Wandy Rodriguez to Pittsburgh Pirates for Rudy Owens, Robbie Grossman, Colton Cain

The Pittsburgh Pirates have acquired left-handed starter Wandy Rodriguez from the Astros, according to Tom Singer of MLB.com. Rodriguez is 33 years old. The Astros long-time stud has made 21 starts this season, and currently sits with a 3.79 ERA after his start last night, up from 2.49 at the end of May.

The Astros will pick up some of the remaining $30 million dollars. Rodriguez will also have his player option triggered on the deal, according to Jon Heyman of CBS.

The strikeout numbers for Rodriguez have dipped in each of the past five seasons –  from a peak at 8.6 per nine innings in 2008, to 6.1 so far this season. Rodriguez has pitched 130.2 innings thus far in 2012.  In the post game interview,  Neal Huntington said that the Pirates scouts like how Rodriguez has traded strikeouts for groundball outs and called him one of the top left handed pitchers in the Majors.

Looking at this, the Pirates might have made a move similar to what they did with A.J. Burnett when this all shakes loose. The Pirates have given up Rudy Owens, Colton Cain and Robbie Grossman to get the Astros left hander.  Each of those prospects have questions in our eyes, but damn… did it really take all three?

"“The important part for us was getting someone who was beyond a rental piece… getting Rodriguez for one, maybe two years we felt was a good move,” Huntington said while constantly checking his phone after the Bucs lost 5-1 to the Cubs."

Singer was on this early and had some good information, so we suggest he is a good twitter follow as Cocktails suggested early in the season.

A no-brainer that Wandy will improve by getting out of the shadow of the Crawford boxes, not that he was awful at home though… proof?  Here is a cool graph from McEffect: