Sammy Siani is creating an interesting decision for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Next week, MLB teams must submit their offseason 40-man rosters, which determines who they will protect from the Rule 5 draft. If you’re unfamiliar with the Rule 5 draft, it’s a largely unimportant event in the offseason where teams can draft players from other minor league systems onto their own Major League roster.
The catch is that the drafting team must keep the player on their active roster the entire following season, else they would have to put the player through waivers, and offer them back to the original team. There’s a cost to draft a player, which is $100,000 paid by the drafting team to the former team. If a player is returned, the original team must return half of the amount to the drafting team.
The Rule 5 draft gets extra attention in Pittsburgh due to a draft that took place 21 years ago. The Pirates lost five players with the first six picks in 2003, despite having the 40-man space to protect these players. The most notable was Jose Bautista, and the Pirates eventually had to trade to get him back.
That wasn’t the only bad move they made with Bautista, but it did get Pirates fans watching the Rule 5 draft closely in perpetuity. By the time Bautista became a Major League star elsewhere, the Rule 5 draft had changed. You could no longer find a Bautista in the draft, due to MLB giving teams an extra year to decide on their players.
For the last decade-plus, the Rule 5 draft has been a glorified waiver system, where teams might find a middle reliever or bench player to fill out the back of their roster. The long-term upside rests with fringe-average starters or high-floor depth options who can be added to an organization’s depth for cheap.
This offseason, the Rule 5 draft will take place on December 11th. This year’s Rule 5 draft is very thin in talent, in large part to the pandemic.
Players become eligible for the Rule 5 draft after their fourth or fifth season, depending on when they signed their first contract with a Major League team. Any player who was 18 or younger in their signing year gets the extra year before they need to be protected.
Prep players from the 2020 draft and college players from the 2021 draft are first-time eligible this year. The 2020 draft was limited to five rounds, while the 2021 draft dropped to 20 rounds, down from 40 in 2019. With fewer players eligible, there will be fewer candidates worthy of a pick.
That’s even more the case with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
The Pirates only drafted one prep player in 2020: Jared Jones. They don’t have a Rule 5 decision to make with Jones, as he is already on the 40-man roster and pitching in the Majors.
Their 2021 draft went heavy on prep players at the top of the draft. Henry Davis was taken out of the college ranks first overall, but is already on the 40-man roster. The college players from that draft who stand out today all look like upper-level depth options who might crack the Majors one day. They aren’t Rule 5 options.
Each season brings the chance for players to improve their stock. And that brings me to Sammy Siani.
There are only a handful of players from the Pirates’ previously-eligible list who I would consider as a top 50 prospect. Siani is not only moving up the list in the Arizona Fall League, but he’s making a case to be protected from the Rule 5 draft.
It’s a small sample of 72 plate appearances, but Siani has been one of the best hitters in the AFL, batting .406/.472/.594 with three homers and four stolen bases. He was selected to the Fall Stars Game, where he had two hits.
The AFL performance is enough to take a closer look at Siani.
Jonathan Mayo of MLB.com reported on Siani’s offseason, noting that the outfielder has made some swing changes to alter his bat path. He was too steep with his approach, leading to a lot of swing-and-miss. Siani was beginning to work on the issue at the end of 2022, following a .625 OPS in Greensboro.
After a successful offseason in Australia, Siani improved to a .701 OPS in 2023. That still wasn’t enough to get him promoted, and he was still dealing with a strikeout rate in excess of 30% from the steep swing.
Siani improved in 2024. He entered the year back with Greensboro, but this time he hit .324/.402/.563, while cutting his strikeouts to 11%. After one month, he was promoted to Altoona. The overall results weren’t great, with a .254/.325/.368 line. He did maintain a lower strikeout rate, at 20.6%, while also improving as the year continued.
Over the final seven weeks of the season, Siani hit .296/.372/.394 in 194 plate appearances at the Double-A level. He was hitting consistently, getting on base, and showing a bit of speed, with five steals in seven attempts. His strikeout rate remained low, dropping to 18% during this stretch.
Now, Siani is continuing this hitting in a showcase league, and continuing in a showcase game. Clearly, something has clicked for him, and it’s something that he’s been working on for a few seasons. I wrote about Siani working to shed his steep swing two years ago, and it seems he’s successfully made the change.
Siani would represent the highest upside you could imagine for a Rule 5 player. He lacks power from a small frame, which will limit him to fringe-average starter potential. He does have a quick bat and displayed great plate patience when switching to a more contact-friendly approach. Ever since the end of July, he’s hit consistently and with enough power sprinkled in that he would be worth thinking about in future Major League context.
If a team drafted Siani this year, they’d be getting a high contact, high OBP hitter who can play all three positions in the outfield. Making the jump from Double-A, there would be questions as to how much Siani would hit in the Majors. He might be a dead roster spot all season. The value would be buying in early on an adjustment that might still produce gains for Siani beyond 2025.
If the Pirates keep Siani — whether by protecting him from the Rule 5 draft, or by watching him go undrafted — they could challenge him with an assignment in Triple-A. They could also take the same approach they had this year, giving him a start in the lower level, with a quick promotion if he starts the season hitting like he did last year.
Because the Pirates don’t have any other candidates to be lost in the Rule 5 draft this year, finding a roster spot for Siani would be easier. They’d have to decide if Siani could possibly be depth this season. If he can, then they should protect him. If he can’t, then it’s unlikely he gets protected all year by another team.
Outside of the context of the Rule 5 draft, what Siani has been doing is impressive. It’s very difficult to make a positive change to your game. The process takes time to click in, and a lot of players give up before seeing results from the new approach. Siani’s development makes it more likely that he’s going to be a Major Leaguer one day.
This offseason, the question seems to be a matter of “When?”.
