Takeaways from the Pittsburgh Pirates series loss to the Texas Rangers

Typing the words “series loss” have become almost copy paste with the Pittsburgh Pirates as of late, especially considering they’ve won two series since July 30, both against AL West opponents, but they didn’t have such luck versus the Texas Rangers.

Pittsburgh lost two of three to the reigning World Series champions, who are anything but World Series contenders this year with their own multitude of issues, but, and you’ve probably heard this one before, each game was tight, competitive and, the Pirates had a chance to win all three.

Here are my takeaways, as I step in for Drew Cagle, on the series loss.

Strikeouts continue to be a massive problem.

KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK, that was included in the Pirates box score after Wednesday’s 1-0 walkoff loss, 16 strikeouts and along with it, zero runs.

It wasn’t just a problem on Wednesday though, as the Pirates struck out 35 times in their Globe Life Park debut across the three game series, an average of 11.67 strikeouts per game, or, even further math, almost half of all the outs they were granted.

The only player in the lineup not to strikeout on Wednesday? Catcher Yasmani Grandal, which I think is even more alarming. Bryan Reynolds, Joey Bart, Connor Joe and Bryan de la Cruz, all players who will likely be here next season, struck out a combined nine times, each having two or more.

Now, the old “was the chicken or the egg first?” argument begins by saying is this on coaching, on the players themselves, or a mixture of both?

Andy Haines has been crucified by myself, fans like you and well, everyone except the team themselves, and his track record doesn’t exactly back him much at all, especially this season.

Pittsburgh ranks fourth in strikeouts on the year as a team with 1179, trailing just Seattle, Colorado and Boston, and I can almost guarantee you without looking that they’ve were probably in the top-ten the last few years Haines was here as well.

There’s no spinning it, it’s a problem, an almost deathly problem that any team can overcome. Take the other three teams ahead of Pittsburgh, Colorado is no where near a competitive team, Seattle has practically taken themselves out of playoff consideration, much like the Pirates, and Boston is there but only because of their high power output, all because of outs that are practically free, and in today’s baseball, you’re going to strikeout, but you HAVE to hit on top of that, and Pittsburgh isn’t and has hardly done that all season.

Starting pitching shines, again

The starting pitching staff has been the light at the end of the tunnel all season for the Pirates, and it showed why against Texas.

Texas isn’t exactly an offensive juggernaut by any means this year, but when your three starters manager six-plus innings in each of the three starts you receive in a series, you take that to the bank and run.

Luis Ortiz has had a unique problem as of late, starting games brutally slow and allowing the game to get out of reach rather quickly early, but then he settles in nicely, much like he did Monday after allowing four earned runs in the first three innings. He managed six innings with seven strikeouts and just five hits allowed, and Ortiz has continued to be a pleasant surprise this year.

Mitch Keller, who’s struggled as of late also, found a bounce back start in the best way possible Tuesday, shutting down the Rangers offense through seven innings while racking up nine strikeouts, returning to the Keller we’ve been accustomed to over the past season and change. It was nice to see, and likely a springboard for a strong ending to the season for Keller.

Then, enter Domingo German, who made his Pirates starting pitching debut after appearing in a few relief appearances prior, and man, was he a surprise.

Despite losing the game, you can’t say much else about German’s start than that he did exactly what he needed to do, tossing six scoreless innings while allowing just three hits. The four walks put him into some trouble, but he managed it well, and for German, it appears he may have put some off field issues behind him, which he needed to take care of for his own good, and if he can be in anyway valuable to this staff, even as a long relief option, then the Pirates hit on signing him despite the issues that came, and could very well still, come with German.

The starting pitching staff will be the strength in 2025 as well, you don’t need to see any offseason signings to change my mind on that, and if the Pirates aspire to get to the 82-win mark(more on that later), the starting pitching, especially with the offensive “output” they are backed by, is going to have to superb, and we’ve seen them be top notch, and lets hope it continues.

82 wins should be the benchmark

The Pirates are 59-67 after the series loss to Texas, and it feels like months ago that we were discussing this team potentially sneaking into the Wild Card, but that potential is all but gone.

What isn’t gone is the chance for a winning season, and I am talking 82-80, a benchmark this team badly needs to get this thing moving along.

At 59-67, that gives the Pirates 13 more losses to play with from now until the season ends in Yankee Stadium in September, which means they would have to go 23-13 over the final 36 games of the season. That is a record that sounds absolutely out of reach, but is it really?

The starting pitching will keep Pittsburgh in any game, as we saw in Texas, and that will be the case over the final 36 games, and on top of that, the schedule is favorable enough to suggest 23 out of 36 is a real possibility.

Pittsburgh comes home for seven versus Cincinnati and Chicago, two teams within the division that they’ve had success against this season, and on top of that, Paul Skenes, who is starting Thursday, will likely get two starts. You then face Cleveland, Chicago again, Washington, Miami, Kansas City, St. Louis, Cincinnati again, Milwaukee and New York, and I’ll ask this, name me a team on that list they can’t beat?

I know 23 out of 36 sounds dangerously optimistic, well, because it is, but its doable, and when breaking it down even further, if they won two games in each of their remaining series, they’d reach 22 wins, and some of those are four game sets like we see this weekend versus Cincinnati. They can manage that, because they have before, with this team, and its up to the team to perform to an adequate enough level to get there, we just get to sit back and watch it play out.