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Twins Claim Ryan Kreidler

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The Twins announced that utilityman Ryan Kreidler has been claimed off waivers from the Pirates. Pittsburgh designated Kreidler for assignment two days ago. Minnesota’s 40-man roster count jumps from 38 to 39.

Kreidler, 28 next month, is a multi-positional player who hasn’t yet hit in limited chances the big leagues. He has appeared in the past four big league seasons but with a total of just 211 plate appearances over those four years. He struck out in 31.8% of those trips to the plate and produced a dismal .138/.208/.176 line.

His minor league numbers are naturally greater in quality and quantity. He has a .236/.342/.401 line and 106 wRC+ in 1,963 plate appearances in his minor league career. That includes a .238/.363/.389 line and 109 wRC+ in 401 plate appearances in 2025. If he could bring some more of that offense up to the majors, he could become a useful utility guy. He has experience at the three infield spots to the left of first base, as well as center and left field.

However, his grip on a roster spot with the Tigers was slipping. 2025 was his final option year, meaning he will be out of options going forward. The Tigers designated him for assignment in August when they selected left-hander Drew Sommers. The Pirates claimed him but put him back on the wire this week when they claimed outfielder Will Robertson.

The Twins have loads of questions about their roster going into the offseason. They underwent a big sell-off at the deadline, trading away many pieces, including infielder Carlos Correa and outfielder Harrison Bader. It’s possible they do some more rebuild-type moves this winter, which could include trading guys like Trevor Larnach, Matt Wallner or Royce Lewis.

With so much uncertainty, it’s possible there will be a path for guys like Kreidler to fill in some of the open playing time. It’s also possible that the Twins put him back on waivers in the winter and hope that he clears so that they can keep him as non-roster depth.

Photo courtesy of Steven Bisig, Imagn Images

Pirates Claim Will Robertson, Designate Ryan Kreidler

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The Pirates announced they have claimed outfielder Will Robertson off waivers from the White Sox. Ryan Kreidler was designated for assignment in a corresponding move.

Pittsburgh marks the third MLB organization for Robertson in the past four months. He came to Chicago in a trade from Toronto back in July after getting designated for assignment by the Blue Jays. Robertson had been in Toronto’s minor league system for his entire career heading into this season, since getting drafted by the team in 2019.

A strong start to the Triple-A season earned Robertson his first taste of MLB action in June. He slashed .292/.403/.578 with the Buffalo Bisons prior to getting the call. Robertson made three starts with the Blue Jays, recording an RBI single for his first MLB hit on June 15 against the Phillies. It would be his only knock with the team.

Robertson spent his first week in Chicago with the big-league club. He appeared in four games, making two starts. He went 0-for-6 with four strikeouts. Robertson was optioned to Triple-A on July 19. He returned to the White Sox on August 27 and carved out a semi-regular role over the final month of the season. Robertson made 13 starts in September, while also appearing twice as a pinch-hitter. He recorded seven hits in 44 at-bats.

Andrew McCutchen and Tommy Pham are free agents, so Pittsburgh could use some outfield depth heading into 2026. Robertson’s persistent strikeout issues will make it tough for him to hold down a regular MLB job, but he’s shown power potential at times in the minors. He hit 20 home runs in Triple-A between Buffalo and Charlotte this past season. Robertson popped 19 homers in 464 plate appearances with Buffalo in 2024, matching his mark from 2023 with Double-A New Hampshire.

Pittsburgh claimed Kreidler off waivers from Detroit in August. He spent a week on the big-league roster in September before heading back to Triple-A Indianapolis. Kreidler did not make an appearance with the Pirates.

Kreidler spent parts of four MLB seasons with the Tigers. He’s hit just .138 across 211 plate appearances at the highest level. His main draw is defensive versatility. Kreidler has made appearances at second base, shortstop, third base, left field, and center field with Detroit. If Kreidler clears waivers, he’ll qualify for minor league free agency at the beginning of the offseason.

Chris Owings Announces Retirement

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Infielder Chris Owings announced his retirement on his Instagram page last week. He last played in affiliated ball in the Dodgers organization in 2024. Now, it appears the 11-year big-league veteran will hang up his spikes at the age of 34. “This game has given me more than I could’ve ever imagined,” said Owings, who went on to thank his family, coaches, and the various organizations of which he had been a part during his career.

