August 29: Heaney has officially been released, according to the MLB.com transaction tracker.
August 26: The Pirates announced Tuesday that veteran left-hander Andrew Heaney has been designated for assignment. His spot on the roster will go to center fielder Oneil Cruz, who has been reinstated from the injured list. Pittsburgh also optioned infielder Ronny Simon to Triple-A Indianapolis and recalled right-handed reliever Dauri Moreta from Triple-A.
Heaney, who turned 34 in June, signed a one-year deal in the offseason, guaranteeing him $5.25MM. Early in the 2025 campaign, it looked like one of the best low-cost pickups of the winter by any team. The veteran southpaw raced out to a strong start, tossing 78 1/3 innings of 3.33 ERA ball in his first 14 trips to the bump. Heaney posted a sharp 7.5% walk rate in that time, and while a pedestrian 18.5% strikeout rate and somewhat elevated 1.26 HR/9 mark pointed to some degree of regression — he had a 4.47 FIP and 4.51 SIERA in that time — the reckoning was more emphatic than anyone could’ve reasonably anticipated.
A pair of consecutive seven-run drubbings in mid-June proved to be the beginning of a two-month spiral from which Heaney simply hasn’t been able to recover. Over his past 42 innings, he’s been trounced for 43 earned runs (9.21 ERA) with just a 12.1% strikeout rate. Opponents have averaged a staggering 2.79 home runs per nine innings pitched during that span.
The Pirates recently demoted Heaney to the bullpen, but the change in roles didn’t prove beneficial. He’s surrendered six runs in 1 1/3 innings across his two most recent relief outings, including five runs in just two-thirds of an inning last night.
Some onlookers might cynically liken Heaney’s DFA to the Pirates’ much-maligned 2024 decision to designate Rowdy Tellez for assignment when he was just four plate appearances shy of a $200K bonus. Given the prolonged nature of Heaney’s struggles, this looks to be a much different scenario. In fact, last night’s two-thirds of an inning proved to be just enough to push Heaney over 120 innings on the season (120 1/3 overall), which unlocked a $50K bonus.
Had the Pirates kept trotting him out there, Heaney could’ve unlocked further incentives. (He’d have taken home another $100K at 130 innings and $150K at 140 innings pitched.) However, based on his past two months, there’s no incentive for the team to keep giving him opportunities. Heaney had ample opportunity to pull himself out of the slump and wasn’t able to do so. In the end, he’ll wind up earning $5.3MM this contract, and the innings that would’ve gone to him will instead go to younger arms whom the Bucs can control beyond the current season.
Pittsburgh surely tried to find a trade partner prior to the deadline, but even then, Heaney was riding a streak of 28 runs surrendered in his past 28 2/3 innings. He’d been tagged for 15 home runs in his past 50 innings. It’s easy to imagine most teams seeking pitching felt they could get comparable or better results simply sticking in house.
With Heaney now off the 40-man roster, he’ll be placed on waivers. It’s largely irrelevant whether that’ll be outright waivers or release waivers, as it’s unlikely anyone will claim the remaining $932K on his contract after struggles of this magnitude, and he has more than enough service time to reject an outright assignment in favor of free agency while retaining the remainder of his guaranteed salary. Barring what would be a very surprising claim, he’ll be a free agent within the next few days. He could latch on with a new club as pitching depth for the final month of the season and could technically be postseason-eligible if he signs with a new team prior to Sept. 1 — though he’d obviously have to turn things around in a hurry to be considered for a spot on anyone’s October rosters.
Interesting
Braves on line 2.
Who’s on line 1?
Also the Braves.
Hean Dog nooooooooo!
*Heandog
Who needs bodies on the mound to finish the season?
Andrew Heaney > JP Sears.
This would be a good pick up for the stretch run AJ.
Maybe if you’re looking at experience as a virtue. Otherwise, Heaney doesn’t seem like much of an upgrade over Sears.
It is an upgrade if a 9.33 era is better than a 5.03 era.
He stinks
Beyond Stink!
He should I yld have been DFAd at the deadline. In fact he should never have been signed. They already had falter, a lefty. Again a bad investment by cherrington
Couldn’t be a proper season without a veteran Pirates starter going to the Padres.
Tow-Only if the Padres do not want to make the playoffs.
I’ll take your word on it. Don’t get to see him put h much. That said Sears is struggling to say the least.
Padres are still in it and that is what is most important.
