The Pittsburgh Pirates are going into the season with a lot of hype as Paul Skenes and Konnor Griffin highlight the team’s bright future.
ESPN is projecting that the Pirates should win close to 80 games this season, which would mark the team’s best record since the 2018 campaign.
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“The starting rotation should rank in the top 10, a great building block for any rising team, and could crack elite status if Bubba Chandler takes a leap to become Robin to Paul Skenes’ Batman. The staff should strike out a lot of batters, which helps. Still, playoff teams tend to turn balls in play into outs, and the Pirates’ positional alignment seems to put too many regulars in tension with their ideal slot on the defensive spectrum,“ ESPN analyst Bradford Doolittle wrote.
“At the same time, projecting team defensive rankings is an inexact science, to say the least, so maybe skipper Don Kelly can make it work. A quick ascension by Konnor Griffin at shortstop would surely help.”
The Pirates have had seven consecutive losing seasons, two of which saw the team drop a hundred games or more. In 2020, had the season been 162 games like a normal campaign, the Pirates would have been well on pace for another hundred lost season.
The Pirates have gone through the trials and tribulations of this rebuild, and it looks like things could be improving for the franchise. Skenes is the tip of the iceberg, and several other players are coming to help improve the team around him. If they can live up to expectations, the Pirates should be much better in 2026.
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