Crystal Ball: Future Trade Targets v. 1.0

This is the beginning of a series that identifies potential trade targets for the Pirates in the future. Explained is the reasoning behind why the Pirates should look to make a big splash in the trade market in the next few years. This version of the series includes Dylan Bundy, Manny Machado, and Chris Sale.  Immediately after the jump is the primer I will use for the entire series.

External Transactions

Baseball is fairly unique.  Twenty-five players comprise a major league squad, but an organization has contractual control over significantly more than that amount.  They are prospects - players in the minor leagues.  Take a glance at a major league team today and a good portion of their players were in that teams farm system in the past.  That's one of the focuses of Buried Treasure - examining and evaluating the minor league system of the Pittsburgh Pirates because it's the lifeblood and foundation of the major league team.

Offseason: Potential Trade Targets v. 2.0

Drew Pomeranz: Potential Trade Target?

Here, I outlined a few players the Pirates could target in trades this offseason to help the team in 2013 and beyond. Since then, the baseball landscape has changed drastically thanks to a blockbuster trade between the Toronto Blue Jays and Miami Marlins.  As a result, I've put together a new list detailing players the Pirates should look to add via trade this offseason. Without a further ado, Offseason: Potential Trade Targets v. 2.0.

Offseason: Potential Trade Targets

Catcher of the future?

Last offseason, two trades stood out - at least they stood out to me - as major trades that reaped major dividends for the buyers.  The Cincinnati Reds traded away a package of prospects that included Yonder Alonso and Yasmani Grandal to acquire at least 4 years of service of stud pitcher Mat Latos.  The Washington Nationals sent A.J Cole, Derek Norris, Brad Peacock, and Tom Milone for Gio Gonzalez, who could win the National League Cy Young this year.

With the Pirates struggles with pitching during their second half collapse this year, it's natural to look to the trade market this offseason for pitching.  That said, their aren't too many great candidates like Latos and Gonzalez for the Pirates to go after.  Plus, the Pirates will have Burnett, Wandy, and James McDonald back next year.  McPherson, Locke, top prospect Gerrit Cole, along with veterans Jeff Karstens, Rick VandenHurk, and Chris Leroux give the Pirates plenty of options for the rotation.  Arguably shortstop and catcher are much more glaring holes.

However, if the Pirates do decide to go after pitchers in the offseason, here are a few candidates.

Castro's on the block...

Apparently the Chicago Cubs are in full-blow rebuilding mode. Celebrity GM Theo Epstein has come out and said that he'd be willing to hear offers for every Cub except pitcher Jeff Samardzija. This makes perfect sense since Theo wants to enter the Cubs into a company flag football league and he's banking on Samardzija to be the team's star. Go Irish! No, honestly I don't understand why he's the "untouchable" North Sider. Don't get me wrong, Samardzija is a good young pitcher. At the same time, he's not that good (4.04 career ERA) and he's not that young (27). Anyway, that's not really the point. Even though I'm pretty surprised about who Theo is protecting, I'm more interested in looking at one of the guys that is apparently now on the market. Starlin Castro. Castro is a good young player. He led the Senior Circuit in hits last season as a fresh-faced 21 year old. He's also a shortstop. At first glance, he looks like he'd be a perfect fit for a Pirates team that has been disastrous at the plate and has given 151 plate appearances to Clint Barmes. What I'd like to do is see just how much a young player like Castro would cost and try to figure out whether he'd be a good target for the Pirates.

Andrew McCutchen's trade value

Before people totally lose their minds, I am not advocating this move. I don't think it will happen and I am not saying that the front office was just trying to build up McCutchen's trade value so they can ship him off to the highest bidder. However, since I have seen a few people mention this and considering how McCutchen's enormous trade value was a hotly discussed topic before the extension, I figured I'd at least crunch the numbers and see what I came up with.

How Foreign the Game of Baseball is Sometimes

Even to so-called "experts."  I will admit right now that I'm about to pick on a writer by cherry-picking (pickity, pick, pick) on one thing he wrote, but onward I plunge.

In this article ESPNNewYork.com writer Wallance Matthews writes about the pending AJ Burnett trade between the Yankees and Pirates.  I'll go ahead of give Mr. Matthews the benefit of the doubt here and assume he's informed and intelligent when it comes to baseball, but even so, he manages to offer up this gem a little past halfway into the article.

Why the Pirates Shouldn't Trade Andrew McCutchen

The rumors are persistent.  Andrew McCutchen, the face of Pittsburgh Pirates franchise, is a potential trade commodity.  To his credit, Neal Huntington has done his plenty to try and dispel the rumors regarding McCutchen being on the trade block.  At the same time, Huntington hasn't fully dispelled the rumors, stating recently that he wouldn't trade his star player, unless there was a 'dramatic overpay.'

Technically, Neal Huntington is 'right.'  If Mike Rizzo of the Nationals loses his mind and calls Neal with an offer of Stephen Strasburg, Jordan Zimmermann, Bryce Harper and Anthony Rendon (the definition of an 'overpay') for McCutchen, Neal accepts before Rizzo can come to his senses. Despite that, by not saying 'Our superstar is untouchable, period' Huntington leaves the door up for some uncertainty, which is amplified by the fact that extension talks have went nowhere so far.

Interactive Discussion: Prospect Swap

I'd love to get some feedback and discussion here on my site and as I mulled how to do that, an idea popped into my mind. Prospects! Everyone loves prospects.  Then another idea popped into my head.  Trades! Everyone also loves trades.  So I decided to combine the two ideas.

In baseball, prospect swaps rarely happen. We just one, kinda, in the Montero-Pineda swap, although technically neither were prospects at the time. Another one, again kinda, was the Rizzo for Cashner swap. Even more rare are prospect swaps for low level minor leaguers.  Theories on why would be the relative 'safety' of doing nothing and the fact that teams have a much better gauge on their own players, so swaps involving low level minor league baseball prospects rarely happen.

Reaction: Pirates trade Jose Veras for Casey McGehee

On Monday, the Pirates made perhaps their biggest move of the offseason.  In a trade that came out of nowhere, the Pirates sent reliever Jose Veras to Milwaukee in exchange for infielder Casey McGehee.  I break down the trade and offer my opinion after the jump.