I'm sorry but there are no positives to be found
The Pirates avoid a sweep, but the complete hopelessness remains intact.
When I started this newsletter by insisting there was nothing the world needed less in 2020 than for the Pittsburgh Pirates to be playing baseball, even I didn’t realize how quickly this would be proven to be completely accurate. We knew the Pirates would be bad; we knew they had the potential to be very bad; but we also held out hope that in the 60-game season with half of the league making the playoffs, anything could happen. Something about 10,000 simulations, I dunno. But instead, in this most awful of years, we’ve had multiple nights ruined by something called Miguel del Pozo. That was not part of the plan; that is not what we need in 2020. (Above is Derek Holland, TFW your lead is blown by the Notorious MdP.)
It was nice — and, to be quite honest, shocking — to see the Bucs pull out a 6-5 walkoff win Thursday afternoon. (It was also nice to have an afternoon game so you don’t have that feeling of dread at 6:55 of oh shit, I’m going to spend the rest of this night watching an awful Pirates game, aren’t I?) It was good to see some smiling faces, because it was starting to feel too much like last season, which, remember, was marked by multiple internal fights, the star player getting arrested for being a child sex predator and an extended stretch where the team won roughly once per week. So a socially-distant celebration to avoid a sweep and 3-gamer coming up against the almost equally-pitiful Tigers means we might have a decent baseball weekend ahead of us.
But let’s be real. Finding any true positives from the first couple weeks of this (cursed, fake) season would require a sort of giddy optimism that I’m not sure even Michael McKenry has in him. (More on the Fort later.) The main storylines that have developed on Pirates Twitter these first few weeks have been: 1) “Are the Pirates tanking?” and 2) developing an obsession with Vanderbilt pitcher Kumar Rocker, the likely No. 1 pick in the 2021 draft.
The most “oh damn they really are tanking, huh?” moment of the series
Obviously it would be going to Miguel del Pozo as the first reliever out of the pen in a game you’re winning 4-3 in the 6th inning. The team’s bullpen woes are significant and only getting worse. But under absolutely no circumstance can Miguel del Pozo be brought into anything resembling a close game. Walk, walk, wild pitch, walk was how his appearance went, a surprise to absolutely nobody, allowing the Twins to tie the game at 4. It would stay that way until a Nelson Cruz walk-off in the bottom of the 9th, which gives us a bonus “does Derek Shelton understand the fundamentals of baseball strategy or not?” moment.
Cruz comes to plate with runners on 2nd and 3rd and 1 out. He’s only one of the most dangerous hitters of, oh, the past decade. You’ve got a free base to work with, his run means nothing, it creates a force at home and a potential double play. Nick Burdi is on the mound and has reliable control, so you don’t have to worry too much about creating a walk-in-the-winning-run situation. Miguel Sano is on deck, no slouch himself, but a big swing-and-miss guy, plus a potential double play threat. There is absolutely no reason to pitch to Cruz. So, of course, they pitch to Cruz and he walks it off. Here was Shelton’s explanation after the game.
I’m going to have to give that one a Nick Young Confused dot gif. I don’t know how you can be watching these games and not be seriously concerned about Derek Shelton’s decision-making abilities as a manager.
From “oh this is tanking” to “shit, this guy is one of our best hitters so far?”
I was all ready to put starting the immortal Erik Gonzalez for three straight games into the Definitely Tanking pile but then… it turns out that outside of Colin Moran, it’s actually Gonzalez who’s hitting the ball hardest early on? Dear god.
Gonzalez has been something of an anti-Jose Osuna for Pirates fans. While Osuna (demoted to Altoona in a solid troll move by the front office) mostly sucks but has a weirdly diehard contingent of supporters, Gonzalez also sucks but is seen as evil incarnate by Pirates fans. Last year he was terrible early on, had a horrifying collision with Starling Marte that knocked him out for most of the year (with Marte briefly landing on the DL, too) and then came back and took his stats from “putrid” to “safely below league average” with a decent September. (Not even I could stomach watching the games by then.)
