The Pittsburgh Pirates had an interesting decision to make prior to Friday’s contest against the San Diego Padres, which they answered by calling up Austin Meadows
The Pittsburgh Pirates also have a couple other pressing decisions upcoming.
Who goes when Josh Harrison is ready to be activated from the disabled list Who is out of the rotation when Joe Musgrove is ready to make his Pirates debut?
Guys like Jose Osuna, Adam Frazier, Max Moroff and Nick Kingham could find themselves back in the minors even though they all belong up in the majors.
And for the Pirates, these tough roster decisions is a great problem to have.
Having too many deserving candidates for the 25-man roster is quite the change from the past couple of seasons.
Gone are the likes of having to call up guys like: Jason Rogers, Cole Figueroa, Pedro Florimon, Wilfredo Boscan, Kyle Lobstein, Corey Luebke, Phil Coke, Curtis Partch, Jorge Rondon, Kelvin Marte, Zach Phillips, Phillip Gosselin, Danny Ortiz, Jhan Marninez, Josh Lindblom, Johnny Barbato, Angel Sanchez and the Dan Runzler’s of the world.
I could do this all day so I’ll stop.
The point being that most of the guys the Pittsburgh Pirates turned to from the minors the past two seasons had next to no chance of helping the club win games.
That’s not the same case right now.
The Pirates depth is helping them right now and while guys like Moroff, Frazier, Osuna and Kingham may never turn into superstars, they are major league caliber players.
That alone is a change for the organization.
The Pirates aren’t churning out superstars, but they are turning out talent and that’s a plus.
You need more than the 25 guys that head north on Opening Day and the Bucs depth is being shown off.
There’s further questions to be answered down the road as well.
What happens when Jung Ho Kang comes back?
Will there be a spot for Jordan Luplow?
Pitchers Mitch Keller and J.T. Brubaker are on the horizon, as are infielders Kevin Kramer, Kevin Newman and Cole Tucker.
Too much talent is a great problem to have.
While none of them may be game changers, collectively they can build a pretty solid 25-man roster.
Neal Huntington takes a lot of heat for some of his roster decisions as he should, but he should also be credited with having the organization in a position to not have to rely on the type of guys the Pirates have the last two seasons.
Over the course of the next few weeks, Huntington has some tough decisions ahead of him.
And for a change that’s a good thing.
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