Pirates Face Their Biggest Series of the Season… Again

Yo. Welcome to the North Shore Nine podcast presented by FanDuel. This is Bucco Brew powered by Defer Coffee and Tea. I'm your host, Anthony DiNardo. With me, we have, as always, this Monday morning, Jim Rosati.

Jim, welcome back to the world. Seemed like you've been traveling day to day, city to city for like the last two weeks.

Yeah, it's been a lot of traveling lately. So yeah, good to be home. Good to be just in our office. I think this is our first Bucco Brew together in like three weeks. I think the one time Ryan filled in for me and another time Ryan filled in for you. So yeah, we got the gang back.

Yeah, we're back. We are back. Not a great series. Pirates take one out of the three. However, they salvage it by taking one out of the three. Pirates are two games above 500. Pirates are one game out of the wild card.

And they're taking on the team that's right in front of them, holding the last wild card spot this series coming. So it's still, it's still, it's, things are still all right.

Yeah, you didn't want to get swept there. Winning one, obviously not ideal against Chicago, especially like with the way that they lost.

Especially, Saturday's game was just pathetic, embarrassing loss. But it was good to get the win yesterday. I said they needed to, they needed one of those at least.

And now is a huge series with Arizona coming up. Multiple reasons why this series is really big. But they're the team that you're chasing right now. And yeah, it's a, it's a big series this week at PNC park.

I don't know if there's a bigger series in the, I don't know if there's a bigger series this year than this one coming up.

Well, this is the biggest series of the season. Part 23.

It is, but this is, this series caps off the brutal stretch.

We talked about this Bucco Brew might've been the last time we were together. It's been like we said so long ago, but we were discussing how, obviously there's the loss of Connor. the loss of Konnor Griffin was fresh on that show as well, but O'Neal's been out. Spencer's been out.

What would hotels been out, and how can they just maintain this stretch of games where it gets tough?

Cause you're playing teams like the Braves and the Brewers and the Yankees and the guardians and the Cubs.

And now though, the diamondbacks that's off the Phillies series, they're coming off of it as well.

like that's a tough stretch for a team. That's, and I think at the time they're like three games under 500, if not, maybe two.

And again, they come out of this two games above 500, still just like one game out of the wild card.

That's what like, that's a perspective on all of this, right?

Like this could have gone a lot worse based on the opponents they had to face in based on the, at the strength they're at with their current roster.

They're also starting to get back at close enough strength.

Again, Connor's going to be out for a while.

That's still going to sting here, but sounds like Spencer Horwitz is on the mend.

He's going to be back soon.

Endy Rodríguez is going to be back soon.

Wilberto tell all this.

He is already back.

So, no Cruz is like, two weeks away, most likely ish.

So again, I know there's a lot of frustrating losses in that stretch of games, but like they came out with a winning record.

So far, again, one more series to go until you get the Reds in the trade deadline.

Yeah.

They were never three games under 500.

I think the most they ever got under 500 was one because every time they would go under 500, they would immediately win.

But yeah, they've weathered, they've weathered this storm.

They're, they haven't, they haven't gone in any big streaks other than that Milwaukee series.

but yeah, this is, this is the end of it.

And this is the culmination of it all.

You've got your 54 and 52.

You're facing the, you're facing the diamondbacks who are, where is Arizona?

They are one game ahead of us at 55 and 51 currently.

yeah, it's big, it's big.

and you win two out of three here, a lot of stuff is falling, is starting to fall your way.

And we're talking about a trade deadline that is in seven days from today, next week, next Monday.

So our Bucco Brew next Monday will be, the day of the trade deadlines a little later this year than normal.

It's August 3rd.

But they have a, they have an opportunity right in front of them right now to catch Arizona and improve this team for the stretch run in this next week.

So yeah, it doesn't get bigger than this next week.

For this time period.

Right.

But that's the thing.

This team has to live in the present on a step farther.

Like this may be the biggest series of the year.

And then including all future series, because if there is a team that if you're, if you're looking at what's in front of you right now, Miami, I guess it's possible.

They could turn things around, but they look pretty dead at this point in a row.

They've lost Miami's probably sellers like going into this week's deadline.

Washington.

I don't know what they're going to do, but I can't imagine them being too aggressive.

San Diego.

I don't think they're going to be all that aggressive.

St.

St.

Louis.

They'll probably try to do something to push themselves over the edge, but I'm not too scared of St.

Louis as of this moment.

I think the pirates have the more talented team.

and so like, if you look at like who it is, who's got the best shot of this third wildcard spot, it's the pirates and the diamondbacks.

It's these two teams and what makes this series so important is really, I think that the NL wildcard tiebreaker more than anything.

Like right now, if the pirates and the diamondbacks finished tied, the tiebreaker goes to head to head season series between the two teams.

Pirates took two out of three against Arizona earlier this year, which means if they can take two out of three in this series, they don't have to finish better than the diamondbacks, right?

They can finish tied with the diamondbacks and they will get that last NL wildcard spot because of the tiebreaker.

But if they lose this series, it then moves to the next tiebreaker, which is like in division record.

And then, who knows what happens there because there's a ton of baseball left.

So in my opinion, this is the biggest series of the year, because if you take two out of three here, you essentially gain not just a game on the diamondbacks, but you gain two games on the diamondbacks.

Really? Because again, you, if Arizona finishes 80 with 85 wins, you just got to finish with 85 wins.

You don't have to have 86. Like it's, this is an important series for down the road.

Yeah, no, that is a good perspective. I still want to push back a little bit.

And again, you laid out all those reasons, which is again, like this is why it is important.

It all could come down to like the last game of the year and you're tied with the diamondbacks and now you get it.

And that's why this was so big. It's still just a three game series in the end of July.

Like there's still a lot of baseball needs to be done.

The pirates need to take care of business, but this series does have season ending implications that mean more than maybe just others.

like when they go against the reds, that's not going to be as meaningful because of the scenario you just mentioned.

So yeah, like that's what makes this series interesting for sure.

