Reading between the lines, November 29 edition

Jen Langosch, on the Pirates’ Winter Meetings agenda

The club’s top priority is finding a first baseman, as the Pirates’ only current internal options are Garrett Jones and Matt Hague. There would be significant risk going into 2012 with either as the team’s everyday option. Jones has never hit well against left-handed pitching. Hague, on the other hand, has yet to make his Major League debut.

There’s nothing technically wrong with this, of course, as first base is a position that the Pirates seriously need to upgrade, but it does imply that the club’s top priority is not improving the starting rotation. The starting rotation that is currently comprised of James McDonald, Jeff Karstens, an injured Charlie Morton, Brad Lincoln, and Kevin Correia. 

The Pirates have showed some interest in upgrading their rotation, though to this point the only name I’ve seen them attached to is Aaron Cook. I’ve got a gut feeling that doing nothing at all might be preferrable to signing Aaron Cook. 

About Pat Lackey

In 2005, I started a WHYGAVS instead of working on organic chemistry homework. Many years later, I've written about baseball and the Pirates for a number of sites all across the internet, but WHYGAVS is still my home. I still haven't finished that O-Chem homework, though.

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