Pirates offseason to-do list: Trade Keller? Will they actually spend?

00:00:07
Speaker 1: Harby.

00:00:08
Speaker 2: Noah Hiles is going to talk about the Pittsburgh Pirates right now in their offseason to do lists. You can check out those work in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette where he's their sports enterprise reporter, and also the brand Spank and New Bucko Territory which is out there and he's one of the three Superstar hosts, so make sure you check out that show. QR code side of your screen. Note, great to have you on, man. You want to lay out the list for us of what you think the Pirates should accomplish this offseason.

00:00:32
Speaker 3: Absolutely, I'd be happy to and thanks for always having me on. I think the list can really be boiled down to one item. Back up your talk. The last couple of weeks, we've heard more about how the Pirates intend to try hard than we've heard them say things of that matter in the last three years. So now it's time to do it. That's probably bullepoint number one is just yeah, back up the talk. You talked about how you want to spend You talked about how you want to ban in a bring in a big name. We'll go do it. You're attached to all of these sexy free agents, right, Kyle Schwarber, jt Real, Muto, Ryan O'Hearn, Hore Polonco, a couple of guys coming over from Japan. Land one of them, and land one of them early enough where you can continue to build. I think that's the first step. Point Number two in the checklist is nail the Mitch Keller trade. We've been hearing for a year now about how they intend to trade this guy. The rumors started last year at the Winter Meetings. They flirted with the idea of moving him at the deadline. It didn't make sense. I intend or I expect him to be moved sometime this offseason. I think the Winter Meetings make a lot of sense. And when they make that move, they have to get it right. It cannot be something underwhelming. It can't be a project. It has to be a return better than their big return last year, which was Spencer Horowitz, who for all intentsive purposes, was the best hitter on their team. But they need a little bit more for Mitch Keller. If you're gonna give away a Mitch Keller, you've got to get Keller value in return. This guy is a valuable piece to this team. I think a valuable piece of the rotation, which is the team's greatest strength. If you're going to part ways with them, you need to make it a worthwhile move. Third thing is just keep going just because you might sign one free agent. Let's say they do. Let's say they sign an O'Hearn or a Polanco, and let's say they get the Keller trade, right, they get a pre r player of equal value, someone with years of control, someone who's also a little proven. That is not enough. That plus Connor Griffin is still not enough. You need to keep going. You need to keep spending. You need to keep building around this pitching staff if you have any chance of being competitive, because that is what teams who are seriously trying to compete do, and that's what the pirates claim they're trying to do. They're trying to do things different, is what they say. They're trying to be competitive. Back up all that talk. Let's see it happen, all right, No, let's just start with the first one.

00:02:53
Speaker 1: Are they really going to do this? Because we've seen it, right, And listen, we make fun of them all the time because they don't spend, and we get it. But they oh, we were in on Josh Naylor. We were just fifteen million dollars below what Josh Naylor got. So we tried, fans, is this going to be like? We also made fun of the Red Sox because the Red Sox are always We were in it, guys, We were in it. So where the Pirate's going to give the old We were in it? But oh no, he got twenty million dollars more. Because if I'm the Pirates, I know I have to overpay. So if I'm Bob Nutting and I'm Ben Cherrington, I got to overpay. They know this going in. Will they actually do it? Or are they just going to do the old college try. We tried, guys, but oh come watch us play because we have Paul Skans and Paul Skiens.

