Ivan Nova did just about everything a team could ask of its starting pitcher, but the Pirates were unable to back their veteran righty.
One swing — a fourth-inning solo homer by the Cubs' Ian Happ in his hometown — made the difference as Jon Lester and three relievers combined to blank the Pirates, 1-0, in their first game back home after completing a nine-game road trip Thursday at PNC Park.
Nova, usually a ground-ball pitcher, mixed his elevations with some success. He allowed seven hits and did not walk a batter in 6 2/3 innings, but his record on the year dropped to 7-7, a .500 mark that matches the Pirates' 61-61 record with 40 games to play.
TAP ABOVE FOR BOXSCOREClint Hurdle had plenty to be disappointed about from his hitters, but he talked about Nova's outing, including his use of the top of the strike zone, in glowing terms.
"I thought he pitched a really good game. Outs are outs, and when you're elevating the ball, you're going to get balls in the air. That was part of his plan tonight," Hurdle said. "He used the fastball all over the place — in, away, up and in, doubled up in. He used the backdoor breaking ball. He used the curve ball, that came around in about the third inning. The changeup he used, actually it was the ball that was hit out, but it was a good pitch for him tonight, and then the sinker. He used his whole arsenal tonight."
All that praise wasn't much consolation for a disappointed Nova in the locker room after the game.
Nova threw 66 of his 97 pitches for strikes and kept the Cubs mostly off-balance, though he did give up long fly balls to the warning track to David Bote and Willson Contreras on his first time through the order.
But as Hurdle said, that was a byproduct of Nova working high in the zone early in the game, and it set him up to work down and away on his second and third trips down the Cubs' lineup. After Happ's home run and a single by Albert Almora Jr. on the next at-bat, Nova retired 10 of the next 12 batters before being lifted in the seventh.
"If you know the other guys, especially the lefties, like to hit the sinker down in the zone, sometimes you try to elevate a little bit and move their eye level," Nova said.
The rest of the Pirates' pitching also was effective, as Richard Rodríguez allowed only Bote to reach base on a hit by pitch in 1 1/3 innings, and Felipe Vázquez allowed only a walk of Contreras in the ninth.
Lefty problems could be mounting
Lester was a challenge for the Pirates to touch all night. He struck out eight and allowed only five hits and no walks in six innings of work, and only once did he allow a runner beyond first base.
"He got outs, and I felt like we were going to push, and it never happened," Hurdle said. "He continued to make pitches. We got his pitch count up a little, but he pitched six strong innings. He competes, and I thought we had some pitches to do something with, but we weren't able to, and he'd come back and make better pitches."
The Pirates' best chance to score came in the fifth, after Josh Harrison and Adeiny Hechaverria hit back-to-back two-out singles, putting Harrison on third. That brought up Nova, and in a 1-0 game with his starter throwing well, Hurdle let the pitcher hit. Nova took balls on the first three pitches, but Lester battled back to a full count. Nova fouled off a pair of payoff-pitch fastballs, but Lester finally got out of the inning by getting a swinging strike on the eighth pitch.
"That's a hard one, and it's not so much the way your guy's pitching, it's the way the other guy is pitching. But I still felt confident when we flipped the lineup around that we were going to score one run," Hurdle said.
While the struggles against Lester wouldn't seem like a problem in a vacuum — he was an All-Star for the fifth time this season and is 13-5 on the year — the Pirates have had some growing struggles against effective left-handers.
They began their nine-game road trip with a 2-0 loss to the Rockies in which lefty Kyle Freeland allowed two hits over seven innings. Later on the trip in San Francisco, the Pirates got three runs in five innings off Giants lefty Derek Holland but did most of their damage against the bullpen in a 13-10 loss.
Now, after Lester's quality start, the Pirates will have to figure out some way to generate offense against left-handers, or they could be in for a long homestand. The Cubs will send three more lefties to the hill — Cole Hamels, Mike Montgomery and José Quintana — during this four-game series, and then the Braves will come to town with lefty Shawn Newcomb likely in line to start on Wednesday.
Hello, Newman
As Hurdle went to his bench in the eighth inning, pinch hitting for both Hechaverria and Rodríguez, it set the stage for newly promoted shortstop Kevin Newman to make his major league debut in the ninth inning.
Going to the new call-up in that situation was a no-brainer, according to Hurdle. With Jordy Mercer on the disabled list, Newman was brought up because he is the second-best defensive shortstop option the club has behind Hechaverria.
"It was unbeliveable. I can't say enough. It's a dream come true to go out there and be playing shortstop for a major league team, let alone the Pittsburgh Pirates," Newman said. "They told me I was actually going to pinch-run if either of the guys that went up that inning got on. That didn't happen, and they said, 'You're going to short'. I was, 'All right, cool,' started to stretch a little bit and went out there and just kind of peeked up and saw the stadium and the fans. It was a pretty surreal moment."
Newman didn't have a ball hit his way, the closest coming when Addison Russell grounded out to David Freese at third to end the inning, but it was still a first taste for a player who is likely to see a start or two while Mercer is absent.
As the Pirates batted in the bottom of the ninth, Newman knew he was unlikely to see an at-bat, but the thought of a walk-off debut did cross his mind when Cubs closer Pedro Strop plunked Freese to put a runner on base with two outs.
"I wasn't (thinking about it) at that moment, but when Freese got on, I was kind of like, if I get up, this is going to be a good situation, a good opportunity with the game on the line," Newman said. "That would have been great, but unfortunately, it didn't happen tonight. But, yeah, I was excited."
Happ the homecoming hero
The difference-making swing was the 13th homer of the year for Happ, a graduate of nearby Mt. Lebanon High School. When the second-year big leaguer deposited the 2-0 changeup into the stands in right-center field, it was met with a fair amount of applause from the many Cubs and Happ fans who occupied the sections behind the first-base dugout.
It is the second time Happ, a versatile switch-hitter who manned left field Thursday, has homered at PNC Park. The 24-year-old seems on track to, if he hasn't already, assume the title of best active MLB player from Western Pennsylvania, and he is playing a valuable role for the NL Central-leading Cubs (70-50).