Month: November 2025

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Pirates Morning Report: Updates

As November comes to an end, the Pirates are making more national noise than normal. They are not really doing anything, but for some reason, the national media thinks they are going to be more active in the free-agent market. They have been connected to Kyle Schwarber and J. T. Realmuto. They supposedly offered a deal to Josh Naylor, but then that was disputed. They may try to sign their no. 1 prospect Konnor Griffin to a long term deal. There have been at least 3 MLB insiders who have written that the Pirates are going to spend more money and make a splash in the free-agent market. Most people around here are taking the attitude of, I will believe it when I see it. I take the same view, plus I really do not want to see the Pirates make a so-called big splash in the free-agent market. J. T. Realmuto has seen better days. Last season, his OPS+ was 91. Joey Bart’s was 96. You could argue that Realmuto is better defensively, but his contract last year paid him almost 24 million dollars. Now he may not make that with a new contract, but Joey Bart, who is arbitration eligible, is projected to make close to 3 million. I do not think Realmuto should be signed by the Pirates. They have greater needs at corner outfield and third base. Schwarber would be a huge upgrade at DH, but he is not going to help where the Pirates need it most. There are only 3 free agents that I feel the Pirates should consider signing: Munetaka Murakami, the third baseman from Japan; Kyle Tucker; and Bo Bichette. These are the only free agents under 30 years of age. Cody Bellinger is 30 years old, but I think he won’t be worth the price. Konnor Griffin is being talked about as the possible starting Pirate shortstop. He has played centerfield, allowing Bichette to move to shortstop. This would also put Oneil Cruz in right field, where he belongs. Cruz could be the DH also, which may be the best move of all. Despite all the media talk about the Pirates spending, I will be surprised if they do. I still think the best way to improve the team is through trades with Bryan Reynolds and Mitch Keller as the trade chips. Now let’s look at what the Pirates have actually done.

So far it is nothing more than the same old Pirates. Not only in what they have done but also in what they have said. First of all, they had to move some players out of their 40-man roster to protect players from the Rule 5 draft. The Pirates made this sound like they had some tough decisions to make. You’ve got to be kidding me! They let go of Colin Holderman, Dauri Moreta, Alexander Canario, and Ronny Simon. Apparently, Cam Devanney went to Japan. Here is who they left on the 40-man roster: Cam Sanders, 29 years old, with a lifetime 4.39 ERA in the minors and 6 major league appearances. Enmanuel Valdez is going into his age 27 season with a lifetime OPS+ of 87. His lifetime slugging is .392 with 2 years in Fenway Park. Will Robertson heads into his age 28 season with a lifetime major league average of .129. In six minor league seasons, he has a slash line of .247/.334/.458. I do not know if the Pirates will make any more roster moves. If they lose anybody in the Rule 5 draft, could they be any worse than those 3? They could have easily made more room on the 40 man roster. Hopefully, they won’t lose anybody, but time will tell. Then they signed Jack Suwinski and Yohan Ramirez. The combined deals came to about 2 million dollars. Not a lot of money by today’s standards, but why sign them at all, especially Ramirez? Since 2020, he has been with 8 teams and twice with the Pirates. He has a career ERA of 4.71 and an ERA+ of 90. He averages 4.5 walks every 9 innings. Now that’s a guy you want coming in when the game is on the line. If the Pirates lose a pitcher in the Rule 5 draft, he could not be this bad. Obviously, the Pirates are hoping for a miracle when it comes to Jack Suwinski. Maybe he should try batting right-handed; it would make about as much sense. They made a couple of their typical minor league signings. When you look at the way this organization thinks and performs, even if the Pirates were to sign a top 10 free agent, it would probably wind up being a big waste of money. They need to be giving all that potential money to one person: Paul Skenes.

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Pet Peeves

The first is the way people drive. Watching people drive makes me wonder why there are not more accidents. They do not use turn signals. They do not stop at stop signs. They tailgate. What the purpose of tailgating is, I have no idea. On a road with traffic lights, I see no reason to swerve in and out of traffic. I see this all the time. A car moving fast and changing lanes trying to get ahead, and then three traffic lights later, there they are right in front of you. Better yet, they are in a lane that is backed up, and you get about 3 to 4 cars ahead of them in the other lane that is waiting for the light to change. When the light changes, you get to see all the maneuvering again. When trying to make a right or left turn, the person veers out the opposite way they are going to turn. The other one that is really good is the driver that is trying to direct traffic while they are driving. Listen, I understand if traffic is at a standstill and you let somebody out of a parking lot or side street. This will be when traffic is moving, and the car stops to let someone out. They may try and let someone make a left turn in front of them, and maybe someone is walking at that street’s crosswalk. Pulling out in front of oncoming traffic or when coming out of a driveway, it’s like let the world wait; I am not waiting. There are other driving issues, but you get the picture.

