April 25: The Pirates expect Gonzalez to miss the next 10 to 12 weeks of action following today’s surgery, per MLB.com’s Adam Berry (Twitter link).
April 24: The Pirates announced to reporters Wednesday that shortstop Erik Gonzalez will undergo surgery to “repair and internally fixate” his fractured left clavicle (Twitter link via Bill Brink of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette). A timeline for his recovery won’t be known until Gonzalez actually undergoes the procedure, but he was already placed on the 60-day injured list over the weekend, so the length of his absence will be substantial.
Acquired from the Indians in the offseason trade that sent Jordan Luplow and Max Moroff to Cleveland, Gonzalez was named the Pirates’ Opening Day shortstop midway through Spring Training. However, the former Cleveland utilityman didn’t acquit himself well in an everyday role, as he batted just .216/.298/.294 over the life of 59 plate appearances. In his absence, rookie Cole Tucker has emerged as an option at the position and is now in line for a long-term audition.
Gonzalez sustained his injury last Friday when he was involved in an ugly collision with center fielder Starling Marte, who has also been placed on the injured list. The outlook on Marte is better, as MLB.com’s Adam Berry tweets that he’s been cleared to begin light baseball activities.
When Gonzalez eventually returns to the Pirates, it now looks likely that he’ll hold a utility role similar to the one he had with the Indians in 2016-18. The Buccos can control Gonzalez through the 2022 season, and he’ll be arbitration-eligible for the first time this offseason.
Correction: Cole Tucker did not play a single MLB game until the Gonzalez injury.
Dang was typing the same thing and you beat me to the post!
Agree.
Maybe if they’d sign Major league player, we wouldn’t have “defensive specialists” running into our star player.
Gonzalez was a Major league player for Cleveland. Played a utility role, much like Josh Harrison did for Pittsburgh for years.
Was a backup infielder but without looking at numbers I’d say that’s all he had on common with Harrison and would suspect his numbers were way off Harrison’s.
Not good when your scrubs injure your star players.
Thought Newman was next in line before Tucker
Kevin Newman was placed on the 10 day about a week ago.
And now he’s playing the outfield in AAA.
Plus Cole Tucker (imo) is the shortstop of the future, as well as the present. Newman’s & Erik’s injuries just expedited Tucker’s call-up.
Ouch
Maybe they could move Kang to SS and start Moran full-time at 3B?
Given the postage-stamp range of both guys, I think the pitching staff might take hostages if that came to pass.
Kang could barely play short before his hiatus, he’s not mobile enough. He’s staying at third, although if he doesn’t start hitting soon he might be a bench bat.
Kang is no longer a viable option at shortstop except in an emergency five inning scenario like last week.
The Pirates are running out of players that Gonzalez can run into.
Shortstop was one of the positions that were on the off season wish list for a true ML replacement player.
The others were veteran right and left handers for the bullpen.
Newman should get the chance at shortstop when he returns unless Tucker is clearly ready to play in the ML.
When Gonzalez comes back they will be able to send Reyes back to AAA where he should be now getting at bats.
With the Pirates starting pitching they had a real chance to do well this year but the horrible off season is going to catch up to them very quickly as it already has with the poor bullpen work this year.
At this point they would have been better off keeping Jordy Mercer for another year.
They absolutely should not have kept Mercer for another year, not at the price he got. However, they absolutely should have signed Iglesias or Hechevarria at the price they ended up getting, which was next to nothing. Gonzalez was a reasonable piece to trade for, but the Bucs essentially handed him the starting job, which he didn’t merit based on his limited track record. I don’t wish bad things on Gonzalez, he’s a decent bench piece and I’m sorry he’s hurt. Hopefully Cole Tucker makes this a moot point.
I was surprised that Mercer got what he did,but he was smart in signing quickly after the Pirates did not make a move.
I agree that Iglesias or even Hechevarria would have been at least as good overall as Mercer and for much less money than he received from Detroit.
I am at sea though as to the solution that NH chose.
Josh Harrison – .159 batting average, .466 OPS, 25 OPS+
Jordy Mercer – .233 batting average, .623 OPS, 67 OPS+
Ivan Nova- 8.43 ERA, 53 ERA+
No case can be made that they should have kept any of the players they let go.
You can argue with the replacements, but…arguments can be made for them, too.
What can’t be argued is that they had no Plan B for losing Marte. Reynolds looked good pressed into emergency duty, but that was definitely not the plan.
Dickerson, Marte, (a healthy) Polanco is a very good to great outfield.
Melky (in a left field the size of most center fields), Jason Martin and (an unhealthy) Polanco (with no arm) is too much for the pitchers to overcome.
Those three ex Pirates have not played well but they all have track records of being decent players over an entire season.It was time to move on for various reasons as long as NH had good replacement plans for each to do so.
Not sure that you can have a good Plan B for every position Reynolds has played well.
There is in no way the word “ great” associated with any of the three outfielders let alone all of them as a unit.
There are really no good fielders among any of the Pirates at this point.The outfield reserves have played pretty well,but the starting pitchers and closer are the only players really holding this team up.Those particular players deserve better.
Hmm, no good fielders in the normal starting OF. Dickerson won a Gold Glove last year & Marte gets to everything in CF, where he should have been for the last 5 years if not for Cutch’s ego. Polanco is not good in RF. Just saying.
Hmm,are Marte and Dickerson playing “at this point”?
Just sayin’.
I think most nationally would associate the word “great” with Marte, steroids or not.
Sorry,Marte is nowhere close to being a Hall of Farmer,and that is my definition of great.
He is a good player,but nothing better than that.
Braves could deal either Johan Camargo or Dansby Swanson plus Ender Inciarte for Felipe Vazquez, either Nick Burdi or Bryan reynolds and Greggory Polanco. Fix that shortstop problem for the Pirates with a young premium defender and offensive threat and add a gold glove centerfielder to the outfield mix. Just what the Bucs need. Brave strengthen their bullpen and get a replacement outfielder that allows Acuna to permanently move to centerfield.
Marte is a quality center fielder,so they do not need Inciarte.Swanson is a good player,but carries only an annual average of 1.4 WAR with a career OBP plus slugging of below .700.The Pirates bullpen needs Vasquez,much like most bullpens would.Plus you want either Burdi or Reynolds who are both good young players.
I do not doubt that NH would say thanks but no thanks,and wisely so.