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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1 This is the last column on the Team of the Aughts. I promise. Just a few more reactions from you, the readers, and then we'll be done with this ... until 2010, when I expect I'll still be here even if you're not. I should have mentioned Tim Hudson when discussing the starters. And to a lesser extend, Kris Benson. In one of Peter Gammons' current offerings, Hudson is listed as the American League's top candidate as a future No. 1 starter (by scouts and pitching coaches), just ahead of Freddy Garcia, who I did mention (if only in passing). Now, about the relievers ...
Greg McMichael (1993 NL): 2nd with 40 points Gregg Olson (1989 AL): 1st with 136 points Bryan Harvey (1988 AL): 2nd with 49 points Todd Worrell (1986 NL): 1st with 118 points Mark Eichhorn (1986 AL): 3rd with 23 points Hudek really doesn't belong here, as he somehow finished second after merely 39 decent innings. McMichael was actually one of the more underrated relievers of the 1990s, posting good (or better) ERAs in each of his first five seasons. But it's clear that his rookie season (2.06, 19 saves in 21 chances) was his best by far. Eichhorn was amazing as a rookie, but like McMichael his success was less fastball than delivery, which was sidearm. He threw 157 innings his rookie season, all in relief, which looks like a misprint today. So his slow, painful decline was hardly a shock. That leaves Olson, Harvey and Worrell, all of them hard throwers, as good comps for Williamson. Olson continued to pitch well until he blew out his arm in 1993. Worrell, who had a 2.08 ERA as a rookie, then posted ERAs of 2.66, 3.00, and 2.96 ... before he too went down (with elbow and shoulder injuries) and missed all of 1990 and 1991. Harvey had a 2.13 ERA as a rookie, then 3.44, 3.22, and 1.60 (his best season) before suffering arm problems in 1992 that limited him to 29 innings and worried the Angels so much that they left him unprotected in the Expansion Draft. The Marlins grabbed him, he had another terrific year (1.70 ERA, 45 saves) ... and then blew out his arm for good. So what do we have? All three pitched well after their rookie seasons. But with the exception of Harvey's 1991 and 1993, none could match their rookie years, and all suffered serious injuries within five years. Actually, all you have to do is look at the Royals' new closer to see how risky it is to bet on a good young reliever. Compare Ricky Bottalico's 1995 to Williamson's 1999: IP H W K HR ERA Bottalico 88 50 42 87 7 2.46 Williamson 93 54 43 107 8 2.41Bottalico's ERAs since his rookie year: 2.46, 3.19, 3.65, 6.44, 4.91 ... Thanks, Rany. Pretty compelling stuff. Another name to consider: Kerry Ligtenberg, who finished just fourth in the Rookie of the Year vote in 1998 despite 30 saves and a 2.71 ERA (he should have finished third, ahead of Travis Lee). Of course, Ligtenberg also wound up getting cut open by a scalpel, thanks to a torn elbow ligament. What's missing here is a reason. Why have so many promising relievers suffered serious injuries? Are the cases of Olson, Harvey and Worrell, along with Bottalico and Ligtenberg, relevant in a discussion of Scott Williamson? The data is sobering, that's for sure. Williamson did suffer from shoulder tendinitis late last season, and his ERA did go up every month after May. Given all this, I simply don't see how we can consider him with guys like Billy Wagner and Ugueth Urbina. One reader made a great point, which is that there's a real good chance that we don't know the Closer of the Aughts yet. He may well be a starter in the minor leagues right now, just waiting for the conversion to relief pitching that makes him a superstar in the bigs. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 3 Yesterday, ESPN.com ran a poll asking us to decide who should be baseball's highest-paid player. I voted for Mark McGwire, and I'll tell you why. In terms of wins and losses, and economic impact of those wins and losses, no player is worth $18 million per season. The math just doesn't work out. Let's say Juan Gonzalez -- and we'll get back to him later -- winds up signing for nearly $18 million per season. Now, the difference between Gonzalez and an average major league right fielder is perhaps four wins. Or three. What does the average right fielder make per season? Well, I'd guess somewhere in the neighborhood of $3 million. Now, I'd