The next thing is grocery stores. There are two pet peeves with them: one they could control and one they should control. Why do they move things around? You will go to an area where a particular food item has been for months or even years, and bingo, it is not there anymore. It’s not even in the vicinity. You go ask, and it’s like 3 aisles over and usually in an aisle that you have already been down. They will move things in the produce department. The damn area is not that big to begin with, and they will switch things around. How does any of that make any difference in running the store? The other thing that should be banned is family shopping. Look, I do not expect anybody to have to get a babysitter to go grocery shopping. When I see a mother or a father with 2 or 3 kids in the grocery store, I have no problem with that. However, when I see both parents and the 3 kids cluttering up the store, that’s when I shake my head. What is that? Do they feel that grocery shopping is such torture that they have to have the spouse suffer it along with them? My point is, have one go grocery shopping and the other one stay home and watch the damn kids. Usually, both parents are not paying attention to the kids anyway, and they are handling all the food, screaming and yelling at each other and making the experience just as bad for everyone else as the parents are perceiving it for them. Grocery stores should have a guard at the door, and when they see the family coming, only allow one parent in the store. The kids and the other parent can go back home and pick up the other parent when they are done. No more family grocery shopping. Life would be so much better for everyone concerned, including grocery store employees.

Lastly, is punting in the NFL. There are 32 punters in the NFL. That is all they do. They take two or three steps and kick the football. They may have some other duties like hold for the placekicker on field goals and extra points but that is it. Seven days a week that is all they have to do is kick a football. I am surprised that NFL teams do not hold worldwide tryouts to punt the football. There has to be 32 people in the entire world that can kick a ball at least 70 yards. This has to be the smallest specialty in the world, 32 people. Why is it that they do such a lousy job. Week after week you see NFL punters shank punts, not be able to place the ball within a 10 yard area, hit low line drive punts that are returned for big gains and punted balls that do not go 30 yards beyond the line of scrimmage. Remember that is all they do. They kick the ball. They could do this for 5 to 8 hours a day for 7 days a week. They appear to be trying to disprove the saying that practice makes perfect. With new techniques to strengthen muscles and unlimited practice time there should not be a punter in the NFL that does not kick the ball at least 65 to 70 yards for every kick. Just think if these guys were surgeons, they would be killing people routinely.

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Golf: Course Management Vs. Having Fun

Everyone wants to improve their game. When your handicap gets down under 10, many say that the best way to get your handicap down further is through your short game and how you manage getting around the course. Most course management advice is usually on the conservative side. In trouble, get out of trouble. Keep it in the fairway even if you lose distance. Shoot for the middle of the green. Try to stay below the hole. I could have titled this blog, maybe we are taking our games too seriously. Some people would argue that the advice I am about to give here is because I grew up watching Arnold Palmer. He had that go-for-broke style. You could argue that he cost himself as many majors with that style as he won. In later years, Phil Mickelson was a player of similar ilk. Many critics of Phil simply felt he made many dumb moves when it came to the shots he tried to play. Palmer was never criticized that way. Perhaps it was because he had so much early success and those spectacular comeback wins. Beyond that, there is no doubt that the consensus is that to improve your score, you play on the conservative side. But really, is that any fun? That is an easy question to answer; hell no, not even close. Even though we are all trying to get better, are we playing for all that much? Even if we are wagering within the friendly confines of our foursome, we certainly are not playing for that much money that it should make a difference. Let’s look at each area of the game and see what the advice usually is and why it is okay not to follow it.

Off the tee: You want to hit the fairway even if it means that you have to give up some distance. I played at a golf course that I belonged to where on the 14 non-par 3 holes, if you were going to play the course correctly, you would only hit the driver 4 to 5 times. I hit mine 13 times. There was only one hole, a very short drivable par 4, that I laid up on. The area of the green was surrounded by trees and bunkers, and it just wasn’t worth it. I would hit driver there about 3 times a year just to do it. I was working back then, and when I played on weekends, I was going to let the big dog eat. Did this cost me strokes at times? I think it did. However, I had a good time doing it. To this day, I almost always hit driver off the tee. I enjoy driving the golf ball too much. There have been many instances where I have scrambled for a par, when the driver has gotten me into trouble. Sometimes it has really gotten the round headed in the right direction. Hitting the driver in golf is to me the most fun part of the game.

