While Ben Cherington has yet to discuss his own future with Pirates ownership, he said Wednesday that his recommendation for Derek Shelton to return as manager was supported by Bob Nutting and Travis Williams, and that he and Shelton plan to be 'accountable together' in 2025.
It was less than a month ago that Cherington provided a vote of confidence in favor of Shelton, saying that he fully expected him to be back next season, despite an ugly eight-win month of August that ultimately resulted in another losing season at 76-86 and a last-place finish in the National League Central division.
“I believe he can help lead us toward winning in 2025," Cherington said during a 46-minute press conference Wednesday afternoon at PNC Park. "I believe he already does a lot of the aspects of the job very well and at a high level. I believe he works as hard as any manager in the game and I certainly believe he cares as much as any manager in the game. Like all of us, certainly including me, he has targets that he needs to improve on and I believe he is fully aware of those. I believe he’s committed to working on those and I believe he understands the team needs to ultimately respond to him, and we’ll go into 2025 together, accountable together. I’m excited for that. I’m excited for the work ahead.”
Shelton's record in five seasons as the Pirates' manager is 294-414. That includes a 2023 season in which the team made a significant jump with 14 more wins than they had in 2022. This year, though, even with the emergence of Paul Skenes and the return of Oneil Cruz, the Pirates made no improvement in the win column.
Even if Shelton does indeed return for a sixth season at the helm, he'll have to guide a coaching staff in need of filling two particular voids. Days after the Pirates' loss to the Yankees in a season finale that closed the book on a disappointing 2024 season, they subsequently fired three members of their staff, including hitting coach Andy Haines and bullpen coach Justin Meccage. Strength and conditioning coach Adam Vish was fired as well.
"We learned a lot this year. One of the things I believe I learned, and we learned, is that while we have made improvement in the way that players are improving at the major-league level and performing at the major-league level, we see evidence that we're able to identify the things that we need to identify and coach players toward improvement," Cherington said. "We also believe that we need to do that more, and faster. Ultimately, I decided that in order to do it better and faster, some changes were necessary. To some extent, what we need to do, what I believe we need to do, is develop just more cohesion, tighter alignment, tighter connection inside our major-league group so that work that goes toward getting players better faster is happening better and faster all the time. It's not that we can't do it. We have examples that we are doing that. Believe that we need to do it better and faster all the time. Ultimately felt like some changes were necessary to help us do that."
Haines spent the last three seasons with the Pirates after being fired as the Brewers’ hitting coach at the end of the 2021 season. Over three years with Haines at the helm, the Pirates were among the worst offensive teams in baseball. This season, they ranked 23rd in batting average (.234), 27th in OPS (.672), 25th in home runs (160) and 24th in runs scored (665). Additionally, they finished with the fourth-most strikeouts (1,506) while also setting a franchise record in that category. The Pirates have had just three seasons in which they’ve finished with more than 1,400 strikeouts in franchise history. They’ve all come in the last three years with Haines leading the hitting group.
Haines' first two years didn’t exactly produce ideal results either. In 2022, the Pirates were among the bottom 12 major-league teams in batting average (.222; 29th), OPS (.655; 28th), home runs (158; 18th) and runs (591; 27th). A year later it was more of the same: batting average (239; 24th), OPS (.707; 22nd), home runs (159; 28th) and runs (692; 22nd).
"I think that first of all, Andy Haines is an incredibly talented guy. Incredibly hard working. He cares so much. I'm personally fond of him. He's going to get another job very quickly. That's how these things go," Cherington said. "I think certainly some of where we got was that that job is really hard, and especially really hard when you're doing it for a team that is really trying to develop offensively. Where we have as many young players as we've had, with offensive challenges that are largely a result of what I'm doing, like this is the roster we have. That job is already hard, and it's going to be even more challenging when you're in that situation. And, when you live in that role for three years, that can add up over three years."
In an effort to hire the "best person" to replace Haines and lead the hitting group, Cherington said it'll ultimately be about serving the players in the best way possible. That means listening to what they've heard and the observations they've made as an organization regarding what the players need more of or less of in terms of instruction.
"I think we also want to build a team, a hitting team that is really working together, and so that it's not all on one person to bear the burden of the offensive performance of the team. I don't think that's the best way in modern baseball. It was that way for a long time, and I remember days when the hitting coach of the Red Sox was just, he was sort of singularly responsible or felt that way for the performance of the major-league group," Cherington said. "I don't think it can be that way anymore. I don't think it should be that way anymore. I think it has to be a team -- there does have to be a leader of that team, and that's the person we'll be looking for and we'll focus on what we believe our players need first and foremost."