Owings was drafted in the first round by the Diamondbacks in 2009, making his major-league debut four years later. He would spend six seasons with Arizona, playing a total of 575 games out in the desert and batting .250/.291/.378 with a 73 wRC+. During that time, he maxed out at 552 plate appearances in 147 games in 2015. The following year, he led the majors in triples (11) while batting .277/.315/.416 in 119 games and splitting time between shortstop and center field. After leaving the Diamondbacks following the 2018 season, he went on to spend brief major-league stints with the Royals, Red Sox, Rockies, Orioles, and Pirates, often acting as a utility player. His last big-league appearances came in 2023 with Pittsburgh. He signed a minor league pact with the Dodgers in February 2024 and played in 80 games at the Triple-A level before being released in July of that year.

In all, Owings played in 723 games and earned just over $11MM in his career. He batted .239/.286/.364 with 550 hits, 37 home runs, 220 RBI, and 79 stolen bases. He was also a serviceable defender, grading out as below-average in 2,105 1/3 innings at shortstop (-11 career DRS) but above average in 1,647 2/3 innings at the keystone (9 DRS). We at MLBTR congratulate Owings on a solid career and wish him the best in retirement.

Photo courtesy of Isaiah J. Downing, Imagn Images

Will The Pirates Trade Dennis Santana?

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After years of speculation, the Pirates traded their closer at this past summer’s deadline. David Bednar was shipped off to the Bronx for a three-player package headlined by catching prospect Rafael Flores. That opened the ninth inning for breakout setup man Dennis Santana, who got an extended run as a closer for the first time in his career.

Santana has been a revelation since the Pirates claimed him off waivers from the Yankees in June 2024. The Dominican-born righty tossed 44 1/3 innings of 2.44 ERA ball down the stretch that year, earning some stability with the fifth team of his big league career. He began this season in a setup role, then briefly took over as closer when Bednar’s early-season struggles got him demoted to Triple-A. Bednar was back in the ninth by the end of April, but the closer role became Santana’s for good after the deadline.

The various roles didn’t slow him down. The 29-year-old Santana turned in 70 1/3 frames with a career-best 2.18 earned run average. He recorded 16 saves and 12 holds while only relinquishing three leads all season. Santana had a less impressive 3.75 ERA after the trade deadline, yet that’s mostly attributable to a five-run blowup at Coors Field on August 1. He worked to a 1.90 ERA while holding opponents to a .152/.236/.291 slash in 23 appearances after that.

Santana doesn’t have the usual closer profile. He struck out 22.2% of batters faced, right around the league average for big league relievers. His 94.7 MPH average fastball speed is fine but not exceptional for a late-inning arm. Santana’s wipeout slider is his bread-and-butter offering, a pitch that gets enough whiffs that teams could project his strikeout rate to climb by a couple percentage points. He’s never going to be Mason Miller, though, and most clubs would probably project Santana more as the second or third-best arm in a contending bullpen.

Pittsburgh received trade interest in Santana at the deadline. The Phillies were the only team specifically known to have checked in, but it stands to reason the Bucs heard from at least a handful of clubs. They clearly didn’t find an offer to their liking. They’re now down to their final season of contractual control. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects Santana for a $3.4MM salary that easily fits within the budget of any team, even one that runs payrolls as low as the Bucs do.

The Pirates aren’t intentionally rebuilding, but they’re coming off a 71-91 season that represented a step back from their consecutive 76-win campaigns before that. Should the Pirates view this offseason as a sell-high opportunity while letting Isaac Mattson, Justin Lawrence and Carmen Mlodzinski compete for the ninth? Will they?

Weigh in on our latest poll.

 

 

Coaching Notes: Royals, Pirates, Diamondbacks

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Royals GM J.J. Picollo told reporters (including Anne Rogers of MLB.com) after the regular season came to a close that he expected that “most of the [coaching] staff” (including hitting coach Alec Zumwait) will return to Kansas City in 2026. At the time, he acknowledged that there might be some “tweaks” to the staff in hopes of getting the most out of the club’s players. Today, Picollo provided more details on those tweaks when he told Rogers that the Royals won’t renew the contracts of assistant hitting coaches Keoni DeRenne and Joe Dillon for the 2026 campaign.

