Battling Bucs : Your 2014 Pittsburgh Pirates

This time of year you often see attempts to predict what the Opening Day roster will look like but really that doesn't tell us much. If a club manages to keep their Opening Day 25 together for more than 2 or 3 weeks it should be considered a small miracle. The truth is teams go through a whole lot of players every year some of them are ones you'd expect and others are not. In fact quite a few are typically players who weren't even in the organization at the beginning of the year. This exercise is going to try and help determine just who may contribute to this year's team not only from the Opening Day roster but all the way through September. Outside acquisitions are of course impossible to predict but we will do our best.
The Position Players
Just how many hitters the Pirates will need in 2014 is impossible to say but we can use past history as sort of a guiding post:
2009: 23 position players
2010: 24
2011: 27
2012: 24
2013: 22
With the exception of 2011 which was the year of catcher-palooza the number seems to be rather consistent around 22-24 but just to be safe we will say we are looking for 25 in total. Now without looking it up we know the Pirates have carried either 13 or 14 position players on the roster to begin the season meaning we will need about 12 guys who don't make the Opening Day roster. First though let’s try to figure out how many players the Pirates have added from outside the organization during each year.
2009: Lastings Milledge, Ronny Cedeno, Delwyn Young
2010: Pedro Ciriaco, Chris Snyder, John Bowker
2011: Derrek Lee, Michael McKenry, Brandon Wood, Matt Pagnozzi, Xavier Paul, Ryan Ludwick
2012: Gaby Sanchez, Travis Snider, Drew Sutton
2013: Marlon Byrd, John Buck, Justin Morneau
Once again 2011 with catcher-palooza is a bit of an outlier but overall it seems like the Pirates fairly consistently add three position players every season to the MLB roster. So let’s remove 3 players from the current group of 25 we are working and try to see if we can identify the 22 players currently in house who are the most likely to appear in the major leagues this season.
The obvious starting point is the 40 man roster which currently has 19 position players on it. These players are far more likely to appear in the major leagues this season than just about any other player. However not everyone on it will appear as I would actually bet against Alen Hanson doing so in 2014 and it is far from a safe bet to assume that any of Chase d'Arnaud, Chris McGuiness and Jaff Decker will. All 3 of them are candidates of course and will re-enter the discussion later. For now though we have 15 players that barring injury are extremely likely to play in the major leagues at some point this season.
C: Russell Martin, Chris Stewart, Tony Sanchez
1B: Gaby Sanchez, Andrew Lambo
IF: Neil Walker, Pedro Alvarez, Jordy Mercer, Clint Barmes, Josh Harrison
OF: Starling Marte, Andrew McCutchen, Jose Tabata, Travis Snider, Gregory Polanco
This leaves us with 7 more spots to fill. We have three leading candidates in d'Arnaud, McGuiness and Decker but who else may come into play?
C: Nevin Ashley, Omir Santos, Carlos Paulino
Ashley and Santos were signed as upper level depth and one of them will likely serve as the 4th catcher. It would obviously take a couple of injuries but it isn't out of the question one of them could see time in the majors. As for Paulino his strong defensive skills make him a possibility to grab an emergency catcher spot should he show any offensive improvements this season.
1B: Travis Ishikawa, Matt Hague, Justin Howard, Matt Curry
Ishikawa appears to be the emergency safety valve at the 1B position. If the younger riskier options the Pirates try fail the Pirates could opt to turn to Ishikawa and get a steady defensive player who will likely hit just a little below league average. The next most likely to appear on this list is probably Hague as he currently appears to be Gaby Sanchez's backup for the right handed part of the platoon. Chances are he would only make an appearance should an injury occur. Howard is a light power good contact option the Pirates may opt to give a shot should Lambo and McGuiness fail and Curry finds himself this season in a similar position to what Lambo did last year. His prospect status is all but dried up but he has one final year to save it and a good surge could land him in the majors.
IF: Michael Martinez, Robert Andino, and Blake Davis
The Pirates middle infield depth is non-existent. If an injury were to occur chances are d'Arnaud would be the next guy up but if he is struggling any of these minor league free agents signed this offseason could get a shot. I'm guessing out of these players Robert Andino would be the most likely to get a call up but Michael Martinez was a utility player with the Phillies as recently as last year so he has to be considered a possibility as well.
OF: Chris Dickerson, Mel Rojas, Adalberto Santos
Dickerson is likely this season's Felix Pie meaning he is the emergency outfield in waiting at the AAA level. Dickerson actually appears to be a bit better than Pie so chances are he could be serviceable if pressed into action. Rojas profiles as a 4th outfielder and with a good showing in AAA has a chance to jump ahead of Dickerson on the depth chart. Santos's best defensive position is a corner outfield spot but he can also fake it at 2B and 3B meaning he too could be an option for an infield job if the Pirates aren't looking for someone who can handle shortstop.
There are others who could factor in such as Gift Ngoepe, Drew Maggi, Jarek Cunningham or Kelson Brown but they all seem to be big time long shots and would need to really up their game. Since I'm doing this exercise I am going to pick the 7 players I believe to be the most likely but in truth it could be any of the above or even someone completely off my radar. The 7 I see as the most likely are McGuiness, d'Arnaud, Decker, Hague, Martinez, Andino and Dickerson. I was tempted to put Ishikawa on the list but I see Lambo and McGuiness both getting good long looks before they would fall back on him and by that point I'd assume we'd be close to the trade deadline and someone from the outside could be acquired.
So my projection for the 22 internal players to be used in 2014 are:
C: Russell Martin, Chris Stewart, Tony Sanchez
1B: Andrew Lambo, Chris McGuiness, Gaby Sanchez, Matt Hague
IF: Neil Walker, Pedro Alvarez, Jordy Mercer, Clint Barmes, Josh Harrison, Chase d'Arnaud, Robert Andino, Michael Martinez
OF: Starling Marte, Andrew McCutchen, Jose Tabata, Travis Snider, Gregory Polanco, Jaff Decker, Chris Dickerson
Starting Pitchers
We will start this the same way as we did the position players by looking at how many starters the Pirates used each of the past 5 years and figuring out how many came from outside the organization.
2009: 9 SP (Charlie Morton, Kevin Hart)
2010: 11 SP (James McDonald, Dana Eveland)
2011: 10 SP (None)
2012: 10 SP (Wandy Rodriguez)
2013: 12 SP (None)
The Pirates seem to be shying away from going outside the organization during the year for SP. This is probably a good thing as it indicates better depth. It looks like we have a pretty consistent usage of starting pitchers in the 9-12 range being cautious one again let’s assume the Pirates use 11 starting pitchers this season and that they all will be from within the organization. Once again we will look at the 40 man roster as our starting point and pick out the pitchers that seem like safe bets to start a game and those who are options to.
Safe Bets: Gerrit Cole, Brandon Cumpton, Francisco Liriano, Jeff Locke, Charlie Morton, Wandy Rodriguez, Edinson Volquez
Options: Jeanmar Gomez, Phil Irwin, Andy Oliver, Stolmy Pimentel, Joely Rodriguez, Casey Sadler, Justin Wilson
We have 7 players who seem like safe bets and another 7 who are options to start a game at some point. Of the 7 though I'm going to quickly drop Oliver, Rodriguez and Wilson as they seem like long shots to start. That still leaves us with our required 11 but it’s not that simple there are other candidates currently not on the 40 man roster.
Not On 40 man roster: Jameson Taillon, Nicholas Kingham, Kyle McPherson
There are certainly others who are possibilities but they seem like longer shots given who is in front of them. Of these three it would appear Taillon is a near lock to start a game at some point so that brings our total to 8 starters. Of the last 3 I think Phil Irwin is a fairly safe bet and that one of Gomez or Pimentel is likely to get a start or two serving as a swingman. Personally I think Pimentel is the more likely choice though the Pirates could try him in a back end role. That leaves one final spot which for me comes down to Gomez, Kingham and Sadler. I have my doubts that Gomez actually makes the team given the Pirates relief pitcher crunch and I'm thinking they'll be cautious with Kingham much like they were McPherson so Sadler gets the nod.
So to summarize my projected 11 starters are:
Liriano, Cole, Morton, Rodriguez, Volquez, Locke, Cumpton, Irwin, Taillon, Pimentel and Sadler

