ATLANTA -- After opening the series on a high note with a gutsy win against a very talented team, the Pirates completely fell apart in almost every aspect against the Braves this weekend.
It’s a painful note for Derek Shelton’s club to have to face for at least two more days. Their next win will be their 19th. A barrier which matches their 60-game win total from the pandemic shortened season a year ago that, when broken, could provide some sort of catharsis. But they’ve been stuck on 18 victories while being outscored 33-3 in the final three games against the Braves, including a 7-1 defeat at Truist Park on Sunday afternoon.
“I think we need to get out of this ballpark,” Shelton said of the Braves’ home well north of the city’s center.
Indeed, PNC Park will probably be a welcomed sight for the Pirates after going 1-5 on their road swing to drop to 18-27 on the season. It’s still a better pace than last year, but lately they’ve done little to distinguish themselves from the literal worst team in baseball that they were a year ago.
Obviously, there are injured players -- namely Ke’Bryan Hayes and Colin Moran -- whose return would make them undoubtedly better. And it seems the club cycles in a different player off the waiver wire almost every other day. But that’s not something exclusive to the Pirates. Right across in the other dugout, the Braves were missing their best starter (Mike Soroka), and their starting catcher (Travis d’Arnaud) and center fielder (Christian Pache) to injury.
The Pirates are not a good team. This should not come as a shock. Nor should it signal the end of the world. But while the first few weeks of the season were all about defying expectations, the proverbial bar for what that entails has gotten lower.
After the first month, it seemed like the Pirates had identified what works and what doesn’t. But, with the exception of their steady bullpen, they’ve truly gotten away from what makes them successful.
“I think it’s just baseball, honestly. You go through good spurts and you go through bad spurts. Try to minimize the bad spurts as much as possible,” Jacob Stallings said. “Obviously we scored, what, one run three games in a row? It’s hard to win ball games when you only score one run, especially against a team like the Braves. Hopefully we can get some rest on this off-day and guys will come back Tuesday refreshed and ready to go.”
These Pirates are not the type of team that, as Shelton says, “can sit back and bang with people.” That couldn’t have been more evident this past weekend, and it’s not really something that Hayes or Moran could help with much. So they have to rely on stringing hits together. Only that hasn’t happened.
As an example, Will Craig was on base nine times in the series with six singles and three walks. But he did not score at all and only drove in a run on an infield roller in the final inning of Friday’s 20-1 blowout.
This isn’t an appeal to bat Craig at the top of the order. Especially as MLB hits leader Adam Frazier continues to bat .335 from that spot. Frazier started Sunday’s contest as he did every game of the series -- with a base hit. He’s batting an incredible .376 in May but has an unacceptably low four RBIs and 10 runs scored this month.
“We have to do a better job at the bottom of the order getting on for him. He’s hitting leadoff, and we’re not going to move him out of the leadoff spot. He’s so good there,” Shelton said. “The bottom of the order has to do a better job of allowing run-scoring opportunities for him.”
But when a team has such little power in the lineup from top to bottom, why not bat Frazier somewhere that will get him more at-bats with runners on base? It’s not like they’re losing any power if nobody has it. And until Hayes and Moran return, it could also jump start someone else in the lineup to hit in front of one of the hottest hitters in baseball.
Although, at least offensively, Frazier and to some extent Stallings and Bryan Reynolds, seem to be the only bats clicking, it’s worth trying something, anything that might enact change for these Pirates.
It certainly doesn’t help that for their past two outings the Pirates’ two most reliable starters, JT Brubaker and Tyler Anderson, have not been their April-selves. Anderson was on the hook for Friday’s debacle. And Brubaker suffered his worst start of the season Sunday due to an unfortunate trend.
In talking with Oscar Marin last week, the pitching coach mentioned that Brubaker’s rapidly rising rate of homers per fly ball was “something to monitor.”
What was once a concern is now a real issue as that figure jumped to more than 20 percent after the right-hander surrendered three more homers to the Braves on Sunday. Yes, more than one out of every five balls put in the air against Brubaker have left the yard.
“It’s just missed locations by a little, and a little goes a long way,” Brubaker said Sunday.
It’s important to note that Atlanta pretty much does this to everybody. Truist Park also allows for a homer-happy team to be successful, and Atlanta’s 78 long balls lead MLB by a comfortable margin with 12 more than the next on the list, the Reds. The 15 homers the Pirates allowed in this four-game series were a record-high for the franchise.
But, for Brubaker, that HR/FB figure is still uncomfortably high.
In the early part of the season, Brubaker had been able to limit the damage after a homer by identifying a pitch as a mistake, taking his lashing, then moving on with the outing. Then Nolan Arenado reached out and yanked a slider over the left-field wall in St. Louis, and he learned that it’s not just the mistakes that have a tendency to leave the yard.
Whatever is at the root of the issue, it’s preventing the Pirates’ most reliable starter from being effective.
On Sunday, he experienced both: An absolute buzzsaw of a hot hitter catching up to a pretty good pitch. And a mistake that was punished accordingly.
Brubaker felt the 3-2 slider that Dansby Swanson -- who was 8-for-15 with three homers and four RBIs against the Pirates -- went down to pull over the left-field fence was his better example of a “tip-your-cap” homer.
But Shelton and the pitch location charts might agree that the fastball up-and-in that Austin Riley -- who was 8-for-16 with four homers and nine RBIs this weekend -- drove to right-center for his second homer of the afternoon might be the tougher pitch to handle.
Either way, these aren’t the types of dilemmas that are indicative of much success.
This was the low point of the season for Brubaker so far as his ERA ballooned to 4.20. But he’s still doing things well. Well enough to comfortably identify the homer issue as the one thing that’s preventing him from looking like his April-self.
All seven runs were scored on those three homers. Otherwise, he struck out seven and pitched into the sixth inning, which, when taken into perspective, is a difficult feat for everyone else in the rotation.
“I felt like for the most part I kept them off balance,” Brubaker said. “I felt like I moved the ball in and out, kept them off balance. I’m just going to take that into the bullpens and into the next start.”
That’s all they can do. Try and be a different team when they get off the plane in Pittsburgh. Whatever that entails.
MORE FROM SUNDAY
• Ben Cherington shined a light on some of the Pirates' many injuries during his weekly radio spot on 93.7 The Fan. Moran (groin) and Phillip Evans (hamstring) have been doing everything but full baserunning -- the final step in their rehab. Chad Kuhl (shoulder) will make another rehab start before being activated. Cherington doesn't expect the severity of Trevor Cahill's calf injury to keep him out for too long.
THE ESSENTIALS
Box score
Video highlights
Scoreboard
Standings
Statistics
THE LINEUPS
Shelton's card:
Adam Frazier, 2B
Kevin Newman, SS
Bryan Reynolds, CF
Jacob Stallings, C
Erik Gonzalez, 3B
Gregory Polanco, RF
Will Craig, 1B
Ildemaro Vargas, LF
JT Brubaker, P
And for Brian Snitker's Braves:
Ronald Acuna Jr., RF
Freddie Freeman, 1B
Marcell Ozuna, LF
Ozzie Albies, 2B
Austin Riley, 3B
Dansby Swanson, SS
William Contreras, C
Guillermo Heredia, CF
Max Fried, P
THE SCHEDULE
The Pirates have a day off Monday and open a series against the Cubs on Tuesday. With Cahill on the injured list, the Pirates still have yet to determine a starter for that series opener. Cherington mentioned Miguel Yajure, Cody Ponce and Chase De Jong as possible emergency starters. They'll host the Rockies at PNC Park for a three-game set beginning Friday.
THE CONTENT
Visit our team page for everything.
