Pittsburgh Pirates: Three More Way to Open Payroll

Francisco Cervelli

Last season, the most talked about Pittsburgh Pirates player in terms of trade bait was Francisco Cervelli.  Cervelli was having a very productive season in 2018 until he started to battle recurring concussion symptoms.  Meanwhile, the Pittsburgh Pirates back up catcher Elias Diaz took over behind the plate and arguably produced even better than Cervelli.

Cervelli batted .259/.378/.431 with a career high in home runs with 12.  He did this through 104 games.  Meanwhile, Diaz in 82 games batted .286/.389/.452 with 10 home runs. So Diaz extrapolated over the course of a full season may be more productive than Cervelli next year anyhow.  Should the team pay Cervelli that amount of money to play second fiddle?

So with Cervelli’s injury concerns and Diaz’s emergence as a potential starting catcher in this league, should the team look to deal Cervelli?  Cervelli is entering the last year of his contract which sees him making a team-high $11.5  million in 2019.  The team has to consider if paying him the highest contract on the team is worth his production when they have Diaz at a cheaper rate.  Furthermore, trading Cervelli could bring in a solid prospect or two. Also, the team can then use the $11.5 million to invest in other areas of the team.

Ivan Nova

Ivan Nova might be the most logical and easiest to trade of the players currently on the Pittsburgh Pirates roster.  He is a durable, back end of the rotation pitcher who many teams could insert with confidence.  While he is not going to be up for any awards, the reliability and consistency that he brings to the mound could help a team.  Meanwhile, the Pittsburgh Pirates could look to add another arm in with more upside than Nova, a reclamation project, or an in-house guy.  The last two options would be interesting because the Pittsburgh Pirates top pitching prospect, Mitch Keller, is at Triple-A and could be up as soon as June.

Nova had himself a solid year in 2018, so there is definitely an expectation for him to be a serviceable pitcher next season.  All in all, Nova threw 161 innings across 29 starts.  He posted a 9-9 record with a 4.18 earned run average.  Nova has a base salary of $8.5 million but according to Spotrac.com, he will make $9.16 million this upcoming season.  So if the team trades him, that could be another significant chunk of change that could be used.  The team could then use that money on another starting pitcher or allow Nick Kingham to be the team’s fifth starter next season.

Controllable Players

One thing the Pittsburgh Pirates do not have a lot of is players on big deals or late into arbitration. The team’s other high salary players on guaranteed contracts are as follow: Chris Archer, Starling Marte, Gregory Polanco, and Felipe Vasquez. Meanwhile, players receiving arbitration in phase two or three are Corey Dickerson (year three) and Keone Kela (year two).  Obviously, they will not trade Archer or Kela being that they just acquired them.

However, could the team trade one of the outfielders?  Now, of course, this seemed likely at one point.  Corey Dickerson is entering the final year of team control and had a really solid season.  The Pittsburgh Pirates could have looked to trade him this offseason.  At one point it seemed very likely because the team had promising prospect Austin Meadows waiting in the wings.  However, the team traded Meadows in the Archer deal.  Then Gregory Polanco underwent surgery and likely will miss at least the first month of the season.

Still, with Dickerson lining up to make likely north of $10 million, the team could look to sell high on him.  They could move him to a team that might have depth at shortstop and could use an outfielder.  Still, the team would likely have to acquire another outfielder either via the free agent market or in a separate trade.

The biggest thing with any of this is that no matter what the Pittsburgh Pirates would do, they need to put that money and more into the current major league roster.  However, if they are able to clear another contract they could have the money to go and get a bigger name free agent.  The team already has cleared $15 million dollars, so dumping another $10 million would give them upward of 25 million dollars to reinvest into the team.

Of the ones in the slideshow, the most likely to happen would be Ivan Nova.  The Pittsburgh Pirates have internal options that they could fill the number 5 spots with.  Pitchers like Nick Kingham and Clay Holmes were former top 20 prospects who could fill the spot until Mitch Keller is ready.  Or the team could look at the market to bring in a cheaper number five or get aggressive and sign an even better start than Nova.

The Pittsburgh Pirates will not trade any of their players on team friendly deals like Marte or Vazquez.  They need to keep Dickerson for 2019 because of Polanco’s injury and really should be looking to bring in another outfielder already.  Cervelli could get traded, but with his concussion history teams could be wary to acquire him.