The Pirates have placed three players on waivers. One of them is outfielder Ji Hwan Bae, per Danny Demilio of Pittsburgh Baseball Now. The other two are infielder Liover Peguero and right-hander Jack Little, per Colin Beazley of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
At one point, the now-26-year-old Bae was a high-profile international signing who ranked among the organization’s better farmhands. He’s appeared in parts of four big league seasons but has never found his stride. The South Korea native carries a meek .223/.294/.293 line in 514 trips to the plate at the MLB level. He’s a good runner, swiping 37 bags in 49 tries (75.6%) and sitting in the 82nd percentile of MLB players in terms of average sprint speed, but Bae has fanned in more than one-quarter of his plate appearances and sits well below average in terms of exit velocity, hard-hit rate and other batted-ball metrics.
Originally a middle infielder, Bae never developed into a passable option at shortstop due in large part to subpar arm strength. The Bucs have given him plenty of run at second base and in center field — more the latter in recent seasons — but he hasn’t drawn quality grades at either position. He’s continually posted strong numbers in Triple-A (.305/.389/.451 in 1109 plate appearances) and has a minor league option remaining.
Peguero was an even more highly touted prospect than Bae. Originally acquired from the D-backs in exchange for Starling Marte, he’s a former top-100 prospect whom the organization at one point viewed as a possible shortstop of the future. In an all-too-common refrain for Pirates position prospects, however, his bat never came around. Peguero has seen action in four big league seasons but has mustered only a .227/.278/.368 slash line in 315 turns at the plate.
Unlike Bae, Peguero has also looked overmatched at the top minor league level. Outside of a late-2023 cameo in Triple-A where he smacked a pair of homers in 30 promising plate appearances, Peguero has produced well below-average numbers with the Pirates’ top affiliate in Indianapolis. He’s a .253/.317/.403 hitter in 888 plate appearances there, including a career-worst .247/.313/.375 showing in 75 games with Indy this season. Baseball America and other outlets have lauded his quality defensive tools but also noted a penchant for slipping into poor mechanical stretches that lead to far too many throwing errors. Peguero is out of minor league options.
The 27-year-old Little came to the Pirates via waivers in August. He made his MLB debut with the Dodgers in 2025. Los Angeles selected Little out of Stanford with its fifth-round pick back in 2019. He’s pitched only three MLB innings and posted a 4.06 ERA with a 20.2% strikeout rate and 8.4% walk rate in 62 relief innings between the two organizations’ Triple-A affiliates in 2025.
Little sits 94 mph with his four-seamer and complements the pitch with a slider and splitter — both in the mid-80s. He’s never been a top-ranked prospect in L.A.’s system but does have a pair of minor league options remaining and decent track record in the minors.
Did Jack Suwinski change his last name?
no he did not.
Jack is arbitration eligible for the first time in his career this winter
He’s not worth keeping let alone paying him more
Little seems like a decent guy to keep on the 40 man.
not really unexpected but Liover does have some power. even with no improvement could be at 20+hr guy. Can’t really afford to wait and find out though.
Fully expecting Liover to get claimed and then breakout in two years
Suwinski needs to be added to that list plus a few more.
I know with the Pirates luck, someone will teach Bae how to bunt for basehits but I am so glad to be rid of this dude. So much athletic ability and so little baseball IQ. Peggy seems like a good clubhouse guy but like Bae he was given so many chances and failed to deliver. Goes without saying but as BC’s first major trade (Marte) shows, he sucks at this important part of his job.
You’re not going to see me defending many of Cherington’s trades anymore, but tbf, the other part of the Marte trade, Brennan Malone, was a pretty highly touted first round pick just a few months before. Shame he’s had so many injuries, but Peguero being a bust sucks. Bae at this point is only really good for pinch running and depth. I don’t see him attemping to bunt more freqently will help him out.
That trade WAS good when it was first made.
I thought it was decent at the time too. Malone was a very talented recent draft pick, and Peguero was quickly making top 100 prospect lists.
I can’t really blame them for Malone, because of his countless injuries. But I can blame them for not developing Peguero, or at least not getting someone better than him. I remember at the time wanting Geraldo Perdomo.
I thought getting two top 100s out of it was really solid. Just a poor development on the hitting side yet again.
BC has done incredible with pitchers but awful with hitting.