DeRenne has been in the Royals organization since 2020 and has spent the past four seasons as the club’s assistant hitting coach. He previously coached in the Cubs and Pirates organizations at the minor league level. Dillon, meanwhile, has been an assistant hitting coach for the Royals in each of the past two seasons and has previously served as an assistant hitting coach for the Nationals and spent two years as the hitting coach for the Phillies in addition to time in the Nationals and Marlins organizations coaching at the minor league level. Picollo praised the pair’s work in Kansas City, telling Rogers that both are “really good, tireless workers” who will “end up in a good spot somewhere in the game.” The duo figure to have plenty of opportunities to catch on somewhere with so many teams changing managers this winter. Many of those new managers will look to make tweaks to their team’s coaching staff, which could benefit coaches like DeRenne and Dillon.

As for the Royals themselves, the departures of their assistant hitting coaches will create an opportunity to bring in fresh voices to complement Zumwait. Kansas City finished the season with a team-wide wRC of just 93, even in spite of strong performances from core pieces like Vinnie Pasquantino, Maikel Garcia, and Bobby Witt Jr. at the place. That’s because much of the club’s supporting cast disappointed in a big way, while some players counted on to be threats high in the batting order like Jonathan India and Jac Caglianone failed to produce. While the Royals might hope that a veteran like India can return to form on his own, a young player like Caglianone could surely benefit from the guidance that new members of the coaching staff could offer.

More from around the league’s coaching staffs…

  • Pirates hitting coach Matt Hague is expected to continue in his current role with the club, according to a report from Alex Stumpf of MLB.com earlier today. Hague, 40, spent part of three seasons as a big league player before starting his coaching career in 2020 as a minor league coach with the Blue Jays. He spent the 2024 season with Toronto in the big leagues as an assistant hitting coach, before getting hired away by Pittsburgh last offseason to serve as their primary hitting coach in the majors. Hague’s Pirates were the second-worst team in baseball by wRC+ this year as even well-regarded hitters like Bryan Reynolds and Oneil Cruz took significant steps back at the plate. Even so, he’ll get another opportunity to guide the team’s offense in 2026, and with improving the lineup being a top priority for the Pirates this season he’ll hopefully have more talent to work with on the field next year.
  • The Diamondbacks are expecting to retain their 2025 coaching staff for next season, manager Torey Lovullo told Dave Burns and John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports last week. Lovullo left the door open for some roles on the coaching staff to change even as the entire group is retained for the 2026 campaign, though he suggested that coaches will generally remain in their same role they had this season. While the Diamondbacks disappointed with an 80-82 record this year, it’s hard not to see how injuries to key players like Corbin Burnes, A.J. Puk, and Justin Martinez wound up significantly impacting the team for the worse, and it’s not impossible to imagine that the club could have squeaked its way into the postseason had core pieces like Josh Naylor, Eugenio Suarez, and Merrill Kelly not been traded at this year’s deadline. Evidently, that’s enough for Lovullo and GM Mike Hazen to feel comfortable sticking with their current staff for at least one more year.

Pirates Make Changes To Coaching Staff

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The Pirates are making several changes to their coaching staff. Pitching coach Oscar Marin will not have his contract renewed, as first reported by Jon Heyman of The New York Post. Assistant pitching coach Brent Strom and third-base coach Mike Rabelo will also not be returning, per Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

It was earlier reported that GM Ben Cherington and manager Don Kelly would remain in their current roles. Cherington has been in charge of the front office since November 2019, while Kelly had served as interim manager since taking over for Derek Shelton in May. Kelly had noted on Monday that he and Cherington would meet to discuss the possibility of coaching changes. It appears the staff will indeed see some turnover as the Pirates look to improve in 2026 following a 71-91 season which saw them finish last in the NL Central.

Marin, 42, is perhaps the most notable of the changes. He had been serving as the Pirates’ pitching coach since December 2019, shortly after Cherington took over the front office. In that time, the team improved from a 5.08 ERA in 2021 (16% below average by ERA+) to a 3.76 ERA this year (14% above average). The starting rotation, in particular, benefited from a dominant sophomore effort by Paul Skenes, while the bullpen was anchored by Dennis Santana and David Bednar, before the latter’s trade to the Yankees.