like to see you demonstrate, with your slide rule and your ball bearings and your gauze pads, how four extra victories can possibly be worth $15 million. I don't think it can be done. Yes, if those four wins are the difference between reaching the postseason and not reaching the postseason, you might have an argument. But how many teams miss (or make) the playoffs by four games or fewer? In 1999, the answer to that question was ... three. Before their one-game playoff, the Mets and Reds tied for the wild card. And the Astros finished just a game ahead of the Reds before that playoff. Thirty teams, and for only three of them did four games make a difference. Hold on there, pardner! Before you commence to shootin' off them e-mails, let's parley. No, I'm not suggesting that teams should limit themselves to $3 million players. You get 25 of those guys, and you'll have a $75 million payroll and a .500 record. That, my friends, is a lousy combination. Let's get back to McGwire for a moment. He's a great player, certainly one of the most devastating hitters in the world. He's not the best player in the game, because he adds little on the basepaths or at first base. But he's got something that very few other players have. He puts fannies in the seats. Have you been to a Cardinals game lately? Not only is the ballpark full (or close to it), but a good percentage of the fannies are in the seats for batting practice. Just think how much all those fannies are spending on beer and soda pop and nachos and frozen lemonade. Now, back to my digression. If you're going to compete, you need superstars. Why? Because superstars are four or five games better than an average player. If you've got three superstars and five guys in the lineup who are average or slightly worse, you can win. And if we assume that you need superstars to win, you almost have to pay somebody $18 million per season, even if there's no way to make the math work. The next question, of course, is "Does Juan Gonzalez deserve to be that somebody?" I've said some unkind (if true) things about Gonzalez in the past, but he's a great player. Overrated? Yes, because big RBI guys who don't walk much are always overrated. But still, he sure looks nice in the middle of the lineup. But $18 million? That would make Gonzalez, for the moment at least, the highest-paid player in the game. But is he close to being the best player in the game? Hardly. Crudely put, a player is asked to perform at three "spots" for his club: at the plate, in the field, and on the bases. Or four, if you want to count "in the clubhouse," but we'll leave that one alone today. At the plate, Gonzalez is very, very good. A lot of people would say that he's great, and some years they would be right. In the field, Gonzalez is adequate at best. He's tentative on fly balls, and his strong throwing arm doesn't compensate for his limited range. On the bases, Gonzalez gives you almost nothing. He's stolen five bases over the last two seasons and hit two triples. No, stolen bases and triples aren't important statistics, but they do indicate speed. And Gonzalez doesn't have much. So that's one positive and two negatives. Of course, this doesn't necessarily mean that Gonzalez isn't a great player. For a right fielder, hitting is more important than defense and baserunning combined. But this does mean that Gonzalez isn't an all-around player, and it seems to me that if you're going to give a guy $18 million, he should be either a good all-around player or a truly terrific hitter. But beyond all that, here's the biggest problem I have with Gonzalez ... he can't stay healthy. I discussed this in detail just last week, so I won't belabor the point here. But if the last four seasons are any indication, the Tigers shouldn't count on Gonzalez for more than about 140 games per season. That means, over the course of those four seasons, Gonzalez will miss about 80 games -- half a season. Figure in the reported length of the contract, eight years, and Gonzalez will miss an entire season's worth of games over those eight years. On the other hand, in a way all this "highest-paid player" stuff is irrelevant. So Gonzalez gets the biggest contract. How long will he be the highest-paid player? In five years, he probably won't even be among the top 20 (though if he's still playing well, he'll want to renegotiate). While we're on the subject of players making a lot of money, let us return to a subject