2014 Pirates

[thecrow124]

Illinest, for just a moment stop focusing on payroll. Focus on the talent that the payroll provides. What is more valuable, Taillon at league minimum and Burnett at whatever he signs for, lets say $13 million, or David Price at $30 million over two years? I would take Taillon alone at league minimum over Price. Price is the better pitcher currently, but where would we be in 2 years if we had to trade Taillon, Polanco and fodder just to add David Price? We absolutely will never be able to pay David Price what he will get when he hits the open market, heck we can not, and I repeat can not afford to pay him the $17 million he will earn in 2015 and still be able to afford the pay raises due to the young players that we currently have on the roster. There is a reason Tampa Bay is going to trade him this winter, not because they couldn't afford him this year, but because they can't afford him next year and their return on him will be 3 fold what it would be next winter.

I think you assume that because history with the Pirates minor league prospects tells us they are going to blow out their arms or never develop into bona fide major league talent. But under Huntington, things are different, our players don't get injured as much, and the have developed into quality major league talent. His development team has given us McCutchen, Walker, Marte, Pedro, Mercer, Cole, Morton, Locke, Wilson, Watson and Morris. That is 10 people off of our 25 man roster that were developed internally, with Cumpton, Taillon, Kingham, and Polanco all on the way, possibly this season. That is how teams on a limited budget have to operate, develop the star talent on your roster and supplement through free agency and trades of fringe minor league prospects.

Am I upset that we do not spend more, no. I am upset that MLB allows teams to throw money at players ensuring that the best available free agent talent ends up in the same large payroll places all the time.

Since I am on the subject now, don't confuse my surprise with the contract being about the money, I am not surprised that in a free market that players end up with astronomical contracts, it is to be expected, I am shocked that teams still allow their gm's to sign 30 year old players to 10 year contracts. I am shocked that with the Angels knowing what they have in Mike Trout, that they would sign Josh Hamilton at all, let alone to a 5 year deal when they were already wasting money on Pujols. Common sense would dictate that it would have been a wiser decision to give Mike Trout a 15 year deal for $400 million than sign Josh Hamilton at all. That is what surprises me about the contracts, not that the player gets paid, that the teams would give old player at the end of their prime years those type of contracts.

Here is another cold hard fact, if Andrew McCutchen wasn't the man that he is, we would be looking at the reality that the hottest trade comosity at this years winter meeting would be him and not David Price. Again not because we couldn't afford him this year, but because we couldn't afford him next year, and the return this year would be 3 times the return next year.

 

[Illinest]

Focus on talent?!

Last year we didn't have enough.
This year we have less.
Next year we're losing more than the farm system can possibly replace.
Soon the payroll will exceed 70 million dollars no matter how hard we try to avoid signing free agents.

Money has a direct correlation with chance of success. Maybe you think you know better, and maybe it's because of shit articles like this one:

If Major League Baseball has shown us anything, winning the World Series is not contingent upon spending large sums of money.

Since 2001, only three clubs that have hoisted the Commissioner's Trophy boasted team payrolls within the top five of MLB. According to USA Today, the payrolls of eight of the other nine champions during that span averaged a payroll ranking of nearly 10th overall in MLB. The Florida Marlins were an outlier in that their payroll ranked 25th in 2003 when they won the World Series.

But as I said - this article is shit. The author started with a premise (David can slay Goliath) and searched for numbers to support his faulty premise. The article is so stupidly written that the author doesn't even seem to recognize that he contradicted himself.
The average payroll was 10th. Only one team won a championship with a payroll in the bottom 5. Yet the article is written as if trying to prove that you don't need to spend money. As a matter of fact you do need to spend money. Here's another article - this one is from Forbes:

Article from 2010:

In the past decade, the one team that has won the most championships is the Yankees. They have the highest perennial payroll by far, over $206 million, which is $43 million more than the second highest payroll – the Red Sox. Is it a coincidence that the Yankees have also participated in forty percent of the championship series, which is also more than any other team? Is it a coincidence that the two highest payrolls, the Yanks and Red Sox, have won 40 percent of the World Series championship in this decade? Is it also a coincidence that the Philadelphia Phillies have the fourth highest payroll, and have been in the last two championships before 2010, and the only team to perform in successive championship series during the past decade except – what a shock – the Yankees (2000-2001)? I think not.

