The Pirates have announced their signing of left-hander Rich Hill, making that official. In order to open a spot for Hill on the 40-man roster, right-hander Zach Thompson has been designated for assignment.
Thompson, 29, was a fifth round selection of the White Sox in 2014. He spent parts of seven years in their system but wasn’t allowed to crack the club’s roster, reaching minor league free agency after 2020. The Marlins then grabbed him on a minor league deal, which turned out to be a shrewd move. Thompson made 26 appearances for the Fish in 2021, including 14 starts, posting a 3.24 ERA over 75 innings along with a 21% strikeout rate, 8.9% walk rate and 43.4% ground ball rate.
In November of 2021, the Pirates traded catcher Jacob Stallings to the Marlins in exchange for Thompson, as well as prospects Kyle Nicolas and Connor Scott. Just over a year later and that deal hasn’t worked out great for either side so far. Stallings took steps backwards both offensively and defensively while Thompson posted a 5.18 ERA over 121 2/3 innings for Pittsburgh. He still got ground balls at a solid 45.3% clip but his strikeout rate dipped to 16.6%.
It seems that Thompson has been pushed down Pittsburgh’s starting pitching depth chart by a couple of factors. They’ve added veterans like Hill and Vince Velasquez this winter and saw encouraging developments from younger pitchers like Mitch Keller, Roansy Contreras and Luis Ortiz in 2022. Those pitchers have nudged Thompson out of the rotation and off Pittsburgh’s roster entirely.
The Bucs will now have a week to trade Thompson or pass him through waivers. It wouldn’t be a shock to see other clubs around the league have interest in him. Thompson has at least some major league success and a full slate of options. Even a club that feels good about its five best starters could have Thompson on their 40-man but optioned to the minors and awaiting a need to arise as the season progresses. He also has just over a year of service time, making him controllable for another five seasons, though optional assignments could potentially push that back further.
The Stallings trade keeps paying dividends
Thomspon wasn’t the big get in that trade. It was Kyle Nicolas, who had a decent season at Double-A last year. Nicolas’ numbers didn’t look great on the surface, but he tanked his third game of the season. Eight of the 40 earned runs he allowed were in that one start. Plus I doubt the Marlins are liking Stallings too much either. Took a massive step back both offensively and defensively, so much so Nick Fortes and Stallings were pretty much sharing the position 50/50.
This reeks of cope. Have fun believing Kyle Nicolas will be anything more than a backend starter.
That would be a win if he does
His power pitches of fast ball and slider are pretty good. He has a more than fair chance to be a better than average reliever. that would be a fair trade off based on what they did after the trade.
Kyle’s k/0 is pretty great for a starter. he cuts back on the walks he will be a quality MLB pitcher regardless of his role.
I think Nicholas is gonna end up being a solid 7th/8th inning reliever on the cheap for several years. Worth the price of two years of Stallings.
One the other end, that Stallings acquisition was not paying dividends either.
Irony: 2 years ago, I was of the mindset Stalls was 2nd most untouchable member of the team, behind Reynolds, ahead of some of the young arms. Stalls did not do well with the change of scenery. Too much “Little Havanna” food.
@Clepto….2nd most untouchable??
Two years ago was before the extension, but having Stallings higher than Hayes seems a bit odd.
It hasn’t yet but let’s see what the prospects do and if Thompson brings back anything.
I think at the very worst, this trade ends up being a wash. Stallings saw his OPS+ drop by 24% and was worth -9 DRS and -4.3 framing runs. He’s going into his age-33 season and catching has a harsh aging curve so betting on a rebound isn’t the brightest move. Kyle Nicolas looked decent at Double-A, but Connor Scott looked like a 4th outfielder at best.
I think Pitt will probably end up with the slightly better end.
Nicolas won’t be a starter but there’s a chance he’s a pen arm. Miami is completely lost with position players.
The central division isn’t big enough for two Thompsons
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Opie, nyuck, nyuck, nyuck
wise guy huh? cues are us!
Well, I give the front office credit for having watched the games last year, if nothing else. Can’t say Wilson and Thompson weren’t given the opportunities
that thumbnail pick got me trippin balls…
Like I’m still blinking
Same. It’s like one of those reflector cards from the 80s. That or the guy is literally an octopus.
That pic made me question whether someone dosed me!
Who will notice?
He was pretty good in 2021, why are they giving up on him already? I guess he’s gonna be pretty old for a 3rd year, but they have guys on their 40-man like Aaron Fletcher and Eric Stout who are near the same age who don’t have starter upside
Also that picture in the thumbnail is dope
Aaron Fletcher was claimed of waivers by the Giants July and Eric Stout hit minor league free agency at the end of the season and was signed by the Cubs. They’ve cut a lot of dead-weight, though personally, I would have let either Duane Underwood Jr. or Ryan Vilade go before Thompson.
Thought if nothing else could be AAA option when get the necessary injuries or ineffectiveness thought underwood would be gone by now..WHAT does he have on the Pirates that he’s STILL THERE!!!!! hope D-backs get Thompson
Underwood knows the same things that Van Meter knew last year in order to keep his job.
