Reports of Pirates' intent to spend this offseason are likely fool's gold

Every year, the Pirates talk a big game about how they are going to make more investments and try to add to their roster, but it usually just ends up being one-year stop-gaps or bargain-basement reclamation projects. 

They entered the 2025 season with the best young pitcher in baseball in Paul Skenes with a strong rotation built around him and did nothing to spend money on the offense to complement it. 

All the Pirates did during the season was shed more money, with the biggest salary dump coming at the trade deadline when they sent Gold Glove third basemen Ke'Bryan Hayes to the Cincinnati Reds. 

Any spending the Pirates do this offseason will likely be to simply spend the money that was removed off the books with the Hayes trade.

They could also theoretically trade veteran pitcher Mitch Keller and his salary, and then simply spend to replace that.

In other words: Any spending and money coming in is likely to coincide with money going out the opposite direction. That is how the Pirates operate. They operate under their own internal salary cap in a sport that does not have a leaguewide salary cap. 

When it comes to professional sports teams, you have to trust what they do, not what they say. The Pirates say all the right things. They never actually do them.