Pirates prospect Nick Yorke sets record straight on swing-change rumors

When second baseman Nick Yorke first arrived in the Pittsburgh Pirates organization last season, he simply could not stop hitting.

The Pirates' return in the trade that sent right-handed pitcher Quinn Priester to the Boston Red Sox, Yorke tore it up at Triple-A Indianapolis with a .355/.431/.507 batting line to go with 54 hits and 26 RBI over 40 games. That earned him a brief September call-up that saw him hit just .216 with a pair of homers in an admittedly small sample size of 11 Major League games.

Since then, Yorke has spent the entirety of the 2025 season at Triple-A, hitting at a .275/.338/.404 clip with seven home runs in 85 games. Technically, it's a dip in production from last season, but Yorke's 2025 numbers are nothing to sneeze at. And yet, some evaluators insist on sneezing.

Pirates prospect Nick Yorke sets record straight on swing-change rumors

MLB prospect guru Keith Law of The Athletic told Pittsburgh radio host Andrew Fillipponi last week that Yorke's decreased production this season is due to the fact that he now has a "crazy pause" in his swing. Law also added that a scout had told him that whoever is responsible for Yorke changing his swing "needs to be taken out behind the woodshed."

While Pirates fans eagerly viewed this strangely veiled threat as yet another reason to blast the organization's front office and player development staff (as if they didn't have enough reasons already), it may not be entirely accurate. Colin Beazley of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette went straight to the source and asked Yorke about the alleged adjustments to his swing, but Yorke categorically denied making any changes.

"I haven't touched my swing," Yorke told Beazley. "I saw that too. I had a couple of people come up to me and ask about it, but yeah, no. I haven't changed my swing once this year.”

"Crazy pause" or not, it's hard to find too much fault with what Yorke is doing at the plate this season. His .275 batting average isn't far off from his minor league career average of .282, and it was going to be incredibly difficult to duplicate the level of production he showed in Indianapolis last season.

After trading Adam Frazier and Ke'Bryan Hayes at the deadline, the Pirates have relied primarily on utility players Jared Triolo and Liover Peguero to pick up the slack in the infield. In the meantime, Yorke is still awaiting another chance to prove himself at the Major League level – evidently, with an unchanged swing.

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