One Pirates player almost certain to get traded during the Winter Meetings

It’s that time of year again. The rumors. The whispers. The “teams are calling.” And, to almost no one's surprise, one name for the Pittsburgh Pirates ends up glowing in red ink: Mitch Keller.

If the Pirates make a real trade at the MLB Winter Meetings, it’s almost certainly going to involve Keller. Not because the front office necessarily wants to move him, and not because fans are begging for it, but because he's the one guy who checks every box for a Winter Meetings deal.

Keller is a proven major league starter on a team-friendly contract in prime age. He's valuable, but he's replaceable –– and in Pittsburgh, that combination usually means one thing: he's getting traded.

Mitch Keller is the Pirates' most obvious trade chip at Winter Meetings

Keller is good, and that's the problem. He's not ace-untouchable, he's not a prospect, and he's not cheap filler. He's just valuable enough to matter.

Keller is locked into a reasonable long-term deal, throws 180+ innings, and gives you league-average-or-better results every year. Every contender in baseball wants a pitcher like that, especially when you don’t have to pay him like a Cy Young winner.

That kind of pitcher doesn’t last long at Winter Meetings. He’s useful to everyone — and expendable to Pittsburgh.

This isn’t the Pirates of five years ago, desperately duct taping starting pitchers together; this is a team with a generational ace in Paul Skenes, a flamethrowing top prospect in Bubba Chandler, a ready-now starter in Braxton Ashcraft, and a breakout candidate in Mike Burrows.

That’s four legitimate MLB starters before you even talk about the cavalry that’s coming. Jared Jones will return from injury at some point this year, and Hunter Barco is close to being major league-ready. Pitching is not Pittsburgh's problem, and if the Pirates are serious about building a winner, they need to start selling from pitching to buy offense and convert surplus into production.

Keller is the bridge between what the Pirates have too much of and what they desperately lack — a real, everyday MLB bat. Not a lottery ticket, not a future "maybe" –– but someone who steps into the lineup tomorrow and doesn't strike fear... into Pirates fans.

Pitching depth is cheap. Every winter, pitchers are everywhere. And if Keller is moved, the Pirates don’t even need brilliance — they just need a stabilizer who can eat innings and hold the line until Barco and/or Jones are ready to join the rotation.

There's no question that trading Keller would hurt emotionally. He's a success story. A draft pick that worked. A reminder that development actually can happen here. But if he brings back a middle-of-the-order bat who helps the Pirates win right now, then he is still providing maximum value.

If the Pirates trade someone meaningful at this year's Winter Meetings, it’s Keller. And if the return is right, this could be the moment the Pirates finally flip the script –– from hoarding arms to buying runs, from "we're almost there" to "we're actually trying."

As Ken Rosenthal wrote after the Johan Oviedo trade, in the very first sentence of his reaction, "Yes, the Pittsburgh Pirates still might trade right-hander Mitch Keller." And, if they pull it off, they'd want a bat who's more certainly big-league ready than Jhostynxon Garcia. The game is very much still afoot.