NEW YORK -- This is so, so tired.
And maybe these Pirates are, too, in their own way.
On this Friday night at Citi Field, the first of Dario Agrazal's suddenly promising big-league career where he absorbed a big-league pummeling, two things felt like dead-set certainties about the visitors:
1. They'd still mount a comeback.
2. They'd still lose.
Because hey, that's pretty much all they do anymore, now losers of six in a row and 2-12 since the All-Star break following this 6-3, four-home-run bashing by the Mets.
The comeback component's been there since the opener, of course. Anyone who's witnessed any meaningful portion of this season can authoritatively attest to that. And anyone who doesn't believe only needs to count up 22 comeback wins out of their 46, 13 in the final inning and four walkoffs. Heck, they've had huge comebacks in games they didn't win.
But has anyone noticed those are now the norm?
For that matter, has anyone noticed that the offense that overpowered the rest of Major League Baseball in June has fallen back in July, currently ranking 15th with a .773 OPS?
Oh, and has anyone noticed how the pitching has morphed from epic disaster to ... um, a more epic disaster?
Seems like a sizable chunk of the fan base wants to pin this on quitting. That's convenient, if only because it's easily condensed. Any baseball team looks bad, even looks sluggish with lackluster body language, when it's getting its brains blown out every other night. On Pete Alonso's monster home run to left-center in the sixth inning, Melky Cabrera barely cast an eye on the ball, never mind budging.
Is Melky lazy? Has he quit?
Good God, no. It's not in his makeup, as evidenced by his having become the spiritual leader of this team after making the roster as a spring tryout.
Have any of them quit?
No one can state that for sure, obviously. There are 25-plus men in this mix, and mass mind-reading is tough.
I'm not seeing it, though. I'm not seeing it off the field where, if anything, their intensity and angst has actually hit new heights. And I sure didn't see it the other night where they nearly pulled off the comeback to top all comebacks with that breathtaking 10th-inning roar that fell a run short against the Cardinals.
But that's the pattern right there. I believe it. At the risk of my own oversimplification, I really believe that this offense has gotten tired -- mentally, physically, whatever -- of having to roll the boulder back up the hill, day after day, night after night. I really believe that all those rallies, all that emotion, all that fire ... man, it can't be sustained forever without results.
In this one, too, Agrazal and the Pirates were down, 4-1, in the sixth when Adam Frazier dented the upper deck with this two-run shot ...
... then sparked another threat in the eighth with a leadoff double, followed by Starling Marte reaching on an error. The tying run came to the plate ... but Josh Bell whiffed and Bryan Reynolds bounced into a 6-4-3.
Right. The two guys who led the offense through the first half.
See the pattern?
Bell sizzled two singles earlier on the night, and Reynolds had one, too. But how much is enough when the pitchers wind up giving up four more home runs after just giving up a dozen over four games to the Cardinals at PNC Park?
Not surprisingly, no one here agreed with my theory.
I asked Hurdle after the game, and he flatly replied, "I don't have that sense at all. Especially not after a four-day break when we came back. And being involved in a lot of games in Colorado, my experience there ... you'd never see a game where you didn't think you could come back. So no, from my perspective, that hasn't been the challenge from an offensive standpoint."
Well, I'll disagree right back, and not just because the high-altitude Rockies always have been rewarded with real results for all their rallies. I see hitters — that I trust to be committed individuals — collectively striding into that box without the same focus, and I'll posit that it's because they can't possibly have the same confidence without the collective result.
I ran this past Kevin Newman, too, and he hated it almost as much.
"Nothing's changed. Nothing," he told me. "You come to work, you prepare yourself as best you can, and you go out there and perform. We know we're good enough to beat anybody. We've done it. You just come to the field and do what you've always done."
Except that they aren't. And there's a reason for it: The pitching's been an abomination. An embarrassment. That's partly because of injuries, but it's mostly because of a lack of talent, which, in turn, is because the ownership couldn't care less and the front office can't draft and develop.
That reason, unequivocally, is not that these people on the field are quitting.
If anyone thinks otherwise, name a name. Don't accuse in nebulous terms. Name the actual name of an actual individual who's quit. Because I can promise that, for each name that's cited, there'll be a hell of a comeback for each of those, too.
