Thursday, April 17

Spring Training is just a week away, and hope springs eternal in Bradenton, Fla. Although the Pirates made several trades and signings this offseason, the only way they’re going to get better as a team is if several players continue to grow and develop. A big breakout season for one player can sometimes do more than any trade or free agent signing.

Today, we’re taking a look at players who could break out in 2025, including a pitcher, a hitter and a prospect to watch:

Pitcher: RHP Kyle Nicolas
There’s no denying Nicolas has stuff. His fastball averaged 97.4 mph, he has two breaking pitches that get better than average movement and he’s adding a changeup that could help his primary pitches play up. There’s really just one thing holding Nicolas back, and that’s his control.

Nicolas walked 12.8% of his batters faced last season, averaging 5.1 walks per nine innings. While he has two solid breaking pitches, they landed in the strike zone just 40% of the time (the League average is 44.3%). Those couple of percentage points can pile up walks quickly.

Commanding his breaking balls was part of Nicolas’ focus this offseason, working with Luke Hagerty at the X2 Baseball facility in North Carolina to land more sliders and curveballs in the zone.

“I feel like the shapes of my breaking balls have been good,” Nicolas said last month at PiratesFest. “It's just where my body's taking it -- it's taking it out of the zone. Just staying more through the zone, through my target rather than falling off toward first base. And, all of that just leads to more consistency in the zone."

Nicolas walked or hit 35 batters last season. If he can cut that number down, his ERA and WHIP should also fall.

Honorable mention: Mike Burrows

Hitter: CF Oneil Cruz
Cruz got off to a rough start last April and didn’t finish on the highest of notes in September. In those middle four months, he hit 15 home runs with 16 stolen bases, and his .861 OPS would have been the best among National League outfielders in that stretch.

We’ve heard about Cruz’s upside for years and have witnessed his Statcast-breaking feats live the past few years. Why should this be his breakout season? Well, it comes down to three points:

• He’s another year removed from his ankle injury. An offseason more focused on training than rehab can go a long way.

• He improved drastically against left-handed pitching as the year progressed. The sample size was small, but the results and peripherals were solid (.306 batting average, .909 OPS in 93 plate appearances against lefties from June through September).

• Center field is probably the better position for him. He went from -3 outs above average at shortstop to +2 OAA in center field, and that was just a five-week sample size for a position he was essentially learning on the fly. With his arm and range, he could excel in center.

Cruz gave a taste of what he could do last season, becoming just the 10th Pirates player to join the 20-20 club. He very well could join Barry Bonds as the only Pirates to go 30-30.

Honorable mention: Jared Triolo

Prospect: LHP Jaden Woods
The Pirates’ No. 29 prospect in MLB Pipeline’s rankings, Woods has some solid offerings, including a mid-90s fastball and a slider that can get into the upper-80s with some sweep. Selected in the seventh round of the 2023 MLB Draft, Woods got the call to Double-A Altoona midseason last year. Although his numbers at that level weren’t great (4.93 ERA, 1.47 WHIP), he showed that his stuff does play, striking out 27% of his batters faced.

He just turned 23 on Saturday, and his stuff is playing up now that he has converted to being a reliever. But what’s perhaps most intriguing is Woods was part of a group of young pitchers who worked out together this offseason. Other pitchers in that group include Paul Skenes, Jared Jones, Top 100 prospects Bubba Chandler and Thomas Harrington, and fellow Top 30 Pirates prospects Hunter Barco and Burrows. That’s quite the crew to hang around -- not just to improve your stuff, but also learn how a Major Leaguer goes about their work.

Woods has been on a fast track through the farm system. Let’s see if that continues in 2025.

Honorable mentions: C Omar Alfonzo, RHP David Matoma

Who led the Pirates in Spring Training hits last year?

A. Ke’Bryan Hayes
B. Jared Triolo
C. Henry Davis
D. Jack Suwinski

The salary arbitration panel found in favor of the Pirates in the Dennis Santana case this week, meaning the right-hander will make $1.4 million in 2025.

Santana was claimed off waivers at midseason last year and found success in his new home, posting a 2.44 ERA with 50 strikeouts over 44 1/3 innings with the Pirates.

The Pirates announced the return of fan value ticket options for the 2025 season. This includes loaded value on some tickets, as well as discounts for seniors, students and the military. 

More information can be found here.

We’re going back to April 30, 2019 for today’s trip into the Pirates vault. With the game tied in the top of the 11th inning against the Rangers, Bryan Reynolds jumped on a Jesse Chavez cutter and drove it to straightaway center for his first Major League home run. That homer proved to be the game-winner, and the Pirates went on to a 6-4 victory.

• Skenes vs. Jones was "a Major League game in high school"

• Four Top 100 prospects were invited to Major League Spring Training

A. Hayes

Hayes racked up 21 hits during Spring Training last season, which led not only the Pirates, but the Grapefruit League.

To subscribe to Pirates Beat, visit this page and mark "Pirates Beat" from our newsletter list. Make sure you're following the Pirates or that they're checked as your favorite team.

View Online

© 2025 MLB Advanced Media, L.P. MLB trademarks and copyrights are used with permission of Major League Baseball. Visit MLB.com. Any other marks used herein are trademarks of their respective owners.

Please review our Privacy Policy.

You () received this message because you registered to receive commercial email messages or purchased a ticket from MLB. 

Please add info@marketing.mlbemail.com to your address book to ensure our messages reach your inbox. If you no longer wish to receive commercial email messages from MLB.com, please unsubscribe or log in and manage your email subscriptions.

Postal Address: MLB.com, c/o MLB Advanced Media, L.P., 1271 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.