Andrew McCutchen sends strong social media message to Pirates after Marcell Ozuna deal

There are subtle ways to say goodbye — and then there's this.

Less than 24 hours after the Pittsburgh Pirates finalized a one-year deal with Marcell Ozuna, franchise icon Andrew McCutchen appeared to remove the photo of himself in a Pirates jersey from his social media profiles.

No press release. No dramatic caption. No public grievance. Just a quiet, unmistakable message.

From a strictly baseball perspective, you can make the case. Ozuna profiles as the more obvious power bat at this stage. Even in a “down” 2025 season, he walked nearly 16% of the time and still cleared 20 home runs. The Pirates desperately needed run production, and Ozuna gives them that — at least on paper.

But this was never just about the box score. This was about how you treat a franchise cornerstone.

McCutchen isn’t just another aging veteran trying to hang on. He’s the face of a generation of Pirates baseball. An MVP. A Gold Glover. A Silver Slugger. The player who made PNC Park electric again. The bridge between irrelevance and belief.

If the Pirates had already decided to move on, that’s their right. Baseball is a business, after all. Front offices make difficult decisions. Rosters evolve. Sentiment can’t override performance forever.

But at the end of the day, transparency and respect cost nothing.

And yet, McCutchen was left twisting in the wind all offseason — publicly expressing his desire to return, posting reflective videos, sharing scripture about patience — while the organization explored every other offensive option first. Kyle Schwarber. Eugenio Suárez. Framber Valdez as a splashy pivot. Anyone but the franchise legend waiting in plain sight.

Andrew McCutchen deserved better than the treatment he received from the Pirates this offseason

Ozuna wasn’t just a signing. It was a signal. And McCutchen responded in the only way he needed to: by erasing the visual tie. It’s not petty. It’s not dramatic. It’s final.

The Pirates could have picked up the phone weeks or even months ago and said, “We’re going a different direction.” Instead, they created the perception — fair or not — that McCutchen was the fallback plan if better options didn’t materialize. For a player who carried the organization through its darkest modern era, that stings.

Baseball decisions are one thing. Cultural decisions are another. When you mishandle a franchise icon, fans notice. Clubhouses notice. Players around the league notice.

Maybe this was always going to end this way. Maybe the Pirates genuinely believe Ozuna gives them a better chance to win in 2026. That’s a defensible argument. But how you close chapters matters. And when Andrew McCutchen quietly removes the Pirates from his profile, it doesn’t feel like a roster move. It feels like an era finally — and unnecessarily — pushed out the door.