Through the green: Now that you’re off the tee, let’s look at some other course management rules or suggestions. Play for the middle of the green. When in trouble, i.e. the woods, get out of trouble. On a par 5, lay up to a good distance to shoot into the green. I rarely follow any of those suggestions. I always flag hunt unless the pin is in some ridiculous spot or I am too far away to go over a bunker. When I am in the woods, I am always looking for a way to go to the green, whether it be high or low. I always try to get as close to the green as I can on a par 5. Why do I do this? First of all, it is fun to try all the shots that are required. I like to bend it toward the flag. Even if I miss the flag on the same side and short side myself, as they say, the greens I play are not that fast, and the short-sided pitch is not that difficult. Making a great recovery shot is really fun. Going around or through a bunch of trees and getting the ball on the green or near the green really is a thrill. Even if it does not turn out, I can still make a bogey most of the time. On a par 5, I hit my 3 wood even if I cannot get home in 2. It gives me great practice with my 3 wood, and I feel I can get the ball just as close with a 30 to 50-yard pitch or bump and run as I can with a full sand wedge at 100 to 110. I will lay back if there is severe trouble around the green, a creek or deep bunkers.

Around the green and putting, there is not as much strategy going on. Even the advice of not getting above the hole does not hold that much water when it comes to playing most public courses. The greens are usually not that fast. The faster the greens, the more you should adhere to that rule. Don’t get me wrong; there are going to be times when you have to take the conservative route with course management. If you want to have real fun playing golf, then 95% of the time, go for broke. Just remember, nobody is going to get hurt or die. This is just a golf game. Who knows, you may pull off a shot that you will be talking about for the rest of your life. I have never heard anybody at the bar talk about chipping out from the woods on number 12. It is time to have some fun playing this game. It is rare when you get that chance.

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June

What’s your favorite month of the year? Why?

I like June because it is the only month that does not have a holiday. I know there is flag day but I don’t think even the banks close for that one. As you know I hate all holidays real or fake like Halloween. The other reason to like June is the days are long and the nights are short. It is the month I played 54 holes of golf in one day. My second favorite is July. My daughter was born that month and I got 2 holes in one that month, one in 68 and another in 88. I would like September and October but the days are getting noticeably shorter and of course October ends with that pagan holiday Halloween. If I could change one thing I wish there was 12 hours of light and 12 hours of dark all year around. I would be willing to give up those long days of light of close to 17 hours. I know this is an impossible wish but what the hell we can all dream. Speaking of months who came up with this shit. I mean some are 30, some are 31 and of course we have stupid February with 28 except every 4 years 29. Why don’t we have 13 months of 28 days each with February having 29 every year. It would be fun naming the 13th month. Then every 4th year we could have the one day month between June and July. I guess a better question would be where do I come up with this shit. See you in June.

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Golf: Our Changing Golf Games

One of the many mysteries of golf is why our games change so much from day to day. You will hear many golfers bemoan the fact that one day their drives are great and their iron game is horrible. Then the next time out, the opposite is true. Everything is clicking from tee to green, and they cannot make a putt. Their putting is fantastic, but they can’t get a ball close to the hole. They are having a horrible time with their short game when it has been good for the last 4 rounds. Here is one that I have experienced when playing competitively. For maybe the last 3 to 4 rounds I have played going into a tournament, I may be driving the ball extremely well. Maybe it’s my iron game that has been spot on. Possibly, I have had 5 very good putting rounds. The day of the tournament, that best part of my game, becomes the worst part of my game. This part of golf has been brought home to me more now that I am retired and get to play a lot more golf. Since 1996, even when I was working, I managed to play 3 to 4 times a week and probably had around 2 range sessions a week. Now that I do not practice anymore, another part of this phenomenon has been brought into focus. Whatever the bad part of my game was the day before seems to go away on its own the next day. This happens even on the pro tour. Tour players’ scores will sometimes vary by 5 to 10 shots from round to round. After a round, they are seen on the driving range “fixing” the problem. It looks to me that going to bed and waking up solves the problem too. This may really be the biggest mystery in golf. Until somebody comes up with the reason this may happen, we have to find a better way of dealing with it.

