It's Official: The Hammer is Gone

The news reports from the weekend are now official:  the Pirates have traded Joel Hanrahan, All-Star closer, who is the victim - in the Pirates point of view - of his own success.  He performed so well that he became too expensive for the Pirates to keep.

Hanrahan and infield prospect Brock Holt are off to the Red Sox and the Pirates receive these four players in return: pitchers Mark Melancon and Stolmy Pimentel, infielder Ivan DeJesus, Jr., and 1B/OF Jerry Sands.  Here are some of my thoughts on this deal.

1. You can probably defend and make a case in defense of this deal, based upon the potential of the four players  coming here, and Neal Huntington will no doubt be spewing the Nealspiel from now until Opening Day doing just that, however...
2. ....this is yet another deal where the NHR (Neal Huntington Regime) seems to be looking towards the ever expanding and undefined "future" while not necessarily latching on to the chance to win NOW, in 2013.
3. Jerry Sands seems to be the same player as Clint Robinson and Travis Snider.  First baseman/outfielders.  Is Neal going for the throw-it-against-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks approach?
4. I am sorry to see Hanrahan go.  I liked him, but at the same time, he can and will be replaced.  Finding a closer is not all that difficult, even for a team like the Pirates. (maybe).
5. Even putting the best light on this, this deal still reeks of being a salary dump, pure and simple.
6. Even if you can make a case, baseball-wise, for this deal, given the NHR track record in such deals, how confident are you that it's going to work out for the Pirates?
7. And  I say the odds are less than 50/50 that Garrett Jones will in a Pirate uniform come Opening Day.

As always, big Pirates news are always accompanied by some great quotes from Huntington, the wacky Nealspeil we have come to know and love.  Here's one of them:

"I'm not saying that Mark's (Melancon) going to become Joel, but sometimes we get caught up in what we've done today and not necessarily take a look in how we've gotten there."

That is a quote directly from the Post-Gazette this morning.  Can anyone tell me what exactly he was trying to say there?

For the next bit of Nealspeil, I turn the stage over to my friend Fred Shugars and a comment he made on Facebook Pirate Chat this morning.  Take it away, Fred:

NH on adding Holt to the deal: "He was somebody Boston came after, and we reluctantly put him in the deal". That does make Neil sound like the bully just took his lunch money.

Thank you, Fred.  Couldn't have said it better.

If you are reading no great sense of outrage on my part, what can I say?  The Pirates have succeeded in numbing me on such matters over the course of the NHR.

But, hey, we're baseball fans, right?  Everything looks good over the Hot Stove, right?  Maybe this one will too.

Watch, but don't bet.

Neal Does It Again

Events have kept me away from the keyboard these last few days, but my plan was to blog this Sunday morning on the Pirates signing of free agent pitcher Francisco Liriano.  Then I come home last night to find that the Buccos madcap GM Neal Huntington had worked his magic once again and engineered a deal that will send All-Star relief pitcher Joel Hanrahan to Boston for, yep, you guessed it, prospects.  So far, a pitcher and an "outfielder/first baseman" (I can't remember their names, don't feel like looking them up, and does it really matter anyway?) will be coming to the Bucs.  Also, it is reported that one other Pirate and two other "prospects" from the Red Sox will be involved once physicals are taken and the deal is finalized sometime after Christmas.

Exchanges on Facebook's Pirate Chat page have been voluminous and lively.   The consensus is that this is yet another Pirates Salary Dump (Hanrahan is arbitration eligible and would have probably been awarded a salary in the $7 million range) in which Huntington deals away an All-Star player for some batting practice balls and a couple fungo bats.  The Huntington supporters, and there are some, believe it or not, claim that this could be a good if not great deal for the Pirates, since Hanrahan's value is high, you can always find someone to close for you, and you can "get something" for him.

My thoughts are, yes, a team should be able to find a closer, and yes, why should a cash-strapped (purportedly) team like the Pirates shell out seven mill for such a commodity, so, in some sense, it DOES make sense to shop and even trade a guy like Hanrahan.  My beef is that this trade reeks of almost every other trade made by the Neal Huntington Regime (NHR).  When the dust settles, and the highly played and proven player leaves Pittsburgh, the Pirates are left with "prospects", guys with "high upsides" over whom the Pirates will have multiple "years of control".  What this really means is - CHEAP.  And how have these trades worked out for the Pirates so far?  How come guys like Andy LaRoche, Brandon Moss, Tim Alderson, Gorkys Hernandez, Craig Hansen, Jeff Locke, Jeff Clement and others of their ilk have yet to lead the Pirates to multiple pennants?  Hey, maybe I've left out someone that Neal HAS traded for that has been a big contributor, and I've failed to mention him, and if so, I apologize.  Wait, he did trade Nyjer Morgan to the Nationals and received Joel Hanrahan in return.  That was great deal for the Pirates, right up until the time Hanrahan got too expensive.

My point - and my frustration -  is that this is yet another deal where the Pirates are looking to "the future" and are not looking to win now, today, in 2013.  The Washington Nationals got ripped two years ago when they signed Jayson Worth to a mega-contract, but that signing proved to Nats' fans that the team was going to win right away, and not build for some undefined "future" that, in the Pirates case, anyway, always is being redefined and pushed further and further out into the distance.  

My friend Al Cotton predicted that the next guy to go will be Garrett Jones.  He, too, will be arbitration eligible and will be getting a huge raise after his 27 HR season last year.  Couple this with the Huntington's stockpiling of "outfielder/first baseman" and I'd say that Jones is as good as gone.  Again, the NH Supporters were out saying that Jones' is nothing but a platoon player (true, but one that hit 27 HR, 86 RBI, and an .823 OPS), whose value "will never be higher" (which could very well be true) so why not deal him?  Well, here's two reasons why not.  One, the Pirates might certainly be a better team with him than without him in 2013, and two, based on his track record, do you have any confidence at all that Huntington will get equal, much less better, value in return?  I don't.

Oh, and about that Liriano signing?  My initial thoughts were, hey, this guy was one of the very brightest young pitchers in baseball a few years back when he came up with the Twins, so what the hell, this might be a good signing.  At the very least, he would be the equal of Kevin Correia, and better than Eric Bedard.  On the other hand, to use a phrase that Neal himself likes to use, Liriano's performance has been "trending down" in recent seasons, but still he is only 29 years old, so, again, what the hell?  But once again on the other hand, this is the Pirates that are making this signing, so how good can it really be?  This is how the NHR has rotted my perspective, and taken away my ability to be positive about the team that I have followed and loved for 54 seasons.