Pirates P Mitch Keller now has a "unique place within the organization” Kim Klement Neitzel/USA TODAY NETWORK
Pirates owner Bob Nutting has "reinforced the need to keep good players in Pittsburgh,” and the team’s commitment of $253.75M to 3B Ke’Bryan Hayes, LF Bryan Reynolds and P Mitch Keller over the past three off-seasons “represents important progress,” according to Jason Mackey of the PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE. Nutting said the Pirates “need to identify the right players, we need to develop the right players and we need to commit to the ones internally coming up through the system.” He added the club knows that they are “always going to have to supplement," but the "core needs to be people who are part of the Pirates organization.” Pirates GM Ben Cherington said that the recent extension of Keller started with talks “almost a year ago” and “picked up during the season and almost reached completion.” Mackey noted both parties arrived in Florida “expecting to resume said discussions, and Keller made no bones about his feelings.” He “wanted to be" with the Pirates and "pushed his agent to get something done” (PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE, 2/23).
A NEWFOUND POWER: Mackey in a separate piece wrote Keller now has a "unique place within the organization” and the “ability to lobby for things the way someone on a one-year deal may not." It sounds like Keller "may soon go to management and petition” Nutting, President Travis Williams and Cherington to "get an extension done" with P David Bednar. The Pirates could have Reynolds under contract through 2031 and Hayes through 2030 and if the Pirates “want to keep this sort of thing going -- and they should -- there are other places to turn, too” (PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE, 2/24).
MAKING A STATEMENT: In Pittsburgh, Mark Madden noted the timing of Keller’s five-year, $77M contract extension was “not coincidence.” The Athletic last Wednesday posted a “lengthy, detailed story exposing" the Pirates’ "frugality, pettiness and incompetence.” The Pirates “needed to get their PR train back on track." The deal with Keller was “doubtless going to happen anyway, likely just before Opening Day,” but The Athletic’s “evisceration rushed the timetable.” Keller’s extension “doesn’t improve this year’s team,” but his retention was still “hailed by the stooges as a triumphant moment for the little engine that won’t” (TRIBLIVE, 2/24).