• This was the one where they were supposed to shake it off, start anew. That's the sense I had all afternoon, from conversations, from Hurdle messing with his lineup and, above all, from Agrazal being the one about to take the ball.
It didn't go well. There's nowhere to run from a 5 1/3-inning line of five runs, all of them on home runs. That's Chris Archer-esque.
In the same breath, if anyone's earned a mulligan, Agrazal's it. He'd never allowed more than two earned runs in his first five big-league starts, and he'd somehow stood all alone in a rotation surrounded by people who were supposed to be worlds better.
Also, this was, in fact, "a good pitch," as Agrazal would call it unapologetically, on Jeff McNeil's three-run home run in the third:
It's a slider Agrazal buried, and McNeil golfed it out.
I'd later be told from the New York side that McNeil prefers to swing at low pitches, and he loves to swing at the first pitch. So, since Elias Diaz called for this one, and since Diaz is coached up by the Pirates' staff, lay blame for that on anyone but Agrazal. He did his job.
He actually stood by all three pitches that resulted in home runs. And not in a ridiculous Nick Kingham-like way. He backed up each one.
I liked this, as well: After the McNeil home run, he faced the heart of the Mets' order and set them down 1-2-3.
I asked about that:
He'll be fine. Again, he's the least of all problems, and it'd be awfully unfair to lump him in with all those guys pitching two-inning touchdowns.
• Virtually no chance that Corey Dickerson's traded after coming up lame again with the left groin from making a catch in left. Missing two months with the shoulder ailment was enough of a red flag, but a second groin issue in the same season -- no IL time for that one, but still on the record -- should crush his value.
• The other bad part of that: Melky's front-and-center to go. Not that losing any 33-year-old bench outfielder is devastating, but, again, he's been a prominent part of the good.
• Michael Feliz gave up the other home run, a moon shot in the sixth from old Cincinnati nemesis Todd Frazier. Feliz has been scored upon twice in his past 14 appearances, which is quite good, but he's got rotten timing. This game was still there to be had.
• No one will be stunned to learn that was Frazier's 19th home run against the Pirates, his most against any opponent.
• Keone Kela pitched a scoreless seventh with a couple Ks, including a knee-buckling curve to freeze Frazier. Encouraging stuff. If he'd been healthy all year, he'd be a much more palatable alternative to trade than Felipe Vazquez. But, as with Dickerson, no one's taking on players who missed several weeks with anything. And there's Kela's recent two-game team suspension, too.
• Potentially popular opinion: I don't mind Vazquez getting traded for elite prospects. I just don't trust this front office to achieve that.
• Potentially unpopular opinion: Francisco Cervelli's been missed behind the plate more than anyone can discuss. Counting this McNeil home run and the one with Jacob Stallings catching that I covered a couple weeks ago in St. Louis ... those just weren't common with Cervelli back there.
• Trevor Williams pitches Saturday night. My bold prediction: If he doesn't pitch terribly, as he has for a month now, the Pirates won't look like they've quit on anything.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
THE INJURIES
• Clay Holmes (10-day IL, triceps)
• Steven Brault (10-day IL, shoulder)
• Gregory Polanco (10-day IL, shoulder)
• Rookie Davis (10-day IL, forearm)
• Francisco Cervelli (60-day IL, concussion)
• Jameson Taillon (60-day IL, elbow)
• Erik Gonzalez (60-day IL, hamstring)
• Lonnie Chisenhall (60-day IL, integrity)
Here's the most recent full report.
THE SCHEDULE
These teams go at it again Saturday, 7:10 p.m., with Williams (3-3, 4.96) facing lefty Steven Matz (5-6, 4.75). Williams made modest strides in his previous start -- five innings, two runs, five hits Monday in the 6-5, 10-inning loss to the Cardinals -- but he's still lugging an 8.13 ERA in five starts since returning from the IL on June 19.
THE COVERAGE
All our expanded baseball coverage, including Indy Watch by Matt Welch, Altoona Watch by Jarrod Prugar, and Mound Visit by Jason Rollison, can be found on our team page.
