3 free agents the Pittsburgh Pirates must avoid this offseason

Craig Kimbrel

The Pirates need relievers, but Craig Kimbrel shouldn’t be a player on their radar. Kimbrel may have been the most dominant closer in baseball at his peak, but that is far behind him, and with a huge drop in velocity, every team in baseball, not just the Pirates, should be extremely wary of bringing in the nine-time All-Star.

Kimbrel put up a poor 5.33 ERA, 4.18 FIP, and 1.36 WHIP across 52.1 innings for the Baltimore Orioles last season. Although he still struck out opponents at a healthy 31.5% rate, Kimbrel handed out free passes 13.4% of the time. The veteran closer was prone to home runs as well, with a 1.20 HR/9 and both an exit velocity (91.1 MPH) and barrel rate (10.6%) below the tenth percentile of pitchers across baseball this season. Kimbrel was so bad in the second half that the Orioles designated him for assignment in September.

Notably, Kimbrel had a dominant 2.10 ERA, 2.47 FIP, and 0.90 WHIP going into the All-Star break. He struck out nearly 40% of opponents (38.5%, to be exact) with a controllable 10.4% walk rate during that span. Kimbrel rarely allowed home runs either, with a HR/9 of 0.52. These numbers are obviously good, and if a bad second half was the only red flag, then it might be worth the Pirates’ time to consider bringing him in and ascribe his 10.59 post-ASB ERA to flukiness.

But there is another, much larger issue at play, and that’s Kimbrel’s huge decline in stuff. His four-seam velocity has been trending in the wrong direction the last handful of seasons, but it took a fall off a cliff this season. He went from averaging 95.8 MPH with the Philadelphia Phillies in 2023 (80th percentile) to 93.9 MPH this season (47th percentile). Stuff+ still had his four-seamer at an above-average 110 mark, but that’s a steep drop from 125 last year. His knuckle-curve also fell nearly two whole MPH, from 86.2 MPH to 84.3 MPH, between the last two years, sending his Stuff+ down from 126 to 117.

Craig Kimbrel has never been Greg Maddux when it came to pitch command, and now, with a severe decline in stuff, Kimbrel won’t solve any problems the Pirates may have with their bullpen depth. The only reason the Pirates should go after Kimbrel is if they can sign him to a minor-league deal with the hope he could jumpstart his pitch quality at Triple-A. Even then, the Pirates might be able to find better depth to stash away at Triple-A.