Why are the Pirates keeping Alexander Canario around so long?

Alexander Canario has gotten semi-regular playing time since the Pittsburgh Pirates acquired him in the first week of the season from the New York Mets. To say he hasn’t done well would be an understatement.

He is only slashing .160/.250/.320 with a .258 wOBA, and 59 wRC+ in 56 plate appearances. He has a solid 10.7% walk rate, but that’s about the only positive from his bottom line. He also strikes out 26.8% of the time with a whiff rate of 40.3%. His whiff rate is currently the eighth highest of any batter with at least 50 plate appearances.

So why are the Pirates keeping him around? Canario is only making league minimum, and while he doesn’t have options left, surely the Pirates could get just as good (if not better) production from one of their prospects at Triple-A. For example, how about someone like Billy Cook, who would also make league minimum? Canario has been designated for assignment twice before, so it’s not like the Pirates are the first team to pass up on him.

One reason is probably Canario’s bat speed. His average bat speed this year is a whopping 77.1 MPH. To put it simply, that is elite. He ranks in the top 10 among players with at least 10 plate appearances this season. That’s higher than Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani, Kyle Schwarber, and Pete Alonso.

That high-end bat speed has helped Canario generate a barrel rate of 22.9%. That also ranks among the best. This is not an exaggeration, but Canario has the best barrel rate among all National League players with at least 50 plate appearances. The only batter ranked higher? Aaron Judge.

Despite all these outstanding metrics, Canario has a batting average on balls in play of just .182. Sure, flyball hitters who strikeout at a high rate typically have a low BABIP. Kyle Schwarber’s career BABIP is only .264. Joey Gallo has a career BABIP of .254. But .182 is exceptionally unlucky. There have only been 17 times since the end of the Deadball Era that a batter has put up a BABIP below .190 in at least 250 plate appearances. Canario has a .557 xSLG% and a .367 xwOBA, showing that bad luck is playing a hand here.

However, that doesn’t mean the Pirates are justified in giving Canario more playing time. Keep in mind, this is all still with a whiff rate just over 40%. There have been three players in the Statcast Era (since 2015) with a whiff of at least 40% in at least 500 plate appearances. It’s Joey Gallo, Keon Broxton, and Keston Hiura. Gallo is the only one here with any extended success. Broxton only stuck around for a few years because he had strong defense and could swipe a bag. Hiura has never played 100 games in any Major League season since making his debut in 2019.

Canario’s contact rate sits at just 62.7%. There have been just 21 players in the Pitch Tracking Era (since 2008) with a contact rate below 65% in 500+ plate appearances. Most were either strong defenders at premium positions or never had sustained success with the bat. In two other cases, they were pitchers. Some had standout seasons, like the aforementioned Gallo, former All-Stars Mike Zunino and Miguel Sano, and former NL home run leader Chris Carter. Of the 21 players, only Matt Wallner has established himself as a quality hitter. Heck, both Matt Cain (61.4%) and Madison Bumgarner (61.8%), the two aforementioned pitchers, made contact at a rate similar to Canario's.

Canario also doesn’t offset this with elite plate discipline either. Sure, he is walking at an above-average rate, but a 10% walk rate wouldn’t even rank in the top 50 if he had enough plate appearances to qualify. His chase rate of 27.7% is also better than the league average, but the league average is 28.4%. His chase contact rate is a paltry 28.6%, nearly half of the league average rate of 55.3%. 

It would be more forgivable if Canraio were a great defender and speedster. He has 211 career innings in the outfield with zero defensive runs saved and -2 outs above average, making him an average glove. He isn't slow, but he's also only in the 64th percentile of sprint speed. Canario's throws from the outfield average 90.5 MPH, which places him in the top 88th percentile of all players in 2025, but that makes his arm the only above-average tool on the defensive and baserunning sides of the ball.

Canario is off to a solid start to May, with six hits, including a home run, and three walks in 26 plate appearances. But his issues with making contact still persist. His contact rate is only 57.8%, his whiff rate sits at 42.2% in the new month, and he's struck out eight times for a 30.8% rate.

Canario has raw power unlike nearly any other Major League batter. There’s almost nobody who swings the bat as hard as he does, or makes quality contact at the rate he does. However, very few players in recent baseball history swing and miss as much as him, or have as high of a whiff rate as he does, while producing decent output. Canario would be a great Home Run Derby candidate, but his whiff and contact rates make it so that he’ll struggle to find a groove.