The Pirates announced that they have signed right-hander Mitch Keller to five-year contract extension. The deal was previously-reported by Jeff Passan and Kiley McDaniel of ESPN. It’s a $77MM guarantee for the 27-year-old righty, per Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Kevin Gorman of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports that the new contract includes the 2024 campaign and runs through 2028. The Tidal Sports Group client had previously been slated to reach free agency following the 2025 campaign.
Keller had already agreed to a one-year, $5.4425MM deal for the upcoming season, avoiding an arbitration hearing in the process. As such, he’ll be guaranteed four years and $71.5575MM in new money. The Associated Press reports the financial breakdown. While Keller’s salary for 2024 is unchanged, he also collects a $2.0575MM signing bonus. He’ll make $15MM in 2025, $16.5MM in ’26, $18MM in ’27 and $20MM in 2028.
That aligns closely with the four-year, $73.5MM extension between the Twins and Pablo Lopez a year ago. Lopez, like Keller now, had between four and five years of big league service at the time of the agreement. A look at MLBTR’s Contract Tracker shows several other comps of note, including Kyle Freeland’s five-year, $64.5MM deal with the Rockies.
A 2014 second-round pick and longtime top prospect, Keller has taken major steps forward over the past two seasons, pitching to a combined 4.08 ERA in 353 1/3 innings. That solid but unspectacular ERA masks some more promising underlying trends. Keller’s 2022 season took off when he added a sinker to his arsenal in mid-May, helping to take some pressure off what had been a rather hittable four-seam fastball. He was dominant for the first two-thirds of the 2023 season before stumbling with a handful of meltdown starts over the final couple months as he pitched to a new career-high workload (194 1/3 frames).
That ugly start in 2022 and similarly rocky finish in 2023 bookend a stretch of 41 starts that underscore the upside the Pirates are chasing with this signing. At his best from ’22-’23, Keller rattled off a stretch of 240 1/3 innings of 3.25 ERA ball, fanning 23.5% of his opponents against a sharp 7.9% walk rate and strong 48.4% ground-ball rate. And even with the tough finish to his 2023 campaign, Keller ended the year with career-best marks in strikeout rate (25.5%), walk rate (6.7%), average exit velocity (87.7 mph) and hard-hit rate (35.6%). There are plenty of arrows pointing up with regard to the 6’2″, 220-pound righty, and the Bucs surely view him as someone capable of that low-3.00s ERA who can team with 2023 No. 1 overall pick Paul Skenes to anchor the rotation moving forward.
Skenes figures to debut this summer, and the Keller extension gives the organization a chance at a dynamic one-two punch atop the staff for the foreseeable future. For the 2024 season, the Bucs’ rotation will also include veterans Martin Perez and Marco Gonzales, though neither lefty is guaranteed anything beyond the current campaign. (Gonzales has a $15MM club option with no buyout.)
The Pirates’ ability to either develop or acquire sufficient rotation help beyond the ’24 season will be critical to their chances of reversing a nearly decade-long run of losing baseball at PNC Park. Prospects like Quinn Priester, Kyle Nicolas, Jackson Wolf, Jared Jones, Anthony Solometo and Bubba Chandler give the Pirates a solid stock of promising young arms alongside Skenes. Each of Skenes, Jones and Chandler has garnered some top-100 fanfare this season (as Priester has in the past).
Of course, the Pirates’ history of developing starting pitching has been suspect, at best. Much of the struggles came under the now-former front office regime, but we’ve seen touted talents like Gerrit Cole, Tyler Glasnow, Jameson Taillon and Joe Musgrove all struggle to reach their ceilings with the Bucs before being traded. Cole, Glasnow and Musgrove, in particular, broke out with their new clubs. Even Keller took a long road to reach the form that led to today’s five-year agreement. It’ll be imperative for the Pirates that they improve their development of young pitchers and/or find help outside the organization. Notably, they’ve been in constant contact with the Marlins about Miami’s bevy of young pitchers and have explored other trade possibilities as well.
Keller joins outfielder Bryan Reynolds and third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes as core pieces the Pirates have signed to long-term deals over the past few years. It’s a breath of fresh air for Bucs fans who’d grown accustomed to seeing their best players traded as their arbitration prices escalated. The long-term deals signed by each player don’t necessarily preclude eventual trades — as evidenced by Andrew McCutchen — but it’s nevertheless an encouraging trend for Pittsburgh fans to see a trio of extensions that each top $70MM in guaranteed money, considering their $60MM extension with Jason Kendall back in 2000 stood as the richest in franchise history for upwards of two decades.
Each of Keller, Reynolds and Hayes are now signed through at least the 2028 season — the same year that the team’s control windows over shortstop Oneil Cruz and outfielder Jack Suwinski extend. That quintet, paired with Skenes and catchers Henry Davis and Endy Rodriguez, could form the nucleus of the Pirates’ next contending club. Reynolds’ seven-year, $100MM extension and Hayes’ eight-year, $70MM pact are both generally affordable, even by the Pirates’ modest standards, which should give the Bucs flexibility to supplement that core in other ways.
