Pirates fans will officially be ready to revolt against Bob Nutting after insider's reveal

The Pittsburgh Pirates are notorious for refusing to spend money. But contrary to popular belief, it's not because they don't have money to spend.

MLB insider Bob Nightengale of USA Today Sports reported that the Pirates make a yearly profit comparable to that of the top teams in baseball. Instead of reinvesting the money earned from revenue sharing to produce a better on-field product, however, team ownership pockets the money.

"The Pittsburgh Pirates, according to information received by the players union and confirmed by several owners, are one of the most profitable teams in all of baseball, stashing a huge chunk of their revenue sharing monies instead of investing in their team year after year," Nightengale wrote.

And thus, the worst fears of Pirates fans were confirmed. Principal owner and chairman Bob Nutting cares more about maximizing profit than producing a winning product.

The Pirates had a projected Opening Day payroll of $89,975,500, according to Cot's Contracts. That's nearly $20 million less than their next-closest National League Central opponent in the Milwaukee Brewers ($109,141,136). That's not a new phenomenon, either; the Pirates have routinely been near the bottom of the league in payroll for the past two decades under Nutting's ownership.

The largest free agent deal the Pirates have ever made was when they signed left-handed starting pitcher Francisco Liriano for three years at $39 million in 2015. The last multi-year contract they signed a free agent to was right-handed starting pitcher Ivan Nova (three years at $26 million) in 2017.

Pirates fans will officially be ready to revolt against Bob Nutting after insider's reveal

The MLB's revenue sharing model distributes league revenue across all 30 teams in an effort to benefit smaller-market teams (like the Pirates). While owners are technically not required to reinvest all of that revenue into their teams, one would think that the Pirates consistently being one of the worst teams in baseball would be enough to convince the team's ownership to spend.

Make no mistake – the Pirates aren't refusing to spend because they are bound by financial constraints. They're making tens of millions annually in revenue sharing alone, and that's all that matters to Nutting. He remains content counting his money behind closed doors, refusing to spend in free agency while his embarrassment of a baseball team continues to be the laughingstock of the league.

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