Rebuilding Like You Read About | Pittsburgh Pirates

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 09, 2010 3:43 pm

Well I got bored and started playing power pros for the first time in 4 weeks and so I'll give you summaries of the 2013 and 2014 seasons

And be sure to check the 1st post of this thread for a lot of details

Pirates 2013 Season in Review
The Pirates came into this year as the defending World Champions and did not disappoint at all, getting better to go 100-62 and win the NL Central by a nice margin. The Pirates made a HUGE move signing Nick Markakis to right field and he hit 33 homeruns with help with that porch in right field at PNC Park. Jayson Werth also hit 37 homeruns but Garrett Jones led the majors in homeruns with a stunning 53. One problem was the struggle of Huston Street who had trouble with his ERA early on and was trade for Kerry Wood who had a 1.08 ERA at that point but it got to 3.20 at the end of the season, Mike Fontenot was also traded to the Giants for Brad Ziegler as well. The rotation was mighty despite Sanchez filing his worst ERA since 2007(4.05). Zach Duke was the story of the Pirates rotation, he was a dynamic force going 23-3, 2.98 ERA and 216 strikeouts in 207 innings firing a cy young kind of year, an award he would win. Kevin Hart was also great goign 13-11 in the bullpen and as a starter, taking over for Blackburn who had struggled badly. With all of this the Pirates took on the Dodgers for a 2nd straight year, winning in 5 games to beat the Dodgers in the NLDS again. But in 2013 the Chicago Cubs(91-71) made the postseason as the wild card and upset the 100-62 Pirates in 5 games to go to the World Series. There the Cubs took on the dominant White Sox, and there the Cubs broke a 106 year curse winning the World Series.

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 09, 2010 3:56 pm

Pirates 2014 Year in Review (Still in progress)
A lot went wrong for the Pirates in 2014 but thats tough to say for a team that went 97-65. First off the Pirates signed 2B Jose Lopez, released an aged Kerry Wood and signed Grant Balfour to be the closer, none of the moves came out well. Balfour struggled while ending the season as a 4.50 ERA, Lopez hit .215 for much of the year before picking it up and hitting .255 and 15 homeruns after a 20 homerun season last year. To make things worse the Pirates were 13-15 in April and were down by as much as 5 games in June. Their bullpen had been awful, Bell had not aged well with a 5.02 ERA, Beimel had to fight to get his ERA under 5.00 at the end, Blackburn had a 6.00+ ERA out of the pen, and of course Balfour was struggling. But the Pirates found some help in the F/A jar, finding former Pirates closer Matt Capps(4.02 ERA) and Aaron Heilman who had a 0.55 ERA at that point in June and became the teams closer saving 22 games ending the season with a good 2.98 ERA. They also called up Benoit who did well and in the end the bullpen was: Beimel, Capps, Heilman, Bautista, Benoit, Balfour and Ziegler and it helped the Pirates serge in the end. The Pirates were still alive in June thanks to Zach Duke and Anibal Sanchez. Duke went 15-8 with a 3.20 ERA after his 23-3 season and Sanchez started the all-star game in Atlanta(which the NL won) going 17-3 with a 3.01 ERA. After that is was ugly. Danks was pitiful and after posting an abysmal 8.77 ERA, was traded in a deal to get Jered Weaver from the White Sox who went 9-7 with a 4.24 ERA. Hart was good but ran out of gas badly ending with a 5.24 ERA but the Pirates held on despite a 4.35 team ERA for a team that was run by pitching. The offense was good at times. Ikari hit 28 homeruns, Werth hit 36 and Markakis broke out hitting 40 with a .300+ average and 140 RBI's. Jones had woes this season hitting .216 and .200- for much of the year and finish with 30, a year after hitting a whopping 53. The Pirates made on last move trading for John Buck from the Royals for Jeff Clement who hadn't hit a homerun. Buck did not have an at-bat until joining us but hit .301 with 1 homerun in 54 at bats as the backup for Doumit. The Pirates will face the Colorado Rockies in the postseason as the Rockies get into the postseason for the first time in this log.