And you guys are looking at extreme cases like that of the Angels, where these obvious Albatross contracts were signed and you're saying "See? Spending money didn't work out for them and therefore we shouldn't be like the Angels."
Well no shit sherlock. But the world series participants this year were the Red Sox and the Cardinals, ranking 4th and 12th respectively. The other teams in the championship series were 2nd and 5th. Spending money on talent has a direct positive correlation with your chances of making it to the championship. Even the model for "competing on the cheap" has only been there once and they lost to a team that spent more. Tampa also loaded up talent prior to their decent run of success by enduring a long spell of very bad seasons. They extended their run by making particularly shrewd trades of a sort that Neil has never demonstrated an aptitude for.

No - I don't think that Neil is capable of doing what Tampa Bay has done because their model is too dependent on winning trades. Neil hasn't won nearly enough trades since he came here for me to think he can pull that off.

I wish you guys would stop fantasizing about being like Tampa Bay. We're not going to be like Tampa Bay. It's not going to happen.

 

[thecrow124]

Focus on talent?!

Last year we didn't have enough.
This year we have less.
Next year we're losing more than the farm system can possibly replace.
Soon the payroll will exceed 70 million dollars no matter how hard we try to avoid signing free agents.

Money has a direct correlation with chance of success. Maybe you think you know better, and maybe it's because of shit articles like this one:



But as I said - this article is shit. The author started with a premise (David can slay Goliath) and searched for numbers to support his faulty premise. The article is so stupidly written that the author doesn't even seem to recognize that he contradicted himself.
The average payroll was 10th. Only one team won a championship with a payroll in the bottom 5. Yet the article is written as if trying to prove that you don't need to spend money. As a matter of fact you do need to spend money. Here's another article - this one is from Forbes:

Article from 2010:


And you guys are looking at extreme cases like that of the Angels, where these obvious Albatross contracts were signed and you're saying "See? Spending money didn't work out for them and therefore we shouldn't be like the Angels."
Well no shit sherlock. But the world series participants this year were the Red Sox and the Cardinals, ranking 4th and 12th respectively. The other teams in the championship series were 2nd and 5th. Spending money on talent has a direct positive correlation with your chances of making it to the championship. Even the model for "competing on the cheap" has only been there once and they lost to a team that spent more. Tampa also loaded up talent prior to their decent run of success by enduring a long spell of very bad seasons. They extended their run by making particularly shrewd trades of a sort that Neil has never demonstrated an aptitude for.

No - I don't think that Neil is capable of doing what Tampa Bay has done because their model is too dependent on winning trades. Neil hasn't won nearly enough trades since he came here for me to think he can pull that off.

I wish you guys would stop fantasizing about being like Tampa Bay. We're not going to be like Tampa Bay. It's not going to happen.

I will stop fantasizing about being like Tampa Bay when you stop fantasizing about being like the big spenders. If we spend $200 million on one contract, that would represent about 30% of our total payroll if you believe you can spend that much on one guy and still put forth a winning team you are delusional.

Spending money does not guarentee you a world series, but it does give you a better chance, I will concede that. The reason for that is not because the big spenders continue to buy the best players available, it is because it allows them the opportunity to plug holes when something happens. Lets say ARod get suspended, to the Yankees, they can go out and buy someone else to fill that void. For the Pirates if we spend $13 million on Choo and he gets hurt, we are for all intents and purposes done for the year. We can't sign a someone to replace him, we can't trade to replace him, so we are just hoping Tabata can fill the void. Now if the Choo deal is a 7 year deal, and he immediately starts to decline and is continually injured, now we are in a spot where we have to trade anyone and everyone because this one contract that represents 1/5 of our payroll is an albatross. So basically if we sign Choo for that amount, and he goes into decline, then we will be looking to dump Cutch in his peak years so that we can co tinue to pay Choo, who no one wants.

