Is the Neil Walker trade actually bad? An exploration..

Everyone knows that people who still think "the Pirates are cheap" have been roaming the Earth as long as Bob Smizik. But was the Neil Walker trade actually bad?

What Is Your Goal For Your Baseball Team

I think what this question ultimately boils down to is, what do you want out of your Pittsburgh Pirates? By design, only 1 of ~30 MLB teams gets to win a championship every year; do you want your baseball team to maximize its chances of doing so every single year, even at the expense of trading the Pittsburgh Kid, Neil Walk-off Walker?

After yesterday I am not so sure the answer is yes. Sure Johnathon Niese fills a need in a decimated rotation; makes about the same as Neil in 2015, lefty, classic need-for-need baseball trade. So why do people still think this trade = the Pirates are cheap?

The answer is probably that some of our best yinzers fancy Pittsburgh as one of the greatest cities in the world, and that we should be able to behave as such in national sports. Theoretically if the New York Yankees had a hometown hero at 2nd base who was due to make ~$10mil a year for the rest of his career; he would play 20 years and retire a few years too late, complete with all the fanfare and b/s of a Derek Jeter style farewell tour. On a personal level I want the same for Neil Walker; that said, the expectations of an MLB GM have risen so high in the last 10 years - Dave Littlefield would be laughed out of an interview if he tried to be a GM today!

Neal Huntington comes across as a bit of a dork. The Pirates won 98 games last year. That's after losing an absolute cornerstone piece in Russell Martin. They are very likely smarter than us when it comes to putting together a baseball team.


As I grow older my interests & expectations for our local professional sports teams has changed. I have gotten so much experience with the fleeting glory of championships from the Penguins and Steelers; I can die happy relative to professional sports if Pittsburgh doesn't take home any more hardware in my lifetime. This trade is for the next generation; the kids who don't know the Pirates as 20+ season losers; and maybe don't think baseball is boring yet. It hurts to lose the Pittsburgh Kid, but hey there's no rule that says I can't root for the Mets once we are bounced from the playoffs in the wildcard round again next year.

Beat Cinci