of columns past; namely, the inexplicable fascination that baseball executives seem to have with Wilfredo Cordero. Sure, he's a better hitter now than he was when he first came up. But that's not saying much. Cordero's slugging percentage the last three seasons combined was .448, nothing special. His on-base percentage was a pathetic .326 ... nowhere near acceptable for a major league right fielder with a .448 slugging percentage. Sure, he did wallop the ol' horsehide last season. But that was only 194 at-bats. And why only 194 at-bats? Because Cordero, as usual, couldn't stay in the lineup. His games played for the last four seasons read like this: 59, 140, 96, 54. Where Juan Gonzalez is merely gimpy, Cordero's been as fragile as your typical 14-year-old's ego. So if you're the general manager of a major league team -- any major league team -- do you sign this guy to a three-year deal for $3 million per? Thickening the plot is a fine, generally healthy fellow named Chad Hermansen. Originally a top prospect at shortstop, Hermansen quickly demonstrated that his skills were more suited to the outfield. Though he's fast and has been playing center field in the minors, that position in Pittsburgh is apparently blocked by Brian Giles. That leaves left and right fields. But Pirates manager Gene Lamont sounds like he's committed to Cordero in right field. Why? Because that's where Cordero wants to play. And as Lamont says, "We got him to supply offense, and if he's not confident on defense he's doing a good job, it might take away from his offense." Why anyone would get Cordero to supply offense, I don't know. But it's done. The problem is that it looks like Hermansen might head back to Triple-A Nashville this year, even though he's already spent two seasons there, and slugged .520 the first year and .530 the second. Make no mistake, Hermansen's still got some work to do. He strikes out roughly once per game, and his OBP would be even lower than Cordero's. But here's the crux of the thing: the Pirates aren't ready to win anyway. They're still at least a year away, so why not let Hermansen learn in the big leagues? Does a third year in Nashville really do anyone any good? Oh, and if you're wondering about left field, Al Martin's penciled in there, and ably backed up by Bruce Aven. Yes, the Pirates could make a trade to open up a spot for Hermansen. But I still can't see the point in signing, for three years, a one-dimensional player like Cordero, especially when his one dimension ain't really so hot. In today's game, the Pirates are the little guys, the Davids, and I suspect most of us enjoy seeing the little guys succeed. But the little guys have to rely on more than a slingshot. They have to know how to use it. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 7 Just back from a long weekend, and found a pile of e-messages similar to the following ...
C. Thomas Frippett Continuing the theme of "e-mails I often receive," here's another of those:
Minds are like parachutes. They only function when they are open.No, I don't have any idea who Lord Dewar was. But I ran across this quote the other day, and it made a lot of sense to me, probably because I read so much e-mail every day, much of which is, quite frankly, the product of closed minds. On the other hand, good days bring healthy measures of open minds, or at least they bring something that makes me open my mind. To wit:
For a parallel to yesterday's Ken Griffey Jr. trade, we need look no further than last November, when the Texas Rangers traded a 30-year-old, two-time MVP outfielder for a quartet of unproven players, including a young starting pitcher with great talent but an uneven track record. But that trade was, in at least one meaningful way, different than this one. The Rangers didn't have to trade Juan Gonzalez; they could have kept him for a spell, and either traded him during the season or let him depart as a free agent after the season, which would have netted the club a pair of high draft picks. Sure, he'd have been a distraction in the clubhouse, but since he was never really a leader there, the effect would have been fairly subdued. It would have been different with Griffey, who for years has ruled the Mariner locker room like a private fiefdom. Which hats do we wear today? Ask Junior. Which movie goes into the VCR? Ask Junior. How close should the right-field fence be? Oops, we forgot to ask Junior. And now he can't stop complaining