The Pittsburgh Pirates announced on Sunday afternoon that they have recalled outfielder Travis Swaggerty from Triple-A Indianapolis. To make room on the active roster, infielder Rodolfo Castro has been optioned to Indianapolis.
The Swaggerty news broke last night. He’s hitting .280/.362/.439 in 35 games this year, but he has been much better over the last three weeks, hitting .397/.465/.667 in his last 16 games, with nine extra-base hits and eight walks.
The 23-year-old Castro has struggled for the most part during his Major League time, despite hitting well in Indianapolis at the time of his recall. He hit .197/.269/.296 in 21 games for the Pirates.
Does this mean we can stop playing Marcano in the OF and let TSwag (an actual OFer) have one of the four OF spots with Reynolds, Suwinski, and Mitchell?
Yes! Yes! Yes!
And here is hoping Gamel goes off and brings back a good trade haul, he has earned a chance at postseason play.
Getting closer. Sometime around mid-July we could be looking at:
M Perez-Heineman-Tsutsugo-Gamel-Chavis-Castillo-Cruz-Hayes-Newman-Swaggerty-Suwinski-Vogelbach-VanMeter
They’re still a mess at catcher. The better version of this is without Tsutsugo but we know that’s not happening before August, so if he doesn’t start hitting upon reinstatement, I hope the front office has the sense to taper his use (of course it won’t). I’d love to have Bae up in VanMeter’s place, but that last one isn’t a difference maker.
Quintana-Contreras-Keller-Brubaker-Thompson-Crowe-Bednar-Stratton-Peters-Underwood-Hembree-DeJong-Banda
Average rotation thanks to the front two, but paper thin in the pen. They’ll give Hembree every chance to bounce back. Not one of the last 6 can be optioned, which is so very Cherington. The better version of this probably has de los Santos in place of Hembree. It’d be good to see Yajure force his way into the conversation (not to mention Mears), but we haven’t seen anything yet to indicate that’s warranted.
So Nickles and Ben get what they were going for: a super-cheap roster that could play on the fringes of competitiveness. As always, it’s going to come down to what they do to supplement it.
You forgot Reynolds.
Ugh, I meant Reynolds but wrote Newman. But then where to put Newman.