This was Billy Cook telling me what, not long after he'd sprinted back, stood on the right field track, squeezed the final out and shaken hands with his fellow Pirates after fending off the Mets, 4-3, in 10 innings Sunday here at Citi Field.
"That's a good team over there," he'd proceed. "A really good team."
No argument from me. A $366 million payroll can buy a whole bunch of baseball goodness.
But pretty much in the same breath, as I was about to put forth that this three-game series, the first two of which were taken by New York, sure didn't feel like it'd been played with much daylight between the two, Cook came back with more.
"We're a good team, too. That was good baseball. We can leave here with our heads up."
They legitimately can.
Listen, anyone who'd prefer to pout over a 1-2 start or some specific things that went awry within those ... hey, go nuts. There's a decade of franchise-level failure leading into this, and it'll take a ton to turn that momentum, tangible or intangible, back the other way. I appreciate that.
I also appreciate damned good ball like this:
That's beautiful. Every bit of it.
OK, from the Pittsburgh perspective, maybe not the part where José Urquidy allowed Juan Soto to launch that meaty fastball off the base of the fence in left-center. But I'm all about Oneil Cruz taking charge over Jake Mangum to gun that ball back to the infield. I'm all about Jared Triolo's terrific transfer and relay to the plate. And I'm ALL about Henry Davis bluffing Francisco Lindor, the Mets' would-be tying run, before fielding the throw cleanly to his left, then lunging back with a tag so unapologetically forceful and targeted -- right in Lindor's face -- that it had him staggering back to the home dugout.
All. About. That.
"So great to watch," Urquidy, owner of the best view, would tell me. "Like perfection."
Start with Cruz.
I checked with Don Kelly if the coaches prefer to have Cruz commandeer any 50/50 ball like that in the outfield, where a throw's a must. He informed that no such practice has existed with Cruz since he was at shortstop.
Which meant ...
"Right," Kelly would tell me. "That was all Oneil."
Across his body, too. Like a quarterback scrambling to his right. Superb.
I brought this up with Cruz, and he simply smiled, pointed to the next stall, and said, "All Tri."
Triolo's throw also took some torque of the torso, arriving to Davis on a single hop.
"Being honest here," Triolo would tell me, "Henry gets all the bells for this one."
That was the clubhouse consensus, with Kelly providing the most compelling particulars: "Henry made a heck of a pick and a tag. For him to be able to slide over, still maintain that composure and pick a short hop and get the tag down, it was a phenomenal play."
I wasn't surprised that Davis did nothing but deflect when I raised the relay.
“When you've got plus arms on the field, you know you always have a chance to get him, so you try to watch the play develop," he'd tell me. "Obviously, if it's an off-line throw and Soto's around the bag, so I'm trying to use all the field vision I have to make the best decision.”
Meaning Soto dangling off second after his double.
Loved, loved, loved it.
Among other stuff over the weekend:
• The rotation, the strength of the team by a broad margin, saw consecutive strong six-inning starts from Mitch Keller and now Carmen Mlodzinski, the latter striking out a career-high eight while allowing one run.
That began with a first-inning flourish:
Remember Mlodzinski's spring splitter that's supposed to represent a fresh start for him?
"Didn't really lean on it much," he'd tell me, and the data showed only 15 of his 85 pitches were splitters. "Really, Henry wanted a lot of fastballs, and that's what we went with."
Yep. There were 33 of those, and they'd finish off five of the eight strikeouts.
"Just get ahead and put guys away," Davis would say of Mlodzinski. "That's been the recipe for 200 years. When he doesn’t think about it too much or think, ‘Oh, should I hide this pitch for the next time?’ ... just go get the guy out and worry about it later. I think he's at his best then.”
As for that opening-day starter ... eh, I wouldn't worry about him much.
• The bullpen was bad in the opener, walking seven batters in the 7 1/3 innings after Paul Skenes' exit, but battled through continued heavy usage in the two extra-long events that followed and delivered 9 2/3 innings with two earned runs, both of those on the single swing of Luis Robert that ended the game Saturday. (And even that was off a quality slider from Hunter Barco that Robert somehow golfed out.)