They don’t have a spot for him in the rotation. Bullpen is loaded. No answer to improve him. Let someone else who has a plan do it and get a prospect.
Looked like a solid back end starter in Miami. Expect someone to trade for him.
You know you suck when the Pirates DFA you.
And yet, there’s always the Rockies.
Rockies won 6 more games than the Pirates. That’s like championship level compared to the Bucs. /s.
Yet teams are always claiming or trading for pirate dfas.
All teams use the DFA of players including your team
Best cover article picture I’ve ever seen on here! I used to love my Sportflix baseball cards with these graphics.
As an Arlington native, he would be a good pick-up for Rangers as a swingman or since he has options as a depth piece in Round Rock. Perhaps allowing TX to include Winn in a trade pkg for Reynolds and Thompson.
Oviedo too! He was great for the Bucos!
Thompson was good in relief for One Inning per game wish Pirates would use their head sometimes.
This is just a stupid move by the Pirates.This guy has an option remaining and the Pirates are not world champions.Underwood and Vilade should have gone instead of Wilson and Thompson.Give them both another shot.If the Pirates can’t help them and someone else can then get someone else to be their pitching coach.They should have gotten a clue with what happened to Holmes.
I think that BC is good at selecting talent,but development and roster construction leave something to be desired.His trades are meh also.
I rather would have seen both Vilade and Underwood go too, but it’s not like Thompson and Wilson were so far behind it was an ovbisous decision. I don’t think it’s fair to compare Holmes to either Wilson or Thompson. It didn’t take a scout to see that Holmes had potential. Dude had a mid-90s sinker with about 25 inches of break and a slider with wipeout action. All that was missing was consistent command. Hindsight is 20-20 and there are dozens of pitchers who flame out because they had the stuff, but no command. Wilson and Thompson might have okay command, but they have maybe one above average pitch between the two.
I question why now. Should have dfa Thompson a week ago for another player. Try to get that player past waivers to add Hill.
Keller, Contreras, Ortiz, and Oviedo is a nice foundation for where they are at. Solid upside there.
I’m doubting Ortiz will be with the big club this year. Heres hoping someone can straighten out Brubaker, the last of the three amigos (Wilson, Thompson) whose propensity to throw pitches down Main Street made them great draws among the kayaking crowd on the Allegheny River
Why wouldn’t Ortiz be with the big club sometime this season? The Pirates were confident enough in him to promote him to the major leagues after just two starts at Triple-A, and he looked decent in all but one of his starts. He’ll start the year at Triple-A again as well. I’m not saying that he’ll break camp with the team, but unless he gets hurt, there’s no reason not to expect Ortiz to get some major league playing time next season.
I have hope Brubaker will figure it out next year. He wasn’t bad last year, and he had a stretch of nearly 100 innings at one point with an ERA of 3.50 (April 19 through July 25, he had a 3.50 ERA in 92.2 innings). He got absoutley hammered down the stretch. His sinker looked decent last year, so hopefully he can build off of that.
Only if one of their current starters go on the IL will Ortiz be promoted to the parent club
It’s all about service time
Defintiley not. If they wouldn’t have promoted him to Triple-A or even the Majors if they wanted to take the slow route to get him here. It’s not like the day the Pirates gain an extra year of control over him is in September either. If it’s about service time, then he’ll be here by June.
Ortiz will come up if he is successful in AAA.Remember that he had three good games with the Pirates out of four.They do this to give these guys a taste of what the ML’s are all about.They are treated like royalty.It is the classic carrot on the end of a stick.
He has not proven that he is Walter Johnson quite yet.
Ortiz will be a starter from the beginning of the year
@mlb1225….. I’m probably forgetting some of the service time CBA rules, but Ortiz only has 23 days in the bigs.
So he can be brought up roughly a month in and still be just short by season’s end, no?
More of a question, I know the new CBA made it service time manipulation a bit more tricky.
Bring him up early and let’s see Pirates get a draft pick after he wins a ROY! ( maaayybe)
Effective Brubaker is one of my favorite pitchers. He’s just not consistently effective, unfortunately.
Ortiz will be up in June. Future is looking decent at least.
Not so sure about that but I guess it depends a great deal on pitcher health and how the Pirates are doing. Unless what I’ve been reading is wrong, I’d have expected—I’d have hoped—that Priester and Burrows would be up before Ortiz but I “get” that we are talking about potential starters as opposed to more bullpen personnel
Stop reading. Sports writers are mostly clueless. Pittsburgh media is awful. Ortiz was called up before those guys. Looked fantastic. Unless that was a fluke or he gets injured he will be one of the first call ups. Just need to get that extra year of team control and probably avoid super two.
If BC had it his way, the starting rotation would stay healthy and Burrows Priester wouldn’t be seen until June 2024 other than their September 2023 cup of coffee.
I agree the Pittsburgh sports media are nothing but idiots. The biggest bunch of clowns are on 93.7 the fan and home of the pirates in radio. The pm team of filliponi and Mueller is the worst. Both big bags of hot air
The 93.7 guys are very interesting…if you are interested in their favorite cereal when they were kids, which local high school would let them work out at their facilities, their favorite restaurant at the beach, who can come up with the worst nickname for other station employees, how many consecutive days they can repeat the exact same “stories,” and how few callers they can take in any one hour. If that kind of adolescent humor isn’t your mug of Iron City, well, then you are right on. No wonder they keep switching pairings and time slots so often. We deserve better.
