I was originally going to write about what I’ve learned on this site over the last ten years, following up on the responses from Wilbur Miller and John Dreker this weekend. However, a big rumor dropped last night that I wanted to discuss. I’ll have that other article tomorrow morning.
#Mets and #Pirates recently reopened Starling Marte trade talks, sources said. A deal is not believed to be close at this time. #DBacks were among teams interested earlier this offseason.
— Robert Murray (@ByRobertMurray) January 19, 2020
Analysis: This is the third time we’ve heard that the Pirates and Mets were talking about Marte, but that a deal wasn’t close. What we can take away here is that we only need six more “Pirates/Mets are talking about Marte” rumors before we get a free “The teams have exchanged names” rumor. Be sure to collect your stamps.
SONG OF THE DAY
You know what? It really didn’t take that long to break down what the newest Marte rumor means. So let’s go ahead and do that other article topic.
WHAT I WISH I KNEW TEN YEARS AGO
By Tim Williams
Audiobook reading by Dave Littlefield
bucswsbound: Kind of a broad question relating more to the wisdom and knowledge of the writers: Pirates Prospects has been doing this for 10+ years now. With respect to understanding the general trend of a system (is it producing bats? is it producing arms? is it on the cutting edge of health and injury limitation? Is it on the cutting edge of data usage?) and the abilities of specific players, what have you learned that you wish you knew 10+ years ago? Are there specific things that you will look for in the new regime that will give you some sense of ‘Yes this is different than how the old regime did it.’? Are there red flags you are on the lookout for that would suggest, ‘This is how the old regime did it.’?
What did I learn that I wish I knew ten years ago?
The Dunning Kruger effect.
The chart above explains the Dunning Kruger effect. The summary, from a lazy Google search:
Coined in 1999 by then-Cornell psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger, the eponymous Dunning-Kruger Effect is a cognitive bias whereby people who are incompetent at something are unable to recognize their own incompetence.
This idea has been around for a long time, but I didn’t first hear about it until a year ago. Instantly it provided a perfect description of my arc on this site. Let’s break it down.
I KNOW EVERYTHING (2009-2010)
I started a site to follow the prospects in the Pirates’ system, then decided I could produce a book with reports on each player after seeing maybe 20% of the system.
Most of this was out of desperation and necessity. I didn’t have a job for most of this time. I was trying to break out of my two-star town. I loved baseball and wanted to remain working as a sports writer after an illustrious 16 month career of fantasy sports and simulation analysis writing.
To be honest, during this time period I was in the midst of a lifetime of untreated depression and social anxiety. I don’t think I ever had a thought along the lines of “I know everything.” So I had that going for me.
Fortunately, I figured out how to fake it until I made it.
THERE’S MORE TO THIS THAN I THOUGHT (2011)
Following the release of the book, I went down to Spring Training for a week. That was the first time I received credentials from the team, and I was able to get a lot of interviews. The biggest ones that opened my eyes were my initial talks with Jameson Taillon and Jim Benedict about pitching and development.
This blends into the next part, but I figured I’d share a link I found from the archives, for my final post from that trip. Key part that still applies today:
As long as you keep reading, I’ll do my best to provide you with interesting content, and that won’t be ending with the end of Spring Training.
I’M NEVER GOING TO UNDERSTAND THIS (2012-14)
The biggest help I had in the early days were conversations with Jim Benedict and Jameson Taillon about pitching. The more I talked to them, the more I realized how much goes into just this one aspect of the game. I had similar discussions with hitting coaches and fielding coaches.
Pitching came easier to me for some reason. Even then, I always was overwhelmed by how much I didn’t know, and how much information I had to catch up on.
Hitting and fielding didn’t come as easy to me. To put all of this in perspective, I felt like I had 10% knowledge of pitching, and less than 5% for the other two, and I had a long way to go to 100.