He put together 5 hits in his 3 starts against the Twins and flashed a nice glove in the field. He seems to be one of those players that GMs are perpetually “evaluating” but if he’s playing 3B a few times a week while Josh Bell and Moran trade off 1B/DH duties… honestly there are plenty more things about this team to be angry about.
Well that’s depressing
On a team lacking in star power, excitement, dominance and just generally interesting stories, Nick Burdi offered a little bit of all of those. Coming back from two major arm injuries, he seemed to be better than ever, pumping 98mph darts and emerging as a potentially dominant late-inning reliever. He was on point in his first two outings, missed his third appearance because he was announced just as a rain delay started, then took the loss Monday thanks to a combo of a bloop hit and Shelton’s bad decisions.
Then Wednesday word came down that he was on the 45-day IL with an elbow injury, done for the year and it’s hard to be optimistic about what the future holds. It’s also hard to feel anything but depressed for the guy and while you can’t blame every injury on the short season and the start-stop-quick-restart nature of things, the rash of injuries makes this season feel even more irresponsible than it already is. Also look at the state of this bullpen, wow.
I want to be optimistic about Gregory Polanco but I just can’t be
Polanco absolutely destroyed a baseball on Thursday afternoon, a rare right-centerfield river shot.
That was a lot better than on Tuesday night, when he was forced to make two (2) throws from rightfield on consecutive plays and it was enough to cause at least minor arm discomfort.
Polanco’s been unfairly maligned as a defender in right because he has an astounding lack of grace. We all remember this one.
But he actually covered ground well and when his shoulder was still attached to the rest of his body, had a cannon of an arm (with varying accuracy). Now he’s 28 — by no means old but certainly not young and full of upside — and it’s hard to disagree with Mackey’s assessment that his days in RF are numbered. Maybe it’s for the best; he can use the DH to focus solely on hitting, where he still has power potential the Pirates desperately need. Unfortunately the Pirates have another one of those players in Bell, who’s an even worse affront to all that is decent when he plays in the field.
During Thursday’s broadcast, Joe Block said something to the extent of -- Polanco hasn’t been making a lot of contact, but when he has, he’s been hitting it hard. Which is true, as you can see in the exit velocity stats above. But he’s struck out 12 times in 26 plate appearances which is basically what a particularly bad hitting pitcher would do.
The explanation is that he’s still “finding his timing” but it feels like that’s been the case with Polanco for about 35% of his career at this point. He’s fun to root for, has that gigantic smile, but for a guy who once was seen as a potential perennial all-star and maybe even a fringe-MVP candidate, the hope now is that he can be… a good side of the platoon DH/occasional RF?
Michael McKenry just keeps going and going and going
I’ve not heard McKenry much before this season, but lord knows I’ve heard a lot of him now that he’s taken over for Steve Blass and is on half the TV broadcasts. The man simply does not stop talking. This isn’t all bad; there is something nice about having someone who’s been in the majors recently in the booth, and you can tell he has a very good understanding of the modern game and is actually pretty good at communicating it sometimes. I’m even willing to overlook his relentless positivity in the face of the extreme incompetence he’s seeing out on the field. It’s a company man position and you’ll hear something similar on almost all local broadcast teams.
But the man needs to take a breath. He can’t let one moment of dead air pass without trying to fill it, which is not what a baseball announcer should be doing. Granted, the beautiful ambient noise of the ballpark on a summer night is non-existent this year, but the Fort can still let us enjoy the silence for a moment or two. That said, his unbridled enthusiasm and compulsive need to fill air time gave us the best moment of this series. Yes, better than Kevin Newman’s walkoff hit.
McKenry’s giddiness and Block’s disturbed-yet-keeping-it-professional horror makes for a great moment. And for the record, every game watching this team feels like its own hostage situation...