00:03:39
Speaker 3: They better hope they found a way to get it done. I think of last year's Pirate Fest, which is a free festival for all the fans to come down to the Convention Center in downtown right before spring training starts. Last year was a total debacle for the organization. In addition to selling expired soda and spelling Andrew Mcutchen's wrong on a name sheet right in front of where he was signing autographs. They do this annual Q and A with friend or with fans of the team, and they bring up the manager, they bring up the team president and the GM to answer questions, and that session was not a good time for anyone on stage. Fans were really upset. And if they do all of this talking this offseason and show up to Pirate Fest twenty twenty six without the likes of a Jorge Polanco, a Ryan O'Hearn, a Kyle Schwarber or someone of that caliber in a Pirates jersey ready to sign autographs or fans, it's going to be an absolute disaster. This. This front office or whoever has been expressing their desires to do things differently and make a big splash. They've written a lot of big checks. Well not technically yet, but hopefully these checks can be cashed because if this is just all talk, which history shows it's it is all talk until they actually do something. If this this ends up just being a whole bunch of words and nothing else, it is going to be a nightmare of not only just Pirate Fests, but just a nightmare of a season because the SPAN base is fed up. They had three sellouts last year, all three games resulted in sell the team chance. You can expect a lot more of those chants if they sit on their hands and don't get any big deals done this offseason.

00:05:22
Speaker 4: No, not to pile on, but I'm going to you forgot about the bricks and covering up the one of the greatest pirates of all times wall in Roberto Clemente because they wanted to sell some vodka sodas don't know something that agent drinks.

00:05:37
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm in therapy because I want to forget those things craps. So thanks for bringing that up. I'm gonna have to add a couple hundred dollars onto my therapist bill now. But yeah, I mean that's it. And when all of those things happen, when the on field product takes a step back after a seventy six weeks win season, it still takes a step back. When you have off field issues like they did with the ricks with surfside, with a whole bunch of other things that went along with it, and everyone's frustrated, including the players. You have to do something different. It's not gonna be different personnel wise as far as the people running the show. The manager who got promoted after Shelton was fired in early May. He got extended and I think he's the right guy for the job. The general manager's back, the team president's back, and the owner is still the same guy. So if you're not going to change the people running the show, you have to change the way things are being ran. And yeah, the pressure is on. I can't imagine how bad things are going to get if things remain the same heading into opening day next year.

00:06:41
Speaker 4: All right, well, the second point on your list was trade Mitch Keller, and you also said don't screw it up. So as Pirates fans, people are going to roast me because they're like, well that was a different regime. But I bring up Garret Cole, Tyler Glass, now, Shane Mosse, Jamison Tyne. What did they ever get from that that made them a winning team? And yes, it's different regime, I get that, but it's the same ownership. And when you sell a piece like Mitch Keller, fans need to understand the ownership has to approve that. They're not just like, oh, we traded Mitch Keller, Okay, great, I hope we got something that has to be approved by the Bob Nutting. So how do they not screw this up, because, in my opinion, with this pitching staff, I don't think the Pirates are as far as the history of the Pirates will tell you they are.

00:07:31
Speaker 3: I don't think so either. I don't think that they're incredibly far away. I think there are a couple of bats away from being I don't know, maybe something similar to what the Reds were this past season, which for a lot of fan bases you would laugh at that and say, well, that's not good enough. Well, in Pittsburgh, five hundred is good enough for some fans because it's only happened four times in the last thirty plus years. So and I know the bar is much higher when you have Paul Schemes on your roster. But you've got to take some steps forward, and yes, nailing the Keller trade is a huge piece to this. You have to bring in I think either a veteran hit or equivalent to Mitch Keller, someone who's gonna be a two to three win player, someone who's gonna play every day, someone who might not be the centerpiece of your lineup, but someone who can certainly lengthen that lineup and just be an abovely gaverage hitter. Because they only had one of them all of last year. Or you go the other route and you try to get two young, controllable pieces. Obviously that's a bigger gamble. I don't know what kind of value Mitch Keller has for that type of trade return. And you just look at their history of returns under Charrington, they have not won a lot of trades, especially in trades that bring back young prospect hitters. So if you're gonna go and try to acquire a guy who's major League ready but isn't proven, you better be darn sure these guys are not only ready to play, but play a lot. Be an everyday starter, because this lineup needs to have at least three to four new faces. As far as everyday contributors are concerned, I would.

