ATLANTA -- Sell this team. Right now.
This, my friends, is rock bottom.
Bryan Reynolds has requested that the Pirates trade him, per Jason Mackey of the Post-Gazette, and that reporting was subsequently confirmed by several national outlets, which not only affirms its veracity but also strongly suggests it originated with Reynolds' representation, since agents are invariably the common denominator when in that realm of the Major League Baseball world.
Meaning Reynolds really, truly -- and finally -- wants out.
The last I'd communicated with Reynolds was two months ago. It was face-to-face. It felt as genuine as every other conversation I'd had with him, since he's anything but a liar, and he'd be a supremely lousy actor. And within that, he spoke of excitement about the young talent in Pittsburgh, about being part of it, about the future they were all expecting to enjoy before long.
I wasn't alone. He'd had similar conversations with others.
It's now painfully apparent that something happened since then.
Might've been a simple clearing of the head and changing of the mind. Reynolds is a richly competitive sort, invested in all 162 games, and he doesn't easily accept distraction, as I'd witnessed on countless occasions.
Might've been not having that multi-year extension that Ke'Bryan Hayes got, despite multiple attempts, including one recent one. According to one report this afternoon, the team recently offered Reynolds an extension that’d exceed Hayes’ in total value, but, one, we don’t know the term and, two, Reynolds is a far better — and more reliable — player Besides, all of this could’ve/should’ve been done forever ago, given the low payrolls and profit that’s being taken annually
Might've been hearing from others around him that this team's plan, as of two months ago, was to punt on the 2023 season. To stall for yet another year while awaiting what's perceived internally as a cavalry of prospects from Class AA Altoona. I reported that at the time, and it wasn't until the past few days, perhaps not coincidentally, that Ben Cherington signed Carlos Santana for $6.7 million and, more striking, started speaking suddenly of how much next year means to the franchise.
Might've been a talk I'm told Reynolds recently had with a former Pittsburgh player who reacted incredulously when Reynolds described being happy here.
Might've been something else altogether, for all anyone seems to know at the moment.
Here's my guess: It's Bob Nutting.
Same as it is with everyone else in our city, the public included.
It's Nutting's cheapness. It's his lack of personal/financial capital put into winning. It's the endless prioritization of pinching every last penny, including all through the indefensible haggling with Reynolds himself this past spring over a simple arbitration extension.
And oh, yeah, it's the people Nutting's hired. Because in the three-plus years of this front office, under Travis Williams and Cherington, in that order, this team's shown fight only at field level. Only when one of the few remaining performers from the previous administration, like Reynolds after he was acquired in the Andrew McCutchen trade, lays out for a sinking liner in shallow center. And because in the three-plus years Derek Shelton's been at the helm, there were a few too many occasions of the manager not having his best player's back.
At the risk of being robustly obvious, these men haven't shown anywhere near the competitiveness -- even now that they've already got a handful of promising youngsters in Pittsburgh -- that anyone anywhere would want to see from people running, of all things, a sports franchise.
Well, almost anywhere.
Under Nutting, winning is welcome. But it's a bonus. It's a bow on top of the business component. And that, unfortunately, both afflicts and infects every other vein that courses through this operation. It was that way under Frank Coonelly and Neal Huntington, and it's now that way under these guys.
The team issued a statement after the Reynolds news broke: “While it is disappointing, this will have zero impact on our decision-making this off-season or in the future. Our goal is to improve the Pirates for 2023 and beyond. With three years until he hits free agency, Bryan remains a key member of our team. We look forward to him having a great season for the Pirates.”
Uh, no. That's not how sports work. That's oblivious beyond belief.
The source of the bigger-scope problem, as I've been writing for half a decade now, is at the very top. And while I've also criticized those under him, at times more robustly since they're more directly responsible on a day-to-day basis, the path's always been unmistakable.
Nutting needs to be the next to go.
This is the 137-year civic institution, the permanent home to five World Series champions, 13 Hall of Famers and the global legend of Roberto Clemente, and this owner, a temporary steward as they all are, has done enough damage to cross over generations. I'd thought so little of Coonelly and Huntington that, upon their firing, I dropped the #OurTeamNotHis hashtag that'd taken off on social media and gave all concerned a second chance. I'm kind like that.
Enough's enough.
Either the owner goes, or every Reynolds who happens to come along will go.