Jam….right you are…they are just old flunky newspaper reporters in their twilight career. And that pm team of filliponi and Mueller is just idiocy. They love them selves like a skip Bayless does. Neither are from Pittsburgh, yet they pretend to know more about Pittsburgh sports that the locals. They don’t take calls, supposed to be talk radio, when they do they are ignorant to the caller and hang up. Sad state of affairs for sports talk radio in Pittsburgh. And as the flagship of the pirates, they hardly talk about them.
And Joe Starkey, who calls himself a savvy old newshound. Sounds like a woman in a man’s body
Look, we’ve had nothing in this market since Stan and Guy, really. Unfortunate that Madden has made a cartoon of himself with the manufactured bravado and continual spew of hatred
Sportswriters, sports talk shows in Pittsburgh, comprise the great wasteland
Ortiz will be a starter from the beginning of the year
Always the contrarian. “Starter?” Ok
Run along and hug your Pirate Parrot doll
Hope they are not counting on Vince to be an effective starter. They seem to be eliminating his competition one by one which they may end up regretting.
He was probably promised a spot. If he fails they have replacements in aaa.
He’s got the Royals written all over him.
Well, looks like that Stallings trade will be forgotten by both teams in the next few years.
Probably longer than that. Pirates will trade off the Stallings pieces for other pieces and trade those pieces. If Nicolas doesn’t make it as a starter they will tey him as a reliever. If they dfa him it’s likely another team wants a shot at his arm.
Did NOT need to go that hard on the thumbnail pic for this type of story.
Apparently they did. 44 comments and 18 of them are by me and mlb or nyuck nyuck jokes. Should be 100 comments already. There is a nice a nice 5th starter on the trade market. No rumors or only if we are blown away with a offer.
Oh wow, Pittsburgh still has a team?
Yes and apparently a good one if they are dfa Thompson. Teams have been feasting on their dfas.
Oh wow you are so irrelevant
Not sure why Marin is so enamored with the sinker, but moving Thompson away from using the 4 seam that worked so well for him in Miami high in the zone and moving to using the sinker low in the zone didn’t pan out for them in Pittsburgh.
I think his to-go pitch with the Fish was the Cutter. I’m not sure what happened to him last year, but he looked solid in 2021, though never impressive.
I’m sure another team can use him as a multi innings reliever, revisiting the plan he used during his time in Miami.
Laugh if you want, but don’t be surprised when the Pirates are decent this year. They could be this years version of the 2022 Orioles.
Maybe not that good but definitely better. Management put in some hard work last year to hold them to 60 wins. Don’t know how they could keep them in the 60s again. Judging by their off season they aren’t going to try.
We’ve had this conversation and I’ve embraced your thinking about the Pirates mimicking the procedural methods of TB and Cleveland. I’m looking forward to seeing how this pans out
That said, I’m unsure how many of us will term the Pirates “decent” unless somehow, their plate discipline improves drastically, their defense becomes more consistent and their starting pitching frankly learns how to pitch
That’s a pretty tall order
Better? Sure. They can’t be any worse
But while I agree with your thinking, either the kids still on the way here represent the true turning point or Pirates staff will finally learn to instruct for the team to be more than a .500 team in the near future
(And truthfully, I’d be ok with a .500 team that re-loads, as you say, and tries to get to the next level every couple years)
Already better defensively. Actually have a 1b and 2 of them! A lot of poor defenders are gone. I like the rotation. No studs yet but six 3 4 era guys and 3 prospects ready to get a look. Bullpen is so much better this year. 70 win floor even without Reynolds.
I agree with underwood but Vilade I’m willing to see if the changes to his batting stance implemented by the Pirates work they cut down on his leg kick& open stance to working on launch angles to get more lift …. let’s see if works
If Andy and Sheltie can’t improve him nobody can.
The next time that Shelton and Haines improve a hitter will be the first.Cruz had to hire his own coach to see improvement.What does that tell you?
They should hire that guy. Or Santana can be a player manager coach.
Web-If this is true about Marin then he contributed to Thompson’s ineffectiveness if not outright caused it.
This is what they said about Ray Searage.
Marin should be fired if he thinks that one size fits all,along with whoever hired him.
are we really considering Vince Velasquez a serious contender for a rotation spot?
Hill, Keller, Contreras, Brubaker, Oviedo seem like the logical choice right now?
Eh can never have enough pitching and Vince should be at least able to take on some longer relief innings. But here is hoping he can provide more.
Joe- I live near Philadelphia and Vince tantalizers with his stuff but he can never put it together.
He has proven that time and time again.
BC must think that he has the fountain of youth,but he signed a 43 year old pitcher for the youth movement and a starter who clearly should be a reliever.
Either Brubaker or Oviedo will not make the grade because VV has almost certainly been promised a starter’s role.
I have a feeling he will get himself turned around and will be an asset this year to someone if not the Pirates.