The Pirates will be deadline sellers yet again, which should be clear to anyone who takes a glance at their 32-50 record and -68 run differential. There’d been hope earlier in the year among some fanbases that Pittsburgh would even weigh the merits of trading ace Paul Skenes for what would perhaps have to be the richest trade return in history, but GM Ben Cherington has publicly quashed speculation on that front. Outside of Skenes, however, it seems the Bucs will be broadly open for business. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic and Jon Heyman of the New York Post have both reported within the past 18 hours that Skenes and franchise icon Andrew McCutchen — who has repeatedly stated since his return to Pittsburgh a few years ago that he has no desire to play elsewhere — are the only two big leaguers who are seen as off the table.
That seemingly puts not only the expected trade candidates in play (e.g. Andrew Heaney, David Bednar, Dennis Santana, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, etc.), but also more controllable names like center fielder Oneil Cruz and longtime stars like outfielder Bryan Reynolds and right-hander Mitch Keller, both of whom signed an extension within the past two years. The Bucs surely aren’t going to move top prospect Bubba Chandler, but the majority of their major league roster could at least be discussed.
Keller stands as one of the most interesting names to watch, not just on the Pirates, but around the league as a whole. The former second-rounder is in the second season of a five-year, $77MM contract and being paid $15MM this year. He’s owed $16.5MM in 2026, $18MM in 2027 and $20MM in 2028. That’s a steep cost for the low-payroll Pirates but affordable for many clubs, particularly given the increasing prices of free-agent pitching on the open market.
The 29-year-old Keller isn’t an ace but was thought to have No. 2-3 starter upside in his days as a top prospect. He’s settled in a step below that, regularly giving the Bucs plenty of innings and an ERA in the low 4.00s with quality rate stats. The 2025 season is no exception. Keller is sitting on a 4.02 ERA in 94 innings. He’s averaged just under six frames per start this season. His 18.5% strikeout rate is a career-low, but Keller’s 6.1% walk rate is excellent and his 45.5% ground-ball rate is strong. Keller’s velocity is down a touch, sitting 93.9 mph in 2025 after averaging 94.4 mph in 2024 and 95.2 mph in 2023, but he’s picking up steam as the season goes along. He sat 93.5 mph in March/April but has averaged 94.1 mph since the calendar flipped to May, for instance.
The current version of Keller would draw plenty of interest even if he weren’t to make any gains with a new club, though teams around the league could well hope that Keller is the latest premier starter to thrive upon being traded away from the Pirates. Gerrit Cole, Tyler Glasnow and Joe Musgrove have all gone on to enjoy top-of-the-rotation success upon being traded by Pittsburgh. Keller, a former top prospect with a 6’3″, 212-pound frame who’s shown flashes of greater bat-missing potential — he struck out 25.5% of his opponents in 2023 — could prove tantalizing, particularly in a market that’s thin on pitching.
Rosenthal suggests that with Pirates not enjoying the attendance increase they likely expected at the time Keller was extended — the Bucs were hopeful of emerging from their rebuild at that point, but injuries and downturns from young players have scuttled that thought — the right-hander and his increasing salary could be more likely to move. Heyman suggests that a Keller trade isn’t as likely due to what’ll surely be a steep asking price.
Given the dearth of starters on the trade market and the deep stock of young arms the Pirates have cultivated, it does seem there’s a real chance to cash in on Keller. Skenes is already cemented as the Pirates’ ace. Jared Jones will miss this season but hopefully return in the first half of 2026. Chandler will debut this summer, and the list of rotation candidates beyond that trio include Braxton Ashcraft, Mike Burrows, Thomas Harrington, Hunter Barco, Bailey Falter (if he’s not traded) and the currently injured Johan Oviedo. Additional arms could join that contingent within the next five weeks, as the Pirates will be adding various new prospects and/or young big leaguers via a series of trades.
A trade of Reynolds would be more difficult to engineer. The 30-year-old is signed through 2030 but is currently scuffling through his least-productive season since the shortened 2020 campaign. In 330 plate appearances, Reynolds carries a tepid .233/.303/.372 batting line — 14% worse than average production, by measure of wRC+. That’s not what a team would want from any player, of course, but it’s magnified by his seven-year, $100MM contract extension, which stands as the largest deal in franchise history.
