Fort Myers, Fla. -- Jason Bay looks even more svelte than when he was in his Pirates days. Looks can be deceiving, though. He maintains that he reported to spring training the same 202 pounds as usual. Blame that optical illusion on the Boston Red Sox. The bright-red jersey, he reasoned, "must be slimming."

The trimmed-down version of the club that shed Xavier Nady, Damaso Marte and Bay isn't, from Bay's perspective, falling on times he'd call lean.

"They have the right ideas," he said yesterday from underneath a red B ball cap, inside a Red Sox jersey, sitting in the dugout of the storied franchise's winter home before his new team lost to his old one yesterday, 3-2, at City of Palms Park. "I think a lot of [critics] want to directly relate it to the payroll, which I don't think is the case. ... They're doing it [through rebuilding the minor league system]. They're a very competitive team. I think in the next few years they're probably going to turn the corner."

Probably.

So it wasn't exactly a gushing endorsement. But it was, if nothing else, a relatively positive outlook from the former left fielder and onetime rebuilding centerpiece who made a public cry for management to add more talent in early 2008. Well, trade-deadline deals for Nady and Marte with the Yankees and Bay with the Red Sox, plus an assist from the Dodgers, brought eight new players to the Pirates. They delivered on Bay's plea for more talent, just seven months later, at his expense.

Asked about the Pirates' cycle of trying to rebuild and then having to reload anew with youth, all without a .500 season in his six seasons and a decade prior, Bay shrugged and stammered before finding his groove.

"I think the guys that are over there, and no slight to the guys there before, but I think they understand what it takes in that type of market, building from the ground up, using other models. I think they understand it. And I think people have to understand: It's probably not an overnight plan. So where some of the guys that are there now that are the impact guys [like] the Nates and Doumits and stuff, whether it happens when they're there or not, they could be a big part of the push toward [success in a small market]," Bay said of Nate McLouth and Ryan Doumit. "Having been there last year with the new regime ... they have a plan, and I think it's a good one.

"It definitely started right out of the chute with ... them drafting Pedro Alvarez. For a lot of people, that was probably a big tell-tale sign whether [the new management types] were just talking or whether they meant business." Add that to Pirates bosses abiding by a few of the players' suggestions last season, such as clubhouse improvements, and Bay said of such attention to details big and little: "In turn, you hope that translates to wins."

Out of Bay's mouth and onto the field of City of Palms Park, it came to pass yesterday.

This come-from-behind victory, and 2-0 exhibition start, arrived courtesy of the No. 2 overall selection whom Bay mentioned: Alvarez. This celebrated rookie got his first professional hit and his first professional RBI, then scored the winning run as the Pirates rallied for three ninth-inning tallies against a mostly minor-league lineup. The Red Sox, you see, had played two games the day before.

Bay, who sat and watched yesterday after going 0 for 3 against the Twins Wednesday night, remains more than comfortable with the tradition-steeped club that won two of the previous five World Series. He went from Pirates epicenter to medium-sized cog in a Red Sox clubhouse lined with David Ortiz, Jason Varitek, Josh Beckett, Daisuke Matsuzaka, fan favorite Kevin Youkilis and now Brad Penny plus John Smoltz. He batted .293 with nine homers in 37 RBIs the final two months last season and then .341 with three homers and nine RBIs in his inaugural two playoff series.

"It was different, obviously, in a lot of aspects," Bay said. "Everything changed in a day, in 24 hours. It was like, boom, here. You get put into a situation that's completely foreign to you. ... Basically, I was in the playoffs for three months. That's what it felt like.

"You get a chance to come here and the race they were in, I couldn't have picked a better situation. There's a lot that goes into wearing this jersey before and after 7 o'clock. Especially coming from the situation I did, it wasa lot different."