Big Lead Sports Bar

12/07/2010

Pirate Free Agent Moves Include Kevin Correia and the Notorious Scott Olsen



Despite their losing...and losing...and losing, the Pirates have stayed out of trouble off the field, for the most part. But who knows what the future holds with one of their newest additions, pitcher Scott Olsen.

The photo above illustrates Olsen after his 2007 arrest for DUI, resisting arrest with violence, and fleeing and eluding a police officer, just one of the many Olsen incidents you can find on the lefthander in his Suspensions, confrontations and legal trouble page on Wikipedia (as I say, always a good measure of character when that such a page exists).

Some of his other highlights:

-A 2006 black eye courtesy of Florida teammate Randy Messenger
-A 2006 on-field incident with Marlin teammate Miguel Cabrera that required the two to be separated
-A 2006 in-game shouting incident with the Phillies' Chase Utley that nearly came to blows
-A 2007 confrontation with teammate Sergio Mitre that resulted in a two-game suspension
-The 2007 DUI, which happened a day after he returned from that suspension
-And a 12-cigarette-a-day addiction, as the cherry on top.


As for the numbers, Dejan Kovacevic says that the Olsen deal is expected to be similar to the $1 million, incentive-laden deal he had with Washington last season. He was 4-8 with a 5.56 ERA in 17 appearances, starting 15 games. Yep, he'll fit right in. 


The Pirates also reached agreement with free-agent starting pitcher Kevin Correia on a two-year, $8 million deal early today, in a deal met by a collective yawn.

Correia, 30, was 10-10 with a 5.40 ERA in 26 starts this past season for San Diego and is expected to eat some of those delicious PNC Park innings in 2011.  He's got a lifetime ERA of 4.57, with 27 career starts. This is how you fill in a rotation in the offseason when you don't overpay for free agents, which is basically the only way to lure quality players to your historically-awful team (see: Werth, Jayson).

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7 comments:

BurressWithButterflywings said...

As the old saying goes: Garbage in, Garbage out.

Bababooey said...

Sucks.

Koz said...

Correia's ERA 5.40 with the advantage of Petco Pitchers Park?

Nightmare

Nate said...

Correia's not as bad as he looks. Last year he was dealing with the death of his brother. He had a decent first half before that. Last season's ERA was a full run above his career norm, so I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. Two years ago he was a useful starting pitcher.

I'm not saying he's going to be great (or even good. Mediocre is probably the word), but he'll probably be a better pitcher than Zach Duke, and he'll definitely be better than Brian Burres, Daniel McCutchen, etc. He's not going to be an ace, but the Pirates aren't paying him to be one or hyping him up to be one either. Bill James projects a 2011 ERA of 4.35, with a 1.43 WHIP. That should give you an idea of what kind of pitcher he is.

Scott Olsen, on the other hand, just plain sucks. He's also a dick. I hope he gets cut in spring training.

Unknown said...

@nate "so I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt"

...we would expect nothing less from you.

Bababooey said...

Wannstache fired!!!

HomeRunFromBehindTheMeatballs said...

The buccos also signed a Lastings Milledge clone (i.e. can't hit righties, does OK against lefties) to platoon in RF. The career numbers are strikingly similar... only difference = next season lastings will be 26, matt diaz will be 33. I don't get it?

These pitchers are just taking shots in the dark and hoping one pans out... maybe they're just for trade value? maybe most of our SPs are just placeholders until last yrs AA rotation is ready?

Anyway, it's a shame that we missed a year of hothead Olson playing under robotic Russel... that would have made for some epically comical confrontations.

@ b. b. booey - how could you possibly be surprised? i'm assuming that exclaimation point signifies excitement and not surprise/confusion?