The Guardians designated Pilkington for assignment Wednesday, Joe Noga of The Cleveland Plain Dealer reports.
Pilkington will move off the 40-man roster to open up a spot for right-hander Tanner Bibee, whose contract was selected from Triple-A Columbus ahead of his MLB debut Wednesday versus the Rockies. Though the 25-year-old southpaw was one of the Guardians' preferred spot starters in 2022 and struck out two over two scoreless innings of relief in Tuesday's 5-1 loss, Pilkington has since fallen behind all of Peyton Battenfield, Logan Allen, Bibee, Hunter Gaddis and Xzavion Curry on the organizational rotation depth chart. He'll now be exposed to waivers and could draw interest from an organization with lesser pitching depth than the Guardians.