Pittsburgh Pirates 2009 Preview: Third Base

Written by: Pat Lackey on 12th March 2009

Pittsburgh Pirates 2009 Preview: Third Base | read this item

Third base is a funny position for the Pirates right now. It’s entirely possible that they have an embarrassment of riches at the position; a stockpile of talent that they don’t have at any other position in the organization. It’s also possible that they have nothing there at all. The truth almost always lies somewhere in the middle, so let’s look at the third base situation in Pittsburgh and then work our way on down.

The starting third baseman for the Pirates this year will be Andy LaRoche. He’s more or less the most vexing player on the team right now, as he could do anything on the field in 2009 and it wouldn’t be surprisng. If he hits .150/.250/.300 and loses his job to Ramon Vazquez, I’ll shrug and take it in stride. If he hits 25 homers and breaks out into the .310/.400/.500 hitter that people have been expecting him to develop in to for three years now, well, I could see that happening, too. This vague future is because of the dichotomy between his Major League struggles and his minor league stardom.

If LaRoche falters, the door would seem to re-open a bit for Neil Walker. He entered last year as the Pirates’ third baseman of the future, but watched the club add both LaRoche and Pedro Alvarez in two month window that saw him drop down the depth chart. His .280 OBP in his first full-season as a AAA player likely had a lot to do with that. Still, Walker showed some decent pop (lead AAA Indianapolis with 16 homers) and there’s at least potential for him to take a big step forward this year. It seems a lot less likely now that he’ll be a regular big league starter than it did a few years ago, but he’s still too young to write off entirely.

Behind Walker is Pedro Alvarez, who will arrive in Pittsburgh with more fanfare than any prospect I can remember whenever it is that he arrives in the ‘Burgh. Some people were upset by his holdout, the typical Scott Boras contract-signing shenanigans, and the impression that he didn’t stay in shape in the off-season, but he worked out hard between mini-camp and spring training and hasn’t looked terribly out of place in the big league camp this spring, even though it’s his first real baseball action since Vaderbilt’s season ended last summer. Weirdly, the Pirates are probably hoping they have to move him to first base down the road, because that would mean that either Walker or LaRoche has blossomed into a productive regular. That’s still a ways off right now because 2009 is going to be his first year in professional baseball. He’ll probably be a fast-riser, though, and Pirate fans will be checking the minor league box scores all year to keep up with him.

Topics: Andy LaRoche, Neil Walker, Pedro Alvarez