Results tagged ‘ Delwyn Young ’

Up and Down

Victory! The Pirates looked great tonight, after Ian Snell was done anyway. Snell got roughed up, despite pitching decently well in my opinion, and gave up 3 runs in 2 innings. The Pirates put up 4 in the second to take the lead, and then the rains came. The game was delayed for nearly an hour and a half, and the Pirates came back and played great ball. Sean Burnett pitched 3 innings surrendering one run but pitching well. Evan Meek, Jesse Chavez, John Grabow, and Matt Capps teamed up to finish the game and pitch 4 scoreless innings. The big story of these guys was Matt Capps. As many of you know, Capps blew the game for us last night. The Pirates had a 1-0 lead (should have been a 3 or 4 to nothing lead) in the ninth, and Matt Capps gave up 3 and took the loss. He was anxious to get back out there and get those thoughts out of his head. He did a lot of work earlier today with pitching coach Joe Kerrigan to fix some of his mechanical issues, and it paid off. He came on in the 9th with a 3 run lead and put instant butterflies in my stomach with a 5 pitch walk of the first batter he fixed. However he quickly righted the ship by getting two ground balls to Jack Wilson, the first a double play ball and the second to end the game. The Pirates took the game 7-4 and improved their record to 15-21. More importantly they earn a chance to win the series tomorrow as they send Zach Duke to the hill. Duke has been our most reliable pitcher this year and always pitches great in PNC Park. I’m definitely feeling a win of this series as we head to Washington for a 4 game set with the Nationals. 


Other notable performances tonight were from Delwyn Young and Brandon Moss. They both had 2 hits tonight. Young had the defining hit tonight, as his 2 run single in the 2nd inning put the Pirates on top and swung the momentum in the Pirates favor right before the rain started coming down. He looked good at the plate in 4 of his 5 at bats, and even stole a bag (okay, he was easily out, but it still counts). He’s been a great addition for the Pirates and I stand behind my statement that this guy should see more playing time. I’ll touch on that more in a minute here, but first I’d like to talk about Brandon Moss’s performance. Like I said, he had 2 hits today. He is really getting the good part of the bat on the ball in this homestand. It’s funny how much confidence can do for your game. Before the St. Louis series Moss just looked awful at the plate, and I’m sure he was feeling even worse than he was looking. He has that one big game and now he’s been one of our best hitters in the 4 games following that performance. We’re finally seeing the potential that this guy has been rumored to have now. This is huge for the Pirates. 


This all brings me to one point. The Pirates have 4 guys that get playing time in right field. And I, at one point, have said that all 4 of these guys should get more playing time there. Now that doesn’t make sense, you can’t alternate 4 guys at one position. So I guess now is the time for me to pick whom I want to see in right field and whom should immediately back that person. The problem is these guys have all looked really good this year. It’s a good problem to have. 

So when I’m making this decision, I pretty much immediately rule out Monroe and Hinske. Any mature bucco fan knows to do that. They are good players and can definitely contribute to the offense, but they most likely aren’t going to be with the team next year and they are both past their primes. There is no way either of these guys makes a significant impact past 2009, and the Pirates aren’t playing for 2009 right now. We are a team of the future and everything we do should be trying to strengthen our team 2 to 3 years down the line. So this all brings me to Delwyn Young vs. Brandon Moss. Such a tough call. You all know that I am a huge fan of Andrew McCutchen and would love to see him starting for the buccos today, but that’s just not going to happen. Between Moss and Young I’d probably like to see Moss get more playing time, just because of the power. Young could definitely be an above .300 hitter, but he doesn’t have much power. At most he’ll be a singles and doubles hitter who doesn’t steal many bases, which really doesn’t help us all that much. Brandon Moss might strike out more than average but atleast he has a good chance at hitting 20-30 home runs some day. This is what the Pirates need. We haven’t had a big power bat for a long time. Not saying that Moss can be a Brian Giles this year or even next year, but he definitely has a chance to be that player in the future and I think we owe him a shot. 

So final conclusion, I’d play Moss in right field primarily, and work in Delwyn Young had second once every couple weeks, then throw him into right field against lefties or just to give Moss a spell. I’d use Monroe as the primary pinch hitter against lefties and Hinske the primary against righties. It’s nice to have Hinske too because he can spell the LaRoche brothers at the infield corners. Again, this is a very good problem to have. I love the Pirates.

And I love you. Yes, you.  Have a great day. 

Pirates Acquired Delwyn Young from Dodgers

Alright well late last night the Pirates made a deal with the Dodgers that will send 26 year old Delwyn Young to Pittsburgh for a couple of minor leaguers to be named later. 

Personally I do not understand this. Young is out of options so he has to come to the big league club instantly, which he will probably do tomorrow. I’m not doubting that this guy could be an effective big league player, although his numbers really don’t show that he can, but I am just confused as to why the Pirates would add ANOTHER outfielder. I mean the big league club already is loaded, and the AAA team is even more so loaded. We have Nate McLouth, Nyjer Morgan, Brandon Moss, Craig Monroe, and Eric Hinske. This is absolutely ridiculous. We don’t need 6 outfielders on our big league club. Hinske will get some games at first and maybe third, but he’s mainly an outfielder. Delwyn Young has played 2nd base in the minors, but I don’t see him playing there very often in the bigs, especially with Freddy Sanchez there. So now we have 6 outfielders on the club, and our 5th outfielder, Craig Monroe, only has only 3 at bats this season, so we obviously don’t really even need 5 outfielders. I’m sure the depth won’t hurt us, but I don’t really like losing Luis Cruz for Young, because I think Cruz can help us more than Young will on the big league team, even though both player’s influences will be extremely minimal. The only thing that could justify this is if the team is planning more trades in the near future. Who knows, maybe some teams are interested in Craig Monroe after the monster spring he had. Seeing that the Pirates don’t play him, maybe some teams are offering some minor leaguers to add another solid outfielder to their club. This is unlikely but it’s really the only thing I can think of right now. We’ll see how it works out, I’m gonna go do more research on Delwyn Young. 
Well here’s the deal from looking at some baseball-reference stuff. Looks like Young has a decent amount of power, he hit 17 homers with 97 RBI and hit .337 in his last full season in the minors. That was all in 490 at bats. His major league numbers aren’t impressive however, but at least there’s a little bit of upside there. I don’t think he’s going to get near enough at bats this season to improve on that upside, so I really see this transaction doing nothing to the team. If I had to decide, as of RIGHT NOW, I’d say it was a bad trade for the bucs. We’ll see how it works out though. 
Back to baseball though, the Pirates host the Astros tonight at 7:05 and send Ross Ohlendorf to the bump for his 2nd start. I’ll be at the game, but the weather isn’t looking good right now. It’s been lightly raining all day, and the forecast says 30% chance of rain for the first pitch, so let’s hope it stays dry. I don’t see any problem getting this game in, and I’m still rather excited for the game and the $1 hot dogs and drinks!! Let’s Go Bucs!
| back to blog home |
Theme: MLB “modern” | Get a free blog at WordPress.com
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.