Pirates payroll is likely going up
Team was at about $72M last season
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — The comment didn’t necessarily change what we already know.
The Pirates still need a boatload of pitching. General manager Ben Cherington has also talked the past two days about adding to first base and/or outfield. The tweaks would be designed to improve Pittsburgh’s offense, which would theoretically indicate actual players, not dumpster dives.
What Cherington said also isn’t likely to satiate the fan base, a group that has seemingly grown frustrated with the Pirates’ inactivity this winter. But as Cherington met with reporters for a second consecutive day at the Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center for MLB’s Winter Meetings, he did confirm something that should impact the rest of the offseason.
It involved the Pirates’ payroll compared to opening day in 2023, which was roughly $72 million.
“I would anticipate us ending up above where we landed last year,” Cherington said. “Generally speaking, we expect that as we get better, the payroll will continue to climb with us. To some extent, motivation for us is if we can actually push that as we get better.”
As ever, this isn’t presented as a blanket endorsement. More than half of MLB doubled that figure last year. The Pirates are hardly nudging themselves into some different spending stratosphere.
It’s also a rough deal for several folks — fans, players, Cherington and his staff — that more financial support will seemingly only come after winning. But it’s the unfortunate reality of how MLB functions and how the Pirates have either been forced to or choose to function.
What the aforementioned comments do give us, however, is some idea on numbers, however frustrating they might be. With a current payroll projection of about $56 million, the absolute base level should be adding $16 million via pitching, first base, outfield, whatever.
It’s also, again, not rubber stamping anything that would be way too cosmetic. The Pirates need more, and with a 30% uptick in attendance this past season, they should be able to pour more into major league payroll than just $72 million.
“It’s a chicken-or-the-egg thing, but competitiveness can help speed that up,” Cherington added. “That’s the way we’re operating. It’s very clear to me that we have resources we can use this offseason to make the team better.”
Another financial thing that Cherington clarified involved the Pirates’ TV situation. While they continue to go back-and-forth between SportsNet Pittsburgh and MLB.com, trying to leverage the best deal possible, Cherington insisted that it has had no impact on the team’s offseason planning or what he’s been allowed to do.
The Pirates have done basically nothing, mind you, so it’s not a big deal to this point. But it is the GM removing one variable when it comes to why the team has not yet made any meaningful signings or trades.
“We do the best we can to predict what it’s going to mean going forward,” Cherington said of the uncertain TV situation. “We can guess at what that landscape is going to look like five years from now; it’s still a bit of a guess.
“What we know is that it’s really important that our games are on TV, and we have the reach that we need for all of our fans to see the games, not just in Pittsburgh but across the country. We’re gonna try to be part of that solution as best we can.
“In the meantime, we feel good about the resources we have and that we can use them to help the team get better.”
Learning from Oviedo
The Pirates try to learn something from every injury situation, Cherington insisted, so Johan Oviedo having Tommy John surgery is no different. At the same time, Cherington also said he doesn’t question the Pirates allowing Oviedo to jump from 117 1/3 innings (MLB and Triple-A) to 177 2/ 3 this past season.
Normally teams don’t like young starting pitchers to increase by more than about 20 innings year-over-year, but Cherington said the Pirates received no indication from a variety of testing options that anything was wrong.
“We’re weighing recovery,” Cherington said. “We’re weighing what we’re seeing in the pitch qualities. Are we seeing regression in spin, velocity, command, etc., as the season goes on? We’re trying to look at that over time.
“In this particular case, we got really good feedback from him about recovery. No concerns whatsoever through the course of the season. We didn’t see any concerning changes in the pitch data, quality of pitches or velocity.”
Even on the final day of the season, as Oviedo had his exit meeting with the Pirates, Cherington said there was nothing brought up about arm issues. But a couple days after the season ended, Oviedo reported feeling something, and the rest is history.
“I think we have to learn from every case, including now and the ones that end up healthy,” Cherington said. “We’ll continue to do that. Keeping guys on the field is really important. This is an issue that’s much bigger than the Pirates. Pitching injuries are happening at a high rate across the industry. We want to be part of trying to make that better.”
Pirates to pick ninth
The Pirates on Tuesday obtained the No. 9 pick in the 2024 MLB draft, per the annual lottery. They had a 3% chance of getting the top pick, which went to the Guardians, who had just a 2% chance. Divisional rival Cincinnati walked away with the third overall pick. Pittsburgh has a top-10 pick for the fifth consecutive year.