{"id":252585,"date":"2026-07-26T22:27:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T22:27:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/252585\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T22:27:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T22:27:08","slug":"pirates-sign-2026-first-round-pick-derek-curiel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/252585\/","title":{"rendered":"Pirates sign 2026 first-round pick Derek Curiel"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Pirates have signed outfielder Derek Curiel, who was selected with the fifth overall pick in the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/pittsburgh\/news\/pittsburgh-pirates-draft-picks-2026-mlb-news\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-absolute=\"true\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">2026 MLB draft<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Curiel, 21, is a Louisiana State University alum and was labeled as the best hitter, as well as one of the top defensive outfielders, among all college-level players in the draft, according to Baseball America. He also helped guide the Tigers to their eighth national championship and second in three seasons.  <\/p>\n<p>Curiel won an ABCA\/Rawlings Gold Glove Award as a sophomore after committing just two errors in 134 chances for a .985 fielding percentage in 2026. He also batted .353 with 18 doubles, two triples, six home runs and 46 RBIs in 58 games. He added 34 walks, 13 stolen bases, a .957 OPS and 64 runs scored.<\/p>\n<p>As a freshman in 2025, Curiel was named D1Baseball&#8217;s National Freshman of the Year and earned second-team All-SEC honors. He also was selected to the College World Series All-Tournament Team after hitting .345 with 20 doubles, two triples, seven home runs, 55 RBIs, 53 walks, a .990 OPS and 67 runs in 68 games.<\/p>\n<p>In two seasons at LSU, Curiel hit .349 with 38 doubles, four triples, 13 home runs and 101 RBIs in 126 games. He also recorded 16 stolen bases, 87 walks, a .975 OPS and 131 runs scored.<\/p>\n<p>Defensively, Curiel committed just two errors in 232 total chances over his two seasons with the Tigers, finishing with a .991 fielding percentage.<\/p>\n<p>The Pirates have now signed 16 players from their 2026 draft class.<\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Pirates have signed outfielder Derek Curiel, who was selected with the fifth overall pick in the\u00a02026&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[11199,31271,73,75,74,10997],"class_list":["post-252585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-major-league-baseball","tag-mlb-draft","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-pittsburgh-pirates"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}