Discussions about a pitcher’s workload begin during spring training, ranging from ramping up for the year, the regular season and even potentially in a fall league or winter ball.
After most of the Pirates' pitchers did not appear in a competitive game in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, those discussions and plans were going to have to be fluid to try to avoid pitcher injuries.
“We laid out a plan, keeping it in perspective that they had missed an entire season,” pitching coordinator Josh Hopper told me recently. “Workload wise, they didn’t have the foundation that they normally had.