I can’t even give Cherington full credit for the Pirates’ pitching. Many of their pitchers have done most of their development under Cherington, but many were Huntington acquisitions. Keller, Burrows, Ashcraft, all drafted by Huntington. Though I will give him credit for finding guys like Santana, Mattson, Moreta, Lawrence, drafting Jones, Mlodzinski, and making the right call in 2023 with Skenes. People might try and play revisionist history with Skenes, but he was absolutley not the consensus number one pick at the time.
Skenes, Jones, Mlodzinski, Chandler, and Barco. That is a great haul I think. Barco still has much to prove but I think he will be a real asset at the back end of the rotation. Hernandez I think will end up showing up early too in the minors.
I very much wanted Crews over Skenes and I am happy to be dead wrong on that note.
I loved the Konnor pick too, but without a winning season this year I don’t think Cherington gets to see him play in the majors for this team.
I was also on the Crews train, but happy I was proven wrong as well. I’m just worried now that Horowitz left the organization, how good they’ll draft, because he’s a massive reason why they landed Griffin and Hernandez the last two years.
I think that Griffin may come up this coming year.
He will get maybe 2-3 weeks in AA and if he is still hitting extremely well will move to AAA.
If he does the same there he will come up after the AS break at the latest to the Pirates.
They will want to have an idea as to how he does before the inevitable shutdown in 2027.
I may not have followed as close as you did but the only reason to consider Crews was if you needed the outfielder way way more than the pitcher.
Skenes is one of the most mature young players who I have ever seen,an old soul in a young body.
That in itself was a reason to draft him number one,
I do not know how you can say that about Horowitz.He seems like a fine employee who does his job well but Cherington must be given credit where it is due and he had the final say on draft choices.
I think that Cherington has done fairly well in this regard over the six years.
He just cannot develop hitters.
Cherington should be given much of the credit for pitcher development.The pitchers drafted by Huntington were very young and have been brought along under Cherington.
It is easy to criticize Cherington for his many shortcomings but only fair to give him credit where it is due.
Cherington may have the final say, but Horowitz was the head of amature scouting and was the driving force behind the Pirates taking Griffin and Hernandez. I still can’t give him full credit for all the pitching though. Yeah, he’s done well with what he has, but the man who gave him some of his most valuable pitchers was the previous GM.
I do not know how one could say that he was the driving force.These two players were very highly rated and to some extent fell into the Pirates laps almost as much as Skenes did.
They both could have easily been drafted several picks before the Pirates picked.
I think that the Pirates under Cherington have drafted well.Everyone talks bad about Henry Davis but his lowball bonus offer not only got them a good catching prospect but also Bubba Chandler.That was several years before Horowitz got here.
I am not particularly a Cherington fan but his drafting has been much better than Huntington’s.
His trading and hitting development are another story altogether.
Come to think of it what Nutting should do is hire Huntington back as a co GM and each one could do what they do best.
Jack Little pitched decently in AAA last year and I am surprised that they did not waive the other guy with two last names who was hammered in AAA.
Bae and Peguero just ran out of time.Maybe another team can get something out of them.
Cherington stinks as a trader and it has hurt the Pirates immensely.
Cherington has thought that he can teach these very young players how to play but the proof is in the pudding that he cannot.
Jones and Darnell will come off the 60 day IL and Darrell-Hicks and Ramirez will be waived.
They will waive Simon and Valdez when they come off the 60 day IL.
Chang should be gone and Delaney will be gone when Endy comes off the 60 day IL.
Holderman will not be retained.
Those changes puts the roster at 33 which leaves room for Rule 5 callups and trades and free agents.
Will Robertson, Jack Suwinski, Evan Sisk, and Chase Shugart are all borderline DFA/waiver candidates as well.
the problem with Endy, injuries seem to find him more often than not
Paul- To my mind Endy is a full time minor leaguer all of this coming year mostly at catcher to see what he really has.
If he cannot cut it there they will need to trade him.
The theme here is lack of player development, failure to inspire a winning culture and psychology in all but a few of the players, and a lack of appreciation for the hard to define (let alone hard to create) chemistry that make great teams great. I don’t know if they are employing a Sports Psychologist, but they should. And maybe their recent player development moves will help. Finally, maybe they should hire a systems engineer with some love of baseball to take a 10,000 foot view of the entire system to try to improve things. Wait….I am so sorry, that would take money.
so would hiring a Sports Psychologist
Suwinski will stay if they are able to trade Cruz.
Sisk is mediocre but one of two lefthanders so they may keep him.
Robertson will stay for his power potential.
I think that Shugart is another Hunter Stratton who pitched well for the Pirates before his 2024 serious injury and very well for the Braves in 2025.
But that means that Cherington will consider to get rid of him.
