Pittsburgh Pirates: Best Offseason Addition Was Not a Player

While it’s been a slow offseason, the Pittsburgh Pirates have made a big off the field addition to the organization

Let’s all be honest, this offseason has been boring for the Pittsburgh Pirates and most of MLB. Aside from the week leading up to the beginning of the work stoppage, where we saw some substantial buzzer-beater deals, nothing else has happened because of the lockout.

The Pittsburgh Pirates showed some activity by re-signing Yoshi Tsutsugo and adding José Quintana to one-year contracts, as well as trading Jacob Stallings for three players, including a former first-round pick and MLB-ready arm.

The most significant addition the Pirates may make the entire offseason isn’t going to be a player. It will be part of the front office and player personnel department, director of pitching development Dewey Robinson.

Robinson formerly played with the Chicago White Sox from 1979 through 1981. While he never made it as a MLB pitcher, he has carved out an excellent career as a pitching developer. Robinson eventually became part of the White Sox minor league coaching staff in the late-80’s and was their bullpen coach during the 1993-1994 seasons.

The former pitcher eventually joined the Houston Astros in 1997. In 1998, Robinson was named the organization’s player development man of the year. A decade later, he had worked his way up to being Houston’s pitching coach, that being in 2008-2009.

The Astros were a quality pitching team while Robinson was part of their organization. From 1998 through 2004 the Astros had a team ERA of 4.15, FIP of 4.19, and fWAR of 124.7. All of those ranked top 6 or better in the MLB. The only notable stat that the Astros weren’t top 2 among National League teams was ERA, where they still placed at 5th.

Following the 2009 season Robinson joined the Tampa Bay Rays, becoming a minor league pitching instructor. Obviously, you don’t need stats to know that the Rays churn out pitching better than almost any other team, maybe except for the Cleveland Indians.

I can name about 20 quality arms the Rays have produced over the last decade off the top of my head. David Price, Blake Snell, Jake Odorizzi, Alex Cobb, Yonny Chirinos, Matt Moore, Jake McGee, James Shields, Matt Moore, Ryan Yarborough, Alex Colome, Andrew Kittredge, Jeremy Hellickson, Shane McClanahan, Brad Boxberger, Chris Archer, Ryne Stanek, Luis Patino, the list goes on, and on. Not to mention they turned around the careers of Charlie Morton, Tyler Glasnow (yeah, those hurt), Nathan Eovaldi, as well as getting the best seasons out of veterans like Joel Peralta, Fernando Rodney, and Kyle Farnsworth. Plus, you can’t count out the multiple low-level pitchers they’ve turned into high-quality bullpen arms.

When the Pittsburgh Pirates added Robinson he stated that “It’s a perfect fit for what I want to do” in an interview with Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Robinson also noted that choosing the Pirates was a “no-brainer” based on the organization’s direction, the role he would be taking on, and how the players have been treated and trained under the new regime. One last thing of note from Mackey’s interview is that Robinson said, “They’re going to be good, and they’re going to be at the major league level quick.”

When someone with over 30 years of experience in his field, being credited as one of, if not the best at his job, as well as being considered one of the best pitching development coordinators with one of the best teams for player development, it gives the Pirates a solid outlook for the future. While Ben Cherington has rebuilt the farm system, he has also completely rebuilt the player development department.