Pittsburgh Pirates Need to Determine Future of Hoy Park

The Pittsburgh Pirates will need to figure out what they have in utility man Hoy Park during the 2022 season as he could be a part of their future.

The Pittsburgh Pirates were quite active at the 2021 trade deadline, and one of the trades they made was sending right-handed reliever Clay Holmes to the New York Yankees for two infield prospects. We’ve already done plenty of coverage on the headliner, Diego Castillo, but Hoy Park, the second piece of the puzzle, was the other player heading over to the Bucs.

The Pittsburgh Pirates need to figure out what they have in Hoy Park in 2022. With the likes of Oneil Cruz, Travis Swaggerty, Nick Gonzales, Liover Peguero, Ji-Hwan Bae, Matt Fraizer, Rodolfo Castro, Jared Triolo, Tucupita Marcano, Jackson Glenn, and Mike Jarvis, Park may already have limited opportunities with the Pirates to prove himself.

When the Pirates acquired Park he was having an astounding year with the New York Yankee Triple-A affiliate. In 223 trips to the plate, Park was batting .327/.475/.567 with a .452 wOBA and 180 wRC+. He had a 20.6% walk and strikeout rate, as well as an ISO well above .200 at .240.

That kind of production didn’t translate to the Pirate major league team. He only had 149 plate appearances but an OPS of just .638. He did have a healthy 12.1% walk rate and playable .142 isolated slugging percentage, but other than that, his small stint in the majors wasn’t anything to write home about.

While Park might not be the hitter he was at the Yankee Triple-A affiliate in 2021, there’s some solid potential within Park. He’s only once graded as a below-average bat while with the Yanks. Since signing out of South Korea with the Yankees, Park has hit .255/.367/.373 with a .345 wOBA and 117 wRC+. He’s been a major on-base threat with a 13.6% walk rate throughout his minor league career. Though outside of 2021, he’s never had an ISO above .150.

Park also ended the season on a high note. In his last 56 plate appearances of the season, Park posted a great .256/.411/.442 line, .366 wOBA, and 130 wRC+. Granted, it was a minimal sample size, just over a half of a month, though it may have been a step forward for the utility prospect.

While this isn’t to say that Park has a very high ceiling, he’d be a fine utility man if he could consistently post a .330-.350 OBP, which, based on his walk rate, all he would need to hit is .220-.250 to make that work. His OBP would play up as he was in the top 79th percentile of sprint speed. Plus, given that he’s shown solid defensive prowess at second and third base, as well as shortstop and all three outfield positions, any team would take a guy like Park who can play that many positions and reach base about a third of the time.

The Pirates need to find what they have in Park. If he can hit .230/.330/.380, he could prove to be a key role player for the long term. Though in order to see if he can do that, the team will need to at least give him a shot to prove himself.