Growing up a baseball fan in Australia, Brandan Bidois had only a handful of fellow Aussies in the Major Leagues he could look up to. Liam Hendriks is maybe the most notable, and Bidois was quick to point to left-handed reliever Graeme Lloyd, who won a couple of World Series with the Yankees in his decade in the game.
Then there is Grant Balfour, who was one of the best relievers in the game in the first half of the 2010s. During that run, Balfour returned to his home country to take in a Brisbane Bandits game. Bidois was 11 or 12 years old at the time, and he got a card signed by Balfour, who left an extra note for the aspiring player:
“Good luck with your career.”
“Having those kind of guys to look up to … there’s been a few Aussies, not too many, that have made it to the big leagues,” Bidois said over Zoom last month. “Pretty small group.”
Bidois’ brother, Nicholas, briefly played in the Blue Jays’ system in 2009, so Brandan grew up around the diamond. It also nurtured a fire in him to advance higher than his brother.
“Seeing my brother play professional baseball, I had to do it better,” Bidois said. “It’s that brotherly love. You just have to add to each other. I followed in his footsteps. The rest is history.”
On Tuesday, Bidois took a leap toward joining that small collection of Australians in the Majors. The 24-year-old right-hander was one of six prospects the Pirates added to the 40-man roster to protect him from the Rule 5 Draft, putting him on the precipice of the big leagues.
The Pirates have added seven prospects to their 40-man roster this offseason, three of them relief pitchers (Bidois, right-hander Ryan Harbin and lefty Tyler Samaniego). There has been an infusion of young arms in the bullpen, and Bidois’ placement seems more than justified. After all, he was named the organization’s Kent Tekulve Reliever of the Year during its Minor League awards ceremony on Oct. 29.
Candidly, Bidois was an easy pick for the award. He started with Single-A Bradenton and finished with Triple-A Indianapolis, posting a 0.74 ERA and 69 strikeouts over 61 innings. Brandishing a mid-90s fastball, a high-spin slider and a curveball, Bidois added a changeup this year and finally had some runway to grow as a pitcher.
Bidois signed as an international free agent in September 2019. But between the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and Tommy John surgery in ‘21, he pitched in only three professional games in his first three years of pro ball.
“Being from Australia, we don’t play a lot of games like you guys do over here,” Bidois said. “The innings are limited. My arm’s still pretty young, pretty fresh. There aren’t many miles on it. Building the workload has been a lengthy process.”
After throwing a combined 53 1/3 innings in 2023 and ‘24, Bidois had what would be considered a traditional reliever’s workload for the first time this season. When that happens, most pitchers tend to slow down because of the extra innings.
Instead, Bidois did his best work. He did not allow a run in August or September, a streak that spanned 14 outings and 21 1/3 innings.
Baseball players can be a superstitious bunch, so for Bidois, it’s better to reflect on that run rather than have to hear about it during the season. But that stretch had people on social media clamoring for him to be promoted to Pittsburgh, and it certainly helped punctuate what had been a terrific season.
“It was pretty incredible,” Bidois said. “Just sticking to what I do best and trying to do it as much as I can kind of created that success for me. The streak, it was cool. Try to do it again.”
Bidois is in a position to try to recreate that success with Pittsburgh next year. There is going to be playing time up for grabs, so he could become the next Aussie to reach the Majors. If he does, Bidois will join that small fraternity he has been working toward since he was a kid.
“We’re all pretty connected,” Bidois said. “We’re close, we stay in touch, helping each other out however we can. We’re a small community amongst the big shots over here in the U.S.”