away before we use it as a negative. The Pirates were pretty quick to move McLouth last year to make room for McCutchen, why would it be any different this year with Iwamura and Alvarez."

It wouldn't be, I wasn't actually implying that Iwamura would take at-bats away from Alvarez specifically.

He's pretty much the most valued player in that organization outside of McCutchen, there's nobody that's going to take at-bats away from him at this point.

"3. Young hasn't done much to deserve many ab's. And he will still be able to get OF ab's."

He held his own last year, and he's had some awfully nice performances in AAA, and he's still 27.

It's certainly not a big deal because Iwamura is cheap enough that they could easily move him again to free up playing time for someone else, I was merely pointing out that it seems odd that a team that's been trading off all of its veterans would trade for a young reliever for a veteran that plays positions that could have otherwise been covered by younger players.

It's certainly a reasonable and justifiable move though.

hmmm..... so the pirates lineup will look something like this-

1. A. McCutchen(CF)
2. Iwamura(2B)
3. Jones(1B)
4. Doumit(C)
5. Alvarez(3B)
6. Milledge(LF)
7. Tabata(RF)
8. Cedeno(SS)
9. Pitcher

and a rotation of-

1. Ohlendorf
2. Maholm
3. Duke
4. Veal
5. D. McCutchen

.... that doesnt seem to bad.. their pitching obviously needs help but maybe they can contend to be a wild card team

And a lot of people are throwing Veal into the rotation for next year based on what? 12.2 innings at the AFL? I was surprised to see even Baseball Prospectus thinks it wouldn't be a stretch. How people can so quickly forget the guy issued at Altoona, Indie, and Pittsburgh respectively 6.8 BB/9, 10.3 BB/9, 11.0 BB/9.

Not only that but Veal's inning total dropped over 100 innings from 08-09. He pitched a total of 43.1 total professional innings in 2009. How much could the Pirates realistically expect from his arm next year in the rotation?

Agreed. I think Morton has earned the spot (or at least should have the edge). I know Veal went through some incredibly tough personal issues last year, but I want to see the control rate become a bit more tame before I see him against Big League Clubs.