I took an extended break from writing over the Christmas holiday, so this post is going to be sort of a roundup of all the comings and goings while I was gone in addition to a look ahead at the 2010 Pirates bullpen.  Of note in the past week:

• The Pirates signed former Phillies pitcher Jack Taschner to a minor league contract
• Former Pirates closer Matt Capps signed a 1 year deal with the Nationals
• There heave been talks with, but no offers to, Octavio Dotel and Kevin Gregg

Lets start with Taschner, mostly because that’s the simplest piece of news.  He was signed to a minor league deal with an invite to spring training.  Basically, he is a middling relief pitcher who walks too many guys (His baseball-reference page can be found here), but with very little set for the Pirates 2010 bullpen, I wouldn’t be surprised if he is pitching meaningful innings come April.

Moving on, the Capps thing has been analyzed to death at this point, but I’ll beat the dead horse just a bit more.  The contract he ended up signing with the Nats was for $3.5 Million, or about half a million more than the value the Pirates had on him.  He also had similar offers from the Cubs and Mets, so it would seem that his “market” value is $3.5 Million, not $3 Million, but only time will tell if his performance on the mound justifies that $3.5 Million dollar salary.  In their defense I will say this;  No matter how well or poorly Capps pitches this season and beyond, this move is not going to have a lot of impact on bottom line wins and losses this year, or for the long term future of the Pirates.  Based on WAR, he was a 2 win player in his best seasons, and below replacement this past year, so this is not the move to lose sleep over.

Now that Capps is officially gone, who is going to set-up and close for the Pirates in 2010?  The last piece of news could be part of that picture.  In the last week the Pirates have been talking with 2 of the few remaining closers on the free agent market in Octavio Dotel and Kevin Gregg.  Both of these are still in the very early stages, and the Pirates have yet to make an offer to either.  Additionally, it seems unlikely they would bring in both. In addition to Gregg and Dotel, there are the internal options for late inning duty, Joel Hanrahan and Evan Meek.

Comprehensive statistical analysis this is not, but among the group I only see Hanrahan as being a capable closer at this point in their careers.  Gregg was below replacement level in ‘09, losing the Cubs closers job to a pitcher who walked 65 batters in 74 innings, Carlos Marmol.  Dotel had a nice ‘09 season for the White Sox, post a 3.32 ERA and a 3.88 FIP in 62.1 innings.  That being said, will be 36 this year and hasn’t closed since ‘07 so I’d like to think there’s a reason for that.  Meek, the former rule five draft pick, will certainly be in the mix to set up and close.  He has a solid strikeout rate, gets a lot of ground balls and appears to have the demeanor to eventually close.  I just have a feeling that he and the tema would be better server to wait another year or two to thrust him into that role.  That leaves only Hanrahan.  He does have a closer’s pedigree having closed for the Nationals early in ‘09 and for Team USA in the baseball World Cup.  He also was excellent in black and gold late last summer after coming over from the Nationals as part of the Nyjer Morgan deal.  Seemingly, the only thing holding him back from the closer’s job is the Front Office’s desire to have him hone his breaking pitchers  bit more before he returns to 9th inning duty.  That line of thinking is laid out here on the PBC blog.  Surely, before the year is out Joel Hanrahan will get a shot at closing, though it is unlikely to come to start the year.  That job will likely go to Gregg, Dotel, or some other as yet unknown outside option.

Tags: bullpen, Jack Taschner, Kevin Gregg, Matt Capps, Octavio Dotel