Apparently the Pirates have traded minor league utilityman Andy Phillips to the White Sox for Michael Dubee, a starting pitcher who played pretty well as a 22-year-old at Class A+ last year and might actually qualify as a marginal prospect. This could probably be described as a very minor miracle; Dubee won't be mistaken for David Price anytime soon, but I'm not sure why the White Sox would give up anything at all of value for Andy Phillips.

Dubee, the son of Phillies pitching coach Rich Dubee, was drafted by the Phils in 2006 but was traded to Chicago for Tadahito Iguchi in 2007. The White Sox' decision to send Dubee back to Class A+ this year indicates that they don't think much of him, but his numbers are good so far, with a solid strikeout rates in levels he wasn't ridiculously old for. I can't find much current information about his stuff, so it's probably safe to assume he doesn't have a blazing fastball. Still, he probably immediately ranks somewhere near the Pirates' top five starting pitching prospects, which doesn't mean much of anything given the Pirates' lack of minor league pitching, but this is still a pretty nifty trade--the Bucs have parlayed one of their many mediocre corner players into a pitcher who has some theoretical chance of someday helping them.