Cherington to Bucs: ‘Take a breath’

It’s a little early to start thinking about the Pearl Jam concerts at PPG Paints Arena on May 16 and 18. But Pittsburgh Pirates general manager Ben Cherington wants his players to channel their inner Eddie Vedder and “Just Breathe.”

“In the clubhouse, what I see is maybe just taking a breath,” Cherington said during his weekly radio appearance on 93.7 The Fan on Sunday afternoon. “I’ve seen some examples where guys look like they’re trying to do too much. As we know, in baseball, that’s a difficult way to play the game. It’s a hard game to play that way. Inside our clubhouse, maybe just a little bit (of) taking a breath. Focus on things we can control.”

You can understand why the Pirates’ players have perhaps felt like they were being suffocated in recent days. First of all, the New York Yankees prevented the Pirates from coming up for air on Friday and Saturday. They totaled 19 runs on 27 hits over the first two games of the 2025 home slate of games at PNC Park, posting wins of 9-4 and 10-4.

Then, of course, there was the weight of the entire fanbase on their collective chest, booing the manager and chanting for the owner to sell the team at every turn throughout the weekend.

That was the case at least until the Bucs won a 5-4 extra-innings game over the Bronx Bombers on Sunday, courtesy of a Tommy Pham RBI.

“It’s always good to have a moment like that, especially when you are new to the team,” Pham said. “It can also propel things for you individually.”

Asking this motley collection of Pirates to carry the weight of what is essentially 46 years of frustration is patently unfair to most of the roster.

For their own individual play, sure, each player bears the responsibility for his own performance. However, it’s illogical to look at, say, Enmanuel Valdez and connect him to blowing a lead in Game 7 of the 1992 NLCS.

No one in the stadium should be booing Caleb Ferguson because the Pirates’ ownership and management deconstructed the 98-win roster at the end of 2015 and have since failed to ever put it back together again.

Nothing in pro sports is fair, though, and whoever wears that black and gold uniform is subject to the angst of a fan base that hasn’t seen a full playoff series win since 1979.

When you yell at a customer service rep because your connecting flight to San Francisco got canceled for no particular reason, you know it’s not their fault that you are grounded in Chicago. But they also can’t do anything to get you back in the air again until tomorrow morning. So you are going to let ’em have it.

That, to an extent, is the role of the Pirates’ current roster. They are the ones who are going to hear it when the crowd turns ugly.

“He’s probably right. We kind of needed to get a breather,” starting pitcher Andrew Heaney said of Cherington’s comments. “Maybe get back home and establish who we are as a team and how we are going to win games. The first two games here didn’t go the way we wanted them to. I mean, (expletive), the season started, and the first three losses were walk-off losses. You’re kind of just getting hit with a body blow.”

Granted, Pittsburgh’s players need to be better. Oneil Cruz has to learn how to play center field. The bullpen has to be tighter. Every now and then, Jack Suwinski has to make contact.

That said, trying to hit a grand slam with no one on base every time the fans start chanting “Sell-The-Team” is going to get counterproductive awfully fast.

“How it manifests is trying to be too perfect. You are trying to do everything right and not wanting to make a mistake instead of just playing the game freely,” manager Derek Shelton said. “A win helps you take a breath. Ben is exactly right. One thing we can’t overanalyze is that it’s (been) 10 games, and (in) the first four games, we had the lead late in the game. … Yeah, we probably have some guys who need to take a breath. Hopefully, a game like this allows you to stand back and maybe exhale a little bit.”

There’s only one guy who can do anything about the fan frustration over the lack of spending on payroll. That’s owner Bob Nutting himself.

Similarly, these Pirates players can’t trade themselves, sign themselves, demote or promote themselves, or write themselves on the lineup card in the proper spots they should be playing.

Those decisions are up to Cherington and Shelton, respectively.

All these Pirates can do is try to play better, and there’s plenty there to keep them busy enough for a while.

But, sure, taking a breath and realizing they aren’t the ones directly responsible for correcting four decades of front-office mismanagement might be a good place to start.