Most fans of the Pittsburgh Pirates had to endure some, if not all, of the historic losing streak and then were rewarded with three consecutive playoff appearances.  During each of those playoff seasons came a trade deadline.  It was a bit of uncharted territory as the Pirates were buyers, not sellers; you would think that this new territory would bring joy and excitement.  Yet, all it brought was discontent and complaining.  And as a Pirates fan, it gets really annoying to hear people cry out “the Pirates are cheap!” no matter what actions are taken.

Two seasons ago, it was complaining that the Pirates did not go out and acquire David Price.  Most reports, however, showed that the Pirates organization tried its best to get him, but the Rays wanted more MLB ready talent.  Last season, it was moans and cries about how the only starting pitcher that was acquired was J.A. Happ and that it was an immense overpay.  And then those same people bemoaned when the Pirates did not resign him in the off-season.  At the end of the day, it feels like the Pirates could win the World Series and some people would still find a way to call out the organization and those within it for being cheap and not doing more.

This trade deadline was no different.  All sorts of people had a dream player or two they would have liked the Pirates to acquire, and I was no different.  At the end of the day, however, all we are are fans; we are people who read reports, watch games, have opinions, have one view out of 30 available, and do not know what happens behind closed doors.

Many fans are upset that Ivan Nova was the biggest piece for the Pirates to acquire.  Nova, however, was the only one really available for the Pirates.  Many people, myself included, wanted to see LHP Matt Moore come to Pittsburgh from Tampa Bay, but he ended up going to San Francisco.  They out-bid Pittsburgh, plain and simple, because Tampa wanted at least two of the Pirates top-five prospects.  That would have meant that two out of Josh Bell, Tyler Glassnow, Austin Meadows, Jameson Taillon, and Kevin Newman would have been sent to Tampa.  I get that pitchers with extended team control are valuable, but Moore has not had the most stellar of seasons and is an extreme fly-ball pitcher (244-151 FB/GB ratio this season, 944/623 ratio in his career).  The current Pirates brass does not often target flyball pitchers, but look for players who induce ground-ball outs, so the chances of using two of the top five team prospects to get him was pretty much out of the question.

Other than Moore, not too many pitchers with extended team control were on the market, and that is what Pittsburgh was looking for.  Not one year rentals like Rich Hill (who has a plethora of concerns on his own, but that is a different conversation).  So the Pirates acquired Nova for very little: two players to be named later.  What Nova will do with the Pirates is unknown, but he gets ground ball outs (175 this year, 1209 in his career), is having the best K/BB ratio oh his career (3/1), and leaving the home run happy Yankee stadium and getting an outfield that is far better defensively than that in New York might help his other numbers come down a little.

Many people were also upset that the Pirates traded away Mark Melancon.  The Pirates wanted to get something out him and the market was high for top-tier closers.  Pittsburgh was able to get five more years for a player who could easily be the closer of the future, if not the closer for next year, in Felipe Rivero.  I am high on him, love the team control through 2021, and also love the fact that the Pirates do not have to risk giving Melancon a qualifying offer that could be around 17 million for this off-season.  The closer position is one of the most fickle in baseball and while it is nice to have consistency, one never knows when a reliever might up-and-implode one season, thus making it hard to justify using about 20% of a teams payroll on one relief pitcher.

Then there is the fact that the Pirates were able to trade Jon Niese.  While I have never been the biggest fan of Antonio Bastardo, he did pitch well enough with the Pirates in 2015 and, as I said before, relief pitchers can be very fickle.  So having Bastardo for next season and giving him a chance to pitch with the team that he had a 2.98 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, in 57.1 innings while limiting batters to a .188/.287/.284 batting line is worth the risk.  He will slide into the 6th/7th inning role nicely and it also eliminates the need to find a second lefty reliever this off-season.  Also, let us not forget that Niese was not worth peanuts.  So the fact that the Pirates were able to get anything for him is pretty good.

