The Pirates minor leaguers played a game at Pirate City today, featuring Charlie Morton and Clayton Richard throwing against each other on the pitching side of things. I’ll have an update on Morton’s outing a little later today. For now, here are a few of the minor league injury updates.
**Connor Joe has been playing in games for the last week, but was still limited. He would either play in the field, or take at-bats, but he wouldn’t do both, and wouldn’t run out of the box. That changed today, as he played his first game this Spring on both sides, playing first base and taking at-bats. Joe went five innings, which is the usual starting point for a rehab assignment. Players typically see their progression go from five to seven innings in less than a week, before getting up to full games. It might be a bit different in this case, since the Pirates are trying to get the 2014 first round pick built back up after missing so much time. No word yet on his progression from here, but it’s a good sign that he’s now getting back into games.
**Adam Frazier has been out with a fractured index finger, but started getting back into games this week. He was a designated hitter today, and played two five inning games earlier this week. He will play a few seven inning games next week, on Monday and Tuesday, then should go to Altoona. Frazier figures to factor into the middle infield mix, getting a lot of time at shortstop. That expects to bump Gift Ngoepe to a reserve role on the bench.
**Stephen Tarpley missed some time at the end of Spring Training with shoulder soreness. He was only shut down for about a week, and is starting to get build back up. Tarpley threw a two inning sim game recently, and will get back on the mound in a real game on Monday. He doesn’t know at this point how many innings he will throw. Tarpley said it would be nice to get back into a competitive game, and is hoping that he will be able to get to West Virginia sooner than later. Sooner could be possible, especially since he didn’t miss much time at the end of camp.
**Clayton Richard went six innings today as he continues to get built back up with his new mechanics. I wrote about those new mechanics last week.