Reynolds, however, is still hitting the ball on the screws; in fact, he’s hitting the ball harder than ever before. This year’s 91.5 mph average exit velocity and 48.1% hard-hit rate are career-highs. His 10.7% barrel rate is just barely shy of his career-best 11.1% in 2023 — a season in which he produced a much more robust .263/.330/.460 output and slugged 24 homers. Reynolds is hitting just .600 on line-drives this year, and while “just .600” sounds like a ridiculous statement, the league-average on liners is .705 and his career mark entering the year was .697.
It’s not all bad luck driving his downturn at the plate. Reynolds’ 25.8% strikeout rate is a career-high in a 162-game season, although even that’s a bit misleading. The switch-hitter’s 11.6% swinging-strike rate and 25.1% chase rate on pitches off the plate both stand as the second-best marks of his career. His 72.6 mph bat speed, per Statcast, is actually his highest mark since that stat began being tracked in 2023. Reynolds isn’t punching out more because he’s expanding the zone or because he’s no longer capable of catching up to velocity; he’s simply swinging less, particularly within the strike zone, which seems more correctable than a decline in bat speed or erosion of plate discipline.
Reynolds is being paid $12MM this season and has five years and $76MM left on his contract thereafter. He hit decently in May before falling back into a slump, but Reynolds has shown some signs of life with eight hits (three doubles) over his past four games. If he can keep building up momentum, it’s possible a well-timed hot streak and this year’s gaudy batted-ball metrics will generate some interest. Still, his contract contains a limited six-team no-trade clause, and while we saw Rafael Devers shipped out just a few weeks ago, it’s nonetheless exceedingly rare to see a player traded when he has this much time left on a guaranteed contract.
Cruz, 26, is the other name who is notable by his absence from Pittsburgh’s list of purportedly untouchable players. He long rated as one of the organization’s top prospects and one of the top prospects in the entire sport. He posted monster numbers in April and hit decently in May before falling into an awful slump this month. Cruz carried a .230/.347/.481 batting line into June but has cratered with a .148/.247/.210 line this month. He’s now hitting .205/.317/.398 on the season.
It’s an unexciting line, but Cruz has some of the loudest tools in the game. He’s a towering 6’7″, 240 pounds and offers explosive athleticism. Cruz is 26-for-29 in stolen base attempts this season and has swatted 13 home runs. He’s averaging a ridiculous 96 mph off the bat with a 22% barrel rate and a 56.7% hard-hit rate. Only Aaron Judge has a higher barrel rate. Only Shohei Ohtani, Kyle Schwarber and James Wood have better hard-hit rates. No one in MLB has a higher average exit velocity or higher bat speed.
There are major hit tool concerns, evidenced by this year’s 33% strikeout rate and Cruz’s career 31.9% mark. However, Cruz is walking at a stout 13.5% clip as well and has actually reduced his chase rate and swinging-strike rate over last year’s levels. Like Reynolds, he’s swinging far less often this season; Cruz swung at 46.2% of the pitches he saw last year (and 61.3% of the strikes he saw) compared to just 40.7% in 2025 (and 55.9% of the strikes he’s seen). The team’s overall swing rate on pitches within the zone from 2024 to 2025 is virtually unchanged, but for whatever reason, Cruz and Reynolds have taken up much more passive approaches — ostensibly to their detriment.
Cruz has gone from a poor-fielding shortstop to a passable center field defender while learning his new position on the fly at the big league level. His plus-plus speed and elite arm strength — he not-so-shockingly leads all big leaguers in arm strength as well, per Statcast — lend themselves well to center field. It wouldn’t be at all surprising if he emerged as a plus defender there as he gains experience. Cruz was benched earlier this week for failing to run out a grounder that someone with his speed should easily have been able to beat, resulting in an inning-ending double play, but he said after the game that he’d lost track of the number of outs. Cruz took fault for the situation and said he supported manager Don Kelly’s decision to lift him from the game (link via the Associated Press).
Even if Cruz’s recent struggles persist, the asking price in a trade would presumably be enormous. Players with this type of tool set simply don’t come around often. Add in that he’s controllable via arbitration for three years after the current season, and Pittsburgh would need a substantial return to consider parting ways with him. The upside on Cruz is so great that it’s hard to see the Pirates actually trading him, but he’ll be a fascinating long-shot target for teams seeking center field help.
There are plenty of other trade candidates to consider. Lefty relievers Caleb Ferguson and veteran infielder/outfielder Adam Frazier are on a cheap one-year deals and could be moved. The Bucs would likely love to shed the four years and $36MM owed to third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes beyond the current season. He’s still an elite defender, but chronic back problems that developed after he signed his $70MM extension have severely sapped his production at the plate.
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