About Those Players The Pirates Didn’t Get At Trade Deadline

The Pittsburgh Pirates have been in first place for 38 days.  Doesn’t feel that way does it?  The team is 3-7 in their past ten games after putting up five straight wins and nine of eleven.  The team was in the middle of a number of possible moves at the trade deadline.

None happened.  The price was too steep.  Sometimes that’s a good thing.

Spurred by the similar rumors about the Padres Chase Headley last season, and then looking at just how awful his numbers are this season, we thought we’d take a peak at a couple of the players the team was in rumors about a few weeks ago.  You know, what the hell?

Alex Rios has a double, a triple and has driven in two runs since being traded from the Chicago White Sox to the Texas Rangers.  In the nine games since the trade was made, Rios has ten hits in 37 at-bats with a walk and six strikeouts.  The 6’5″ right fielders former team has been playing well in the ten games since moving one of their high priced players.

The Rangers were playing well despite numerous injuries winning 14 in their past 20 games.  The team is closing in on their high water mark on the season as they shoot for 20 games over .500 tonight.

Texas acquired Rios with cash considerations in exchange for the famous player to be named later which was Leury Garcia.  Rios has hits in seven of the nine games.  Overall, he has hit safely in 16 of last 18 and is hitting .296 in the 28 games since the All-Star break.

The player we thought might be a nice fit has not been hitting the bombs like he was hitting when we wrote this post.

Figures.

Raul Ibanez hit his first home run in 90 plate appearances against the Tampa Bay Rays a few days ago.  Still, he is tied for eighth in the American League with 25 homers and tenth in slugging with a .507 slugging percentage.

The Mariners are an interesting bunch.  We are positive it was Seattle that was talking with the Bucs about trades before they started to win.  With some of the executives in the final year of their deal, the talks went silent when the numbers in the left column started climbing.  But Seattle is just 14-15 since the ASG.

The consistency attracted us as this is the 13th consecutive season Ibanez has hit at least ten homers.  He is the first player in MLB history to hit 20 bombs before the All-Star Game in an age 40-or-older season.

Kendrys Morales was another name buzzing around the trade deadline.  Morales is second on the Mariners team with 46 extra base hits and has put together 37 multi-hit games.  Since the All-Star break. Morales is hitting .322 with seven doubles and three homers while driving in 12 runs.

Morales might have been the best of the bunch, despite being the one talked about the least.