about it. Well, if The Kid got worked up over a ballpark, what would he have done if the Mariners hadn't traded him? Right, it would have been the Pacific Northwest's biggest distraction since ... well, since the same thing happened with Randy Johnson during the 1998 season. So Mariners general manager Pat Gillick felt compelled to trade Griffey, if only for the sake of clubhouse harmony. For perhaps the best parallel to this deal, we must go back nearly 23 years, to the summer of 1977. On June 15, just hours before the trading deadline, the New York Mets traded Tom Seaver to the Cincinnati Reds for pitcher Pat Zachry, infielder Doug Flynn, and outfielders Steve Henderson and Dan Norman. Of these four, only Henderson was regarded as a top prospect, and he did enjoy a pretty decent career. Their magical 1969 season aside, Tom Seaver was just about all the Mets had ever had. In huge headlines, The New York Post trumpeted, "Mets Trade THE Franchise." Why did they trade him? In 1976, Seaver signed a three-year, $675,000 contract that made him the highest-paid pitcher in the game. A year later, the first big crop of free agents hit the market and suddenly Seaver wasn't the highest-paid anything. This rankled him, so -- according to Seaver -- he asked the Mets to tack on a couple of extra years and $700,000. When they refused, he requested a trade. But after some last-minute negotiations the Mets agreed to the contract extension, and for a few hours everything was copacetic. Then came the famous column written by Dick Young in the New York Daily News. On July 15, the morning before the trade deadline, Seaver learned of Young's column, which read in part: "Nolan Ryan is getting more money than Tom Seaver and that galls Tom because Nancy Seaver and Ruth Ryan are very friendly and Tom Seaver has long treated Ryan like a little brother." Seaver and Young had long been feuding, but this particular column sent Seaver over the edge. He immediately called the Mets and yelled, "Get me out of here! Get me out of here!" And so they did. As with most relationships that end acrimoniously, there was plenty of blame to go around. Seaver reacted petulantly to something in a newspaper. Dick Young stirred things up just for the sake of stirring things up. And maybe, just maybe, the Mets could have dealt with Seaver's contract concerns a bit more adroitly. And today? It's 23 years later and again the Reds are the lucky ones, but this time it's not as easy to divvy up the blame. There's no devilish columnist, sitting behind his old Underwood, rubbing his hands together and muttering, "Exxxxcellent." Griffey might be a tad immature, but at least he wasn't complaining about his salary; in fact, given the contract that he did sign with Cincinnati, money was apparently the least of his concerns. As for the Mariners, there's probably not much they could have done, aside from moving the fences and replacing Lou Piniella with Ken Griffey Sr. But what rankles me, as a Mariners season-ticket holder, is the endgame. It's one thing to virtually demand a trade, but quite another to specify a single team, because of course that leaves your current club with almost zero leverage. And that's how the Mariners lost one of the great players of our time, and gained a package roughly comparable to that received by the Mets back in 1977. Mike Cameron? He's Steve Henderson with experience. Brett Tomko? Not a bad comp for Pat Zachry, though Tomko does have a bigger up-side. Antonio Perez may likely turn into Doug Flynn, a career utility guy, while Jake Meyer may never enjoy major-league meal money. All in all, the Mariners did a little better than the Mets did 23 years ago. But any time you trade a true superstar and don't get one in return, you're going to come out on the wrong side of the talent equation. The math might not make sense, but one great player is worth far more than four good ones. Why? Because it's a lot easier to find good players than great ones. Had Gillick been able to shake loose Travis Dawkins or Rob Bell from the Reds, this trade would look good for both sides. But Gillick could not get one of those top prospects, and for that Jim Bowden deserves plaudits. He got Junior, and he really didn't give up anything that he wanted to keep. With Griffey in center field, Cameron is surplus. Jack McKeon and pitching coach Don Gullett feuded with Tomko all season. Perez is an 18-year-kid with potential, but it will be three