I un derstand what you are saying, I would love to be players in the free agent market, but on a team in our position, it just isn't feasable.

On the matter of the new tv revenues, I read an article today where Colorado came out and said where their money was going to go. They received $19 million (not the $25 million everyone was so quick to throw around). With that money $4-5 million iss for new contracts. So assuming that every penny of the ne tv money will go to new co tracts, well that is up to each team, but I doubt that any team allocates all of it to new contracts, except maybe Seattle.

I realize the goal of every team is to win the world series, but that is the ultimate goal, in order to do that, you must first make the playoffs. Once you are in the playoffs, it is a whole new game. Having a higher payroll allows you to put bandaids on where there are holes. It doesn't mean that you have the best team.

Lastly, you say we have less talent this year than last and then the next season we lose more talent than the farm system can replace, could you expound on this please? I would say that as we sit here today, we have a more talented roster than we had opening day last season, and I see no one leaving the following year that the farm system can not replace, so I just want to see your thinking.

 

[Illinest]

I didn't ever say we should get involved for a cano or choo contract though, did i?

A beltran contract (3 years) for example is long enough and big enough to make the Nuttings uncomfortable but not big enough to turn us into the Angels. But that's the biggest expenditure that i've argued for. Napoli got 2. Burnett may get 1. Etc...

As for comparing talent levels, i don't see why the 2013 opening day roster has anything to do with this. Compare the roster to the one that wasn't good enough to beat StL.

Byrd - gone
Burnett - gone
Morneau and Jones - gone

If Polanco is able to replicate Byrd's production I'd be very pleased, but that's not a foregone conclusion and probably won't happen until mid-season.
I would say the same thing about Taillon replacing Burnett.
Morneau and Jones weren't great performers but it's overly optimistic to think a guy like Decker or Lambo would be able to step in and be immediately competent.
So already the assumption you have to make is that every single question mark will be answered in the affirmative just to stay about even with where we were. That's not realistic.

Maybe you think we'll get ace level performance out of Locke again, but I don't see that happening. I think that the best we can hope for is competent back-end starter, which might be what we get from Wandy as well and in any event is not better than the contributions of guys like Cumpton and/or Gomez.

Then as I said - Alvarez, Walker, Liriano, Martin and Morton are all potential losses in 2015. Keeping them all or signing equivalent replacements is going to be fairly expensive, and perhaps Kingham can replace Morton and Hanson replace Walker but we're still in a bind about what to do about the other three spots. Of course this "problem" is not really a problem if we can afford to spend 90 million, but at 70 million we're going to have to unload talent. And if we can afford to spend 90 million then why aren't we spending it this year too?

The difference between budgeting 70 million and 90 million is huge in our case.

But what if we're just trying to build the brand up? Why is it that StL can afford to spend 120 million dollars in their market? What do we have to do to get to that point? Does competing on the cheap advance the brand? No you'd think that the owners would want to advance the visibility of the brand by fielding a competitive roster. You'd think they'd want to make the product as good as possible so that they have enough leverage to make a better deal with the city and with the tv stations. You have to spend money if you want to make money.

 

[Darkstone42]

I didn't ever say we should get involved for a cano or choo contract though, did i?

A beltran contract (3 years) for example is long enough and big enough to make the Nuttings uncomfortable but not big enough to turn us into the Angels. But that's the biggest expenditure that i've argued for. Napoli got 2. Burnett may get 1. Etc...

As for comparing talent levels, i don't see why the 2013 opening day roster has anything to do with this. Compare the roster to the one that wasn't good enough to beat StL.

Byrd - gone
Burnett - gone
Morneau and Jones - gone

If Polanco is able to replicate Byrd's production I'd be very pleased, but that's not a foregone conclusion and probably won't happen until mid-season.
I would say the same thing about Taillon replacing Burnett.
Morneau and Jones weren't great performers but it's overly optimistic to think a guy like Decker or Lambo would be able to step in and be immediately competent.
So already the assumption you have to make is that every single question mark will be answered in the affirmative just to stay about even with where we were. That's not realistic.

Maybe you think we'll get ace level performance out of Locke again, but I don't see that happening. I think that the best we can hope for is competent back-end starter, which might be what we get from Wandy as well and in any event is not better than the contributions of guys like Cumpton and/or Gomez.

Then as I said - Alvarez, Walker, Liriano, Martin and Morton are all potential losses in 2015. Keeping them all or signing equivalent replacements is going to be fairly expensive, and perhaps Kingham can replace Morton and Hanson replace Walker but we're still in a bind about what to do about the other three spots. Of course this "problem" is not really a problem if we can afford to spend 90 million, but at 70 million we're going to have to unload talent. And if we can afford to spend 90 million then why aren't we spending it this year too?

The difference between budgeting 70 million and 90 million is huge in our case.

But what if we're just trying to build the brand up? Why is it that StL can afford to spend 120 million dollars in their market? What do we have to do to get to that point? Does competing on the cheap advance the brand? No you'd think that the owners would want to advance the visibility of the brand by fielding a competitive roster. You'd think they'd want to make the product as good as possible so that they have enough leverage to make a better deal with the city and with the tv stations. You have to spend money if you want to make money.

You're thinking a bit short-term here, I think. If we sign free agents to the point that our payroll is $90 million this year, it it not unlikely that many of them will have contracts which extend through 2015 and beyond, because length is the new dollars in MLB free agency. But even if it's just a two-year deal, if we want to maintain our talent from 2014 to 2015, we have to pay those raises and the new contract, which means that $90 million to retain our young talent turns into $110 million or so quickly. And if we do get a guy on a 2-year contract, he's likely either a reclamation project or in the twilight of his career.

That's for us to sign him. Remember, we will still probably have to pay more in either years or money or both to get guys, despite our playoff berth last year.

We have to have a plan for 2015 and 2016 and beyond when deciding on what sort of free agent deals to sign.

 

[thecrow124]

I didn't ever say we should get involved for a cano or choo contract though, did i?

A beltran contract (3 years) for example is long enough and big enough to make the Nuttings uncomfortable but not big enough to turn us into the Angels. But that's the biggest expenditure that i've argued for. Napoli got 2. Burnett may get 1. Etc...

As for comparing talent levels, i don't see why the 2013 opening day roster has anything to do with this. Compare the roster to the one that wasn't good enough to beat StL.

Byrd - gone
Burnett - gone
Morneau and Jones - gone

If Polanco is able to replicate Byrd's production I'd be very pleased, but that's not a foregone conclusion and probably won't happen until mid-season.
I would say the same thing about Taillon replacing Burnett.
Morneau and Jones weren't great performers but it's overly optimistic to think a guy like Decker or Lambo would be able to step in and be immediately competent.
So already the assumption you have to make is that every single question mark will be answered in the affirmative just to stay about even with where we were. That's not realistic.

Maybe you think we'll get ace level performance out of Locke again, but I don't see that happening. I think that the best we can hope for is competent back-end starter, which might be what we get from Wandy as well and in any event is not better than the contributions of guys like Cumpton and/or Gomez.

Then as I said - Alvarez, Walker, Liriano, Martin and Morton are all potential losses in 2015. Keeping them all or signing equivalent replacements is going to be fairly expensive, and perhaps Kingham can replace Morton and Hanson replace Walker but we're still in a bind about what to do about the other three spots. Of course this "problem" is not really a problem if we can afford to spend 90 million, but at 70 million we're going to have to unload talent. And if we can afford to spend 90 million then why aren't we spending it this year too?

The difference between budgeting 70 million and 90 million is huge in our case.

But what if we're just trying to build the brand up? Why is it that StL can afford to spend 120 million dollars in their market? What do we have to do to get to that point? Does competing on the cheap advance the brand? No you'd think that the owners would want to advance the visibility of the brand by fielding a competitive roster. You'd think they'd want to make the product as good as possible so that they have enough leverage to make a better deal with the city and with the tv stations. You have to spend money if you want to make money.

