CHICAGO -- The Pirates kicked off their trade deadline (most likely mini) sell-off a bit earlier than expected this week, and with a player that didn’t seem like a likely trade candidate: Daniel Vogelbach.
The designated hitter wasn’t given a proper platoon and his results took a hit because of it, but he was unquestionably one of the Pirates’ top bats this year. He also had up to two more years of team control remaining, one of which was cost controlled. The Pirates didn’t need to hang onto him, but there were plenty of good reasons for why they should.
But if there is a way to justify trading a good hitter, it’s if you get a good pitcher in return. And general manager Ben Cherington made clear on his radio show on 93.7 The Fan Sunday that he wanted a major-league pitcher, not "a pitcher in A ball who might be a reliever some day."
Ideally, the Pirates would get a leverage reliever in the trade. They certainly need one, if not a couple. David Bednar is an All-Star, but the other two pitchers the Pirates had pegged for late-inning clutch situations were Chris Stratton and Heath Hembree. Stratton has been up and down this year and has been used in different roles instead of the eighth or ninth inning guy. Hembree’s tenure was disastrous.
So while the bullpen has had a couple of success stories this season – Wil Crowe, Dillon Peters and Chase De Jong have done well in hybrid roles, and Yerry De Los Santos could one day be a setup man – the Pirates need more help in that bullpen, especially in those leverage roles.
In the seventh and eighth innings this year – the innings where you use those leverage, non-closer relievers – the Pirates have issued 116 runs, the third-most in baseball entering Sunday behind the Reds (133) and Royals (129).
The Pirates need more good relievers. They might have bought high on one this week.
In exchange for Vogelbach, the Pirates got Colin Holderman, a late-bloomer reliever prospect whose story you’ve probably heard before. Originally a minor-league starter, he moved into the bullpen, focused on throwing two pitches, got a little extra velocity and started getting hitters out more consistently. It’s a reliever origin story you’ve probably heard.
What’s interesting is that at 26 years old and in his first taste of the majors, Holderman quickly became a valued member of the Mets’ bullpen. But if the Mets wanted Vogelbach, they needed to give him up:
Billy Eppler: "I ran through a bunch of different iterations to try to not have to yield Colin (Holderman) in this transaction. Pittsburgh didn’t have to move (Daniel Vogelbach) . . . We had to give them, ultimately, the player that they dug their heels in on."
— Tim Healey (@timbhealey) July 22, 2022
The results speak for themselves: 2.04 ERA over 17 ⅔ innings, 18 strikeouts, a really good ground ball rate in Class AAA (63.6%). And he’s doing it with effectively two pitches, a sinker that averages 95.7 mph and a breaking ball (classified as both a slider and cutter, but they profile similarly) that gets good spin.
Talking with an analyst about the trade, they described the sinker as major-league average and the slider as a plus pitch. He throws them equally, effectively giving him above-average offerings.
“He’s got really good stuff,” Cherington told local reporters after the trade. “He’s a pitcher who has the ability to get ground balls and strikeouts. Some guys can do one or the other; he has the ability to do both. That’s nice to have."
He’s able to get those whiffs and grounders for the same reason: He knows how to attack low in the zone. It might be his most intriguing trait as a pitcher.
At 6’7”, Holderman definitely profiles as a sinkerballer, which can be beneficial or a hindrance. If he’s able to pound the bottom of the zone, it gives his pitches even more opportunity for vertical movement in the zone while still remaining a strike. The strike zone is taller than it is wide, so if you want as much movement as possible while still being a strike, it’s often better to go vertical. However, if those sinkers get too much spin and stay up, they land right in the wheelhouse.
And while Holderman does get more than average spin on his sinker, it doesn’t hang often:
He’s going after that low, gloveside corner. It’s the same spot he wants to throw his breaking stuff:
So it’s no surprise that most of his whiffs are right around that area:
This is where Holderman is going to want to continue to execute his pitches. He gets above-average vertical movement on both his fastball and breaking ball. It has led to really good results, including holding hitters to a 2-for-27 clip against his breaking ball. That will eventually even out, but for a first real look in the majors, you can tell why the Pirates targeted him in a potential trade.
Holderman is with Class AAA Indianapolis for the time being, though he’ll be back up with the big team sooner rather than later. Whenever he does come back, he could provide a boost to the backend of the bullpen if he continues to work down.
