Free-agent left-handed beginning pitcher Andrew Heaney has agreed to a one-year deal value $5 million with the Pittsburgh Pirates, in accordance with ESPN’s Alden González.

Heaney, 33, was 5-14 with a 4.28 ERA (92 ERA+), 1.25 WHIP and 158 strikeouts in opposition to 40 unintentional walks in 160 innings final season for the Rangers, a season value 0.8 WAR. He confirmed extra worth in 2023 as a swingman, beginning 28 video games and coming in reduction six occasions. He additionally made three begins and got here on in reduction 3 times within the playoffs whereas the Rangers received the World Sequence. He had a 3.86 ERA that postseason, together with a 1.59 within the World Sequence in his 5 ⅔ innings of labor.

CBS Sports activities ranked Heaney because the thirty second finest free agent obtainable this winter, writing the next:

Heaney is now a number of seasons faraway from his slider-inspired revival with the Dodgers. He hasn’t reached these heights since, however he is been a wonderfully cromulent starter who spams the opposition with a three-pitch combine (fastballs, sliders, and changeups). Heaney wants a selected surroundings to thrive: he permits numerous fly balls and is weak to exhausting contact, however groups in spacious ballparks may see him as a short-term match close to the again of their rotation. 

Heaney figures to fit right into a rotation that additionally consists of Paul Skenes, Jared Jones, and Mitch Keller.

Heaney was having his finest season in 2022, when he had a 3.10 ERA and struck out 110 in opposition to 19 walks in 72 ⅔ innings for the Dodgers, but it surely was lower quick attributable to a shoulder harm. Nonetheless, that partial season supplied a glimpse into Heaney’s upside and he is averted harm since. The truth that he is a lefty can be a promoting level.

In his profession, components of 11 seasons, Heaney is 51-62 with a 4.45 ERA and 1,070 strikeouts in 1,014 ⅓ innings.