3 (realistic) free agents that would make Pirates’ bullpen the best in the NL Central

The Pittsburgh Pirates’ bullpen was a massive letdown in 2024, and that might be sugarcoating it. Injuries to key hurlers like Dauri Moreta and Ryan Borucki, and underperformance from the likes of David Bednar and Colin Holderman, decimated a once formidable-looking group. There were some positives, like Kyle Nicolas putting up a promising rookie year and Dennis Santana having an extremely surprising breakout, but they were about the only silver linings to come out of the pen.

Improving the bullpen should be one of the Pirates’ top priorities this offseason. After all, it was one of the main reasons for another edition of one of the Pirates’ patented late-season collapses. The Pirates have too good of a starting rotation depth chart to let close games slip away because the bullpen can’t do their job consistently. Given those constraints, the Pirates could easily go after these three free agents and give themselves the best relief corps in the National League Central.

3 bullpen targets that can turn Pirates into best bullpen in NL Central

David Robertson

David Robertson might be one of the most underappreciated relievers in baseball history. The last active member of the 2009 New York Yankees, Robertson has now played in parts of 16 MLB seasons and has shown no signs of slowing down despite entering his age-40 season in 2025. If anything, he’s shown he’s still got plenty left to offer to MLB clubs.

Robertson spent the 2024 season with the Texas Rangers, pitching to a 3.00 ERA, 2.65 FIP, and 1.11 WHIP. The veteran right-hander struck out a whopping 33.4% of batters with a 9.1% walk rate. Robertson was not prone to home runs either. Robertson had just an 0.63 HR/9 rate and was in the 85th percentile of barrel rate, clocking in at 5.5%. The veteran didn’t get lucky either, as he had a sub-3.00 xFIP (2.88) and SIERA (2.69).

Robertson’s 48.8% ground ball rate was not the only career-best mark he hit in 2024. He also tossed a career-high 72 innings and fell just one K shy of matching his career best of 100, which he set in 2011. His overall strikeout rate was the best he’s put up in over six seasons. The last time he surpassed his 2024 K% was in 2017 at 37.1%.

Robertson’s age hasn’t taken a toll on his abilities, either. His primary pitch, his cutter, averaged out at 93.3 MPH in 2024, which is just about as hard as he was throwing it during the best season of his career, 2011. During that year, he threw his cutter at 93.5 MPH. Stuff+ still pinned him at 119 in 2024, making him well above-average in that regard.

Robertson is one of baseball’s few ageless wonders. There have only been 31 times since the turn of the millennium where a reliever has had a season where they posted both an ERA and FIP of 3.00 or lower in 60+ innings in their age-36-or-older season, and five of those seasons belong to Mariano Rivera. Robertson joined that short list in 2024, and has a very good chance of adding his name a second time in 2025.