Link: Interview With The Wingman Of The Pirates GM

We got a note today from Yankeeist regarding an excellent interview with Alex Langsam, who works in the front office of the Pittsburgh Pirates as Baseball Operations Assistant.  Alex reports directly to Pirates GM Neal Huntington.

In the interview, Alex

touches on everything from whether we’ll ever see wOBA show up on stadium scoreboards to when we might see some of the Pirates’ young phenoms hit the Bigs to what year the Pirates will return to the playoffs.

One caveat — this interview was conducted prior to the recent news regarding the Pirates’ financial documents and the status of GM Neal Huntington, and so those topics are not covered.   For the record, Alex actually grew up a Yankee fan.   What?

Here is a sneak peek and go here to check out the interview on Yankeeist. 

"Yankeeist: Jameson Taillon and Stetson Allie are obviously tremendously exciting, super high-ceiling prospects, and if all goes well could be anchors in the Pittsburgh rotation for years to come. How quickly do you see them getting through the system? Could we see Taillon in the rotation in a year? How does the front office feel about its 2010 draft class?AL: To answer the last part of the question first, we’re extremely excited about the 2010 draft. Obviously Taillon and Allie head the bill for us and are getting most of the attention, but we’re also excited about a lot of the other players that we’ve added to the system. With the press and media hype that comes with a #2 overall pick, I think some of our other, later draft picks fly under the radar, but I know our scouting staff puts a tremendous amount of work into selections #1 – #50.As to their path to the big leagues, our farm director, Kyle Stark, has really put that burden back onto all of our minor league players. These draft picks – as well as all of our minor league players – will dictate their own path based on their performance on and off the field and their ability to develop the traits and skills we see necessary to excel in the Major Leagues. I don’t think they’ll operate within a “timeline” of any kind, even though that question gets asked a lot because of their advanced abilities when compared to other HS arms. It doesn’t take a scout to note that there’s a big difference between High School baseball and the Major Leagues, and even the most advanced arms – guys like Josh Beckett, Clayton Kershaw, Madison Bumgarner – were not ready to join a Major League rotation in their first year of professional ball."