‘I Want to Help the Pirates Win More Games,’ Ben Cherington Expecting to Return as GM
PITTSBURGH – As the 2025 season comes to an end, the Pittsburgh Pirates are in an all-too-familiar spot.
The Pirates already clinched their 29th losing season in the last 33 years and their seventh sub-.500 season in a row.
Six of those seasons have come since Ben Cherington took over as the team’s general manager prior to the 2020 season. Under Cherington’s watch, the Pirates have yet to sniff a .500 season, let alone a spot in the playoff picture.
Despite the Pirates’ struggles over the past six years, Cherington is operating under the assumption he will continue in his current role.
“I’m certainly doing the job that way,” Cherington said when asked if he was told he will return as GM. “We talk all the time. Haven’t heard anything to the contrary. I don’t know if any of us in this room ever have full assurance of anything, but I want to help the Pirates win more games. That’s it.”
When Cherington was named general manager, it was part of a complete overhaul that saw Travis Williams replace Frank Coonelly as team president and Derek Shelton take over for Clint Hurdle as manager.
The beginning of Cherington’s tenure can be categorized as a complete rebuild with several established big-leaguers being traded away for young talent.
But now in the sixth year, the fruits of that rebuild have yet to blossom. The Pirates enter their penultimate home game of the 2025 season against the Athletics with a 65-89 record and will finish in last place for a third-straight season.
“Sleepless nights, wrestling with it every day,” Cherington said on why the Pirates haven’t gotten better faster. “I think there’s always more than one thing, but the easiest thing to say is we got to score more runs at the major-league level in Pittsburgh.”
Though the Pirates have long been eliminated from the playoff race again this year, Cherington believes his team is closer to competing than the lowly record would indicate, despite dropping 12 of their last 13 games.
“I mean, it’s painful to watch the games [in] the last stretch because it’s not reflective, I don’t believe, of how close we are and how close we can be. With that said, you can’t just hope it’s gonna happen.”
Based on Cherington’s comments, the assumption, as of now, is that he will be the one to try and make that happen.
Though there have been some hiccups at times, the Pirates have built a pitching core that can be described as playoff-caliber. Paul Skenes is arguably the top starting pitcher in baseball and Mitch Keller has given the Pirates about what they’ve expected, though second-half struggles have again been present.
Rookie right-handers Braxton Ashcraft, Mike Burrows and top prospect Bubba Chandler add to the appeal of the pitching staff. Johan Oviedo returned from injury and has been solid, and Jared Jones should return from the IL at some point next season.
But while the Pirates’ pitching staff has been strong, the offense has been anything but. Throughout Cherington’s tenure, that’s been a common theme.
If he does indeed return as general manager, he will need to prove for the first time that he can build a lineup capable of helping catapult the Pirates into the postseason for the first time since 2015. If not, it’s almost impossible he will get another chance in Pittsburgh.
“We gotta score more runs,” he said. “Again, some of that needs to come internally, no doubt. Whether it’s guys that have produced at a high level in the past and getting them back to that level, or improvement from young players. It has to happen. We believe it can happen. And yes, of course, we need to try to strengthen the offense through acquisitions this offseason, too.”
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