First ballot hall of famer getting disrespected by the Pirates of all teams
He won’t be picked up so you change the Pirates to all the Major League teams.
Who’s a first ballot HOF?
Green Acres is the place for Mr Heaney
Arnold the pig was my favorite actor on that show.
This guy stinks. They DFA’d him because he lost his stuff not because of incentives
He should have been gone at the trade deadline. At least the Pirates could have got a box of balls.
There were no takers apparently.
KBO calling.
they tried to trade him at the deadline, no one wanted him
F
Should have done it at 119.2 innings. They would have won yesterday and saved Nutting 50k
Nutting Williams are the problem. They were more worried about the pr hit of dfa before bonus than the good of the baseball team.
Well people still think Nutting is cheap and awful. His approval rating is 0. This should have been done before today.
I agree wholeheartedly but still think that they either should have traded him much earlier or released him immediately after the trade deadline since he has been awful since mid June.
No one wanted him. I guess if they looked at wins era they would have but unfortunately they didn’t.
Someone may very well have wanted him in mid June.
By the end of July they probably could not have given him away for nothing.
You keep pounding your drum buddy
No more of that but it takes a GM who actually thinks ahead.
Well, there was another option – not pitch him last night and wait for a real blowout to pay the bonus and avoid the criticism. Or at least take him out after two guys got on base (4 batters, so fulfilled the minimum).
Who gives a it about critic. I would have done it at 119.2 just for the fun of it. I don’t believe it’s possible for people to think any less of Nutting.
People who thought Rowdy deserve a bonus are just idiots. Yes I just called most of you idiots because you are stupid.
Hot takes.
55 comments 6 hours not a single complaint. Opposite. People complaining they didn’t do it sooner.
Why should Soto bat first?
He would not hit into as many double plays that way.
He doesn’t hit into more than any other player.
Second to Alonso in the NL with 16.
If that’s an absolute number and not prorated based on playing time, then of course players who play the most games will hit into more DPs.
The Mets have played 133 games, of which Alonso has played 133 and Soto has played 131.
The DPs go with being a durable player. It’s a dumb stat to fixate on.
Soto is 10th in plate appearances and Alonso 12th. Soto is only 19 PAs from #1. It absolutely is a stupid stat for him to be fixated on.
You are assuming that I am fixated on it which I am clearly not but you seem to be.
It was actually said in a lighthearted manner which is unfortunately not evident.
Maybe the other poster that you reacted/ responded to is saying it in a positive way to get him more at bats.
And yes Soto has a lot of at bats so to be fair a true stat would be the rate of grounding into double plays.
One would have to calculate that and compare the rate to others but as I am not fixated on it it would be a waste of time.
It was said in a lighthearted manner which neither you nor Blue Baron picked up on because you are fixated on saying something negative.
Mendoza: As opposed to you saying something negative in the first place, Mr Troll calling the water wet.
I just explained to you that I did not mean it be negative.
You automatically show your negativity by saying that.
Pot calling the kettle black.
You also show your lack of baseball knowledge by implying that it is a meaningless stat.
There is a reason why they call dp’s rally killers.
It certainly does not affect the fact that Soto will be a first ballot HOFer.
It’s a meaningless stat because every player hits into them.
And you apparently don’t know that if something you say is received and perceived as negative, your intent is irrelevant.
I could say that my intention wasn’t to be negative, but it wouldn’t change your perception.
Now go away. End of discussion.
I don’t do what you tell me to do,—-hole.
You have clearly been a condescending jerk on here for several years.
You need to be the one to go away.
Tigers- go get him. Mize is Miserable. So is Flaherty. He’s also a lefty.
Don’t do it Tigers.
The Tigers have won Mize’s last 5 starts and 8 of his last 10. Most starters should be so “miserable”…
No no. Wrong. None of that matters come playoffs. I’ve watched his past 3 starts. Have you? The guy is afraid to throw in the zone. He cannot put guys away with two strikes. If he was a ground/fly guy specifically, cool. We got the defense for that, but he’s neither.
Heaney’s five earned runs last night cost owner Bob Nutting $10K per run because of the innings bonus in Heaney’s contract. He’s laughing all the way to the bank.
Yep, people have no idea what they want. Besides, every veteran starter signs deals with incentives yet they only bring it up for the pirates. Why is no one shedding tears for Marcus Stroman??
Heaney was solid for a stretch, sure, I guess they got their moneys worth from him.
No one is shedding any tears for Stroman because he missed so much time from injury, it was virtually impossible to get enough innings for his option to vest. And he sucked.
“Completely agrees with hott” You obviously would. No reason to confirm this.
Look at his plummeting K rate. In 2023 and 2024 he was striking out almost a guy an inning. This year, it’s down to 6.3/9 IP. In July and August,, he’s down to 4.3 K’s/9. vs. 6.9 K/9 April-June. Something’s clearly wrong besides run prevention so might as well move on.
Heaney had a very good April but was downhill the rest of the season
I was just checking Heaney’s stats for this season and he was hugely better at PNC Park than everywhere else. At home, even when he regressed, he had an OPS against at just over 700. On the road?? Around 940!!
Did no one want him at the deadline? The only reason they signed him to a one year was to dump him at the deadline
There was an article on this site that the Yankees were interested before the deadline. Could have been nothing to it, could have been the Yankees wanted the Pirates to pay the remainder of his deal and they didn’t want to.
What scares me is with Buehler demoted to the bullpen and Fitts leaving last nights game with “right bicep tightness” that Breslow doesn’t come calling
The start of the drastic drop in Heaney’s effectiveness in the middle of June corresponded to Chandler’s in AAA.
Then was the time to trade Heaney and bring up Bubba.
At that point the Pirates knew that it was a wasted season as far as competing was concerned.
Pirate fans actually knew that it was a wasted season when they brought back Shelton.
I knew 6 years ago that under Cherington, his tenure as GM would result in a waste of time
Will find out if he gets claimed. He’s just as good now as he was a month ago. Don’t even need a prospect to get him now.
Yankees or other teams may have called just to have something ready to go if they can’t get anyone else. Obviously no one as weak as Heaney was traded so need to break glass in case of emergency.
Pham though is a different story. Surprised no one wanted him. If dfa that may be different story. Cherington might not give him up though.
They may have already floated Pham with no interest.
I think that his reputation precedes him.
I doubt that any contender wants Heaney now but he might get a minor league contract for the rest of the 2025 season.
He also may have to settle for one next year also.
This guy was actually a pretty good starter for the first 2-2 1/2 months.
May 4.74 era. 4.7 k. 1.703 whip.
June era 5.57
July era 9
August era 10
You don’t even want to see the win percentage!
Sorry having trouble finding the additional month and half.
His era mid June was like 3.50 so he still would show a different result than later when it really cratered.
But we all know that era is not important.
Thats why I also include the awful k rate whip and opponents hit for a 800 something ops against him in May
what’s the over/under on how many times Cruz struck out in tonight game?
3.5 I think that he is hitting 103 against lefthanders.
Tonight’s starter for the Cards throws right
Given Canario only missed catching that walkoff HR by inches, I had to wonder if Cruz might’ve caught the thing.
Which is not to suggest the Pirates would’ve found a way to win in extras.
His short stay in AAA was nothing worth talking about. As a matter of fact, the nineteen year old high school kid, just moved up from A ball had a better series. Just sayin.
Not a hot take-If you were being serious the two things that you said are mutually exclusive.
You seem to agree that he did not deserve bonus money.
But Moreta is a much better pitcher and deserves to pitch in the ML’s.
And he is young if not a kid.
And the Pirates will actually be better for it.
The only reasons that they kept Heaney are because he is left handed and they would leave almost $1M on the table.
But he was terrible enough for even Bob Nutting’s taste.
Good catch on Moreta.
He has pitched pretty well when healthy for the Pirates.
They cannot continue to give up depth players though in case some of these other young pitchers get hurt.
The Pirates are fat dumb and happy with the good young pitchers but I remember just last year and the year before when the Bidos and Hellers and Woodfords were among many other AAAA pitchers to be brought up near the end of the year because of injuries.
Cheapskate Bob Nutting would rather pay Heaney a $50k bonus than a minor leaguer league minimum!
Should have dfa’d him a game before to save 50k if I’m reading his incentives in his contract right .
They were hoping that they could save $932,000 thinking that he could be the left handed reliever.
people who work every day didn’t contribute to the Rangers winning a World Series championship
This is different than Tellez. Heaney doesn’t GAF . If you watch him pitch he’s not pitching he’s throwing the ball to eat innings. Pirates have enough guys who want to pitch to not keep running this guy out there.
I think the Yankees interest in Heaney was if Pittsburgh was willing to include IKF. That didn’t happen, so Yankees moved on to Rosario.
I would have done that deal just to get IKF to a good team to give him a chance.
He always hustles and is a good team player.
They could have received the three young players that they received for Bednar and been happy.
No one wanted IKF either. And why would a playoff team want either. They aren’t good players this year.
Dumping veteran salary for prospects is what the Pirates do. If anyone wanted these guys they would been gone.
Oviedo was pitching well last night, Bucs up 4-1 after 4. He was at 50 pitches. Then they take him out and put Heaney in and hey presto it’s 6-4 Cards. Suspect they sacrificed this game to get Heaney to his incentive innings total so they could dfa him and not be accused of another Tellez situation. Not that wins mean anything to them at this point but hate to see them just throw one away.
Bizarre management decision with a guy dealing and only 50 pitches in the 5th.
Oviedo is 19 months from TJ surgery and another 5 months from a Lat injury.
Throwing under 65 pitches makes sense
19 months is a long recovery period. Does he even get tendered?? At a certain point just gotta let the man pitch.
He will get tendered.
One thing about being out for 1 1/2 years is his salary will not go up much.
A day late and a dollar short. $50k to be exact.
Not a single person has complained yet. People who did about Tellez are just very casual fans
Fans here are much smarter than ones on Facebook and trib posts acting like what they did to Rowdy was the crime of the century.
I swear this sums up the Pirates perfectly. Veteran pitcher on a cheap expiring contract, pitching well for a garbage team that was never going anywhere from day 1. Guy easily could have been traded around 80-90 innings, and they might have got a somewhat useful piece. Nothing crazy, but maybe a wild card with some upside. Instead, they hang on to him, he starts fading and loses his rotation spot, the team continues to be garbage, and now they DFA him and get nothing. Tell me again how Ben Cherington is qualified to be a GM. Starts with Nutbag the owner, but Cherington doesn’t help anything. As a Cubs fan, I like it because it’s one less team to deal with in the Central. As a baseball fan it sucks though, because watching them have the best pitcher in baseball (okay second because Skubal is ridiculous), but then doing nothing because they literally no talent, is pretty bad. Skenes is easy to root for, but you know they are awful behind him. They only have 2 position players with a WAR above 1, is Cruz (1.8), and Gonzales (1.2). Horrible. Okay, rant over. The Pirates are awful, carry on.
If another team picks him up after he’s released, can he still earn his bonus that kicks in at 130 innings? I assume the signing team would be responsible for that, not the Pirates?
Hell, there are still people taking Nutting to task for going to arb vs Garrett Jones over $200K when Jones was still actually decent (or at least bringing female fans to the park).
If another team picks up his contract via claim then yes it would still apply.
It is amazing that Heaney has pitched in the league for 12 years, has a 4.55 career ERA and is 20 plus games below .500. I know someone will jump all over the career record statement and note that he played on bad teams blah blah but his ERA supports my point that he stinks, has always stunk and is lucky to to have pitched 12 years in the majors and made serious money and will get a great pension one day. Cheers to him.
And he amassed $55 million in salary as well as played on a World Series winning team.
This story seems sketchy.
Pirates knew they were going nowhere. When Heaney was pitching well, why wasn’t he then traded? When you’re going nowhere, you take advantage of 1 year contracts and trade them for futures, not hold onto them until flame out time.
Especially when you have a very highly touted minor league player who is pitching well to take his place.
How close was he to highest ERA by a qualified pitcher in the modern era? Might have been his only chance to make the record books.
Now they need to DFA Z NUTTING and CHERRINGTON
Now
Now they need to DFA Kelly and Cherrington
Like two left handed stiffs they signed last off season , this was predictable from the start
But I take solace in knowing the front office brain trust is likely scouring the bargain bins as we speak for another “A+” signing in a couple months. Maybe Rich Hill will come back
Martin Perez isn’t one of those stiffs is he? With a 3.46 era with the Padres? Or 2.02 era with white Sox this year? Or is he like Priester Holmes Morton Mr Glass only a stiff in a Pirates uniform?
Perez was signed the year before and had a 5.46 era with the Pirates even though his first few starts were very good.
He was a stiff with Pirates.
Morton was a good pitcher with the Pirates but was being paid too much to always be hurt.
The other three were stiffs with the Pirates who responded well with the next team who also got them after they had matured as pitchers.
He’ll go to Milwaukee and they’ll somehow turn him into an amazing bullpen arm.
