MILWAUKEE -- "We'll keep fighting. We have to."
That was Gregory Polanco. I could barely hear him. Minutes earlier, five-plus hours into a game at Miller Park, he and Elias Diaz had been celebrating what should have been the winning runs in the 15th inning.
That's runs, plural.
The Pirates lost to the Brewers, 7-6.
After overcoming a four-run deficit on their starter's first 14 pitches.
After tying the score in the ninth inning down to their final strike.
After every available inning was squeezed from a short-handed bullpen in the fantastic form of 10 scoreless innings.
After all that ...
That up there is Clay Holmes. He had no business entering this stadium without buying a ticket.
He's 25 years old, he's a ninth-round draft pick from 2011, and that dude would rather have been anywhere on the planet than that mound on this night. It's not just that it took him 30 pitches -- half of them balls, two of them wild pitches, one of them nearly decapitating home plate umpire D.J. Reyburn as it sailed to the backstop -- to give up three walks and the tying and winning hits by Erik Kratz and Orlando Arcia.
It's that he undid everything that had come before. It's that this might have been the most draining, most devastating defeat of the summer, and it all came down to him.
Unfair?
Don't pick on the kid?
Just one game?
Hey, sorry, but that symbolic ship sailed as far as Holmes' fastball a long time ago. Because here's what counts: This front office has been in charge for a decade, and their drafting/developing is demonstrably the worst in all of Major League Baseball in that time, and we've now formally reached the stage where that's no longer a footnote.
It's front and freaking center:
This front office no longer enjoys the luxury of being able to cite happy prospect rankings or hoist Baseball America trophies. We're a decade into this. Prospects needed to be players by, oh, five years ago. And so far, despite spending more money and having better draft position than any team in the majors, all that's completed the journey to Pittsburgh -- meaning made it and really stuck -- is this: Pedro Alvarez, Gerrit Cole, Jameson Taillon and Jordy Mercer. The first three were all taken within the top two overall picks of the draft. Adam Frazier and Josh Bell are here, but neither's entrenched. Austin Meadows and Tyler Glasnow just might make it with the Rays, but they haven't done so yet, either.
Who am I missing?
And yeah, I'm including prospects or drafted players who were traded away, just as I'm very fairly leaving the Latin American free agents in their own bracket since that's an autonomous set of scouts.
Anyway, let's swing back to this game: The Pirates were off Thursday, embarking for the nine-game trip that began with this game, and Neal Huntington and his lieutenants could have summoned anyone they wanted from Class AAA Indianapolis to support what all concerned still insist is a playoff push.
They called up Holmes.
They handpicked this guy who's now made seven appearances in the majors, including three starts, and has given up in his 17 2/3 innings the following: 22 hits, 17 walks and 16 runs for an 8.15 ERA.
They handpicked this guy who was utterly petrified in Los Angeles a couple months ago -- I was there, saw it on and off the field -- who completely imploded in that now-infamous 'biometric data' spot start in San Francisco, and who in this game was so visibly rattled that first Ray Searage, then Diaz made separate mound visits without telling him anything other than to calm down. And unless my eyes weren't messing with me, I'd swear Diaz stopped putting down signs, presumably because they knew their only prayer of a strike was a fastball.
They were panicking over a pitcher. In the major leagues.
This was their choice:
Yikes.
Look, this isn't to bury Holmes. That would actually miss the point. Whether or not he'll eventually shake out of his issues -- or even just stop shaking -- what stands out on this night, at the risk of pounding this to pieces, is that this was their choice. This was, in the context of this game, this trip, this perceived playoff push, their choice.
After 10 years of acquiring, instructing and motivating talent from the amateur ranks to the pros, this was their choice. And it's been the same story again and again and again all through that time. The 2013-15 playoff teams, as history will powerfully attest, were built through free agency and trades, and those are the antithesis of a sustainable winning model for a team that spends so little on payroll.
There are symptoms, and there are causes. This is the cause. And until it's addressed, meaning all the way from the top, the symptoms won't change.
• Did Clint Hurdle really have no other option besides Holmes?
I put that question directly to the manager:
I'd already presumed Kyle Crick wasn't available and, as you heard, he wasn't. His lower back flared up following that line drive he took there Wednesday night at PNC Park.
I'd also presumed Steven Brault wasn't going to be allowed to go longer than the four high-quality innings he pitched, and that, too, was confirmed. His pitch count of 58 was a season high, and he'd already exceeded the pregame "pitch target" set by Searage.