I credit Benedict and Taillon specifically because their conversations led to a better understanding of the game, allowing me to dive deeper and know how to ask the right questions to get good development information.
I’ve found that players can be guarded toward those types of questions, but if you know how to speak “the language” you can get more detailed information. That led to the next part.
IT’S STARTING TO MAKE SENSE (2014-)
In the spring of 2014, I was walking around the clubhouse with a baseball, asking every pitcher how they threw their sinkerball, what kind of grip they used, and the key development tips they received over the years. It led to one of my favorite articles.
It also led to a massive understanding of that single pitch. I’ve since had conversations about the changeup, curveball, slider, and other pitches. I haven’t done a follow-up article in a similar fashion, but I was planning an article on the changeup.
That was in 2017. In the early days of Spring Training, I spotted a new grip in the bullpen from Tyler Glasnow. I went back and looked, and discovered he added a changeup. I wrote about that, then had a conversation with Jameson Taillon about some changeup adjustments he made the year before. That’s when I learned he had a new changeup as well.
That launched the biggest story topic of early Spring Training that year. Everyone was writing about Glasnow’s new changeup. Reporters were asking every pitcher “Do you have a new changeup?” Clint Hurdle was getting more annoyed each day at the questions about the new trend with changeups.
It killed any chance I had of completing my changeup story, which is probably for the best. I’d be embarrassed today at how much praise I would have put on Felipe Vazquez.
But it also provided some validation. I can do this. I can see what outsiders to the game can’t see. I’ve finally started to figure it all out.
TRUST ME. IT’S COMPLICATED (The Next Day)
The next day I’m feeling good. I’m watching Mitch Keller throwing at Pirate City, looking forward to an article on Keller to follow-up the articles to Glasnow and Taillon.
Pirates pitching coordinator Scott Mitchell walks up to me by the fence watching Keller.
“So you spotted Glasnow’s grip from a photo?” he asked in a way where it sounded like a difficult or uncommon thing to do.
“Yeah. I didn’t recognize the grip, looked through my photo archives, didn’t see anything similar, and knew he had something new,” was probably the variation of the surprised explanation I provided.
“What do you see here?” Mitchell asked, turning his attention to Keller who was delivering a pitch.
I look at Keller. I don’t know what the hell Mitchell is talking about. I don’t see anything.
“What am I looking for?”
“You tell me.”
Fuck my life, I thought. I don’t know a god damned thing.
And since learning about the Dunning Kruger effect, my entire approach in everything in life, but especially with baseball, is to always assume I’m on that first slope.
If I’m feeling confident about my knowledge of a subject, I assume I don’t know shit, and I’m progressing to a state of never being able to understanding anything.
Even if I might consider myself on the right side of the “Expert” chart above, I know that an expert is only someone who knows enough to know that no one will know everything. Especially in a sport that sees massive changes by the year that make all previous knowledge invalid.
So what do I wish I knew ten years ago?
Everything.
But more important, the knowledge that you’ll never get close to learning everything about a subject.
DAILY QUIZ
RANDOM STUFF OF THE DAY
This is my life.
https://www.facebook.com/nathanwpyle2/photos/a.1377156059035720/2658904994194147/?type=3&__xts__%5B0%5D=68.ARCv7_-TWt4OAGT_iYjHwj2b16dRWMfZLjtKebZsrjPNeXfLMjUYolxOuEohddirhnz3cXxpD5jRyxNfDQwbb7VOUfLLeKYTDrQN45OLsz7C96m1ROUGhYpXh0k3ebFvlzWdip27O40IJwZNo3ndYX0okD5VcwLTZrSpKMnePH3cSycLpMcu_D62hFT4xxD1QMuNGQ3mz9JN-4KAGGcYonGu3CaF4aZ44ErFg2lDt0SEtGmnJoDHd_zlb5aEPkt9AugUEMHdZcLjdzJQaLHxW4BPqwRSqmFiSKCDDZbiwKltB-hyKeunVPWaweHPBPpqQ0HFW7vFyV-YLwQ8A4Oxkkd7_A&__tn__=-R
THIS DATE IN PIRATES HISTORY
By John Dreker
Two former Pittsburgh Pirates born on this date and one major trade of note.
