Royals acquire Jason Frasor

The Royals have acquired reliever Jason Frasor for minor league reliever Spencer Patton. That's worth noting here because the Bucs will also surely be in the market for right-handed relief help, so trades like this will affect who's available and define what they'll have to pay.

Frasor has a long history as an unspectacular but effective reliever -- he walks too many batters but strikes out his fair share. He probably could have helped the Pirates. Patton is ... well, actually he's a 26-year-old Triple-A reliever who might have been able to do a fair Jason Frasor impression in the big leagues -- he had 60 whiffs in 46.1 innings for Omaha, walking 22. But let's emphasize "might." I can't find anything particularly laudatory about Patton's stuff (he seems to throw in the low 90s), and he was a 24th-round pick as a 23-year-old, so it's hard to tell how he'll transition to the majors. He also wasn't listed in MLB's list of the Royals' top 20 prospects. If this is an indication of how the market for righty relievers will go, I feel good about the Pirates' chances of getting someone helpful without paying too much.