DK's Breakdown: Is this bullpen (finally) beginning to dig out?
A game under .500.
If the 2026 Major League Baseball season had ended Tuesday evening, soon after the Pirates' 3-2 loss to the Mariners here at PNC Park, that'd represent an epic failure for a baseball operations department that's now halfway into Year 7 of its collective tenure. If Ben Cherington deserved to be fired a year ago, then, should this pace persist, he'd deserve to be fired like a rocket into the hot sun.
Right now, it's 39-40. And after a jarring July schedule that'll see the Phillies, Nationals, Braves, Brewers, Guardians, Yankees, Cubs, Diamondbacks -- all with winning records and three of them among the majors' top four teams -- it could easily look a whole lot worse.
It doesn't have to, though.
This isn't a prediction, by any means, but I'd bet anything that the local club could find fresh life by addressing nothing more than this single act:
That's Isaac Mattson. Meaning the real one. The one everyone came to love a year ago.
The one Endy Rodriguez, his catcher up there in whiffing Randy Arozarena, would tell me afterward has "great f---ing stuff" and is a "fighter" and has "no fear."
That's the one. He expanded his arsenal a bit in his recent stint in the minors but, at the end of the outing, he'll always be about rearing back with old No. 1.
Ideally upstairs, like almost all of these:
BASEBALL SAVANT
A slider, a change ... sure, but this cooking was done with heat. The Mariners went down 1-2-3 in his eighth inning, and six of the nine pitches were standard four-seamers.
"That felt good," Mattson would tell me afterward. "I've diversified what I'm doing, and I think it's helping everything I'd done in the past."
Wonderful, right?
Now, picture a scenario in which others from that beleaguered bullpen begin to figure stuff out. Meaning for themselves. And by themselves.
Because, to be brutally blunt, my friends, that's the only way out. For three reasons:
1. Cherington might as well be comatose when it comes to any external solution. The one reliever he's plucked from the outside, Hunter Stratton just last week in the Joey Bart trade, was sent straight from Atlanta to Indianapolis. And that's been it. The guy can't even be bothered, apparently, to scan the waiver wire, a common place to find such help.
2. Cherington was told by ownership this past fall that he could spend up to a franchise-record $110 million on payroll, as I reported exclusively at the time, provided it'd be on a bat that'd make a meaningful impact on a push to the playoffs. He spent the money, all right, but it was $12 million on Marcell Ozuna. Which hurt not only the offense but also, now, in all likelihood, the flexibility to find such help.
3. The new pitching coach, Bill Murphy, doesn't appear to be overseeing much of anything but year-over-year downgrades. Not just to the bullpen, either. Not even Paul Skenes, fresh off a Cy Young, or Mitch Keller, Mr. Consistency, have been the same since Murphy took over for Oscar Marin. And if there's progress being made on any front that's got anything to do with Murphy, let's just say it's moving about as slowly as his sloth-like walks to the mound.
The way out, thus, is for these relievers to return to being their best selves. And, to be fair to all, there've been concrete indications of that of late, even if it's maybe been lost amid this 7-12 month: Yohan Ramirez has found some semblance of command and has put up six straight scoreless appearances. Dennis Santana's had one stinker out of his past seven, and that was in Denver. Mason Montgomery's had one stinker out of his past six. Evan Sisk's stayed steady throughout. Gregory Soto's been better than steady, I'd say, and might be -- pun intended -- this bullpen's saving grace to date. And now that Carmen Mlodzinski's overcome being mad about being removed from the rotation and management's overcome being dumb about the piggyback usage, he could bolster that back end.
Lots of ifs, I know.
I asked Don Kelly after this game if he's seeing this trend, too.
"I think so," he'd reply. "Mattson's mixing it up and pitching real well. Santana had an outlier there in Colorado, but he's been throwing the better better of late. I thought Montgomery was sharp tonight. Just starting to get those guys back to what they're capable of doing."
What a difference that'd make. Just being able to play six-inning ball again would bring, as I see it, less strain on the starters and far greater rewards for the offense that, for the most part, endures through the Konnor Griffin and Oneil Cruz injuries.
But it's got to start at the back. And believe me, those guys know it. The bullpen's WHIP is 1.39, which is 22nd in the majors. There've been 318 strikeouts, fifth-most, which shows the arms are there, but also 151 walks, seventh-most, and an absurd 26 hit batsmen, by far the most, and 16 wild pitches, seventh-most.
Nobody's winning with that. Not here. Not anywhere.
"I think we've got a really special group, especially on the offensive side," Mattson would tell me. "We're just trying to find ways to be at our best. And when it means the most. The close games. Even blowout games, just going out and doing our job regardless of the situation. Tickets are nice, and turn-up zeroes are awesome, but for me, it just goes back to last year's motto, which was that we just need to try to find ways to help the team win."
With this group, he meant.
"We've got the guys here to win. We've been through some struggles, but it's a long season. We still have a chance to be at our best when it means the most."
