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Jitty
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Jitty
@jitty412
Hail To Possible | #DoitforJeff | RTJR
Pittsburgh, PA Katılım Mart 2021
476 Takip Edilen640 Takipçiler
PCA is truly an ambassador for the game
No one else can bring together the NL Central like this
Thomas Welch@twelcher15
The reason why PCA is so good is because most outfielders don’t even get to this ball with the speed and range with which he closes. Just makes every difficult play look routine
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@SteelCityBucs30 I wish we had a Donnie Kelly GIF
One at a time let’s keep going! Bury them
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Pirates win 12-1!
The Cubs have lost 10 straight games and move to LAST in the NL Central
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Jitty retweetledi
I heard that @jitty412 is giving away 3 free Nick Gonzales city connect jerseys if he hits his first home run today
Pittsburgh Pirates@Pirates
55/162. 📺@SNPittsburgh 📻 @937theFan
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@elliotmellinger Right. It feels like we always catch teams when they’re red hot 😂
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It’s so nice for the Bucs to catch a team struggling instead of the usually linsanity run coming into Pittsburgh
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@uncleJunior32 @Nathan_Hursh Hitting .304 with 55 hits and 22 RBIs with RISP
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“Remember when Nick Gonzales hit fourth in all of those games a few months ago? Wild” -something we as fans will be saying a few months from now
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@uncleJunior32 @Nathan_Hursh And that take that he didn’t produce when the game was close is crazy because he’s arguably our most clutch hitter with RISP man
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@jitty412 @Nathan_Hursh Ummm he made an out in the 5 run first so it was close. It started 0-0
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@jitty412 @Nathan_Hursh Not really. Did he hit a homer? Did he produce anything when the game was still close?
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@Nathan_Hursh The shine is coming off this guy. His defense is not great and his 0-14 with no power and not a single XBH vs a lefty batter
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@GMBCSuperfan @KodyDuncanPGH I think Graves took over and he’s been with them for a while. Saunders who has been with BC for a while will probably help he has an immense background with the draft process.
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Great call. No GM is an island.
It’ll be interesting to see how the draft goes this July without Justin Horowitz, the Director of Amateur Scouting who joined the club in late 2023 and oversaw the franchise defining drafts of Konnor Griffin and Seth Hernandez. A great example of someone under GMBC who was very good at his job.
He is now Assistant GM for the Nationals and a guy I would hope is on the shortlist should Ben Cherington ever not be renewed.
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Just want to mention something today.
Yes, Ben Cherington has made a lot bad decisions since becoming GM, but the past year and a half he has actually made some great moves:
- Traded away Ke’Byran Hayes
- Traded for Spencer Horwitz
- Traded for Brandon Lowe
- Signed Soto and O’Hearn
- Drafted Griffin, and Hernandez
- Improved his scouting department in the DR
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@jitty412 Spence and then Lowe hitting after will be so deadly
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@GMBCSuperfan @KodyDuncanPGH I’d agree with that but I think we have to give a ton of credit to guys under him as well. He has a very expensive staff and they’ve done a very good job.
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I think you'd have to be pretty jaded not to give Ben Cherington credit for these moves. I think there are a bunch of others that maybe didn't seem so at the time, but were defining in retrospect:
Drafted Nick Gonzalez - 2019, No. 7
Drafted Carmen Mlodzinski - 2020, No. 31
Drafted Jared Jones - 2020, No. 44
Drafted Bubba Chandler, 2021, No. 72
Signed Wilbur Dotel, 2020, Dominican Republic
Signed Esmerlyn Valdez, 2021, Dominican Republic
As you get away from just the players on the current team, these pre-2025 signings were meaningful too:
Axiel Plaz, 2022, Venezuela
Yordany De Los Santos, 2022, Dominican Republic
Tony Blanco, 2022, Dominican Republic
Edward Florentino, 2024, Dominican Republic
No GM is perfect, but I think his legacy will be better understood ten years from now, not unlike the gruff Neal Huntington received in the leadup to 2013.
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Here's the Let's Run the Numbers feature from yesterday on the argument to invest significantly in the bullpen in 2027:
x.com/GMBCSuperfan/s…
GMBC Superfan@GMBCSuperfan
What Will It Take to Fix the Bullpen in 2027? Last night I went on a bit of a rant outlining a plan for 2027 to address our bullpen woes. I’m using this morning’s column to expand upon it. Here’s the initial 2027 lineup post: short.do/W_T54s And here’s the bullpen justification: short.do/-WxHpa We Have a Bullpen Problem I spent most of January profiling the Pirates 26-man roster, and dutifully reviewed each of the relievers and felt pretty good entering the season. Boy, was I wrong. The season started out well enough. Through the end of April, we had a 10th ranked bullpen by WAR with a 3.74 ERA that was 8th best in MLB. But in May, that’s plummeted to 24th in baseball. The number of dependable arms has narrowed significantly. And when you consider who would still be around next year, the list grows narrower still: Mason Montgomery. That’s about the only leverage reliever we have under control for 2027. As evidenced in May, where our team OPS actually went considerably up (.740 vs. .706 in April), our bullpen issues can keep the team moored around .500. A Solution for 2027 Gregory Soto and Aroldis Chapman represent the template of what the Pirates need to be doing in 2027: buying dependable bullpen arms. But unlike in the past, securing just one to augment a homegrown set of cheap options isn’t going to cut it. We need multiples. That is easier said than done. The cost of dependable relief pitching has gone way up. If Montgomery represents the lone leverage arm we can reasonably count on to still be here in 2027, we will need to secure three more to join him at a cost of $8M-$12M each. No doubt, we could flesh out internally around core talent. In addition to Montgomery, one expects that Carmen Mlodzinski might still be around in a bulk role if he isn’t starting (and I sure hope he isn’t starting). Evan Sisk has been surprisingly effective (his blowup last week notwithstanding). Brandon Bidois seems promising. But we don’t have a wellspring of internal options. Pitching below AAA has been really (really!) bad this year. I don’t see many interesting arms coming up. We could also trade for it, moving some of our positional talent for promising relievers -- that’s how we got Montgomery, after all. But that introduces risk, and there’s enough risk with relievers as it is. I’d much rather we went out and brought in veterans with track record. Where Do We Find $30M? As I walked through last night, we’ll have roughly $30M coming off the books with Brandon Lowe ($11.5M), Marcell Ozuna ($10.5M), and Soto ($7.75M). But the Pirates will need to prepare for Paul Skenes’ first year of arbitration where he is expected to receive $10M-$12M. We also need a 3B, and I suspect much of the remaining cost savings will need to go toward addressing the hot corner. I’m advocating for trading Bryan Reynolds ($15M) and Mitch Keller ($18.3M) this coming offseason and using the cost savings for 2027 to address the bullpen. Both players have their advocates, and I understand why. The word “dependable” gets used the most. But I believe both are superfluous given maturing internal (and much cheaper) talent. The promotion of Jhostynxon Garcia and Esmerlyn Valdez make Reynolds an expensive .750-ish OPS bat with a logjam at DH. And the return of Jared Jones means Keller could be moved without significant disruption. In both cases, the Pirates have surplus value to spend with a 6th ranked scoring offense and 8th ranked starter ERA. Trading some of that excess value and banking on cheaper internal alternatives creates the payroll flexibility to secure bankable bullpen help. The Bottom Line 📌 These are the trade offs for a team with capitated payroll. I see folks advocating for re-signing Lowe, going after a real-deal 3B, while also addressing the bullpen. We can’t do all of those things (especially Lowe who will cost a pretty penny), especially while holding on to both Reynolds and Keller. Something’s gotta give.
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Gregory Soto and MLB's Unfair Economic Advantage
In a year where the Pirates bullpen has imploded and we can’t really trust that anyone handed the ball will protect the lead a hard-working starter just gave him, God bless Gregory Soto. The man is a metronome of consistency.
That’s what $7.75 million buys you. Soto was the lone investment made by the Pirates in a solid, tested reliever this past offseason, and he’s now our go-to closer.
Yesterday I put forward the idea of spending significantly more next year on the bullpen to button up the area of the team where we are most exposed this year. The template for that suggestion is Soto, who is also having one of the best seasons of his career.