Oh, we got some, is this Jim Olytics? We got some charts up here.

This is just, this is just fan graphs, playoff odds right now.

And like, you look at it and fan graphs is saying that this last wildcard spot is most likely down to the pirates and diamondbacks.

Right.

You know what?

So I think that's why this is, this series is so important to me.

pirates, sitting at right around 42% playoff odds, Arizona at 36, no one else in the national league is above 18.

Right.

so yeah, it's, I don't know.

I'm willing to go ahead and say that this is, this is the series of the year.

Like it doesn't get, it doesn't get more important than this one.

Yeah.

Until it comes down to the last series of the season.

And that's the most important because of whatever it might be anyways.

No.

But again, implications though here.

Yeah.

Like that's really good information.

That's why this series is important.

However you want to put it.

And this is definitely a winnable series, for the pirates, this is going to be a pretty good matchup and such.

But as far as the series goes, what do we have here?

We have Mitch Keller facing Merrill Kelly, Bubba Chandler, Brandon fought and Jared Jones, Eduardo, former future pirate, Eduardo Rodriguez.

Like the pitching match.

Like I know skeins isn't going, but hell, sometimes skeins doesn't really matter these days.

Jared Jones has been a beast.

He's going to be in here.

Mitch Keller's coming off of probably his best start or one of the best starts of his, this season.

And Bubba's been turning it around.

So like, as far as the pitching matchups go, pretty nice.

And we know what this offense can do, especially when they're facing righties.

So, yeah, I actually want to dive into that a little bit more because, I was looking at these two offenses heading into the series.

And it's funny because they're almost polar opposites of each other.

The Pirates are second in baseball in hitting against right-handed pitchers, with a one 15 weighted runs created.

Plus they are, they are a second in batting average.

They are first and on base percentage in their third and slugging percentage.

Arizona rakes against lefties, Arizona with a one 13 weighted runs created plus against left-handed pitching.

They are first in batting average third and on base percentage second and slugging percentage.

So like Arizona really good against lefties Pittsburgh, really good against righties.

when it comes to right-handed pitchers though, this Arizona team bad 87 weighted runs created plus against right-handed pitching or the diamondbacks.

That's second worst in baseball.

They're hitting two 30 against righties.

That's second worst in baseball.

They have the fourth worst on base percentage against righties and the worst slugging percentage in baseball against right-handed pitchers.

So, if you look at it, just a setup here, the Pirates don't have any lefties in their rotation and that's what Arizona feasts against.

So, the Pirates are going to be sending out three righties and Arizona is one of the worst teams in baseball against right-handed pitchers.

So, yeah, it lines up nicely for Pittsburgh right now.

You, it lines up to take two out of three, right?

Like they, Pirates are facing one lefty and two righties, Pirates mash righties.

Let's take these first two games against Arizona.

Some might say Ben had the vision, the same vision you had, knowing that this Arizona series is going to be so huge that he omitted going after a lefty starter the entire offseason.

That's what it was.

Yeah, that's what it was.

Yeah.

The, we just didn't see the vision, but here it out comes into fruition anyways, but right.

I think that's cool.

And like you mentioned two righties, Rodriguez is going to be the lefty that they face the last game of the series, which is also why the first two are going to be very important to win because they're going against the lefty.

But that's also the game that Jared Jones is starting, which Jared Jones has been essentially lights out.

It doesn't matter who's facing him in the five innings that he's going to go.

They can't get a hit off of them.

So, he's been one of the better pitchers in the national league all last month.

So.

Yeah.

It's been him, Zach Wheeler and Christopher Sanchez.

Like those have been the three best pitchers in baseball, at least in the national league for July.

Mm-hmm.

So it is going to be a very interesting series.

Yeah.

And I don't know, like we haven't heard any word yet.

Spencer Horwitz has been in rehab.

He had a home run the other day.

He got hit in the helmet as well the other day, but all things good with that.

So I don't know.

Like, again, we haven't heard anything, but do we think maybe Spencer is coming back this series?

Endy, I think, maybe still a few days away, but he could also essentially be back.

I think Endy's back.

You think Endy's back?

I think Endy's going to be back.

So, like, that Sean Ross legacy game.

Mm-hmm.

Who knows if there's ever another Sean Ross game?

I don't know.

he's...

We'll probably see him again at some point.

But what a moment for Sean Ross yesterday, that two-run homer in his first start of his career.

But, yeah, I think Endy's going to be back for this series.

I think Spencer might be back, too.

I think we might see both of them come off the IL, which, again, big boost, even against right-handed pitching, which they've been able to hold their own without those two.

But with those two back, certainly helps.

From my understanding, they're both going to be at Pittsburgh for re-evaluation.

again, does that more or less sound like, hey, if things are good, can that line up?

Yeah, I just don't know how much rehab you need.

Endy was hitting the ball with really high exit velos in his couple starts that he had in Indianapolis.

Spencer Horwitz homered, in his last game.

So, it's like, how much more rehab do you need to send these guys on?

If they're ready, if their timing's back, just get them back in there.

Well, then.

So, let's play GM.

Those two are coming back.

Who's gone?

No, I think, obviously, Endy is here.

It's Sean Ross.

Yeah, Sean Ross is gone.

He's going to make that right.

Yeah, Sean Ross is gone.

And I don't know if I'm looking at the roster when it comes to Horwitz coming back.

Probably Tyler Callihan, who's filled in admirably.

Yeah, so I would say Sean Ross, Tyler Callihan are probably the two to go for the guy.

Yeah.

We talked about this, Tyler, not debating.

Like, is it Billy Cook?

Is it Callihan?

He mentioned Callihan.

I think it made a lot of sense, too.

But I do want to point something out here.

Let me pull up the numbers.

But, I mentioned this on Twitter the other day.

Well, yesterday.

But to get the actual numbers now updated.

So, Tyler Callihan, since the Dodgers series, has not been pretty.

You say he's filled in admirably.

And, like, he has.

However, since the Dodgers series where he played hero, right?

And everyone's like, oh, okay.