Now I am confused are we trying to make money or trying to win a championship? And your assertion that you have to spend money to make money is very poor advice for anything. You can spend the money you have, but once you spend over that you are creating debt and that is not a winning formula.

I guess where our views differ is that I see no reason that our prospects can't step in and fill the production that we lost from our departing players. Lambo for Jones, Polanco for Byrd, Cole for Burnett and Taillon for Cole, Morton for McDonald, Locke for Sanchez and Wandy whom I expect nothing from, but Cumpton, Gomez, and later Kingham can fill in. Mercer is an upgrade to Barmes, Walker will be Walker, Cutch, Marte, Fat Pete, Martin, I don't see a downgraded roster, I see improvement, Burnett coming back would only be a bonus.

The following year, Morton, Wandy, and Martin are the only ones we lose, Walker will be in his final arb year, Alvarez his second. Sanchez will replace Martin, which is a step down defensively, but should provide improved offense. I hope that we can extend Morton, and since I expect nothing from Wandy at all, I don't see a loss there. We could also have Hanson, Glasnow, Barnes, Bell, Heredia and any number of other players at AA and AAA by that time.

I am not saying this is the ideal way to do things, but the more talent you can produce from your own minor league system, the cheaper you can build a roster. Honestly, I wish we could spend more, it just isn't feasable. Beltran signed for 3/$15 million, we could possibly have stretched or budget to fit him in, but why if you have internal talent that is nearly ready, that is the reason StLouis let him walk. Napoli would not have signed with us unless we doubled Boston's offer, and even then only if he got pressure from outside to sign with us for the money. You can look at contracts and say we can afford that price to prove your point, but there is a reason players sign team friendly deals and that is because that is where they really want to play. Right now the only person in major league baseball we can say that about is Cutch.

 

[Darkstone42]

The Pirates are allegedly in talks with Bronson Arroyo. He's not our typical type of pitcher to target, but he had another solid year last year in a very hitter-friendly ball park in Cincinnati. Good insurance for if Wandy can't go/isn't effective at least.

 

[Illinest]

You can be certain that some of the prospects will fail. It's fine to pick an individual and say "Polanco is such a sure thing that he will certainly succeed", and maybe you're right, but there is a percentage of all prospects that fail for one reason or another and that is the first example of how naive it is to think that we can replace everyone from within our farm system.

You're also greatly underestimating the cost of arbitration i think. The arbitration cases don't result in cheap contracts. The players will still get paid relative to what their peers are getting paid in similar situations. Take a look at the market for starting pitchers for example. Morton has pitched better than some of the guys who are about to get 10 - 15 million. He won't get that right away but he'll be there soon. Maybe you're thinking "morton isn't worth that much" but that's what he's going to eventually be paid. More actually if his performance remains decent.

Now money needs to be spent. That's a fact. If you take two guys, each with million dollar incomes, one of them invests every penny in real estate investment debt and the other one invests half, socking away the other half as cash. The first guy will accumulate money-making assets at twice the rate of the second guy. He is more in debt but he's also accumulating more land. Ten years down the road you'll find that the first guy is now making 2 million a year while the second guy is only making 1.5 million. You do have to balance risk against return but there is nothing to be gained from being the most conservative.

What can the pirates do to leverage their brand? Well it seems pretty obvious to me that you could build a pretty bitchin' real pirate ship and float it in the river next to the stadium. The cost of doing so would be miniscule compared to the cost of paying Barajas to suck, and the Pirate ship would be of national interest to people who don't even care about baseball. It would be visible in just about every single pittsburgh sportscenter homerun highlight. I think that it would push our team merchandise in a big way. Pirates are one of the coolest mascots in all of sports and we're doing very little to promote that.
They could also start their own television network a la the YES network.

Why isn't this shit happening?

 

[element1286]

How many? Almost all of them. Not Cano, but aside from that there's only a few shit players who got more than they should've. Qualls and mclouth and guys like that.