There literally was nothing for Hurdle to do aside from considering a position player or throwing one of his starters off by a day. Given that Chris Archer's set to return Sunday from an injury of his own, the latter wouldn't have worked.
What was needed here was a minor-league callup who could perform at an above-catastrophic level. Those clearly are scarce.
• Hurdle, on Holmes: "It's command. We've seen shades of that the last three times he's been out there."
Oh, good. So that explains why the front office would bring him back for more at this particular time.
• Sean Rodriguez returned from his latest DL stint. He batted with a runner in scoring position in the 11th. He struck out. He's 1 for his past 21.
(This must be how zookeepers feel when they toss 20 raw steaks into a lion's den.)
Here again, a player needed to be activated or promoted from Indianapolis to fill a vacancy on the 25-man. They handpicked Rodriguez. And from the mouth of Huntington himself in recent weeks, Rodriguez keeps getting chances because they feel he gives them the best chance of helping in a playoff push.
Rodriguez was their choice.
And if you want to know why, go back up to that graphic and check the options.
TAP ABOVE FOR BOXSCORE• Before I go further, while still on this subject: Good for Kevin Newman to get that first big-league hit, a slashed double to left in his first at-bat. He nearly had another in the next but was robbed by Mike Moustakas on the third base chalk. He added a single to open the 10th and a full-count walk in the 14th.
Anybody from Indianapolis contributing anything is obviously welcome.
That said, Newman blew it in the 10th when not tagging from second on Diaz's deep out to right-center. Joey Cora's a bad third base coach, but he made the right call on that one. Newman just never looked.
It's amazing to me how many diehard fans of the Pirates, to this day, don't realize that Andrew McCutchen, Neil Walker, Tony Watson and Jared Hughes, key players on the three playoff teams, were all Dave Littlefield draft picks. In fact, Littlefield, Ed Creech and Brian Graham also drafted and developed Steve Pearce, Rajai Davis, Matt Capps, Nyjer Morgan, Paul Maholm, Tom Gorzelanny and Zach Duke. And those gentlemen were in charge for only six years compared to the current front office's 10.
• I don't call many, so I'll take a lap for this one:
Kela gets out of a two-out jam in the eighth, setting up the Pirates for the ninth vs. Jeremy Jeffress: Diaz, Polanco, Freese are due up. It's crazy, but I actually think they'll come through. #DKPS #Pirates
— Dejan Kovacevic (@Dejan_Kovacevic) August 25, 2018
It's a shame. This would have been just one win, obviously, but it would have been uplifting, I've no doubt, based on the intensity shown in the dugout and especially in the game's bigger moments, such as Starling Marte's tying RBI single in the ninth:
Instead, it's four losses in a row, three games under .500, 8 1/2 out of the wild card, etc.
• Joe Musgrove couldn't have started worse: His first pitch resulted in a double to deep center, his next pitch resulted in a two-run home run for Christian Yelich, his fourth pitch resulted in a lasered single, and his 17th pitch resulted in Moustakas pounding his own two-run home run way up into Prince Fielder territory:
Just like that, that, that and that, it was 4-0.
He suspected the Brewers recognized that he'd been pumping the zone for first-pitch strikes in recent starts.
"It's part of the price you pay if you live in the zone so much," Musgrove said. "I've got to make sure my first pitch is quality. Those guys were ready to swing right out of the gate."
• For better or worse, Musgrove didn't last long at all. And that's because Hurdle took the extraordinary step of pinch-hitting for him in the top of the fifth -- pitch count at 61 -- with the bases loaded. Josh Bell struck out.
• I'm increasingly convinced the main reason the front office keeps S-Rod around is so that people complain about him instead of the team's real issues. If so, they really are as smart as they think.
• Saw Josh Hader jerseys all over the ballpark. Kids, too. Ugh.
Forgiving is one thing. Celebrating is another. Not sure where that line's drawn here.
• This is purely cosmetic, literally, but who at Major League Baseball had the gall to create those awful Players Weekend uniforms for the Pirates?
Watching games on TV through the day, other teams were dressed in clever, playful derivations of their basic uniforms. Same went for the Brewers here, with their bright yellow caps and sleeves, rooted in their real colors.
The Pirates ... wow, who thought of that?
Never mind the wholly non-Pittsburgh yellow. The worst element, by far, was the marring of the otherwise awesome 1970s logo by making his face neon green as if he was about to vomit.
I checked before the game with resident fashion ace Chris Archer:
"The lime-green Pirate," indeed.
• There's more ball here Saturday. Maybe more runs, too. And maybe more arms will be called up because of the length of this game.
Get that graphic ready to be updated.