The 2026 season is going to be one of the most pivotal seasons the Pittsburgh Pirates have had in a very long time. This is going to be Paul Skenes’ third year in Major League Baseball. The Pirates have also made a legitimate effort to give him some offense. The rest of their pitching staff is also strong. The Pirates have to find some success this year. So what’s the bare minimum level of success we need to see from the Bucs for 2026 to be considered a good year?

The Minimum Amount of Wins

The bare minimum we need to see is 85 wins. Last year, the Bucs only won 71 games. That may seem like a large jump, but it’s not out of the question for the Pirates. Between 2022 and 2023, the Pirates improved by an impressive 14 games. They went from 62 wins to 76. Their offseason additions then pale in comparison to what the Pirates added to their roster between 2025 and 2026.

During the 2022-2023 offseason, their biggest additions consisted of Austin Hedges, Carlos Santana, Connor Joe, Rich Hill, Dauri Moreta, Ji-Man Choi, Joshua Palacios, and the first year of Andrew McCutchen’s three-year reunion.

That’s nothing compared to the additions of Brandon Lowe, Ryan O’Hearn, Marcell Ozuna, Jhostynxon Garcia, Jake Mangum, Gregory Soto, and Mason Montgomery. Not to mention the 2023 Pirates also improved by 14 games without Oneil Cruz for most of the year, didn’t have Skenes in their rotation, and didn’t have a prospect of Konnor Griffin’s caliber waiting in the wings. They have a much better roster compared to 2023.

Not to mention the Pirates also added by subtracting between 2025 and 2026. Ke’Bryan Hayes, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, Ji-Hwan Bae, Jack Suwinski, Alexander Canario, Adam Frazier, and Cam Devanney collected a total of 1557 plate appearances. They also had a combined -61 batting runs. The Pirates improved their lineup dramatically, simply by removing multiple well-below-average bats. All of them also played semi-regular to regular roles at some point in 2025.

2026 Breakouts We Need To See

Improvements in record aren’t the only thing the Pirates need to see. They also need to see improvements from individual players. The biggest is Henry Davis. One thing is for sure: Davis has improved his defensive chops behind the dish. Coming out of college, Davis was known as a bat-first backstop. His defense definitely lived up to expectations in 2024, when he had -4 defensive runs saved and -2.3 framing runs over 271.1 innings behind the plate. He also had -2 blocks above average. However, in 2025, Davis looked like a borderline Gold Glove candidate. He racked up +8 defensive runs saved with +0.5 framing runs. His blocking became significantly better. Davis only allowed two passed balls, and had just -1 blockings above average while catching 681.2 innings.

The bat, however, has not developed as hoped. In 2025, Davis turned in a weak .167/.234/.278 triple-slash, with a .229 wOBA, and a wRC+ of 41 over 283 plate appearances. Davis only walked 6.4% of the time while striking out at a 26.9% rate. He has certainly shown raw power, with an 11.5% barrel rate last year and roughly league-average .366 expected wOBA on contact (or xwOBACON for short). Still, he needs to improve his offensive production. Anything less than an 80 wRC+ means that Davis hasn’t done enough to improve his bat.

Jared Triolo also has to keep taking steps forward. He accomplished one step forward in 2025, batting .227/.311/.356 with a .296 wOBA and an 86 wRC+ over 376 plate appearances. Triolo really figured things out down the line, with a 117 wRC+ after the Pirates called him up at the start of August. That may not seem like much, but it is a sizable upgrade from his .216/.296/.315 slashline, .275 wOBA, and 72 wRC+ from 2024. On top of that, Triolo made key improvements to fundamental parts of the game.

Triolo started making harder contact, upping his exit velocity from 88.4 MPH to 89 MPH. He was less prone to chasing outside the zone and more prone to drawing ball four. His chase and walk rates went from 24.3% and 9.4% in 2024 to 24.1% and 10.4% in 2025. However, his biggest improvement was making contact and avoiding strikeouts. Triolo had a 27.3% whiff rate and struck out at a poor 26.5% rate in 2024. Then in 2025, he had a whiff rate of just 24% with a better-than-average 20.2 K%. Triolo is going to hold down the fort at shortstop until Griffin is ready, then move back to third base when Griffin is in the Major Leagues. Triolo needs to keep moving forward and look more like what he did in August and September of last year.

2026 Rebounds That Need To Happen

If the Pirates want to find success in 2026, they need Cruz to rebound. Cruz hit well in 2024. He batted .259/.324/.449 with a .331 wOBA, and 110 wRC+ over 599 plate appearances. The towering slugger showed off his power, with 21 home runs, 99th percentile exit velocity (95.5 MPH), and 97th percentile barrel rate (15.5%). He also had a respectable 8.5% walk rate. Cruz struck out at a high rate of 30.2%. His xwOBA of .344 and xSLG% of .475 indicated there was bad luck playing a hand.

Cruz started the 2025 season hot. By June 15, Cruz owned a 118 wRC+ and xwOBA of .370 (29 percentage points higher than his wOBA). However, things quickly went off the rails for Cruz. He ended the year with a .200/.298/.378 line, .295 wOBA, and 86 wRC+. While Cruz dramatically improved his walk rate to 11.8%, his strikeout rate also rose to 32%. He was still a huge threat to go yard. Cruz belted 20 home runs over 544 plate appearances with a 100th percentile exit velo (95.8 MPH), and 97th percentile barrel percentage (17.9%). However, it was far from the encore he likely would have wanted to have after a promising 2024.

The Pirates also need Bryan Reynolds to rebound. Reynolds turned in a Reynolds-esque season in 2024, with a .275/.344/.447 line and 118 wRC+ over 692 plate appearances. He provided plenty of power, with 24 home runs, marking his fourth straight 20+ homer campaign. His K% and BB% also clocked in around league average, at 22.5% and 8.2%, respectively. He was expected to be a key contributor in 2025, but slashed just .245/.318/.402 with a .315 wOBA, and 99 wRC+. His BB% remained relatively the same at 8.7%, but he put up a career-worst 26.5 K% (not including his shortened 2020 season).

However, there is certainly hope that Reynolds can rebound in 2026. Reynolds isn’t losing his power. His 91.2 MPH exit velocity was a career-best mark. Both his 10.1% barrel rate and .424 xwOBACON came in around his career-average marks of 9.4% and .421, respectively. He was also in the 72nd percentile of xwOBA at .335. He was the 17th unluckiest batter in 2025 by xwOBA.

Having more protection in the lineup will certainly help. Last year, the only other hitters who were coming off an above-average season at the plate included McCutchen and Horwitz. McCutchen didn’t pose nearly enough of a threat, leaving Horwitz as Cruz and Reynolds’ only line of defense. That shouldn’t be the case this year. Along with Horwitz, Lowe, O’Hearn, and Ozuna were all well-above-average hitters in 2025.

Playoffs?

Having a winning record, getting multiple hitters to break out, and more to rebound isn’t enough. The ultimate end goal of all of this is to make the playoffs. The Pirates cannot have the sort of offseason they had and use another year of Skenes just to miss out on October baseball. Whether that means earning a Wild Card spot, or taking the National League Central, getting to the Postseason should be the bare minimum expectation of this 2026 Pirates team.

 

Main Photo Credit: Jonathan Dyer-Imagn Images