It’s unlikely the Pirates ever dive into the deep end of the free agent market. But if owner Bob Nutting ever decides he’s finally comfortable spending in even the second tiers of the open market — Francisco Liriano’s three-year, $39MM contract is the largest free agent signing in Pirates history — the Pirates would have the chance to complement their growing foundation with some meaningful talent and break away from their lengthy run near or at the bottom of the NL Central.
It’s a shame the Pirates won’t spend a little in free agency. That could help get them over the hump some. Good on them for extending some of their young players though.
They should go after Bauer and win the division or Cincy should it’s there for the taking literally all 5 teams have a shot at it.
Bauer contacted Cherington who said that he wasn’t interested in signing the pitcher
I don’t understand all the Bauer love. He isn’t that good. Look at his record post-sticky tack and he’s a slightly above-average pitcher. That’s before you consider all of the behavioral problems and clubhouse issues. I was not too fond of it when the Dodgers signed him and if I were a fan of any other team I wouldn’t want my team anywhere near him.
Bauer is a solid #3 who would come very cheap. To the point he would be easy to get rid of if he became a problem. I would bet Pitt could sign him for $1 million. He is desperate to get back in MLB.
Never had to refuse to date or break up with someone despite them looking good but they were crazy or annoying? Maybe you were even ok with it but your friends family couldn’t stand them. I think that’s Bauer’s problem. Even if they believe in his legal innocence and think he is a good pitcher. Too many teammates would find him annoying.
Bauer stated he’d take league minimum 760K this yr + performance/incentive base. It’s simple, you sign him 2yrs, & flip him at trade deadline either yr.
The Bucs probably could sign him for $1 million dollars but they won’t
Flip him to who? No one wants him.
Nobody wants to be that team and deal with media headlines. Buccos already have one in the bullpen who had similar headlines that actually admitted illegal discharge of a fire arm 8 times within his home & domestic but never charged 30gm suspension but hey let’s turn a blind eye right.
Bauer has become a super hero to incels.
I do not know what they have to lose with Bauer.Give him a chance.Yes,he is creepy.So what?If he can pitch to anywhere near his former self is he not worth $2-3M per year with a second year club option of $5-6 M?
Yes,they have to think outside of the box.Yes,Nutting does not want him.But he needs to understand that Pirate fans have put up with this crap of a team for long enough and he needs to take some chances if he wants to be a bona fide ML owner.
No one wants him when there is no cost in players. Its not his pitching that makes him an undesirable employee. Its simple, you sign him for 2 years and then cut him and eat the contract because NO ONE else wants him.
Nutting has had 14 years to make himself a bona fide ML owner. If he hasn’t already become one, it’s likely that he won’t nor care
The Pirates could really really use a slightly above average pitcher.
That’s why.
Bauer is clearly a bit of a d0uche and so is some of his YouTube fam. I agree he clearly showed he was an expert at sticky stuff. There are positives and negatives to being so…like he is. He has said some important things at times and said many things that make him seem petty and egotistical. It’s always his type, for better or worse, that speaks out about everything. I do believe the allegations are false but why is he even in that situation? He could find anyone he wanted to sleep with (if that’s all he wants which seems like all he could probably handle from a relashionship), and while it’s his own business it still makes him seem childish. He strikes me in every way like a teenager. Personally I am a believer that events don’t arbitrarily happen to people for no reason. Life knocked him off his high horse. How he responds is his own decision. But I don’t see him ever pitching again state side, despite the online support of many. As a poster once said about John Coppolella recently- everything goes over smoother for you when you don’t act like a d0uche to people. But they wouldn’t touch Trevor anyway. Deserved or not he’s branded.
Bauer is blackballed while he has open and unresolved cases brought by women against him. He’s not even listed on MLB’s available FA’s list.
They would lose me as a fan, though I know that might not be much to lose.
When are people going to realize that nobody is signing Bauer. His mlb career is likely over.
They got the best free agent pitcher Perez. Got Gonzales in trade for free. Still a few pitchers available but they like how their young current options look. Most free agents took over pays to get. Extending Keller was the much better move.
Yeah, surprised there wasn’t a bidding war for “Best Free Agent Pitcher” Perez
It’s amazing how awful most front offices are. Same teams who had no interest this year will be offering him much more next year.
They will spend on free agency if they need a couple of good players to get over the top and compete for pennants.
They do not have a good enough team right now to do so.
They also have to overpay to get good players to come to Pittsburgh as it has been a bad team for 4 1/2 years.
And with the exorbitant prices being paid to mediocre starters this year I can understand why they are having trouble finding them.
But they need at least one more good starter to compete like your Reds have done.
Pirates are a big move away from completing. I liked the luzardo/alcantara package for them. And they got the farm to acquire the talent
Apparently, they’ve been on the verge of acquiring Cabrera for like a week. They agreed to Ashcraft and Jebb as the first 2 pieces but the Marlins want Peguero and the Pirates would rather them take Bae. I think the Pirates should do it. They have Gonzales and Bae with Johnson a whole lot closer than people think.
