Bucs' GM looks ahead after Winter Meetings

PITTSBURGH -- The virtual Winter Meetings ended Thursday afternoon with the Rule 5 Draft. Rather than taking part in the annual tradition of rushing from a hotel ballroom straight to the airport and flying back to Pittsburgh International Airport, Pirates executives went on about their day.

Working from home or their offices rather than pulling long days and late nights in a hotel suite, front-office staffers slept more than they would during a typical week at the Winter Meetings. They consumed fewer snacks than usual, Pirates general manager Ben Cherington guessed. And without the entire baseball industry packed into a hotel for four days, their activity produced fewer rumors.

After acquiring two players during the Rule 5 Draft, Cherington said these virtual meetings “felt like a very normal week in an offseason.” They made “tons” of phone calls with other teams and players’ agents, Cherington said, and they finalized some important hires in their baseball operations department.

Yet, the buzz that often defines the Winter Meetings was limited to two pieces of news on Wednesday night: a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette report that the Pirates and Yankees had some discussions involving right-hander Jameson Taillon and first baseman Josh Bell, and MLB Network insider Jon Heyman’s acknowledgement that right-hander Joe Musgrove and second baseman/outfielder Adam Frazier are the Bucs' two players most often being discussed in trade talks.

The Yankees could just be surveying the trade market for affordable, controllable players who possess star potential. Bell and Taillon certainly qualify, even if they’re not obvious answers to the questions currently facing New York. Bell was an All-Star in 2019, and Taillon has been excellent when healthy. To that end, an industry source noted that the Yankees asked around about Taillon’s progress in his recovery from a second Tommy John surgery.

The Pirates will discuss just about anyone on their roster in trade talks as they look to add more talent to their farm system, and Musgrove and Frazier were already thought to be their most likely trade candidates. The news that they are being discussed more than their teammates only confirms that.

The uncertainty created by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and the resulting lack of clarity on things like the schedule and roster rules, has made it difficult for executives to predict what next season will look like.

“We’re working under the assumption it’s [a 26-man roster], no DH [in the National League] and we’re in Bradenton [Fla., for Spring Training] in mid-February,” Cherington said. “If at some point we get information that any of that changes, then we’ll adjust. But that’s how we’re thinking about it.”

But so far, there’s been more talk than transactions this offseason. When might that change?

“It feels like the conversations are real. I’ve never been good about predicting when that turns into action. I guess it could at any time,” Cherington said. “I don’t know how much actually not being in the same place affects that. Taking the pandemic aside and the effects from that, we’re not physically in the same hotel. Is there something psychologically different about that that affects behavior? I don’t know. It feels like a very normal week of an offseason, just not a normal week of Winter Meetings. I think we’ll see movement and activity happening. Your guess is as good as mine as when it picks up.”

Staff changes
The Pirates announced a number of additions and role changes within their baseball operations department on Thursday, overhauling their athletic training staff and hiring Josh Hopper as their new pitching development coordinator.

Hopper spent the last three seasons as the pitching coach for Dallas Baptist University after working the previous nine seasons in the same role at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Cherington said the Pirates were looking for someone who’s “able to think about the entire pitching development continuum,” from mechanics and pitch design to game-planning and throwing programs, and can affect pitchers at every level from the Dominican Republic academy to the highest levels of the organization. The months-long search led them to Hopper.

“In the end, he just kind of separated himself from the field,” Cherington said. “He’s coming from college baseball into a professional environment, so there will be some learning to do there and we’ll put a team of people around him to help him with that in the early going. But we’re looking forward to working with him, and we think he can help us.”

The Pirates added the following people to their Major League staff: Rafael Freitas as head athletic trainer, Terence Brannic as head strength and conditioning coach, Adam Vish as a strength and conditioning coach and Seth Steinhauer as a physical therapist. Freitas was Milwaukee’s assistant athletic trainer, Brannic was Oakland’s assistant strength and conditioning coach and Vish (a Pittsburgh native) was most recently San Francisco’s Minor League strength and conditioning coordinator. Cherington said they will soon add another athletic trainer to the big league staff.

Todd Tomczyk will remain in his role as the club’s director of sports medicine, while former senior rehab coordinator A.J. Patrick will now assume the title of director of sports performance. In that role, Patrick will work with the Major League and Minor League coaches, the sports medicine department and strength coaches.

“We’ve also wanted to move toward just a much more collaborative approach and environment around our players where, if we think about any of our players and any of their goals and whatever’s facing them, we’ve got a strength coach and skills coach and a trainer and a [physical therapist], and they’re thinking together all the time and working together all the time around the player,” Cherington said. “So it’s trying to go from multidisciplinary to interdisciplinary, where it’s not just having the expertise, but it’s those people really working closely together and learning from each other.”