00:09:07
Speaker 4: Say, but you watch the Pirates more than I do. Like you make it to eighty three wins. That's what the Reds got to to get into the playoffs this year. If you make it to eighty three wins and you have Jerry Jones and you have Paul Skeins pitching two of your games in a five game series, you saw what Trek Scoobel's done. So if they trade Mitch Keller for two possible future prospects. Isn't that a fail to the fact that you're gonna lose Paul Skeens in two years anyway?

00:09:38
Speaker 3: Potentially, I mean, it depends on what type of prospects you're getting. If you're getting someone like not to say that this is gonna be the exact thing, but you look at a team like Baltimore per se and you get a guy like Kobe Mayo who didn't have a great rookie year but could come in and has that upside potential. If you could get two players like that for Mitch Keller, then yes, that's I think that that's worth the gamble because you could potentially get guys who can a impact your team now and be help you further down the line. Now, again, I think the safer route to travel is by just getting a one for one, get your Mitch Keller hitter equivalent, and take that win. Because you're already getting an upgrade at shortstop with Connor Griffin, and apparently you're going to spend some money on some free agents. So if you can just sign two free agents, get a position player for Keller, and then you up you promote Connor Griffin. That's almost half a new lineup right there, and there's still more work to be done, but I think that's the route to go. And you talk about the pitching, I mean, yes, Keller is going to be their number three, but you got to remember you got Bubba Chandler here, who I think is poised to contend for a Rookie of the Year award this upcoming season, and you've got some other young arms who can cover a lot of innings as well. Keller is a luxury on this team. He's going to be their highest paid player, and if he sticks around, there's a chance that he might be their number four in the rotation. So it makes sense to move them. But if you're gonna move them, you've got to get it right.

00:11:04
Speaker 5: Okay when you say keep going, Noah, what are you talking about, Because you know McNeil has been possibly linked in Brandon Lau and j Trio Muto and Kyle Kyle Schwarper's not going to the Pirates unless you grossly over Pam.

00:11:17
Speaker 1: Okay, I mean, yeah, cool, sounds like a cool story. JT probably not going there either. Most veteran guys aren't going to go to the pirates because they don't see it. So you're gonna have to do it in trades. And I get Connor Griffin could be a special player, but and Mitch Keller can get you. You know, if you're saying Kobe Mayo, I mean, okay, but he hasn't proven anything right, So what can they What else do they have to trade to keep going? Because once you trade Mitch Keller, then you're gonna have to trade. If you want veteran guys and you're Ben Charrington, you're Bob Nutting and you're the Pirates organization, you're gonna have to trade from your surplus, not just Mitch Keller.

00:11:49
Speaker 5: Do you have the.

00:11:49
Speaker 1: Prospects to go out and trade, because more than likely Bob Nutting is not gonna want to pay the price it's gonna take to get a JT.

00:11:55
Speaker 5: Realmuto or someone.

00:11:56
Speaker 1: Like that, because they want to go somewhere with their guaranteed they're gonna have a shot in the are not a guarantee.

00:12:02
Speaker 3: I totally agree. And when I say keep going, I mean they've got to keep going in a direction that they haven't gone before. I mean it's going to require more than just one multi year deal. Which hasn't happened in Pittsburgh. Said, you know, since I was a senior in college like seven years ago, so it's been quite some time. You need to just sign deals that to the rest of the baseball world might not seem remarkable, but finding guys who could just be a serviceable player on half the league's rosters. The Pirates have been lacking those guys. You need some veteran presences. You need just some steady, consistent it that's one through nine in the order. You need guys who know how to win baseball games. So, yeah, you might only be signing one marquee free agent if that. But when I say keep going, it's adding the pieces around them, the guys who've been missing, Guys who are well within their price range. Even with this this low budget that they have. I mean, if they move Keller, they're gonna have hardly any money committed to their payroll. Next year, They're gonna have to spend money just to get back to that ninety million dollar mark that they were last year on opening Day. So signing a few two year, twenty million dollar deals shouldn't be out of the realm of possibility. Maybe trading a couple of other prospects. They have some really high ranked guys who are years and years away from reaching the major league level. If you're Ben Charrington, you have to ask yourself why am I hanging onto these guys if I won't even be able to likely enjoy their talents, Because if they have another losing season, he's probably gone. So maybe you explore the idea of trading a Seth Fernandez and Edward Florentino, or even some lower rank guys and Esmerlin Valdez and Antoine Kelly. They have a ton of great young pitchers that I anticipate being top one hundred prospects one day. Trade them early, get something in return for him. Again, just find a way to get seven league average hitters in this lineup, and this team can probably contend for a wildcard spot.