This is cool.

Maybe he can do something here.

82 played appearances.

He is batting 195, 232, 286 with a 517 OPS.

I think we've seen the Tyler Callihan run cease.

Yeah.

You know what, though?

The Pirates won a game because of Tyler Callihan.

So, we'll always have that.

We'll always have that.

A lot of legacy games this year.

Yeah.

And I think he's shown that, like, hey, if you've got a call upon him, like, he's not incompetent.

He's someone.

He's a replacement level player, right?

And Ryan and I talked about this last week where these are the guys that the Pirates have been missing.

Like, for the last, for all decade.

Because if a starter goes down, and let's face it, the starters haven't been very good either.

But if a starter goes down and you need to call up just this guy from AAA, this next guy, that next guy has typically been awful.

You know?

Like, just go down the list.

How many guys have just littered this team with negative war, half season, quarter season.

To be fair, Jim, half the starters are those players you're talking about.

That's what right?

So, like, in the years past, they haven't had a Tyler Callihan to call upon, where he's come up.

And, Tyler Callihan, yeah, he's, again, he's slumping since that Dodgers series.

But 91 weighted runs created plus, you'll take that from your, what, your eighth guy in the infield?

Like, he's way down there on the depth chart.

And he's not playing terribly.

So, yeah, shout out Tyler Callihan.

As I said, we've probably seen the end of his run this time.

We will probably see him again at some point in the future.

But I think he did, I think he did a nice job filling in, during all of these injuries.

And, again, the Pirates have one less win right now, if not for Tyler Callihan.

True.

Yeah, I get, true.

But, I think the run's done.

And, again, it's just circumstances.

And, because you have two really good players for the Pirates right now.

And Spencer Horwitz and Indy coming up.

And, of course, Indy's going to replace Sean Ross.

But, yeah, like, Spencer Horwitz is coming back.

That's a dude.

There's a lot of dudes on this team.

And that's what's fortunate for the team and unfortunate for people like Tyler Callihan.

There's a lot of dudes on this team.

And you've got to go.

it is what it is.

But, with that said, like, yes.

Like, this lineup, which has, again, been good.

I know since the All-Star break, they've struggled a bit.

Also, since the All-Star break, they've had a lot of lefties they've had to face.

That's part of it.

But, this is a good offense.

And now it's going to get even better.

Because Indy's back.

And Spencer Horwitz is back.

And it's funny and weird.

And I'm not saying this because, of course, people, like, they're already talking about trades and trading people.

But it's like, you could have a stacked lineup.

Just a completely stacked lineup.

And, yeah.

That's cool.

That's cool.

Yeah.

you start looking at what the lineup looks like with.

And this is with Konnor Griffin still out and Oneil Cruz still out.

Right.

you plug in Indy and Horwitz for Davis.

And right now, like, Callihan or Triolo, pick one.

who's starting in the day there.

Or Arizona's going to get him less.

Yeah.

So, you're looking at, like, does Jake Mangum move back to the nine spot?

Jacob Gonzalez is your eight hitter now.

The lineup is starting to look pretty deep again.

just bringing those two guys back.

So, yeah.

I hope they're back tonight.

Team could certainly use them.

And, yeah.

I don't know how much longer rehab you need out of these guys.

There's no reason to send Indy.

Indianapolis is in Louisville this week.

No reason to send him on the road either.

Like, he was hitting the ball in Indy.

He doesn't need to go to Louisville.

I don't need to see Indy this week in Louisville.

No.

There you go.

Yeah.

So, again, with this huge series coming up, reinforcements likely back as well.

And that's going to be a nice little boost.

Again, it's a great offense as it is.

So, it's not like they need them in theory.

But with this bullpen, maybe they do need them.

maybe eight runs aren't enough.

They will need the nine or ten.

So, okay.

Anything else with this series that you want to dive into real quick?

No, it's just, it's a big series.

They need Mitch Keller to put up a, as I said, he doesn't even have to be outstanding, I don't think.

You're facing Merrill Kelly.

This lineup is potent.

Mitch needs to go out there and give them six innings and probably four runs or less.

If he can do that, then I feel pretty solid about tonight.

How many lefties are in the Diamondbacks lineup?

How many lefties are in the Diamondbacks lineup?

That's going to determine a lot here.

Not many.

Two, three, four, five.

If you count switch hitters.

Corbin Carroll, Perdomo, Marte, Kepler, and Adrian Del Castillo.

Okay.

We'll find out what happens with Mitch tonight or tomorrow.

But again, like I've read the numbers that this Diamondbacks lineup, they are second worst against righties in baseball.

Correct.

Mitch is also very bad.

So it's going to find out.

It's going to see who.

Merrill Kelly is also very bad.

so you're looking at, Merrill Kelly's having a worse season than Mitch Keller right now.

Yeah.

Well, yeah.

Yeah.

But.

So, yeah.

Like, Mitch Keller just needs to do better than Merrill Kelly tonight.

And like the Pirates need to get to Kelly.

Like this is, this is a guy that this lineup just, they need to get to him.

Well, there you go.

And it's funny because I have faith that they will.

Like, no, Jim, no, Merrill Kelly legacy game incoming after that.

No, I have, I have faith that this team is going to get to Merrill Kelly.

Yeah.

All right.

It may take them a second time through the order, but they're going to get to him.

I had more faith 30 seconds ago.

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So what do we want to talk about next?

Cause the pirates did sign their first round draft pick.

Derek Correo.

We'll talk about him a little bit here.

I also want to talk about the magician a little bit here.

I'll just go ahead and talk about Correo first.

I don't want to spend a ton of time on them.

I did, I did our draft show.

so make sure you check that out.

If you haven't just go to our YouTube page or anywhere you get podcasts.

So I did a full breakdown of everyone in the draft, but, yeah, Derek Correo officially signs yesterday, $6.2 million, about $2.1 million under slot, which the pirates

have essentially already spent almost all of that money on the Aiden Ruiz's of the world.