The pitching outlook for next year is promising. As it stands, Skenes will be joined by Mitch Keller (barring an offseason trade) at the front of the rotation, while Bubba Chandler and Mike Burrows should be in the mix for season-opening spots. Jared Jones is recovering from UCL surgery but could be back within the first couple months. All three pitchers are controlled through at least 2028. Santana could return as the team’s closer in 2026, though he’s an impending free agent who could be in trade rumors himself. Braxton Ashcraft and Justin Lawrence also performed well out of the ’pen in 2025 and remain under team control for several years, although Ashcraft may be in contention for a rotation spot himself.

Strom, 76, has been the assistant pitching coach for just under a year, having been hired in November 2024. He had previously served as the pitching coach for the Astros from 2014-21, followed by a stint with the Diamondbacks for the 2022-24 seasons. He is known among players for blending an old-school mentality with an appreciation for analytics. While there were initial reports that Strom was contemplating retirement, the longtime coach tells Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic that he does not intend to retire and is open to offers from other teams. Strom told Rosenthal that he made the decision to leave the Pirates and informed the club of that call six weeks ago.

Rabelo, 45, was originally hired by the Pirates as an assistant hitting coach in 2020 before becoming their major league field coordinator in January 2021. He has served as the third-base coach since the 2022 season and has also acted as a bench coach since Kelly’s elevation to the manager post in May. This year, Pirates baserunners tied for last in the majors in extra bases taken on hits with 103.

Heading into the offseason, the club appears to be making these changes with the hope of building on their pitching core and making marginal improvements on offense. The Pirates are expected to carry a bottom-tier payroll once again, although they only have $31MM on the books in the contracts for Keller and Bryan Reynolds and might look to make marginal upgrades through one-year deals for free agents. If the team can add additional offensive pieces to complement Reynolds, Spencer Horwitz, and Oneil Cruz while the pitchers take another step forward, the club may look to finish at .500 in 2026.

Ben Cherington To Remain Pirates GM In 2026

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Pirates GM Ben Cherington told reporters (including Alex Stumpf of MLB.com) earlier this afternoon that he has “received assurance” that he’ll remain in his current role with the club going forward. Cherington’s contract with the club runs through the 2027 campaign, as was reported last week.

The news that Cherington is remaining in the organization doesn’t register as a massive surprise after news broke earlier today that the Pirates were signing manager Don Kelly to a contract extension after he took over for Derek Shelton back in May. While Pittsburgh’s 71-91 record this year is impossible to view as anything other than a major disappointment, the team went 59-65 under Kelly. That’s still six games below .500, but the club’s .476 winning percentage under Kelly would be their best since 2018 if carried across a full season.

That stat makes it easy enough to understand why Pirates ownership would think it worthwhile to see how a full season of the partnership between Kelly and Cherington would look, but it also highlights the fact that the team’s issues run deeper than leadership in the front office or dugout. Cherington will begin his sixth year at the helm of Pittsburgh’s baseball operations department in November, and while the team hasn’t had much success during his time at the helm those struggles must be viewed through the lens of the budget he’s had to work with throughout his tenure.

RosterResource estimates the club’s payroll at $87MM this year, more or less identical to the club’s 2024 payroll. While the organization ran payrolls between $90MM and $100MM from 2015 to 2017 according to Cot’s Baseball Contracts, they began steadily dropping in 2018 before the trend line started to reverse in 2023. Even if the team’s payroll got back up to the $100MM range, however, that would still leave them as a bottom-five team in the sport by payroll (according to RosterResource). That would be a modest improvement over their current bottom-three status, but wouldn’t change the organization’s reputation as a financial bottom-feeder.

Of course, it should be noted that even getting out of that bottom-three range and back into the territory of around $100MM does not seem likely at this juncture. Noah Hiles of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that the team’s payroll isn’t expected to go up much in 2026, if it does at all, and that it might even wind up lower than it was in 2025 after attendance dropped this year relative to last season.

