The Pirates are among multiple teams that have expressed interest in free agent righty Noah Syndergaard, reports Robert Murray of FanSided. According to Murray, both Syndergaard and right-hander Michael Lorenzen threw a bullpen session in front of teams today.
While it’s unclear which teams are involved in Lorenzen’s market, Pittsburgh is apparently considering Syndergaard as a rebound target. He’ll certainly settle for a one-year contract for a third straight offseason. After locking in a $21MM guarantee from the Angels in 2021-22 and a $13MM pact from the Dodgers last winter, he’s looking at a cheaper deal this time around.
That’s a reflection of Syndergaard’s trouble finding his form since he returned from Tommy John surgery. He underwent the elbow procedure in March 2020, essentially wiping out two seasons. During his first year back, he turned in a 3.94 ERA over 25 appearances for the Halos. While that’s decent run prevention, the righty wasn’t nearly as overpowering as he’d been before the surgery. He fanned just 16.8% of opposing hitters, nearly eight percentage points below his 2019 mark.
The Dodgers hoped that Syndergaard would rediscover that level in his second year after surgery. Instead, the lack of missed bats caught up to him. He was tagged for a 7.16 ERA over 12 starts in Los Angeles. The Dodgers placed him on the injured list and flipped him to the Guardians in a change-of-scenery swap that sent infielder Amed Rosario to Southern California.
Things didn’t get much better in Cleveland. Syndergaard returned from the IL to start six games. He pitched to a 5.40 ERA while allowing 10 home runs in 33 1/3 innings. The Guardians released him at the end of August. He didn’t sign elsewhere and finished his year with a 6.50 ERA across 88 2/3 frames. His 14.3% strikeout percentage and 8.2% swinging strike rate were each personal lows, while he allowed a career-worst 2.23 home runs per nine innings. Once one of the sport’s hardest throwers, the righty has lost a lot of velocity in recent seasons. His fastball was down around 92 MPH on average last year.
Syndergaard is still just 31 years old, so it stands to reason some clubs have optimism about helping him rediscover some of that lost arm speed. He has excellent control and has walked fewer than 6% of opposing hitters in each of the past two seasons. If he can even find the 93-94 MPH he brandished in 2022, he’d be a potential back-of-the-rotation starter.
The Pirates would benefit from that kind of production. Pittsburgh’s rotation is led by Mitch Keller. They’ve already targeted Martín Pérez and Marco Gonzales as rebound fliers, while players like Luis Ortiz, Bailey Falter, Roansy Contreras and Quinn Priester could vie for back-end jobs.
Pittsburgh’s signing of Aroldis Chapman pushes their projected player payroll to roughly $79MM, above last year’s $73MM Opening Day figure. It’s unclear how much budgetary room remains at the front office’s disposal.
Pirates really trying to do something this year…I am not a fan but I am proud of them. Very possible for Thor to make a comeback. It’s not his velo, it’s his head! He THINKS he has to throw 100 still to get guys out but he doesn’t. The day he comes to terms with that, we might just see him turn the tide and show us something once again!
When he had the velo he could work in the zone and get away with some mistakes. He can’t do that now because those mistakes are now homeruns. His stuff earlier in his career compensated for the what he lacked. It just doesn’t seem like he’s tried to adjust to his limitations and “pitch”, rather hope for that spark to return.
If he goes to the Pirates, hopefully he can adjust or it’s probably a BP finish to his career.
Spot on!
This guy is absolutely Washed!
The Pirates have had success at bringing pitchers back from mediocrity in recent years, a fact that only diehard baseball fans would know
And watch their own prosper elsewhere.
TheMan3 I’m a diehard fan and that’s news to me. But I do know the Dodgers, Indians and Rays are the top 3 organizations that are capable and proven to improve mediocre arms. And 2 out of 3 tried and moved on.