THE ASYLUM
DK's Breakdown: Is this bullpen (finally) beginning to dig out?
A game under .500.
If the 2026 Major League Baseball season had ended Tuesday evening, soon after the Pirates' 3-2 loss to the Mariners here at PNC Park, that'd represent an epic failure for a baseball operations department that's now halfway into Year 7 of its collective tenure. If Ben Cherington deserved to be fired a year ago, then, should this pace persist, he'd deserve to be fired like a rocket into the hot sun.
Right now, it's 39-40. And after a jarring July schedule that'll see the Phillies, Nationals, Braves, Brewers, Guardians, Yankees, Cubs, Diamondbacks -- all with winning records and three of them among the majors' top four teams -- it could easily look a whole lot worse.
It doesn't have to, though.
This isn't a prediction, by any means, but I'd bet anything that the local club could find fresh life by addressing nothing more than this single act:
That's Isaac Mattson. Meaning the real one. The one everyone came to love a year ago.
The one Endy Rodriguez, his catcher up there in whiffing Randy Arozarena, would tell me afterward has "great f---ing stuff" and is a "fighter" and has "no fear."
That's the one. He expanded his arsenal a bit in his recent stint in the minors but, at the end of the outing, he'll always be about rearing back with old No. 1.
Ideally upstairs, like almost all of these:
BASEBALL SAVANT
A slider, a change ... sure, but this cooking was done with heat. The Mariners went down 1-2-3 in his eighth inning, and six of the nine pitches were standard four-seamers.
"That felt good," Mattson would tell me afterward. "I've diversified what I'm doing, and I think it's helping everything I'd done in the past."
Wonderful, right?
Now, picture a scenario in which others from that beleaguered bullpen begin to figure stuff out. Meaning for themselves. And by themselves.
Because, to be brutally blunt, my friends, that's the only way out. For three reasons:
1. Cherington might as well be comatose when it comes to any external solution. The one reliever he's plucked from the outside, Hunter Stratton just last week in the Joey Bart trade, was sent straight from Atlanta to Indianapolis. And that's been it. The guy can't even be bothered, apparently, to scan the waiver wire, a common place to find such help.
2. Cherington was told by ownership this past fall that he could spend up to a franchise-record $110 million on payroll, as I reported exclusively at the time, provided it'd be on a bat that'd make a meaningful impact on a push to the playoffs. He spent the money, all right, but it was $12 million on Marcell Ozuna. Which hurt not only the offense but also, now, in all likelihood, the flexibility to find such help.
3. The new pitching coach, Bill Murphy, doesn't appear to be overseeing much of anything but year-over-year downgrades. Not just to the bullpen, either. Not even Paul Skenes, fresh off a Cy Young, or Mitch Keller, Mr. Consistency, have been the same since Murphy took over for Oscar Marin. And if there's progress being made on any front that's got anything to do with Murphy, let's just say it's moving about as slowly as his sloth-like walks to the mound.
The way out, thus, is for these relievers to return to being their best selves. And, to be fair to all, there've been concrete indications of that of late, even if it's maybe been lost amid this 7-12 month: Yohan Ramirez has found some semblance of command and has put up six straight scoreless appearances. Dennis Santana's had one stinker out of his past seven, and that was in Denver. Mason Montgomery's had one stinker out of his past six. Evan Sisk's stayed steady throughout. Gregory Soto's been better than steady, I'd say, and might be -- pun intended -- this bullpen's saving grace to date. And now that Carmen Mlodzinski's overcome being mad about being removed from the rotation and management's overcome being dumb about the piggyback usage, he could bolster that back end.
Lots of ifs, I know.
I asked Don Kelly after this game if he's seeing this trend, too.
"I think so," he'd reply. "Mattson's mixing it up and pitching real well. Santana had an outlier there in Colorado, but he's been throwing the better better of late. I thought Montgomery was sharp tonight. Just starting to get those guys back to what they're capable of doing."
What a difference that'd make. Just being able to play six-inning ball again would bring, as I see it, less strain on the starters and far greater rewards for the offense that, for the most part, endures through the Konnor Griffin and Oneil Cruz injuries.
But it's got to start at the back. And believe me, those guys know it. The bullpen's WHIP is 1.39, which is 22nd in the majors. There've been 318 strikeouts, fifth-most, which shows the arms are there, but also 151 walks, seventh-most, and an absurd 26 hit batsmen, by far the most, and 16 wild pitches, seventh-most.
Nobody's winning with that. Not here. Not anywhere.
"I think we've got a really special group, especially on the offensive side," Mattson would tell me. "We're just trying to find ways to be at our best. And when it means the most. The close games. Even blowout games, just going out and doing our job regardless of the situation. Tickets are nice, and turn-up zeroes are awesome, but for me, it just goes back to last year's motto, which was that we just need to try to find ways to help the team win."
With this group, he meant.
"We've got the guys here to win. We've been through some struggles, but it's a long season. We still have a chance to be at our best when it means the most."
That'd be soon.
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