Pirates announce they chose the contract for catcher/first baseman Rafael Flores. In the corresponding active lineup, the infielder Liover Peguero Has been selected as triple Indianapolis. The 40-person roster is open, but it is now full.
Flores, 24, just received from the Yankees as part of the deadline deal David Bednar Go to the Bronx. If not added to Pittsburgh’s 40-man lineup, he will be offered in the upcoming Rule 5 draft. They are certainly going to give him a roster from the draft. Before the offseason arrived, it took months to get ahead of the day to see him in the major leagues.
The young man took an unusual path and became a significant prospect. He was playing summer ball for Alaska Goldpanners, a community college outside Los Angeles, when Yanks approached him and signed him as an undrafted free agent in 2022. He is about the league average in the 2023 game.
Flores seemed to have taken a big step in both offense and defense last year. He stepped on the board 506 times between High-A and Double-A and produced a combination of .279/.379/.495 lines and 152 WRC+. Fangraphs ranked 34th in the system after the campaign, noting that his work behind the plate is improving. Baseball America ranks tenth among New York farmers entering the season.
The 2025 season allowed Flores to further improve his stock. The 24-year-old waved his double A pole with his right hand, showing up in 370 set appearances at .287/.346/.496 (145 WRC+) and hit .281/.363/.459 (119 wrc+) in 157 Triple-A sections. He wasn’t great when it comes to controlling the running game, but the baseball prospectus has provided his minors with above-average frameworks and lockdown results this year. At least, he has the material for bat supremacy behind the plate, a desperate need for pirates in the past few years.
Catcher has been a revolving door for Pittsburgh since the Bucs deal Jacob stalls After the 2021 season, I will go to the Marlins. After that, they combined Henry Davis,,,,, Endy Rodriguez,,,,, Joey Bart,,,,, Jason delays,,,,, Yasmani Grandal,,,,, Taylor Heinman,,,,, Austin’s hedge,,,,, Michael Perez,,,,, Andrew Knapp and Roberto Perez – Among other things, and with bats, catastrophic results were obtained. Since the opening day of 2022, only less offensive production has been received by the Pittsburgh sum.208/.285/.314.
The hope of moving forward is that Flores can turn the trend around – or at least play a meaningful role in the receiving committee that began to correct the ship. Overall, the Pirates’ offense is the poorest in baseball. If Flores can even provide an average offense (or slightly higher than slightly higher), he should get a lot of looks as the Bucs have a hard time running on the annual scoring run.
