For a few months in 2026, the Pirates looked like they had finally turned the corner. Home runs were flying, runs were pouring in and Pittsburgh no longer resembled the club that sat dead last in Major League Baseball’s offensive rankings in 2025.
Then the season drifted into its final stretch, and the shine came off fast.
The most eye-catching number is the one that will live in the team’s record book: Pittsburgh finished with 186 home runs, breaking the franchise mark of 171 set in 1999. That was a massive leap from the 117 homers the Pirates hit in 2025, when no team in baseball finished with fewer.
But the home run total only tells part of the story. Before the All-Star break, Pittsburgh was averaging 5.32 runs per game, which tied for the best mark in the majors.
The lineup was also performing at a high level in batting average, on-base percentage and OPS. For a while, the Pirates weren’t dragging their pitching staff through every game.
That changed over the final 65 games. Pittsburgh averaged about 3.86 runs per game over that stretch, a drop of nearly 1.5 runs a night. A lineup that had looked dangerous in the first half started looking far more fragile.
The underlying numbers backed that up. By late August, the Pirates’ second-half strikeout rate had climbed to 26.3%, one of the worst figures in baseball. Their .226 batting average ranked 26th, and their .350 slugging percentage ranked 29th.
Oneil Cruz HOMERS 🚀
The @Pirates have 172 home runs this season, for the MOST in Bucs history 🏴☠️ pic.twitter.com/BeclHWARBl
- SportsNet Pittsburgh (@SNPittsburgh) September 16, 2026
By the end of the year, Pittsburgh had piled up 1,505 strikeouts, falling just one short of the franchise record. For a team celebrating its most prolific power season ever, that’s a whole lot of empty swings.
Injuries played a role, too. Oneil Cruz, Konnor Griffin, Ryan O'Hearn and Endy Rodríguez all missed significant time, and that kept the Pirates from running out their best version of the lineup with any real consistency.
Still, injuries don’t fully explain how quickly the offense unraveled when the long balls stopped coming. The bigger issue was contact, or the lack of it, and the way the lineup disappeared when power wasn’t carrying the night.
That’s what makes the season so tricky to judge. The Pirates did improve.
There’s no way around that. But a franchise-record homer total can also mask how much work still needs to be done beneath the surface.
Brandon Lowe led the team with 30 home runs, and he’s headed for free agency. That puts Pittsburgh in the uncomfortable spot of possibly losing one of its most productive bats while leaning harder on young hitters whose consistency is still being shaped.
Murf Gray gives the organization a real reason to be optimistic, and Griffin and Esmerlyn Valdez bring plenty of offensive upside. But banking on those players to instantly replace established production would be a risky bet.
So yes, the Pirates made progress in 2026. They also spent the back half of the season showing how quickly that progress can evaporate.
They proved they could score with anybody early on. Later, they showed why that still didn’t mean they could be trusted to do it every night.
If Ben Cherington reads the first half as proof the job is done and ignores what happened after, the Pirates could be headed straight back into the same offensive mess in 2027.
In Other News...
Pirates Face A Costly David Bednar Question This Offseason
David Bednars path out of Pittsburgh and into free agency has become one of the more interesting offseason subplots for a club that still needs to sharpen its roster in multiple places. The Pirates moved on from him after a rough start to the 2026 season, only to watch him settle in and finish strong, which makes the trade look a little more complicated now than it did in the moment. The prospects Pittsburgh got back are part of the equation too, but the bigger question is what the Pirates are willing to spend if they want to keep a proven late-inning arm in the mix.
Bednar remains a high-end bullpen option, the kind of reliever any contender would be happy to plug into the back end, but Pittsburgh has to weigh that against a broader list of needs. The bullpen can always use help, yet the front office also has other roster areas demanding attention, and thats where the real tension sits for this winter. The Pirates may like the idea of a reunion, but whether they make a serious push could say more about their offseason priorities than about Bednar himself. [Read more 🡒]
Pirates May Be Running Out Of Time On Their Top Offseason Need
The Pirates have spent the early offseason treating second base as their clearest priority, and Brandon Lowe has emerged as the player most tied to that need. Pittsburgh has been weighing ways to address the spot while the free-agent market still has some depth, but the broader backdrop is making the decision harder. The club would prefer to sort through its options with some patience, especially with other second basemen available if the top target proves too expensive or too difficult to land.
The problem is the calendar may not offer much of that patience. A potential MLB lockout could quickly squeeze the Pirates leverage and limit what they can do if negotiations stall, turning what looked like a measured pursuit into a more urgent one. If the market tightens and Lowe remains available, Pittsburgh may have to decide sooner than planned whether to push hard for him or risk watching its top offseason need linger deeper into the winter. [Read more 🡒]
Pirates Still Lack The Late-Game Edge Contenders Rely On
The Pirates gave themselves something to build on with an 82-80 finish in 2026, their first winning season since 2018, but the run only sharpened the conversation around what still separates a good club from a true contender. In a year when the bullpen showed its flaws, Pittsburgh leaned on arms like Mason Montgomery and Yohan Ramrez, yet the late innings often looked more fragile than teams with October expectations can afford.
For a club trying to turn a modest step forward into a real jump, the relief corps remains the part of the roster that most needs sharpening. The Pirates have enough evidence now to know that better late-game run prevention is not just a luxury, and the next few moves will reveal whether they can turn a promising season into one with staying power. [Read more 🡒]