Bucs on Deck: Pittsburgh Pirates 2025 minor league predictions
Who will be the top hitters, pitchers, and breakout players in 2025 for the Pirates minors?
While Triple-A began its season last week, the rest of the full-season affiliates begin their 2025 schedules today.
Indianapolis has some of the top pitching prospects in the system, but more of the hitters are spread out through the rest of the affiliates.
With the rest of the full-season affiliates getting started today, we made some predictions on who will be the hitter, pitcher, and breakout player of the year. A few of the other writers on the site joined in to give their thoughts going into the season.
John Dreker
Hitter of the Year: Omar Alfonzo
I think he sees a lot of at-bats splitting between catcher and first base, so he will get enough playing time to seriously challenge for the best hitter in the system. He will be in Greensboro to open the year, which should help his stats compared to spending most of last year in Bradenton. The guy has been hitting the ball hard consistently for years. He had a solid year in 2024, so I expect him to improve into a bigger prospect in 2025 as he continues to mature as a hitter.
Pitcher of the Year: Alessandro Ercolani
I wanted to pick one of the top Triple-A starters in this spot, but the uncertainty regarding how much time they will spend in the majors keeps me from picking a guy who might be in Pittsburgh half of the year. I'm going with Alessandro Ercolani here. He's a young player with great stuff, who had success in Greensboro last year, which is never easy. He's moving up this season to face more experienced hitters, but the better ballpark for pitchers should help him out. I also think he will put in more innings than last year, putting him in the Pitcher of the Year talk.
Breakout Player of the Year: Yordany De Los Santos
All three of these categories had some solid choices available. I'm going with Yordany De Los Santos as the Breakout Player of the Year. He has put up outstanding numbers two years in a row while playing in the Florida Complex League. At some point those stats have to translate to a higher level. He's still just 20 years old this season, so I'm saying third time is a charm at Bradenton. He will start to show why the Pirates gave him a seven-figure bonus at 16 years old. He looks too good at the lower level all around to not have at least some success in full-season ball
WTM
Hitter of the Year: Konnor Griffin
If this ISN'T Griffin, we're in trouble. There's just so little competition in the system. He made a big impression during spring training and also made adjustments to his swing to address the possibility of contact issues — an issue that didn't show up when I saw him, which was a fair amount. And then you add in the speed and arm.
Pitcher of the Year: Hunter Barco
I'm guessing the AAA guys will all see major league time this year, possibly a lot of it in some cases, so it's hard to go with one of them. Barco seems poised for a strong year, especially with reports that he was hitting 97 mph this spring. He hasn't quite gotten the attention of the other guys, but that may be about to change.
Breakout Player of the Year: Levi Sterling.
Sterling has two big things going for him: He's a prep pitching draftee, and he has strong athleticism. These are two characteristics that have worked very well for the Pirates recently. He isn't overpowering as of yet, but that won't be a critical problem in the low minors for a pitcher with strong command, and at 6'5" he should still have projection left.
NolaJeffy
Hitter of the Year: Konnor Griffin
This feels like the gimme answer, but I expect big things from him. He already added some good weight, and it looks like he improved his swing.
Pitcher of the year: Alessandro Ercolani
I talk about him a lot, and I'll keep talking about him. He (relatively) surprisingly moved up to Altoona this year, and I think this could be the year he really begins to pop up on the radar (outside of Bucs On Declk).
Breakout Player of the Year: Yordany De Los Santos
For the past two years, Yordany has dominated the Florida Complex League, and then stalled out when reaching the Florida State League. I think he puts it all together this year, in part due to having some high-end competition with Konnor Griffin and Wyatt Sanford.
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Murphy
Hitter of the Year: Omar Alfonzo
The answer should probably be Konnor Griffin. Overall, I believe he will have a good year. I also believe there may be an initial adjustment period before the natural skills take over.
Alfonzo brings a rare blend of contact ability and power potential to the system. The prospects have power potential but struggle with swing decisions and making contact. They also have players who make decent contact but don’t impact the ball enough.
That, and the fact he should start in Greensboro again, will help him stand out among the rest in the system and should lead to an eventual promotion to Altoona. He nearly tripled his home run output from 2023 to 2024, and if he elevates the ball better, could go even further than that.
Pitcher of the Year: Hunter Barco
In a lot of systems, Barco is probably one of, if not the top, pitching prospects. He’s also probably knocking on the major league door as well, but with the amount of depth they have right now, it bumps him down even further on the organizational depth chart.
The Pirates are flush with pitching prospects in the upper levels, and Barco’s season was cut short due to an injury. This keeps him in the minors all of 2025, but it also allows him to walk away with the organization's top pitcher honors. I also believe he’ll get some top 100 consideration by the end of 2025 as well.
Breakout Player of the Year: Edward Florentino
I will talk about Florentino as much as possible, as I believe he is in line to take a huge step forward, and I’m not the only one. Anyone who has seen him during spring has noticed the potential, and he is quickly finding himself on more breakout candidate lists.
He’ll start in the FCL, but I believe he has the approach and talent to hit his way to Bradenton before the complex season is over. He faced some much older competition in spring and never looked out of place at the plate.
There’s power potential there, and still some room to fill out his giant frame.
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I like Javier Rivas to break out this year. All the talent just hasn’t put it together yet. Could be the year.
I like a bounce back from Solomento as pitcher of the year, based on nothing. lol but we need it. Hitter of the year I’m going with Termarr- he is due but I wonder if his ego gets in the way. If he’s in the right mindset he could have a career year.
This year the farm system is going to have an up arrow in a big way I feel. Even if we graduate pitchers, there are plenty of intriguing arms lower in the system and we finally have at least a handful of bats I feel could genuinely be exciting.