REPORT: Marcell Ozuna drawing interest from Pirates

According to Andrew Fillipponi, former Braves DH Marcell Ozuna is drawing interest from the Pittsburgh Pirates. This comes after 3B/DH Eugenio Suárez inked a contract with the Cincinnati Reds over the weekend.

The market for DH-only type players, outside of Kyle Schwarber, has been extraordinarily cool this offseason. Suárez has accrued 13.2 bWAR over the last four seasons with 132 home runs, including 49 long balls in 2025, and still had to settle for a one-year pact worth $15 million. That’s not great news for Ozuna, who’s a year older than Suárez and is coming off a down season in which he dealt with a hip injury and hit just 21 home runs with a .756 OPS.

The Pirates, who have been desperately searching for offense all offseason, make a lot of sense. They finished dead last in runs scored and hit 31 fewer home runs than any other team. Ozuna isn’t going to change that by himself, but in his last two healthy seasons he combined for 79 homers with an OPS well north of .900.

I still wouldn’t completely count the Braves out of the running for the Big Bear, either. There’s been no noise on that front, but he was a beloved member of the Atlanta clubhouse, and with both Sean Murphy and Ha-Seong Kim already ruled out for the first month of the season, adding more power to the lineup could prove beneficial.

Ozuna will likely be looking at a more lucrative offer from a team like the Pirates than he would get from the Braves, but Atlanta stood by him at his lowest point and likely gives him the best chance to compete for a championship. Those factors might be able to swing the pendulum in the Braves’ direction if the money is somewhat comparable.