That’s hard because I think Peguero could break out huge this year with the potential to be better than Cruz
Where did you get this information? I think they would include Peguero
I was wondering the same.. first i saw the details of Jebb/Ashcraft. Not saying it is wrong, but I have also seen in the past people quoting from discussion boards that were fan proposals.
My cousins uncles barber has it on good authority.
Your father’s barber?
Gonzalez hasn’t yet shown he can hit major league pitching, but neither has Bae for that matter
I do, however like, Peguero, and prefer that he isn’t included in any trade
Don’t give up on Gonzalez! Chance to be special!
Yes, 36 strikeout versus 8 walks, in 112 plate appearances to go along with a .209 batting average
If he has the ability to be good he needs to show it in spring training
Peguero’s K rate in 2023 was higher than NickG’s. And 112 plate appearances isn’t enough to judge yet. Plus Nick’s OPS in the minors over 3 seasons is over 900.
I too like Peguero. He should be our shortstop with Cruz in the OF, but if he can get us a quality SP then I say do it.
Hitting in the minors doesn’t always translate well into the majors as there have been numerous instances of Bucs that were successful at Indy then failed with the parent club
Especially considering they have one of the worst player development systems in baseball
Garrett showed up to camp with a shoulder injury and that put the brakes to the Cabrera trade most likely. Also they just signed Anderson to a contract so the shortstop need is filled for them as well. They made Anderson the offer about the same time that Garrett ‘s shoulder became known.
Pirates could compete as is. Trade cost has been expensive. I advise keeping prospects. Marlins haven’t been able to teach Cabrera control and are willing to trade him. Are the Pirates so superior in pitching development? Ashcraft and a Gonzales/Bae and a lesser prospect than Jebb would be worth a try. Peguero would be only 2b I would be interested in if I was Miami. One team will have to budge to get something done. Or Pirates will need to pay more to go after a better grade starter.
I’m not a fan of trading for Cabrera. Why not trade some more depth like Harrington or Shin and get Luzardo, Garrett or even Rogers at a lesser prospect cost? then they’d have a LHP with some arb years left.
IMO Luzardo or Garrett would cost much more than Cabrera.
Price is too high. Other teams aren’t as stingy with prospects yet all those guys are still Marlins. Probably cost a arm and a Shin and a leg.
I think that Peugero is talented but not fundamentally sound enough to ever be a very good ML player.
His inclusion should be enough with Ashcroft and another average minor league player throw in to get Cabrera.
Except Garrett has a bad shoulder. The fish may have decided that they need to keep Cabrera until they see what happens with Garrett. If Garrett was healthy, I think the deal would have been done.
I suggest sending Alika Williams in any trade with Miami
A right handed hitter that can’t hit lefties is pathetic
Miami trade dreams aren’t coming true it seems. If you don’t want Alika why would Miami want him?
As long as we don’t have to hear, “I’m tired of losing” comments from him for the next 5 years.
Great move in that this makes the third year in a row the Pirates have extended one of their better players. Maybe there is hope for the future. Now trade for a decent starting pitcher to go along with Keller.
Plus Luzardo would make a nice 3-headed monster if Skenes pans out as quickly as we all assume!
Sign Lorenzen.
Another relief pitcher?
Still think they make sense for Cease
Cease makes sense for a team ready to compete for championships now. And that’s not the Pirates. They might be ready in a couple of years.
Idk I could see them being like the Reds last year with a nice group of position players in place, in a wide open division, surprising the baseball world.
The Sox apparently want the sun, moon and stars for Cease. No team has offered that yet
They won 76 games last year without Cruz and 2/5 of a rotation for half the season. They have a full season of Cruz and Roansy/Ortiz don’t bomb in May and they would’ve won at least 85/86 last year and the D-Backs would’ve been watching the Pirates from their couches. The Buccos aren’t nearly as far off as some would believe.
And they lost 1 starter to tj in preseason and another in May and their best mlb ready prospect.
Exactly
The Pirates have been lucky with injuries but it ran out last year.Every team has injuries,some worse than the Pirates.Baseball has become like football,next man up.Only the rich teams and young pitcher rich teams can afford the depth necessary to withstand the typical annual depletion due to injuries especially of the starting pitcher corps.
It’s rare for a team to make it through the seasons sans a big injury to a crucial player. Last year it was Cruz. It will be some other player this year.
That’s why depth is so important. Good teams have it. Bad to mid teams don’t
It’s already happened, losing a big injury to a crucial player
Endy Rodriguez
Oviedo
Great offseason so far for the Bucs. Land Cabrera from the Marlins now and we are in business. Cherington has done a great job. Great farm system, players moving up from the farm to the majors including ones he did not draft and ones he traded for, and stocked the farm well past just the top 10. 12 of their top 15 on Pipeline are all pitchers. Doing it right.