On this date in 2007 the Pittsburgh Pirates traded relief pitcher Mike Gonzalez and minor leaguer Brett Lillibridge to the Atlanta Braves in exchange for first baseman Adam LaRoche and minor leaguer Jamie Romak. Gonzalez had pitched out of the Pirates bullpen for four seasons and in 2006 he took over the closer role, where he saved 24 games with a 2.17 ERA in 54 innings. During the 2004 season the lefty had a 1.25 ERA in 47 games. Lillibridge was a fourth round draft pick of the Pirates in 2005, who split the 2006 season between low-A and high-A, hitting a combined .305 with 87 walks and 53 stolen bases. LaRoche was 27 years old at the time of the trade and he had just come off a season in which he hit .285 with 32 homers and 90 RBIs. Romak was 21 years old with four minor league seasons already. He hit .247 with 16 homers in 2006 in low-A ball.
For the Braves, Gonzalez pitched only 18 games before he was diagnosed with a muscle tear that required Tommy John surgery. He didn’t return until June 18, 2008 and had a 4.28 ERA with 14 saves in 33.2 innings. He pitched well in 2009 before leaving via free agency. Lillibridge was rushed to the majors in 2008, hitting .200 in 29 games. In that off-season he was traded to the White Sox in a six-player deal for Javier Vazquez. In 2011 he hit .258 with 13 homers in 97 games for the White Sox. Romak played three seasons in the Pirates system, topping out at Double-A before he was released. He signed with the Royals and has spent the last two seasons at Double-A . LaRoche played with the Pirates until the 2009 trading deadline. He hit .272 with 88 RBIs in 2007, then followed it up with a .270, 25 homer, 85 RBI season. In 2009 he was hitting .247 with 12 homers through 87 games when the Pirates traded him to the Red Sox for minor leaguers Argenis Diaz and Hunter Strickland. He played with four teams after leaving the Pirates.
Chris Stynes, third baseman for the 2004 Pirates. He had played nine seasons in the majors with five different teams when he signed with the Pirates on January 4, 2004 as a free agent. In 2003 with the Colorado Rockies he set career highs in games (138), doubles (31) and RBIs (73), but hit just .255 and had a huge home/road split, batting .291 with ten homers at Coors Field and .218 with one homer on the road. For the Pirates he hit .216 with one homer and 16 RBIs in 74 games before he was released on August 4, 2004. In 71 games at third base that season he made just one error. He signed with the Orioles for the 2005 season but his year ended in Spring Training when he broke his leg with a foul ball. He was a career .275 hitter in 828 major league games
Scott Little, outfielder for the 1989 Pirates. Scott was a seventh round draft pick of the 1984 Mets, who came to the Pirates along with Al Pedrique in exchange for Bill Almon on May 29, 1987. He started the 1987 season in Double-A for the Mets, but was sent to high-A prior to the trade, then stayed there with the Pirates. In 1988 he played at Double-A and hit .290 with 52 RBIs and 27 steals in 118 games. While in Triple-A in 1989, Little was called up in late July and made his MLB debut on July 27th as a pinch-hitter. A week later he got his second at-bat in a pinch-hit role and then on August 6th he came into the game in the 14th inning, going into RF during a double switch. In the 17th inning Scott picked up his first Major League hit, a line drive single to left field on the first pitch. Four pitches later on a fly ball to right field by Junior Ortiz, Little was doubled off first base for an inning ending double play. He was back in the minors right after that game and played with the Pirates in Triple-A through the 1991 season, never making the majors again. Little has managed 15 seasons in the minors since retiring as a player, six of them in the Pirates system.
