Morning Rundown: Ben Cherington talks pitching prospects, Canaan Smith-Njigba claimed, Dots Miller
Pirates GM talks to FanGraphs on pitching prospects, Canaan Smith-Njigba claimed by antoher team.
FanGraphs posted an article on Wednesday about a conversation with Pirates General Manager Ben Cherington, the topic being the team’s pitching prospect depth.
Some highlights of the conversation included quotes on Paul Skenes, Jared Jones, Anthony Solometo, Bubba Chandler, and even briefly Zander Mueth.
When talking about Jones, Cherington mentioned his two breaking pitches as ‘a cutter and slider’. It will be interesting to see if he cuts the curveball going into the year.
It seemed he was messing around with a potential cutter last year, as there were the time velocity went up on the slider (92-94) with a little less break as well. With Jones in major league camp, it will be interesting to see.
FG also brought up the Pirates favoring pitchers with a lower arm slot, citing Mueth and Solometo and if it was planned by the front office. Cherington mentioned that due to the nature of the draft, it’s hard to really plan for that one specific type of thing, but did not say that (the lower arm slot) ‘it is something that, if it can be combined with enough command and the right secondaries, that slot can be effective.”
As of late, the Pirates have grabbed a few pitchers that really lean into lower release angles and such.
The Seattle Mariners announced that they claimed Canaan Smith-Njigba off of waivers on Wednesday, ending his tenure with the Pirates.
Smith-Njigba was one of four players the Pirates acquired in the Jameson Taillon trade, and the second to no longer be in the organization. Roansy Contreras and Maikol Escotto are the only two that remain of the trade.
After a strong spring, Smith-Njigba made the Opening Day roster last year but struggled in limited playing time before being sent to the minors, where he spent the rest of 2023.
He hit 15 home runs and stole 21 bases in 105 games with Indianapolis last year.
John Dreker has a new book out on former Pirates infielder John “Dots” Miller. It’s available on Amazon right now. The link below will take you to the Amazon page to order it.
For a little more on the book, John sent this in for me to share with everyone;
They Call Him Dots looks at the life story of John "Dots" Miller, infielder for the 1909-13 Pittsburgh Pirates. He played 12 years in the majors, then managed two years in the minors before his passing at 36 years old, just four days shy of his birthday.
Dots was mentored by Honus Wagner early in his career, then took the mentor role for Rogers Hornsby when he debuted at 19 years old in 1915. Miller was the double play partner for a time with both the greatest shortstop and greatest second baseman in baseball history. He also served during WWI in the middle of his career, giving up a full season and part of another for his country.
He was a hero in his hometown, who also volunteered for the town's fire department. There were well-known writers who considered Miller to be one of the best players in baseball at times during his career.
This book goes into detail about his career from the start as an amateur, right to the finish as a manager, while also showing his life away from baseball.
According to Jon Morosi, the Pirates have reached an agreement with right-handed pitcher Brent Honeywell on a minor league contract. If he were to make the major league team, the deal would be worth $1.25 million.
Honeywell pitched for the Chicago White Sox last year, posting a 4.82 ERA across 52.1 innings pitched.
He’s dealt with a lot of injuries throughout his career and has made the transition to the bullpen, but he’s another option for the Pirates this spring and can be a multi-inning guy as a reliever.
He also throws a screwball, which is fun since it’s something we don’t see often.
This week, our site will release our top 25 prospects in the Pirates system. We will have tie-in articles throughout the week as a build-up along with the rankings.
With the rankings coming out and the start of the season, the site will be running a special on yearly subscriptions (20%). There’s a link in the article that will take you where you can subscribe.
Subscribing gives you complete access to our rankings, which come with complete player write-ups on each prospect and my video breakdowns and on-site features from my trips during the season.
With the discount, your subscription comes out to just $3.33 per month.
So far, WTM and Nola have shared three prospects not in our top 25 that they are watching for the 2024 season. Today, I will give my three to watch, and then the list will officially drop on Friday.
Over the weekend, we will also have a pair of roundtable articles with some breakout players to watch as well.
Thank you to Anthony and Bucs on Deck for posting the link to my book. If you followed me on Twitter, you've seen Dots Miller the entire time as my profile photo. Even my photo here has been Dots Miller. For a quick background reason on why I wrote the book, Miller spent almost his entire life in my hometown of Kearny, New Jersey. He was born 13 days after my great-grandfather, who was also named John Dreker. Miller's house he lived in is surrounded by houses my family lived in during that time. Both were German families, and that was back when you still had sections for certain countries. Kearny was definitely guilty of that practice at that time. My original house is a short walk from where Dots lived and it's a very short walk from a business he owned on the same street.
I have the hometown connection to Dots, plus the Pittsburgh Pirates connection, but I also have a family connection. As mentioned with him being close in age/location to my great-grandfather, the pair most certainly knew each other, as they also had a common interest in bowling. I was able to find them in the same place at least one day in a tournament. Dots had a niece who married the nephew of my great-grandfather, which is how I have ten relatives who are also related to Miller, one of them still living in Kearny.
I knew a lot about Dots prior to writing the book, but I learned a lot more in the process, including him being considered among the best players in the game at various points by famous writers. He got comps to Nap Lajoie and Tris Speaker. I heard stories about Dots being called the best utility player because he could start anywhere in the infield, but didn't know that someone like John McGraw considered him to be the most valuable player for a time.
I do write about every game, so there are times where you are getting recaps for a bit, but those short recaps are surrounded by any stories I could find about him. I basically went day-by-day during his career, going into a lot of detail about how he ended up with the Pirates, and I did put more focus on his rookie season than any other due to the Pirates championship.
I hope everyone gives it a shot if you're into baseball history
Pirates signed more veteran MiL RPs: Connor Sadzeck and Kade McClure.