The somehow is know how for me. Milwaukee got rid of his 4 seam that batters hit at .409 average. Replaced his worst pitch with much better ones.
That is what you have said before but if it was that simple why did the two other teams not do it?That is such a simple stat that even old timers would pick up on it.
My guess is that he could not get his breaking balls over and had to throw the predictable fastball when he got behind in the count.
For some reason either the Brewers taught him how to control them or he worked on his breaking ball control as a more mature pitcher.
Your guess would be wrong. Control was never his problem. 2023 he threw 4 seam 19 percent of time and batting average against it was .386 2024 14 percent and the now infamous giddy up giddy up .409
2025 with Brewers opponents are hitting his 4 seam at a 000 average because he no longer throws the pitch.
You can see why I wanted Cherington fired. That and the Yorke trade. Red Sox are pretty clueless as well. Signed Buehler Giolito. Had to trade for Crochet. Wanted to trade for Jones Keller. Yet gave away Sale. But their Priester trade looks like the Hershel Walker trade compared to pirates. Knowing what I know about 4 seam I still make that trade.
Yeah you would think it would be simple easy to see and it took me 47 seconds to discover it. Yet you won’t find anyone other than me mention it. And there are numerous people in media that come here and steal my material. I even just looked nothing.
Mlb.com reporter asked both the Brewers manager and Priester whats the difference? They answered some small mechanical changes but the biggest thing is confidence. I know I have good defense behind me blah blah blah. So even they think it’s some big secret thing that they know and other teams don’t. I agree with them. Not a single team claimed Hill. When I keep bringing up Hill it’s not to brag myself up. It’s just an insane example of how awful baseball people are these days.
Everyone thinks baseball is run on analytics. No it is ruined by analytics. As in their analytics departments are awful. Almost completely useless to useless. If someone signed up for my analytics 101 after the very 1st hour 1st lesson they could have found Hill and Priester. It’s kindergarten analytics. Is it even analytics? I guess I analyzed a piece of data. They have a .409 batting average against this pitch. My analytics super computer suggest maybe not using this pitch?
So the Pirates used 4 seam 13.6 percent of time and sinker 30 percent. Brewers use sinker 43 percent of time and he has never thrown a 4 seam. His sinker has a 57 percent ground ball rate. Hard to have a high era hitting so many ground balls.
Tim Hill is even better. I made fun of era and say it’s useless but Hill made me believe that mlb teams use it. He had a near 6 era with a 63 percent ground ball rate giving up some of the lowest exit velocities in baseball. How weak was the hitters contact? In 27 games he didn’t give up a single hr! To have a era that high pitching like that is like winning the Powerball and getting struck by lighting 3 times on your way to cash it! White sox released him and no one claimed him. Yankees signed him and he has shown what he really is ever since.
Question-I presume that they can tell where each type of pitch thrown in a ML game over say the last five years by each pitcher is or would have been a ball or strike,and even what quadrant in the strike zone it was located.
Is that a correct presumption?
Andrew Heaney had a record of 3-8 with an ERA of 6.07 and 47 strikeouts in 16 appearances between April 24, 2025 and July 31, 2025
Why didn’t Cherington trade him!!!!!!!!!
He should have traded him at his peak in mid June and brought up Bubba.
Peak was April 23. Teams don’t trade starting pitchers on April 23 or may or june. Priester was traded but 1 look at what it took 2 he was in minors. No one wanted Heaney why he was signed by Pirates. Pirates get the free agents others don’t want. Would 1 month change their opinion vs his entire career? After April 23 he was toast.
His era was still good at like 3.50 in the middle of June.
Yes,it peaked clearly earlier,and yes,much too soon to trade him.
He did not start to get really bad though against the Tigers then when he had two straight games with 7 runs given up which begs the question why he was not taken out earlier in those games.
After the middle of June he was toast but a trade then before the drastic drop off even though he was digressing may have been possible with a team needing pitching because by that time some of them would have.
To this day I cannot believe how much money Andrew Heaney has been paid for his actual performances.
To me, out of all the pitchers in baseball, Heaney is the prime, singular piece of evidence to prove that pitching is over valued at an insane premium.
To me he’s been borderline DFA/borderline Quadruple-A, stress inducing when playing for your team, etc. and yet he’s averaged $11.3875M per season to be atrocious.
It seems to me that this has been happening over the last 5-10 years when teams will pay good salaries just to get innings.
I think that is because of all of the pitching injuries.