00:13:57
Speaker 4: Wait no, the reason he can't get rid of those guys is because somebody told Bob a long time ago, prospects are capital and we do not trade those. So Ben Jerrington season writing on the wall, He's like, they're never getting rid of the owner. They're gonna get rid of me, and other gms get the blessing to get rid of their prospects, but their biggest prospect has he been turned into a salesman. Also, Paul Skeens trying to recruit guys to come to Pittsburgh. Is that a team ploy? Is that a Paul Skeens is so focused and utterly just focused on being a pirate and winning as a pirate that he wants to do that or is this just is it hogwash?

00:14:42
Speaker 3: I think it's the latter, not hogwash. I think Paul Skeens is just a guy who wants to win. I think he is very cognizant of how hard it will be to win here in Pittsburgh. I think he knows he only has a few more years left to try to win in Pittsburgh, and he rather than sitting here and pouting and being upset about the situation he's in, he says, you know what, screw it, I'm going to try to recruit some people to come here and we can be legends, we can be heroes. I mean, the twenty thirteen Wildcard team, a team that ultimately ended up winning just three playoff games, gets talked about in the same light that like Steelers Super Bowl teams and Penguin Stanley Cup teams get talked about in this town. That's how starved for baseball success Pittsburgh is. So if they could just bring people here, who knows what will happen. It's just been an issue of not being able to bring anyone here for reasons that we're aware of. So Paul Skins, yeah, he's going to do his part for as long as he's here, because Paul Skeins is going to try to win on any team in any environment that he's placed him, because that's just who he is.

00:15:43
Speaker 1: Okay, I just have one question before can they do it? And will they do it? I keep going back to this no because I just don't. You got to go off history of people, right, Yeah, will they so give me yes or no? Will they actually go all in and do what they need to do to make this team competitive? And will they make the fans happy? Because last year I remember Opening Day people were like Bob Nutting walk through the crowd and they were like sell the team in his face and he like ran away. So he knows what's at stake. Sherrington knows what's at stake. Everyone knows what's his stake. The Pirates fans are pissed. Off and good for them, but will they actually do what they need to do?

00:16:20
Speaker 3: Probably not. I mean again, like, so.

00:16:24
Speaker 1: Well, no, We're having this whole conversation and I'm just like, all this sounds great, all this sounds wonderful, but at the end of the day, he has to actually do what he wants he says, right.

00:16:34
Speaker 3: And I'm sure you know, people from the pirates are going to hear this conversation like they've heard all the other conversation. It's it's going to piss him off. And I'll just say what I've always said, if it pisses you off, through something to change it. Prove everyone wrong, prove everyone wrong. No one believes that anything's going to be any different, and they've earned that stigma. They've earned the situation that they're in where no one will ever believe them until something actually gets done. The way to fix that is by actually doing something. If they were to go out and sign a Schwarber, which I know is not going to happen, or someone may be a tear beneath him. People are so desperate to buy in on this team. They would sell more tickets, they would have a more bought in fan base, and I think it would also give a huge spark to the players in that clubhouse who have gone on record saying that they need help, that what they did last offseason was not enough. Everyone is desperate for this team to do something different, but you can't believe it's gonna happen until it actually does.