Anderson and Quintana come to mind and if it needs explaining again, perhaps you really aren’t paying attention
You seem to have missed it. LA fixed Anderson. And Quintana was a very good starter for many years in Chicago with the Cubs and the ChiSox. Quintana finally got healthy in Pittsburgh. And he was much better in St. Louis that year anyway.
Maybe washed as a starter but he has back of the bullpen potential. If the Yankees (yeah I am a bit biased) take a flyer on a reclamation project I hope it’s him. Several flamethrowing starters jump started their career after injury by moving to the bullpen. Who knows he could become the next John Smoltz. Smoltz was able to get his fastball back to 95mph after switching. I hope he decides to give it a shot because I do agree his days as a good/decent starter are over for now.
I hope Thor is able to make it back. I agree that his starting days are over and the bullpen maybe the way to go. The thing is he lost so much velocity and his top stuff was pretty straight anyway he overpowered hitters and got away with alot of mistakes that are getting punished now. The thing is Smoltz never lost his stuff he was injured. They moved him to the pen where his stuff played up and then they moved him back to the rotation at like 35-36 and he was pretty strong again. I remember Smoltz vs Pedro in 2005 and he was throwing 98. Thor never had the stuff Smoltz had. If he comes back it’s more like a right-handed Matt Moore came back.
Funny thing about the Dodgers fixing Anderson, he had an ERA of over 5.6 last year. Great job at fixing him
Does putting Rich Hill in a cryogenics chamber between starts until you can trade him at the deadline count as improvement of a pitcher? what do you think the Bucs will get for Chapman at this year’s deadline? I do congratulate them on leveraging the roster to bring back some lottery tickets.
Mac-Hill has been in a cryogenics chamber for several years.He pitched decently for the Pirates then must have gotten tired with the Padres.
Anderson was a meh pitcher at best then had a good year with Pittsburgh and was traded and pitched well.He slid downhill with the much bigger money.
Quintana had some injuries and poor pitching then came to the Bucs and pitched very well before he went to the Cardinals.
Valesquez had wild swings with the Phillies but pitched very well with the Pirates before he got injured.
Ray Searage was very good at providing rebounds for veteran pitchers and Oscar Marin seems to have upheld that skill.
The problem with the Pirates has always been that they cannot develop the young pitchers that they have.
TheMan3 If anything that’s vindication the Dodgers are better at developing their players. Meanwhile the Angels, or Moreno throws money at free agents developed by others. Finally he doesn’t use that money to get the best staff to keep the players in peak form. I bet he doesn’t listen to them either.
Pirates are on fire
Aaaaaaar!
No thank you
I’m all for picking up as many pitching reclamation projects as possible.
Anything to stop seeing Bailey Falter as a possible starter.
Bailey Falter is likely a better pitcher than Syndergaard at this point.
What do people think he could possibly command in guaranteed money? $3M? He was so awful last year.
$3-5m is probably about right. I wouldn’t be against it though.
5m ish sounds right. Market gets desperate could be a few more. So few pitchers if you were once something teams still dream of fixing you. He has name recognition as well.
I think they plan to open with payroll right around $90M, which would give them some room to add at the deadline if they stay in it.
Bob Nutting has never failed to spend what is necessary to contend. That my opinion. Many don’t like it but I am usually right and they keep reading my comments. Obviously there is a max of 110 120 130 tops but I don’t care if he spends 80 90 100. Just fill the holes. I have no problem with him making more $. Perez should out pitch guys who got paid the more. Will pitch similar to many. I don’t want Nutting paying more to get the same production just so fans can see a 90 or 100 payroll. Give me Perez who is my favorite free agent signing in all of baseball. Don’t care what the payroll is. Fill the holes.
“ Nutting has never failed what is necessary to contend”
The problem with this is the Pirates haven’t been serious contenders since 2015, nine years ago
They tried in 2016. Can’t survive 3 starting pitchers falling off a cliff. 2018 they fought there way into it and made 1 good trade and 1 bad one.