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 09, 2010 4:28 pm

2014 Postseason In Review
This postseason featured some interesting teams. The Angels went .500 at 81-81 to make it, the Rockies were in the postseason for the first time in this log and since 2007 and the Rays were looking to win their first ever title. The Angels upset the Orioles winning in 4 games and the Rays beat the mighty White Sox to go to the NLCS against the Angels. In the NL, the Marlins beat Milwaukee in 4 games but the bigger suprise was sadly with the Pirates. The Pirates went to a 2nd straight Game 5 in the NLDS and lost in 10 innings on a walk-off homerun by Yorvit Torrealba, Barmes had 8 RBI's in the series with big hits like a game 1 grand slam against Anibal Sanchez and a Game 5 3-run homerun. The Rockies managed to beat the heavily favored Marlins in 7 games as Florida fell in a 2nd straight Game 7 NLCS game at Florida. In the ALCS, the Rays took a 3-0 lead but the Angels fought back to force a Game 6 but fell to the Rays. This World Series was a series with 2 teams looking for their first World Series titles as expansion teams, the Rays in '98 and the Rockies in '93. The Rockies won the series in 6 games and as a team in their first postseason in this log, they won their first ever World Series title.

Bobby Baseball · **Posted:** Sat Jan 09, 2010 5:03 pm

Wow, you did a lot. 4 more years until the end of the log. Let us know what happens after 10 years is up!

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 09, 2010 5:11 pm

Well this wasn't all in one day, I actualyl wrote down some of the key things in 2013 like Duke's numbers and Jones

In 2015(8th year) there is some controversy

I got 3 relief pitchers in the F/A market, Eric O'Flaherty(3.28 ERA, much need LHP), Matt Lindstrom(former closer), Joey Devine(former closer)

I got rid of Benoit because he got too old. But sadly Werth lost 4 contact points and Jones went from C contact to E contact so he may be done soon

But I got an offer from the Yankees, McCutchen for Teixiera. I rejected it, Teixiera was 5,000 more than McCutchen and McCutchen has hit .310+ in all 7 years :shock:

It would have given me a great 1B while Jones struggled with age but McCutchen is too valuable

For trades, I got Joba from the Yankees for Blackburn, Beimel and Balfour(Chamberlain had struggled so I got him easy).

And now I go into the regular season with the same roster from 2014 except:

Jamey Carroll is in AAA as an emergency player, he's 40 now. But I can go with Young, Buck, Baldelli and Vazquez and be fine, they fill in every position except 1B

My bullpen is now: Capps, Heilman, Rafeal Perez(got from CLE), Chamerlain(closer), Devine, Lindstrom, Bautista, O'Flaherty

My bullpen has been an awful problem in the last 2 years and I'm hoping that this is the way to go. I'm going to try 8 relief pitchers because I needed an extra lefty in the pen in Perez

And updates coming after the 2015 season

Oh yeah and by the way, I got my first ever triple play in this franchise. On the last game of the '14 season, I got Alfonso Soriano to ground into one. If he didn't get slow from age theres no way I would've tripled him up

PowerPro Jr · **Posted:** Sat Jan 09, 2010 5:30 pm

Whatever happened to Ross Glanville?

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Tue Jan 19, 2010 10:33 pm

he's still here but doesn't play much still

But I have a 2015 season and postseason update on the way and it is suprising and very likely history but had an interesting ending but what happened was absolutely unreal and a pretty much lifetime Pirate was traded

