Every year during the MLB Draft, area supervisor Dan Radcliff would show up to the Pirates’ war room with a new Hawaiian shirt. On Sunday, Radcliff could not be in the war room as he’s battling cancer, but the tradition lived on. This year, everyone in the war room had on a new Hawaiian shirt.

Matt Skirving, the team’s assistant director of scouting operations, was the one to come up with the idea, which is why any videos that came out of PNC Park Sunday almost looked like the front office and scouts were at a Lūʻau rather than picking prospects. But it was important for the group to have a moment for Radcliff and that he got his flowers, especially if they’re on a shirt.

“We want to honor him because we care about him and love him,” general manager Ben Cherington said, still wearing the teel open-colored shirt after the first day of the Draft was completed. “The shirts were a small way to do that. We tried to keep Dan in the room as much as we can.”

“[We wanted] to let him know we’re thinking about him and that we love him and that he was with us in spirit if he wasn’t with us physically,” amateur scouting director Justin Horowitz said, also donning the floral short-sleeve duds.

Radcliff joined the Pirates in 2015 and has signed several of the Pirates’ early round picks in recent years, including left-hander Anthony Solometo (the Pirates’ No. 3 prospect according to MLB Pipeline), outfielder Lonnie White Jr. (No. 10 prospect) and right-hander Carlson Reed (2023 fourth-round pick). Before the Pirates, he worked with the Los Angeles Angels.

In his near decade of work with the organization, Radcliff has clearly left a mark, both in terms of players he helped sign but also as a person. Horowitz is new to Pittsburgh and has been quick to praise the culture and the people who helped make this Draft possible.

“This is a really tight-knit group, this amateur scouting group specifically, some incredible individuals,” Horowitz said. “This is my first year here with them and I feel so grateful and honored to be a part of this team – and that group specifically. It’s because of the people there. It showed throughout the spring in supporting Danny and so many others, honestly, that faced some personal challenges this spring. This group has been incredible, stuck together, worked really hard and it all culminated tonight. We wanted to honor Danny in the best way that we could.”