Bullpen
I think you all pretty much know the process by now but I think I am going to have to mix it up some for this one. Every year there are a few guys who both start and pitch out of the bullpen so what I'm going to do here is look back at the last five years and see both how many pitchers threw in relief and how many pitchers were used in total.
2009: 19 RP (26 total pitchers)
2010: 22 RP (28 total pitchers)
2011: 20 RP (25 total pitchers)
2012: 22 RP (25 total pitchers)
2013: 20 RP (28 total pitchers)
So it looks like the Pirates typically use between 20-22 relief pitcher and 25-28 total pitchers. Considering we know they use between 10 and 12 starters this would seem to indicate there are about 4-5 pitchers used per season in both roles. So we are looking for let’s say 17 pure relievers and 4 starters who are also going to pitch in relief.
The 4 starters are likely rather easy to come up with. Pimentel is a near lock to pitch some relief and I'd expect Sadler to do some in September as well. Outside of them Rodriguez, Locke, Cumpton, Volquez and Irwin all might depending on need. I'll be optimistic and say Volquez stays in the rotation all year but Wandy pitches some relief due to injuries and Irwin makes an appearance or two later in the season. Now on to what is actually the interesting part the 17 pure relievers.
It’s probably a safe assumption the Pirates add a few every season during the year but let’s see if we can figure out just how many.
2009: Joel Hanrahan, Jose Ascanio, Steven Jackson, Eric Hacker, Anthony Claggett
2010: Chris Resop, Chan Ho Park, Joe Martinez, Chris Leroux, Sean Gallagher
2011: Jason Grilli, Tim Wood
2012: Chad Qualls, Hisanori Takahashi
2013: Kyle Farnsworth, [Josh Harrison]
Interestingly enough we see a similar trend. Back in 2009 and 2010 when the Pirates were really bad they picked up 5 relievers during the season to fill out the bullpen but as the team improves the number fell to two the following two seasons and to one last year (though Josh Harrison is a special case of course). Since I was so aggressive in assuming no outside starters would be acquire I'll assume 2 relievers will be so that leaves us with 15 pure relievers to use. Once again let’s start with the 40 man roster and remember this list won't include any of the above 11 I have listed as starters.
Candidates: Jeanmar Gomez, Jason Grilli, Jared Hughes, Vin Mazzaro, Mark Melancon, Bryan Morris, Andy Oliver, Joely Rodriguez, Tony Watson, Duke Welker, Justin Wilson
I have my doubts that Rodriguez will pitch in the majors at all this season and it seems like a stretch to say Oliver is a safe bet so that leaves us with 9 pitchers all of which seem like reasonable bets to pitch in the majors this season. One could argue that the Pirates will likely have to waive/trade one of Morris, Gomez or Mazzaro but injuries and such usually manages to work things out so for now let’s assume all stay with the club. This leaves us with 6 more relief pitchers from off the 40 man roster but inside the organization. Let's look at the most logical candidates:
Nick Kingham, Kyle McPherson, Adam Wilk, [Andy Oliver], Zach Thornton, Jake Bringham, Daniel Schlereth, Yao Hsun Yang, Josh Kinney, Jay Jackson, Cody Eppley, Elvin Ramirez, Seth McClung, Collin Balester, Zack Dodson, Aaron Pribanic, Tyler Waldron, Eliecer Navarro, Quinton Miller, Ryan Beckman, Jason Townsend, Jeff Inman, Nate Baker
Essentially I listed everyone who in AA or AAA who seems like even a remote possibility to make it to the majors. I have included Oliver as I expect him to be out righted off the 40 man roster but clear waivers. I see two clear favorites in the bunch in Thornton and McPherson so that drops our need down to four players. Of the rest I would figure at least one in the Wilk, Schlereth, and Yang trio would make as the third left hander. This is also where Oliver will enter the discussion. I'm going to be optimistic here and projects Wilk and Oliver will both get a chance at some point. So two more spots to go! Pretty much the remaining players who are the most likely come from the mass of right handed relievers the Pirates signed as NRIs this offseason. It could be any of them but I'll take a shot in the dark and say Josh Kinney. As for my last spot I'm going to go with a bit of a surprise and predict that Ryan Beckman will pitch his way on to the major league squad at some point this season.
So let's recap the 15 relievers I believe to be most likely to contribute:
Jason Grilli, Mark Melancon, Tony Watson, Justin Wilson, Vin Mazzaro, Jeanmar Gomez, Bryan Morris, Jared Hughes, Duke Welker, Zach Thornton, Kyle McPherson, Adam Wilk, Andy Oliver, Josh Kinney and Ryan Beckman
Recap
All of this leaves us with approximately a 53 man roster the Pirates will use this season. The math tells us that approximately 48 of the 53 players will come from within the organization. To make things a little more even I'm going round that up to 50 and include an extra position player (Nevin Ashley) and an extra relief pitcher (Yao Hsun Yang). Below is my best guess at the Pirates Opening Day 50 man roster!