I agree, and it’s why I don’t get people who rag on Cherington when it’s clearly Bob telling him you get $80M to spend on this team, and so you’re forced to make trade offs and sign third best options on the FA market. His job is to maximize the resources given to him and there might be enough here to sneak in as a wild card and then who knows.
I think the farm system and seeing guys like Bae, Davis, Endy, Peguero, Priester, Roansey, Mlodzinski, Gonzales, Cruz, and Suwinski move up into the majors is huge. Huntington would alway wait on guys too long at times in the minors.
Cherington has guys who are outside the top 100 who could easily sneak in this year in Lonnie White, Shalin Polanco, and Hunter Barco. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him draft almost exclusively college hitters this year considering how deep the team has pitching at the middle to lower minor league levels right now. They carry a decent 1st round pick and a great comp pick this year and should have a really great chance to do what the Orioles did and continue to do.
Mueth Harrington Shim Kennedy Burrows could all be top 100 guys. A few of them already are for me. Jebb Ashcraft are interesting. They have lower level guys with top 100 potential as well. Prospect ranking sites flood their top 30 with trash like Martin Nunez Frazier Gorski CSN Castro Thomas Mitchell so fans don’t get to see the real talent until a few years later.
Gorski isn’t “trash”. In fact none of them are. Harold Ramirez was called similar and look at him now.
The Pirates are in the wrong division. They have a top 10ish farm system, but 3rd or 4th in the Central, behind Chicago & MKE, and about the same as Cincinnati, who have a better big-league core of young talent.
Until they improve their infrastructure, especially their pitching development system they will have a hard time getting past MKE-Cinc-Chi. They should be better moving forward than St Louis, but that’s still not postseason ball most years.
Milwaukee and Pittsburgh match up for farm systems pretty closely I think. Both are represented well with a top 3 prospect and the rest falling somewhere through the mid 60s.
The Pirates however, have a few guys who likely will enter the top 100 this year with only 1 of their current top prospects likely to exit (Skenes and MAYBE Jones but unlikely Jones). Not to mention they will likely add 1 or 2 to the top 100 with their draft this year as well. It is possible that the Pirates deal from that depth in order to secure a starter.
The Cubs farm is easily better just due to depth at their top 10, but a lot of those players will be moved through this year as well leaving a large void. The Pirates for the most part had that occur over the last two years and still have depth to offer.
The central will be a very exciting division to watch for many years with a ton of young players. I can’t wait for it. A lot of great baseball to come for sure.
There pitching development is what they do best. Most their best prospects are pitchers who are performing well. Pitching and depth is what wins divisions. Pitching is what teams want in trades. Farm systems are all somewhat close with the 4 teams. I would take Pirates because of the pitching.
The Pirates have never had good pitching development.They May be better now,and certainly better than current player development,but that is damning with faint praise.Drafting is clearly better under BC than under NH.
Their development team and hitting coach both need to go.
But that should have both happened over a year ago.
Nice to see the Pirates spending on keeping guys like Reynolds and Keller.
Congrats, Buccos fans.
The also extended Hayes. They do spend.
Can’t leave out Hayes. Hitting ups and downs aside he has the best leather at 3B in the league.
*Machado & Arenado stares intensify*
*it looks like Ha-Seong joined them*
Your opinion is valid though. Ke’Bryan is a beast on the dirt!
Hayes found his power stroke last year hitting a career high in home runs
He’s only 26 I believe and will improve offensively. Plus they haven’t had offensive players in the lineup to build around recently
With the additions made this offseason, they should be a better team
Gwynning, Arenado won 2 years ago based on reputation and name recognition but Hayes had the better year defensively I think.
If healthy he could go on an Arenado-like streak winning maybe another 4-6 times if healthy.
Theman & king, it’s funny because people ragged on that deal when he slumped and he finished on fire last year. With Cruz and Cutch back healthy and with Davis having some major league at bats he has a lot of portectio this year and I really think he will surprise people at the plate. He needs to convert some doubles to HRs but he should be better than last year I think.
Hayes is on a historic run of the “runs saved” stat. No one in their first few years have come close to Ke’bryan
Yeah, the Hayes deal is looking like it will pay off quite handsomely for the Pirates, especially if the power keeps trending upwards.
Thank you Mr King.
A lot of money for essentially a 4+ FRA pitcher, but we’ll see how this plays out. Last year, his FRA was 3.73, compared to his ERA of 4.21, so he underperformed his ERA, meaning he pitched much better than he was credited with.
I like that his K% increased and BB% decreased last year and he limited the exit velocity so we’ll see how this turns out for him in the coming years of his contract.
With the price of starting pitching on the open market., I look at his as a pretty darn good deal for the Pirates. They get Keller’s 30-32 age seasons at an affordable price.. Comparable starting pitchers who hit the market during that time will want nothing to do with signing with the Pirates.
Having a veteran in the room, who is well liked and respected will pay dividends down the road with all the young guys they have coming up these next few years.
whats also missing is that most of that ERA came from a “handful” of games.
Keller was top 20 in quality starts in 2023 with 18 out of 32.