These guys provide very good depth even if they do not throw 100 mph.
I find it hilarious if the Pirates are considering signing Andujar which is another of Cherington’s boneheaded decisions.
With my projections it should give them plenty of openings to make any improvements to the roster.I had thought that they would keep all three of the players waived.
I don’t see them trading Cruz unless they’re really impressed by an offer. There’s no reason to trade him when he was solid in 2024 and has potential for a lot more. Robertson had a 28.6% whiff rate at Triple-A. I honestly think that he could be out the door before even Suwinski. The difference between Shugart and Stratton was that Stratton actually had some decent numbers backing him: didn’t get hit hard, low HR/9, low BB%, good stuff. Shugart didn’t get K’s, didn’t limit walks or home runs, and had a .214 batting average on balls in play. I think Sisk is the least likely to go though. He had a few bad games with the Pirates, but wasn’t outright awful. I think he has a lot more potential than anyone like Shugart, Little, Darrell-Hicks, and Sanders.
Liover could be a solid pickup obviously the pirates are a death camp for hitting talent was a decent prospect has okay numbers at triple just hasn’t shown it in the bigs but then again who has in Pittsburgh
Triple A*
Cruz was so solid in 2025, he struck out almost twice as many times as he had hits
The 2025 version is the real one, 2024 was his career year
Yeah, it’s not that I’m heartbroken they’ve waived either kid but at this point, they could literally waive most of the roster and you’d see no difference
Mendoza mentions them trying to perhaps trade Cruz. Nice thought. I’d wonder if they’d get anything approaching immediate help for him. And if it means more of Suwinski out there, well, the strikeouts would be similar but at least the guy is a better fielder and won’t dog it
It’s funny to me. They waive Peguero and Bae while there is nothing else on the horizon.
Griffin, and the kid who was the homer leader in the Arizona fall league—might as well bring them up now
I highly disagree. 2024 is what I think his career norm will be. 2025 was his floor. Also, I said he was solid in 2024, not 2025. 2025 was definitley bad, no denying that. But I really think he can be a .250-.260 hitter with an OPS+ around 115-120 and 20/20 season.
Cruz strikes out so much that he needs to hit at least 35 home runs a year to justify playing him.
He really is a DH against right handed pitchers only.
Last I saw he was hitting 103 against lefthanders.
There is also much negative about him that cannot be measured by statistics.
I agree that he should not be this bad.
I do not think that he wants to play in Pittsburgh and it affects him adversely.
That was one of Hayes’ problems.
Trading Cruz now when he is at the nadir could be stupid,but he is still young and cheap so I would have no problem doing it for the right players.
So far cherrington has cleaned out his mistakes. Either by trade or dumpster diving signings. This story is getting old. It’s like the movie Ground Hog Day. He just keeps doing the same crap every year. Then you have Scrooge McNutting, who opens his wallet,dust comes out and he counts his money. And the cries about attendance and lowers the payroll. In all honesty I would have kept Pegeuro and given him one last shot. Could of been A Shot In The Dark.
Cruz will be 27 next season, if he hasn’t improved his offense by now, it’s hard to believe he will in the future
And I know that you referred to his 2024 season, I was making a comparison to how horrible he was in contrast
Btc-I agree about Peguero,and also the other two guys deserve another chance,only inasmuch as there are so many others who should have gone before them.
I said it a couple of years ago after I watched Peguero at an AA game stand at the plate and stare at a long fly ball that didn’t make it out only to be thrown out at second base. He has no hustle, no attitude, no game. Good luck, but if he doesn’t get hungry, he will never see the majors again.
no hustle, no attitude no game defines many of the players on the current roster
I watched Peguero play against the Phillies two years ago and he seemed lackadaisical.
He does have some talent,but so does Cruz.
The years go by quickly.They better figure it out soon.
I truly believe that the lackadaisical attitude of some of these players are a result of a lackluster approach by management
It started with Shelton and hasn’t changed much since under Kelly
Disciplining players when they deserve it is necessary to change the attitude of the club entire team
Man3 ..Just my point about Kelly. Hes just a clone of Shelton. It’s seems that both were afraid to discipline players. Keeping Kelly and cherrington just shows how much nutting cares about the pirates. He cares nothing. He cares about the money he makes with the lowest payroll. Then complains about attendance. Hes your typical owner who uses the excuse of a small market to keep a low payroll. Of course this is unfortunately the new era of sports owners.
I read that the Astros are interested in hiring Andy Haines as their hitting coach
They must want to finish in the lower tiers of every offensive category in 2026