Karstens, Meek Ink Deals

Well, the FO is TCB on the arb front so far. Two more guys, Jeff Karstens and Evan Meek, have agreed to contracts.

Karstens, who had a breakout season in 2011, came out better than expected, inking a one year, $3.1M deal, a cool $2M more than last season, per Bill Brink of the Post-Gazette. The 29 year old righty went 9-9 with a 3.38 ERA after being a stop gap insertion into the rotation.

He started 26 games and went 162-1/3 frames. Clint Hurdle kept him on a short pitch-count leash early on, but by the dog days, JK was getting his six innings and 100 pitches in. The caveat is that in the last two months of the season, his ERA was around 6.5. It could be a natural reaction to his first full season as a starter since the cows came home or as stat guys warn, his regression toward the mean. We'll see if he can repeat in 2012.

Evan Meek, an All-Star in 2010, had shoulder woes and worked just 20-2/3 innings last season. The Bucs brought him back on a one-year, $875K deal with $25K in possible bonuses, according to Jen Langosh of MLB.com. He'll be in the mix with Chris Resop and Jason Grilli to be Hanny's eighth inning caddy, and the favorite if he regains his 2010 mojo.

That brings the Pirate arb signings to six players and nearly $12.5M, with Garrett Jones and Casey McGehee to go. Jones is expected to be worth $2.5 or so, and McGehee $3M plus, but the FO has been a bit on the generous side so far, so we'll see.