7 games out of 32 he gave up 5 or more runs. 25 games keeping the team in Grand Slam range isn’t tooo bad.
Yeah, he just needs a little more consistency. He’s close.
It’s a absolute bargain. Unless severe injury or a awful timing tj happens it will turn out great.
Unless he regresses horribly, or ends up under the knife, this was market price for his past season as a whole. Should he level out the peaks and valleys a little, it will end up being a bargain.
OK, Baltimore. If Pittsburgh is locking up young players, can you do the same with one of your stars? I mean, anyone? You can make some sort of commitment, right?
So basically 3/60 or so not bad for age 30-32 seasons
He was a 3 War pitcher last year. Typically the cost of 1 free agent War is 8 million. There could be some team value to that extension if he can maintain relatively similar performance through age 32.
As a free agent he would get at least 25 and more than 3 years. If he wanted long term he is a over 100 million guy.
$8M per one WAR says nothing.The best players were getting around $5M per one WAR last year.Injured players may have been getting that much or more per one WAR but are they worth it to the team if they are injured?
The real value now seems to have climbed to $4-5M instead of $3-4M per one WAR.
Awesome news for pirates fans. If they could get or have gotten another controlable starter like Cabrera to pair with Skeens and Mitch life would be good. All they would need would be a healthy Oviedo, Jones, and a few other of their young starters to be solid
Bob saw the Athletic article from yesterday and decided to get stuff done today.
So this is the floor for a Paul Skenes pre-MLB debut extension
Float 7yr/$80MM for Skenes and see if he nibbles?
14 years 120m I love it.
14 for Paul might have to top 200 large… that’d be a tough call for any team, I think!
Maybe 9 80 or 90. They already have him for 7 at minimum wage. Well 6 and 2/3. He isn’t making opening day roster. He isn’t getting called up soon enough to contend for ROY. Highly unlikely he gets called up soon enough for super two. If he is doing well and they need a starter and are contending he will be up mid June. If he is just doing ok and they don’t need him at mlb level he won’t be called up until early September and they will try for the draft pick. If he is just dominating AAA he will be called up mid June regardless.
It would be wise to let Skenes prove that he is healthy and a good major league pitcher before they offer him a fat contract.
How did the twins get Pablo Lopez so cheap
They had a pile of $ and Lopez wanted it right now. He didn’t want to risk injury and wait 2 years to get more.
They should have extended him when his ERA was over 6……..
They would have gotten a better deal.
You really think that Keller and his agent would have extended for small money before his Arb years?
And of course you have a direct line to the agents brain and can address the public on their behalf
LOL
No, Just my opinion that a player and agent would not look too look to accept a long term extension after the first full season with ugly results. Would not make any sense for the player to accept a low ball offer so quickly. Most players seem to bet on themselves that they will improve and command bigger money. If that was the case with Keller, he bet wisely.
They been trying to extend him for years. If they could have cheaper they would have. His era had nothing to do with his decision. He knew his 6 something era would improve.
Congrats to Pirates and their fans on this one. I unfortunately was in attendance at Camden Yards when Mitch carved up the O’s this past year. 7 scoreless with 4 hits, no walks, and 13 k’s. He was dominating. That’s what I get for trying to attend “an easy win”.
This contract seems like it’ll be a great value at the onset, even though he tailed off a bit in the second half. I’d wager he takes another step forward rather than regresses in 2024…maybe even a big step forward.
Kudos to the Pirates for investing in some stability and a home-grown dude on this one.
You’re not the only one. I did the same thing.
Thank you Waymann.
Not the worst deal but he isn’t very consistent. still if they can get half a season top rotation performance and half a season at a reasonable back end worth the money.
first half last year his stuff was just nasty. He ran in to some dumpster level games, seemed to happen more after Hedges was gone. Coincidence?
I partially blame his inconsistency on Shelton for leaving him in when he’s not sharp and giving up 5+ runs. A few games Shelton left Keller in after giving up 7 runs
They had a good bullpen last year, in my opinion, Keller was often misused
The games that you are referring to, Mitch was gutting out around 5 innings to keep the pen as fresh as possible. There were a lot of bullpen games because they lost too many pitchers to injury, If he yanked Keller in many of those games, the pen would have been way over used and it would not have been as good. That is my opinion. Hopefully the Bucs can limit the opener/bullpen games this year and have the choice to pull a starter sooner his season.
I agree with you on red Shelton mis managing Keller. OF course Shelton mis manages all the time
Great signing and a relief they signed him.
Signing their core players is a step forward.
I see them contending this year and Keller becoming one of the best pitchers in baseball
If you look at Mitch’s bad games last year, you’ll notice a pattern: the Pirates had relied heavily on their bullpen in the previous games.
In his last bad game of the season, his Sept. 8 start against Atlanta, the Pirates had heavily used their bullpen in Milwaukee. Keller needed to give them innings, and was left out there against the best lineup in baseball to take it on the chin. He was also already about 20 innings past his previous career high by that point.
