Pittsburgh Pirates: There's Always Next... Decade?

In July of ’99, they sent Jose Guillen to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays for Joe Oliver and Humberto Cota.

Two years later, they sent Schmidt (and John Vander Wal) to the Giants for Armando Rios and Ryan Vogelsong. Rios was out of the league two years later, while Schmidt twice finished in the top-five for Cy Young voting with the Giants.

Now, in 2003—11 years after their last winning season—the Pirates made another deadline deal, and this one probably takes the cake for the worst trade of all. They sent third baseman Aramis Ramirez (and Kenny Lofton, I might add) to the Cubs for Jose Hernandez, Bobby Hill, and minor leaguer Matt Bruback. 

Hernandez played 58 games for the Pirates that year and was gone for good. Hill played 126 games for the Pirates in 2004, batting .266 with 27 RBI. He would be gone a year later. I don’t need to remind baseball fans about whether or not Aramis Ramirez has been good since the trade.

The one good deal they made was trading their star, Brian Giles, to the Padres in return for Jason Bay and Oliver Perez. While Perez faded after his first year (which was brilliant) in Pittsburgh, it was worth it just to get Bay for Giles.

But that’s only one good deal after dozens of bad ones.

Through all of those years, they said goodbye to Jason Schmidt, Aramis Ramirez, Brian Giles, Esteban Loaiza, Tony Womack, Jon Lieber, and Jose Guillen. Today, they have Jason Bay to show for it. 

On top of that, they released Tim Wakefield, Bronson Arroyo was picked up by the Red Sox on waivers, and Gary Matthews Jr. was sold to the New York Mets.

After all of those years of holding onto Jason Kendall and refusing to trade their overrated catcher, they traded him to Oakland before the 2005 season for Mark Redman, Arthur Rhodes, and cash. Rhodes never pitched for the Pirates, and Redman went 5-15 in his one season there. I hope they spent the cash wisely.

The Pirates are a team that completely changes from year to year. The only sure thing about the players is that they will get dealt when it appears they will become too expensive. 

Ryan Doumit is the third starting catcher since Kendall’s departure. 

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