Oneil Cruz entered the Pirates' record books with his 33rd consecutive stolen base in the third inning of tonight's matchup against the Padres. It's the most consecutive stolen bases by a Pirate since caught stealing became an official statistic in 1951.

Cruz's steal extended a streak that started after he was thrown out by Brewers catcher William Contreras on April 22, 2024. It surpasses the previous mark of 32 set by Tony Womack in 1997. The Pirates also recognize Max Carey's consecutive stolen base record of 37 which took place between 1922-23. 

• At one point in the month of April, the Pirates had one of the top-ranked bullpens in the game based on team ERA. Now, after 33 games and another poor late-game performance against the Padres tonight, they rank 19th in that specific category (4.29) while having allowed the 11th-most earned runs (56) in the league. 

Ryan Borucki and Chase Shugart combined to toss 2 1/3 innings of scoreless ball, but Caleb Ferguson and Colin Holderman followed by allowing a combined four runs on four hits with two walks in 1 2/3 innings. This was the fourth time since April 26 that Pirates relievers combined to allow four or more runs on five or more hits in the final three innings of a game. 

"We haven't put people away. I think we've gotten ourselves into counts and we have not put people away," Derek Shelton said. "When you get ahead and you're coming out of the bullpen, we have to put people away and we have not done that." 

• Padres starting pitcher Dylan Cease turned to his bread-and-butter slider early and often -- 54 of 91 pitches -- against the Pirates' poor-hitting lineup and generated whiffs (10) on 33% of the swings taken (30). He mixed in his fastball and knuckle curve to keep hitters off balance en route to allowing two earned runs on three hits with three walks and three strikeouts in four innings. Pirates hitters were able to draw out lengthy at-bats against Cease, pushing him out of the game early, but they didn't do enough damage while he was on the mound.

"When you get the (sliders) up, you can't miss them, because the ones he gets away and gets them against his arm-side, it's why he's a really good major-league pitcher. You have to take advantage of his misses," Shelton said. "I thought we did a good job with our approach. He threw four innings and we made him throw (91 pitches). I think the one thing that's different than probably 95% of teams in baseball is, you try to run starters to get to bullpens. You get to this bullpen, it's a little bit of a different story." 

• Speaking of the Padres' bullpen, six different relievers combined to limit the Pirates to just two runs on four hits over the final five innings.