Kovacevic: Pirates prepared to embrace results rather than expectations

CHICAGO -- Richard Rodriguez was getting fidgety.

Maybe not in his own view. Definitely not in my view from the Wrigley Field press box on this Thursday afternoon. 

Heck, from way up here, despite Rodriguez having just issued a one-out walk in the ninth inning, despite Rodriguez having just followed that with a wild pitch to the backstop, despite the Pirates' three-run lead having just been put in jeopardy, his body language might as well have been as cool as the biting wind around him.

But Adam Frazier no doubt saw it differently, since he then took a purposeful solo stroll to the mound, did most of the talking upon arrival, then strolled right back to second base.

At which point Rodriguez kept his cool by freezing Javy Baez:

At which point Rodriguez heated up from 94 mph to Baez, to 94.8 mph for a Jason Heyward foul tip and the final out:

At which point ... hm, maybe Frazier was right:

Looks like a little sigh of relief for the reliever, doesn't it? 

If the sentiment I'm sensing is off, go ahead and thumb back up to the still photo above this column. That'll do the convincing.

It's almost as if these guys know each other better than any of us ever could.

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The final tile was then flipped on the ancient, still-manual scoreboard, high above the bleachers, the bricks, the ivy and, if we're being real, almost all expectations for this, the Pittsburgh Baseball Club's 135th season opener: Pirates 5, Cubs 3

Atop that same scoreboard are the famed stack of five flapping team flags, always stacked in the order of the Central Division standings. The ones that began this day with Chicago blue on top, Pittsburgh gold on the bottom, emblematic of the 2020 finish. And the ones that'll be reversed by the teams' next meeting Saturday.

Wait, almost all expectations?

Yeah, exactly.

Chad Kuhl, the afternoon's starter, lasted only three innings. Sounds awful, except that his counterpart, Cy Young talking  Kyle Hendricks, lasted the same length, with both afterward complaining that they'd had trouble gripping the ball. It was a legit complaint. The thermometer at first pitch showed 36 degrees, but the gusts came from right field at 12-18 mph, dropping the feels-like temp to Oh-man-get-me-out-of-here.

As Kuhl would recall, "It was definitely cold. In that first inning, I think me and Hendricks were definitely trying to figure it out. Coming from warm-weather climates, the bullpens here both being climate-controlled ... it's an adjustment both of us had to account for."

That's not what I wanted to ask him about, though. I wanted to ask him about emotion. He's good like that. Wears it on his sleeve.

I asked what the reaction was in the visiting clubhouse -- reporters can't enter due to COVID-19 regulations -- and whether or not those inside reacted to this broader performance with the same level of surprise that people likely would on the outside.

It was if he'd heard only that last word.

"You know, there's a lot of people on the outside who can say what we can do or what we can't do," Kuhl came right back. "As a professional, it's just noise. It doesn't matter to any of us in this room."

He took it no further. No one associated with the Pirates ever does. At least not in front of a camera or microphone.

"Obviously, it's a good feeling to be 1-0," he wrapped up the reply. "We have an off-day tomorrow. We can drink this in, enjoy opening day at Wrigley Field -- it's awesome -- and then move forward from there."

Move forward, indeed.

The record doesn't mean any more than if the Pirates were 0-1. Or 0-2. Or if they'd have been swept here. Or if they do, in fact, go on to lose 100 or 121 or all of the remaining 161.

And those who suit up to play ball under Derek Shelton and, by extension, Ben Cherington, aren't dumb about any of this. It's not as if any of them rushed to their phones to cancel any personal plans they might've scheduled for October. They know the opening-day payroll was $47,116,800, they know how much that buys in this sport's imbalanced economics, they know all those veterans-for-prospects trades were aimed at the future, they know that future comes with an uncertain timetable, and they fully grasp, individually, they might not be part of the end result.

But that's why the one commonality in this group is a perfect fit with the over-arching cause: They all want to get better.

The younger players want to have successful careers, as all of them do. The few older guys want to keep playing well enough to keep enjoying the game they love. The GM, the manager, the coaches, everyone else involved in evaluation and instruction, they want to keep their jobs.

And the best canvas on which to paint any such picture is also the simplest: Win.

Winning elevates everyone and everything in any team sports setting. A star embraces the stage, and the stage doesn't matter if no one's watching. A role player is never more pivotal than when that role produces relevant results. It's all symbiotic.

And winning in a setting this ...

DEJAN KOVACEVIC / DKPS

National anthem, Wrigley Field, Thursday afternoon.

I'm betting they enjoyed it.

But for anyone on the inside to be surprised ... they'd have had to have slept through the entirety of spring training.

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What I appreciated most about this opener was that it felt, both for better and worse, like an extension of spring training. And within that, an affirmation of a lot of observations I'd had along the way.

