Position Report Card: Relif Pitcher

Today I am going to focus on relif pitchers, but not the closer, stay tuned for my take on the Pirates 9th inning situation in my next post. Middle relievers, or 'bridge' guys are very important to have as a ball club. I have a little bit of experience with this position myself as well. This summer I was the 8th inning guy for the Mat-Su Miners of Palmer, Alaska in the Alaska Baseball League.

This year's bridge or set-up guys for the Buccos were lefties Tony Watson and Justin Wilson as well as righty ground ball specialist Jared Hughes. It was a new thing in 2014 for these guys becuase Mark Melancon (the current closer) had that role last year while former Pirate and current Angel Jason Grilli was in charge of the 9th inning.

Tony Watson had an incredible career year in 2014. He was selected to represent the Pirates in the All-Star Game which is extremly rare for a middle reliever. Watson racked up 77 1/3 innings pitched while holding a 1.63 era. He also only surrendered 64 hits in those innings while striking out 81 batters. A very, very soild 8th inning guy.

Pirates pitcher Tony Watson
photo courtsey:  mlb.com

Justin Wilson came back down to earth this year after a great 2013 season. Although he will not get a chance to retain form with the Pirates, as he was traded to the Yankees this offseason. The Yankess are going to be very pleased with the young flamethrowing lefty. I think he will definitley succeed in the AL East. Wilson ended the year with a 4.20 era. His problem was with the strike zone. He walked 30 batters in 60 innings pitched, which is not good.

Lastly is Jared Hughes. I have always liked Hughes, he is a ground ball pitcher like myself. He pitches with a lot of passion and it was great to see him really come into his own and succeed this year. Hughes had an impressive 1.96 era in 64 1/3 innings pitched this year.

***Overall Grade B+

Position Report Card: Starting Pitcher

Starting Pitching is very, very important for any club if they hope to be successful over the course of a 162 game season. For this post, I am going to focus on three of the Pirates starting pitchers this year, but factor all of the starters throughout the course of the year for the final grade.

Gerrit Cole, Edison Volquez, and Charlie Morton will be the three pitchers that I will breakdown for this post. This is a good variety because this year Cole was dominant, Volquez surprised us all, and Morton was inconsistent.

Gerrit Cole is a solidified ace, and the undoubted #1 of the Pirates pitching staff. He has electric stuff with a 95+ mph fastball, a good slider, and a nast change-up. This year, Cole went 11-5 with a 3.65 era, averaging 1 strikeout/inning with 138 in 138 innings pitched. Cole suffered from the injury bug a bit this year, otherwise he would have had more innings pitched.

Edison Volquez was the surprise of the Pirates staff this year. Arguably the Bucs most consistent arm, Volquez went 13-7 with a team leading 3.04 era in a team leading 192.2 innings pitched. In my opinion Volquez should have won comeback player of the year this season, but the voters must have thought otherwise.

Lastly is Charlie Morton. I 've said for the past few years the Morton has the best pitches on the team, and I still firmly believe that. He just suffers from wildness and bad fielding with all the ground balls he gets at times. Morton went 6-12 this season despite having a respectable 3.72 era. This just shows the lack of run support Morton recieves. Morton also suffered from the injury bug this year, spending some time on the disabled list with a hip injury. He was still able to compile 157.1 innings pitched though.

Overall, I give the Pirates starting pitching an ***A. Thier pitching coach Ray Searage is a mastermind and he continues to get the most out of lackluster names. The Pirates had quite a number of injuries this year and they were able to mange that as well. I t will be interesitng to see if they can once angain do it next year.

Pirates pitching coach Ray Searage (left) with Pirates picher Edison Volquez (right)
photo courtsey of the Bradeton Herald