Fortunately, that still leaves some room to maneuver given that the team has just $31MM on the books for next year between the contracts Bryan Reynolds and Mitch Keller are currently signed to. That doesn’t include arbitration raises for players like Johan Oviedo and Joey Bart, not to mention Oneil Cruz’s first arbitration-level salary, however. It also doesn’t include the roughly $19MM the club would be spending even if the roster is filled out with players on the major league minimum. That could leave Cherington’s front office with around $25MM or less to work with as they try to build an offensive nucleus that can support Paul Skenes and the rest of the team’s young pitchers.

It’s not a lot to work with in a market where the majority of above-average regulars command eight figure salaries. With those constraints, it seems likely that Cherington will have to lean on the club’s highly-rated farm system to execute trades and bring in big league talent without having to dip into free agency in a substantial way. That’s how the club acquired its top bat of 2025, as Spencer Horwitz came to the Pirates in a trade where they surrendered right-hander Luis Ortiz and posted a strong 119 wRC+ in 108 games as the team’s everyday first baseman. Another successful trade or two like that could go a long way to creating the offense needed to get the Pirates back into playoff contention, though that of course will surely be easier said than done.

Pirates Sign Manager Don Kelly To Extension

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The Pirates announced Monday morning that manager Don Kelly has been signed to a contract extension. He was named manager back in May, after the team fired Derek Shelton, but there was never any commitment beyond the current season (despite Kelly not having an “interim” label included in his title). Today’s announcement makes it official that he’ll continue managing the team beyond the current season. Pittsburgh did not specify the length of Kelly’s new contract.

“Donnie has earned the respect of the players, front office, and our fans –- and he has certainly earned mine,” chairman/majority owner Bob Nutting said in this morning’s press release. “Donnie took over the team at a true low point. Since then, we’ve seen meaningful progress, not just in the clubhouse culture, but on the field. His connection to the community and passion for the franchise make him more than just a manager. He is a Pittsburgher; he is part of our community. He’s the right fit, at the right time, and is the right person to lead us forward.”

“I’m proud to continue leading the Pirates,” said Kelly himself in the press release. “Our clubhouse is full of players who care deeply about each other, about winning, and about representing Pittsburgh the right way. I was a Pirates fan first. I know our fans deserve a team that delivers on the field, and it’s on me to make sure we reach that standard.”

“Donnie is an elite communicator. He is deeply trusted by our players because he’s credible, consistent, and unafraid of tough conversations,” said general manager Ben Cherington in the press release. “His background as both a scout and a coach gives him a rare perspective: patience when it’s needed, and an unwavering belief in players’ ability to improve. Above all, he values people and winning. His ability to adjust, lead, and do the hard work makes him the right leader.”

The Pirates have been mired in mediocrity for a long time now. They last made the postseason in 2015. They have only finished above .500 once since then, which was back in 2018. They lost at least 100 games in 2021 and 2022. They showed a bit of promise in 2023 and 2024, flirting with contention at times, but finished both of those seasons with 76 wins.

Ideally, they would have taken another step forward in 2025, but they got out to an awful start. They were 12-26 when Shelton was fired in May. Kelly took over from there and the club fared better the rest of the way, though their 59-65 record under the new skipper was still subpar.

Going into 2026, there will be pressure for the club to finally get to another level. The Bucs have graduated a large number of pitching prospects to the majors. That’s obviously a good thing but it’s also a bit of a ticking clock. They have four remaining years with Paul Skenes. The Mitch Keller contract runs another three seasons.

In the past, the Bucs have traded some of their most prominent pitchers before they have reached free agency, a consequence of their consistently low payrolls. Pitchers like Gerrit Cole and Jameson Taillon are a few of the notable examples. As such, it’s common for people in the baseball world to speculate about Skenes being traded before those four years are up. Keller was in plenty of trade rumors this past summer but ultimately stayed put.

On the offensive side, the club has had far less success. They didn’t have a qualified hitter post an above-average season in 2025, by measure of wRC+. Spencer Horwitz did finish the season with a 119 wRC+, though his offseason wrist surgery limited him to just 411 plate appearances. Joey Bart got just over the line with a 101 wRC+ but in just 332 trips to the plate. The team-wide wRC+ came in at 82, behind all MLB teams apart from the Rockies. Improvement will obviously be required there for the club to be a real threat.