You guys like to keep a loose tally of what contracts were like last year and the year before and you like to pretend that that's a fair value for the player, but every offseason it's the same story. "i can't believe he got that much!" The dollars that these players are getting are their free market value. If it's higher than you expected it just shows that you're naive about cost. Hint: it goes up every year.

Now you're all thinking that a playoff appearance vindicates Nutting? No. Maybe it vindicates Neil, but only in the sense that he knew how to draft guys that most anyone with a BA subscription could've drafted. Then he did another really obvious thing in signing bounceback candidates like Liriano. Well he happened to hit on one. You think that's a sustainable source of talent?

The best thing this team has going for it is Gayo, but there's a limit to how much he can do. Drafting guys like Cole and Alvarez was obvious, but it isn't going to happen anymore as long as we're not one of the worst teams in the league. Now we're drafting in the bottom half of the round and there's a slotting system in place too.

So what's the plan? Are we going to sign any talent? No? Maybe eventually Taillon and Polanco get promoted and do reasonably well, but all that gets us is back to where we were in 2013. Maybe. Hopefully we're not below .500 by then, but it seems unreasonably optimistic to think that we'll have any reasonable chance of catching the Cardinals at that point. So we try to finish above .500 and look forward to 2015?

Well now Alvarez and Walker are each getting arbitration again and Liriano and Martin are gone. Morton is starting to get expensive at that point too. We're not willing to pay Alvarez now so what makes us think that we'll want to pay him next year? Possibly the same situation with Walker. Is the farm system going to be able to replace those five players or are the Nuttings going to suddenly decide that they can afford 90 million after all? Cause that's what we've got to look forward to if the Nuttings are really truly at their limit. There is no way in hell we're going to be able to keep those players for 2015 if we can't afford a payroll higher than 70 million.

Basically we're already fucked then.

Agree to disagree on the free agents, they are getting term and dollars, the Pirates can't afford both. It also hinders their ability to pay their current players who they want to keep.

 

[sychmd]

You can be certain that some of the prospects will fail. It's fine to pick an individual and say "Polanco is such a sure thing that he will certainly succeed", and maybe you're right, but there is a percentage of all prospects that fail for one reason or another and that is the first example of how naive it is to think that we can replace everyone from within our farm system.

You're also greatly underestimating the cost of arbitration i think. The arbitration cases don't result in cheap contracts. The players will still get paid relative to what their peers are getting paid in similar situations. Take a look at the market for starting pitchers for example. Morton has pitched better than some of the guys who are about to get 10 - 15 million. He won't get that right away but he'll be there soon. Maybe you're thinking "morton isn't worth that much" but that's what he's going to eventually be paid. More actually if his performance remains decent.

Now money needs to be spent. That's a fact. If you take two guys, each with million dollar incomes, one of them invests every penny in real estate investment debt and the other one invests half, socking away the other half as cash. The first guy will accumulate money-making assets at twice the rate of the second guy. He is more in debt but he's also accumulating more land. Ten years down the road you'll find that the first guy is now making 2 million a year while the second guy is only making 1.5 million. You do have to balance risk against return but there is nothing to be gained from being the most conservative.

What can the pirates do to leverage their brand? Well it seems pretty obvious to me that you could build a pretty bitchin' real pirate ship and float it in the river next to the stadium. The cost of doing so would be miniscule compared to the cost of paying Barajas to suck, and the Pirate ship would be of national interest to people who don't even care about baseball. It would be visible in just about every single pittsburgh sportscenter homerun highlight. I think that it would push our team merchandise in a big way. Pirates are one of the coolest mascots in all of sports and we're doing very little to promote that.
They could also start their own television network a la the YES network.

