Team History
1946: 73-81, 6th, 19 GB
1947: 71-83, 6th, 18 1/2 GB
1948: 82-71, 3rd, 10 GB
1949: 71-83, 15 1/2 GB
Key Additions: OF George Stephens (sale - BSN)
Key Losses: C Ron Locke (sale - CHW)
The Pirates, in spite of the final record, were fighting for first place into early August but were just 7-18 from September 1 onward. Those are the breaks when you rely on one player as much as the Pirates do, and that one player misses almost an entire month. We have to say that we like their new duds - yellow and black is a nice, unseen color scheme for a major league baseball club.
Pitching
Code:
Name W L SV ERA G GS IP ▴ HA R ER HR BB K WHIP OAVG BABIP WAR
Willie Casas SP 9 16 0 4.33 35 35 224.1 250 131 108 19 117 82 1.64 .285 .294 2.5
Ryan Harlan SP 14 10 0 3.61 30 30 212.0 194 97 85 11 81 95 1.30 .242 .261 4.8
Tony Morales SP 9 12 0 5.14 29 29 182.0 197 115 104 12 102 100 1.64 .279 .310 3.0
Mark Jaffe SP 6 6 0 5.07 14 14 97.2 121 62 55 6 37 30 1.62 .309 .321 1.7
T.J. Simons SP 3 3 0 5.33 8 8 52.1 60 38 31 7 24 27 1.61 .286 .298 0.4
Jim Carrubba CL 5 7 9 5.14 56 0 70.0 92 45 40 12 34 24 1.80 .327 .324 -1.1
Aaron Mazza RP 9 6 5 4.01 51 9 139.0 147 67 62 11 74 56 1.59 .274 .289 0.9
Robby Page SP 2 11 0 4.82 29 14 117.2 128 71 63 10 72 38 1.70 .287 .295 0.4
Mark Engelbach RP 6 2 2 3.34 43 0 67.1 61 32 25 6 30 37 1.35 .248 .268 0.6
Bill Belcher RP 2 6 0 6.04 16 6 67.0 77 50 45 10 34 30 1.66 .292 .296 -0.0
Sincere Matthews RP 5 3 0 6.16 11 9 57.0 68 42 39 3 28 25 1.68 .296 .317 1.0
Mike Clarke RP 0 0 2 4.76 11 0 34.0 31 18 18 4 20 16 1.50 .242 .248 -0.2
Thomas McAdams RP 1 1 2 1.85 12 0 24.1 18 7 5 0 7 12 1.03 .209 .243 0.6
Domenic Wakely RP 0 0 0 11.49 5 0 15.2 28 21 20 6 8 9 2.30 .389 .386 -0.6
Ben Gallas RP 0 0 0 27.00 1 0 1.2 7 5 5 1 0 0 4.20 .636 .600 -0.1
Ricky Coté CL 0 0 0 0.00 1 0 0.1 1 0 0 0 0 0 3.00 .500 .500 0.0
The Pirates' pitching staff suffered... it just suffered. They were hoping for Robby Page to be the staff ace; Page went 14-1 with a 2.11 ERA back in 1947. However, he turned out to be whatever the opposite of an ace is and found himself pitching in long relief. He suffered an elbow injury on the last day of the season and may or may not be ready in time to start 1950. Anyway, it's not like the Pirates are going to be counting on him heavily anyway! Look instead to 26 year old Ryan Harlan, who was 14-10 and at least a solid player. Willie Casas won 18 games for Pittsburgh in 1948 but almost wound up losing that many in '49.
The bullpen was a complete mess. Both Jim Carubba and Aaron Mazza pitched in more than 50 games but both also wound up with ERAs north of 4 and K/W ratios below 1. Mazza may find himself in the rotation in 1950 on the basis of having finished 6 of the 9 games he started last year.
Catcher
Code:
Name G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI TB BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS WAR
Billy Hernandez C 129 455 81 136 28 4 17 89 223 57 26 1 0 .299 .378 .490 .868 4.6
Ron Locke C 96 213 38 65 7 1 5 25 89 35 17 0 0 .305 .406 .418 .824 1.9
David Glenn C 2 3 0 1 1 0 0 2 2 0 1 0 0 .333 .333 .667 1.000 0.0
Having a great hitting backup catcher is a luxury when you already have the perennial All-Star Billy Hernandez as your starter, so Ron Locke was sold off to the White Sox with the proceeds going to purchase some defensive help in the outfield. Hernandez just turned 36 but set career highs in homers and RBIs, so it's not like he's showing any signs of age, and besides he's the leader of the clubhouse.
