Pirates Oddly Suspend Bullpen Coach Euclides Rojas for Undisclosed Reason

One of the longest tenured bullpen coaches in all of baseball seems to have run afoul of Pittsburgh Pirates management and, as a result, has been handed a small suspension.

Pirates bullpen coach Euclides Rojas has been banned two games for violating his contract. The reason for his suspension was not given, and the team has offered no further comment.

Rojas has long had a reputation as one of the best bullpen coaches in the majors, as he served in that capacity for the 2003 and 2004 Boston Red Sox, the latter of which won the franchise's first championship in 86 years.

Rojas has been serving as the bullpen coach in Pittsburgh since 2011, when Clint Hurdle was named manager. He has had a generally sterling reputation around the league, so this suspension comes as a bit of a surprise.

The Pirates have been going nowhere fast for some time now, and Rojas' suspension is just the latest in a series of moves that have the Pirates looking like the 100-loss regulars of the 2000s rather than the early 2010s team that looked like they had finally gotten their act together.