Most of the time, we are looking to find ways to correct the part of our game that has gone haywire during the round. Instead of trying to do that, we should just make the best of it. The problem will most likely correct itself the next day. Some problems are bigger than others. Let us start with driving the golf ball. You will hit your driver 13 to 14 times a round. If your shots are having a particular pattern, just go ahead and play if you are making solid contact. If you are not making good contact, then change the ball position or open or close your stance. Sometimes what you do may not even make sense, but just go with the results. If your irons are the issue, then take some pressure off your iron game by going for the middle of the green until things seem better. If that doesn’t work, then again, ball position and stance may help you get better. You may wind up hitting nothing but low punch shots or your 7 wood from 150 yards and out. Sometimes taking more club than you think may work; taking less club may actually free up your swing when you go after the ball a little harder. This can be helpful toward the end of a round that you are playing well. Never underestimate fear and adrenaline. If your short game around the greens is giving you problems, then change the way you are playing the shots. Maybe go for the bump and run for all shots, even if that means not hitting the green on the fly. Go the opposite way and hit nothing but high shots, even when the high shot is not required. Getting closer or farther away from the ball may help. We discussed putting in the last blog, but the principle is the same. A grip or stance change may help the situation. The one thing you do not want to do is to try and fix your swing or technique. Whatever you come up with is not going to last anyway. You probably have misdiagnosed your problem anyway. The bottom line is you have to go with whatever game you have that day and do the best you can on the part that is misbehaving. Once the round is over, forget about it. It most likely will go away the next round. That is the good news about your game changing so much from day to day. The bad stuff doesn’t stay around either.

The best way to think when you start a round is to be ready for anything. Try to minimize what you are doing poorly and take advantage of what you are doing well. If you are driving the ball well, use it on holes where you might otherwise use an iron or fairway wood. If your fairway woods are bad, then use irons when you are over 190 yards away. If the irons are bad, then bunt that 7 wood 150 yards. If low punch shots seem to be working, do it. If trying to lift the ball up high in the air gives you good results, do it for every shot. If everything in your game is working smoothly, just say a little prayer and don’t expect it to happen tomorrow. Remember changing ball position and stance may do wonders. Do it quickly and see if results will change. If you are hitting better shots, continue until you stop hitting better shots, and then try something else. Remember you can hit a fade from a closed stance; Hogan did it all the time. Likewise, you can hit a hook from an open stance. There are no laws on the golf course, just results. It is not that you want expectations to be low; you want them to be nonexistent.

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Golf: Putting

One of my favorite subjects is putting. It is by far the most important part of the game. There are many people out there that think other aspects are more important. One that gets a lot of play is greens in regulation. I am sorry, it just won’t fly. I do not care how many greens you hit; if you don’t sink those putts, it is all for naught. I think the reason for this is that everyone wants to make shot-making the most important part of the game. It sells golf clubs, lessons, and just seems that it should be. Putting is so simple to do. There are almost no fundamentals, really. Your method is meaningless as long as you can get the ball into the hole. Many people will argue that putting is not golf. Like a lot of things in golf, there is really nothing to compare to in other sports. It would be like a basketball player having to throw a strike in bowling rather than shoot a free throw when he is fouled. I am going to touch on bowling again later. Watch any tournament down the stretch. See who holes the most putts. That will be your champion. I think this is what holds people back on their putting. They do not give it its just due. It doesn’t keep them from working on their putting. It is more of a mental thing. Subconsciously, they are more concerned and happier when they are hitting great iron shots and getting the ball on the green. They chalk up a missed putt to just one of those things. It is that unconscious lack of respect for putting that inadvertently undermines everyone’s game.

My putting had its usual ups and downs and right now it is in an up position. About 3 weeks ago I started spot putting. It is just a fact it is easier to aim at something that is 3 to 10 feet away than something that is over 15 feet away and beyond. Those spots on the bowling alley are not there just for show. I find a spot on the green or some color change on the green that is close to the line I want to go on. I line up to that. I get a picture in my mind of what speed I want the ball to go when it is going over the mark. On short putts I still try to find a mark. I have done this in the past and then got away from it. One of the big things now in golf balls is the alignment tool. I do not use it. I find that it is difficult to line it up exactly where I want it. Mentally I feel that it makes putting seem to be too exact. I will use it on short putts sometimes, especially when there is no spot between the ball and the hole. Now that leaving the flagstick in has been around for a while, there seems to be a shift toward taking the pin out. For myself, I am pretty ambivalent about it. I think the real problem here is that all flagsticks are not created equal. If during a round I see the ball being rejected by the stick a couple of times, I may start to take it out. In my mind, I think it is a crap shoot. There is no question in my mind that on certain putts the flagstick has kept balls out of the hole. It has also let other putts go into the hole that would have lipped out or gone right over the hole. I don’t know how long I will be using spot putting. Will it make it to my season-ending blog? Technique is irrelevant when it comes to putting. The key to putting is to get the ball moving at the right speed for the line that you have chosen.

