Friday Insider: Liriano trade angered people inside, outside Pirates' walls

Sep 30, 2016 • 12:01 am

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Francisco Liriano is suddenly a star reborn in Toronto.

With the Pirates for the better part of 2016, he posted a 5.46 ERA, a .264 opponents' batting average and 69 walks, most in Major League Baseball.

Since being traded to the Blue Jays -- sorry, dumped to the Blue Jays -- he's made 10 appearances, including eight starts, and he's posted a 2.92 ERA, a .222 opponents' batting average and 52 strikeouts against 16 walks over 49 1/3 innings. Wednesday night, he struck out 10 Orioles and walked one over 6 1/3 innings.

Basically, he's Filthy Frankie all over again.

Or, as Canada's National Post newspaper wrote after that game, "Liriano, peddled to the Jays by Pittsburgh in a salary dump at the trade deadline, continues to turn heads."

Now, I share all of the above first because I want you to know they have nothing to do with what's to follow, as the information was accrued more than eight days ago in every instance, and not one of the sources even casually mentioned how well Liriano is pitching in Toronto.

Inside the Pirates' walls, there is massive disappointment/disillusionment over the Liriano trade, unlike any I've heard since the 20-year streak ended.

You probably picked up on some of that with Andrew McCutchen's remarks the other night at PNC Park, and you definitely picked up on it last month when Francisco Cervelli cited it specifically to our Josh Yohe:

https://vimeo.com/181356556

Those are rare examples of players going public. Players have very obvious reasons for picking their spots with such remarks.

But when I was with the Pirates in Milwaukee for three days last week, it was everywhere. Players, coaches, you name it. All about the Liriano trade. And again, not one mentioned his upswing, but all pointed, instead, to the bizarre nature of the trade in which the front office shamelessly peddled his salary for this year and next -- a prorated $18 million -- and even more brazenly tossed in two top-10 prospects, Harold Ramirez and first-round draft pick Reese McGuire, to get a 25-year-old non-prospect pitcher named Drew Hutchison who, by all accounts, lacks a single big-league out pitch.

It was Aramis Ramirez II, right there in plain sight.

Bob Nutting, Frank Coonelly and Neal Huntington now had their own edition. And don't think it was missed by the many people under them.

Mid-level management types -- scouts, instructors, etc. -- were aghast, partly by the general sense at the time that the front office had pulled the plug on a playoff contender but some also by the PR flak that followed with criticisms of Ramirez and McGuire, neither of whom was being criticized while in the system.

Coaches were put off mostly by losing Liriano, not just for his pitching but also for his leadership among the Hispanic players. He was the guy in that group, for however much that's valued, and it's valued a ton in the clubhouse setting. Yes, Liriano and Ray Searage had some trouble in a tough summer, but nothing that couldn't have been corrected by straightening him out on the mound. All concerned felt that was close.

And the players?

Let's just leave that with this from one veteran who spoke to me on this at length: "I just play here. When I'm playing, it's all I can control. But when I think about what these guys are doing, what they did, making that move for money ... I don't even want to think about it. I can't think about it."

It's outside the walls, too, though I'd never be able to gauge to what degree.

A veteran scout with longtime connections to the Pirates was covering the series in Milwaukee. He stopped me as I walked by in the press box and, after some how-do-you-do, his first question was: "What was that bulls--- with Frankie? Are those guys serious?"

Last, but absolutely not least, I was contacted this week by an American League assistant GM, one with no ties to the Pirates past or present. Or to me, for that matter. I'd never even heard of him. But he's legit, and he reached out to share that his team, based in a big market and among the game's bigger spenders, was so put off by the prospects-for-salary-relief component of the Liriano trade that they and "other teams" contacted the office of Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred to inquire about it. He didn't elaborate.

The Pirates declined comment on whether the commissioner's office might have been contacted with any complaints about the Liriano trade. MLB, as a policy, doesn't comment on what it considers internal team affairs.

And I've got to tell you here before changing the topic: This stuff above is a fraction of the criticism I've heard about this trade. And again, it wasn't at all because of Liriano's performance since then. Rather, it's been about prioritizing the business above winning to the extreme extent that the Pirates would go against their most passionately held principle in shipping out prospects to hoard cash.

