Luis Ortiz has been impressive, and he may have carved out a role on this team after all

6-18-24 – Ethan S. Smith / @mvp_EtHaN

Luis Ortiz has had quite the career with the Pittsburgh Pirates up to this point, going from an out-of-nowhere, emerging starting pitcher with some serious gas in 2022 to falling from grace a bit to being completely out of the Pirates rotation.

Throughout all of this though, Ortiz has remained a member of the Pirates pitching staff, scrounging around for an established role, and although it appears he is still finding his place, as of late, he’s seemed to be on the right track to finding something consistent for himself and the team, becoming beneficial to not just himself, but others as well.

Over the past week and change, we have seen Carmen Mlodzinski, who mind you has improved mightily from his early season struggles, open games in which the Pirates did not want, or flat out didn’t have, a starter scheduled or available to pitch. Mlodzinski has been impressive in those outings, and both times, he was followed by Ortiz, who turned back the clock a bit.

On the 2024 campaign, Ortiz has a 2.51 ERA over 43.0 IP in 20 appearances, including a 2.11 ERA in his past seven appearances. Ortiz’s biggest struggle has been his command, seeing walks become a massive problem over the past season and change, but he’s been much better in that department this year, posting 33 strikeouts to 17 walks, a much closer ratio to his 2022 campaign when he had 17 strikeouts and 10 walks and a much better ratio than what we saw in 2023 when he had 59 strikeouts and 48 walks.

His advanced analytics suggest those statistics aren’t a front either, as he ranks in the 73rd percentile in xBA(.224), the 74th percentile in fastball velocity(95.4) and the 81st percentile in pitching rule value(7), so although he isn’t missing tons of bats, as evidence to his 20-percent whiff rate, he is finding ways to have success with the fastball again, something he lost a bit in 2023.

June, the month we have seen Ortiz go deep in outings after the Mlodinski opening stints, has been especially impressive from Ortiz, who currently has nine strikeouts and 1 walk with a 0.73 ERA in three appearances, all of which he pitched three innings or more.

To further drive this point, Ortiz’s walks per nine innings has dipped considerably from last season, from 4.98 to 3.56, while his strikeouts per nine has increased from 6.13 to 6.91, so its safe to say we have seen massive improvements from Ortiz on the mound.

The question over the past year and a half for Ortiz has been what kind of role he would carve out for the Pirates, and almost suddenly, he’s found one, becoming useful as not only a long-reliever, but also a “relief” to two of the Pirates young, top stars in Jared Jones and Paul Skenes, who are both in their first full seasons of work at top level.

Over the past weekend, when many anticipated Skenes to pitch Sunday in Colorado, we saw two bullpen games, due to a desire to keep Skenes fresh, seeing as this is the first time he has ever truly pitched on four-five days rest on a consistent basis, as he wasn’t doing so at Air Force, LSU or even the minor leagues very often.

The same can go for Jones, who has seen “struggles” as of late, and I put “struggles” because he is having a rookie campaign and is having the usual ups-and-downs of one, but his spin rates have fallen a bit, nothing super worrisome, but is a possible indication of fatigue, seeing as Jones has already pitched 79.0 innings this year.

For Ortiz, this could line up well for, well himself, and Derek Shelton and the coaching staff, as it could set up for the Pirates to have a viable, consistent approach to games where they want to push Jones, Skenes or any pitcher back a day to keep them fresh, allowing Ortiz and Mlodinski to operate in roles that have now produced a 100-percent winning percentage, albeit 2-0, but if it isn’t broken, why fix it?

Now, in a perfect baseball world, you wouldn’t want to have to do that, but with injuries to Martin Perez, who appears to be nearing a return soon, Marco Gonzales and Quinn Prietser, it has become a necessity to have something in place in case its needed, and Ortiz has shown he can be relied upon, and it helps in another area as well.

We have seen this bullpen gas itself out due to the bullpen games and shorter outings the Pirates get from their starting pitchers every now-and-then, but in those bullpen games we have seen from Ortiz, he has taken up a large chunk of the innings needed, but also done so efficiently, throwing 9.1 innings while only allowing one earned run and setting things up well for the Pirates to utilize their strong back-end bullpen options without having to over utilize them.

If Ortiz can continue to be a steady force in the middle, or even beginning of games, it helps the starting pitch staff by leaps and bounds and also benefits a bullpen, that’s usage as stated before is one of the highest in baseball.

It is good for Ortiz as well, because he has had a ton of changes to his roles throughout his first two years in a Pirates uniform, but if he continues to be consistently impressive, the Pirates have no choice but to keep him there, and they should with the current state of things.

I am sure Ortiz will continue to find innings moving forward, and he should, because even on the surface, Ortiz has continued to be consistent, and is arguably one of the most consistent arms the Pirates have had all season, and they should be thankful for it with the amount of turmoil they’ve seen in the middle-relief so far in 2024. Ortiz may have carved out a new role for himself, and it may a role he stays in for the long haul, and that’s a good thing for himself, and the Pittsburgh Pirates.