Pittsburgh Pirates News: Team Signs Roberto Gomez

The Pittsburgh Pirates have been quite active already this offseason.  They have made their second move in as many days yesterday.

Well, the Pittsburgh Pirates offseason is off and starting, and the team has already made a handful of moves.  First came the five player trade that the team made with the Cleveland Indians. This deal sent out Jordan Luplow and Max Moroff and brought in Erik Gonzalez and two prospects.  Then the team signed outfielder Lonnie Chisenhall off the free agent market.

The team has apparently signed another player, this one comes on a minor league free agent deal. According to Pirates Prospects, the Pittsburgh Pirates have agreed to a minor league deal with right-handed relief pitcher Roberto Gomez.  Of course, a minor league deal most likely means the team will use Gomez as bullpen depth at Triple-A and will call him up when needed.

Gomez has been a part of the league since 2010 when he signed with Tampa Bay as an International Free Agent out of Dominican Republic. He was released by Tampa Bay after the 2014 season. Eventually, in 2016, Gomez ended up in the San Fransisco Giant’s organization.

Over the last two seasons, he has bounced between the major league and the minor leagues.  All in all, Gomez has compiled a total of 550 innings with a 3.68 earned run average.  While Gomez can throw his fastball from 92-94 miles per hour he does not show much swing and miss stuff, only posting 6.3 strikeouts per nine innings.  However,  he has always shown good command walking less than three per nine innings.

Gomez has had very limited Major League career over the last two years, both which were with the Giants.  He has appeared in nine games over the last two years tossing 14.2 innings total. The innings were split up between two years with 5.1 in 2017 and 9.1 in 2018.  His ERA over the last two years totaled up to 7.98 with 13 earned runs he has given up, which is not very inspirational.

However, people were not overly impressed with the team’s signing of Richard Rodriguez last year. At the time, he was a career minor league pitcher before breaking out last year. Not saying Gomez will end up being as effective as Rodriguez, but bringing him in on a minor league contract is a lower risk with a potentially high reward.