Our editor, Ron Ledgard, and our beat writer, Matt Gajtka, have been given the names of all the unnamed people quoted in this piece.

If anyone has any questions about this portion of the Insider, in the interest of accountability, as always, I'll be in comments to take whatever you've got.

FROM JOSH YOHE IN TORONTO:

In what has become a September tradition, the Penguins aren't delighted with Derrick Pouliot.

Oh, he's done some good things during the past few months and deserves credit. He committed himself to a summer of training with Gary Roberts, and surely that wasn't a pleasant experience.

But Pouliot has done little to distinguish himself during training camp. And really, that's the problem.

In a game filled with AHL players on Tuesday in Detroit, Pouliot absolutely did not stick out. He didn't commit any horrific defensive miscues, but he didn't stick out. Penguins brass believes he should be sticking out in general, particularly in a game with largely AHL players. It will be interesting to see how he handles the remainder of camp. Mike Sullivan isn't often critical of players following games, and while he didn't blast him Tuesday in Detroit, he was far from complimentary.

• I sense some excitement in the organization regarding the play of Eric Fehr. He was never healthy last season and, while he doesn't play the speed game that has become the Penguins' trademark, he looks a step quicker in camp this season. The Penguins believe he will be more productive this season.

• Don't be shocked if the "HBK" line is split up from time to time this season. Come playoff time, I'm willing to bet that line will be together. But the Penguins are going to experiment from time to time during the regular season. They'd like to see some different looks. For instance, once might expect that Sidney Crosby and Carl Hagelin would look pretty good together. The Penguins want to find out. Of course the HBK line will be used during the season. And come spring, you can bet that the Penguins will go with the lines that worked last postseason.

FROM MARK KABOLY IN PITTSBURGH:

OK, ShoeGate is over when it comes to Antonio Brown and the NFL. But it almost got real ugly first.

If you don’t recall, Brown was told by an NFL official that he had to change his custom-made baby blue cleats with the likenesses of all four of his kids during halftime of last week's game against the Eagles.

But there was much more to the story than that.

The Steelers were informed during the first half by the league-appointed uniform official on the sidelines that Brown was in violation of the NFL’s uniform policy and that the official threatened to remove Brown from the game until he complied and changed the shoes.

The official eventually agreed that Brown could change the shoes at halftime.

Because of protocol, the official had to notify Mike Tomlin at halftime about Brown needing to change his shoes and that was again relayed to Brown during intermission. Brown agreed but still came out for the third quarter with the blue cleats on. Brown was then told again before he finally changed them before the start of the third quarter.

Oh yeah, and Brown was fined anyway for wearing them. We will find out how much exactly Friday.

• It wasn’t the first time the Steelers had issues with the uniform official and cleats.

William Gay wanted to start a new fashion statement and decided to wear two different colored cleats during the opener against the Redskins. Gay tried it out during the preseason in New Orleans and figured he could be a trend-setter.

The NFL wanted none of that.

The uniform official made Gay change his cleats to match at halftime.

• The Steelers will wear their throwback uniforms next week against the Jets. If that’s not bad enough, that’s the one game the team gets 'Pinked-Out' for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Not a good look.

• Speaking of throwbacks, next week will be the final time the Steelers will wear the Bumblebee uniforms. The league mandates that teams can only change their throwback uniform every five years. So, take a picture next week because after that the Bumblebee will become extinct.

• Speaking of breast cancer awareness, rookie practice squad linebacker Travis Feeney isn’t messing around with the way he is showing support. Feeney had a breast cancer awareness ribbon shaved into the back of his head to honor a couple of family members and a friend of his mother whom he lost to the disease.

“I really wanted to find a way to honor them with awareness,” Feeney said. “So, I was thinking of doing a marathon or wearing a shirt with them on them. I always do something with my hair so this is what I did.”

Feeney has been doing it for the past three years and said he trusts only one barber to do it. Problem is that his barber is in Washington — that’s the state of Washington, not Washington, Pa. Feeney went to the University of Washington.

“I don’t trust anybody to do it initially,” Feeney said. “This is the biggest it has ever been. I never had it this big. It gets better every year."

Feeney said that he plans on dying it pink at some point then proceeded to pull out his phone and show me a picture of him last year while playing for the Huskies with the pink ribbon shaved in the back of his head.

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