Spencer Evans, guys like that, like they've gone over slot on quite a few of their later picks.

and Curry out going under slot allowed them to do that, but it's exciting to get this guy into the system.

if you look around, baseball America, for example, has already updated their top 100 lists with the new draftees.

So, Derek Curiel is officially a top 100 prospect.

According to baseball America, he sneaks in at 94 on the team, on the, on the list that makes him the pirates third, excuse me, third highest prospect behind Seth Hernandez

and Edward Florentino.

That's probably about where I'd slot him in at this point.

I might even put Murf Gray ahead of him with just how good he's been hitting.

But, yeah, so Curry L is officially a top 100 prospect.

Now pirates, get him into the system.

Be curious to see how quick he gets to playing games.

I don't think it's going to be quite like, when they, the last position player they drafted Konnor Griffin, didn't play at all his first professional season, right?

He just, he just went to, instructional league and just, worked on his swing.

I know the pirates are going to, they have a plan for Derek Curiel and his swing, right?

Because one of the things leading into this draft was, Hey, elite bat to ball skills, big contact guy, but the power, doesn't play in games.

So, the exit velos are there.

He hits the ball hard.

It's just a matter of, Hey, like how much power do you want to get out of this guy?

How much power can you get out of this guy?

and so they've got, they've got some work to do.

He's a younger, he's a younger college pick.

He just turned 21 in may, I would imagine he gets sent to probably Bradenton first.

but I wouldn't be shocked to see him finish the year in Greensboro, just depending on how he does.

and maybe just put them in Greensboro too.

So he can see a few balls fly over the fence.

I don't think that might just be good for the psyche, you know?

but no, it's nice to have a guy like this in the system.

everyone who, if you look at, if you check out offbeat this morning, Alex did his entire episode on Derek Curiel.

He got the chance to talk to LSU coach, Jay Johnson, talk to his dad, talk to, some pirate scouts who were all in attendance at yesterday's press conference.

And everyone just has like, just nothing but rave reviews to say about this kid.

And again, knowing that the pirates do have some plan in place to tap into a little bit more of this Derek Curiel swing.

It seems like he's the right kid who is going to take that feedback and hopefully implement it.

So we'll see how it goes.

they said the pirates have actually like for the first time that we've ever done this podcast together, DiNardo, the pirates have some developmental wins to talk about.

It is.

So it's like, Hey, you know what?

Let's get another one.

I almost trust their minor league development at this point.

It's weird.

It's very weird, but it's warranted.

You know?

it is like, we're not just blowing smoke out here.

They've done.

the one thing we've said is, well, they can develop pictures.

It looks like, or at least, through the minor leagues, but hitters, they absolutely can.

And you're getting, you're talking about the last position player.

It's well known.

I was against the whole entire Konnor Griffin being drafted by the pirates was nothing to do with Konnor Griffin.

It was everything to do with the pirates.

They can't, they can't make this kid good.

They can't help this kid be something.

And now he's the best prospect that ever existed in some people's eyes.

So yeah, like some degree there for the pirates, again, like the Esmerlyn Valdez is too, even like the ones that are in the system that are unheralded, that develop and such.

So the pirates have done a good job of that.

And so, you can trust in them a little bit, at least at this point in time to see what they can do a couple of things with him.

Like, I know we had our draft show and he got drafted and we weren't the happiest, there was a little bit of confusion.

Part of that also is like, when we had Jim Callis on, we asked him, he was like, well, that's not going to happen.

Well, the question was the question that I specifically asked Jim Callis was, do you see the pirates drafting?

And I mentioned Curiel by name.

I was like, do you see them drafting someone like Derek Curiel to save some money to spend later in the draft?

And I think his words were, that wouldn't make sense.

I think, I think those were his words.

So, and that's exactly what they did was that, they drafted Curiel fifth to save, not necessarily, I don't, I'm not going to say that they did this to save money.

That was a by-product of this.

but everyone that I've talked to, the pirates were very high on Derek Curiel.

They were very comfortable taking him at number five.

It's just, other outlets had him ranked more in that like 10 to 12, 10 to 15 range.

The pirates really like Derek Curiel.

So I do want to make sure I point that out.

and I don't, I don't think they're lying about that.

Like, I don't think they made this pick specifically to save money to use later on.

And I think that's just, I think they liked Derek Curiel and they had the fifth pick and they knew they could, they could get Curiel to sign for a little bit cheaper.

And that led them to, shoot a little bit higher later on.

they love Aiden Ruiz.

so yeah, they were able to use that savings from Curiel to get some guys later on in the draft.

Yeah.

And like, I don't want to go down this rabbit hole on this show and such, but again, like when people hear save money, like it's when it comes to MLB draft, it's not in the sense of like being cheap that they spent all of their dollars.

They spent all their dollars, it wasn't like, oh, we've pocketed now 2 million more dollars that we don't have to spend.

Like they spent it all.

It's the design and way to attack it.

Like, right.

Like you mentioned, like they wanted a guy later on, they could sign them.

They did overslot with all the other players and such.

So yeah, I guess there was some strategy to this, but what I do want to say to like everything you mentioned here and the reason I was going with, the whole, like we're disappointed in the Jim Callis stuff is even at the end of the day, he gets drafted by pirates.

There's still a lot to like about him more like the floor, right.

And they hit tool, but the pirates do really like him.

It sounds.

And like, again, he still is a top 100 prospect.

Like, it's not as if they just went and took someone like more or less punted on this pick or, did some crazy, like Kansas city Royals stuff on this pick.

Like they still got a talented players at top 100 prospect right now, according to baseball America.

Was that a Zion Rose dig out of you?

Yes.

Yes, Jim.

Just checking.

Yes.

But again, like what I'm alluding to is the Ryan from the office gif where he's just making notes.

Noted me right now.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But again, it's still a talented player that they got on their hands and they're able to still attack the draft and get some talented players.

Hopefully, later on, they can develop and such too.

With that said, we're talking about the player.

want to talk about the person a little bit here.

of course he's saying all the right things.

It's new.

He's brand new to the cities.

