Inside the Pirates: He's tough, he's a ... baseball player?
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It is heard at least once, it seems, during every highlight from the ongoing Stanley Cup playoffs:
"He separated his shoulder, but he was back over the boards for his next shift. ... He's tough. He's a hockey player."
Baseball?
Not so much.
Most often, one will see a player grab his hamstring after a routine sprint to first base. Or a pitcher lifted for a cracked fingernail.
But is that fair or accurate?
Ask those inside the game, and they will indignantly insist it is not.
"I've seen guys play through broken bones, torn hamstrings, all kinds of stuff," right fielder Xavier Nady said. "A lot of people don't see that part of it."
"There are strained back muscles, busted-up fingers, sore wrists ... everybody's got something," first baseman Brad Eldred said. "It's tough to play baseball when you use your hands, your wrists, your back, a lot of twisting motions. But you do see guys find a way to get it loose and go play. And that's the big thing: In our sport, you play every single day. There's no other sport like it. No chance to recover."
The extent of most nagging injuries are not revealed until after the season, and the Pirates had three fine examples in 2006 ...
Left fielder Jason Bay's ailing left knee was examined by the Pirates' medical staff before the All-Star break, and enough of a mess was found that he was told, if he had surgery, no one would begrudge him.
Bay declined, went on to appear in 159 games and have another All-Star season, all while wrapping his knee in 4-5 inches of ice after every time out. After the season, he finally had the surgery.
He still shrugs it off.
"It was more away from the field, going up and down stairs, that bothered me," Bay said. "Once you got to the ballpark, though, you got a little fired up. It was OK. It wasn't great."
Nady had a fractured wrist, beginning early last season, and a wrist is to a hitter as the elbow is to a pitcher. It was only a hairline, but he felt it with each swing. He neither complained, nor blamed it for a dropoff in home runs, nor took himself out of the lineup.
"I went as long as I could, which is what you have to do until you can't tolerate it," Nady said. "But there are different situations, too. If you're a pitcher and you can't throw right ... you're not going to do your team any good if you try to perform with what I had."
Pitchers can tough it out, too.
John Grabow was summoned from the bullpen six times in nine days last August and, shortly afterward, felt something amiss in his elbow. He informed management and, even though he has a spur there, even though he would flounder to a 6.43 ERA the rest of the way, even though his career could be jeopardized, he kept taking the ball.
"I'll tell you this: You can ask any trainer in the league, and they'll tell you 80-90 percent of pitchers have some kind of shoulder tear, elbow spurs, something. They'll tell you what pitchers go through," Grabow said. "It's really not like hockey or football or anything. You have to be pinpoint."
He paused.
"If we're not as pitchers ... think about it: People can really get hurt. Those hitters aren't wearing face shields."
The art of the deal? All timing
The Oakland Athletics and Minnesota Twins are universally praised for being perennial contenders despite low payrolls. Almost as universal, that praise tends to focus on those teams' ability to develop talent internally.
It is correct that Billy Beane and Terry Ryan, the general managers in Oakland and Minnesota, have overseen deep drafts and productive developmental systems. But the unquestioned foundation of each franchise's ability to keep competing, even when their star players become too expensive and leave, is that they trade those players at peak value for exceptional prospects. Those prospects, if evaluated correctly, zip right up through the system and start the cycle anew.
Same with the Florida Marlins.
Buy low, sell high.
In Dave Littlefield's tenure, the Pirates have made few such deals. Of the most noteworthy players sent out of Pittsburgh at high value -- Brian Giles, Aramis Ramirez, Kris Benson, Jason Schmidt and Mike Gonzalez -- only Gonzalez was moved for reasons other than a salary dump. Giles netted a fine return, but the rest ranged from negligible to zero.
Which brings to mind Oliver Perez, a classic case of selling low.
When he was dealt last July, few in Pittsburgh seemed to mind. He was struggling and wild, had worn out two pitching coaches and had reached the point where the Pirates' answer was to demote him to Class AAA. His value could not have been lower.
Perez now is the New York Mets' ace, with a 5-3 record, a 2.90 ERA and -- most reminiscent of his brilliant 2004 in Pittsburgh -- has 48 strikeouts while walking only 16 in 492/3 innings.
Will that hold up?
Who can say? Perez has been nothing if not inconsistent.
But might the Pirates have been better off to hang onto him until he had one of those spurts? Might they feel stung by not having done so?
How they handle the Jose Castillo situation could be telling.
Too much, too soon for some
When Bob Nutting and the Pirates' brass arrive in the Dominican Republic today, they should not expect to find Rene Gayo, their Latin American scouting director, waiting with his hand out.
Six-figure bonuses are becoming more common for Latin American amateurs, even though players are signed at age 16 and are immensely challenging to evaluate.
The Pirates have not hit six figures with any bonus to a player that age and, to hear Gayo tell it, they would be better off it stayed that way.
"These kids ... people don't understand the cultural differences there are, how they react to going from being so incredibly poor to having so much money, how they react to coming to Bradenton [Fla.] for the first time and seeing America," Gayo said. "It can change a kid, and not necessarily for the better."
He cited one gifted prospect, recently signed for close to six figures.
"You get to the point where you have to tell the kid you're going to cut him if he doesn't focus," Gayo said.
First Published May 19, 2007 11:27 pm
