The 2025 season served as a reality check for the Pittsburgh Pirates’ offense.
Missing out on October baseball for the 10th consecutive year, the team's inconsistent offense plagued it for the entirety of the campaign and kept it from even coming close to securing a playoff spot, unable to back up the brilliance of eventual National League Cy Young Award winner Paul Skenes on the mound. Changes had to be made.
Amid the long offseason, Pirates General Manager Ben Cherington got to work. Moving on from veteran outfielder Andrew McCutchen, Cherington revamped Pittsburgh’s batting order by picking up hitters Ryan O’Hearn and Marcell Ozuna off the free agency board. He also added some more punch to Pittsburgh’s lineup via a three-team trade with the Tampa Bay Rays and the Houston Astros, acquiring Brandon Lowe, Jake Mangum, and left-handed pitcher Mason Montgomery.
The expectation was for Pittsburgh’s batting order to take a significant step forward this season with its revamped depth. But nobody could’ve imagined it would be this significant.
Now 61 games into the 2026 campaign, the Pirates have looked like a completely different team at the plate and boast one of baseball’s highest-scoring offenses. Fresh off one of the team’s best months of May in recent memory, that trend continued Tuesday night in Houston against the Astros.
Despite trailing by two runs at one point twice, the Pirates rallied for a 10-6 victory behind three-run homers from Oneil Cruz and Lowe. Endy Rodriguez also helped build the lead with three RBIs on the night. The win marked Pittsburgh's fourth in a row, an ever-important one as it looks to keep pace in a crowded NL Central division.
“Throughout the game I thought our at bats were great top to bottom, everyone continuing to grind out the at bats and keep the line moving and get to the point where we’re able to get guys and base and hit home runs,” Pirates Manager Don Kelly told Sportsnet Pittsburgh postgame.
Racking up double-digit runs isn’t anything new to this team. In fact, it's become something of a habit. Tuesday’s 10 runs marked the sixth time this season the Bucs have reached double-digit runs in a game. They did so only seven times last year, per PM Team host Chris Mueller.
If that’s not enough to show this Pirates team is different, there are plenty more statistics that back the idea. Per MLB.com’s Jason Mackey, the Pirates have hit 72 home runs in 61 games, and are now on pace to surpass last year’s total of 117 by July 19th (game No. 101).
93.7 The Fan Morning Show hosts Adam Crowley and Dorin Dickerson didn’t hesitate to give Pittsburgh’s offense its flowers during their show on Tuesday.
“I thought the offense would be better, I didn’t think it would be this good. Did anybody think it would be this good?,” Crowley said.
“No. No chance,” Dickerson answered.
In the win, Lowe hit his 15th homer in 55 games as a Pirate, the second-most of any Pirate during that span. The only Pittsburgh batter to reach that mark in fewer games to start his career with the club was Garrett Jones, who played for the Pirates from 2009 to 2013, per Alex Stumpf.
Though there’s still plenty of baseball left to be played in 2026, what Pittsburgh’s done in the batter’s box so far this campaign has been eye-opening to say the least. And with every dominant offensive showing the Pirates put up going forward, it will get harder and harder to deny they have the makings of a ‘good’ baseball team.
“Every day they’re doing something special. They might be a great baseball team. This isn’t smoke and mirrors,” Crowley said. “I don’t see this offense coming back down to Earth at all.”