Iron, sharpens iron and stuff.

And of course that resonated on the broadcast because, oh, it sends your palooza.

Right.

So here we go with that.

but again, like you're talking about the last position player, Konnor Griffin, there's some connections there.

Connor, like personally met him and talked to them.

I'll say one thing if Connor likes you, that's also a Ryan noted in my notebook as well.

All right.

You know what?

The Griffin, the Griffin's like them, right?

Ryan and Connor to get along.

because again, like you were talking about the pirates also, I feel like something they've been doing draft wise.

I won't talk about free agent wise, but when it comes to draft wise, it seems as if the person means a lot to them.

They, it's not even just so much as like this kid has talent.

It's always the person.

We like the person, there's stuff about the person.

And again, with Konnor Griffin, I'll put it this way.

Even if the pirates development hasn't changed, he was going to succeed because of the person, you know?

So I guess I put that a little bit with Derek, you're hearing about him as the person such.

And again, with Connor being somewhat close in, and also his walkout song is Kanye.

His favorite artist is Drake.

You know?

All right.

All right.

I can get down with his music selection too.

Yeah.

I missed that.

I missed that part of the broadcast.

but no, I'm in agreement with you.

Last year we had Justin Horwitz on who is no longer with the pirates organization.

He moved to Washington, but that was one of the things that he pointed out with both Konnor Griffin and Seth Hernandez was, yeah, these two, these guys are super talented individuals, but on top of the talent, the person that those two guys

are, the people that they are, is going to allow them to maximize that talent just because of who they are, the work that they put in, and skeins

follows in that same path to where like Paul Skenes, Paul Skenes wasn't going to fail.

like that wasn't an option for Paul Skenes coming out of college.

Right.

and it seems like they've done at least in their last four first round picks.

Right.

and we'll see about, farther than that, but like their last four picks have been home runs, from that department.

well, let's call it three.

Cause we don't really know curiel just yet, but skiing that run they went on with skeins Griffin and Hernandez.

It, those three, not only are the talents there, but like they're exactly the people you want on your team.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So again, there's a lot of unknown, right?

It was just a track just got drafted.

There's plenty of first round busts, like we don't know.

We're not here to proclaiming like, Oh, the pirates nailed this by any means, but what we have at our disposal, yes.

Live on draft day, we were again, I want to use the word disappointed is more shocked, like it was, it was unexpected, maybe shocked a little more.

It was just unexpected.

I think disappointed might be the right word because again, like, and I said it on our draft show, like Derek curiel, they're like, there's nothing about their curiel that I don't necessarily dislike.

Like I think he's a really nice prospect.

It's just, I think the upside of curiel, there's just a question mark there because it's like, will he actually ever hit for power and you don't have to hit for power to be a

successful major league baseball player.

It just means that your upside is a little less there, right?

Like Louisa rise is never going to be a four worth player because he doesn't hit the ball over the fence.

Nick Gonzales, like four wars probably is cap, right?

Like if everything goes well, the rest of this year, this is probably going to be like the best year of his career.

So it's just, the power allows you to just have a higher ceiling and that's the thing that curiel is missing right now.

But if the pirates can configure something out where they just tap into that a little bit more, it certainly changes, it changes his ceiling.

Right.

Well, I wanted to add to that just slightly here too, is, you're talking about the ceiling because the power and such.

And the thing is too, is like, he has to have that hit tool, like that has to come.

That's also why it's limited too, because Nick Gonzales is Nick Gonzales right now because he actually is hitting for average when he wasn't, he wasn't Nick Gonzales either, you know?

So like guys like Curiel, that's also why I talk about the ceiling so much because like the tool that they do have, that has to come to fruition.

He has to come up here and hit for average because he doesn't have all the other tools to make up for it in other ways as well.

but at any rate, yeah.

So again, seems like a cool kid.

Seems like he's got a head on straight, and Konnor Griffin approved.

So it's good enough about that book.

I'm excited to have him in the organization.

Yeah.

I'm excited to see him hit the ground running.

I hope that the plan is to give him some professional at bats and we can start seeing highlights and video and stat cast numbers.

I like the Greensboro.

Yeah.

I like what you said.

Yeah.

Like let him, let him get his feet wet and brain send him and send him to Greensboro for the last month or so just to see a few balls go over the fence and then get the fan base all riled up as well.

Yeah.

Be like, Oh, Derek Curry.

I'll hit 10 home runs in the last month of the year.

It's like three of them went 270 feet, but Hey, it counts.

Count it.

all right.

anything else on Derek or the draft?

Nope.

Excited to have him here.

I don't know if they're going to sign anybody else.

they, the deadlines today, they do have like 60 something thousand dollars to spend.

If they do want to go over slot on somebody else, there are a couple other picks.

Out there.

If you go to the North shore nine draft hub on North shore nine.com, you'll see that, Rowan Leto.

Yeah.

On the app to Rowan Leto, is still available.

The 12th round pick DeMarcus right out Carter, a high school kid out of Canada who doesn't have a college commitment.

So like, I wonder if there's something there.

he's still unsigned Grant Govelle 16th round pick out of USC.

I could see him going back to college Malachi, Washington, high school kid out of Georgia.

he's probably going to LSU and then Andrew Duncan 19th round pick out of Wright state.

He's probably transferring to Tennessee.

So if there is anyone else in play, you're probably looking at Leto and ride out Carter.

I'm not quite as confident in Govelle.

but yeah, we'll see what happens.

There it is.

Well, let's do this then.

Let's go ahead and kick it on over to Cody.

We'll come back and we'll talk about Cody's boy, the magician.

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So Jim, I put out a tweet last night, just some information here.

Felt like, we both talked, maybe talk a little more about it.

And, it's something to sense, like, I don't think like a ton of people are going crazy about this.

And like, knocking Esmerlyn Valdez, but it's something that I do find interesting.

Cause I do think it's fair.

there's been like this small minority.

It's, I hope at least, or some people are saying like, oh, he is, and that's probably just other fan bases.

Like the brewers, when he goes out there and just wrecks them, but like, there's some people in the pirates fan base, like, man, I hope like Esmerlyn Valdez's not like Aquino from the reds, the reds, a few years back, right.

Who can't fool you remember him on many people do.

He came up and he was just hitting home run after home.

And he was on like a, an Esmerlyn Valdez terror as well.

And then that dude just flamed out and went into the abyss, never to be heard from again.

And like, what says Merlin?

Well, Esmerlyn Valdez wasn't really a top prospect, like again, like a year ago, he was in Greensboro himself.

We were questioning if he's going to be a regular major league or a fourth outfield or whatever, part of that was because he needs to make sure he's making contact, not striking out, as much that was like his knock earlier on.

And he's cleaned all out.

he came into this season in triple a and he was certainly on notice, not so like a top prospect in baseball, but certainly someone that, your eyes are looking at it.

And of course now he's just tearing it up here.

So like, I wanted to talk about these two a little bit and maybe make people feel a little more comfortable about Esmerlyn Valdez, not being a guy who's going to come up here and then not be talked about in 2028 again, flame out in the Mexican league.

Yes.

That's where Aquino's at right now.

He's been in the Mexican league for like three years.

Yeah.

Didn't even know that, but fantastic.

But also I'll say this though.

Cause we do talk about our strat league often here.

So I know some people even recognize I had him and I traded him like immediately when he had that run, I don't remember what I traded, I got for him in return, but yeah, I was like,

thank you.

Thank you for doing this.

So I am going to sell high.

Yeah.

what year was that?

That was 2019.

Yeah.

he went on quite a tear, 56 games for the reds in 2019 with 19 homers.

And I feel like all of those came in like his first month or so, similar to Valdez, right?

Like if you've been seeing those lists where it's like, Hey, the only people who have done this over X amount of games are Valdez.

And then there's like two or three other people on like all these lists.

And like Aristides Aquino is on a lot of those lists because of how crazy that run was.

but yeah, I wanted to talk about this because you wrote, you called it a tweet, but I felt like this was like more of a book.

It was a six paragraph tweet last night.

It's a little longer.

That's some good information.

I want to get out there.

Twitter needs to go back to 140 characters.

That's my boomer.

It's my boomer Twitter take.

And you go back to just being Twitter and they need 140 character limit so that you can't write novels about this, but I saw this.

That's fine.

I would just had a 12 tweet thread going on.

Bring back, bring back 12 tweet threads.

That's what I want.

And just 10 X our monetization.

Anyway, anyways, you write this, you have to read it all.

You write this 1000 character tweet, last night trying to, just comparing the two.

And I thought you brought up some really good points because yeah, you look at, you just look at like the home run totals over the first X amount of games.

And there are people who have come up and just like gone crazy for a month or two.

And then you never hear from them again, but there are, there are vast differences between these two hitters.

Yeah.

And like, Oh, so again, like I want to come here because there are valid concerns for Esmerlyn Valdez.

Like the numbers are fantastic, but the guy's still striking out basically 38% of the time.

And one thing about us, again, we understand new age baseball, right?

We get it.

But even us, we talk about that 30% strikeout rate.

when you, when you start creeping up above that and higher things, aren't so sustainable.

Now it's more of the minor leagues, how they'll translate to major leagues.

Once you get the major leagues, they see who you are, like, Oh, no, Cruz can do that.

Like others can do it, but it's still not a whole lot of players that can do it.

38% is not a number.

We're also like, we're talking like maybe 32, 33, 38 is really high.

So yes, I understand the valid points of like, well, this isn't going to sustain and what's going to happen to Esmerlyn Valdez when pitching teams, they figure him out.

Right.

So yeah, like I put up some points here and again, going with the strikeouts, the contact rate is really low.

Like he has a 65.4% contact rate where league average is 82.6 zone in the zone contact.

My bad.

like that's is very low, very low.

Aquino was 72.8 for some perspective.

So obviously his is low too.

He's a bad player, but it was also better than Esmerlyn Valdez.

The contact in the zone is a little bit alarming here.

And that's why he does, strike out at the rate that he does.

But there was a lot of stuff outside of that again, makes me feel very good about Esmerlyn Valdez.

And that's why I'm not so worried about this.

It still has to get better.

Don't put words in my mouth.

It still needs to improve.

He is developing.

He's a rookie.

He's a 22 year old.

Right.

So that's something you can envision that he does do, but we've been talking about this, but now like putting numbers to it, what is just so impressive about him is his ability to identify and know what the strike zone is.

And it's not even just knowing what the strike zone is in theory.

It's also knowing what pitches, right?

Selecting the pitches to swing at knowing the strike zone.

The guy just doesn't chase.

And again, for a 22 year old.

And as we keep saying too, with that type of power, that game changing power, there's been plenty of times where the game's been on the line that you could envision this young kid who's salivating that he wants to be a hero, that it just expands the zone and starts swinging

at things still doesn't.

He chases only 23.6%.

He walks 13.3%.

Like I said, not too long ago, like it's reminiscent of like peak cutch that we're talking about with Esmerlyn Valdez, and Aquino, his walk rate 7.1%.

So basically half of what Esmerlyn Valdez is.

And his chase rate was 39%, almost double what Esmerlyn Valdez is.

So again, like this is part of the reason also why I feel very optimistic about Esmerlyn Valdez that he's not going to flame out like a guy like Aquino.

Yeah, he, I think that's what, the power is impressive.

We knew about the power, obviously I didn't know.

I don't think anyone expected this type of power so quickly.

He's essentially, he's still homering once every 10 plate appearances.

Like that's the rate he's at right now for 143 plate appearances, 14 home runs.

So the power is just impressive.

the K rate is high.

And it's like you mentioned, a lot of that just has to do with, he's swinging and missing quite often.

but the encouraging piece to that, as you mentioned is like, he's still not like he's swinging and missing, but he's really, he's only swinging and missing at balls in the zone for the most part.

Like he's swinging at strikes and he's laying off balls.

