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Pirates Prospects Daily: Plenty Of Wheels In Motion After Henry Davis Promotion

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There are probably very few things that could beat sweeping a rival to stretch a winning streak out to five games, keeping within a half game of the division lead in the process.

While it still might not beat a sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, with the final game being televised nationally, there was still a bit of fresh air added throughout the system after the game – Henry Davis getting promoted to Triple-A.

Moving Davis up was coming at some point, and it was obvious they had some sort of timeline in place for all of this could happen.

The former first overall pick showed that the only thing that was holding him back the last two seasons was injuries, and that there wasn’t much developing he could do at the Double-A level.

Davis moving up to Indianapolis could start a ripple effect throughout the system, as his promotion actually impacts multiple players throughout several levels. Here’s a look at some things to watch in the aftermath of the recent news.

— An open spot at the catcher position is now opening in Altoona, which you would have to imagine opens the door for Abrahan Gutierrez to finally get out of Greensboro. After spending all of last year there, he remained there this season to ensure he got plenty of playing time behind the plate.

Acquired in 2021, Gutierrez has continually put up one of the lowest swinging strike rate, while also putting up one of the better line drive rate in the system.

He should get the big test to see if the hitting translate to Double-A now.

Endy Rodriguez probably doesn’t directly get promoted due to Davis coming up, but this happening does start some sort of final countdown for him.

In the meantime we get to see how the team could deploy the two in the same lineup. We saw a bit of that last year when they were both in Altoona, but Davis was in and out of the lineup with an injury before Rodriguez getting promoted to Indianapolis.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Endy has seen time at first base and Davis in right field as their secondary position. There’s probably some fun things they can do to get both of them in the lineup, and keep the defensive prowess of Austin Hedges behind the plate for a game here and there.

Say what you want about his offense, he’s been huge with the pitching staff and they’d be crazy to abandon that while the team is competing. If they fall out of contention, that’d be a different story.

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Anthony Murphy
Anthony Murphy
Anthony began writing over 10 years ago, starting a personal blog to cover the 2011 MLB draft, where the Pirates selected first overall. After bouncing around many websites covering hockey, he refocused his attention to baseball, his first love when it comes to sports. He eventually found himself here at Pirates Prospects in late 2021, where he covers the team’s four full season minor league affiliates.

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