The office of Pittsburgh Pirates owner Bob Nutting might be the only place that sees more of the Pirates' top excutives than the Senior Men's Club.

In its weekly meeting at the Sewickley Valley YMCA on Friday morning, the Senior Men's Club welcomed Pirates' general manager Neal Huntington as its guest, the latest in a recent series of high-profile baseball speakers for the group.

Huntington's visit followed recent talks by team president Frank Coonelly, the man who hired Huntington, and former Pirates manager Jim Leyland, all of whom shared their unique baseball insights with the club members in attendance.

As a baseball general manager, scouting is one of Huntington's primary areas of focus. Of course, that meant Huntington didn't come into Friday without some idea of what to expect.

"(Coonelly) told me there'd be some tough questions and some good questions here, but they're all very passionate fans," Huntington said before speaking to the group.

A veteran of 16 seasons in the front office with the Montreal Expos and Cleveland Indians, Huntington's previous posts were all related in some way to the area of player development.

So when he began fielding questions from the club, it was no surprise that the first was related to one of the Pirates' top prospects, Pine-Richland High School graduate Neil Walker.

"Neil Walker is projected as our everyday third baseman for the future. He's a good kid that comes from a good family and, obviously, from a good area," Huntington told the Senior Men's Club.

Many of the questions on Friday were of a similar nature, asking for Huntington's thoughts on specific players, ranging from veterans like Matt Morris and Doug Mientkiewicz to prospects like Walker and Sean Burnett.

But unlike the previous baseball-related guests to the SMC over the last six months, this visit came in-season.

After being hired last September, Huntington and the rest of the Pirates' fans have now had a chance to see this year's on-field product. That, says the GM, is a bit of a relief.

"Watching the players play and watching the things come together on the field, that's the most enjoyable part of the job," Huntington said.

"So far we've seen some things that are very encouraging, positive signs for the present and the future. We've also seen some things we know we need to work on, and we know we need to do a lot of things better."

One of the repeated points of Huntington's presentation was a focus on controlling the things that the team can control.

While the Pirates will never be able to spend the amount of money the New York Yankees or Boston Red Sox will, he said, the team can work toward making sound decisions on the management side, and keeping up a high level of effort on the players' side.

"If you have $200 million to spend, you can overcome a lot of mistakes. We don't have that luxury," he said.

An area the small-market Pirates can exploit is overseas, where the team can scout and quickly sign prospects. Huntington emphasized the importance of scouting the Caribbean and Pacific Rim nations, but also untapped markets like India, where skilled batters and pitchers could be found among the ranks of cricket players.

Still, Huntington enjoys the challenges he's faced as the GM of the Pittsburgh Pirates, even if he's yet to enjoy the Pittsburgh part of that.

"Right now, I just have an apartment downtown, and I'm embarassed to admit that all I've really done is walk from my apartment to PNC Park," he said.

"This April and May, my family and I are going to start aggressively looking for a place to become a part of the Pittsburgh community, and we're excited about that."