BRADENTON, Fla. -- The Pirates are projected to open the season with a payroll of about $51 million. That is the third lowest in baseball, just above the Marlins ($46 million) and the Orioles ($45 million).
It does not appear likely they will make a transaction to change that total significantly in either direction before opening day. If it does hold, it would be their lowest opening day payroll since the 2011 season.
While Cherington does not believe the Pirates are rebuilding, they have not added much to their major-league roster for the 2020 season. Jarrod Dyson inked a one year, $2 million contract last week, and Guillermo Heredia, Luke Maile and J.T. Riddle signed major-league contracts with the team this winter. Besides them, every other addition has either been a prospect or a player on a minor-league deal.
Cherington is confident he will have a larger payroll to work with once the team starts winning, but that does lend itself to a chicken-egg conundrum, and he does not know exactly when that will be.
"I think you can look at a lot of teams and how teams have moved towards winning, it's fairly consistent," Cherington told reporters Monday at Pirate City. "There does tend to be more investment over time. Sometimes that investment precedes the wins, and sometimes it comes at the same time.
"We're not talking about a certain date or drawing a straight line to that. We just know that investing in players will be an important part of building a winning team, and we've got to identify the right time and opportunity to do that. There is no specific timeline we have for that."
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