Because, truth be told, with all the individual improvement witnessed down there, that'd be A-OK for Year 1 of Ben's Big Build.

I loved the bats in Bradenton, up and down the order, while also worrying about their pop.

In this game ... well, this happened ...

... but there also was an RBI double and single off Frazier's Grapefruit-bashing bat, as well a mega-clutch RBI double for Jacob Stallings.

On top of that, the Pirates were 3 for 20 with runners in scoring position.

Hang on, someone thinks that's bad?

Wow, no! That's a hitting coach's dream come true!

As Shelton replied when that figure was broached, "We have to look at those things. We have to get better and continue to identify things to get better at. If we had that many runners in scoring position, we need to make sure we capitalize on that."

Then, right when I was about to wonder if he'd lost his mind, he added, "If we do that on a nightly basis, we're gonna be in pretty good shape."

No kidding!

Show me a team that's taking 20 at-bats a game with runners in scoring position, and I'll show you ... no one! Because no one anywhere can do that!

Hitting coaches always caution against focusing on outcomes, whether they're hits or outs or whatever. They focus on process. Which makes perfect sense, since the very nature of hitting doesn't always reward taking the right approach. Rick Eckstein's pupils were hardly ablaze here, but nine hits and 11 drawn walks makes for a whole lot of Gashouse Gorillas.

As for missing the big hit, I'll reiterate: Two-run home run, two RBI doubles and an RBI single. Show me a team that's coming through at that pace every game, and I'll show you ... no one!

Where was I again?

Oh, right: Things that were similar to the spring.

Wrapping up the offense, everyone in the new everyday eight hit the ball except for Gregory Polanco, Anthony Alford and Colin Moran, and even they drew walks, three in Moran's case. Hayes was ... Hayes. Frazier might as well have been in Fort Myers. Reynolds and Newman looked far more like 2019 than 2020. Stallings smartly fouled off one unhittable pitch, looked into the Pirates' dugout and laughed with that apparent realization, then smacked his double that brought the fifth run.

"Great, great at-bat," Shelton called it.

I can't know what this means, as I've still got too much 2020 burned in the mind. But if choosing from a menu, I'll take this spring over last summer.

I wasn't wild about Dustin Fowler's baserunning uber-lapse in failing to tag at third on Hayes' liner to deep-enough right, but it'd be bizarre to connect that to Shelton's intensive teachings on baserunning this spring -- I saw and heard them myself -- since Fowler arrived in the final week of February and hardly was part of any long-term instructional culture here.

Not that anyone should've had to tell him to tag there. That's the point: What he did wasn't indicative of anything more than what was seen.

In fairness, the Pirates also stole three bases, another primary component to what was pushed this spring.

I wasn't wild, either, about rapid-fire errors by Frazier and Stallings. But if there were two guys you'd want committing errors on this team, it'd be those two, since you know their respective 'E' columns could stay that way for weeks, if not months. Again, not indicative of anything.

And then, there's the pitching.

I'd predicted the starters wouldn't give much length, but that the bullpen, if not overworked, was more than capable of compensating ... provided someone could close.

Well, now ...

... that's David Bednar, the Mars kid who's been out of this world all spring, getting the Pitching Ninja treatment on Twitter, a rarity for anyone (currently) employed by the Pirates. And it's a testament to the entire bullpen that all Bednar achieved here was to fit in among five one-inning appearances in which the Cubs managed not even a hit.

In order:

• Duane Underwood Jr.: Three batters, three Ks
• Sam Howard: Three batters, three Ks
• Clay Holmes: Three batters, one K
• Bednar: Three batters, two 2 Ks
• Rodriguez: Four batters, one walk, two Ks

I'm omitting Chris Stratton, who conceded the pen's only run -- manufactured after a leadoff double -- in the eight.

"Unbelievable," Kuhl observed. "Each guy just passing the torch. There's a lot of talent in that bullpen."

Live arms. Lots of poise. It might be the team's strength.

That's in part because of the havoc the virus has wreaked on throwing schedules over the past year-plus.

"I think the bullpen’s gonna be significant, not just for us but for everybody," Shelton said. "Until starters get built up and when you have cold-weather environments and with the fact that we’re all coming off 60 games, I think you're gonna see bullpens become really important."

That's when I asked Shelton if he appreciated some of these aforementioned facets carry over from the spring, even if just for a day.

"Yeah, I think so," he replied. "I don’t think that plays out once you get out of spring training, but there were some things that we did really well in the spring that kind of carried over in today’s game. That was good to see. There are things that we need to clean up, but it did carry over."

He'd know better than me. And besides, as he stressed, it was one day. After one month of prep. Not a sliver more.

At the same time, don't think for a second that anyone involved won't cast at least a casual glance up at those flags this weekend.

DEJAN KOVACEVIC / DKPS

The Wrigley Field outfield, Thursday morning.

Don't lie now. You'd do it, too.