The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette's Bill Brink tweeted on Monday that new Pirates third baseman Casey McGehee has dropped his weight from 231 pounds at the end of the 2011 season to 208 pounds now and has cut his body fat in half.
That's a development the front office, which acquired McGehee from the Brewers on Dec. 12 in exchange for reliever Jose Veras, has to be pleased about. McGehee's numbers (.223 batting average, 13 home runs, 67 RBIs and a .626 OPS) left a lot to be desired for the Brewers last year, which is why Pittsburgh was able to pick him up fairly cheap.
The Pirates are. are hoping McGehee can bounce back and return to the form that produced a .285 batting average, .859 OPS, 23 home runs and 104 RBIs with Milwaukee in 2009, and the weight drop would appear to be a good first step in that direction. It must be said, however, that these sorts of stories about players being in great shape appear like clockwork as Spring Training begins, and they rarely amount to much.
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