Cherington: Bucs may have more up their sleeve

PITTSBURGH -- Another round of Starling Marte trade rumors came and went on Friday, but the Pirates’ roster remained unchanged.

That’s been the case for most of the offseason, even after Pirates chairman Bob Nutting introduced new team president Travis Williams, general manager Ben Cherington and manager Derek Shelton. Pittsburgh’s most significant additions to this point have been catcher Luke Maile and outfielder Guillermo Heredia, while the club lost veteran free agents Melky Cabrera and Francisco Liriano before cutting ties with pitcher Dario Agrazal and non-tendering catcher Elias Díaz.

Opening Day is two months away, and Spring Training begins in a little more than two weeks. But Cherington implied the Pirates could make moves between now and those dates, saying the club is “definitely engaged on a number of things.”

Cherington offered no specifics but hinted at areas where he might add, noting the club is interested in acquiring more outfield depth -- which, it’s worth noting, will be necessary if they’re going to trade Marte -- along with further pitching and catching depth.

• Pirates may be ramping up efforts to trade Marte

“Beyond that, probably more opportunistic. Where are the opportunities left?” Cherington said on Friday, shortly before the start of the club’s annual PiratesFest at PNC Park. “We have players to start a season. We can have an Opening Day roster right now if we want to, but we’d like to add some depth in some areas and then we’d also like to continue to look for opportunities where we think there’s an opportunity that helps the Pirates short- and long-term.”

In other words, their roster could transform throughout the year. Shelton said Thursday that the club is still evaluating its own roster. But maybe they’ll find the right deal for Marte before Spring Training or the July 31 Trade Deadline. Maybe they’ll dip into the pool of remaining free agents before Opening Day arrives.

“The one great thing about working with Ben is he communicates extremely well,” Shelton said. “When I came into this job, it was eyes wide open. ‘We’re going to have change at times and there’s going to be things that happen.’ As long as we’re aware of it and we continue to communicate on it, I think that’s just how we’re going to operate.”

The Pirates seemingly don’t have an appetite for a full-scale rebuild, which is understandable given their collection of young, controllable players on top of upper-level prospects. But they haven’t meaningfully complemented or added to that young core, which lost 93 games last year, and their Opening Day payroll is currently projected to be around $60 million.

Asked to explain the club’s plan for 2020, Cherington began with three words: “Just getting better.” But to build a sustainable winning team, he later acknowledged, the Pirates need to improve their talent base. Specifically, he said, “We need more players with more collective upside.”

“The way I’m looking at the team is that we’ve got good players. We need to help them be better. We need to add in order to build a winning team. And we won 69 games last year. That’s what we’re working off of,” Cherington said. “So that helps us, I think, be clear on the amount of work that’s required to get to the point where we’re playing meaningful games in September and October, and we’re going to work as hard as we can to do that.”

Around the horn

• Cherington said the punishment levied upon the Astros for using technology to steal opponents’ signs in 2017-18 won’t have any effect on Pirates bench coach Don Kelly, who was Houston’s first-base coach last year, or special assistant Oz Ocampo, who held the same role with the Astros the past three years.

• Cherington added that right fielder Gregory Polanco is set to have a “full, healthy season” after rehabbing his surgically repaired shoulder this offseason, but the club could manage his workload as early as Spring Training to be cautious with him.

• Third base could be a position to watch this spring. Cherington said incumbent Colin Moran is “working really hard,” but he added that the Pirates “expect that to be a competitive situation where we want to give some others a chance to show what they can do, too.” Prospect Ke'Bryan Hayes has long been viewed as the club’s future at third base, though it’s unclear if he’ll be deemed ready for the Majors on Opening Day.

“Long term, to build this winning team, we’re looking for more production defensively and offensively out of third base,” Cherington said.

• It’s been assumed since former closer Felipe Vázquez was arrested last year that right-hander Keone Kela, who served as closer for the Rangers, would step into that role this season. Shelton pumped the brakes on that a bit, saying only that Kela “is going to pitch at the back end of games.”

“To specifically say, ‘He’s going to be our closer,’ not going to say that. I think he’s going to pitch very meaningful innings at the back end of games,” Shelton said. “There are multiple people who could be in the mix that are going to be pitching at the back end of games and big innings for us. I’ve expressed that to those guys and told them that. As we get into Spring Training and work further, we’ll be able to make that decision.”