Gary’s Five Pirates Thoughts – The West Coast Trip Might Have Changed the Team a Bit

4-28-25 – By Gary Morgan – @garymo2007 on X

The Pirates just wrapped a 3-3 road swing to the West Coast, and while there’s nothing special about going .500 on a trip, the team might have changed a few philosophies they’ve been living by for this entire management team’s tenure.

Lets Go!

1. Consistent Lineups?

It has become such a running gag at this point that Derek Shelton changes the lineup daily, that it was legitimately shocking when he turned around on this road trip and started using a consistent lineup.

Sure, he changed it facing a lefty. Sure he changed it a bit when Henry Davis caught Paul Skenes, but by in large, he left this lineup intact and by doing so, he may have just finally achieved something this offense has not been able to capture since he got here, consistency.

Check out Andrew McCutchen’s comments from last night, especially the last part where he really talks to the lineup.

First, there’s a reason Cutch is so open to discuss this and it goes back to before this road trip. He made it a point to talk about how hard it was to gel when the lineup changed constantly last week, and yes, he was framing it around his own usage, but this repeatability, this standard starting point, this is what he was asking for.

You’ve listened to him for a long time, you know he rarely if ever discusses big picture stuff like this, at least not in much detail, or without some jokes tossed in.

He was right, and while it shouldn’t save Shelton’s job, it should be to his credit he listened, at least so far.

Reality is, they don’t have enough to beat the Dodgers if they’re firing on all cylinders. Few do. They do have enough though, if they’re playing the best they can and the other team is down for whatever reason.

That’s what was encouraging on this trip. They played the kind of baseball that will net you 2 out of 3 against most teams, and secure 1 of 3 against a juggernaut.

Convincing players to take what the game gives you requires convincing players to trust the next man up, and it stands to reason you need to know who is next in order to have that kind of faith.

Look, it’s early days here for this whole thing. Let’s see how long he sticks with it, and let’s see what he does when certain members start cooling off, but for right now, it’s been a positive step and something this team should be able to feel good about. The offense hasn’t been awful since they did it, that’s step one, now work on bolting some of these parts and pieces back into it and see where it goes.

And before you “educate” me about everything they’re missing, or who’s to blame for what, please understand, I know all that, and when it’s THE story, I’ll talk about it, but I’m not a person who needs to see perfection in order to enjoy or appreciate my teams. Thank god, because I’m 48, and I’ve only seen maybe 2 teams that came close, the two Stanley Cup winning Penguins teams of the early 90’s.

I’ve enjoyed a hell of a lot more sports than those two runs.

2. Hunter Barco is Dealing

Hunter has pitched 20.2 innings this year for Altoona.

He’s given up not a single run. He’s struck out 30, and his WHIP is 0.63.

Lights out might not do it justice.

So of course I’ve read a lot of promote him to Indy calls, often paired with calling Bubba Chandler up to the Bigs.

Honestly, I can’t think of too many good reasons to keep him in Altoona, but I will say, it’s very hard to sketch out what the rest of Barco’s season could look like.

He was drafted in 2022, in the 2nd round and the only reason he was there, he was recovering from UCL surgery.

Because of that, he was only able to go 18.1 innings in his first season with Pittsburgh back in 2023. Then in 2024 he managed to reach 66 innings.

A healthy stretch and this year, it’s safe to say the surgery is behind him, now it’s about stretching out to handle a workload.

Based on what we know, you can expect Hunter to top out in 2025 around 100 innings, maybe 120 if they really want to push him.

I say all this because no matter how you frame it, no matter when they promote him to AAA, there isn’t much chance he makes it to the majors in 2025, and while he’s unreal early on here and certainly not being challenged at the AA level, there is a cap on what he can get accomplished this year.

His 2025 story will be a minor league story. An important story, a reason to continue to think this team has enough internal pitching here and coming to be pretty damn good for years to come, but a minor league stopping point is all but decided.

3. How this Rotation Could Evolve Through 2025

The first thing I’m going to do here is the dumbest thing anyone talking baseball can do, I’m going to assume health.

Meaning, I’m going to assume guys getting healthy, get there, and guys pitching now stay that way.

Paul Skenes, Mitch Keller, Carmen Mlodzinski, Andrew Heaney and Bailey Falter are a decent starting 5, but the Pirates are in position to strengthen this rotation and today I want to try to sketch out how that could happen.

Let’s take things in the order I expect them, yet another dumb thing to do, but here goes.

Bubba Chandler is looking ready, and I truly believe his call could come any day now. They have him on schedule to be a direct swap with Carmen Mlodzinski and I think that’s what we’ll see play out.

So the rotation, when that happens will be Paul Skenes, Mitch Keller, Bubba Chandler, Andrew Heaney and Bailey Falter.

Looks better already doesn’t it?

Now, Jared Jones will likely be starting to throw again very soon, and as it comes to the starters returning from injury, he’ll be first up if everything goes well.

