Major League Baseball held the 2023 Futures Game in Seattle on Saturday night. The Pittsburgh Pirates were represented in the game by catcher Endy Rodriguez and right-handed pitcher JP Massey.
Endy Rodriguez was in the game at first base, batting sixth in the National League batting order. He received two plate appearances before he was pulled on defense in the bottom of the fifth.
Rodriguez walked in his trip to the plate in the top of the second. He would eventually come around to score after a walk, single and a sacrifice fly. He walked again in the fourth.
Rodriguez is hitting .258/.342/.390 over 65 games for Indianapolis this season. He homered 25 times last year, but he has hit just five so far this season. He had a decent 19.0% strikeout rate last year, which he has cut down to 15.1% this year.
He has played 52 games at catcher, with eight starts at first base mixed in.
JP Massey came on for the bottom of the sixth with a 5-0 lead. He got the first batter on a pop up to third base. The next batter grounded out to second base.
After getting two outs on eight pitches, Massey walked the next three guys on 16 pitches. He then got out of the inning on a three-pitch strikeout. His fastball topped out at 93.8 MPH. He was mostly fastballs to the first three batters, then started mixing in more curves as the inning went along, with 2-3 changeups as well.
Massey was recently promoted to Greensboro, after a strong run through Bradenton. He has a 3.45 ERA over 62.2 innings between both stops, with 34 walks, 64 strikeouts and a 1.34 WHIP. Batters are hitting .221 against him for the season.