As the skipper, Kelly can only work with the players he is given. While the club still lost more games than they won with him at the helm, the organization seems to feel he did a good job regardless. A lot of a manager’s duties occur in the clubhouse, communicating with players on things like preparation, usage, strategy and the like. The Bucs are presumably pleased enough with Kelly’s work in those areas to keep him around as they try to find a new gear in 2026 and beyond.

Photo courtesy of Rick Osentoski, Imagn Images

Michael A. Taylor Announces Retirement

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White Sox outfielder Michael A. Taylor announced his retirement to members of the media today, ahead of the Sox facing the Nationals in Washington, a place he played for many years. “To be able to play my last games of my career here in this ballpark in front of these fans, it’s just the icing on the cake,” Taylor said, per Andrew Golden of The Washington Post. He is in the lineup for the Sox today, playing center field and batting ninth, in what will be his final game.

Michael A. Taylor | Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY SportsTaylor, now 34, was a sixth-round pick of the Nationals back in 2009. He was a shortstop at that time, considered to be raw, but in possession of some elite tools. He was moved to the outfield and quickly showed the potential to be a strong defender. He also showed more pop with the bat as he climbed the ladder, hitting 23 homers in the minors in 2014.

Going into 2015, he was considered to be one of the top 100 prospects in the game. Baseball America gave him the #32 spot, MLB Pipeline had him at #42, Baseball Prospectus at #57 and ESPN at #71. FanGraphs was a bit more bearish, putting him at #133 on their top 200 list.

Taylor had already made a brief major league debut in 2014 but got more properly established in 2015. He got into 138 games for the Nats, popping 14 homers and stealing 16 bags, but his overall value was held back by subpar walk and strikeout rates of 6.8% and 30.9%. Over his career, he would have his ups and downs, but his contributions mostly took that shape. He could put the ball over the fence, track it down with his glove and swipe some bags, but the plate discipline was never good.

Despite his flaws, he was a useful player for the Nats during their best stretch in Washington. The club finished above .500 in each season from 2012 to 2019, making the playoffs in five of those eight seasons. Those clubs featured stars like Bryce Harper, Stephen Strasburg, Trea Turner, Juan Soto, Max Scherzer, Anthony Rendon and others, but Taylor often played a solid supporting role.

In 2019, Taylor spent a decent chunk of the year in the minors, only getting into 53 big league games with one home run. But he took on a more prominent role at just the right time. As the Nats made a miracle charge through the postseason, Taylor got into eight of the club’s playoff contests. He clinched the NLDS over the Dodgers with a diving catch, as seen in this video from MLB.com. He also slashed .333/.391/.619 in his 23 plate appearances as the Nats eventually went on to win the World Series.

In the shortened 2020 season, Taylor had a rough showing, slashing .196/.253/.424. At the end of that campaign, the Nats put him on waivers and he elected free agency after clearing. That led to a one-year, $1.75MM deal with the Royals for 2021. He bounced back somewhat that year with a .244/.297/.356 line and 14 stolen bases. As the season was winding down, the Royals didn’t want him to get away, so they gave him a two-year, $9MM extension for the 2022 and 2023 seasons.

He had a somewhat similar campaign in the first year of that extension but the Royals flipped him to the Twins for 2023. He hit a career-high 21 home runs for Minnesota that year but also struck out at a 33.5% rate, leading to a .220/.278/.442 batting line.

That was a relatively strong campaign for him but he remained unsigned into mid-March of 2024, when he settled for a one-year, $4MM deal with the Pirates. His year in Pittsburgh turned out to be fairly forgettable, as he hit just five home runs and put up a .193/.253/.290 line. He then secured a one-year, $1.95MM deal to join the rebuilding White Sox this year. With one game remaining, he is currently sporting a .199/.256/.366 line.

Taylor currently has 1,215 games played with 3,797 plate appearances, with one more contest to go. He has 806 hits, including 109 home runs. He has drawn walks at a 6.9% clip and struck out 30.7% of the time, producing a .232/.287/.379 batting line. He stole 128 bases. He was credited with 90 Defensive Runs Saved and 61 Outs Above Average in his career as an outfielder. For the 2014-2025 period, that DRS total was sixth among outfielders and his OAA tally was eighth. FanGraphs credited him with 10.2 wins above replacement. Baseball Reference gave him 12.6 WAR and pegs his career earnings above $27MM.