Infield
Code:
Name G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI TB BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS WAR
Jose Aceves 1B 138 521 76 152 26 2 24 91 254 67 59 1 2 .292 .372 .488 .860 3.7
Jose Velazquez 1B 28 72 6 20 2 1 1 18 27 3 0 0 0 .278 .307 .375 .682 -0.0
Guadalupe Andrade 1B 13 33 4 7 1 0 1 6 11 2 4 0 0 .212 .257 .333 .590 -0.0
Dylan Ball 1B 9 8 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .000 .000 .000 .000 -0.2
Marvin Krueger 2B 65 223 42 61 10 3 10 38 107 42 7 1 0 .274 .390 .480 .870 1.5
Austin Seiler 2B 26 71 11 16 5 1 0 5 23 8 8 0 0 .225 .300 .324 .624 -0.3
Jonathan Cartagena 2B 17 16 2 4 1 0 0 1 5 1 0 0 0 .250 .294 .313 .607 -0.2
Bobby Munoz 3B 95 349 64 109 19 4 15 70 181 64 18 2 0 .312 .417 .519 .935 3.6
Oscar Valles SS 152 590 74 186 26 3 4 56 230 50 17 2 3 .315 .371 .390 .761 3.1
Rick Packer SS 89 297 38 73 11 1 3 34 95 19 36 2 0 .246 .289 .320 .609 -0.7
Jerry Gonzalez SS 75 204 30 42 6 1 5 17 65 26 36 0 0 .206 .299 .319 .617 0.1
Jose Aceves is one of those rare instances where promoting a career minor leaguer to a starting gig at the age of 28 worked out. Aceves went from blowing up in Louisville, Kentucky in 1947 to... well, maybe not blowing up in Pittsburgh but playing passably, with 9 homeruns, 68 RBI, and a .268 average in 489 at-bats. Then last season he exploded to 24 round-trippers and 91 RBI. Clearly this is a man who benefits from hitting behind the great Luke Spurr.
Marvin Krueger has made the All-Star Game in each of the 4 seasons since the league restarted but the Pirates are reportedly unhappy with his fielding and so they brought in prospect Danny Perkins from Brooklyn to compete with him for a job. Krueger came back to the Pirates after 2 years away in Boston in exchange for Jonathan Cartagena. He did wallop a combined 15 homers between the two ballclubs but also committed 18 errors. He never was the rangiest second baseman on the planet and at 34 it's looking like he's just not quick enough to play there regularly anymore.
At third there's yet another good, solid third baseman. It's pretty much, if you don't have a guy capable of .300-20-100 for you at the hot corner in 1950, you need to upgrade. Munoz missed almost 60 games last year but he'd have surely reached those totals had he played.
Oscar Valles won Gold Gloves in 1946 and 1948 but last year his defense was iffy enough that he started the year out playing at second base. The trade for Marvin Krueger nixed all that and he was a somewhat below average shortstop the rest of the way. That being said, he had a real career year at the plate and based on that alone he'll get another chance to show his stuff.
Outfield
Code:
Name G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI TB BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS WAR
Adam Shuffler LF 136 483 56 141 21 0 4 49 174 45 27 1 0 .292 .351 .360 .711 -0.9
Kineji Tidwell LF 30 67 10 27 7 0 1 13 37 17 5 0 0 .403 .518 .552 1.070 1.0
Tyler Pratt LF 12 10 2 5 1 0 1 3 9 1 1 0 0 .500 .545 .900 1.445 0.2
Isaiah Williams LF 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .000 .000 .000 .000 -0.0
Robin Zick CF 146 651 112 221 35 19 12 87 330 29 43 28 20 .339 .370 .507 .877 5.4
Dave Reising CF 40 61 10 15 1 1 1 8 21 8 4 0 1 .246 .333 .344 .678 -0.1
Larry O'Shaughnessy CF 9 12 2 3 0 0 0 0 3 2 2 0 0 .250 .357 .250 .607 -0.0
Luke Spurr RF 137 545 125 182 27 6 53 141 380 68 70 5 3 .334 .406 .697 1.104 8.3
Evan Reilly RF 37 113 14 28 6 2 1 16 41 6 7 1 0 .248 .286 .363 .649 0.1
Adam Shuffler hit well enough - well, he hit a lot of singles, anyway - but was an absolute butcher in left field. He'll be relegated to pinch-hitting duties in 1950, as the team brought in the sure-handed George Stephens from Boston to fight it out in spring training with Kineji Tidwell, who hit .403 in 67 September at-bats.
Robin Zick celebrated his first full season as a starter with a league-leading 19 triples, 112 runs, and a .339 average. It's no surprise that he made the All-Star Game last year as well; that should be the first of many such appearances for the 25 year old.
Right field, of course, is manned by Luke "The Butcher" Spurr (Ralph Kiner, although he plays more like Babe Ruth). Spurr, the holder of the all-time HR record with 61 hit in 1947, looked like he might break it last year before going down with an upper back injury in mid-September. That, ironically, also broke the back of the Pirates offense. He's lowkey
a big-time student of the game, and it shows: he managed to cut his strikeouts way, way down from 177 in 1947 to 70 last year and is now, on top of everything else, a .330 hitter.