Meccage, who initially joined the organization as a pitching coach in 2011, had been the Pirates' bullpen coach since 2020. This year, relievers combined to finish with a collective 4.49 ERA, the fourth-worst in MLB, and a 1.38 WHIP, the third-worst in the league. The unit, which was expected to serve as a strength heading into 2024, also finished with 27 blown saves.
Despite the poor results produced by the Cherington/Shelton regime, as well as the fact that two members of the major-league staff need replaced, Cherington still remains optimistic about what the club can achieve in 2025.
"I believe we're going to go into 2025 with as strong of a major-league roster as we've had since I've been here. Just as importantly, I think we're going to go into 2025 with as strong of a baseball operation as we've had since I've been here, and we need both," Cherington said. "Ultimately, proof's in the pudding. Gotta go to do the work and get the results on the field. I'm excited about what's ahead in 2025 and beyond because I do believe we'll go into '25 in the strongest position we've been in all of those areas."
MORE FROM CHERINGTON
• Cherington was asked about the trade deadline deal that sent Martin Perez to the Padres and said it was a tough call in making that decision. Down the stretch, there were plenty of instances where a guy like Perez would have proved serviceable as the final member of a six-man starting rotation. Instead, he and Quinn Priester were traded in separate deals and Marco Gonzales underwent season-ending surgery, leaving them shorthanded and having to rely on different arms like Jake Woodford and Domingo German.
“Certainly we can look back and see two or three games where he may have helped us," Cherington said of Perez. "We can also look back and see, in hindsight, even that probably isn’t enough to get us into the postseason. At the time, we felt in order to execute the plan that we wanted to execute, that that trade was an important component of it so we included it. We weren’t looking to get rid of Martin Perez necessarily but in the portfolio of what we were trying to do, it fit into that and allowed us to do what we wanted to do.”
• Cherington said he doesn't think the team will go into spring training with any sort of hard limits on Skenes after he throw just over 160 innings between Pittsburgh and Class AAA Indianapolis this season.
"I think we always will need to keep assessing over the course of the season just in terms of how guys are holding up and recovery and how the pitch qualities are trending and all that and make real time decisions inside of a decision if we feel guys need a blow or a break."
• Until he gets back to doing the things the organization expects him to do on the field, Cherington said there is always going to be some level of concern regarding Ke'Bryan Hayes and his lingering back issues.
“That’s just natural. At the same time, we really believe that we have way more information now than we did four months ago. It’s way more clear. I believe he’s more clear. I believe the work that he’s been doing these last two months has really helped him gain confidence in that work and what that’s going to lead to. In my conversation with him at the end of the season, he seemed excited about the offseason, excited about next year. Probably with some level of anxiety because until he’s out there doing it, you’re always going to have some of that. But, he’s obviously really important. We need him on the field. Period. We need him on the field, doing the things he’s capable of doing in order for us to be the team that we want to be next year. He knows that, he feels that and feels some form of responsibility for that. We gotta keep working to help him be that.”
• Cherington on Cruz's experience so far with his transition from shortstop to center field: “I would sum it up as that he absolutely showed us that he can do it, and that we should be confident that he can do it going into 2025. That’s partly because of the metrics that we track. How we measure how he’s moving out there, which balls he’s getting to and how he’s getting to them. And, as we all saw, there is more room to grow. Largely, I think that’s in how he’s using his arm as a weapon and how he’s just thinking about the role as a communicator. It’s sort of the two things we expected to take more time, when we did it. Would’ve anticipated that it would take a little more time for him to figure out how to use his arm out there effectively, and also take more time to figure out the communication part of the role. So, we’ll have a full offseason and full spring training to work with him on that. I think he’s developed a good connection with Tarrik (Brock), and we’ll get together this offseason and keep working on it.”
• On the possibility of Bryan Reynolds, who did take pregame reps at the position this year, playing first base next season: "We're going to do our offseason planning meetings a couple weeks from now. We haven't really had a chance to get into 2025 roster construction quite yet. I think we'll stay open minded. We have not had any formal discussions. Certainly no decisions about Bryan Reynolds playing anywhere else than left field. Bryan Reynolds is a really good baseball player and I think he likes doing baseball things and so he likes taking ground balls at first base. It could just be that. But we'll get into that deeper here in October. The great thing about Bryan is that he is just a really good baseball player and I think he badly wants to win, I know that. And at some point in the future if it gave us a better chance to win, would he do something else? I'm sure he would. But we haven't gotten into that with him."
• On the possibility of Andrew McCutchen returning to the Pirates in 2025: "We've said before, I'll say it again, we'd love to find a way for Andrew to finish his career in a Pirates uniform. That's as far as we've gone to this point. I haven't had a chance to talk to Andrew since the season ended. I expect I will. I expect we will and we'll get into that. We'll let the season breathe just a little bit and get together with him on that and listen to him and see what makes sense from there."