This is where you look at the strikeout rate and you look at the power and you look at the chase rate and you look at everything and you're like, you know what?

This could work.

Now is Esmerlyn Valdez going to bat 293 for his career?

No, like that's not going to happen.

That is the unsustainable part of this.

I think, right?

Like he's not going to, he's not going to have a 400 babe up for his career.

Like it's 393 right now.

That's not sustainable.

Right?

So like the batting average is going to go down.

I think you can expect batting averages more around like the 240 range for Valdez going forward.

And the strikeouts I think are always going to be there, but the fact that he only swings at strikes and he lays off balls is going to do a couple of things for him.

One, it's gonna, he's going to draw walks.

Like you're seeing it now.

Like he gets on base, even whenever he's not making contact, he's walking.

He's still doing things to help the team because he's so good at identifying balls and strikes.

And then the second thing it's going to do is if you're a pitcher, then you've got the decision to make.

Like, do I, do I pitch around this guy, which is a lot harder to do with this lineup right now with how deep it is?

Or do I attack him?

Because he's not going to, he's not going to chase.

Like I can't get him out by throwing balls.

I have to attack him to get him out.

And when you attack him, if he makes contact, I'll go far, I'll go far, right?

Like, so that's going to be, that's going to be this thing that we, I think we're going to see with Valdez is, yeah, he's going to swing and miss a lot.

He's going to strike out a lot, but because the plate discipline is so good, it's going to allow him to still capitalize on pitchers having to make that decision.

Like they're going to have to, they're going to have to decide, do I attack you or do I walk you?

And when they attack him, they're going to strike him out, but they're going to give up their fair share of long balls too.

So I think that's what makes them a special player right now is I don't think all of this is sustainable, but I think like a good chunk of it is he's, we're not talking about that small of a sample size anymore.

He's almost at 150 plate appearances and he's, he looks, he looks really good.

Like pirates haven't had a right-handed power hitter like this.

I don't even want to go ahead and say like, I could like Jason Bay never went on a run like this, you know?

like I can't remember a right-handed power hitter doing this in my life.

Right.

And he's a rookie and again, like it's not like a 50 plate appearance stretch too.

Like it's close to one 50 now.

So a few more things to add in here about the Aquino Valdez comparison.

Aquino was basically just a pool hitter and he was playing in great American small park to help him out here.

Right.

Aquino pulled the ball 46.3% of the time.

What's Esmerlyn Valdez doing dudes hitting to all fields, like all fields.

He's hitting away, he's pulling 31%, hitting away 28% up the middle, 41%.

Like he's using all fields.

Like the dude is just a hitter.

He's, he is a hitter.

And that again, like we're talking about things that are impressive and why it's different than the guy that flamed out.

There's still a problematic issue and that's the contact rate.

That's a big thing in baseball.

You got to hit the baseball.

Right.

But all these other things around it are very good.

Very good.

So again, when you look at the rookie, can he develop, can he make a little bit more contact?

I hope so.

It can happen.

It's still not going to be great, but it can happen.

And I guess that's ultimately where I want to lead down to on this path.

I want to share this screen for you.

Cause I want to show you, the, Esmerlyn Valdez stuff, right.

That's going on.

So this is his stat cast page.

so again, when you look at this, his, as here's Esmerlyn Valdez, as you see all the things about hitting the ball, very good.

Lots of red, right.

His expecting slugging five 36 is expecting batting average.

Oh, two 22.

Like you said, it'll probably be like a two 40, maybe a two 20 batting average guy barrels the ball, hard hit rate, bat speed, right?

What doesn't he do well on whiff rate K rate.

Has the high walk rate has the high chase rate.

Like everything we talked about, this isn't this guy who was a Kino that we're comparing, right?

As you see here, like a Kino was just bad.

He had a nice run.

I want to point out something Esmerlyn Valdez.

Now, again, understand what I'm getting at because this is the year of Lord 2026.

Or everyone takes words and makes them a certain way.

I'm not telling you that he is this person.

What I'm telling you is.

If he can tighten up that contact rate, right.

And he's doing what he's doing, which does seem sustainable.

Esmerlyn Valdez is a lot closer.

To this guy right here.

And that's Kyle Schwarber.

Like Kyle Schwarber's contact rate is 74%, I think.

So again, like that has to come up, but like Kyle Schwarber, like it's his contact rates are very low as well.

What does Kyle Schwarber do?

He does damage when he makes contact.

What does he do?

He knows the strike zone.

He chases 25% of the time, which right now is his higher.

He's usually like around 22.

That's Esmerlyn Valdez.

Like he doesn't chase.

He walks.

Yes.

He strikes out because he doesn't make contact as well, but it's not because he's chasing balls outside the zone.

Like, Oneil Cruz, right?

His knock.

I'm not saying Esmerlyn Valdez's going to be Kyle Schwarber, right?

What I'm telling you is if he does get better at making contact with the baseball, this is the type of player that you're looking at.

Like he can certainly be a Kyle Schwarber light.

Not an Aristides Aquino major.

I don't even want to look at it.

Yeah.

who's, whose page he actually looks.

There's a lot of similarities on outside.

Valdez is probably a little bit better at, launching balls in the right direction.

Go to, go to Murakami.

Just.

Although still, like if that's who we're talking of.

that's, you're looking at a guy with, a ton of power.

It does everything high, but the batting average, expected batting average is low.

Whiff rate, very high whiff rate, very high K rate.

Doesn't chase.

Like Murakami and Valdez have very similar profiles right now, it seems.

And Murakami was an all-star contact rate 66.7%.

Yeah.

Chase rate 22.

Yeah.

Those, that's an all-star.

That was an all-star first baseman this year.

And again, like I would look at him as a, he's a Kyle Schwerber light.

Yeah.

Like that's what Schwerber does.

Murakami, like you mentioned.

Yeah.

He's an all-star like Esmerlyn Valdez follows more of this trajectory based on everything.

And again, the strikeouts do have to come down the contact you want to see increased to get there.

