7-29-2024 – By Corey Shrader – @CoreyShrader on X
The Pittsburgh Pirates have swung their first deal at the 2024 trade deadline. In a somewhat rare, “prospect for prospect” trade, the Pirates are sending starting pitcher Quinn Priester to the Boston Red Sox in exchange for middle infielder, Nick Yorke.
Pirates fans have just begun getting familiar with the organization’s 18th overall selection from the 2019 entry draft but now it is time to wish Priester good luck in another organization after tossing just 94.2 innings in the black and gold.
While the results were oftentimes mixed, the raw material was shined through occasionally as well. Often enough that Boston felt compelled to take a shot on him and his interesting breaking pitches, despite his at times faulty locations. Boston has a very strong development team of their own, and it will be interesting to see what becomes of Priester in their organization.
As for Nick Yorke, he too was a mid-first round selection coming off the board at #17 overall to Boston in the 2020 draft. His time in the minors he has proven to be a strong hitter who is capable of contributing with both power and hit tools. His offensive game has mostly featured a sound approach that has really shone through at AAA this season with a 14.2/18.9 BB/K rate split.
If what I described above sounds familiar, eerily similar to the Bucs recently injured keystone Nick Gonzales, you would not be wrong. Reading scouting reports you get a similar picture painted of the skillset; great hands, profiles as a big league hitter, etc. One thing to keep in mind when looking at Yorke’s MiLB performances by year, he battled a multitude of injuries in 2022 (severe illness, turf toe, & back ailments). In 2023, Yorke had a near full healthy season in which he continued his strong play at AA posting 13 homers, 18 steals, .354 wOBA, & a 116 wRC+.
Flash forward to the present year and we see Yorke opening the season in AA again and with modest production there (.319 wOBA/100 wRC+), he earned a promotion to AAA. Now this is where Yorke began to take off in 2024. And it appears that he made a significant swing change that has enabled him to do so.
Here is Yorke’s set up pre-2024. Note the hand position and extremely “noisy” pre-loading set-up:
Now take a look at this 2024 hand set up and loading phase:
So far in AAA Yorke has produced some impressive statistics in 38 games:
6 HRs, 8 2Bs, 32 runs, 19 RBI, .310/.408/.490, .898 OPS, and .402/136 wOBA/wRC+
The batted ball information backs this up too with him sporting a well above MLB average EV, strong 90th percentile EVs, a solid max EV, and great hard hit rates. He has been able to tap into some more power thus far at AAA posting a .179 ISO. I think the EV & hard hit rate indicates a guy that is getting closer to a 50 grade for game power. Combine that with the rest of the profile and he is an exciting young player to add to the mix for Pittsburgh.
His assignment has him slated to head to Indianapolis, but hopefully we will get a look at Yorke in a big league jersey sooner rather than later.
Steel City Pirates 
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