I asked Kelly what he'd learned:
"A lot," he'd reply. "We know we have to get the ball in the zone more. Too many free passes. Something we will continue to talk about, work on, and we will dominate that. And I thought we filled a lot of innings out of that bullpen. Guys were resilient. They're showing up to win and fight. I thought that was something, not just the bullpen but the whole team in a tough series against a good team."
I could share reams of data here, but I'll instead show Mason Montgomery stealing Soto's soul:
• The offense ... man, not sure where to go with this one.
OK, how about this dude:
My goodness. That's three in as many games for Brandon Lowe, and two of those have been boomers. He's also 5 for 12 with four RBIs and two walks.
"You can have all the personal aspects, but honestly, the win's more fun," he'd tell me. "That said, yeah, of course you want to get off to a good start. New team, new colors, all that kinda stuff."
Ryan O'Hearn, the offseason's other major acquisition, went 6 for 14 with the Pirates' only other home run and a 10th-inning RBI single in this one, so that's encouraging, as well.
But I don't want to omit two others, both first-rounders who feel like they've been around forever without blossoming: Nick Gonzales went 4 for 14 with a double and three RBIs, telling me, "I just feel like, with this new approach, I'm staying on top of every pitch." And Davis had two hits, including the other 10th-inning RBI single in this one.
That single, by the way, was struck to straightaway center. In his postgame interview session with the full assembly of cameras and microphones, he'd described that hit as "oppo," as if we were all supposed to be impressed or something.
Uh, he wasn't about to get away with that:
Look, anything from Davis that isn't a dead pull, that's promising.
More than that was promising here.
• Thanks for reading my baseball coverage here the past five days. Right back to hockey tomorrow, and it's only 8 miles down the road: Penguins vs. Islanders over in Elmont, N.Y.
THE ASYLUM
DK: All told, this was some pretty good baseball
"Tell you what ..."
This was Billy Cook telling me what, not long after he'd sprinted back, stood on the right field track, squeezed the final out and shaken hands with his fellow Pirates after fending off the Mets, 4-3, in 10 innings Sunday here at Citi Field.
"That's a good team over there," he'd proceed. "A really good team."
No argument from me. A $366 million payroll can buy a whole bunch of baseball goodness.
But pretty much in the same breath, as I was about to put forth that this three-game series, the first two of which were taken by New York, sure didn't feel like it'd been played with much daylight between the two, Cook came back with more.
"We're a good team, too. That was good baseball. We can leave here with our heads up."
They legitimately can.
Listen, anyone who'd prefer to pout over a 1-2 start or some specific things that went awry within those ... hey, go nuts. There's a decade of franchise-level failure leading into this, and it'll take a ton to turn that momentum, tangible or intangible, back the other way. I appreciate that.
I also appreciate damned good ball like this:
That's beautiful. Every bit of it.
OK, from the Pittsburgh perspective, maybe not the part where José Urquidy allowed Juan Soto to launch that meaty fastball off the base of the fence in left-center. But I'm all about Oneil Cruz taking charge over Jake Mangum to gun that ball back to the infield. I'm all about Jared Triolo's terrific transfer and relay to the plate. And I'm ALL about Henry Davis bluffing Francisco Lindor, the Mets' would-be tying run, before fielding the throw cleanly to his left, then lunging back with a tag so unapologetically forceful and targeted -- right in Lindor's face -- that it had him staggering back to the home dugout.
All. About. That.
"So great to watch," Urquidy, owner of the best view, would tell me. "Like perfection."
Start with Cruz.
I checked with Don Kelly if the coaches prefer to have Cruz commandeer any 50/50 ball like that in the outfield, where a throw's a must. He informed that no such practice has existed with Cruz since he was at shortstop.
Which meant ...
"Right," Kelly would tell me. "That was all Oneil."
