The Pirates are confident Adam Frazier can handle being their everyday second baseman. Scouts from other teams have the same belief.
In the final days of spring training, I conducted a very informal survey of five scouts who watched the Pirates on a regular basis during Grapefruit League play. I asked which player they thought was most likely to surprise this season.
Four of the five answered Frazier. The other vote went to Joe Musgrove.
“He’s a good little player,” a scout from an American League team said. “It’s easy to pigeonhole a guy who has been a bench player and say he can’t play every day, but I think Frazier is going to handle it. I think it is an inspired move by the Pirates to give him a chance.”
Frazier spent his first three years in the major leagues in a utility role, though he did take starts away from Josh Harrison at second base during the second half of last season.
“For me, Frazier is basically the same guy as Harrison,” a scout from a National League team said. “He’ll hit for a decent average, he’ll show a little pop, he’ll steal an occasional base and he’ll play OK defense. And he’s a lot of cheaper, which the Pirates always like ... He’s also younger than Harrison, so there’s some upside there.”
The 27-year-old Frazier will make $584,000 this season. Meanwhile, the Pirates paid the 31-year-old Harrison a $1-million buyout for this season rather than exercise his $10.5-million club option, allowing him to become a free agent.
“I know the Pirates get blasted for being cheap, and it’s deserved in many instances,” the NL scout said. “You can’t blame them in this case, though. There is no way you can pay Harrison $10.5 million a year at this stage of his career.”
Indeed, Harrison settled for a one-year, $2-million contract with the Tigers and the chance to add an additional $1 million in performance bonuses. -- John Perrotto in Cincinnati
• A scout had a rather stinging appraisal of Clint Hurdle in Sports Illustrated's season preview story on the Pirates, saying the manager is in "cruise control" because he knows his team is "not gonna win." That might seem harsh but there is merit to it. Hurdle has three years left on his contract, and there are questions from baseball people outside the organization as to why the Pirates continually show a lack of attention to detail and consistent breakdowns in fundamentals. -- Perrotto
PENGUINS
• The NHL shamelessly tooted its own horn back in October when it announced a partnership with MGM Grand as its official gaming partner. It then tooted its own horn again during All-Star Weekend in San Jose when the league unveiled a player-tracking system it says will better inform gamblers. The thing the league overlooks, however, is bets are often based on injuries. After every NFL practice, each team provides a full injury report with exact detail. Gambling, in part, has helped the NFL become the most popular sport in the country, by far. The NHL? The league still lives in an upper-body, lower-body world. That helps explain why the injury reports regarding Kris Letang and his latest upper-body injury are so vague. I'm told the Penguins are just taking a cautious approach before the playoffs, by the way. But the Penguins are under no obligation to provide detail on Letang or anyone else. And that's not about to change, either. Gary Bettman reiterated Thursday at the AMA Sports Betting Executive Summit that the NHL has no plans to change its rules on the disclosure of injuries. Of the other major pro sports leagues that reveal more about injuries, Bettman said: "Most of the injury data affects whether or not a player is going to play. Our guys probably play injured more than in any other sport and we don’t see any reason to subject them to any further injury.” That might be good for the player, but how does that help gambling or spread the popularity of hockey? -- Chris Bradford
• If the Stanley Cup Playoffs started Thursday, the Penguins would face the New York Islanders. Imagine, however, a series against the Toronto Maple Leafs that would feature Sidney Crosby vs. Auston Matthews and Evgeni Malkin vs. John Tavares. It would be a reality, too, if the NHL had kept its 1-through-8 conference format. Instead, the Penguins would be facing the Islanders under the NHL's current playoff format, which has the first six spots in each conference occupied by the top three teams in each division, while the wildcard spots are filled in by the next two highest-placing teams. The current format places a premium on divisional matchups but comes with a risk. Take, for instance, the Bruins, who have the second-most points in the league. They are on a collision course in the second-round against the Presidents' Trophy-winning Lightning. That means one of the league's two best regular-season teams will be eliminated halfway through the tournament. The same could be said for the Capitals and Penguins in the Metro. From Brad Marchand to Steven Stamkos, both the Bruins and Lightning have already stated their dislike for the current format. However, of the Penguins I spoke to, there was no such visceral reaction. "I grew up with 1-through-8, so I'm biased toward that. I thought it made sense," one said. "But I don't lose sleep over the way it is now. If you're going to win the Stanley Cup, you have to beat the top teams anyway." There was zero interest in changing the playoff format during the GM meetings earlier this month in Boca Raton, Fla. -- Bradford
• Last week I used this space to tell you how the Penguins don't practice 6-on-5 situations. Lo and behold, their next two games finished in a shootout. Under Mike Sullivan, the Penguins don't routinely practice shootouts either. Under Dan Bylsma, almost every practice ended with a shootout. However, since the advent of 3-on-3 overtime, shootouts have been relatively rare and simply don't merit much practice time. The one time the Penguins did it this season was for an open practice for area school children. It was won by noted non-goal-scorer Dominik Simon. Sullivan's practices are more up-tempo and feature game-like situations with back-side pressure. The Penguins' shootouts against the Hurricanes and Predators were just the fourth and fifth they've had this season and first since mid-December. The Maple Leafs went 76 games before their first shootout Wednesday night in Philadelphia. -- Bradford
• What does 42-year-old Matt Cullen do during intermissions to keep himself ready? Not much. The Penguins' Masterton nominee says he usually just tapes a stick if it needs done. Or, if he's feeling sluggish, he might get in a quick workout. Nothing crazy. But he did have a teammate who made the most of the 17-minute breaks. Cullen says former Ducks teammate Warren Rychel used to shower between each period. That's pretty impressive considering the amount of time it takes to take off and put on full hockey gear. Bryan Rust said former teammate Carl Hagelin was just as fast off the ice as he was on it. Hagelin could get into full gear in "two or three minutes." -- Bradford
STEELERS
• Remember all the fretting about how some of the Steelers raided the locker of Le'Veon Bell when it became apparent he would not be reporting in 2018? Well, turns out it was a big deal about nothing. The Steelers forced all of the players to give back everything they took out of Bell's locker so it could be boxed up and sent to the running back. -- Dale Lolley in Phoenix
• Mike Tomlin's words about Artie Burns here when I asked him about the former first-round draft pick were telling. I asked if he was a "little disappointed" Burns had never been able to take the plays he made on the practice field and transfer them to the game field. "More than a little disappointed," Tomlin replied. "Disappointed." Tomlin also said the team won't go out of its way to give Burns another chance to play. I firmly believe the Steelers will shop Burns in the days leading up to and including the draft. He's still a first-round talent and hasn't turned 24 yet. It wouldn't be surprising if another team took a shot at Burns for a mid-to-late-round draft pick. If not, there are no guarantees Burns will be on the roster in 2019, though he is relatively cheap ($1.75 million salary) and is a good special teams player. -- Lolley
• A lot of people who listened to the phone conversation between Antonio Brown and agent Drew Rosenhaus that Brown released this week thought the call was staged. They based that on the comments made during the call. Here's another reason: In 11 states, it's illegal to record someone without their knowledge. Three of those states are Pennsylvania, Florida and California. Now, certainly Rosenhaus isn't going to file charges against Brown — not with what Rosenhaus is being paid — but to think Rosenhaus wasn't a part of first taping that conversation and then releasing it is just beyond the realm of belief. Don't think for a second that they didn't cook that up in an effort to steer other clients to Rosenhaus, while also continuing to try to rehab Brown's image by showing, at least in part, the receiver was concerned about winning on the field. -- Lolley