He could have tricked fans who thought Frazier Newman Bell Marte were something special and tried to contend. Rebuild was the right baseball move.
2018 they got hot, got close at the deadline and made trades that set them back. Way back.
That trade is why Neal Huntington is long-gone. The Felipe Vazquez situation helped to obscure that fact.
O- What got NH fired is poor drafting and just as bad development of young players.
Unfortunately,things have not changed a whole lot.
$6MM-$8MM plus incentives. If Frankie Montas can get $16MM after not pitching for an entire year, Thor should be getting half of that in guaranteed with how this market is.
Not pitching an entire year is better than pitching awful an entire year.
Lance Lynn, Kyle Gibson, and Lucas Giolito would beg to differ.
Those guys were all above average.
There’s more entertainment value in watching the money spin counter clockwise down the toilet. What a bunch of maroons. Ahahaha!
you mean like the Mets?
What is a maroon? I thought it was a color. Now, a moron on the other hand …… hmmm.
Thor will get hammered
Uncalled for Manny…He has never been known as a big drinker!
Perhaps Thor will learn to drop the hammer again!
Acoss, I remember a scene from one of the Avengers sequels where everyone was trying to pick up Thor’s hammer, and Captain America actually moved it like a millimeter lol And the look on Thor’s face was priceless! He was so scared & shocked hahaha
Trumbo, I’m not bragging, but Thor was modeled after me. They even said they were going to call him Yankee Clipper, but for some weird reason they didn’t call him that in the movies…..
Clip, all of you were modeled after Joe D. and you darn well know it!!!
You name-dropping, clout-chasing mad man!!
Okay, fine (eye roll). Maybe he wasn’t, but Superman definitely was –
Hey, I saw you chasing Joel before…ya know, when he was claiming he wasn’t Joel. Weird dude, man.
Superman?!?!? Hahahah Yeah “Joel” is a special case in which the good Lord has dropped into my lap!
Be honest, do you think he’s still living out of his mom’s basement? I think he might actually be a real case of basement living at 50, or whatever he is.
Clip, I am being totally honest here when I say this….I think he is a resident/patient/inmate of a Sanitarium somewhere here in the midwestern US…And I think he has gotten a hold of someone’s phone inside the establishment (probably some new & clueless orderly), and he is posting at his hearts content..
Far more interesting…… I like yours better. All in favor?
The ayes have it! That makes yours the official version.
Clip, he really went off the deep end earlier…Started accusing ME of being “King of Cards” and “daveygee” etc…lol
Well, that just confirms it is him.
I am just hoping that he gets burnt out and fades away, or the mute button comes back into commission and allows us to mute these people at will once again.
Yeah let’s hope they fix that mute button. I couldn’t make it through the comments in the HOF post.
If the Dodgers and Indians can’t fix you…
…. The Pirates can.
DreamGM, he has the road to “Comeback Player Of The Year” right in front of him. Just needs to take the 1st step!
I joke but see what the Pirates paid Anderson Quintana and what they make now. CLE LA are really good though. Along with SF TB. Thor rebounding will be impressive.
Yeah I mean the dodgers are a roster full of reclamation projects.
I really think Ohtani at $2M a year is going to be a great move for them. Scrappy, I like it.
I believe he’s referring to their ability to produce pitchers through their system. Kershaw, Urias, May, Buehler, Miller, Gosselin, etc. that were on the roster alone last year. 6 starters right there alone through their system is pretty impressive. And Phillips prospered under them as a closer.
The irony of Noah having no choice but to play for, in his own words, “the s****y Pirates.”
He has no problem playing for them. Just didn’t want to watch them. Can you blame him? I am sure many of you no Pittsburgh fans don’t watch them but would gladly take a few million to throw a baseball for them.
1 year, $8.6M.
I can’t see any team giving him that much.
@charlie 6
Why not? Starting pitching is pretty inflated this off-season.
OldYork, maybe a bit lower but with incentives.