The final key to putting is green reading. You can have the stroke of Ben Crenshaw and Brad Faxon combined, but if you can’t tell how much the putt is going to break and in what direction, then you are doomed. There are many green reading tips out there and cookbook methods. I think most of them are pretty worthless. My best advice is to use the laws of correction. On the very first hole, notice what you did on your first putt of the day. Whatever way you missed it, correct it immediately on the next hole. If you missed it short, on the next hole, make sure you are pass the hole. If it was low, play more break on the next putt. Instead of bemoaning the missed putt, just calmly observe why you missed it and correct it immediately. This is the only way you are going to get your putting on track. Recently, I had a day where my speed was perfect from the first hole. I did not change a thing and wound up making 5 birdies, of which 3 were putts of over 15 feet. I have no idea why my speed was so good that day. I made 5 bogeys that day, and all were related to ball striking and short game issues. If you make early corrections when putting, you will get a feel for the greens much quicker. However you do it, you must find a way to get the ball into the hole. The better you are at the most important aspect of golf, the lower you will score. It is a very simple equation.

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Golf: My 2025 Season So Far

My 2025 golf season is winding down. It has been a typical year, with lots of ups and downs. I would say there have been more ups than downs. Nothing new on how to play the game, but there are a few changes. There was not as much traveling for golf this year. Many of the guys I play with had tough years with injuries and, in some cases, illnesses. Everybody made it through the year, but some better than others, to say the least. The best way to go through this year is to take a page from the classic western The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. I would say there was enough to go around for all three.

There was plenty of good. I have already broken my record for rounds played in a year. I have played 158 rounds, which eclipses my old record by 6 rounds. Right now, we have a weather break, but things are looking up to play Thursday through Sunday this week. With any luck, this year I may make the 170 mark. I have shot my age, 75 or better, 48 times so far this year. Last year I did it only 22 times. Of course, I had to shoot 74 or better last year. I did shoot a 73 from the white tees this year. Most of my rounds were played from the gold tees. My best round of the year was a 2 under 70, the same as last year. I started the year with a 5.0 index and currently, it is 4.9. I did have a much more consistent year. The highest I went was 6.3, and the lowest was 4.5. I also won my age group in the South Park Seniors and tied for the 4th best score of the day with a 75. My driving was still the stalwart of my game. My putting was up and down, so I will still put it in the good. I have actually been putting very well lately after having a downturn with putting during October. My other big improvement this year has been my sand play. I am not great, but I am not costing myself 2 or 3 shots when I am in a bunker. The weather had its ups and downs also. It was very windy and wet in March, April, May, and the early part of June. Then we went through a blistering hot spell that left a lot of courses in terrible shape. The rain we did get in this time frame was more in the form of a deluge. Beginning about the 2nd week of August, we went through some of the best weather I have ever experienced in Western Pennsylvania. Temperatures ranged from 66 to 84. It never got too hot or too cold all the way through the 3rd week of October. We could have used more rain, but we did get just enough to help some of the courses recover. Right now, we have hit a bit of a cold spell, but milder temps are on the horizon.

Next the bad, and there was plenty of that. My iron game continues to give me problems. It was the biggest reason my handicap did not go down. My iron play was especially bad from the 9-iron on up. I would have some good days with the irons. I have pretty much given up on figuring it out. My irons now consist of just the 6-iron through the lob wedge. Even though my handicap did not change much, I did have some really bad rounds this year. It wasn’t quite as bad as last year, but I had 14 rounds between 84 and 90. All of these rounds were brought on by bad iron play and a terrible short game. My problems with my irons did not have just one issue. Sometimes I would hit them fat, other times thin, and short irons just skulled low line drives. Those three shots could occur in just one round. There were some days that I had no finesse with them at all. I would have days where I did everything well with them: hit cuts, draws, high, and low shots at will. These were the days I shot my best rounds, as long as the putter behaved.

Now for the ugly and we all know where this is going. THE CHIP YIPS. Plus I added the shank chip, which I believe is nothing than a form of the chip yips. Even my good round in the South Park Seniors had a chip shank on the 17th hole. I admit I was choking down the stretch as I was just 2 over par after 16 holes. I somehow managed to hit 2 very good shots on the Par 5 and was almost green high on the left. The pin was on the front right but the green is narrow at the front. I tried to get too fancy and shanked it right out to the middle of the fairway. From there I putted from about 20 yards short of the green to avoid another shank. I putted it about 8 feet past and missed for a bogey 6. I played 18 better than I thought I would and had a 10-footer for bird but made a horrible putt but parred the hole to stagger in with my 75. The putting yips for now seem to be under control. I will be writing about that later this week. I have tried various things when it comes to the chip yips and just go back and forth with it. Some things seem to work and then everything just goes haywire. Fortunately, at times they just seem to go away. They are there more than they are not. I may discuss them further in another blog, but I don’t know. If I have a big breakthrough, I will be writing about that.

There is still some golf to be played this year, and where there is golf, there is hope. I will do the end of season right near Christmas when the year will be ending. I will be blogging some more over the next two days. The next one will be about my favorite subject: putting. Not too sure what the second one will be; most likely something about the mental game.

