In minor league news on Monday, the Pittsburgh Pirates released left-handed pitchers Nathan Kirby and Blake Weiman.
Weiman was an eighth round pick in 2017, who has struggled in parts of three seasons at the Triple-A level, while also missing some time due to injury. The 26-year-old had a career 3.71 ERA in 194 innings, with 207 strikeouts and a 1.10 WHIP. However, at Triple-A in 2019, 2021-22, he had a 5.33 ERA in 74.1 innings, with his highest mark coming this year (7.27 in 17.1 innings).
Kirby looked like he was doing well this year in limited time, posting a 2.74 ERA in 23 innings, BUT that low ERA came with 22 walks and a 1.91 WHIP. The Pirates acquired him mid-season from the Milwaukee Brewers last year, two months before he hit minor league free agency. He re-signed with the Pirates last November. The 28-year-old was selected 40th overall in the 2015 draft.
If more transactions pop up today on the minor league side, we will add them here.
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.
I thought Weiman had potential. But what do I know.
Per MLBTR, Banda released, Yajure promoted, VanMeter reinstated, Mitchell sent down.
Eickhoff passed through waivers and was assigned to Indy, but he still has the right to reject the assignment.
Was bound to happen. The Indy pitching staff had bloated to 20 arms, and they were still holding on to the 28-and-over guys while trying to re-integrate Jacques and Mears, and promoting Toribio, Matson and MacGregor. I wouldn’t count on Eckelman being around much longer.
Not really spring anymore but I guess cleaning time is any time…
Saw both these guys pitch a couple weeks ago. I figured Weiman was done for because he was trucked during a rundown thanks to Rodolfo Castro being bad at anything baseball except hitting home runs.
I thought Kirby looked decent, but that WHIP is definitely a big giant red flag.