Pittsburgh Pirates: Quick Look at Dovydas Neverauskas

Analysis: The Pittsburgh Pirates have the only player that hails from Lithuania in the major leagues.  Let’s take a look at how Dovydas Neverauskas has faired so far in the big leagues.

Dovydas Neverauskas became the first player ever from Lithuania to play in a major league baseball game.  However, he has not just played in a major league game, but has had some pretty good success thus far in his first season as a Pittsburgh Pirates reliever.

Minors Pre-2017

Neverauskas signed with the Pittsburgh Pirates back in 2009 as part of their international signing class.  He originally was utilized as a starting pitcher and a reliever.  In fact, he made starts from 2011 until 2015, when the Bucs decided to convert him to a relief pitcher.  As a starter, he showed power stuff, but he struggled to find consistency on the mound.  This was mainly due to the lack of a quality pitch outside of his fastball.  However, once converted to a full-time reliever in 2016, Neverauskas found a lot more success.  In 2016 he pitched 58 innings between AA and AAA.  He posted a 3.10 earned run average, along with a 1.21 WHIP, and a .229 batting average against.

2017

This year Neverauskas was even better in Triple-A.  He threw 50.1 innings for Indy and posted a 2.86 earned run average.  He struck out 46 batters and posted 13 saves for Indianapolis.  He has been even better for the big league club, however.  So far with the Pittsburgh Pirates this season, the hard-throwing right hander has accumulated 23 innings in 21 games, and he has only given up seven earned runs for a 2.86 earned run average.  He has also done a good job of limiting base runners, having a WHIP of 1.13 so far and a 2.74 base on balls per nine innings pitched.

There is some room for regression with Neverauskas, but that is expected with any 24-year-old power relief pitcher.  His FIP currently sits at 4.59 while his XFIP is even higher at 4.76.  Also, he has a .242 BAbip, which is nearly unsustainable going forward.  He also has a mediocre ground ball percentage of 45 percent.  Meanwhile, he is only striking out just over five batters per nine innings pitched.

Next: The Bucs next Top 100 Prospect

At the end of the day, Neverauskas has done his job.  He has produced outs and has not given up a lot of runs.  Some of it might be luck, but he has shown enough promise to have a spot in the bullpen next season.  Hopefully, he can continue to develop over the offseason and can be one of the young, bright spots of this team’s bullpen in 2018.