This is How Big Market Teams Compete
As put so aptly yesterday by Jim (@Burghfan99):
“I’ve long thought an under-recognized unfair economic advantage for big markets is in the pen. Where the Bucs can sign one guaranteed reliever each winter, teams with $100-$150M+ greater payroll sign 3-4 guaranteed solid arms.”
The most volatile part of team construction for any team is the bullpen. It is a difficult, unpredictable job to come in to bridge following the starter, hold leads, and close out games. It is as much mental as physical, with the best relievers simply built differently.
The marketplace has put a value on that talent, with proven relievers now commanding $5M-$15M+ annually. While teams like the Pirates can maybe afford one such player annually (Soto this year, Aroldis Chapman at $10.5M in 2024), other teams make this a strategic advantage:
Mets: $55.0M ($22M Sean Manaea, $15M Devin Williams)
Braves: $38.8M ($16M Raisel Iglesias, $15M Robert Suárez)
Tigers: $35.5M ($11M Kenley Jansen, $9.5M Kyle Finnegan)
Dodgers: $34.1M ($16.1M Tanner Scott, $11M Blake Treinen)
Blue Jays: $33.5M ($12.3M Tyler Rogers, $11M Jeff Hoffman)
Phillies: $32.2M ($11M Brad Keller, $8.5M José Alvarado)
Not surprisingly, the Pirates are somewhat further behind…
Pirates: $16.0M ($7.8M Gregory Soto, $3.5M Dennis Santana)
What Was the Bullpen Plan?
Dennis Santana has lost the job of closer this season that he inherited last year when David Bednar was traded to the Yankees. Santana was incredible down the stretch for the Pirates in 2025, with a 2.18 ERA in 70 games including a 1.27 ERA in his final 21 appearances.
But Santana does not have the profile of a modern closer. He was picked up on waivers from the Yankees as a journeyman reliever in 2024, and surprised with his ability to get outs. He doesn’t strike guys out, averaging a little worse than 1 per inning as a Pirate. He doesn’t induce ground balls or weak contact. And his exit velocities were always a little elevated. This year it all caught up to him as he’s put up a 5.48 ERA.
Soto was brought in as a left-handed fireball pitcher to pair with recent acquisition Mason Montgomery who has a similar repertoire. They have been the most reliable bullpen options this year.
The rest of the relief corps? Largely comprised of middle relievers who either had career years in 2025 or were reclamation projects. And none of them have worked out. Which makes the investment in Soto all the more valuable.
You Get What You Pay For
Soto has been everything the Pirates hoped they were buying. His 2.25 xERA sits in the 96th percentile, hitters have managed just a .163 xBA against him, and his 31.9% strikeout rate (94th percentile) gives the Pirates a shut down, leverage reliever to finish out games, just as he did yesterday against the Cubs.
The contact profile is even more convincing. Soto is allowing an average exit velocity of just 84.6 mph with a 3.8% barrel rate, both elite marks. He still walks too many hitters, which was the knock on him coming in, but the stuff is good enough to survive it. That’s the point: when you pay for real relief pitching, you also buy margin for error.
The Bottom Line 📌
What would the bullpen look like with three Gregory Soto-types closing down the 7th through 9th innings? That’s the premise of my recent advocacy for a change to how the Pirates allocate resources in 2027.
Our own unfair advantage has been high draft picks that have landed us Paul Skenes, Konnor Griffin, and a fully home-grown rotation. Smart trades and a strong international program have reshaped the starting lineup. We are top-10 in MLB in run scoring (4th) and starter ERA (6th).
The difference maker for the 2026 teams has been the 12 blown saves, a mark that is tied for 2nd in all of baseball. Spending money on relievers doesn’t guarantee you a strong bullpen -- there are no guarantees in this sport -- but there is a reason teams with the money to do so invest in tested relievers with track record.
We should join them in 2027 while the rest of our team is relatively inexpensive.
#TheEarlyShift
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I’m glad they didn’t put me in charge of making Mt. Rushmore I probably would’ve put Larry Bird up there😭😭😭
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@SFI412724 @Pirates I hope he’s not booed
No manager would’ve won with those rosters
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