Pittsburgh Pirates News: Kevin Kramer to Replace Kevin Newman

The Pittsburgh Pirates have made two roster moves today.  Both moves had to do with members of the “Seinfeld” middle infielders.

The Pittsburgh Pirates have had to make a little bit of a roster shuffle today.  The team placed backup infielder Kevin Newman on the Injury List.  This is according to the Pittsburgh Pirates team Twitter page, which stated that Newman was going to the Injury List due to a right finger laceration:

"“We have recalled INF Kevin Kramer from Triple-A Indianapolis and have placed INF Kevin Newman on the 10-day injured list due to a laceration on his right middle finger (retro to April 9).”"

To replace the 2015 first round pick, the Pittsburgh Pirates will recall 2015 second round pick, Kevin Kramer.  Kramer had a small cup of coffee with the Pittsburgh Pirates last September but did not have a clear-cut role on the big league club at the beginning of this year.  So, instead, the team sent Kramer to Triple-A Indianapolis to continue and play every day.

This is another player added to an already lengthy list of Pittsburgh Pirates on the Injury List.  Newman joins outfielders Corey Dickerson, Gregory Polanco, and Lonnie Chisenhall along with catcher Elias Diaz as the offensive players hurt already.  Although the team did catch somewhat of a lucky break.  With the Bucs being in Chicago, Kramer will be able to get there quickly from Indianapolis to be on the roster for tonight’s game.

Kramer has played in six games thus far in Triple-A and is off to a somewhat slow start.  The former UCLA Bruin is hitting .231/.286/.385, which of course is well bellow his career minor league slash line of .292/.362/.431.  He does have 4 doubles in the 6 games but has struck out 9 times.  Kramer has played exclusively second base through the first week of the new season.

The Pittsburgh Pirates likely will not miss much in changing out Newman for Kramer.  Kramer has more power than Newman, although Newman is a more traditional shortstop (yes, he made a lot of errors a few days ago). It will be interesting to see how much playing time Kramer gets going forward.