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Pirates Morning Report: If I Was The Czar Of The Pirates

Now that baseball season is over, I was going to start doing some golf blogs. I decided to get this blog out as soon as possible. I could also title this “what the Pirates should do but won’t.” I also wanted to get this out while I still feel there is a glimmer of hope for the 2026 season. There are some things that the Pirates could do that would end all hopes for the 2026 season. If they sign Andrew McCutchen—I love Andrew McCutchen—they should have never let him go. They should have re-signed him after the 2018 season. He unfortunately hurt his knee, but at the time, who could have predicted that? The facts are this: he was the 29th ranked DH in baseball. The Pirates can’t afford this from their DH for another season. You can say the same thing about two other players, Jack Suwinski and Alexander Canario. If they are on the 13-player opening day roster, this season is over before it even starts. I am not even wasting my time showing their stats; I have done it way too many times before. Before it is too late and the Pirates take all the fun out of it, this is what I would do if I ran the Pirates.

The number one priority for the off-season should be to sign Paul Skenes to a long-term contract. I feel that he would take a 6-year, 200 million dollar contract. However, if he would go for it, I would offer him 15 years at 600 million, making him a Pirate forever. Both of these deals could be done without increasing the current Pirate payroll all that much. You would trade Bryan Reynolds and Mitch Keller, which frees up 31 million. Look at it this way: if some other team had Paul Skenes and they said they would give you Paul Skenes for Reynolds and Keller, you would make that trade in 1 second. The Pirates have already freed up 25 million in salaries by getting rid of Tommy Pham, Andrew Heaney, Ke’Bryan Hayes, Adam Frazier, and Isiah Kiner-Falefa. That is 56 million, more than enough to do either deal. Is the 15-year deal risky? You bet it is. To me, it’s worth the risk. You are dealing with most likely a once-in-a-lifetime pitcher. Of course, Skenes would have to be willing to take the deals. The 6-year deal might have more appeal; who knows? I think either deal would have a good chance of getting the job done. What would be the starting rotation and what would the bullpen look like for 2026? My rotation would be Skenes, Bubba Chandler, Johan Oviedo, Braxton Ashcraft, and Hunter Barco. Barco is by far the least experienced, but I like him as the left-hander in the rotation. I can’t imagine him being any worse than who they had for the 5th and even the 4th starter last year. Where is Mike Burrows? I would put him in the bullpen and make him my new closer. He has the closer arsenal: fastball and changeup. I know that this would be a new role for him, but I think he would do just fine. Dennis Santana would go back to being the setup man. Justin Lawrence and Isaac Mattson would do 7th and 8th inning work also. That gets us up to 9 pitchers. The final 4 spots would be down to 7 candidates, in order of most likely to least likely to make the roster: Carmen Mlodzinski, Dauri Moreta, Chase Shugart, Evan Sisk, Kyle Nicolas, Eddy Yean, and Thomas Harrington. Then, there is the case of Jared Jones. I do not know what his timetable is exactly, but what better way to bring him back than to start him in the bullpen? You can never predict how injuries are going to affect your pitching staff, but this looks pretty solid to me. This staff looks pretty deep and could weather a few injuries here and there. Does anyone see a need to keep Mitch Keller on the team? I do not.

