Pirates likely to non-tender Zach Duke this offseason

Once upon a time Zach Duke went 8-2 with a 1.81 ERA as a 22-year-old rookie, but in the five seasons since then he’s 36-66 with a 4.74 ERA while allowing the highest opponents’ batting average of any pitcher with at least 120 starts. And now it looks like his Pirates career is coming to a close. Duke failed to make it out of the second inning against the Braves yesterday, falling to 7-13 with a 5.47 ERA, and Dejan Kovacevic of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writes that “indications are powerful” the Pirates will non-tender the 27-year-old southpaw rather than risk having to give him a raise on this season’s $4.3 million salary via arbitration. John Russell removed Duke from the game without saying a word to him in the second inning and afterward the manager told reporters, simply: “He didn’t have much. Not much else you can say.”