The shelling before that featured a typical Bido start (3 innings) with multiple guys pitching multiple innings. Mitch gave up 5 runs in 5 innings to the Brewers, but he actually pitched better that day than the line showed.
His worst game, the one against Cleveland on July 18, got off to a very rocky start before he settled down. Again, Bido had “started” two games prior and only got through 2.1 innings. Between that game and the next one, the Pirates had used almost every guy in the bullpen heavily, and needed innings. Keller was left out there to battle and somehow got through 6 innings – with no semblance of his best stuff (1K the whole night) – giving up 8 runs in total.
Point being, his “inconsistency” did not happen in a vacuum and was almost always due to poor starts ahead of him in the rotation. Part of that was the Pirates’ lack of SP depth last year, and probably part of it fell on Mitch putting too much pressure on himself to get deep into games.
If he puts it all together going forward (ie gets that ERA down to the mid 3.00’s or better) then this will look brilliant. If he stays a 4.00+ ERA guy, not so much.
I think he’ll perform. He’s certainly trending in the right direction over the last two years.
Not a Pirates fan, but I’m happy for them. Seeing Hayes, Reynolds, and Keller get extensions instead of included in trades is a nice change of pace for them.
4 era with 200 innings and most games being top of rotation performance. Absolute bargain of a contract.
I like Keller, but wow this shows how good of a deal the Twins got with Lopez.
It’s called setting the market and inflation. Hard for Keller to accept less with such a recent comp. And Pirates really wanted to extend him. I think both parties believe he will put up Lopez numbers going forward.
Keller should fetch top prospects when he’s traded in 2.5yrs
Of course, let’s start thinking about the prospects we can get for Keller during their next rebuild window
Will be nice in 2025 and beyond with Skenes, Keller, and hopefully a mix of Brubaker, Burrows, Chandler, Jones, Solometo, and Oviedo to have a solid starting staff during the window.
Roberto-Let’s hope that the minor league pitching hopefuls stay healthy number one and prove their strong potential by pitching extremely well in AAA for at least three months number two.
They are suspects until they prove to be prospects by their record in AAA.
These are just some internal options off the top of my head. Skenes should be no issue as long as he stays healthy. Burrows and Brubaker, if they return to 100% should be at least solid # 4 or 5 guys. Same for when Oviedo returns later in 2025. The other 3 kids will depend on how they start out this season. Several other kids will be in the mix as well. My point being, at the very least, there will be several internal options to start this next window with and if all goes well it will be easier to entice better grade of FA pitching and bats with a solid foundation to sell to FA that are available and they will not look to be trading Mitch in 2.5 years like @bucsfan0004 said to start this thread. That is what I was responding too.
I understand that I think that your evaluation is spot on.My point is that pitchers are unproven unless they produce very well in the upper levels of the minor leagues.I think that you get that and I apologize for responding to seem that you might not.
Some posters on here unfortunately do not grasp that point as these minor league pitchers in my opinion have really not proven anything meaningful as of yet.
Won’t be traded that soon. Would cost too much. He likes Pittsburgh so they would be able to extend him again if they wanted to.
That would be the biggest K in White Sox franchise history. Oh, by the way yesterday Jerry Reinsdorf said they can’t compete because they need $1 Billion in tax payer money for a new stadium and if the Illinois taxpayers don’t give it to him the team will move to Nashville when he dies. Reinsdorf is 88. Lol.. Also, Diamondbacks Ken Kendrick made a similar threat two days ago except death wouldn’t trigger the move he was threatening.
If the Pirates have 3 70 million plus contracts any team other than Oakland should be able to.
For Keller’s sake I hope he got at least a partial no trade clause. I didn’t see it mentioned in the article.
That’s a really solid deal. And a very welcome one.
Diehard Cardinals fan here , I’m glad for the Pirates fans to be excited that the owner is actually spending a little money they have a lot of good young players . Congrats Pirates.
Owner extended Cutch Tabata Vazquez Marte Harrison. Kept Liriano Nova Cervelli. Nothing new. Some just want him to spend every year even though they are trying to lose 100 games on purpose for a rebuild.
Thank you KitKat.
Now get Cabrera from Miami and sign Pham. Let’s go Bucs!
Wow someone who actually wants to stay in Pittsburgh unless having a contract easy to trade now
Hayes, Reynolds and Cutch wanted to stay in Pittsburgh meaning that you obviously don’t know much about the Pirate players
Paul-NYY fan.nuff said.
Outfield isn’t a need. Rather extend players instead of wasting $ on minor upgrades.
I think Pham boost the OF and spell Reynolds or Jack. Internal options aren’t exciting
He would at least add excitement to the clubhouse’s fantasy football league. I don’t see Pham really being enough of an upgrade to even be kicking the tires on, he’s just about the same player as Joe, only older.
Pham would be a huge upgrade over Joe. Joe and Pham can split RF with Pham spelling Reynolds and Jack. Having a 4th OFer like Pham is exactly what the Pirates need on both offence and defence
I wanted my Pads to go get Keller, oh well! Nice extension for Mitch and the Bucs.
