Weekly Report: Quiet Week As The Winter Meetings Approach...

Well ho ho ho, it's December already...

Pirates Stuff: 

• The Pirates have resigned RHP Beau Burrows to a a minor league deal. He had a 3-3-9/2.94 line in 2025 while fanning a batter per frame in 37 outings through four levels of the Bucco system. He had a rough go at Indy (1-2-3/6.20 line in 16 calls) after kickin' butt at Altoona (1-1-5/0.44 in 16 games). 

Beau Burrows - 2025 photo/MLB.com

• Darragh McDonald of MLBTR gives us a general picture of the Pirates postseason trade targets.
• Paul Skenes has landed a record $3,436,343 from this year's pre-arbitration bonus pool. If your memory needs jogged, the pool is a $50M fund established by the 2022 CBA to reward top-performing pre-arb players (fewer than three years of MLB service time). The Buc ace pocketed $1.5M from it in '24.
• IF Coach Mendy Lopez is the latest assistant to leave as Don Kelly continues to personalize his staff.
• Good news on the personal & professional fronts - Jared Jones married his fiancé, Rylie Fox, in Hawaii this past weekend w/Skenes and Kyle Nicolas as his best men. And after the honeymoon, he's due back from UCL surgery on schedule this spring, sometime between March - May, after missing all of '25.

MLB Stuff:

• The hot stove should get a log or two tossed into it shortly; the 2025 MLB Winter Meetings in Orlando, Florida are scheduled from December 7-10, with the Hall of Fame vote, Rule 5 Draft and the agents peddling their clients to hopefully light a fire in what's been a fairly quiet postseason so far.
• The Cards traded Sonny Gray to the Red Sox, putting a crimp in Bucco trade options as Boston was a rumored landing spot for Mitch Keller. Of course, St. Louis' rotation has an opening now...
• Local boy does good: The Rockies made Warren Schaeffer their F/T skipper, removing the interim tag he held since May of last season. Schaeffer is from Vandergrift and went to Greensburg Central Catholic HS, where he played SS on the road to Virginia Tech, the minors and ultimately to the bigs as a coach.
• IF Vinny Capra, who had a short stint with the Bucs in 2023 (.167 BA in 18 ABs), has signed a minor league deal with Boston. He's also had brief MLB time served with Toronto, the Brewers and the White Sox.