7-1-23 – By Gary Morgan – @garymo2007 on Twitter
The Pirates don’t feel the way they did just a week ago. They’re scoring runs. They’re scoring runs when they get down early. They’re scoring runs late in games to make things uncomfortable.
They’ve done it against perceived good pitchers, and bad alike.
None more so than Carlos Santana, who went from doing almost nothing to swatting over .450 in his past week.
The Brewers are in bullpen hell, Pirates fans should understand that. They didn’t have their closer or other key components available and were asking Freddy Peralta who hasn’t pitched more than 6 innings all year to give them more than he has shown capable.
Really, again, should sound awful familiar.
The Pirates countered with Osvaldo Bido, and the voodoo he’d been using was ineffective against the Crew who knocked him out after only 3.1 innings, surrendering 4 runs.
Then the Pirates started chipping away.
Number 297 was a ball he had no business keeping fair, but Cutch has long been a master at bat control.
That got the party started. It was a solo shot, but the entire game you got the impression, this team wasn’t going to go away.
They’d score 2 more in the inning before turning to the bullpen on this Nick Gonzales double off the Clemente Wall.
The Brewers would take advantage and tack on 3 more runs, seemingly putting this one away and ultimately, saving their pen and getting a win without their best options available.
Wrong.
That’s right, walk off in the river.
News & Notes
- Andrew McCutchen is now 3 homeruns away from 300
- Henry Davis had 3 opportunities to impact this game at the plate last night and didn’t manage to come through. He also made a rather large error in RF. His night could easily have been the story but the Pirates didn’t allow it.
- Nick Gonzales hasn’t been as consistent as Davis, he too made a fielding mistake last night, but man can he impact a baseball. You can see how that opposite field power is going to serve him well.
- Bryan Reynolds & Ji-man Choi could both be back this weekend from the IL. You have to imagine Bae, Castro, Marcano are all possibilities to go. Marcano and Bae came through with important hits last night.
- Jack Suwinski had a good night, going 2 for 3 with a walk. One of the hits was against a lefty.
- Dauri Moreta still looks shaky. The slider looks great, but hitters are clearly trying to just wait for the heater. It’s a problem the Pirates knew was there all year, even while he was killing it. It’s why he’s gone dormant for stretches this year, trying to side bullpen the problem away. That slider is a unicorn pitch in this league, so he’s certainly worth figuring out.
Steel City Pirates 
It’s going to be fascinating to see how they handle playing time once Choi returns. Will Cutch play RF? Will Henry finally catch? Are we looking at more rest days split between Santana, Cutch and Choi?
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It’s super hard to say right? I can’t even say for sure who goes for Reynolds. Much better problems this year
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The decisions are definitely much tougher. Palacios has been good and necessary. Joe has carried the team at times. Resting the veterans could really pay off down the stretch.
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And if it turns out the kids are pushing them aside, hey, win/win
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The decisions are definitely much tougher. Palacios has been good and necessary. Joe has carried the team at times. Resting the veterans could really pay off down the stretch.
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