@TrumboRedux
According to Spotrac, that’s his market value. Seems pretty reasonable given that he pitched to an Forecasted Run Average of 4.77 las year. Biggest issue for him is that his K-BB% is significantly lower than before he surgery.
2023: 14.3 K% – 4.9BB% = 9.4.
spotrac.com/mlb/cleveland-guardians/noah-syndergaa…
Not everyone recovers from TJ surgery. Rick Ankiel didn’t. He got the walks under control but his pitches no longer had movement and he got hammered every time out.
But what a hose in the OF
Less stress pitching for the Buc’s
Hard pass
Maybe by signing Noah and Aroldis they are hoping they transform them into some prospects at trade deadline. Not a bad idea if they don’t feel they’ll compete for postseason.
They are trying to contend. Will definitely trade them if they fail at contending.
If anything these small market teams could do for themselves is take a chance and rehab a player for the trade deadline and swap for future ace players. See Chapman. Not like he’s going to have a lot of saves with the bucs
Small markets can still contend and the Pirates are trying to and should be able to. Saves won’t change his value one way or the other. He has enough saves already and any buying team either won’t want him as a closer or will be incredibly desperate for one.
Much rather have Ryu. But no reason they can’t sign both! Or Ryu might be too hot. Lorenzen would be alright. Even Wood. That’s who I was thinking. Although I haven’t seen much of Thor. Maybe Pirates see a fix. His data doesn’t look great. And data looked great on Anderson Quintana Velasquez Hill. They obviously know what they are doing with veteran pitching free agents. Not interested in watching film on Thor, especially not love and thunder. Will just have to sit back and see what happens. Trust the process.
Maybe Thor needs some screaming goats to get him motivated to learn to pitch again lol
When the offseason began I was hoping for Ryu or Manaea. I like getting Gonzalez and Perez to fill that veteran, inning eater rotation presence on the cheap though. The Chapman deal was surprising and I love the aspect of creating more competition by taking one bullpen spot away from the group of guys fighting to establish themselves in MLB. I think Jose Hernandez will particularly benefit having Chapman on the team by being able to see and learn from another power lefty arm. One more starter and the pitching is vastly improved compared to the last 6-8 weeks of this past season. I’d prefer it not to be Syndergaard though, I think he might be toast at this point.
Thor wasn’t one of my recommendations. But hard to ? Pirates signing veteran starters. They better be right though!!!!!
Thor is going to look weird in a Pirate outfit.
He’ll look similar to Hader in a Pads uni..
Good luck to Thor. Hope he has a career renaissance somewhere
I think wherever he ends up next will be his last stop in the MLB. I hope I’m wrong but seems like he just doesn’t have it anymore
The true project would be to make Thor a reliever.
I actually said that last year. Don’t worry about getting through five, give them one good inning (or two).
Maybe an opener ? Pirates seem in more need of inning eaters than starters
Yeah an opener. That must be it.
Worth a shot. Kind of like the Gallo signing not a lot to lose by signing him.
Pirates this off-season: Bring me all the 30 something SP rebound fliers with name recognition in the land so we may gamble on unexceptional 3-5 starter upside! King Nutting wills that it be so!
So people complain that they don’t spend, then when they do spend they complain about who it’s spent on.
Sounds about right in Pittsburgh
I’m not a pirates fan, just mildly amused by their approach this off-season.
There are so many under 30 free agent pitchers out there
New to baseball?
Gonzales was acquired in a trade. Perez isn’t a bad one year signing at all but I wouldn’t call either syndergaard or Gonzales safe bets for reliable back end bulk innings or to recapture their form from earlier in their careers and deliver higher end results. But way to focus on one aspect of my comment to try and score a gotcha moment lol. Imo the pirates moves are not those of a team making a serious push to transition from rebuild to contention so far. If it was Perez plus a higher upside guy and a third reclamation and/or reliable innings guy of the Kyle Gibson type I’d have a higher opinion of their moves/free agent targets so far.
Right.