Why isn't this shit happening?

lots of assumptions.
1. yes some prospects will fail, but so will some veterans. look at byrd, who, besides the terrible spending philllies believes byrd at 35 has finally found himself and can replicate his "successful" year.
2. look at the many signings that don't work out and crash, not giving the value the first 2-3 years after the signing.
3. arbitration does not pay the same as the free agent market. the arbiter weighs heavily the fact that the person is not a free agent. just look at the ryan howard deal in arby compared to what he made as a free agent just after it. all parameters being the same, arbitration payouts are appreciably less than for a free agent.
4.your investment analogy is great. but unfortunately you make one very important but incredibly inaccurate assumption. you assume, as 99% true for real estate, that the investments are always appreciating. the huge problem in baseball and free agency is that 100% of the investments are depreciating in value and in the time you are owning them, 50% are depreciating when comparing the start of investment to the end and the other 50% have wide year to year return, often not producing the ROI your dollar could have brought for another investment (prospects, development, international, in year deadline trades, etc).

not to mention your foul language is as insightful and intellectual as the points you try to articulate.

 

[thecrow124]

You can be certain that some of the prospects will fail. It's fine to pick an individual and say "Polanco is such a sure thing that he will certainly succeed", and maybe you're right, but there is a percentage of all prospects that fail for one reason or another and that is the first example of how naive it is to think that we can replace everyone from within our farm system.

You're also greatly underestimating the cost of arbitration i think. The arbitration cases don't result in cheap contracts. The players will still get paid relative to what their peers are getting paid in similar situations. Take a look at the market for starting pitchers for example. Morton has pitched better than some of the guys who are about to get 10 - 15 million. He won't get that right away but he'll be there soon. Maybe you're thinking "morton isn't worth that much" but that's what he's going to eventually be paid. More actually if his performance remains decent.

Now money needs to be spent. That's a fact. If you take two guys, each with million dollar incomes, one of them invests every penny in real estate investment debt and the other one invests half, socking away the other half as cash. The first guy will accumulate money-making assets at twice the rate of the second guy. He is more in debt but he's also accumulating more land. Ten years down the road you'll find that the first guy is now making 2 million a year while the second guy is only making 1.5 million. You do have to balance risk against return but there is nothing to be gained from being the most conservative.

What can the pirates do to leverage their brand? Well it seems pretty obvious to me that you could build a pretty bitchin' real pirate ship and float it in the river next to the stadium. The cost of doing so would be miniscule compared to the cost of paying Barajas to suck, and the Pirate ship would be of national interest to people who don't even care about baseball. It would be visible in just about every single pittsburgh sportscenter homerun highlight. I think that it would push our team merchandise in a big way. Pirates are one of the coolest mascots in all of sports and we're doing very little to promote that.
They could also start their own television network a la the YES network.

Why isn't this shit happening?

Some prospects will fail, that is overly obvious, you draft 40 prospects a year in order to get, on average, one regular and 2 bench players out of each draft. I will go out on a limb and say most prospects will fail, it is just the nature of the beast. I have never said don't trade prospects, I am all for it, what I do not agree with is trading prospects that are almost major league ready for a 1 or 2 year stopgap, trade from the lower levels if you must trade prospects. As for Polanco, if he is league average offensively over the course of his career, his defense alone will make him a valuable baseball player. I can see giving up the next 7 years of him in our system for a couple years of one pitcher that significantly decreases our window of opportunity from 7 years to 2.

Arbitration gives players raises, this is true, often very big raises, but on average in year 1 of arbitration a player will make 25-30% of their estimated FA value, 50% in year 2, and 75% in year 3. All arbitration years are less than the player will earn in free agency.

As for your investment scenario, if a person invests 100% of their income, they will die for one, but hypothetically, your scenario suggests that the would purposely incur debt, or a deficit in income of some sort. If this is true, they may well have $2 million dollars in value at some point, but they will also incur compounding interrest payments on their debt, which over time would significantly devalue their investment. You can not take on debt at 6% or more to invest in something at 4% return, let alone in something that loses value as baseball players do, especially after signing a huge deal that pays them exactly what their market value is.