Great news. My only fear is that if he has a down season they will panic and dump his salary instead of waiting for a bounce back season. Pirates in the past have not shown a lot of patience with young players.
Good move by the Bucs. And a fair deal on both sides.
Joe Musgrove was an established MLB player when the Bucs acquired him from Houston. Can’t blame the Pirates staff for that one and the others listed are a bit tenuous apart from the Glasnow disaster. Cole was very good in black and gold while Taillion’s career was massively hampered by health problems.
I’m not saying they aren’t bad at developing pitchers, but the examples given are poor.
Terrier- I agree with your post.I thought that other than Glasnow these were poor examples,and show the type of “piling on” that is typical with many Pirate observers.
I do however totally agree that they do not spit out good starting pitchers like Cleveland or the Dodgers,and also that it is imperative that they as a small market team begin to do so.
Cherington is betting his career that he has the right young pitchers in the Pirates’ minor league system to enable him to continue it.
Cole
5 years in Pit – 15.5 fwar (3.1 / yr)
2 years in Hou – 13.4 fwar (6.7 /yr)
Cole’s time in Pittsburgh includes his rookie/soph years with the usual teething problems. I see you chose to omit Cole’s Yankees numbers, where he’s come back down to earth after his career peak at a typical age with the Astros.
A+ extension.
His rookie year he started 11 games. His ERA was over 7 and his FIP under 4. That’s pretty bizzare, especially pitching at Pittsburgh.
When I went to the comments, I was surprised to see “24 comments are hidden because you muted the comment authors.” lol
Short long term contracts when the guy is still relatively young are the best.
At least the Pirates have room for optimism, instead of the dark days of whatever nonsense Neal Huntington was doing.
Now Pirates need to go all in on competing this year and go get somebody like Bieber or Bauer for this year. The Central is terrible – any one of those teams can win it.
I prefer remembering Huntington’s time here during the Cutch earlier period than how he ended. That is, the period where the Pirates had young talent and augmented it with AJ, Martin, Frankie Liriano etc, and won a lot of games
Seems like a lifetime ago. Better players being developed on the farm, better pitching coach and manager and astute front office types who plugged players into glaring needs
No idea what happened at the end—I suspect he was told to cut salary and amazingly took a swing at a wild card by making an outrageous trade. But by the end, between bad trades, poor player development and even poorer scouting, he’d stamped his own ticket out of town
Huntington was bringing the team during a three year period to the team with the second best record in all of baseball.
This signing is good news for almost all Pirate fans.
But it does not help one iota with this year’s team.
Anyone who follows this team knows that it needs at least one more reasonably good starting pitcher to be able compete for the playoffs this year.
And Cherington no longer has two months to find one.
If the reports we’ve read are true and the Pirates are balking at sending the Marlins Peguero and a pitcher like Ashcroft in return for Carbrera, it’s somewhat strange. With Termarr a year or two removed and an entire stable of young stud pitchers, I’d have to question the validity of the rumor
That said, yeah, it’s great they locked up Keller but on one hand, he’s the only real starter they have and on the other, he goes through periods where he gets hammered for games at a time
It’s hard for me to see this team as being competitive with so many question marks surround the team in terms of starting pitching and run production
Let’s just say he doesn’t find anything else. By June 15, Super 2 would be passed (or close to it), Brubaker should be ready, Jones may be knocking at the door. The Pirates have 70 games up to that point.
I don’t think it’s outrageous to suggest that team might win 4 out of every 7 games the top 3 starters start in. That’s a 24-18 record. If the bottom two can just stay around .500, the team would be 38-32, with upgrades on the way. I would consider this close to the best-case scenario, but not beyond the realm of possibility.
My point is that as long as the current group can basically tread water until June, the division is weak enough that a 35-35 start, followed by a 50-42 finish should, in all likelihood, put them in the race into September.
Exactly, and it’s what I’ve been saying since November
Their thought is simply, why spend money when they are going to be awash in starting pitching come mid/late summer?
“Tread water” has always been the idea
My thinking is that signing Bauer would’ve added a starter who could fit under any incarnation of a starting staff now or months from now, but so be it
You’re right. The division as it sits has done the Pirates a great favor in terms of being a competitive team this year
Time to cool off on the Nutting is cheap talk now. I’d actually suggest the dumpster diving free agents is more on BC than Nutting. At this point, he’s ponied up the cash to keep the cornerstone players on the team for years. Yes, they can sign free agents, but it’s still very risky and the best approach is developing and locking up your own. It doesn’t actually look that crazy to see the Pirates getting a wild card spot this year with a few breakout players.
Please. Come on man. Get real. Enough of this wild card talk. They are good enough to win the division.
I think Hayes has big year. Pirates can cause trouble in Central IF they can get just alittle pitching.
