Neal Huntington blames himself for the decline of Pedro Alvarez:
Alvarez, who will turn 29 this offseason, was drafted by the Pirates with the second-overall pick in the 2008 amateur draft. Two years later, he made his major-league debut, and by 2012 he was a regular in Pittsburgh’s starting lineup.
“My mistake was bringing him to the big leagues before he was ready,” Huntington told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “That was my mistake. In hindsight, giving him additional time in the minors probably would have been very beneficial. Things might have been different.”
Alvarez accumulated 990 minor league plate appearances. He killed AA pitching in 258 PA in 2009, then hit for power at AAA in 2010, although his OBP suffered. Alvarez was also seasonal age 23 in 2010, which is not young for these level. One advantage of drafting older players is that they should move to the majors quicker.
The problem is 2011. I’m guessing the league finally adjusted to Alvarez, and he didn’t have the time to adjust back. A full year at AAA in 2010 might have helped with that.
Then again, the Pirates were not a great team at that point, and Alvarez probably helped more than he hurt. Plenty of players respond positively to the call up at that age. Huntington should not beat himself up too much about that, nor should he automatically leave people in the minors too long.
A GM will always be criticized for bringing a player up too soon, but he’ll never be criticized for leaving him in the minors too long. If the player is in the minors a long time and hits well when he finally gets a chance, well, all that time in the minors helped him. If the player flops after being in the minors too long, well, he wasn’t good enough anyway. On the other hand, if a player is brought up early and flops, everyone is down on the GM. The system creates incentives to hold young players down too long (there are financial incentives to doing so, too, of course).