Hanrahan And Ohlendorf Tendered By Pirates

The Pittsburgh Pirates tendered Joel Hanrahan

and Ross Ohlendorf.   We are happy about that, real happy.  But the contracts that Hanrahan and Ohlendorf will sign in the coming months will be very different.  Hanrahan had a breakout 2010 season, Ohlendrof was mostly broken in 2010.

Hanrahan is one of the players that made Pirates baseball enjoyable in 2010.  Remember that first save opportunity this past seasonwhen the AC/DC intro music was played rather than Joel’s favorite  band Slipknot?  Dejan asked him about it here:

Hanrahan scared us shitless in spring training when his injury was reported, but he bounced back.  In a big way.  Getting paid couldn’t happen to a better guy.  We trust he gets a big bump in pay for his efforts.  Hanrahan made $453,000 last season.

In case you might not know, what being tendered means is basically this:  an agreement to go to arbitration will occur if the team and the player can’t come to an agreement on a contract.  The Bucs people, Hanrahans people and Ohlendorfs people have until January 18 to get a deal done.

If not, each side would trade salary numbers and can continue negotiations until an abritration hearing would be scheduled in February.   We trust it doesn’t take that long to get deals done with two solid individuals both on and off the field.

Ohlendorf, who made a grand more than Hanrahan,  $439,000 in 2010, will also see an increase in pay.  We doubt he will see as large an increase  because of his forgettable 2010.  But one thing to remember is the fact that GM Neal Huntington went on the record saying that Ohlendorf deserved to win more games, the Bucs didn’t score runs for him.  Ohlendorf will certainly appreciate that should the two sides need to go to arbitration.

We like the fact that Huntington came out in support of Ohlendorf, that doesn’t always happen in these situations.  Players appreciate honesty and arbitration can sometimes get a little personal.  A comment by the GM such as Neal made will be appreciated by Ohlendorf we’re just not certain Bob Nutting will approve.