Big Lead Sports Bar

10/12/2006

The Pirates Trade for ARod?

Here is another Reader Submission piece, this one from Pat B. Your feedback is always encouraged in the comments section.
Mr. Mondesi's House,

The Pittsburgh Pirates should trade for A-Rod.

Beaten down Bucco fan will say, "How can the Pirates afford A-Rod?" or "The Buccos have nothing to give the Yankees". But this deal of the century is possible only if McLittlefield Nutting sees how it can all come together.

I've seen that A-Rod's 2007 salary is $16-million dollars which is a huge amount of money in the world of the Pirates, but it seems much smaller when you consider the Buccos paid Burnitz, Randa, Casey, Marte, and Hernandez almost that much or more to sail on the 2006 Pirates' ship. One would suspect that A-Rod's production would eclipse the production of that group of superstars hired to bring the Pirates back to prominence in the less than glorious All-Star season.

A-Rod's long term salary may be too much for the Pirates to handle, but a two year rental of one of the games most talented players would be a hell of lot more fun then the annual signing of bottom of the barrel free agents.

Who do the Pirates give the Yankees? Here is the list of candidates:

Ian Snell - He is a productive, young starting pitcher. The type of guy that no longer inhabits the House that Ruth Built. Plus, he doesn't like Pittsburgh.

Salomon Torres - Proven veteran relief pitcher who can be made expendable by the development of Capps, Bayliss, and others.

Jose Castillo - The Yankees have done a nice job of taking infielders off the hands of the Pirates. See Enrique Wilson, Luis Sojo, and Charlie Hayes.

Sean Burnett, Jon Van Benschoten, and Brian Bullington- Maybe the Yankees can use a witch doctor to resurrect the dead arms of these former 1st round draft picks.

Shawn Chacon - In typical Pirate fashion, the Buccos could get absolutely nothing out of a trading deadline deal that saw an established veteran being moved to another team. Craig Wilson could have been given to the Yankees as a thank you gift for all of the revenue sharing money sent to the bank account of McLittlefield Nutting.

Send that conglomeration of talent to the Yankees for A-Rod, and the next thing you know the Pirates are holding a press conference announcing that they are instant contenders. A-Rod will be in a pressure free environment and he'll win the Triple Crown. The Pirates will finish 82-80 and they'll be in the wild card race until September 20th. Then two years later they can trade him to San Diego for Brian Giles who wants to finish his career in a Bucco uniform.

It will never happen,and I doubt that McLittlefield Nutting ever thought of something as creative as this.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

A Rod need the Buccos. He needs to reinvent himself as someone who is playing for the love of the game not money. He has more money than he'll ever need. He should sign with the Pirates at the league minimum and announce that he is playing from now on for the love of baseball. I bet his performance anxiety will disappear if he does this. The city would LOVE him and support him no matter what, and he would make the difference that would get the Buccos back their early 90s form. Not to mention he would sell out every home game and totally drive Pirates merchandise sales.

Anonymous said...

The Pirates have nothing that a team like the Yankees can use in the offseason. And why on earth would a player like A-Rod want to go to the Buccos?

No chance.

I will agree that the morons who run the Bucs should put their money into one or two talented players instead of 5-6 chitty ones.

Anonymous said...

Forget A-Rod. Here's another idea: How 'bout the Steelers trade for Randy Moss?

Anonymous said...

Nice...there's always one yinzer out there that wants to talk about the Steelers in a non-NFL article. I think this guy was on Madden last week asking who the Steelers should take in the 2010 draft - he wanted Mark's opinion on what it would take to get Max Suter (Greensburg CC standout) in the Black and Gold.