Rosternomics
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Pirates PIT

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GM: Neal Huntington (since 2008)

2017 roster — every player, value & surplus

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-3.2
WAB — wins above budget
-3.6
TAB — roster Talent above budget
75–87 (0.463)
record
-7M
surplus $M (value/$)
27.1
roster fWAR
$97.9M
payroll
PlayerAgeServiceGfWARSalary $MSurplus $M
Andrew McCutchen 30 FA-elig 156 3.6 14.0 -1.8
Gerrit Cole 26 arb 34 3.6 3.8 +8.2
Jameson Taillon 25 pre-arb 25 3.1 0.6 +9.9
Josh Harrison 29 FA-elig 128 2.8 7.8 +1.5
Felipe Vázquez 25 pre-arb 73 2.3 0.6 +7.1
Trevor Williams 25 pre-arb 31 2.2 0.5 +7.0
Chad Kuhl 24 pre-arb 33 2.1 0.6 +6.4
Jordy Mercer 30 arb 145 1.9 4.3 +2.2
David Freese 34 FA-elig 130 1.8 6.2 -0.1
Iván Nova 30 FA-elig 31 1.6 7.7 -2.3
Juan Nicasio↔ PHI 30 FA-elig 65 1.3 3.1 +1.2
Starling Marte 28 arb 77 1.2 5.3 -1.4
Josh Bell 24 pre-arb 159 0.9 0.5 +2.3
Adam Frazier 25 pre-arb 121 0.7 0.5 +2.0
Steven Brault 25 pre-arb 12 0.4 0.1 +1.2
Francisco Cervelli 31 FA-elig 81 0.4 9.0 -7.7
George Kontos↔ SFG 32 FA-elig 15 0.4 0.4 +0.8
Max Moroff 24 pre-arb 56 0.3 0.3 +0.6
John Jaso 33 FA-elig 126 0.3 4.0 -3.0
Wade LeBlanc 32 FA-elig 50 0.2 0.8 -0.0
Josh Lindblom 30 – 4 0.2 0.1 +0.6
A.J. Schugel 28 pre-arb 32 0.2 0.3 +0.4
Daniel Hudson 30 FA-elig 71 0.2 5.5 -4.9
Jacob Stallings 27 pre-arb 5 0.2 0.1 +0.5
Christopher Bostick 24 – 20 0.2 – –
Jack Leathersich↔ CHC 26 pre-arb 6 0.1 0.1 +0.4
Gregory Polanco 25 arb 108 0.1 1.6 -1.2
Gift Ngoepe 27 pre-arb 28 0.1 0.1 +0.1
Jhan Mariñez↔ MIL 28 FA-elig 24 0.0 0.3 -0.2
Edgar Santana 25 – 19 0.0 0.1 -0.1
Tony Watson↔ LAD 32 FA-elig 47 0.0 3.7 -3.7
John Bormann 24 – 1 -0.0 0.0 -0.1
Tyler Glasnow 23 pre-arb 18 -0.0 0.5 -0.7
Dovydas Neverauskas 24 – 24 -0.1 0.1 -0.4
Dan Runzler 32 pre-arb 8 -0.2 0.1 -0.6
Alen Hanson↔ CHW 24 pre-arb 37 -0.2 0.2 -0.9
Danny Ortiz 27 – 9 -0.2 0.0 -0.8
Johnny Barbato 24 pre-arb 24 -0.2 0.2 -1.0
Sean Rodríguez↔ ATL 32 FA-elig 39 -0.2 4.2 -5.0
Angel Sánchez 27 – 8 -0.3 0.1 -1.0
Jordan Luplow 23 – 27 -0.3 0.1 -1.0
José Osuna 24 – 104 -0.3 0.5 -1.5
Joaquín Benoit↔ PHI 39 FA-elig 8 -0.4 1.2 -2.4
Antonio Bastardo 31 FA-elig 9 -0.5 6.6 -8.3
Phil Gosselin↔ TEX 28 arb 28 -0.6 0.4 -2.3
Chris Stewart 35 FA-elig 51 -0.6 1.4 -3.3
Elias Díaz 26 pre-arb 64 -1.1 0.3 -3.8

47 players appeared (WAR is complete); salary & surplus are on record for 46 of them (98%). Players without a salary show "–" — no single historical salary source is fully complete (especially 2020–2022).

WAR = FanGraphs (fWAR). Green = produced more value than paid (bargain); red = paid more than produced. Service: pre-arb (<3 yr) / arb (3–6) / FA-eligible (6+). Click headers to sort.

History: front-office performance & develop-vs-buy (1985–2024)

Trade ledger (realized WAR, all-time)

Best acquisitions
PlayerYearWAR for PIT
Andy Van Slyke198731.1
Brian Giles199825.4
Doug Drabek198621.4
Bobby Bonilla198620.6
Bryan Reynolds201820.0
Mike LaValliere198712.9
Josh Harrison200911.9
Jack Wilson200011.0
Ones that got away
PlayerYear tradedWAR elsewhere
Aramis Ramírez200325.0
Jason Schmidt200123.6
Brian Giles200317.1
Willie Randolph197514.7
Moisés Alou199013.8
John Tudor198412.0
Randy Milligan198811.9
Bip Roberts198511.1
Rosternomics — quantifying front-office skill, attribution-clean. Follow @rosternomics on X. Decision-makers on record back to 1933; resource-controlled metrics (WAR & payroll) cover 1985–2026.
Data: FanGraphs (WAR), Baseball-Reference & the Chadwick Bureau register (rosters, IDs), the Lahman Database, Baseball America prospect rankings (via The Baseball Cube), and public payroll records. Transaction and trade data was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Executive birth/death data via Wikidata (CC0); bios are original. Emoji graphics by OpenMoji (CC BY-SA 4.0).
All figures are franchise-level outcomes credited to the decision-maker in the acquisition year — not solely attributable to one executive.