Pirates GM Neal Huntington said Sunday that Bell will see more action in the outfield after he was optioned to Triple-A Indianapolis a day earlier, Bill Brink of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. "It'll be just a refresher. He's very comfortable in the outfield, in fact he ran around the other day here in right field as we were working through when and if Gregory [Polanco's] going to be ready to go," Huntington said. "With what he's done offensively with the number of years, the number of balls he's taken in the outfield, we felt that he could be a very good fallback choice for us if there were an injury or something happened at the major league level and we needed another outfielder."

EDGE Analysis

Bell had played primarily first base this season at Indianapolis prior to his promotion to the big leagues earlier this month, but the Pirates are content with what John Jaso and David Freese have provided them at that position. However, with Bell slashing an impressive .324/.407/.535 at Triple-A and having little left to prove in the minors, the Pirates will try to find ways to increase his utility at the big-league level. Once he gets comfortable playing the outfield again, a promotion could come again in the next couple of weeks, and at the very latest, as a September call-up.