It's not on his to-do list.fjk090852-7 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 30, 2025 3:48 am Seen some information this evening about Verdugo and Grichuk it appears Boston, Kansas and Houston have interest in one or the other player. If this is true the Pirates have little chance of signing either player. Looks like dumpster diving again this year. Thank you Bob for not giving us a competitive baseball team.
We can talk all day about how cheap he is. But I don't even think that's the issue. I don't believe Nutting is thinking, "I'd love for the Pirates to be strong contenders but I just don't want to spend the money." He's just not competitive, at least not in the dynamic of sports. I believe he sees his team ownership as a successful (i.e., profitable) business. Maybe he feels competitive in terms of where he ranks in profit. Or maybe that doesn't matter to him as long as his business is profitable. The final score of games is not a concern. Being in last place doesn't matter. If other owners want to get all wrapped up in how their team is fairing on the field, that's up to them. But Nutting is just running a business that happens to be part of MLB. There's even prestige in being 1 of 30 MLB team owners regardless of the product on the field.
His methods make him unavoidably unpopular with all the fans who have an interest in his product. But that's just the cost of doing business. He deals with that by keeping a low profile. Nutting is essentially a carpetbagger. He stepped in when McClatchy couldn't afford to have the team and hijacked the franchise to make it his personal money-making enterprise rather than the competitive baseball operation the fan base wanted it to be. He even flirted with on-field success in 2013-15 but, despite record attendance, decided results don't matter and went in another direction. Every move the Pirates make (or fail to make) simply reinforces the idea that this franchise is not being operated as a competitive sports venture. Cherington is the front man who has to move the chess pieces around in a game that can't be won while making meaningless statements to the public about trying to win games. But as fans, it seems pointless to expect anything more than what we see them do every frustrating year.