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Pirate Morning Report: Can The Pirates Only Blow Teams Out

Final Score: Pirates 13 Marlins 1

Why The Pirates Won: The Pirates have won 2 of their last 9 games. The combined scores of the two wins have been 22 to 1. I can’t put too much significance on the wins. Giving credit where credit is due, Braxton Ashcraft pitched himself one hell of a game, going the distance in just 85 pitches while giving up 1 run on 3 hits. He struck out 10 and walked one. The Pirates got 5 of their runs against a position player. Beyond that, there was no question the bats came alive for the 2nd time in 9 games. The Marlins still won the series to keep the Pirates at bay. The Pirates will open a 6-game homestand against the Red Sox and Tigers.

Key Moments of the Game: Ashcraft got the Marlins to ground into three big double plays. He walked the second batter of the game in the first but two pitches later, got the next batter to ground into the double play on a very nifty play by Jared Triolo. After an opening single in the fourth, he induced the second double play three pitches later. This was still when the game was scoreless. With the score 2-0 in the bottom of the fifth, there was a third double play after a leadoff single. In the top of the sixth, the Pirates put a three-spot up on the board to take a 5-0 lead. Ashcraft retired the side in both the bottom of the sixth and seventh. The Pirates really broke the game open in the eighth and ninth, leaving the only question: would Ashcraft get his complete game? He did with ease, giving up a bottom of the ninth home run. The Pirates will have a well-rested bullpen going into the homestand. Will Don Kelly know how to use it? Highly unlikely, but we will see.

Next game: Tonight, the Red Sox, in Pittsburgh. The Pirates face another team that is fighting for a playoff spot but in the American League. The Red Sox are holding down the 2nd Wild Card spot by 5 games and trail the Yankees by 3 games for the top wild card spot. They have rattled off 15 game and 9 game winning streaks over the last 6 weeks. However currently they had lost 5 in a row but snapped the losing streak yesterday by beating the Blue Jays. This could be good for the Pirates. They need to get on a roll just to save some face. Bubba Chandler is going for the Pirates, with the Red Sox countering with lefty Jake Bennet. As we all know the Pirates have trouble with lefties. Let’s hope they get over it. Stay Tuned.

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Pirates Morning Report: A Perfect Example

Final Score: Pirates 2 Marlins 8

Why the Pirates Lost: Another bad day for the offense. They could only muster 2 runs, and one of those was a gift from the Marlins. They managed only 6 hits for the game and just 2 hits for the last 18 outs of the game. The pitchers did not fare much better, giving up 8 runs on 9 hits and walking 8. Don Kelly did exactly the same thing he did a few games ago against the Mets, which was a disaster then, and it was a disaster last night. With the game in doubt in the 3rd inning, he made the same wrong move he made against the Mets. The Marlins had just made the score 2-1 and had runners on 2nd and 3rd with one out. With the exception of Yohan Ramirez, Kelly had his entire bullpen at his disposal. Who does he bring in, AGAIN? Evan Sisk, who failed miserably in almost the exact same situation. Against the Mets, he gave up a bases-loaded double that cleared the bases. Last night, it was much more painful to watch. He walked a batter to load the bases. He hit a batter to make the score 3-1. He walked another batter to make the score 4-1. The Marlins hit a sacrifice fly to make it 5-1. They scored 3 runs and did not get a hit. Again, he had practically the whole bullpen at his disposal. The game was on the line. I just can’t write any more about this. Let’s just move on. It is truly beyond comprehension.

Key Moments Of The Game: The Pirates proved once again that Carmen Mlodzinski is really not a starting pitcher. They refuse to use the opener where Mlodzinski has followed the opener with two of his best performances. The Marlins had gifted the Pirates a run in the top of the second on an errant throw by the shortstop. In the bottom of the second, the Pirates essentially gifted the run right back when Mlodzinski was slow to cover first base on a hard-hit shot up the first base line that Spence Horwitz made a great play on. The Pirates actually manufactured a run in the top of the fourth. Nick Gonzales doubled. Lonny Simon hit a ground ball to the right side of the infield, moving Gonzales to third. Esmerlyn Valdez was robbed of a home run, but it was good enough to score the run. Lake Bachar immediately gave up a home run in the bottom of the inning, allowing the Marlins to take the lead 6-2. For the second game in a row, the Pirates never threatened to make a game of it. The Pirates will lose their seventh series in a row. They are six games out of the wild card. They are six games under .500. It looks like the last 2 wild card spots are going to boil down to a three-team dogfight between the Padres, Diamondbacks, and Phillies. Even if the Pirates got red hot, they would have to bump out two of those three teams to get into the playoffs. What are the odds of that happening? Baseball Reference puts their chances at 1.8%. It looks like the Steelers aren’t the only ones who are going to be playing exhibition games in August.

Next Game: This afternoon, Marlins in Miami. The Marlins go for the sweep today and I would not bet against them. They look so much better than the Pirates. The Pirates just have a lackadaisical look to them. Combine that with the strange thinking of the Pirate management team and you can see why this team is folding up like an accordion. Putting Evan Sisk in the same situation where he failed miserably just a few days before is a perfect example. It shows a lack of understanding of what high leverage means, and bullpen mismanagement that has been going on since opening day. What will they do next? Stay tuned.