Like what he's doing now is insustainable, but I see a lot of good things with Esmerlyn Valdez, a lot of good things that do not make me feel like he's any flash in the pan.

No, I agree with you.

There are, there is, there's two things he needs to work on and honestly, he doesn't even need to work on that much.

Like he just keeps doing what he's doing and he's going to be a really good hitter, I think in this league.

and yeah, I'm with you.

Like the Aquino comparisons I get just because of, bursting onto the scene, I understand the comparisons, but you dig deeper.

and I think you even mentioned it, in your, in your second tweet of this thread, Valdez is also a lot younger than Aquino was.

Oh, God, so it's like, there are so many things that favor Valdez in this situation over someone like Aquino, that yeah, I just an outstanding start to his career.

And I can't wait to see what he does, down the stretch here and throughout the rest of his career, he, like I said, he looks like a huge developmental win for the pirates.

Just like you mentioned, he was in Greensboro last year.

He's also huge.

That's thick.

He's built.

He's got a lot of power.

Yeah.

I am looking forward to Valdez being a pirate for a long time.

Are you saying extend them?

I'm saying like, you might, you might, maybe this off season, you think about it.

He's an interesting case.

I'll say that.

Cause of course people already like, extend them.

You don't need to yet.

I don't think.

I think you can wait.

Like, I think you can wait like another year if you have to let's like see if this is real, but, it is, it is funny that you're already thinking about.

And it was a time to extend Esmerlyn Valdez when a year ago you're thinking, is he an everyday player?

Again, shout out to him, the person also the person, but shout out to this developmental team that the Pirates have in place right now.

There's things that are starting to click.

So cool.

by the end of this week, he will most likely.

He'll be the third most valuable outfielder of the Ben Cherington era.

He's 0.1 war away from third place.

I want to revisit something.

Cause I feel bad.

I trashed Tyler Callihan.

Tyler Callihan might be the third most valuable reliever in Ben Cherington's era as well.

Callihan, you know what?

I'm at the point now where you like, do you just give Callihan the ninth inning?

I think so.

I think so.

God.

Yeah.

This bullpen.

So yesterday I was, I was, I was like out in the middle of nowhere, like middle of nowhere Kentucky didn't have very good service, but I was getting like the notifications.

I was getting score notifications, but I couldn't really like open up any apps and like follow along.

And I saw the pirates were up seven to one.

I'm like, Oh, we're good.

I can just chill.

I don't really need to pay attention anymore.

And then I'm looking and it's like seven to four.

And I was like eight to four.

I was like, eight to four.

We're fine.

And then it's eight to five and eight to six and eight to seven.

I was like, Oh yeah, this bullpen, man.

Like I said, they've got a week.

They got a week to fix it.

I'm excited for NS nine live on Wednesday.

Be ready for a PowerPoint.

DiNardo.

Oh dear Lord.

I'm going to break down all of the trade deadline possibilities.

It's going to be, it's going to be a lot of fun.

A lot of fun.

They got to add some people to this bullpen.

It is, it is so bad.

The two people they brought in are somehow worse than the people that they had.

So, I don't even know how that was possible, but Ben did it.

Ben found a way.

He persevered, but they said, they got to add probably go ahead.

Three people.

I think three arms makes this bullpen at least like respectable.

So yeah, I'm excited for Wednesday.

We're going to dive through all the possible trade candidates.

There it is.

And then on Monday, we'll have our live trade deadline show.

So that'll be glorious.

Yep.

Yeah.

It's always a fun time of year.

Last year, definitely not as fun because you knew you were sellers.

So it was more like, what are you going to get back for your only good players?

But this year, yeah, this year we're the buyers.

Being a buyer is, it's a little more frustrating because you tend to have to overpay a little bit at the deadline.

That's just how it works.

Unless you're dealing with Ben Cherington and you can somehow get an all-star closer for like a fourth string catcher, then we need to find, we need to trade Ben Cherington this week.

And then figure out a way to swindle Ben.

Swindle Ben.

I'm good with that.

Yeah.

I just fear no one's going to take him.

We're going to lose Derek Curiel in trading Ben Cherington.

It's going to be like the Liriano trade.

Well, you got to give up pieces for us to take him on.

Yeah.

Anyways.

Is that it?

I think that's it.

Somebody's asking, when is CISC supposed to be back?

I haven't really heard any updates on Evan CISC lately.

Two days ago, he began a throwing program.

But no timetable for return.

he is determined that he does not need surgery.

That was the last update.

Yeah.

Well, we'll find out.

Yeah.

We'll see.

Jared was pretty determined also.

I'm not.

I would, I would not count on CISC being back this year.

Honestly.

Elbow inflammation.

That's never a good sign.

At any rate.

Go check out the app.

Go check out the website.

As Jim just mentioned, right?

There's a lot of stuff on the draft that the draft hub just introduced, the trade deadline hub last night.

So you can go see all, I think it's happening in the trade deadline previous years as well.

That's both of those are on the app now.

Also.

So you've already had the app to new additions.

So you can see the draft hub and the trade hub.

other than that, we'll be live again, seven straight days, seven straight games.

Oh, I see what you're doing.

There we go.

Yeah.

I was just gonna say the trade deadline hub is a really cool addition.

So yeah, if you're on the website or the app trade deadline hub, it's going to give you every trade made within two weeks of the deadline.

And it goes all the way back to 2009.

So you can even see what Neil Huntington was doing back in the day.

But if you want to relive the 2024 date trade deadline, Oh baby, can I look at this?

We got you.

We got you covered.

If you really want to relive it, scroll all the way down.

Keep going.

Oh yeah.

Let's relive it.

Let's relive it.

There's our trade deadline show from 2024.

Yeah.

How about that?

Can't wait.

Everyone just deleted the app.

but again, yeah, seven straight games, seven games, again, three games versus the diamond backs.

And there's a four games here is against the reds that take us into the trade deadline.

So a lot of shows, a lot of shows this next eight days.

Yeah.

Seven post game.

Like, yeah, no off days either.

So yeah, we got you covered here and emergency podcasts.