The Pirates are acquiring righty Chase Shugart from the Red Sox in exchange for minor league right-hander Matt McShane, reports Robert Murray of FanSided. Boston designated Shugart for assignment earlier in the week. The Pirates will need to make a 40-man roster move of their own to finalize the swap.
Shugart, 28, made his big league debut with the BoSox last season and allowed four runs in 8 2/3 innings out of the ’pen. He averaged 96.1 mph on his heater in that brief cup of coffee. He’s pitched in parts of three Triple-A seasons, struggling in the first two before finding more success there in 2024: 4.46 ERA, 25.6% strikeout rate, 10.2% walk rate, 44.4% grounder rate.
During his brief look in the majors, Shugart showed five pitches — a four-seamer, cutter, sinker, slider and changeup. He didn’t induce many whiffs in the majors but logged a solid 11.7% swinging-strike rate in Triple-A. Shugart has a pair of minor league options remaining, so he’ll provide the Bucs with some flexible bullpen depth.
McShane, 22, was the Pirates’ 13th-round draft pick just last summer. He’s yet to pitch in pro ball. McShane posted a 3.76 ERA in parts of three seasons as a reliever at St. Joseph’s University and also pitched in the Cape Cod League in each of the past two summers. The 6’4″, 220-pound righty has a strong pitcher’s frame but amounts to little more than a lottery ticket. Odds are that the Sox also liked him coming out of St. Joe’s and might’ve considered him with their own pick in the later stages of the 2024 draft. He’ll likely head to a Class-A affiliate to begin the 2025 season.
Pirates are spending all that money they saved the past 6 years
actually, their payroll projected for 2025 is $77 million dollars and if it doesn’t increase, the cheapest owner in baseball will have the lowest payroll too
Steve was joking
yeah, Einstein, I know
Sounds like the Marlins will be taking that honor but Bobby won’t be much higher.
Maybe he will get hit by a flying snow ball tomorrow at pirates fest
will there be a rock inside the snowball?
How did you not get that was a joke?
$77M isn’t a projection. It’s the actual total committed by the Pirates. They will spend anywhere from $85M-$100M total by Opening Day. That could be on an extension and/or an addition to the 26-man.
Actually Pirates finally trading prospects. Only problem is that they are not getting proven players in return. Between this trade and Horwitz trade that’s now 3 SP prospects and a proven MLB pitcher for a 27 year old 1B with minimal experience and a 28 year old reliever who was DFA earlier this week.
BC either has a terrible amateur scouting department or a terrible MLB scouting department. Or perhaps both
This marks the 29th player that Cherington has scooped up from the Red Sox or Blue Jays since taking over the Pirates.
To me, that shows he’s not very good at scouting and developing if he can’t think outside the box from his past teams.
@holecamels if that is the case, why have scouts?
Outside of pitching development, Ben hasn’t exactly set the baseball world on fire with his position players scouting or development.
Or drafting position players for that matter
or outside the Sox
Trades like this always confuse me. Like, oh, you have a 28-year-old rookie reliever that wasn’t good enough to justify a bullpen spot on a .500 team? Yeah, we’ll take him, have our 13th-round pick from a few months ago who we haven’t even given the chance to play.
Unless I’m missing something, this feels like a trade that we’ll look back on in a decade the same way we look at the Tatis Jr./Shields trade now.
As a red sox fan that’s what I’m hoping
Guy who might be useful in 6 years for a guy who cracked the majors last year
I don’t love this trade, but Ben is creating a real competition for bullpen spots
It’s not like the Tatis Jr./Shields trade is an often occurence. Sure, it happens, but for every Tatis/Shields trade, there are hundreds of trades like this that are forgotten about in a week and neither player ever makes an impact on either team.
It’s not all that confusing. Ben sees a guy with a record and more scouting vs a guy who has shown nothing yet.
Doesn’t make it a good idea just not a overly perplexing one. I probably wouldn’t do it with my limited knowledge of the situation. Could just be to free up low-a roster space while getting more pen arms with the hopes some stick. (?)
Yea I hate trading prospects for veterans that have just been designated for assignment. Nothing to see here. Depth for a prospect that will probably end up being depth.
there’s never anything to see with this team which is a problem
They need a right fielder and not from dumpster diving either
MLB1225
They still need a right fielder and for every dumpster diving trade Ben makes that won’t have any impact on this season, it becomes more clear that he won’t be either signing one or trading for one
Doesn’t matter. He’ll throw some meaningless analytics out there and come this time next year, this scrap Cherington has added this winter will be trivia questions
RIGHTFIELDER please !! Make it a good player……Grichuk, Verdugo, Jesus Sanchez. At least a little positivity going forward ! Spend a little money
RF should be Yorke against RHP. Cook (Or Henry or Cutch ) against LHP.
Screw the washed up vets. Try a prosect
None of those vets are coming here. That’s the joke of it all. They might as well say they’re interested in Alonso, too
Not sure about yorke out there but through spring and aomth or so into the season I would have Davis in the OF as much as possible. He needs ABs as he really has nothing really left to prove at the MiLB level
It’s believed, McCutchen still isn’t official. No corresponding move required for Shugart.
Cutch officially signed with the Bucs on December 23 of last year
It was reported, but never made official by the Pirates. Confirmed when Shugart was made official today with no corresponding move. 40-man is full. McCutchen will require a corresponding move once official.
So when I saw him being interviewed on local TV after the signing, saying he was glad to be back home for another year—and when the Pirates made the announcement via instagram—-it was all an illusion.
I didn’t say, he’s still a free agent. He doesn’t yet count against the 40-man because the trade has not be made officially official by the Pirates and MLB. Likely waiting for PiratesFest.
Pirates and Red Sox love trading with each other
According to the transaction report on the Pirates website, they have signed a slew of players to minor league contracts since January 1 and most weren’t reported on this website
Hanley Ramirez is one of those players
Those are International players signed since the window opened on Jan 15th, 2025
Been a lame offseason even by pirates standards. How about capitalizing on the excitement surrounding skenes Jones Keller and the next group? Reynolds are Cruz are really good ballplayers. Just try a little.