Jubilant Grandal makes the most of a chance to deliver as walkoff hero

Having connected on a 1-2 fastball up and out of the zone from the Reds' closer Alexis Diaz, as Yasmani Grandal admits, he didn't know if he got enough of a ball that ultimately landed in the second row of the seats located above the Clemente Wall at PNC Park. The one that resulted in a two-run home run in the ninth inning lifted the Pirates, 4-3, over the Reds Sunday afternoon.

Grandal didn't know it off the bat, but his finish evidently did: 

"I don’t know why but as soon the bat drops it’s usually a homer," Grandal said after belting his first walkoff hit of any kind since June 16, 2021. "I was just looking for a pitch that I can get in the air. Obviously, a ball on the ground there is not good for me. He gave it to me and I put a good swing on it.”

Grandal said he wasn't anticipating a fastball, despite the fact that he had seen two in a row to begin the at-bat. Diaz sticks with a two-pitch mix with a 56.8% reliance on his fastball and a 43.2% usage of his slider. He has held hitters to a .176 batting average and a .235 slugging percentage with his heater this season, while lefties -- a side of the plate the switch-hitting Grandal was forced to in the ninth inning -- were batting .125 with a .156 slugging percentage. 

Grandal was attacked with fastballs all day, as he noted when I asked if he was expecting a heavy dose of heaters from Diaz. He said for some reason the Reds thought he was sitting soft in his first three at-bats, which resulted in a strikeout, a flyout to left field and a groundout to first. But in reality, he was just late after going two days without seeing a pitch from a live arm. By the time he faced Diaz and saw 94 mph left up, he was ready to make something happen:

“It doesn’t matter what you do in the cage with a machine," he said. "Somebody actually throwing a ball at you is completely different. It just so happened that what I needed was velocity, the velocity to get it to where I need. I think the numbers show this year that it doesn’t matter how hard you throw, it’s what you can get barrel to. It just so happened that that’s what it was, a matter of just seeing velocity. The first two guys did great. They went right at me and I just didn’t have an answer for them. It just so happened that I did for him.”

As his homer off Diaz sailed over the wall, Grandal let emotion take over. He greeted Tarrik Brock with a low-five as he rounded first base before immediately turning toward the home dugout and motioning in excitement. As he rounded third, he removed his helmet, gave it a toss, took two leaps toward home plate and seemingly let out a roar as he approached his teammates waiting to greet him with a celebratory shower. 

"He’s very important to us, and he’s been very important to us all year," Derek Shelton said. "I know at times he struggled offensively and he’s a little bit older, but he’s smart, he’s very smart. If you Baseball Reference this guy and look at his offensive numbers through the course of his career, he’s been an elite hitter. It’s one of those things where you may fool him once with a pitch, but very rarely do you fool him twice when he’s looking for it. Today, he got it and it was a huge hit for us.” 

It was a dramatic win, a pivotal hit and a special celebration for a veteran player -- one closer to the end of his career than the beginning -- who has experienced quite the up-and-down year. He's endured his share of struggles both offensively and defensively after immediately being tested following a spring in which he was limited to just two games due to plantar fasciitis. 

Grandal was forced to make adjustments without participating in spring training, a time where players usually have a chance to get their legs underneath them before heading into a grueling 162-game season. It was a challenge he needed to tackle head on. 

"Trying to make adjustments in the big leagues is really hard," Grandal said. "Luckily, for me, understanding how my body was moving, making the adjustment I need to make in order to start producing and start helping these guys out, it was all a matter of understanding where exactly I needed to do damage in and what I needed to let go." 

After slashing .184/.222/.319 with a .541 OPS over the course of 48 games between the months of May, June and July, Grandal has turned things around as of late. Granted, he has been playing less with Joey Bart emerging as the primary catcher, but Grandal has still found plenty of time and has put together better results, slashing .297/.366/.568 with a .934 OPS in the month of August. He's now homered in back-to-back starts, adding another in the series opener against the Reds on Thursday, and has gone deep three times while driving in five runs this month. Going back even further, Grandal's OPS is .757 -- league average is around .714 -- over his last 30 games. A much more promising number for a guy who is still at .208 average with a .624 OPS in 58 games this season. 

“I think you guys have seen that for, I don’t know, the past month and a half or so. My OPS in the last two months is maybe up in the high 700s or something like that," Grandal acknowledged. "So we’re going to continue doing exactly what we’ve been doing.”

Grandal could be counted upon to be behind the plate more often considering Bart exited Sunday's game with left hamstring discomfort after running to first base on an RBI groundout in the first inning: 

Bart is expected to be placed on the injured list with Henry Davis being called up from Class AAA Indianapolis, per source. Regardless of the role the Pirates expect Grandal to play in Bart’s absence, he’ll be ready for the workload down the stretch. 

“Obviously, it’s a big hit for us. He’s swinging the bat well. It was kind of what we were waiting for, right? One of those guys getting it going. We thought Henry was going to do it, then Joey stepped up and started doing it," Grandal said. "The fact that he went down, it’s next man up now. I’m here to do my job. I’m here to fill in wherever the team needs me. If they want to put me back there for the next 20, then go right ahead.”