When the Pirates sit down and sort through why a season that started with real playoff hopes ends without October baseball, the list won’t be short.
The rotation faded. The offense vanished for long stretches after the All-Star break.
Injuries kept stacking up. The dugout made some questionable calls.
The roster had holes.
But if Pittsburgh wants to circle the moments that really changed the shape of 2026, the first-half bullpen belongs near the top.
This was a team that kept putting itself in position to win, then let the game slip right through its hands. On April 12, the Pirates owned a 5-0 lead over the Chicago Cubs and lost 7-6.
Six days later, they were up 4-0 on the Tampa Bay Rays and dropped an 8-7 decision in 13 innings. On April 27, they carried a 2-0 lead into the ninth against the St.
Louis Cardinals and still lost 4-2.
That pattern never really went away.
In May, Pittsburgh blew a 6-0 lead against the Philadelphia Phillies. On June 3, the Pirates led Houston 8-3 in the sixth inning and wound up losing 11-9.
In June, they also surrendered late leads against the Atlanta Braves, Colorado Rockies and Cincinnati Reds. Then on July 18, they gave away a 3-0 eighth-inning edge against the Cleveland Guardians.
A day before the trade deadline, they were up 7-5 on Cincinnati in the eighth and still lost 8-7.
Stack those games together, and you get about 11 before the deadline in which the bullpen played a major role in turning a winnable night into a loss. No one should simply tack 11 wins onto Pittsburgh’s record and call it done. But even turning four or five of those into victories would have changed the feel of September in a big way.
Instead, the Pirates are headed into their final eight games with essentially nothing left on the line.
The Pirates have officially been eliminated from postseason contention, extending their playoff drought to 11 consecutive seasons. pic.twitter.com/e75EYBM225
- FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) September 19, 2026
The bullpen issues were easy to spot, too.
Dennis Santana and Justin Lawrence both slid far enough that Pittsburgh eventually designated them for assignment. Isaac Mattson couldn’t lock down a role and spent time moving between Pittsburgh and Triple-A Indianapolis. The Pirates kept shuffling relievers through the first half and never found the steady late-inning setup a contender needs.
To their credit, they attacked the problem at the trade deadline, bringing in Luke Weaver, Camilo Doval, Kirby Yates and Lake Bachar. But by then, the damage was already baked in.
That’s what makes this stretch so maddening for Pittsburgh. The bullpen the Pirates needed eventually arrived. It just showed up after enough games had already gone sideways.
There were a lot of reasons this team missed the postseason in 2026. Still, when the final Wild Card standings are printed, the biggest regret may not be how far the Pirates finished behind.
It may be how many leads they handed away before August.
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Paul Skenes has already shown he can miss bats at an elite level, but his first two seasons have also featured enough uneven stretches to leave the Pirates watching closely. The right-hander pointed to one major reason for some of that inconsistency: his participation in the World Baseball Classic with Team USA, which forced him to start earlier than usual and ramp up much faster than he normally would have.
For a pitcher still trying to sharpen the details, that altered preparation mattered. Skenes said the accelerated timeline affected both his build-up and his performance, and it came on top of some mechanical issues and a dip in fastball velocity. Even so, the strikeout ability remains in place, and his offseason work will center on getting those pieces back in sync. [Read more 🡒]
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Still, the issues that dragged Pittsburgh down were the same ones that tend to linger on the wrong side of a rebuild: injuries, thin pitching depth and a bullpen that never held up over the long haul. Even with some key offseason additions, the Pirates never managed to turn the promise into results, leaving Cherington with another offseason defined less by optimism than by the challenge of proving the progress is real. [Read more 🡒]
Oneil Cruz Just Built A Pirates Resume Few Players Ever Reach
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Manager Don Kelly has pointed to Cruzs growth and resilience as a major part of that progress, and it is easy to see why. For a player still building his track record, three straight years in the 20-20 club is the sort of accomplishment that puts him in unusual company, especially when it comes with a comeback from injury and a strong finish after a long absence. The bigger question now is how much more he can stack on that resume before the year is done. [Read more 🡒]