Pirates Add Three Lefties, Two Pitchers and a Utility Player

1-28-2025 – By Gary Morgan – @garymo2007 on X

The Pirates signed three players yesterday and today. Two are left handed relievers, Ryan Borucki, Tim Mayza, and one is Adam Frazier.

I figured I’d gang them all into one piece frankly because none of the three alone are all that exciting. In fact, even ganging them together isn’t something fans are going to change their opinion of the team based on.

That said, these are all roles that it feels nice to have filled. None of these are difference makers, none of them at the salary they’ve agreed to are guaranteed anything, all of them add depth if not something the team straight lacked.

Tim Mayza – LRP – 1.15 Million MLB Deal

Tim Mayza had a terrible season in 2024. There, I said it right off the top because when a guy is signed, fans rush to the Baseball Reference page and see what the team got and what they saw kinda depends on how hard you wanted to look.

His career numbers are really good. 3.88 ERA in a little over 300 innings along with 304 K’s and only 99 walks. He’s had a pretty good career.

Largely fueled by his killer sinker, a plus pitch that he builds everything he does with.

Then 2024 hit, and he lost velocity on the pitch, a little, but it was enough to change everything about it and he suffered in Toronto because of it to the tune of an 8.03 ERA in 35 outings. The Yankees gave him a go too and he rebounded a bit to a 4.00 ERA in 15 outings.

Solid shot at a nice lefty reliever, and being good has been his norm, so there’s a very good chance he snaps back.

Ryan Borucki – LRP – 1.15 Million MiLB Deal

You should be familiar with Ryan, he pitched here in 2023 after being claimed on Waivers and became so relied upon he was serving as the left handed back end option in the bullpen. 38 outings with the Bucs and he turned in a 2.45 ERA and an incredible 0.744 WHIP.

In 2024 the Pirates brought him back and he spent the vast majority of the season injured. Even when he came back late in the year, he just wasn’t right. 14 games, 7.36 ERA, but it’s so driven by what he went through all year, it’s very hard to pinpoint what happened aside from being rusty and hurt most of the year.

So, bringing him back on an MiLB deal is a fine addition to the depth of this team. If he makes the team out of camp, great, if he doesn’t, hey, they have an experienced lefty in the minors hopefully improving and performing that they can call on.

Again, not a major deal, but a smart one.

Adam Frazier – UTL – 1.525 Million MLB Deal

Adam has had a fine career for someone who doesn’t really have a whole lot of “special” in his game.

Meaning, he’s not a like super fast, not a great defender, nothing special about his arm. Contact tool is above average, but that’s about it. He’s a solid MLB player, but especially now, a bench player.

Last year with Kansas City, Frazier had easily his worst season in the Bigs. In only 294 plate appearances he only hit .202 with an abysmal OPS of .576.

That’s not been his history, but the signs of slowing down are there and have been really since 2022.

The money is nothing. So long as they treat it as such. If he looks bad in Spring and they keep him anyway, even at this paltry sum, you’ll have reason to be irritated. If he does well in Spring, I still think he fills a niche of a niche.

Spencer Horwitz is the only left handed stick they have for the infield, unless you’d like to count Ji Hwan Bae. So I can see that being a role you might like filled on the bench, but I still think you probably have 2 or 3 players who even being right handed you’d rather see them play.

Truthfully, if it were easier to trust this organization that this is depth and little more. Someone they’d cut loose if it didn’t work out quickly, you could probably just shrug it off.

The only other aspect of this that makes sense to me, is if the club has legitimate concern, as they probably should that Ke’Bryan Hayes isn’t going to be healthy all season. That would cause Jared Triolo to have to take over 3B and then they’d not have a backup 2B with experience.

Even that is a bit of a stretch because it would be fairly easy to argue Nick Yorke would be a better fit.

The club has very little veteran presence on the roster, so I don’t hate bringing some of that in here, but in this case, it’s veteran presence that for the most part was here helping to build the room they currently have. A guy like this, with the limited role he’ll likely have isn’t coming in here and commanding the room.

We’ll see how it plays out, but as it sits, this is a bit confusing.

And I highly doubt this signals any incoming trade. Signing anyone for 1.5 something something million isn’t prompting anything like that.