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 23, 2010 5:01 pm

Pirates 2015 Season In Review
It was forever a year to remember, a comeback to remember in Pittsburgh and for every sports fan a live to see it. But let's start back early. The Pirates fell in the NLDS last year and made a lot of relief pitching moves. In the offseason they signed 4 good relief pitchers, Matt Lindstrom, Eric O'Flaherty, Joey Devine and Rafeal Perez. They also traded away Grant Balfour and Joe Beimel for Joba Chamberlain who had seemed to lose his favor in New York. So the Pirates were looking at 3 or 4 possible closers in their bullpen. But the bullpen was terrible in the 1st month, it saved 3 games and all started with Joba blowing up giving up a game tying 2-run homerun int he 9th in the season opener and then allowing a 10th inning game winner to fall on opening day. The pitching was just not the same and the Pirates went 11-17 in April. Things only got worse in May as they went 9-18, a 20-35 record for a franchise that hasn't lost less than 90 games since 2009. They saw themselves 15 games behind the Reds in mid-June and looked way out of it. They released veteran infielder Ramon Vazquez and signed former closer Matt Capps to the Pirates bullpen, in the end it was a 14-12 June which gave the Pirates some hope. But in the end the Pirates saw themselves 27-42 at the all-star break(the AL won again in Seattle) and ready to forget about this season. The Pirates pretty much gave up on their season on July 31st. They sent longtime 1B Garrett Jones to the Rays for J.P Howell and Ryan Huffman(OF, 27 YRS old, B,D,E,D,C,E). Jones just got too old but his 2008-2015 champaigns with the club was memorable. But the Pirates ended the month of July on a 7-1 run. The Pirates 2015 first round draft pick Scobie took over and had bad results, he hit .197 with 2 HR after Jones left. One player that really stepped up was Michael Palmer(draft a few years ago). The 27 year old shortstop hit .299 with 3 homeruns in 99 at bats playing nice defense at shortstop and another nice player was Devine who dominated in the bullpen with a 2.24 ERA and saving 36 of 41 games for the Pirates becoming yet another different Pirates closer. But back to the season, the Pirates surged in August going 19-7 as the clawed closer to the Cubs and Atlanta for the wild card. But the greatest month in baseball season shaped in September. They won 23 straight games to begin September, yep 23 to take a tie with the Cubs with 5 games left, 2 vs the Cubs. Their 23-game winning streak came to an end after losing to the Cubs to tie the NL Central with 1 more game with the Cubs and 4 games left. That's where Jose Lopez would be a hero for the Pirates for the first time blasting an 11th inning walk-off homerun on Sunday Night Baseball to take a 1 game lead and the Pirates would win the Central 2 games later in St.Louis to complete the fairy tale story and complete probably the greatest comeback in sports history. This also came to be with amazing pitching. The Pirates won 26 games in the September giving up 66 runs in 28 games altogether. The rotation was amazing, the highest ERA being 3.78 and lowest being Duke's 2.81. The offense was shaky though. Ikari and Werth led the team with 25 homers. McCutchen led the team with a .329 average and second came Doumit who had a 2nd half surge hitting .301 but all of the other averages were below .283. So in the end the Pirates went 55-19 in the 2nd half and went 26-2 to finish at 96-66 and an amazing season no matter what happened in the postseason.

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 23, 2010 5:08 pm

2015 Postseason in Review
The postseason came in 2015 with the Pirates being the surprise team for once. They faced the Rockies in the 1st round and won the 1st two games but in the 9th inning with the winning run at 2nd base in Game 3, Delwynn Young hit his biggest single of his life shooting a ball in the gap to give the Pirates the walk-off winner as they walked off to the NLDS with a 2012 rematch against the Marlins who beat the Cubs in 4 games. In the AL, the mighty White Sox saw a first round finish as they fell to the Mariners and the Red Sox blew by the Angels in 3 games for the sweep. The Pirates ended up choking to the 103-59 Marlins in the NLCS though. They led 3-1 in the series and Devine blew a 9th inning save as the Marlins came back scoring 3 in the 9th to beat the Pirates 4-2 in Pittsburgh. The series ended up going to a game 7. It was tied at 4 through the 1st 9 innings of game 7 but in the 10th inning, the Marlins catcher Bumatry hit a walk-off single to send Florida to the World Series and end the miracle run put on by the Pirates. The M's fell to the Sox in the ALCS in 6 games and the Red Sox went on to win the '15 World Series in 5 Games.

Also: Check the 1st post for updates on 2014 and 2015

LightningMan117 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 23, 2010 6:26 pm

You said the Pirates faced the Pirates in the first round. I hope that's an error :mrgreen:

.

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 23, 2010 7:59 pm

Whoops I fixed it to Rockies. I said Pirates so many times in those reviews that I got too used to it

And here are other key players and stats:

Weaver: 16-8, 3.08 ERA

Sanchez: 14-6, 3.28 ERA, 202 K

McCutchen: .329 AVG, 19 HR(career high), 53 SB

Werth: .247(lowest average with PIT), 25 HR, 99 RBI

Markakis: .283 AVG, 19 HR (.320 AVG, 40 HR Last year)

Cabrera: 19 HR(Career high)

Chamberlain: 4-9, 3.45 ERA(dominated after demoted from closer)

Lopez: 22 HR, .258 AVG, 16 SB (14 HR, .255 AVG, 8 SB last season)

