Pittsburgh Pirates: Colin Moran Trying To Improve Defense

The Pittsburgh Pirates are starting to really get Spring Training ramped up with some of their players reporting already.  Here is an update on their third baseman.

Last year, the Pittsburgh Pirates acquired third baseman Colin Moran from the Houston Astros in the Gerrit Cole trade.  This was an important part of any deal for the Pittsburgh Pirates because they needed to acquire a third baseman with the uncertainty of Jung Ho Kang at the time.

When Moran was acquired, the first thing that was noted was his hitting potential.  He always hit for a high average in the minors, but he also hit for a career-high 18 home runs during his 2017 Triple-A season.  However, there were many questions about his defense when he came over in the trade.  He was never considered very gifted on defense, even back to when he was coming out of the University of North Carolina.  Still, he made it through college and the minors as a third baseman, so the expectations were for him to be at least decent enough.

Pittsburgh Pirates fans saw why there were some questions about his defense last season.  He was able to make the plays that he needed to make.  He was sure-handed with balls that were hit close to him.  However,  it was evident he lacked was the range.  This was shown by his URZ/150, which was at -9.2 with 0.0 being considered league average.

So that is the thing, Moran is not a bad third baseman per se, he makes the plays when he can.  The best thing about Colin Moran is his arm.  When he did make some tough plays he was able to complete them with a strong and accurate arm.  Still, there is much room for improvement for Moran on defense.  Apparently, he focused on that this offseason.  Moran tells Adam Berry of MLB.com that he has worked hard on trying to get his body in better shape to play third base.  Here is what he told Berry:

"“It was more about working on my body and making sure that, when I’m ready to go, the right muscles are firing and I’m ready to get going with that first step,” Moran said Friday at Pirate City. “It’s something I worked hard on, and I’ll continue to work hard on it.”"

Moran also credited new Pittsburgh Pirates assistant and former all-star infielder David Eckstein for giving him advice on what to do.  If Colin Moran takes another step forward offensively, he is going to provide a big boost to a teams’ questionable offense.  However, that is expected, what could help the team, even more, is if he comes in with improved defense.  It sounds like that could be the case.