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Ryan Lavarnway Elects Free Agency

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The Pittsburgh Pirates announced that catcher Ryan Lavarnway was sent outright off of the 40-man roster and he elected free agency.

The 31-year-old Lavarnway was the backup catcher to Jacob Stallings at Indianapolis this season, though he ended up seeing decent playing time with all of the time that Stallings spent in the majors. The Pirates called Lavarnway up in September, where he was used six times as a pinch-hitter. He never saw any time behind the plate. He hit .288/.375/.485 in 77 games with Indianapolis this season. Lavarnway has spent parts of seven seasons in the majors, though he has played just 146 games during that time.

The Pirates will likely have Christian Kelley as the starting catcher in Indianapolis this upcoming season, now that Stallings is out of options. It’s possible that they could bring back Lavarnway on a minor league deal. Jackson Williams and Jin-De Jhang are both minor league free agents after Friday if they don’t re-sign, so it’s clear that the Pirates will need to add catching depth at the lower levels.

John Dreker
John Dreker
John started working at Pirates Prospects in 2009, but his connection to the Pittsburgh Pirates started exactly 100 years earlier when Dots Miller debuted for the 1909 World Series champions. John was born in Kearny, NJ, two blocks from the house where Dots Miller grew up. From that hometown hero connection came a love of Pirates history, as well as the sport of baseball. When he didn't make it as a lefty pitcher with an 80+ MPH fastball and a slider that needed work, John turned to covering the game, eventually focusing in on the prospects side, where his interest was pushed by the big league team being below .500 for so long. John has covered the minors in some form since the 2002 season, and leads the draft and international coverage on Pirates Prospects. He writes daily on Pittsburgh Baseball History, when he's not covering the entire system daily throughout the entire year on Pirates Prospects.

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