We at MLB Trade Rumors congratulate Taylor on a solid career and wish him the best in whatever comes next. He tells Golden that he plans to spend more time with his kids but would consider a coaching role in the future.

Photos courtesy of Geoff Burke, Steve Mitchell, Imagn Images

Pirates GM Ben Cherington’s Contract Runs Through 2027

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Pirates GM Ben Cherington’s contract runs through the 2027 season, according to Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic. Cherington has been at the helm of Pittsburgh’s front office since November 2019. John Perrotto of The Associated Press wrote last week that Cherington was signed beyond this season, though it was previously unknown if his contract ran through 2026 or ’27. This latest update gives him at least two more years worth of guaranteed salary.

Dating back to Cherington’s first season at the helm – the COVID-shortened 2020 season – the Pirates have a record of 363-504 and have finished 4th or 5th in the NL Central in every season. The club’s last winning season was in 2018 under then-GM Neal Huntington. They lost 93 games the following season. Owner Bob Nutting fired Huntington and brought in Cherington after the following season, even though Huntington had multiple years remaining on his contract at the time.

That same offseason saw the Bucs fire manager Clint Hurdle, whom they replaced with Derek Shelton. Pittsburgh stuck with the Cherington-Shelton pairing for five full seasons, maxing out with 76-86 seasons in both 2023 and ’24. A 12-26 start to year six led them to fire Shelton in early May. They’ve been better under interim skipper Don Kelly, yet their 57-64 record in that time has them playing at the same 76-win pace of the previous two seasons. Some growing pains are always expected at the beginning of a rebuild, but the record has plateaued even as the Bucs have put together a talented collection of young arms.

Under Cherington, Pittsburgh has had much more success drafting and developing pitching than they’ve had on the position player side. The Pirates drafted Paul Skenes No. 1 overall in 2023, and the righty is now the favorite to win the NL Cy Young Award. He gives the club their first bona fide ace since Gerrit Cole and should anchor the rotation for the next few years.

Braxton Ashcraft and Mike Burrows were drafted before Cherington’s arrival but have developed into promising pitchers this season. Closer Dennis Santana has broken out since being claimed off waivers last June. There’s more pitching talent in the pipeline. Five of MLB.com’s Top 100 prospects are in the Pirates organization, and two of them – RHP Bubba Chandler (No. 7) and LHP Hunter Barco (No. 82) – have recently made their big-league debuts. They added another potential impact arm with RHP Seth Hernandez, the sixth overall pick this summer.

Impressive as the pitching group has been, they’ve had too many misses on offense. Henry Davis, the first overall pick in 2021, is a career .178/.260/.288 hitter. Nick Gonzales, selected seventh overall in 2020, has a .259/.302/.378 line in more than 900 plate appearances. While it’s too early to close the book on 2022 fourth overall pick Termarr Johnson, he’s not as highly regarded as he was at draft time because of questions about his power ceiling and defense at second base.

Last year’s first-round pick looks much more successful. Konnor Griffin, the #9 pick in 2024, had a phenomenal minor league season. He’s a potential franchise shortstop and arguably the #1 prospect in the game. Griffin has a chance to become the dynamic position player talent that the club has lacked, but they’ll need a lot more production throughout the lineup. Spencer Horwitz and Joey Bart are their only two hitters who have been even slightly above-average at the plate this season, as measured by wRC+. No team has scored fewer runs.

Cherington said over the weekend that he hasn’t received any indication from ownership that he won’t remain in the position going into 2026. If that proves to be the case, he’ll first need to decide whether to retain Kelly as the permanent manager. The focus will again be on building even a league average offense. Skenes, Chandler, and Mitch Keller form a strong front of the rotation, with all three under control through at least 2028. The team’s payroll annually ranks in the bottom 10 of the league, likely leaving the front office looking in the third or fourth tiers of free agency to acquire some complementary pieces to strengthen the lineup in hopes of getting above .500 and challenging for a Wild Card spot.

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