Pirates May Have Traded Brains Away, Too

I came across this wonderful article on ESPN.com this morning which recounts the Pirates players' reaction to the McLouth trade.

While it makes sense for players to be upset after losing a teammate who was in his fifth season with the club, the outrage towards management that some of the team had was ludicrous.

""Wow," second baseman Freddy Sanchez said Thursday of the trade, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "I think the biggest thing was the shock factor. It's obviously a tough pill to swallow. Our No. 3 hitter just got taken away, the guy who leads our team in home runs and RBI, and we were 6½ games out. We could still have been right there. I think we still can. But we're all just kind of wondering right now...wondering what it is.""

First, I would like to acknowledge that Freddy Sanchez is delusional if he thinks the Pirates could win the division or the wild card this season, especially with the lineup they had pre-trade.

Second, the Pirates traded for prospects who will actually make it possible for the team to win a divisional crown in a few years time. As my blogmate Nate pointed out, the Pirates got three of the four players who were demanded in the proposed trade for Peavy.

That's pretty impressive, especially for Nate McLouth. While this trade may not lock up a division title some time in the future, it does definitely help move towards it. Too bad Sanchez doesn't do his homework, because I'm sure it would quell his fears.

But wait, there's more!

""There ain't a guy in here who ain't [ticked] off about it," said first baseman Adam LaRoche, according to the report. "It's kind of like being with your platoon in a battle, and guys keep dropping around you. You keep hanging on, hanging on, and you've got to figure: How much longer until you sink?

"It's fine. Heck with it. We're not the GM. We don't run the team. If they feel like it's the best move for three or four years from now, great," LaRoche said, according to the report. "Unfortunately, that does me no good. I've still got to be in here telling guys it's going to be fine with Nate gone. Well, you can only do that for so long until guys just kind of ... well, they know.""

Alright, can we please stop with the war and sports references? Sure, sports may be a modern-day replacement for gladiator games and tribal warfare, but it's not like war, it's a replacement. Please...stop.

Also, things will be fine without McLouth. Andrew McCutchen is now starting in Center Field and is leading off. He has a consistent bat, showcases fantastic speed and is a better fielder with a far superior arm over McLouth.

Additionally, if your teammates are going to "you know" then that says a lot about your faith in the rest of the team to pick up the slack.

It's defeatist attitudes like that, that kill team morale and sink seasons. If you fail, Pittsburgh, it's a mixture of common sense and attitudes like that.

Then we come to the greatest part of this article, this is the point where I reread the entire thing and started to think the entire roster needs to get its collective head checked.

"On Thursday, at the clubhouse table where McLouth used to play cards with relievers Sean Burnett and Jesse Chavez, a candle bearing McLouth's uniform No. 13 was lit, along with a photo of him in uniform, the Post-Gazette reported. "We'll miss him," Burnett said."

This can't be real. This just cannot be real. A candle? Really? Apparently in Pittsburgh if you get traded that's the equivalent of dying. Although, I understand how being traded could be mistakable with death.

You know, moving on to a team with a shot of finishing above .500 and making the playoffs? I guess to Pirates personnel that sounds like Heaven.

So with the complete collapse that the players seemed to be predicting, one would assume it came to fruition on the field yesterday right?

Well it didn't, the Pirates won the game 11-6 and finished off a sweep of the Mets. Also McLouth's replacement, Andrew McCutchen, went 2-for-4, with an RBI and scored three times. Not bad for a first game.

Oh well, maybe this was just a hiccup on the road to ruin.

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