Francisco Liriano and Russell Martin have been Neil Huntington’s best pickups of the season (Flickr.com/Paul Hadsall)
Earlier this month, I wrote an article looking into what type of players the Pittsburgh Pirates should have been targeting at the Trade Deadline. The most pressing need I was focused on was adding a consistent bat off the bench in a player such as Raul Ibanez or a consistent everyday player in Hunter Pence.
While I still think each of these players would have brought a new dimension to the Pirates and added some pop. At the end of the day, I am not an executive for the Pittsburgh Pirates and I am not paid to make those decisions. Clearly, Neal Huntington knows what’s best for this club.
In the last two years, we have seen the Pittsburgh Pirates start strong and be in contention going into the second half of the season. Each of those years, the Pirates have went out and picked up players at the trade deadline only to watch these players under produce and slip out of contention. More importantly, we watched the Pirates slip under the .500 mark and continue the drought of losing seasons to 20. This year, the Pittsburgh Pirates have decided on a new philosophy, “Why change a good thing?”
The 2013 Pittsburgh Pirates are a much different team than the past couple of years, most notably a deep pitching rotation. We have seen the resurgence of Francisco Liriano, leading the way with an 11-4 record. Jeff Locke, an All Star selection is 9-3 with a club best ERA at 2.36. Gerrit Cole, the young buck, is 5-4 on the season, and AJ Burnett leads the Pirates in strikeouts with 132. The Pirates rotation continues to be superb, pitching late in games, and the Pirates pitching staff leads the majors with a team ERA of 3.03. Let’s also not forget that Jason Grilli was having an outstanding year before getting injured with 30 saves on the year.
Andrew McCutchen continues to be the driving force for the Pittsburgh Pirates, batting .301 with 15 home runs and 59 RBI’s. Pedro Alvarez continues to silence critics as he leads the National League with 27 bombs. Starling Marte, despite his recent slump, is silently becoming McCutchen 2.0. On the season, Marte is batting .277 with 10 home runs, and 31 stolen bases.
The best acquisition the Pirates have made in quite some time who has been a rock for the Pirates is Russel Martin. He’s not flashy by any means, but Martin is a solid defensive catcher who controls the game well and keeps his pitching staff calm and collective. On the season, Martin is batting .251 with 9 home runs and 38 RBI’s.
Neal Huntington did in fact have offers out on the table; however he wasn’t going to change the complexity, the chemistry, or the bright future that the Pittsburgh Pirates continue to show one day at a time.
Why change a good thing?
