Pirates Acquire Derrek Lee

The Pittsburgh Pirates have acquired Derrek Lee in a trade that will send Baltimore Aaron Baker, a first baseman that was playing in high A Bradenton. Baker is not regarded as potential high end prospect by anyone, so this is really a something for nothing deal, which is very good news.

The deal with Lee is that he had an awful first half of the season (.235/.294/.372) but has heated up in the 2nd half (.321/.368/.604, 3 HR). That's not a huge surprise, since he has shown to be a better 2nd half hitter in his career (.288/.371/.510 compared to .275/.359/.481). He is also a career .297/.370/.470 hitter in PNC Park, which probably means nothing but is worth mentioning.

Lee wasn't the guy that the fans were hoping for at the beginning of all this, but after the market showed it's true colors, he seemed like one of the best options. The Pirates simply could not afford to give up what they would have had to give up to get a big name guy like Pence or Beltran. The Cubs also showed even more stupidity by not dealing Carlos Pena, who was the guy I wanted most. They still have tomorrow until 4pm to deal him, so it's not set in stone yet that he's staying, but that's what it looks like and it makes no sense to me.

Anyways, Lee is a very good defensive first baseman and provides some valuable experience to this roster. He is 35 years old and is on the last year of his contract which is worth $7.25M, but the Pirates are going to have to pick up less than $2.5M of that.

This is certainly an upgrade for the team, but probably just a marginal one. Lee has struggled at the plate this year, and you can't say for sure he will turn it around in the 2nd half. The guy is clearly past his best days and there have been questions about his attitude in the past. It's hard to say he won't easily outperform Lyle Overbay however.

There's a decent chance we'll see Lee in the lineup tomorrow, as Baltimore is in New York, so it's just a short plane ride to Philadelphia.

This is new and exciting stuff for Pirates fans. The team made a move to improve immediately and will hope that Lee's bat brings some life to this offense and wins the Pirates some games, and possibly a division.