9-18-24 – By Michael Castrignano – @412DoublePlay on X
After dropping the first two games of the series, the Pirates will next send Jake Woodford against 2023 AL Cy Young runner-up, Sonny Gray – who last faced Pittsburgh on June 12th tossing 7 frames of 4-hit, 1-run ball walking 1 while striking out 9 Bucs batters.
Gray is 13-9 and has a 3.75 ERA over 160.2 innings through his first season in St. Louis – but has gotten into a groove as of late, allowing just 3 runs over his last 3 starts and 19 innings pitched.
His ability to miss bats, induce chases and generate strikeouts has continued in the Gateway City, ranking 6th in strikeout rate among all starting pitchers.
While his main offering is his low-90s 4-seam, Gray also throws a high-80s cutter, low-90s sinker, low-80s curve and a high-80s changeup but his most effective offering has been his sweeper, which sits mid-80s and breaks off his fastball moving in the opposite direction.
Gray works 4-seam/curve/sweeper combo against lefties and leans more sinker/cutter/sweeper against righties.
But the main thing is batters will see a lot of fastballs and strikeout against the sweeper a TON as 109 of his 195 Ks have come with the sweeper – which has a whopping 43.8% whiff rate – despite only throwing the pitch 20% of the time.
Opposing hitters are batting just .142 against the sweeper compared to .310 versus the 4-seam and .279 against the cutter. His sinker has produced positive overall results as well, with a .198 BAA but Bucs batters will need to lean on the heat.
The Pirates have a number of things working against them today. For starters, the offense has been beyond anemic all season, mustering a single run over the first two games while leaving 13 men on base. They won’t get many opportunities against Gray and will need to capitalize when they get those chances.
Second, Gray is very good at home! That’s underselling it a bit, honestly. Gray is DOMINANT when pitching at Busch Stadium.
His home ERA of 2.56 ranks 8th lowest among all qualified starting pitchers while his 2.32 FIP is 3rd best behind only Chris Sale and Garrett Crochet.
Pirates batters need to stay on the fastball if they’ll have any success today. Try to catch the break on the sweeper early and spit on those pitches.
Uphill battle but hopefully the team rises to the occasion today.
Let’s Go Bucs!
Steel City Pirates 
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