{"id":808597,"date":"2026-07-18T17:10:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T17:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/808597\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T17:10:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T17:10:12","slug":"pirates-select-khristian-curtis-mlb-trade-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/808597\/","title":{"rendered":"Pirates Select Khristian Curtis – MLB Trade Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Pirates have selected the contract of right-hander Khristian Curtis<\/a> from Triple-A Indianapolis prior to today\u2019s doubleheader with the Guardians.\u00a0 (Reporter Alex Stumpf noted earlier today<\/a> that Curtis had a locker in the Pittsburgh clubhouse.). Oneil Cruz<\/a> was moved to the 60-day injured list to open up space for Curtis on the 40-man roster, and the Bucs already had an opening on their 26-man roster.\u00a0 Right-hander Wilber Dotel<\/a> was also activated from the 15-day IL and he\u2019ll be the 27th man for the twin bill.<\/p>\n

The 24-year-old Curtis will be making his MLB debut whenever he appears in a game.\u00a0 The 12th-round pick from the 2023 draft was rated by Baseball America as the fifth-best prospect in Pittsburgh\u2019s farm system, though MLB Pipeline puts Curtis 21st in its ranking.\u00a0 Curtis\u2019 mid-90s fastball is probably the best of his intriguing array of pitches that also includes a cutter that misses a lot of bats, though control remains an issue with any of these pitches.<\/p>\n

Curtis has a 12.3% walk rate over 74 1\/3 combined innings at the Double-A and Triple-A levels this season, as well as a 29.8% strikeout rate that speaks to his ability to generate whiffs.\u00a0 Curtis had a 4.73 ERA in 53 1\/3 innings with Double-A Altoona and then a 5.57 ERA in 21 innings for Indianapolis.\u00a0 Sixteen of his 18 appearances this year have come as a starting pitcher, though perhaps telling, Curtis\u2019 most recent Triple-A outing saw him work as a multi-inning reliever.<\/p>\n

This kind of long relief role might be in store for Curtis however long he\u2019s on the big league roster.\u00a0 Today\u2019s doubleheader adds to the Pirates\u2019 need for pitching depth before their next off-day on July 23, and the club then has a stretch of 17 games in as many days before its next off-day on August 10.<\/p>\n

The August 3 trade deadline falls just about in the middle of this busy stretch of the schedule, and the Pirates are known to be looking to add to a bullpen that stands as the team\u2019s biggest weakness.\u00a0 Curtis could provide an internal solution if he pitches well in this audition, or it is possible this call-up might be a bit of a showcase if the Bucs are dangling Curtis to any trade suitors.<\/p>\n

Dotel might also be able to help out in the relief corps, though the righty has only a 5.89 ERA in 18 1\/3 innings since making his big league debut on April 19.\u00a0 A right lat strain kept Dotel on the sidelines for a little over a month.<\/p>\n

Cruz\u2019s 10-day IL stint began on June 8, so the move to the 60-day IL officially rules the outfielder out of action until August 7 at the absolute earliest.\u00a0 Cruz is recovering from fracturing the fourth and fifth metacarpals in his left hand, and he has started swinging within the last couple of weeks.\u00a0 With more baseball activities and a rehab assignment still to come, the 60-day IL assignment doesn\u2019t really alter Cruz\u2019s overall timeline, though it does confirm that one of the Pirates\u2019 key bats will still be absent beyond the deadline.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pirates have selected the contract of right-hander Khristian Curtis from Triple-A Indianapolis prior to today\u2019s doubleheader with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":808598,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,383030,591,44462,85,383031],"class_list":["post-808597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-khristian-curtis","tag-mlb","tag-oneil-cruz","tag-sports","tag-wilber-dotel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=808597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808597\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/808598"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=808597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=808597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=808597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}