diff --git a/spacy/cli/train.py b/spacy/cli/train.py
index 0a640d909..19880295a 100644
--- a/spacy/cli/train.py
+++ b/spacy/cli/train.py
@@ -137,9 +137,6 @@ def train(
         output_path.mkdir()
         msg.good("Created output directory: {}".format(output_path))
 
-    tag_map = {}
-    if tag_map_path is not None:
-        tag_map = srsly.read_json(tag_map_path)
     # Take dropout and batch size as generators of values -- dropout
     # starts high and decays sharply, to force the optimizer to explore.
     # Batch size starts at 1 and grows, so that we make updates quickly
@@ -250,8 +247,10 @@ def train(
                 pipe_cfg = {}
             nlp.add_pipe(nlp.create_pipe(pipe, config=pipe_cfg))
 
-    # Replace tag map with provided mapping
-    nlp.vocab.morphology.load_tag_map(tag_map)
+    if tag_map_path is not None:
+        tag_map = srsly.read_json(tag_map_path)
+        # Replace tag map with provided mapping
+        nlp.vocab.morphology.load_tag_map(tag_map)
 
     # Create empty extra lexeme tables so the data from spacy-lookups-data
     # isn't loaded if these features are accessed