LaRoche, Andy

Pedro Alvarez.

The Pirates Uber-prospect looms over any projections of Andy LaRoche, so you are well advised to keep your ears tuned to news from the Pirates camp as to whether Pedro heads north with the club. If so it is hard to see what happens with LaRoche.

LaRoche now has over 900 major league at-bats separating him from his fine minor league career. Admittedly his triple-A numbers come from Las Vegas, a notorious hitters environment in the Pacific Coast League which has several parks that inflate numbers. Although his numbers look superficially similar in the much less hitter-friendly Southern League, all his good slugging and home run numbers are in Las Vegas (and earlier in Vero Beach which is also a hitter-friendly environment). So he looks like more or less what he has been on the major league level, which is a tweens-power, contact type hitter, the kind of numbers that would look better at second base than third. Although there has been talk of this, there hasn't been any corresponding action.

LaRoche is better than what he has showed and we expect Pedro Alvarez to at least start at triple-A. .260-75-15-70-3. 575ABs