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 30, 2010 9:42 pm

Pirates 2016 Season In Review
It was an odd year to say to say the least. The season started off trading away fan favorite Jayson Werth and RHP Aaron Heiman to the Mets for a young talented LHP Szuminski, Werth had gotten too old(E con, B pow, C spd) and his price had gone up too much but in the offseason the Bucs could only get LHP Jesse Carlson and could not find a left field. So in spring training the Pirates gave Ryan Huffman a chance to play left field while Michael Palmer got the starting job at 1st base, Denny Bautista was also released after getting too old. The Pirates had another mediocre first month at 14-14 but rebounded to a 16-12 May and a 16-10 June. But it was odd for the Pirates, they offense could just do nothing, they ended the season with the 3rd fewest runs in the major leagues but once again pitched to the tune of a collective 3.75 ERA. Huffman and Palmer both struggled early but picked it up late in the year, Huffman hit .265 with 11 homers and Palmer hit .253 with 10 homeruns in 2016. There were other hitters out there struggling for the Pirates, Cabrera hit only .227 and 8 homeruns a year after hitting 19 and Lopez only hit .231 and 12 homeruns which adds another frustrating year in Pittsburgh. Luckily the Pirates had guys like Markakis and McCutchen to lead this team. McCutchen hit .343 with 15 HR and 67 RBI's while stealing 50 bases and had 40 doubles and 23 triples while leading the team in other important categories. Markakis made up for Ikari taking a step back(20 HR) as Markakis hit .305 with 35 homeruns and 138 RBI's. Duke had another heck of a year hurling 213.1 innings of 2.87 ERA ball and went 17-7. Sanchez had an odd year though going 11-11 with a 3.46 ERA but Weaver(3.56), Hart(4.32) and Maholm(4.05) all did well and Joey Devine saved 43 games in 43 tries while posting a 2.98 ERA. But back to the season. In July the Pirates didn't play very well with a 13-12 record but Duke, Sanchez, Devine, Markakis and McCutchen were all part of the all-star game(none started) in which the NL won 4-3 in Citizens Bank Park. The season wore on and into September the Pirates led by 1 game over the Cubs and 4 games over the Reds at 74-60. But the Pirates swept the Cubs in 3 games in early September to put the Cubs back to 6 games while the Cubs floundered in the end going 11-17. But nothing could stop the Reds who competed for the first time in this log. The Reds went 21-7 in September but the Pirates still had a 1-game lead heading into the last day. The Reds won and the Astros pulled out a victory against the Cubs which tied the Pirates and Reds at 91-71 in the final day.

One-Game Playoff
Well the Reds and Pirates were tied at 91-71 and they finished 7-7 against each other in the regular season but they were both tied for the wild card as well. So they had a 1-game playoff to decide who would win the Central and who would win the wild card. It was somewhat big because the loser would play the 100-62 Mets and the winner would play the 87-75 Rockies. It was played in Cincinatti and was one heck of a game but not for the Pirates. The Pirates held a 2-1 lead heading to the 8th but allowed a 2-out homerun to Wilson Betimet to tie it. The game went into the 11th inning when Cabrera singled in the go-ahead run for the Pirates to give them a 3-2 lead but Betimet would homer for the 2nd time to tie it in the 11th off of Devine. And into th 12th it went with 2 on for the Reds in the bottom of the inning where Jay Bruce hit a walk-off single which got over McCutchen's head to give the Reds the NL Central title going from worst to first coming out of nowhere to win the division.

