Pittsburgh Pirates General Manager Neal Huntington has an eye on the future of his pitching staff
Masterson increases workload in Bradenton
Pittsburgh Pirates general manger Neal Huntington addressed several pitching related questions during his weekly Sunday press conference at PNC Park, including the status of Justin Masterson, who was signed to a minor league contract in mid-April.
“So far, so good,” Huntington said. “The velocity is slowly increasing. He’s throwing strikes. He feels like he’s physically in a great place, as good a place as he’s been in a while.”
Masterson’s arm strength will be an important thing to monitor over time, as his average velocity on his sinker fell from 91.7 mph during his All-Star season of 2013 with the Cleveland Indians to 86.8 last season with the Boston Red Sox.
“His shoulder feels strong,” Huntington said. “It’s just a matter of continuing to build him up, continuing to try to build some arm strength, as well as continue to take steps forward to allow him to repeat his mechanics.”
MLB could raise strike zone
Huntington also addressed a report from ESPN’s Jayson Stark about Major League Baseball potentially raising the lower part of the strike zone as much as two inches from below the knee to above the knee after this season, saying it may be a bigger problem for umpires than pitchers.
“Pitchers are good enough athletes that they would probably make the adjustment over time, the same way the umpires would make the adjustment over time,” he said. “There might be some unintended consequences of asking them to change their zone overnight, and we understand the intent behind it. We’ll certainly support it if that’s the direction we go in and we’ll adjust.”
Niese improving in past few starts
Left-hander Jon Niese has stabilized in his past three starts, pitching into the seventh inning in each of them. He has thrown a total of 19.2 innings with 16 hits allowed, four walks and 14 strikeouts with an ERA of 2.75, despite earning only one win and one loss.
“He’s held us in games, and he battles and competes,” Huntington said. “(Saturday) night might be the only example where he pitched well and we didn’t hold the game for him. He’s a battler and he’s a veteran. We’ve expected him to give us a chance to win every time he took the ball, and for the most part, he’s done that.”
Niese’s record stands and 4-2, and his ERA has fallen from 5.94 to 4.75 since his five-inning, six earned run loss performance in a 7-1 loss to the Chicago Cubs on May 3 at PNC Park. He is under contract for $9 million this season with two team options for the next two seasons. Both also have buyouts attached of $500,000 apiece.
Indy arms making push for Pittsburgh
The news of the starting rotation’s success in Triple-A Indianapolis continues to grow, and Huntington says other executives around the game have taken note as well, marking the apparent popularity of right-hander Chad Kuhl.
“I can’t even think of the number of trade requests over the years for Chad that we’ve (turned down),” Huntington said. “Chad has very quietly been a guy that we’ve put our arms around and felt like he could help us at the Major League level as a starter. We see Chad being able to help us at some point this summer.”
When asked about the number of innings he would expect for the top prospect arms like Kuhl, Tyler Glasnow and Jameson Taillon, Huntington said, “In a perfect world, they’d have a full year at Triple-A. It’s probably not going to be a perfect world.
“We’d love to give our guys more experience at Triple-A than we have in the past. The result when we’re able to give guys a significant amount of experience shows they make an easier transition. They tend to be able to adjust quicker at the Major League level.”
Huntington used Gerrit Cole as an example of the rare player that did not log significant innings at Triple-A before being called up. Cole pitched only 68 innings in Indianapolis before making his Major League debut in 2013.
“Gerrit Cole is the only one that was on the front edge of the readiness curve in our minds that stepped in and has never looked back, and even that hasn’t been a completely smooth ride along the way.”
Josh Taylor is an award-winning sports personality who currently serves as a producer/host on Trib Live Radio as well as appearing on KDKA‘s sports coverage and programming.
Featured photo credit – Keith Allison – Flickr Commercial License
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