And then there is the highly contested Francisco Lirano trade with the Blue Jays.  I will not sugarcoat it for it does not need to be sugarcoated.  This was partly a salary dump trade.  Liriano is not worth that 13.7 million he is due next year.  He leads the majors in walks, he is set to have his worst ERA and most losses since 09, set for a career worst in WHIP and WAR, and his worst K/BB ratio since 11.  And a move to the Rogers Centere does not bode well as it is a smaller ballpark.  The Pirates had to give up something to have the Blue Jays take on that burden, enter Harold Ramirez and Reese McGuire, as well as need to acquire something of some value in return, so enter Drew Hutchison.  He is not the most impressive of pitchers, and his fly ball/ ground ball ratio is a bit alarming for the Pirates, but he has a chance to adapt to the Pirates way of pitching in AAA for a bit before getting a chance to start in September and next year.  And yes, keeping him in AAA does help lower his cost and give an extra year of control, but keeping costs low was part of the framework of this deal.

Now for a look at the two prospects.  Honestly, I do wonder how many people knew about Ramirez before yesterday.  Ramirez is a high average, decent OBP, low power outfield bat with a cannon arm.  That is fantastic to have, if your team does not already have two All-Star caliber outfielders signed through 2020 plus, a fan-favorite center-fielder, and a mega prospect waiting in the wings.  Ramirez was expendable, simple as that.  It would have been nice to see him part of a better return, but he was not going to have much of a future in Pittsburgh.  And his bat, honestly, may not develop into a major league bat given his low walk rate and lack of power.

McGuire has defense that is very well regarded around the league.  His bat, however, is looking to be below average.  He has not hit above .270 in any season above rookie ball, sans one short stint in the Arizona Fall League, and his defense could possibly falter as he has committed a total of 20 errors in the last two seasons combined.  With Francisco Cervelli signed for three more seasons and Elias Diaz set to line up as the next back-up an then starter for the Pirates, McGuire too was starting to look a little blocked.

At the end, the best way to know more about this trade is to see how the Pirates will use the extra 14 million, give-take, that has been opened up for the off-season.  Salary raises are coming in bunches from arbitration (Gerrit Cole hits that for the first time this season) and contracts already signed are going to be big next year and the Pirates might look to extend Cole or another young pitcher, akin to what the Rays have done in the past.  Also, people need to give Hutchison a chance to perform and see why the Pirates went out of the way to acquire him.

I am not trying to say that these were the best moves, but what I am trying to say is stop calling the Pirates and the front office cheap!  First, you cannot fault the Pirates for teams not willing to play ball with them, see the fact that the Pirates called the Braves about a chance to acquire Julio Tehran and were told no off the bat.  Second, stop complaining about everything the Pirates do.  It is super easy to spend someone else’s resources, be they prospects or cash, and think both short and long term with the moves.  And if the Pirates are cheap, what does that make the Padres?  The Padres front office traded away about every single large contract on its books this season.  Were the Indians cheap when that franchise tried to absolve itself of a few payroll eyesores last season when trading Michael Bourn and Nick Swisher?  How about the Astros?  Are they cheap and giving up on the playoffs because they traded away a few major league players in the middle of a playoff hunt?  Are the Tigers cheap because they did not make any moves?  The Cardinals only acquired Zach Duke so do they not care and are they cheap?  I can go on.  And third, stop being so obsessed with the big names and the flashy moves.  Rarely do moves like that actually pan out for a team.  Price has yet to win a World Series and he has been traded twice.  Carlos Beltran has been all around the league and has yet to win a World Series.

I know some people who would not of been happy unless the Pirates had traded John Jaso, Jeff Locke, and Matt Joyce for Stephen Strasburg and having the Nationals still pay all his contract.  Some people really need to wake up and smell the freshly cut outfield grass.  The MLB does not work the same way your video game does.  I had heard some ludicrous trade ideas before this deadline, including but not limited to: “Jaso, Joyce, and Eric Fryer to the Rays for Moore” and “David Freese, Joyce, Sean Rodriguez  and a prospect to the Indians for Carlos Carrasco and Tervor Bauer.”  I get it, people are frustrated with losing the last two Wild Card games, being stuck in a division where the Cubs and Cardinals can out spend the Pirates, no salary cap, and watching some fan-favorite players leave and/or struggle.  But sometimes it takes more than one or two months to see the whole picture, sometimes you cannot see the forest through the trees, and as the Penguins fans learned from watching the Pens hoist the Stanley Cup this past June, sometimes the unpopular moves are the right moves to make.