Digital Gameday Programs

If Donald Moore’s game attire included a uniform number on the back of his customary beach-style button down, the baseball gods might assign him the number 27408, the Greensboro zip code where he spent his first six decades of life. That number would be retired someday to honor the most transformative figure in Greensboro’s pro baseball history.

The numbers don’t match the legend. The numbers are good: a .245 batting average with 25 home runs and 117 RBIs in 148 games with the Grasshoppers.

This was the plan all along for the rebuilding Pirates: assemble a roster of draft picks and minor-league free agent signings. It’s just happening quicker than most of us imagined, with young men rapidly rising from the Class-A South Atlantic League to The Show.

The Pirates’ big-league roster is filling up fast with players we saw wearing Greensboro Grasshoppers uniforms in the post-pandemic 2021 and 2022 seasons.

J.P. Massey, a 23-year-old Greensboro Grasshoppers right-hander, was among 25 elite minor league players named to the National League’s team for the 2023 SiriusXM All-Star Futures Game.

He leads the South Atlantic League in saves so far this season with seven. They’re the first seven saves of 22-year-old left-hander Cy Nielson’s life.

Solometo started playing at 5 years old, growing up with tee-ball, then progressing to coach-pitch in the leagues near his home in south New Jersey, a stone’s throw from Philadelphia.

There was a time, not so long ago, when young Anthony Solometo loved baseball a whole lot more than baseball loved him. He was like a lot of us who played the game when we were kids.

Most of the young pros in the South Atlantic League play baseball. Jase Bowen attacks the game. Full throttle. All out. Heart on his sleeve.

In a lot of ways, that crisp October day in 2011 still feels like yesterday to Robby Hammock. It’s the day his baseball life changed forever.

As we come back to First National Bank Field for the 18th season of the Greensboro Grasshoppers, there’s a welcome sense of familiarity.