With the signing of a contract extension for Manager Donnie Kelly, the Pittsburgh Pirates took the first step toward the 2026 season. For sure, numerous other steps are required to assemble anything close to a division-winning team. But Kelly’s signing is a step in the right direction, for fans, our city, and our baseball club.
The end goal is the same for every team: a championship. Although this may be some time off here in Western Pennsylvania, a wake-up call may have been placed to Bob Nutting, owner of the Pittsburgh Pirates. The New York Mets missed a playoff berth after fielding a $341 million team, but a nearby small-market team, the Cleveland-based baseball club, made the 2025 MLB Playoffs by spending about $250 million less than the Mets.
Look. Bob Nutting is a billionaire with his hands in various businesses. He has to know, from a historical perspective, that a sports team’s value can grow exponentially with a World Championship victory.
First, though, Bob Nutting needs a “Light Bulb Moment” about this team. His mishandling of the “Bucco Bricks” fiasco (the Pirates removed commemorative bricks inscribed with messages from fans) was downright idiotic. The bricks, which included memorials to past Pirates fans, were discovered in a dump site. Meanwhile, the Priates began “improving” the area where the bricks once stood.
Pirates fans WANT to support an owner that supports them.
Pittsburgh is a hard-working town full of fans just clamoring for anything that gives them pride—from old military buddies on Facebook taunting each other about their teams, to fathers and sons on the edge of their couch, hoping and cheering and crying together. This is the town any owner should WANT to win for. Once you have us, you’ve got us.
But many Pirates fans have already turned their backs on the ball club, mainly due to the ownership. But I can’t do that, and here’s why.
There’s romanticism about the game of baseball. It is the game we all played in our yards: Wiffle Ball, home run derby, run-down, and having a catch with fathers, siblings, and friends for hours at a time. We grew up in a city, and THAT team is ours for life. Live or die. Win or lose. Through thick and thin. Hoping. Praying. Cheering on our team as adults, whose parents have passed on, reminds us of our time together laughing and crying and knowing better than the manager FOR DAMN SURE.
My lady listens to the baseball stories that I tell her about the wonderful things that happened throughout the history of America’s pastime. She listens, and she enjoys baseball as much as I do. We spend so much fantastic time together watching, scoring, and talking about baseball. But, I’m not so sure she understands why I usually have a lump in my throat and tears welling in my eyes as I tell her these stories.
As fans turn away, I still sit in my living room or in the ballpark, keeping a score sheet for each game. I have sheets for young players’ MLB Debuts, players’ first saves, wins, hits, strikeout records, and more. I hope to get the “special” score sheets autographed someday, so I can frame them and hang them. I often open the book and look back at a game, replaying it in my mind. Friends wonder how I can still be that much behind the Pirates.
I like to point them to a scene from the film Patton (1971) starring George C. Scott. General Patton and General Bradley walk up to survey a battlefield after the fighting. The field is littered with the remnants of men and machines. It’s utter decimation. During their conversation about the future of the war, Patton looks out over the battlefield and says these words that echo in my soul when I think about my Pittsburgh Pirates.
“I love it, Brad.” God help me, I love more than life.”
That’s me. That’s the Pittsburgh Pirates. That’s baseball. And I can’t quit her.
That was well written by ryan . I’m happy to see that there is some true Pittsburgh fans still out there that will remain thick or thin. I hope in my lifetime I see one more championship (I’m 61). I sat in the stands for an under 500 team for 20 years…
Very well said my friend
I am totally with you Ryan!
Great read!
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