Now on to the position players. Besides trading Reynolds, I would also trade Jared Triolo. His defense makes him attractive to a lot of teams that have high-powered offenses, something the Pirates do not have. A lot of what I would do here is going to be predicated on not knowing what we might get in a trade for those three players: Keller, Reynolds, and Triolo. I will discuss the free agent market and trades at the end of the blog. I am going to look at this position by position with what the Pirates have after trading those players. At catcher, we have Joey Bart, Henry Davis, and new entry Rafael Flores. I would trade Joey Bart, but I would also be open to trading Davis. For now, the catchers would be Davis and Flores. The first baseman will be Spencer Horwitz. The last 62 games of the season, Horwitz’s slash line was .305/.395/.520. You hope he doesn’t turn out to be Triolo II, but you have to go with him a full season. Obviously, I would not have him lead off. Second base will go to Nick Gonzales. Gonzales slumped the last six weeks of the season to have solid regression from 24 to 25. Right now, he is the only viable option at the moment, but that could change. Hopefully, he will find his groove again. His ankle-foot injury could have been a factor, but time will tell. Hopefully, it will be fully healed by spring training. Third base, Jared Triolo is the only guy that can play third. Cam Devanney and Malcom Nunez are other options. Who is Malcom Nunez? I don’t think even the Pirates know who he is. He is 24 years old and has been with Indianapolis for the last four years. He got hurt this past year, and that could be an issue. In 874 at-bats, he has hit 21 homers at the AAA level. I would rather see Devanney play shortstop. The other possibility is Tsung-Che Cheng. Both he and Devanney are excellent glove men. This is what the shortstop position needs. Even though Devanney had awful batting stats, I am not ready to give up on him yet. Of the two positions, third base is where the biggest hole is, even if the Pirates would decide to keep Triolo. That leads us to the outfield. The first thing I would do is get Oneil Cruz out of center field and put him in right field. I would have Billy Cook and Nick Yorke play left field. Conner Griffin would be my opening day center fielder. I would see no need for him to go to AAA. Then you have three wild cards, all for different reasons. Can Endy Rodriguez, who has had severe elbow issues to say the least stay healthy for a season. Who knows how he will do even if he stays healthy? Even when he has been healthy, he has never had a chance to play regularly. To me, he would make the perfect DH replacement. He can also catch and play first base. Being a switch hitter makes him even more appealing as a DH. The next wild card is Esmerlyn Valdez, soon to be 22-year-old outfielder. He put up insane numbers at the Arizona Fall League. In 77 plate appearances, his slash line was .370/.519/.870. That’s right; he slugged .870. He could be on the team as soon as June. Finally, we have Tremar Johnson, the no. 1 pick of 2022. He had an okay year at AA Altoona, but with a young player—he just turned 21 in June—maturity and development can sometimes come fast. He’s got speed, and he does seem to be able to get on base. It might be too big of a jump, but he should at least start in AAA.

A lot of the lineup will be dictated by what the Pirates would get in return for Keller, Reynolds, Bart/Davis, and Triolo. Hopefully, they would get nothing but position players. They do not need to add pitching. Their biggest need is third base and outfield. As far as the free agent market is concerned, I would not delve into that at all. Having said that, I would consider three players if the contracts are not too big: the Japan star Munetaka Murakami, who has played third base, Bo Bichette, and Kyle Tucker would be the only other two free agents I would even consider because they are under 30 years old. I know there are players on the Pirates that are up for arbitration that will increase their payroll some. With 55 million gone from the payroll, the Pirates could do the six-year Skenes deal and sign one of the three free agents mentioned. It would still keep their payroll manageable at around 120 million. These are the things I would do during this offseason. I think the best bet is to improve the team through trades. Any one of those three free agents would be a big help also, but it would increase the payroll more than what the Pirates are comfortable with. One thing does not change: I finish every article of this type with the same sentence. We all know that this is what the Pirates should do, but we know that they won’t do it. They just do not have a high interest in bringing winning baseball to Pittsburgh.

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Pirates Morning Report: Game 7, An Unlikely Hero And Missed Opportunities

Final Score: Dodgers 5 Blue Jays 4 in 11 innings

Why The Dodgers Won: The Dodgers became the first team to win back-to-back World Series since the Yankees won 3 in a row from 1998 to 2000. You have heard of bullpen games. This was a starting rotation game. The Dodgers used all of their 4 starting pitchers. Shohei Ohtani went 2 and 1/3 innings, Tyler Glasnow went 2 and 1/3 innings, and Blake Snell went 1 and 1/3 innings. Last but certainly not least, Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched 2 and 2/3 innings the day after he went 6 innings in game 6. He was the winning pitcher in 3 of the Dodgers’ 4 wins. The Dodgers used only 2 pitchers out of their bullpen, and one of those, Emmet Sheehan, made 12 starts during the regular season out of 15 appearances. It was a sad last 2 games for the vaunted Blue Jay offense. In the last 2 games of the World Series, they were 4 for 26 with runners in scoring position. They left 22 men on base, including 14 in game 7. It is going to be a very long offseason for the Blue Jays.

The Key Moments Of The Game: In the bottom of the third, with a runner on 3rd base and one out, the Dodgers decided to intentionally walk Vlad Guerrero. They paid the price when Bo Bichette took an Ohtani slider and hit it 442 feet into the seats, giving the Blue Jays a 3-0 lead. The Dodgers started chipping away with a run in the 4th and a run in the 6th. Mookie Betts opened the 6th inning with a walk and eventually scored on a sacrifice fly. Both Dodger runs scored on sacrifice flies. In the bottom of the 6th, the Blue Jays scored a run on a single and a double. Then the Dodgers long balled the Blue Jays to victory. Max Muncy in the 8th made it 4-3. In the top of the 9th, Miguel Rojas took a 3-2 slider and lined it over the fence to tie the game. Rojas, who is 36 years old, had hit only 7 home runs during the regular season. He did not start in the first 5 games of the series. He is at the end of a 3-year, 15 million dollar deal. He is a free agent in 2026. I wonder if anyone will sign him. He is one of the most unlikely World Series heroes of all time. Will Smith, who is 30 years old and has a 10-year, 140 million dollar contract, hit the go-ahead homer in the top of the 11th. It is just too painful to go through all the missed chances the Blue Jays had since the 6th inning of game 6. In the last 15 innings of the World Series, the Blue Jays had a runner on 2nd with no outs 4 times and a runner on third with less than 2 outs 3 times and did not score a run. They could not do what the Dodgers did 2 times in game 7: hit a sacrifice fly. If they could have just done it one out of 3 times, they would be the World Champions. On one final note, I think the bench-clearing incident, as ridiculous as it was, did not really have any bearing on the outcome of the game. It is a little ironic that the most fortunate play of the game for the Dodgers was the line drive by Andres Gimenez that Max Muncy snared, even though he was playing in for the bunt. Gimenez needlessly instigated the confrontation. Just like the Blue Jays, you could say it was not his night.

