There have been developments over the last several days on the future of the middle infield, and the status of Miguel Angel Sano.  There’s still nothing major on either front, but its enough that it’s worth putting my thoughts into words.

The Sano situation is an interesting one, and its not something I’ve wrote much about so far, mostly because I don’t want to get myself too excited about anything until he is officially a Pirate.  Well in recent days that has become much, much more likely.  A few days ago, Jorge Arangure of ESPN tweeted that he thinks “it’s 90 percent” the Pirates sign Sano.  That’s when I started to get rather excited, but all of this still hinged on Major League Baseball completing their age investigation and confirming he is in fact 16.  Given the Bucs had already conducted a bone graft that confirmed he was between 16 and 17, that seemed like a foregone conclusion to me .  Now that stumbling block is out of the way.  Sport Illustrated is reporting that MLB has in fact completed its age investigation, and DK says that it will be announced Tuesday or Wednesday.

So where does that leave us.  In short, let the negotiations begin.  In addition to Pittsburgh, The Twins and Orioles have both been linked to Sano.  And no doubt, now that the age investigation is complete, there will be more teams throwing their hats (and money) in the ring.

Whats nice is that the Pirates have an inside track.   They have a long standing relationship with the player, his family, and perhaps most importantly his agent.  I don’t want to put words into his mouth, but this is probably at least partially why Arangure says the Pirates are 90% to sign him.

This would be huge.  It’s not that I think Sano is a sure thing, at 16 no one is.  There’s a lot that can happen between 16 and The Show.  But what makes this so impactful, and its not a surprise really, is that management is finally spending the big dollars in the international market.  Unlike the major league free agent market, signing international players at a young age is one way that small to mid market teams can gain a competitive advantage over the big boys.  This type of stuff never happened under Dave Littlefield.  I guess what I’m saying is that this is another huge step in the right direction.

The other big development, and I linked to the news of it yesterday, is that the Pirates have extended contract offers to both Jack Wilson and Freddy Sanchez.  Since that development, its come out that these offers were of the low ball variety.  Quoting DK:

The offer to Wilson, according to two sources, covers two years plus a club option. No money terms were divulged, but it was seen as competitive even though it represented a significant cut from his current $7.4 million salary. Wilson would prefer three guaranteed years.

But the initial offer to Sanchez, also made yesterday, was for two years and a total believed to be in the range of $10 million. That would represent a cut from his current salary of $6.25 million and, more striking, the total is $2 million more than the $8 million Sanchez is set to make in 2010 alone under the vesting option in his current contract, one that would be annulled under the Pirates’ proposal.

Sanchez is on a comfortable pace to achieve the 600 plate appearances necessary to trigger that option.

What this really means is that the Pirates are making a legitimate effort to re-sign Jack, but not quite doing the same with Freddy.  Signed or not, this has to be resolved in the next few days such that trade offers can continue to be fielded.  With all of this being said, I’m going to stick by what I wrote the other day in part 2 of my first half wrap up.  Freddy Sanchez is almost certain to be traded.  If the pirates offer negates that 8 million dollar option, without giving up something in return, Sanchez would be crazy to sign it, thus sealing his fate.  Jack will be kept in a scenario where no major league ready shortstop can be acquired via a trade.  My guess is that Neal Huntington and company do not expect to get a shortstop prospect in a trade, and therefore are making an effort to re-sign Jack.

Last, I’d like to discuss Garrett Jones real fast.  Jones is already 28, and as I said when we traded Nyjer Morgan, guys that old don’t tend to get much better.  I’m leery to get excited here because players who come up at 28, with just a stale cup of coffee at 26, don’t have a track record of being impact talent at the big league level.  But what he’s done so far is beyond impressive.  .313/.365/.833 for an OPS of almost 1.200.  Add to that 7 home runs and 3 stolen bases in just 12 games and its hard to ignore how well he has played since being called up.  Numbers like that are just as useful to the bottom line when they comes from a  28 year old as they are when they come from a 22 year old.  The tear Jones is currently on is unsustainable, so he’s sure to cool off.  But if he can give us solid power production and steal a few bases he could certainly play a corner outfield position or even take first base if and when Adam LaRoche is traded.  Call me cautiously optimistic.