Across his body, too. Like a quarterback scrambling to his right. Superb.
I brought this up with Cruz, and he simply smiled, pointed to the next stall, and said, "All Tri."
Triolo's throw also took some torque of the torso, arriving to Davis on a single hop.
"Being honest here," Triolo would tell me, "Henry gets all the bells for this one."
That was the clubhouse consensus, with Kelly providing the most compelling particulars: "Henry made a heck of a pick and a tag. For him to be able to slide over, still maintain that composure and pick a short hop and get the tag down, it was a phenomenal play."
I wasn't surprised that Davis did nothing but deflect when I raised the relay.
“When you've got plus arms on the field, you know you always have a chance to get him, so you try to watch the play develop," he'd tell me. "Obviously, if it's an off-line throw and Soto's around the bag, so I'm trying to use all the field vision I have to make the best decision.”
Meaning Soto dangling off second after his double.
Loved, loved, loved it.
Among other stuff over the weekend:
• The rotation, the strength of the team by a broad margin, saw consecutive strong six-inning starts from Mitch Keller and now Carmen Mlodzinski, the latter striking out a career-high eight while allowing one run.
That began with a first-inning flourish:
Remember Mlodzinski's spring splitter that's supposed to represent a fresh start for him?
"Didn't really lean on it much," he'd tell me, and the data showed only 15 of his 85 pitches were splitters. "Really, Henry wanted a lot of fastballs, and that's what we went with."
Yep. There were 33 of those, and they'd finish off five of the eight strikeouts.
"Just get ahead and put guys away," Davis would say of Mlodzinski. "That's been the recipe for 200 years. When he doesn’t think about it too much or think, ‘Oh, should I hide this pitch for the next time?’ ... just go get the guy out and worry about it later. I think he's at his best then.”
As for that opening-day starter ... eh, I wouldn't worry about him much.
• The bullpen was bad in the opener, walking seven batters in the 7 1/3 innings after Paul Skenes' exit, but battled through continued heavy usage in the two extra-long events that followed and delivered 9 2/3 innings with two earned runs, both of those on the single swing of Luis Robert that ended the game Saturday. (And even that was off a quality slider from Hunter Barco that Robert somehow golfed out.)
I asked Kelly what he'd learned:
"A lot," he'd reply. "We know we have to get the ball in the zone more. Too many free passes. Something we will continue to talk about, work on, and we will dominate that. And I thought we filled a lot of innings out of that bullpen. Guys were resilient. They're showing up to win and fight. I thought that was something, not just the bullpen but the whole team in a tough series against a good team."
I could share reams of data here, but I'll instead show Mason Montgomery stealing Soto's soul:
• The offense ... man, not sure where to go with this one.
OK, how about this dude:
My goodness. That's three in as many games for Brandon Lowe, and two of those have been boomers. He's also 5 for 12 with four RBIs and two walks.
"You can have all the personal aspects, but honestly, the win's more fun," he'd tell me. "That said, yeah, of course you want to get off to a good start. New team, new colors, all that kinda stuff."
Ryan O'Hearn, the offseason's other major acquisition, went 6 for 14 with the Pirates' only other home run and a 10th-inning RBI single in this one, so that's encouraging, as well.
But I don't want to omit two others, both first-rounders who feel like they've been around forever without blossoming: Nick Gonzales went 4 for 14 with a double and three RBIs, telling me, "I just feel like, with this new approach, I'm staying on top of every pitch." And Davis had two hits, including the other 10th-inning RBI single in this one.
That single, by the way, was struck to straightaway center. In his postgame interview session with the full assembly of cameras and microphones, he'd described that hit as "oppo," as if we were all supposed to be impressed or something.
Uh, he wasn't about to get away with that:
Look, anything from Davis that isn't a dead pull, that's promising.
More than that was promising here.
• Thanks for reading my baseball coverage here the past five days. Right back to hockey tomorrow, and it's only 8 miles down the road: Penguins vs. Islanders over in Elmont, N.Y.
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