Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. This is the fifth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.
A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.
All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here.
Other Prospects of Note
Grouped by type and listed in order of preference within each category.
Power-Over-Hit Types
Matt Gorski, OF
Jase Bowen, OF
Esmerlyn Valdez, 1B
Bralyn Brazoban, RF
This entire group has enviable power but is striking out too much to be on the main section of the list. Gorski, 27, was the club’s 2019 second round pick out of Indiana, and has had three consecutive years with 20 or more homers. Bowen, 24, came back to Earth in 2024 as opposing pitchers learned that he’s one of the more swing-happy players in baseball. Valdez, 21, is a power-hitting Dominican first baseman with plus pull power and a flimsy hit tool. He’s a bucket strider who K’d at a 30.6% clip with Bradenton in 2024, but he swings really hard. A player with a typical right field toolset, Brazoban got $2 million in 2024, then struck out in 35.1% of his DSL plate appearances.
Contact Bats
Mitch Jebb, CF
Jonathan Rivero, C
Jebb struggled out of the gate in 2024, but the tide of his season turned in late June, and he hit .316/.411/.431 after June 25. His infield defense plateaued, and the Pirates began to play him in center field, which looks like it has a chance to work. Jebb’s contact quality is poor, but he puts the ball in play frequently enough to be considered a potential depth piece. Rivero is a lefty-hitting catcher who led the DSL squad in swinging strike rate.
Relief Look
Wilber Dotel, RHP
Alessandro Ercolani, RHP
Keuri Almonte
Matt Ager, RHP
Garrett McMillan, RHP
Dotel is a 22-year-old Dominican righty who had a 5.33 ERA at Greensboro last year. He sits 95 with sink and downhill plane, and bends in an 86 mph gyro slider off of that. He doesn’t have the command or repertoire depth to start, but if he throws harder in relief, he’ll have a good shot to be a big leaguer. Ercolani hails from San Marino, and it will be a great story if he reaches the big leagues because he’s the country’s lone player in affiliated ball. The majority of his innings came in relief in 2024. His delivery is violent and deceptive, and it helps his low-90s fastball play. Erc’s curveball is also better than average, and he could play an up/down role in the near future. Almonte is a 19-year-old DSL lefty relief prospect who touches 96 and flashes a plus curveball. Ager, Pittsburgh’s sixth rounder in 2024, is a 6-foot-6 righty who had a great sophomore year in Santa Barbara’s rotation, but struggled as a junior and was moved into the Gauchos’ bullpen. He lost a tick of velocity last year, but at his best, he touches 96 and has an above-average slider. McMillan, who spent two years at a JUCO and two at Alabama, signed for $150,000 as a Day Three pick in 2023 and had a great 2024 in A-ball. His 91 mph fastball punched well above its weight, while his secondary stuff played like average.
Sorry, Charlies
Carlos Mateo, RHP
Carlos Jimenez, RHP
Carlos Castillo, RHP
This group has seaworthy stuff but struggles to locate. Mateo, 19, is a 6-foot-2, low-slot Dominican righty who sat 95-98 in last year’s FCL, but he also walked more than a batter per inning. Jimenez is a 22-year-old Dominican righty who sits 95 and will flash a plus changeup and slider, but he’s been treading water in A-ball for three years and again walked just about a batter per inning in 2024. Castillo is a 19-year-old Venezuelan righty with a good sweeper and changeup. He sits 91-93 from a low slot and posted a 4.81 ERA combined between the complex and A-ball in 2024.
“No, dad, different guy.”
Richard Ramirez, C
Jose Garces, RHP
Jose Regalado, LHP
Ramirez (not the Night Stalker) is a physically mature 19-year-old Venezuelan catcher with above-average power. He K’d 32.2% of the time on the complex last year. Garces (not the chef) is a 20-year-old Colombian righty who has struggled in rookie ball for several years, but his arm is so fast and his breaking ball so nasty that he needs to be monitored. Regalado (not the other former Pirate Jose Regalado) is a lefty relief prospect with mid-90s velocity, a drop-and-drive delivery, and a vertical arm slot that creates huge uphill ride on his heater. See him on the right day and he looks like a high-leverage reliever, but he walked just about a batter per inning in 2024.
System Overview
The Pirates system is average but also unique, because there are so many hitters with extreme outcome variance in the fat middle of the system. For an organization that tends to be (rightly) lauded for its ability to develop pitching, but scorned (again, correctly) for the trouble it has had with hitters, this snapshot of the farm system sure is flush with position players. This is the only list I’ve done so far this cycle with more hitters than pitchers. All of the bats you see in the 40+ FV tier above are extremely volatile, an active volcano full of wild card prospects mostly from Latin America who the Pirates either signed or traded for. Each of these hitters has a potential pitfall, and any given one of them is probably likely to fall victim to that flaw, but when you collect a bunch of players of this sort, there’s a decent chance that a couple of them will pan out and become star-level players. Because the Pirates basically won’t spend money to acquire high-upside hitters in free agency, their impact players need to be “homegrown” and affordable. Their approach in several different channels of talent acquisition — draft, international, trade — has recently targeted talents with this sort of upside, even when it comes with elevated risk.
Also, let’s perhaps hold our horses with regard to heckling the Pirates about their inability to develop bats. While the big league roster is no doubt imbalanced right now, the Pirates have made changes to the swings of Nick Gonzales, Sammy Siani, Konnor Griffin, and Tsung-Che Cheng just within the last year, generally with good results. These are signs that they have at least gotten some traction in this area. However, teams like the Red Sox seem to be targeting players with contact skill and then finding ways to help them swing harder and get stronger, while the Pirates seem to be doing the opposite, acquiring bat speed mavens and trying to dial down their strikeouts.
This isn’t a bad system, but aside from what Nick Yorke, Cheng, and Billy Cook can bring to the table this season, it isn’t in a position to give the Pirates what they need (impact bats) for at least another couple of years. They might have to keep aggressively trading pitching to acquire bats, like they did at last year’s deadline in order to acquire Yorke and Cook. Hopefully one or two of the volatile, talented lads will ascend and be in position to make an impact sooner than expected.
