Monday, July 16th, 2007 by Adam Wagner
Littlefield’s Looneys - 2001 Edition
Dave Littlefield, the Man, the Monkey, the Legend, was hired on July 13, 2001 (a Friday), replacing Roy Smith as General Manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates.
The fun started immediately, as 2001 was the year when the Pirates held the Jason Schmidt Sweepstakes, Littlefield’s first big project. He ended up getting an outfielder with scary comparisons (Gerut and Nady) and a rag-armed pitcher for the future ace. Schmidt, therefore, was the first Pirate who Littlefield gave up for nothing and went on to succeed somewhere else. Littlefield’s other notable moves that trade deadline were trading for Tony McKnight, who could seemingly only pitch against the Pirates and was out of baseball half a season later, and getting Adrian Burnside and Mike Fetters from the Dodgers for Terry Mulholland. This was actually a pretty solid trade for Team Littlefield and is, therefore, unworthy of mention in this article.
Littlefield’s next major personnel moves came on November 28, 2001 as he hired Ed Creech as his scouting director (oh GOD!) and purchased the contract of J.R. House, therefore adding the potential quarterback who was not afraid of a linebacker but was afraid of a baseball, to the 40-man roster.
December 2001 was a particularly fun month for Littlefield, as he named Brian Graham Director of Player Development on the third, therefore messing up the next generation of Pirate prospects for years to come. This move, however, was not anywhere near the most important or the worst one that month. And, for once, these are two separate moves instead of the same move.
The most important move was shipping Todd Ritchie and his fluke good decent years to the White Sox, who had become sick of the Kip Wells experience, for Wells, Josh Fogg, and Sean Lowe. The move showed insight on Littlefield’s part as he managed to dump one or two good seasons for about ten years of Pirate starters, which is always a good trade. Kip Wells, though, is like Kris Benson except the team was willing to trade him before he could get pitching coaches fired. Fogg, meanwhile, is a typical back of the rotation innings eater who simply goes out and throws the ball over the plate, getting hammered occasionally and having a good start about once a month. This was a very good trade for Littlefield and the Pirates.
Littlefield, however, could not keep up his successful run as he traded Gary Matthews Jr. to the New York Mets later that month for future considerations, presumably to make way for the one and only Chad Hermanson. Yes, that Gary Matthews Jr. and that Chad Hermanson. Littlefield, therefore, guessed wrong and kept the wrong young centerfielder, choosing the homegrown kid over the one already in the majors.
2001 was actually a decent year for Littlefield, thanks to the Mulholland and Wells deals. He ruined the team’s future, however, by naming Brian Graham director of player development (HA!) and Ed Creech Director of Scouting (Yup, that’s worked out.).
There is plenty to knock here, but Littlefield certainly showed potential and seemed worthy of another year at the end of 2001.
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