Pittsburgh Pirates Prospects: Diego Castillo Hit Machine Rolls into Indy

Pittsburgh Pirates prospect Diego Castillo has already made an impact at Triple-A, recording a four hit game for the Indianapolis Indians on Thursday night

When the Pittsburgh Pirates traded Clay Holmes to the New York Yankees on July 26, 2021, many people were expected that the Pirates were able to acquire anything of value for Holmes. To Ben Cherington’s credit he was able to net a pair of top 30 prospects for Holmes in Hoy Park and Diego Castillo.

Castillo came to the Pirates as highly thought of prospect in the Yankee farm system. In fact, he is a prospect that FanGraphs has discussed as potentially hitting his way into top 100 prospect in all of baseball discussion.

Between the Pirate and Yankee farm system Castillo hit for a .278/.344/.485 slash line to go with a 123 wRC+ in 370 plate appearances. Castillo also showed a great eye at the plate drawing a walk in 8.4% of his trips to the plate while striking out just 11.6% of the time. That strikeout rate indicates a potentially elite contact tool for Castillo.

After spending the month of August turning heads in the Pirate organization, Castillo was promoted to Triple-A Indianapolis earlier this week. This was Castillo’s first trip to the Triple-A level as he made his debut with Indianapolis on Wednesday night.

In his Triple-A debut Castillo was 0-for-2 at the plate, however, he did draw a walk and drive in a run with a sacrifice fly. Then on Thursday night he really made his presence felt by going 4-for-4 with a double. Castillo also scored 3 runs, drew a walk and drove in a run as part of his four hit performance.

During the month of Castillo’s performance at Triple-A is something that will be worth following for Pirate fans. The Indianapolis Indians have 25 games remaining with their season set to end on October 3. This will present plenty of opportunity for Castillo to continue to impress and turn heads within the Pirate organization.

If Castillo has a strong month of September with Indianapolis he could enter the spring with a chance to potentially crack the 2022 Opening Day roster. Even if that does not occur, Castillo making his MLB debut will be a question of when, not if, next season. Once Castillo does arrive in Pittsburgh it is not difficult to envision him hitting his way into a permanent long-term role with the Pittsburgh Pirates.