Rebuilding the Bucs

One of a negative Pirate fan’s greatest weapons in his mind is to say the following: “…same old Bucs. We do the same thing every year. Trade the good players away for minor leaguers. I’m not going to follow them anymore.”

This is the type of criticism that I hate, because it usually comes reflexively without looking at the facts of the situation. To counter these claims, we need to start with a couple of salient points about how to win baseball games in a big way. Here is how you have to win in the MLB:

• Drafting and development is the key. You have to field a team of mostly homegrown players.
• Give the kids time in the majors to either sink or swim. You need to see what you have with what you’ve drafted and developed.
• After you’ve seen what you have, fill in the holes. This can be done through free agency or trades. The trade aspect is why you have to continually draft and develop well.
• Stay away from bad contracts. Perhaps much easier said than done.
• Keep your stars but choose wisely!

That’s it. That’s how you win. These steps are magnified for small market teams; the smaller the market/payroll, the more important these are. Now, let’s compare the Pirates performance in these ways under Dave Littlefield and Neal Huntingdon.

• Drafting and development – Littlefield’s failure in this key area is why the Bucs are in a position where they have to rebuild. First look at his first round picks. The only ones currently with the team are Paul Maholm and Andrew McCutchen. The Cutch pick was out of character for Littlefield; he was a high schooler with a lot of upside. The Maholm pick was more in line with his philosophy; college arms with low ceilings. Maholm represents the only success among these college arms; Bryan Bullington and Daniel Moskos represent the worst of these decisions. He also missed on Neil Walker (perhaps being blinded by the fact that Walker is a local product). Neal Huntingdon has only been in charge for two drafts. However, in his first draft he showed a willingness to go for upside and to pay overslot for top talent. This draft featured Pedro Alvarez as the top pick (who has been tearing it up at AA Altoona in July), but also contained lower round signability guys like Robbie Grossman, Quinton Miller and Wesley Freeman. All in all, the Bucs spent almost $10 million on the 2008 draft signees (which ranks in the top 5 in history). This year, the Bucs went even more extreme in the draft, taking a low risk, low upside guy at #4 overall (Tony Sanchez) in the hopes of spreading even more money around in the later rounds. They drafted a bunch of high upside high school arms like Trent Stevenson (signed away from LSU), Zach Von Rosenburg (currently committed to LSU), and Colton Cain (Texas). Allowing the draft budget to be the same as 2008, and giving the $2.5mm slot deal to Tony Sanchez, that leaves around $8 million for the Bucs to spend on getting these guys. It is important to get young arms en masse, because young arms routinely fail, all the time. The more arms you get, the more chances you have to succeed, and the more upside they have, the better chance you will unearth a star or two. It has to be said that Huntingdon is a big improvement over Littlefield in this area.
• Letting the kids play – Under Littlefield, the Bucs were famous for misevaluating talent and pulling the plug way too early on experiments. Nate McLouth sat on the bench for 2 years before the Huntingdon/Russell combo realized he deserved a full time chance. They ruined Zach Duke when Jim Tracy came aboard. Craig Wilson saw sporadic playing time for the likes of Raul Mondesi and Jeromy Burnitz. The tone under Huntingdon has changed dramatically. McCutchen was given a full blown opportunity at the MLB level once McLouth was traded; he has run with it and proven that he can be part of the core of the next great Bucs team. Young guys Snell and Gorzelanny were given plenty of time to sink or swim; they sunk. Steve Pearce and Lastings Milledge will play every day for the rest of the year. These are the kinds of things that will hasten the process of building a model organization.
• Filling in the holes – Huntingdon hasn’t reached this point yet, so he can’t be judged. But lets illustrate what he has to “live up” to. Jeromy Burnitz, Joe Randa, Chris Stynes, Raul Mondesi, and Matt Morris were just some of the guys that Littlefield handed big money to. For those Bucs fans that complain about payroll, wouldn’t you rather spend the money when McCutchen needs to sign a long term deal in 2012 than spend it on these chumps? The answer to this, if you are serious about winning, has to be yes.

Rebuilding a franchise takes a lot of effort, and it is vastly unpopular. That ultimately is why Cam Bonifay and Dave Littlefield never did it. Neal Huntingdon is one of the 3 most unpopular people in Pittsburgh right now, but he did the right thing. Trading the mediocre pieces we had right now for the best we could get would help speed up the process of rebuilding. Targeting young arms in large numbers is a great strategy to get some quality big league arms. Another strong trend is getting players who were previously well-regarded but for some reason cast aside and undervalued by their previous organizations (Milledge, Gorkys Hernandez, Jeff Clement). With these trends, plus his proven proclivity for taking reasonable risks in the draft, means that Huntingdon is doing things the right way. Some moves will succeed, probably more will fail, but the plan is being executed, and that is the important thing right now. It is certainly different than anything else attempted in these 17 shameful years of losing.