No. They’re not. They have one legitimate starter followed by four big question marks. That alone makes the “good enough to the division” comment somewhat funny
Like last year, the question will be, where do the runs come from? They still lack run production potential and it’s not likely that Cutch is suddenly going to hit as he did 10 years ago, that Tellez is suddenly have a season as he had a couple years ago or that Suwinski will dramatically cut down on strikeouts to drive in runs beyond his occasional homers. And we hope Cruz can provide a huge spark
A lot of hoping when the Brewers are still the best team in the division and the Cubs and Reds have better all around young talent
But it’s not even March. Have to hold out hope
Every team in the division has major flaws; the Brewers may be in worse rotation shape than the Pirates are. The Cubs, if they don’t re-sign Bellinger, could have a pretty anemic offense. The Reds have young talent (which can be inconsistent) and a bullpen that would terrify me (in a bad way). The Cards actually might have the best current roster on paper, they’re also the most likely to see their pitching staff on the IL and they don’t have a ton of depth there either.
What four question marks? Perez was the number 1 best free agent pitcher. A+++++++++++ signing. If Pirates medical team is any good Gonzales won’t be a question either. Good news. There’s only two question marks.
Agreed, Pundit. 84 wins may win the division. But tell me again where the runs are going to come from. And hey, low scoring games are fine when you have Bednar and Chapman and the gang, but Dream’s love of their starters notwithstanding, who is a reliable starter other than Keller?
Your points are well taken and I hope they do well. But jeez, they sure could have gone all in with a signing of Bauer or Urias (or both)
I honestly don’t see much of a difference between Perez’s performance last year and Mitch’s. He blew up a couple of games, but was good for 6-7 innings for many games last season. Both Perez and Marco should be at least marginal improvements over Rich Hill.
We started last season with pretty much all question marks — could Mitch sustain his ’22 finish? Was Oviedo the real deal? Was VV going to be anything better than an innings-eater? We’re actually in much better shape this season in terms of the ceiling of the starters, even Priester/Ortiz/Roansy, than last.
Fangraphs has them projected for 77 wins, last in the division.
Fangraphs hit it out of the park last season projecting the Cards to win the division with 91 wins. Projected the Mets to win 94. Had the Reds winning 70, San Diego winning the NL West win 91 wins.
They had the Pirates winning 68 last year, which they missed by 8 games — and would have missed by a few more if Cruz had played more than a dozen games last season.
I think Fangraphs does their projections with the mouse from the fair, spinning it around, lifting the cup and seeing what number he runs into.
Stop it! Nutting is cheap and his former employees are saying the same thing in case you missed it! He makes so much money from other teams that should be allocated directly to payroll!
Gpod for them. I hope the Reds do some of these instead of breaking it up for the third time.
This will not go well.
So the extension is ~21.5m for 3 years and it doesn’t even get into his mid 30s? Pretty solid deal for the pirates and I can understand why pitchers would want to lock in this kind of guarantee, so it makes sense for Keller too.
This seems reasonable enough for both sides. Pirates retain a good pitcher at a good cost and Keller avoids the risks associated with waiting for his pay day. It does seem like it slightly favors the Pirates over Keller but not in a gross way they didn’t take him to the cleaners or anything.
@bloomquist4hof Well said. It looks like a $5.4m arb agreement for 2024, say $10m in 2025, then roughly $20.5m in each of 2026, 2027, and 2028.
That’s for a 2-3 win pitcher for his age 30, 31, and 32 seasons, getting the heart of his free agency, without paying the inevitable premium in the form of years after the first few years the team absolutely does not want.
Seems fair both ways, given other deals for comparable pitchers, though the Marlins got Pablo Lopez, a better pitcher and at an important year younger, for only $1m more a year.
Now he just needs to be healthy for 5 years. Just.
This needed to happen and I’m glad it did. We couldn’t let another home grown stud leave after giving away glasnow and bailing on cole. It’s a very friendly deal both ways, but yes let’s just round the rotation with Bauer. Cherrington we are begging you to make it happen. Even if all you end up w is b level prospects it’s something.
I love the extension and yes it’s good for Pittsburgh but this doesn’t make Pittsburgh better this season! So many are like see Nutting spends! He has always extended young players but until he participates in UFA market improvement will be slow!
The rotation is one of the worst in the league! Just because you’re left handed doesn’t mean you will have success in Pittsburgh! I think the only way our starters are better is if Roansy bounces back! I still believe he could be a top of the rotation arm with Keller! Perez should be OK then so much uncertainty!
Need another Outfielder also!
The Rockies and Nats are definitely worse. The Cardinals have big names, none of whom is, or ever has been particularly good, with the exception of Gray, who can’t stay healthy. Their rotation looks good on paper — Gray, Mikolas, Gibson, Lynn and Steven Matz — but again, outside of Gray, each has been on a steady season-over-season decline. (Maybe Matz gets an incomplete, he loves him some IL too.)
I’d sign up for the Pirates’ rotation any day over that bunch, only Mikolas really has any kind of ceiling after Gray, the rest are guys who will toss 5 IP, walk a guy or two, and have 2-3Ks (i.e. pitch to contact types). And I’ll almost guarantee that the Cards will see more IL time out of those 5 than the Bucs will from theirs (barring a TJ situation).