The 2025 baseball season has come to an end. Even though I did not think they would, I have to give the Dodgers credit for going full bore to try to win two World Series in a row. It took them 11 innings into Game 7, but they got the job done when it needed to be done. As mentioned before, this will be a long offseason for the Blue Jays. It is what I always say: hitting is always a sometime thing. In spring training 2026, I expect the Blue Jays to be practicing hitting fly balls deep enough to score a runner from third base. It was a great season for baseball. This was probably the best postseason baseball has had since the 1986 season. In the coming weeks, I will look at what the Pirates should do but probably won’t do in 2026. I think you will find it to be a bit of a surprise. Not as big of a surprise as the Pirates having a winning season, but surprising nonetheless.

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Pirates Morning Report: We Have The 7th Elimination Game Of This Post Season.

Final Score: Dodgers 3 Blue Jays 1

Why The Dodgers Won: The Dodgers were able to put 3 runs on the board after 2 were out in the top of the 3rd. They were able to make it stand up for a 3 to 1 win over the Blue Jays to force a game 7. The Blue Jays did everything they wanted to do except score runs. They were able to get Yoshinobu Yamamoto out of the game after 6 innings. The Blue Jays had chances to score in the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th but failed every time. They were 1 for 9 with runners in scoring position and left 8 men on base. The Dodgers were even worse overall in hitting, getting only 4 hits. They got 3 of those in that 3rd inning. It does not take a math major to figure out they got only 1 hit in the other 8 innings. They got 2 walks in the 3rd and another 2 walks for the rest of the game. The Dodger bullpen barely hung on, but hang on they did.

Key Moments Of The Game: In the top of the 3rd, the Dodgers had a runner on 2nd with 2 outs. Then came the dreaded intentional walk to Shohei Ohtani. Will Smith followed that up with a double, making the score 1-0. Freddie Freeman walked on 5 pitches, bringing the slumping Mookie Betts to the plate. He fell behind in the count 1-2 but lined a single to left on an up-and-in fastball. This scored 2 runs and gave the Dodgers a 3-0 lead. The Blue Jays bounced back in the bottom of the inning when George Springer got a big 2-out single to make the score 3-1. Then came the heartbreaking bottom of the 9th for the Blue Jays. Roki Sasaki got out of a 1st and 2nd, one-out jam in the bottom of the 8th. The bottom of the 9th got even worse. He hit the first batter, Alejandro Kirk. Addison Barger got a ground rule double that turned out to be a bad break for the Blue Jays. Even so, this put runners on 2nd and 3rd with no one out. The Dodgers brought in Tyler Glasnow. Ernie Clement swung at the first pitch that was up and in off the plate. He blooped it right to Freddie Freeman. This brought up the light-hitting Andres Gimenez. On the 2nd pitch of his at-bat, he swung at a pitch that was just off the outside of the plate. He went with the pitch and blooped it out to left field. That is when Addison Barger made the cardinal sin of breaking too far down the line toward third. The throw by Kiki Hernandez beat Barger to the bag, and the game was suddenly over. Glasnow got out of the inning by only throwing 3 pitches with none of them being in the strike zone.

Next Game: Tonight, in Toronto, game 7. This 7th game of the World Series is really difficult to get a read on. The Dodgers, even though they won game 6, are still in a team hitting slump. The Blue Jays, on the other hand, may be psyched out by not cashing in on all the opportunities they had to tie and win the game. Both pitching staffs are running on fumes. The game could go either way. It could be a wild scoring affair or a close, tight, low-scoring game. The most interesting part of the game will be how each team manages their pitching staffs. This will be the key to victory. I still like the Blue Jays’ chances. No matter what happens, I expect it to be a great game to end one of the best postseasons in the history of baseball. Let’s just hope that some umpire does not screw it up.