 

[Illinest]

lots of assumptions.
1. yes some prospects will fail, but so will some veterans. look at byrd, who, besides the terrible spending philllies believes byrd at 35 has finally found himself and can replicate his "successful" year.
2. look at the many signings that don't work out and crash, not giving the value the first 2-3 years after the signing.
3. arbitration does not pay the same as the free agent market. the arbiter weighs heavily the fact that the person is not a free agent. just look at the ryan howard deal in arby compared to what he made as a free agent just after it. all parameters being the same, arbitration payouts are appreciably less than for a free agent.
4.your investment analogy is great. but unfortunately you make one very important but incredibly inaccurate assumption. you assume, as 99% true for real estate, that the investments are always appreciating. the huge problem in baseball and free agency is that 100% of the investments are depreciating in value and in the time you are owning them, 50% are depreciating when comparing the start of investment to the end and the other 50% have wide year to year return, often not producing the ROI your dollar could have brought for another investment (prospects, development, international, in year deadline trades, etc).

not to mention your foul language is as insightful and intellectual as the points you try to articulate.

My language is not relevant to the discussion, but since your method of complaining about it is to link it to the quality of my arguments you've made it into an escalation into an ad hominem. Don't bother me with false arguments like that.
By the way I have no intention of changing my language. I only post on message boards that don't try to regulate language. The language policy here was a factor in my decision to start posting. If it's a problem for you then i'm thinking you need to be more careful about the issue in the future.

 

[sychmd]

your prerogative about the language. your stance is disappointing but predictable.

what about the false assumptions you made that i pointed out.

 

[Darkstone42]

What in the world is this market?

Rajai Davis got two years and $9-10 million.

 

[element1286]

What in the world is this market?

Rajai Davis got two years and $9-10 million.

Yeah, it seems like a lot, but that's the deal Barmes got two years ago.

 

[Johnnydollaz89]

The Pirates are resuming their talks about a potential signing of James Loney, reports ESPN's Buster Olney (on Twitter).
Loney was said to be a top target of the Pirates last week, but reports shortly thereafter surfaced, suggesting that the former Ray is looking for a three-year deal worth as much as $30MM. The lefty swinger enjoyed a nice rebound campaign with the Rays in 2013, hitting .299/.348/.430 with 13 homers and his typical brand of strong defense at first base. Since that time, the Pirates have been connected to Logan Morrison in trade talks, though interest on that front was most recently said to be "mild."

MLB Rumors - MLBTradeRumors.com

 

[Darkstone42]

Yeah, it seems like a lot, but that's the deal Barmes got two years ago.

Yeah, and look at how that turned out.

Some of that deal was the Pirates having to overpay, too. I can't imagine why the Tigers would have the same issue.

 

[element1286]

Yeah, and look at how that turned out.

Some of that deal was the Pirates having to overpay, too. I can't imagine why the Tigers would have the same issue.

Yeah, I don't disagree, but I guess it's part inflation, and part not having too many glove guys on the market. I guess you pay a premium for a guy with an elite skill, even if it's glove/speed.

 

[Illinest]

Well i'm in favor of trading a few of our regulars now. I thought we'd be taking advantage of walker and alvarez's cheap years, but since we're apparently planning to go after bad regulars to fill out a mediocre roster i would prefer that we just explore trades now so that we can get maximum value. Considering the return Smoak got it makes more sense than putting a guy like Loney opposite Walker and Alvarez and hoping for the best.

 

[thecrow124]

Well i'm in favor of trading a few of our regulars now. I thought we'd be taking advantage of walker and alvarez's cheap years, but since we're apparently planning to go after bad regulars to fill out a mediocre roster i would prefer that we just explore trades now so that we can get maximum value. Considering the return Smoak got it makes more sense than putting a guy like Loney opposite Walker and Alvarez and hoping for the best.

I would always be in favor of trading Alvarez.....always. But more to your point, this is essentially the same team that won 94 games last year, however we will be starting this season with a team with more experience. You keep saying we need to do this or that, but you neglect that fact that we are in a better spot heaing into 2014 than we were heading into 2013. Even with a lower payroll. Loney, whom you seem to hate, would give us a very good defensive firstbaseman, which would be a huge improvement over last season. I would also be ok with trading Walker, but I think the entire Pittsbugh baseball fanbase would lose their collective minds if he were traded.

I do not expect 94 wins next season, but neither do I expect a colapse. I would expect 88-90 wins with our current roster and if we add players that add value to the team then the total would obviously go up.