There would be almost no doubt he’d replace Bailey Falter in the rotation, if only because he’d be the low man on the totem pole, but we’ve also only seen one side of Andrew Heaney, and he does have bullpen experience. If he’s going like he is right now, this isn’t a debate, if he regresses and Bailey gets stronger as he did last year, he could win out.

That gives you Paul Skenes, Mitch Keller, Jared Jones, Bubba Chandler and Andrew Heaney.

Yeah.

From there, you have Harrington who you hope continues to improve in AAA, and Johan Oviedo who suffered a setback in his rehab but still should make it back before the end of the season.

There’s a chance that Andrew Heaney would be dangled at the deadline to make room for one of those, and even if they don’t look ready, they still have Bailey Falter to fall back on. In fact, I almost see no way he isn’t traded at the deadline unless he becomes a valuable part of the pen.

But here goes anyway, Paul Skenes, Mitch Keller, Jared Jones, Bubba Chandler and Johan Oviedo.

No lefties in this setup, but all 5 are big arms.

That’s this year. This offseason it gets interesting again. Harrington and Barco, Solometo, Sullivan, they might afford you making a baseball trade with a guy like Oviedo, or even Mitch Keller.

Yeah yeah, you don’t want this management team making these deals, keep your pants on, just one issue at a time here.

Still, it’s on a track where this could be an absolute shut down unit, and in rather short order.

4. Konnor Griffin is Off to a Great Start

It’s too early for me to tell you this draft choice will rewrite Pirates history, it’s too early for me to even tell you he’ll be a star, but he’s certainly doing everything he can in Bradenton to show you himself.

He’s hitting .270 with an OPS of .859, so his surface numbers are certainly good enough. He’s done this while learning SS, handling it well mind you and dominating CF when they play him out there. This isn’t positional flexibility for the sake of it, it’s about a superior athlete being capable of just about anything playing the two hardest positions not named catcher or pitcher.

In other words, when the time comes for a call up, because of his ability to play those two, chances are he’ll be able to play as many as 6 different spots in the infield and outfield. Greasing the skids.

The most exciting number for Konnor if you ask me, his in zone whiff percentage which sits at 16%. Folks, that’s really good. Especially for a kid facing pitching he’s never seen before. This means, if you throw a strike, and he swings, he is rarely going to miss it. The WHOLE zone.

He’s going to move in this system if he keeps this up. At 19 years old, they’ll always be promoting him to a level he’s probably young for, but I fully expect them to challenge him and if he keeps hitting like this, it’s not insane to see this being a 2 level per year jump scenario for him.

He’s got speed, power, defense, contact, and he uses all of them every chance he gets.

For instance, he’s getting on base at a .345 clip, and he already has 11 stolen bases. And he’ll go whenever, from first, from second, hell I even saw him threaten to go from third in one game drawing a throw that almost got past the 3B.

You can’t walk him or it might as well be a double. You can’t just throw strikes cause he won’t miss much and he can and will do damage if you do. You can’t get him to chase, cause he simply doesn’t do it much, in other words, he’s a problem.

All the makings of one of those kids that a smart organization gets to AAA and inks to a 10 year deal.

Yeah, he’s far away, and young, but he’s also different, and it feels different when he comes up. The latest comp I heard from a friend at Baseball America, a right handed Corbin Carroll.

Think on that for a minute.

5. Cubs and Padres Round Out Huge Test for The Pirates

The Pirates are 6 games back in the division, last in the NL Central and own the second worst record in the NL. The Cubs lead the NL Central, but their 17 wins is tied with the Padres who right this second are 3rd in the NL West.

Both of these teams have better offenses. Both of them have some pitching that can take over a game, but both are beatable.

The Pirates managed to go 3-3 on their West Coast trip and they need to do even better in these two series at home this week.

6 games is already a lot, but a sweep of the Cubs would muddy this entire division, and taking a series from the Padres, well, it would create some separation in that hotly contested division too.

There comes a point where you’ve dug too big a hole, and the Pirates have their heels right on that edge. There’s time, and we discussed a little in this piece today how this team could improve as the season plays out, but there’s also a point of no return. If you’re 10 games back in the first week of May, well, let’s just say unless you have the type of team you see reeling off 10-12 in a row, you’re probably in trouble.

This is a team that probably has to aim a bit lower like 7 out of 10 and making up ground that way takes a lot longer, so these series really carry more weight than they should.

The Cubs team OPS is .784 second only to the Yankees, and their team ERA is 20th at 4.24. They’ve got the Pirates bested offensively by a mile, but the Pirates have them on the mound, so what separates these clubs in the standings, it might not hold up in head to head.

No need for predictions, and I make no illusions as to the Pirates having an advantage, but they should be able to hang with them, and if they do, the entire NL Central is going to look like a mess.

Here I am rooting for a sloppy looking division come next 5 Thoughts.