years before we know anything. And Meyer is a 25-year-old relief pitcher who hasn't done anything above Class A. Throw in the fact that the Reds will pay Griffey well below market value for at least nine years, and suddenly we've got our first serious candidate for General Manager of the 21st Century. Finally, a word on Junior's contract ... First, I think we should hold our applause until we see if he's still happy in five years, when there are 30 or 40 major leaguers making more money than he is. That said, it's possible that we'll see more deals like this, players taking less than market value in order to play close to home and/or family. It makes a certain amount of sense, if you figure that once the dollars get high enough, a few more dollars may seem irrelevant. If so, the teams in Southern California, Arizona, Texas and Florida should have an advantage because a huge percentage of major league players hail from those states. Minnesota and Milwaukee? Let them eat cake, as usual. MONDAY, FEB. 14 The Cincinnati Reds are now most everyone's pick to win the National League Central this season. But should they be? Let's look at the Reds, position by position. 1B, Sean Casey: Casey was probably a little bit over his head last year, but then he's only 25 and figures to get better. So it's reasonable to think he'll be about as good this year as he was last. 2B, Pokey Reese: This guy was so far over his head in 1999 that he'll need a safety net to catch his fall in 2000. Reese posted a 747 OPS last year, and he'll be lucky to clear 700 this year. SS, Barry Larkin: I'm of two minds about Larkin. His numbers last season were poor, by his standards. A fine .390 on-base percentage, but just a .420 slugging percentage, the fourth-lowest of his career and his worst since 1994 (.419). Simply a sign of age? Perhaps, but Larkin also set a career high by playing in 161 games. My guess is that his percentage stats will be better, but he'll spend at least a few weeks on the disabled list, for an overall wash in value. 3B, Aaron Boone: Boone's an OK player, no star potential but worth keeping around until the club develops a kid. We should expect roughly the same performance this season. LF, Dante Bichette: Below are two left fielders from 1999, both of them connected to the Reds in some fashion ... Games OBP Slug OPS Left Fielder A 151 .354 .541 .895 Left Fielder B 153 .347 .535 .882Nearly identical, right? Of course, the punchline here is that Left Fielder A is Dante Bichette, and he did half his hitting at Coors Field. Left Fielder B is Greg Vaughn, who did half his hitting at Cinergy Field. My buddy Lance McAllister, who hosts a show on Cincinnati's WBOB Radio -- 1160 on your AM dial -- never tires of pointing out that Bichette's lifetime batting average in Cincinnati is .328, along with great power. But Lance, it's only 122 at-bats. And guess what? Bichette has gone just 7-for-31 (.226) the past two seasons in Cincinnati. Jim Bowden has made a lot of smart moves, but he got this one wrong. Removed from Coors Field, Bichette will give the Reds sub-par production at his position, and represents a significant downgrade from Vaughn. CF, Ken Griffey Jr.: This one you know about. Believe it or not, I think Mike Cameron might be a better defensive center fielder at this point. But who cares? Griffey's good for 50-plus home runs, and he's worth approximately five extra wins (Cameron was very good last year). RF, Dmitri Young: About the same age as Casey, and like Casey, Young's a talented hitter with room yet to grow. Unfortunately, Young doesn't throw well and is miscast in right field. Actually, he doesn't field well, either, and is miscast anywhere aside from the batter's box. Griffey's going to be ranging far and wide (i.e. left and right) making plays that most center fielders wouldn't have to. Catcher, Eddie Taubensee: Talk about a guy that got ignored. Taubensee played 126 games and slugged .521 last season. Catchers often develop their offensive skills late, so even though Taubensee's 31, his power surge may be for real. He also batted .311, and is unlikely to match that mark. Taubensee is backed up by Jason LaRue, who's generally been overrated as a prospect. Starting Pitching: The Reds don't have that one guy, the true ace that you slot for Game 1 of your first postseason series. They do have a solid first two in Denny Neagle and Pete Harnisch. While neither are sure things, they're both pretty