Pirates DFA Pitcher To Avoid Paying Bonuses (& Because He's Really Bad)

Let's be honest, left-hander Andrew Heaney has not been good of late. In fact, he has an 8.87 ERA in his last seven starts, and a 10.13 ERA in the past month. But he's also within reach of accumulating several bonuses based on innings pitched, which the Pittsburgh Pirates have no intention whatsoever of paying. So they've designated Heaney for assignment on Tuesday.

Andrew Heaney designated for assignment by the Pirates.
— Underdog MLB (@UnderdogMLB) August 26, 2025

The Pirates did allow Heaney to get the two outs he needed Monday night to reach his first bonus of 120 innings pitched, for $50,000 extra. But he gave up five earned runs in doing it. He would have earned $100K bonus at 130 innings pitched, but the Pirates not only didn't want to pay him that money, they probably didn't want to watch him pitch another 10 ugly innings—even for free.

He was demoted to the bullpen last week, which many saw as a means of holding him back from acquiring those bonuses, but his latest appearance certainly gave the Bucs license to dump him for performance-based reasons.

Certainly, Pirates fans, even though they're not happy with the team's cost-cutting ways, completely understand the Heaney DFA:

Andrew Heaney got enough outs for his $50K innings bonus now but man is he awful! He has been straight up awful for a couple months now and truthfully should be DFA’d tonight. #Pirates
— PGHSportsFan (@Based412) August 26, 2025

The lefty was signed this season to a one-year, $5.25 million contract, with the Bucs hoping he'd be a decent trade deadline piece at least. It started out pretty well, as he had a 2.50 ERA through his first six starts in March/April. But it was all downhill from there:

May: 4.74 ERA
June: 5.57 ERA
July: 9.00 ERA
August: 10.13 ERA

It got so bad that there wasn't a team around the majors that had any interest in giving up any type of prospect, even a lowly one, for Heaney at the trade deadline.

He has a 5.39 ERA on the season overall, with a 1.36 WHIP. The 34-year-old was coming off three decent years, however, with ERAs of 3.10, 4.15 and 4.28 in 2022, '23 and '24.

It's doubtful that any team will look to pick him up the rest of this season, but perhaps he'll scratch out a minor league deal next year.