If the Siege of Leningrad were re-enacted on a baseball diamond, PNC Park would be the logical location. Let’s bunker in with refreshing Pittsburgh Pirates notes!
• The New Yankees are killing it with those newfangled torpedo bats. The Pirates might as well be using Wiffle ball bats. Not much of a matchup for the latter’s home opener Friday. The first 10,000 fans should get a Gen. Custer bobblehead.
• I’m tired of the torpedo bats being called “controversial.” MLB has examined and cleared them. There’s nothing controversial. Why aren’t the Pirates using them? The equipment budget must be spent. If the Pirates used torpedo bats, we’d quickly learn that it’s the carpenter, not the tools.
• Sending closer David Bednar to Triple-A is the correct move. Bringing him back to be the closer was not. Local cachet inspired that. Same thing that keeps Andrew McCutchen with the Pirates. Part player, part mascot.
• If pitching prospect Thomas Harrington was available for a panic call-up and start after the Pirates started the season 1-4, why didn’t he make the rotation coming out of spring training?
• Outfielder Tommy Pham should not have been signed. Give Jack Suwinski and/or Henry Davis time in the outfield instead. They couldn’t possibly be worse.
• Sit McCutchen. You don’t need to find out about him. Give at-bats to players you need to find out about. Like Suwinski and Davis. Unless you already know they stink. But if the Pirates benched everybody who reeks, they’d field a five-man lineup. Paul Skenes and his Court.
• The Pirates’ roster is rotten. The GM and manager are incompetent, but Joe L. Brown and Chuck Tanner couldn’t make chicken salad out of this chicken scratch. That said, Derek Shelton at the helm offers zero shot at overachieving. If any manager can make this bad group worse, it’s Shelton.
• Shelton and GM Ben Cherington should not have been retained after last season. But they’re affordable. Whoever replaces Shelton will just be the next Shelton. Nobody with better options wants that job.
• Bench coach Donnie Kelly is Shelton’s likely successor. If offered, Kelly should refuse. Whatever managerial potential Kelly is deemed to have would die if he replaced Shelton. But Kelly is from Mt. Lebanon, played for the Pirates in 2007 and grew up supporting the team. It would be difficult to say no. Plus there’s only 30 of those jobs.
• Oneil Cruz is 26. If he hasn’t learned the basics of baseball by now, he won’t. He’s either incredibly stupid or can’t be bothered to learn. Million-dollar talent, 10-cent head.
• At season’s end, Skenes should demand to be traded. Not because he could make more elsewhere. There’s no guarantee of that till he hits arbitration in 2027. Skenes should push for an exit because the Pirates’ scrooge organization and cheaply assembled team give him absolutely minimal support. Skenes is a diamond in a pile of manure.
Related
• Kevin Gorman’s Take 5: Can Pirates torpedo Yankees’ record-setting blasts with new bats?
• Going to the Pirates home opener? What you need to know
• Pirates add OF Alexander Canario, option IF/OF Ji Hwan Bae, trade C Jason Delay to Braves
• If Skenes did ask out, Pirates fans would support him. They see what’s going on. #FreeSkenes
• Sportsbooks have the over/under for Skenes’ win total at a mere 10½. That’s not telling you that Skenes won’t pitch well enough to win. That’s telling you that Skenes will be sabotaged by both bullpen and bats.
• Butler native Marc Fogel will throw out the first pitch at the home opener. He spent 3½ years in a Russian prison. If anybody present could give Skenes useful advice, it’s Fogel.
• San Diego outfielder Jackson Merrill was runner-up to Skenes in last season’s National League Rookie of the Year voting. Merrill just signed a nine-year, $135 million contract extension with the Padres, triggering a cry (albeit wisely muted) that the Pirates should give Skenes a deal worth some big figure like $250 million over 10 years. But the Pirates wouldn’t offer that, and Skenes wouldn’t take it. He can ultimately get a lot more and win a lot more elsewhere. It’s worth biding his time to eventually escape.
• Have no sympathy for Bryan Reynolds, the Pirates’ lone truly legit everyday player. If Reynolds wanted to win, he would have gone to free agency instead of signing an eight-year extension in 2023. Reynolds has talent but no ambition. He declined to bet on himself.
• It’s accurately said that several Pirates are playing out of position. But maybe Cruz and Endy Rodriguez don’t have positions. They’re butchers regardless of where they’re stationed.
• Rodriguez started Opening Day at first base after having played exactly one game there during the entirety of spring training. It’s all about preparation. The day before the opener, the Pirates had four players working out at first base. I wonder if they all got out of the same car.
• Before the season, the usual suspects were predicting the Pirates would challenge .500, maybe even finish with a winning record. How could anyone possibly think that? I said 74 wins and I already feel like a nitwit. The Pirates will never field a serious team. They have the best pitcher in baseball but, instead of building around him, they cut payroll. They have a low-rent, Little League-level manager. They can’t draft or develop. The Pirates keep telling you what they are. Believe them.
• It was written that the Pirates lost money in 2024. But former columnist Bob Smizik emerged from the “where are they now” file to rightly point out on Twitter that Bob Nutting bought the Pirates for $200 million and they’re now worth $1 billion. Even if you believe the fairy tale that they were in the red last year, the franchise’s value provides unerring context.
Categories: Mark Madden Columns | Pirates/MLB | Sports
