The Pirates' pathway to getting better in 2023 became bumpier Sunday afternoon after Oneil Cruz fractured his ankle, but that doesn't erase that they still are off to a very strong 6-3 start. And so far, they've been buoyed by their bullpen, a group that had plenty of question marks coming into the year.
Through nine games, the Pirates lead the league in reliever fWAR (1.1) and win probability added (1.64). At the time of publication, no other team has at least 1 WAR or 1.00 WPA from their bullpen. For reference, last year's Pirates bullpen combined for 1.8 fWAR and had -3.80 WPA, the latter stat meaning that the relievers' performance actually made it less likely for the team to actually win games despite having an All-Star closer.
It's a small sample size and the group is still mostly unproven, but so far, so good.
"They've done a really nice job," Derek Shelton said. "They've handled themselves really well. They've leverage situations really well, and I think they've really taken to the fact that we had a lot of competition in spring training and they've thrived on that."
It's a team effort, but there are two guys in that middle relief core that have been pleasant surprises thus far because of some mechanical changes they've made.
The first is Dauri Moreta, who has garnered attention for getting out of jams as a fireman reliever and his memorable exits off the mound. He's eighth among relievers in WPA (0.42) and has eight strikeouts through his 4 2/3 scoreless frames thus far.
I wrote a Mound Visit on his fastball when the Pirates acquired him from the Reds for Kevin Newman in November, saying that the issue is his sinker. The four-seamer was consistently located up in the zone, but the sinker didn't get a lot of vertical movement and was usually center cut. It seemed like a quick fix: Ditch the sinker and stick with the four-seamer. There was just one problem.
"I don't have a sinker," Moreta explained to me recently. "Sometimes it just moves like that."
Ok, so it's not as quick of a fix.
Instead of a ditching a pitch Moreta wasn't throwing, the question was why was his fastball not moving the way that he wanted it to. Diving into the biomechanics, the answer they found was with his timing. He would fall forward too quickly at times, making him land too quickly and mess up his arm action.
Between that and relying on his slider more...
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Moreta has become the swing-and-miss pitcher the Pirates wanted to get this offseason. The sliders have led to some walks early, but a 56.3% whiff rate is worth the occasional free pass.
The other pitcher worth highlighting is the one who traveled to Cincinnati without knowing if he made the team, Rob Zastryzny.
Zastryzny's ERA is a bit out of whack at the moment after allowing three runs against the White Sox, but that was a spot where he was asked to pitch a more traditional frame rather than go after lefties, like he had been to this point. He has handled the southpaws well, even in high-leverage spots.
Zastryzny has skirted that line between reliever and starter for a couple years, but coming off of elbow surgery and the COVID-19 pandemic, he's gone from a soft-tossing lefty who could barely touch 90 mph to one averaging nearly 93 mph on his fastball. That's a jump that can' be explained just by him changing roles.
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Zastryzny has spent his last offseasons at a facility called Push Performance and made a stop at Driveline to reevaluate his mechanics, especially hip-shoulder separation. That came after working with an offseason coach named Scott Lacey after the 2019 offseason, where he first saw his velocity jump after doing what he called a "complete rebuild." Zastryzny had pitched with an elbow fracture since high school, and the stress of the extra velocity forced him to have surgery, but the end result was a much better arsenal.
"After that surgery is when I could throw harder," Zastryzny told me. "I was restricted that injury I think, my whole career."
Mix in production from pitchers like Duane Underwood Jr., Wil Crowe, Jose Hernandez and Wil Crowe, and the middle relief has been a lot less scary for the Pirates' through the first three series. There was plenty of talk last season and spring training about how many games the Pirates played that were decided by two runs or fewer. They were on the wrong end of too many of them. It's this portion of the bullpen that usually makes or breaks those games.
If the Pirates can continue to get this production, especially from unexpected sources like Moreta and Zastryzny, then they could take that step forward they have talked about this year.