good bets to pitch well this year. Most of the rest of the starts last year went to three pitchers: Steve Parris (11-4, 3.50), Ron Villone (9-7, 4.23) and Steve Avery (6-7, 5.16). Avery won't be back, which of course is a plus. The other two guys ... well, I'll be somewhat surprised if either of them wins more than he loses, let alone both of them. As Ron Shandler points out, there are three reasons to consider Villone a high risk: 1. He pitched as many innings in 1999 as in the three previous seasons combined; 2. Aside from allowing just one home run in his first 57 innings, his stats really weren't so great; 3. He declined significantly in the second half. If you don't follow the game closely, you might think Parris is a kid. But he's 32, and has pitched only 336 major league innings. On the other hand, in two seasons with the Reds he's 17-9 with a 3.60 ERA. Some people just bloom late, and maybe Parris is one of them. Still, he's far from a sure thing. With Brett Tomko gone, that leaves the fifth slot open with the leading candidates apparently being prospect Rob Bell, ex-Pirate Elmer Dessens or a converted reliever like Dennys Reyes or Scott Williamson. Relief Pitching: This is where Reds fans should be worried. A year ago, the top three Cincinnati relievers -- Williamson (12-7, 2.41, 19 saves), Danny Graves (8-7, 3.08, 27 saves) and Scott Sullivan (5-4, 3.01) -- were worked very hard by modern standards, combining for 318 innings. Let me stress that I am not criticizing Jack McKeon for this. He did what he thought he had to do, and it very nearly resulted in a postseason berth. And frankly, on a manager's list of things to worry about, the long-term health of his relief pitchers should rank somewhere near the bottom. Nevertheless, for most of us there is a next year, and this next year could mean trouble for the bullpen. They posted an NL-best 3.36 ERA in 1999, and that's going to increase by at least half a run in 2000, probably more. So let's add everything up. Replacing Cameron with Griffey is a big plus. Replacing Vaughn with Bichette is a minus. Pokey Reese's likely offensive decline is a minus. It's highly unlikely that Cincinnati's bullpen will again be the best in the National League, so that's a minus (at least). So we've got one big plus and three minuses. Before the Reds acquired Griffey, I was figuring them for roughly 84 wins, with the potential for a sub-.500 record. Adding Junior is worth five or six, and that pushes the Reds back into contention. But the favorites in the Central? I still say the line forms behind the Astros. TUESDAY, FEB. 15 Today's subject might be better suited to a Stats Class, but this does bear upon a number of recent columns, so please indulge me. I have discovered, these last few weeks, a basic law of baseball fandom. If it gives you pleasure, you may call it Rob's Third Law: Fans of a team overwhelmingly think that improvement will be followed by improvement.That's to say, after a team improves measurably from one season to the next, you'll have to search far and wide to find a fan who thinks his team will regress the following season. This tendency is quite natural. Shoot, fans tend to be optimistic every spring even when their favorite team lost 100 games last year. If their team, out of the blue, won close to 100 games last year ... well, Katy bar the door and start printin' them World Series tickets. And to be sure, it does happen sometimes. But how often? Let's take a look at recent clubs that have improved significantly in the 1990s. All we have to do is record each team's victories for each three-season span. It's a little tricky in the '90s, for a couple of reasons. One, the labor strife in 1994 and 1995 blows a four-season hole in our sample (think about it). And two, the economic conditions of the last few years, especially, have led to the premature dismantling of some fine clubs. But we'll discuss that later. Right now, let's focus on the teams that improved by at least eight games from one season to the next (excluding those strike-marred campaigns). There have been 26 such teams, but to forestall the obvious criticism, I'll go ahead and delete the 1998 Marlins and the 1999 Padres from the data set, since neither club really had any chance (and both declined precipitously). So now we've got 24 teams. What did they do in Years 1, 2 and 3?
