Pittsburgh Pirates: Five More Surprising Ex-Players Still Active

Pittsburgh Pirates history is full of obscure players. However, many of them are still active in professional baseball today despite not playing in MLB.

Last month, we took a look at ten former Pittsburgh Pirates who are surprisingly still active in professional baseball. There are plenty of other relatively obscure Pittsburgh Pirates players still out there. Many of which haven’t appeared in the major leagues for a handful of seasons.

Today, we’re going to take a look at five of those players. Most of these guys have played in the majors very sparingly, if at all, over the past handful of seasons. However, to find guys who served as depth for major league teams is still interesting to see. They’re keeping the dream of playing baseball as a profession, even if it’s not with a Major League team or one of their affiliates.

Wilfredo Boscan

Wilfredo Boscan was pretty much a career minor leaguer when he made his debut with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2016. He made his pro debut back in 2007 as a 17-year-old Venezuelan with the Texas Rangers. While he pitched solid throughout the minors, he never reached top prospect status. He played with the San Diego Padres and Boston Red Sox systems before getting to Pittsburgh, but never gained much traction.

Boscan posted pretty good numbers at Triple-A Indianapolis in 2015 and then got off to a hot start in 2016. That’s when the Pirates called him to the majors and he seemed to be a pretty solid multi-inning bullpen arm. His first 9 innings yielded just 2 earned runs, 1 walk, and 5 K’s. However, after 2 poor outings, Boscan was sent back to the minor leagues.

Boscan struggled down the line at Indianapolis and was eventually released by the team. Then, he was signed by the Atlanta Braves. Boscan was released by the Braves in early September and then was picked up by the New York Mets as a depth right-hander for the 2017 campaign.

But this was his last season with a major league-affiliated team. Boscan pitched in the Venezuelan and Mexican Leagues for the next handful of seasons. This past season, he pitched 48 innings with the Tigres De Quintana Roo of the Mexican League, and Navegantes del Magallanes of the Venezuelan league. All told, he had a 3.75 ERA while only allowing a single home run. But he struck out just 29 while giving up 18 free passes.