This doesn’t directly affect the Pirates, but the Braves have traded for Ryan Dempster this afternoon, which both sets the price for rent-a-starters at this deadline and removes him from the market as a potential target for the Pirates, if you happen to think that the Pirates would be interested in a starter this summer. It’s not quite clear what’s going back to the Cubs in this deal, but Keith Law says that Randall Delgado will be going to Chicago. Delgado is a 22-year old that’s spent some time in the Braves’ rotation this year and showed quite a bit of potential after entering 2012 as Baseball America’s #46 prospect.
Peripherally, this deal is at least worth noting for the Pirates. The Bucs have the Cubs on the schedule nine more times in 2012 and were scheduled to see Dempster on Wednesday of this current three-game set. Seeing Delgado instead of Dempster two or three times could be a nice swap for the Pirates. Of course, the Pirates do play the Braves three times at PNC Park to close out 2012 if the season ended tomorrow, the Pirates and Braves would be the National League’s two wild cards, which would mean a one-game playoff at PNC Park. Which means that what the Braves do is worth monitoring, so long as the Pirates are competing with them for a playoff spot.
UPDATE: It appears that while the Cubs and Braves have agreed to a deal, Dempster, as a 10/5 guy, has to sign off on it and he hasn’t done so yet. That could mean any number of things, so I suppose for now the only thing we can do is sit back and wait and see what happens.
