There was a lot working against JT Brubaker on Friday night at PNC Park. But, even as things turned south or buckled around him, he maintained his status as the most effective starter in the Pirates’ rotation.
Brubaker was charged with three runs on seven hits with seven strikeouts while keeping his team in the game over the first five innings of their 7-3 loss to the Cardinals.
“Even though maybe it didn't look as good, I think he was still able to execute,” Derek Shelton said. “That's a good lineup. He got some swings and misses, and some off-balance swings and misses.”
The 27-year-old really only made one mistake pitch, which resulted in a solo homer by Tyler O’Neill in the fourth inning. Considering what went wrong around him, preventing the night from snowballing was an impressive feat.
The whipping winds through PNC Park wreaked havoc on Brubaker and the Pirates’ fielders. And rather than rising to the occasion with stingy defense behind Brubaker, the team was much sloppier than they’ve been in the past few weeks.
“You’ve still just got to make pitches. With the type of wind we had today, put it in the air and anything can happen,” Brubaker said. “It was swirling. It’s tough to catch a fly ball. Just tried to make sure I keep the ball on the ground and work down in the zone and work up when I need to was really just the mindset.”
Dylan Carlson put a ball up into those swirling, 16-mph winds in the opening inning that seemed to be ticketed for Gregory Polanco’s glove in right field. But it carried all the way to the wall for an unlucky double. Nolan Arenado followed with a 70.3-mph blooper that landed just short of a diving Ka’ai Tom in left field for the Cardinals’ first run.
St. Louis scored again on an Arenado pop up that should have been the final out of the third inning. The ball had a .010 expected batting average but fell in between Tom and shortstop Kevin Newman for another hard-luck double.
“It's tough. The wind tonight was pretty substantial,” Newman said. “I thought I could get there, and it ended up being 10 or 15 feet more behind me than I thought.”
Despite these unfortunate circumstances, the Pirates were very much in the game through those five innings, and that’s all thanks to Brubaker. Outside of the hard-luck, the Cardinals forced Brubaker to get a lot of outs with runners on base.
But the right-hander had his slider working as well as it has all year, and it led to a ton of swing-and-miss and strikeouts in big spots.
“Really just focusing on where [Jacob Stallings] was, throwing it down the middle, letting the movement take care of the rest. Wasn’t trying to do too much with it,” Brubaker said. “Just focusing on throwing it below the zone on the plate.”
Sure, the homer that O’Neill tanked 426-feet into center field came against Brubaker’s slider. But that was one mistake -- a flat, poorly located, first pitch mistake, but it was one that he did well not to repeat.
“It was one of those, just, spinners,” Brubaker said. “He stuck with it, hung on it and just took it a long way.”
Otherwise, the Cardinals whiffed 12 times on 20 offerings at Brubaker’s breaking ball, and only put four sliders in play. Brubaker went to the slider to complete four of his seven strikeouts.
“Just coming in, knowing that they’re somewhat aggressive counts, but once they’re in hitter’s counts or behind in the count, they’re wanting to put the ball in play and not get to two strikes,” Brubaker said. “Knowing that, pitching to that, making sure I established my offspeed for strikes definitely helped, too.”
Although he does throw a four-seamer and a sinker, Brubaker goes to his slider nearly 35 percent of the time, the most among any of his five offerings. It’s a strategy that’s worked out well for him so far. He’s pitched to a 2.63 ERA with 30 punchouts over 27 ⅓ innings.
His consistency has certainly been notable for his Pirates’ teammates. And, in games like Friday night’s, the Pirates might need Brubaker to be good, even when things go bad around him.
“He's throwing the ball really well right now,” Newman said. “He's got great tempo. His stuff is playing, and he's definitely a lot of fun to play behind right now. We always know we're in it.”