C: Russell Martin, Chris Stewart, Tony Sanchez, Nevin Ashley
1B: Andrew Lambo, Chris McGuiness, Gaby Sanchez, Matt Hague
IF: Neil Walker, Pedro Alvarez, Jordy Mercer, Clint Barmes, Josh Harrison, Chase d'Arnaud, Robert Andino, Michael Martinez
OF: Starling Marte, Andrew McCutchen, Jose Tabata, Travis Snider, Gregory Polanco, Jaff Decker, Chris Dickerson
SP: Francisco Liriano, Gerrit Cole, Charlie Morton, Edinson Volquez, Jeff Locke, Brandon Cumpton, Jameson Taillon
SM: Wandy Rodriguez, Stolmy Pimentel, Phil Irwin, Casey Sadler
RH: Jason Grilli, Mark Melancon, Vin Mazzaro, Jeanmar Gomez, Bryan Morris, Jared Hughes, Duke Welker, Zach Thornton, Kyle McPherson, Josh Kinney, Ryan Beckman
LH: Tony Watson, Justin Wilson, Adam Wilk, Andy Oliver, Yao Hsun Yang

#FreeMattHague

Originally Posted by wvkeeper This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. ://">://" onclick="kh99_iqts_show('330132_1'); return false;">Show Quote #FreeMattHague He would seem to stand a non-zero chance of making it. He is really the only backup we have to Sanchez and he can kind of play 3B which is useful as Josh Harrison is the only real backup we have there.