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Sat Jan 30, 2010 10:01 pm

2016 Postseason in Review
For the first time since 2010 the Pirates head into the postseason as a wild card team but there were some other surpise teams in there such as the Reds in the NL and in the AL the Rangers and Blue Jays made their first postseason visits since the log started in 2008. After losing that odd one game playoff, the Pirates had to face off against the 100-62 Mets which was a lot different than in years past. Normally an offensive squad, the Mets had a better ERA than the Pirates(3.50) thanks to Johan Santana, Jeremy Bonderman and 21 game winner CC Sabathia, but the least amount of runs in the NL but had 30 homerun hitters in Nick Swisher and Jeff Francouer along with former Pirates Jack Wilson and also Jayson Werth. The Pirates lost the 1st game of the series 2-1 but won the next 3 games to surprise the Mets and head to the NLCS. In other series, the Reds beat Colorado in 5 games, the Blue Jays beat the heavily favored White Sox in 4 games and the Rangers beat the favored Orioles in 5 games and so 3 teams in the postseason for the 1st time in this log were headed to the LCS. The Pirates were now taking on the Reds. The Bucs won the 1st game with heroics by McCutchen with a 9th inning RBI single to win 5-4 in Cincy but the Reds stormed back smacking around Paul Maholm en route to an 11-3 rout of the Pirates. But the Pirates would not give in as they headed back to Pittsburgh to win Games 3 and 4. But game 5 was a thriller with the score tied at 5 in the 9th. Jose Lopez has struggled since coming to Pittsburgh, you know where this is going. Lope homerun in the bottom of the 9th inning to send the Pirates to the World Series and become another postseason hero. In the AL, the Blue Jays took a 3-0 series lead but the Rangers became only the 2nd team ever to be down 3-0 and force a game 7. But the Blue Jays stayed poised and won in 7 games and so it was the 87-75 wild card winning Toronto Blue Jays against the 91-71 wild card winning Pittsburgh Pirates. The Pirates lost game one with a 9th inning go ahead shot by Travis Snider but won three staight and at one point led the series 3-1 but could not finish off Toronto in game 5 with Christian Guzman hitting a walk-off single to send them back to Pittsburgh down 3-2 in the World Series. They also fought, with elimination staring them in the face and in a 1-1 game in the 10th, Travis Snider singled in 2 runs to give them a 3-1 lead which they would keep to force a World Series game 7. It was a great one. Trevor Cahill was put up against Anibal Sanchez. Sanchez went 6 strong striking out 11 Blue Jay hitters. Cahill's only mistake came in the 6th when he let up a solo homerun to Nick Markakis to make it 1-0 and Michaek Palmer hit his 1st ever postseason homerun in the 8th to make it 2-0 going into the 9th. Joey Devine did not make it easy at all in the 9th though. He loaded the bases and Lyle Overbay stepped up to the plate with 2 outs. The biggest moment of the season for both teams was a battle, Devine vs Overbay. But Devine struck out Overbay on 3 pitches to send Pittsburgh into a frenzy winning Game 7 2-0 and giving them their second title in 5 years. Andrew McCutchen was named the World Series MVP.

McCutchen Wins National League MVP
After winning the World Series MVP, he was named the national league MVP. McCutchen had another amazing season at the plate hitting .343 with 15 homeruns and 63 RBI's. He also hit 40 doubles, 23 triples, was 50/51 in stolen base chances, had a .431 OBP, 323 total bases, a .572 slugging percentage and had 74 extra base hits, he led the Pirates in all of those stats except homeruns and RBI's. He led the team the whole season for a bad offensive Pirates team which will make him an MVP for the 2016 season.

jacobye46 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 07, 2010 2:34 pm

well I'm just going to officially call everything on this dead(we all know its been dead) but I was meaning to do this since I was expected this to somehow go 10 seasons(the updates ended in 2016). I don't think I'll ever finish the last 5 years

Here are the highlights(and lowlights):

2008: Zach Duke no-hits the Braves
2009: First over .500 season in 17 years
2010: First playoff appearence but missed playoffs on last day
2011: 5-Game NLDS win over Marlins and 4-2 series win over Mets in NLCS
2011: First world series (lost to CWS in 5 games)
2012: Won NLDS vs Dodgers in 4 games and NLCS vs Marlins in 7
2012: Won WS vs Red Sox on Ikari walk-off HR in game 5(log ended before this series)
2013: Won NLDS in 5 games over Dodgers but lost in 5 games to the Chicago Cubs in the NLCS
2014: Lost in 5 games to Colorado on walk-off HR
2015: Pirates made story-book run to the playoffs after being 27-42 at the all-star break and won 23 straight in September at one point
2015: Managed to sweep Rockies but lost to Marlins in 5 games in the NLCS
2016: Lost in odd one-game playoff to Reds to decide the Central, but still made it by the wild card for the first time since 2010
2016: Beat favored Mets in 4 games in the NLDS and beat the Reds in 5 games in the NLCS, Jose Lopez hit a walk-off HR to send the Pirates to the World Series
2016: Won World Series in 7 games over the Toronto Blue Jays. Joey Devine struck out Lyle Overbay with the bases loaded and 2 outs in the 9th to win the championship with a 2-0 win
2016: Andrew McCutchen won the MVP with a .343 AVG, 15 HR, 63 RBI, 50/51 in SB attempts, 23 triples and 40 doubles

Standout stars for the Pirates:

Andrew McCutchen
Garrett Jones
Zach Duke
Jayson Werth
Nick Markakis
Paul Maholm
Anibal Sanchez
Susumu Ikari

Final team statistics:

821-637 record
2-time Wild card winners
5-time division winners
3-time National League champions
2-time World Series champions

And now from the longest log ever, I officially say good-bye to the Pirates

ChiCubsFan4 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 07, 2010 2:36 pm

Wow man, way to make it all sad. :lol:

This was an awesome log, and you were a great manager/general manager jacobye.

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