00:17:41
Speaker 4: Andrew McCutcheon, one of my favorite teammates of all time, my son's first ever favorite player when we played together in Indie. Andrew McCutcheon fake news, fake rumor, real rumor. Do you see him coming back? Just like it was? North Shore nine? Said it. In a redditt Ama, Alex Stump was asked if thinks Cutch is coming back due to frustrations on both sides, he's leaning towards no return. Do you want to see Cutch back in the black and gold? And Cutch responded, which we didn't even need Josh Harrison to respond. Wow, that's news to me.

00:18:17
Speaker 3: Man. You guys are gonna get cutching my Twitter mentions now too by asking me this. So I don't appreciate that. But if I had to answer honestly, I as things currently stand, yeah, I think it's probably less likely. I wouldn't completely write it off, but toward the end of the season, I sensed a lot of tension on both sides. It seemed like Andrew McCutchen was very frustrated with the state of the organization and how they've continued to operate in the last couple of years, and it seemed like there was some frustration on the organization side as well with you know, mccutchen's comments. So if those two sides can get over it, then yeah, I think a deal could be done. I think McCutchen wants to play here, but he doesn't want to play in a place that was like the one that he played the last three seasons. He wants to play on a team that's actually trying to win. I think he needs to be sold on that. I think the Pirates owe it to him to try to sell him on that, and after they make a couple moves, if there's still space for Andrew McCutcheon, I have no doubt that if he wants to be here, he'll be there. But they've got to make him want to be there. It has to make sense for both parties, and just going off the vibes at the end of the season, I think there was a lot of work to be done and getting that relationship to a point where he would want to sign up for another year in Pittsburgh.

00:19:32
Speaker 2: Oh, you know, Cutch, he's gonna watch this.

00:19:37
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know. I'm sorry, And.

00:19:40
Speaker 5: We all love him.

00:19:41
Speaker 2: He's a lovable guy, right, And the things that like he's even being quote faulted for is what wanting to be competitive to win?

00:19:51
Speaker 4: Yeah, he wants to win.

00:19:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, he wants to see additional players come in and not force him to be the only leader for three straight years, the only guy who has any sort of voice in a clubhouse. There needs to be a little bit more than him. I think that's a fair gripe on his end.

00:20:10
Speaker 2: I'm going to quote something that he definitely said, but I can't prove it, Like I didn't get this from anyone. I'm just guessing here. There were probably times last year where he was like, why am I the best hitter on this team right now?

00:20:23
Speaker 3: I wouldn't I wouldn't go against that, bet. I mean, it's more just why is this the same thing that we've just gone through? And I wrote that it's just you look from it, you look you go back to July twenty twenty four, the Pirates went on a little win streak. They added a little bit at the deadline. They were a couple games out of the wildcard. But from the moment August twenty twenty four arrived, nothing has gone right for this franchise. And a few bad months to end the season that's tough enough, But when that same vibe continues for an entire twenty twenty five campaign, that's exhausting. And few people want to bring winning baseball back to Pittsburgh than Andrew McCutcheon. He's done it once before. And to see him be a part of a team that's kind of just seemingly going through the motions, or at least that's how he probably felt the circumstances where that has to be very frustrating.

00:21:20
Speaker 2: All Right, so this gets talked about on Bucko Territory. Encourage everyone to check that out. Noah, great stuff, man, We love talking to you, we love having you part of the FT network.

00:21:29
Speaker 1: Man.

00:21:30
Speaker 3: Good to see it, absolutely, guys, I have a happy holidays.

00:21:33
Speaker 2: Thank you you too, And again, Bucco Territory is the show that you should be listening to if you're a Pirates fan or if you just want to learn more about an organization that frankly has been a disaster for the last while. Okay, but maybe things turn around coming this year. If they do put their money where their mouth is, you can hear much more from Noah, Josh Harrison, and Platinum Key on that show. You get two a week in the off season, and you'll get more during the season