Big name recognition guys. Gonzalez and Perez.
Oh wait, that’s another gotcha.
I’m sure cherington craves your approval.
I don’t recall saying “big” name recognition lol.
Every article that says a team is interested in pitching needs to add the goofball Red Sox mgmt team of Werner and Kennedy. Sam Kennedy has been at the helm for three of the last four last place finishes. Dude needs to go.. Anyone else would have been fired! Goes to show that Henry does not care other than drop spending and raise ticket prices.
How much $$ is Syndergaard going to be paying the Pirates for his comedic services ?
He’s worth a gamble.
If this was 2014 instead of 2024 Syndergaard would have been the perfect Ray Searage reclamation project
Hey bottom of the barrel!
Can Thor catch lightning again or is that Mjolnir-sighted thinking
I’d rather Clevinger. Maybe both?
Another rebound flier they could try is Cookie Carrasco.
Every article that has had the Pirates “interested” in a SP turned into that player signing elsewhere.
Lets hope that continues
why?
Thor’s issue is quite simple in my opinion – he’s a thrower and not a pitcher. After the last surgery he needed to learn how to pitch. I don’t see it happening.
I still to this day don’t understand why Thor didn’t convert to Closer. I assume he has no ability to do what he did in his heyday. I always thought he might could do what Kerry Wood did circa 2007-2008 and have more value, by being a 3 out/half inning guy.
Good to see they deleted Padres from the headline and article.
This is what the Pirates do but just stop telling lies! Allegedly looking at SP and offering multi year contracts but always comes back to 1 year of aged/washed pitchers!
All this move would do is bring more uncertainty to the rotation! Not an improvement at all!
Surprised and relieved the Nats didn’t make this move. Or maybe they already have two similar pitchers in the rotation, Corbin and Williams.
Has Bauer’s agent called the Pirates yet?
He still has another case pending, most likely won’t be coming back until it’s figured out.
Feel like the pirates should go get both ML and NS. Think the vets would be pretty valuable and not like they would cost much. You can also flip them to the bullpen pretty quick
both could be an okay signing for the pirates.
Given the other pirates starter acquisitions I think I would pass on both of them. Neither are likely to give you any more than what we got.
Noah does have a pretty high ceiling though. Getting him and seeing what he can do wouldn’t be the worst thing if you can get him on a cheap deal.
I say give it a shot, if there’s mutual interest. Reminds me a bit of Burnett type. Can no longer blow everyone away, and might improve to 3/4 of his former dominant self. All free agents carry risks, at least he used to be decent.
Worth a try…no bad one year deals and they may be able to flip him for a prospect in July. It’s better than the money sitting in the owners bank account.
The Pirates seem to be employing a strategy of hoping fans think it’s still 2015.
This would be a pretty amazing offseason if it were.
I’m just curious, as I’ve mentioned his name quite a few times – for the same money (or probably less) – why wouldn’t we consider Eric Lauer? He had a bad year last year working through a shoulder impingement. Having suffered the same injury not all that long ago (also on my non-throwing arm), I could see how it would affect a pitcher, as it affects your mechanics with limited range on your glove arm. It also fully cleared on its own after about 8 months (with 6 weeks of intensive rehab that didn’t do much for it).
I get it, last year he sucked, but so did Thor. Thor has stunk for awhile now, while Lauer had one bad year. He could ditch his cutter in favor of using his slider and change more often, and would be a clear upgrade over Falter even if he didn’t return to form in a swingman role. The odds of him finding something the first half and having value to this team or any other is WAY higher than Thor, IMO – at a comparable price tag AND he still has another year of arb eligibility after next season.
If you’re going to spend $5 million on a pitcher who could fill out your rotation, why in the world are we considering Thor over Lauer?
I like Laurr too.
I’ve also been thinking that Lauer is the best bet for the Bucs, as well as the best bang for the bucks. I think it is likely that either Priester or Falter would be as good or better than Thor for a fraction of the cost.