As we saw yesterday, seven teams improved by eight or more wins from 1998 to 1999. Those teams were the Indians (+8), Pirates (+9), Mets (+9), Marlins (+10), Athletics (+13), Reds (+19) and Diamondbacks (+35). As we also saw yesterday, realistically we can expect a third of these teams to drop off seriously in 2000, a third of them to drop off slightly, and a third of them to improve slightly. The rest of this week, I will attempt the impossible, which is to accurately project each of those seven teams for one of those three slots. After visiting the Reds yesterday, today we visit the Cleveland Indians. I'm not going to mention every position individually, so let's start at the top ... the top of the order, that is. And this year we'll see significantly lower production from Cleveland's top three hitters. Here they are now, along with their ages and on-base percentages in 1999: Age OBP 1. Kenny Lofton 32 .405 2. Omar Vizquel 32 .397 3. Roberto Alomar 31 .422Lofton hurt himself during the postseason while making one of those ridiculously stupid head-first slides into first base, and will miss at least two months of the season. Vizquel set career highs in on-base percentage and slugging percentage. So did Alomar. So it seems highly likely that the Indians will get less from each of these spots in the batting order. Cleveland can expect better production from the corners, assuming Jim Thome can stay in the lineup. He was close to his usual self last year, but third baseman Travis Fryman played only 85 games, and he was pretty lousy when he did play. A healthy Fryman comes close to making up for a missing Lofton. The hitting spots are solid, with Dave Justice, Manny Ramirez and Richie Sexson. It's unrealistic to expect Ramirez to duplicate his incredible 1999 stats, but Sexson figures to pick up some of the slack. The Indians scored 1,009 runs last season, but this year that number will drop to the mid-900s. So can the pitching staff make up for it? Chuck Finley replaces Doc Gooden in the rotation, which obviously is a big plus. Jaret Wright, assuming that he wins a rotation spot, can't be worse than he was last year. Shoot, even if he blows out his shoulder, his replacement from Triple-A will be better than Wright was last year. Dave Burba and Charles Nagy are who they are. And Bartolo Colon, if he's healthy, figures to maintain or get even better. What's more, I do think that a new manager might be a tonic for these guys. The bullpen lost Mike Jackson, but he wasn't great anyway. Relief pitching doesn't figure to be a major strength or weakness. I think the pitching will be a little better this year, enough to make up for at least some of the decrease in run production. The Indians won 97 games last year? They'll win 94 this year, due in part to improved teams in Kansas City and in the National League Central. Speaking of the NL Central, the Pirates have been getting lost in the shuffle, haven't they? Well, in a sense they should get lost in the shuffle because they don't have the juice to contend. That said, I do think they're a team that could actually follow last season's improvement with another improvement, perhaps from 78 wins to 82. Why? They'll have a whole year of Jason Kendall, who missed half the season after breaking his ankle. Even if Kendall's not at full strength, he'll be better than his replacements were last year. Second baseman Warren Morris is good, and could get better. Brian Giles is very good, and should remain so. With Kris Benson, Jason Schmidt, Todd Ritchie and Francisco Cordova, the Pirates boast one of baseball's most exciting, if unsung, young pitching rotations. All this is enough, I am sure, to kindle hope in the hearts of Pirates fans. But about the best they should hope for is a .500 record, because the Pirates have a lot of question marks. The corner outfielders, Wil Cordero and (for now) Al Martin, are mediocre. Third baseman Aramis Ramirez is going to be a fine player, but he's probably two or three years away from that. Pat Meares is Pat Meares. If you're keeping score, here's the tally to this point: 1998 1999 2000 Pirates 69 78 (+ 9) 82 (+4) Indians 89 97 (+ 8) 94 (-3) Reds 77 96 (+19) 90 (-6)Tomorrow, we'll continue this discussion with your New York Mets and your Florida Marlins. And remember that I still need to find two clubs that will seriously decline next season, and by "seriousl" I mean at least a dozen games to the bad. If you think it might be your favorite team, please let me know, because at this point I don't see any great candidates. |