Bob Nightengale, who writes for whatever's left of the USA Today brand, included the following single-bullet entry about 40 paragraphs deep into his Sunday column:

USA TODAY

Not at all surprisingly, this would soon be taken seriously by some. Or they'd just pretend to take it seriously.

And not just the laziest usuals in the local media who'll chirp us at every chance, if only because they're too unmotivated and/or understaffed to have attempted to do any version of our special report on the Pirates' finances themselves. So, instead of trying to compete with the company that's now the market leader in page views, app downloads, video views, podcast downloads and probably hot dogs sold within the near future ... they try to cut down.

Remember what I once wrote about the Vontaze/Pacman Bengals?

That. Exactly that.

Anyway, to Nightengale's thing:

• The only distinction that should matter is that he's referring to the Pirates having been profitable in general. Hence the couched term "year after year" that he uses. Our special report was very specifically and pointedly about the 2024 season. That was our aim at the outset, and it was our sole conclusion. Everyone everywhere knows the team's been profitable over the years. Hell, the team's acknowledged that, even on top of the two sets of books that made their way into the public. But Nightengale says nothing about 2024.

• Once more for emphasis: The Pirates have been profitable for a long time. They weren't in the COVID years -- no team was -- and they weren't in 2024. Simple stuff.

• In this industry, if you've got some big or even big-ish scoop, you're not asking the reader to scroll down for a half-hour to find a single paragraph. But I'm getting sent stuff today being asked to respond to "a report." That's no report. It's padding the ending of a notebook.

• Nightengale's one of the last reporters in the country anyone would want to utilize on baseball business matters. He openly roots for the Dodgers on his social media account, he makes fun of fans who suggest that L.A. has an unfair advantage and, even in the very bullet before the one on the Pirates, boasts about how they spend $6 million a year to fly not one but two charter planes everywhere they go. Seriously, people.

• Nightengale's another in a disturbingly long list of reporters who a) don't cover beats/teams but who b) get everything they get from agents. In Nightengale's case, as with most, a lot of that comes from Scott Boras, whose influence has to be experienced to be believed. Boras happens to be quoted in this very column. 

• Boras is terrified of a salary cap. I once spent an entire summer back-and-forthing on the phone with him, during the Pedro Alvarez debacle, and I learned a ton about how he thinks, about baseball's system, about owners, about himself. He'd sooner lie down on train tracks than allow the union, which he still manipulates -- though not as much over the past couple years -- to accept a cap system of any kind. I'm just throwing this in because the one scenario in which owners could most plausibly unite behind a cap is if a significant number of them are losing money.

• The Pirates lost money in 2024. I've learned since that report that several other teams are, as well. And in fact, there's been public reporting to that effect in St. Paul, Phoenix and Denver. Don't see any of the chirpers bringing those up.

• The bright side of all this: We have the status that we do, I'd hope, because of your trust. And because there are more of you than there are of anyone reading, viewing or listening to any other outlet covering the Steelers, Penguins and Pirates. As I'm often reminded around here, that's why some of them -- not all -- react the way they do. Rather than simply venturing to do better work and build a bigger audience of their own.

• Closing with this, then getting back to the football column I'd been writing: We'll keep pushing harder than everyone else. If that ticks people off, that'll say far more about them and their audience than it says about us or our audience.