Let's be fair here, the Pirates built a small ball park because they sucked for years before it was built and no one was showing up. Having maybe 20k at a Bucs game in Three Rivers that held 50k wasn't a good look. So they turned around and designed their 'small intimate ballpark'. It's the same end point Snyder is going towards with FedEx, just coming in from a different direction, by removing half the upper bowl for the same reason.
Now, credit where it's due. PNC is a fantastically designed building, and the Pirates and HOK deserves all the praise they've gotten for how it turned out. But if they were a better drawing team that stadium would have been built with a club level with an additional 5,000 seats.