The Pittsburgh Pirates have agreed to acquire relief pitcher Joakim Soria from the Tigers, confirms Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com. As we know, every agreed upon trade is pending medicals. As things stand, the return to the Tigers is unknown, but we'll pass along that information when we get it.
Once the Tigers went into sell mode, the most logical candidates to be moved were free-agents-to-be David Price, Yoenis Cespedes and Joakim Soria. So now two of three are gone in the matter of a few hours.
 
Tigers trade Joakim Soria to Pirates
 
With All-Star closer Mark Melancon set as the ninth-inning man for the Pirates, expect Soria to take over eighth-inning duties, as more teams are shifting to closer-type duos at the back of games.
Soria, 31, is 23 for 26 in save chances this season with a 2.85 ERA, 1.05 WHIP and 36 strikeouts in 41 innings. He's a two-time All-Star.
He joins an already-great Pittsburgh bullpen. Melancon has a 1.32 ERA and 0.94 WHIP. Tony Watson has a 2.76 ERA, 1.01 WHIP and 46 strikeouts in 45 2/3 innings. Jared Hughes has a 1.99 ERA. As a whole, the Pirates have the second-best bullpen ERA in the NL at 2.71 heading into Thursday's action.
Soria only makes it deeper. It looks like the Pirates are looking emulate the Royals in terms of their success with shortening games last postseason.
Matt Snyder/CBS Sports
 

Comments are closed.