On one hand, there is nothing confusing about the Pittsburgh Pirates. They are a losing team and have been a losing team for more than a decade and a half. In fact, they are on the brink of breaking a major league record with their 17th consecutive losing season.
On the other, they are one of the most confounding teams in the majors. They trade players before they have to sign them to expensive contracts, they trade players after they sign them to mildly expensive contracts and they trade players whose contracts are still under their control.
At different times under different general managers and different managements, the Pirates have traded their most promising young players, belying the idea that they are building from within by developing good young players. The Pirates have developed good young players, but they have developed them for other teams.
In the first week of June and again last week, the Pirates made trades that prompted their fans, as well as officials of other teams, to say, “There they go again.”
With the two deals the Pirates wiped out two-thirds of their young starting outfield, sending center fielder Nate McLouth to Atlanta and left fielder Nyjer Morgan to Washington. Morgan, 29, was at least two years away from salary arbitration and five years from free agency. McLouth, 27, signed a three-year, $15.75 million contract last February.
The twin trades fit the pattern the Pirates have followed throughout their losing years. The Pirates have changed front-office regimes several times in that period, but their practice has remained the same. The below-30 players the current regime traded a year ago were Jason Bay and Xavier Nady.
“It’s pretty simple,” Frank Coonelly, the Pirates’ president, said, explaining the McLouth and Morgan trades. “We need more premier talent here. In Nate we had a player highly sought by Atlanta and we had an opportunity to get three high-ceilinged players for the future. We weren’t looking to move Nate, but the opportunity arose.”