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Pirates Morning Report: Pirates Shutout To Go Further Into The Abyss.

Final Score: Pirates 0 Marlins 2

Why The Pirates Lost: The Pirate bats were completely stifled getting only 4 singles and not getting a runner in scoring position the entire game. One of the hits did not even result in a runner being on base as Ronny Simon tried to go to second on a chopper down the left field. He was thrown out by a mile. The Pirates struck out 10 times and the first 5 batters in the lineup went 0 for 18 with a walk and 8 strikeouts. Paul Skenes went 5 innings throwing only 65 pitches. He gave up 1 earned run on 5 hits. He walked one and hit a batter which eventually scored the 2nd run of the game. Skenes’ velocity continues to go down with no explanation from him or the Pirates. Another unsolved mystery that involves the pitching staff. Yohan Ramirez had a nice 3 innings of work giving up 0 runs and 0 hits to lower his ERA to 2.67. Meaningful games for the Pirates continue to be a problem in performance. Another couple of weeks of this and the pressure will be off.

Key Moments Of The Game: I do not know if there was a key moment in this one. The Pirates never really threatened to score the whole game. The Marlins hit a home run in the 3rd inning and the Pirates gifted them a run in the 5th. The Pirates bats were so inept that the Marlin did not feel threatened all night. The bottom line is that the Pirates are now 5 games under .500 and are slowly but surely sinking right out of playoff contention.

Next Game: Tonight, Marlins in Miami. Carmen Mlodzinski will start for the Pirates. The Pirates continue not to use the opener which has proven to be so effective when they used it with Mlodzinski. The Marlins are countering with Jason Junk. The only good news that came from last nights game was Esmerlyn Valdez got a line drive single and hit two other line drive outs. Will tomorrow be the turn around day for the Pirates. Stay tuned.

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Pirates Morning Report: Being Wrong, Being Right, And An Unsolved Mystery

The Pirates open a three-game series against the Marlins tonight. It is a series where nothing less than a sweep will be satisfactory. Anything less, and the Pirates’ slim playoff chances become ever more remote. I thought this would be a good time to look at one thing I was wrong about, one thing that I was right about, and the unsolved mystery of this team that essentially is keeping them from making the playoffs.

I was wrong about the Pirates signing Yohan Ramirez. When they signed him to a one-year major league contract, I could not believe it. There was nothing in his resume that would indicate that he was capable of improvement. He proved me wrong. He got off to a great start but then ran into a bit of a rough patch that I thought might get me off the hook, but he has righted the ship to have an even better July and August. He has already faced 278 batters this year, which is the most in his career. Some of his stats are worse than they have been in the past. Like all the Pirate pitchers, he has had trouble finding the plate, averaging 5.5 walks per 9 innings. His career average has been around 4 per 9 innings. His strike out rate is down from last year, when it was 12.2 to 10.4 per 9 innings. Where he has excelled is in overall run prevention. When he has pitched in 25 games or more, he has not had an ERA under 3.67. Last year, his ERA was 5.40. With his recent success, he has his ERA down to a career-best 2.80. His WHIP is a career-best 1.290. His hits allowed per 9 innings of 6 is his best since 2022. Granted, he has not been in that many high-leverage situations, but he has served this team well by eating up relief innings and keeping the Pirates in most ballgames when he is called upon. His ERA+ of 155 is the highest he has ever had, except for a 16-game sample from his first year in the majors back in 2020. If every Pirate pitcher had improved as much as Ramirez, the Pirates would be in first place.

I was right about the Marcell Ozuna signing. I did not like it because it took all of the flexibility out of the Pirate lineup. Before Ozuna was signed, you looked at the 13 position players and could see a bevy of players that would be DHing for the Pirates: Brandon Lowe, Oneil Cruz, Ryan O’Hearn, Spencer Horwitz, Bryan Reynolds, and Endy Rodriguez. It would be a way to give a player a rest but still use him. Now you could throw Nick Gonzales into the mix the way he has been fielding this year. It was a way to keep your best hitters in the lineup and really stretch the lineup out. Once Ozuna was signed, that all ended. We signed a player that could do one thing only, and that was DH. If the Pirates were going to go that route, then they should have just signed Andrew McCutchen. Ozuna got off to a horrible start, which made matters worse. Ozuna batted in 25 of the first 30 games of the season. He got hits in only 10 of those games for a very Henry Davis-like OPS of .470. In the next 32 games, he batted in 22. For that stretch, he got hits in 14 games and raised his OPS to .582. Then the Pirates only used him in 12 of the next 31 games. He got hits in 7 of those games, raising his OPS to .613. One thing is for sure: no player is going to get better if he is not given the opportunity, even a veteran. I am not saying he might have really come on and started hitting like he did his whole career, but basically, the Pirates never really gave him a chance to do so. Ozuna had 277 at-bats. Other Pirate players have had 250 DH at-bats. The Pirates are ranked 29th in baseball at the DH position. The DH problems of the Pirates are not all Ozuna. I would have felt that the Ozuna signing was bad even if it had worked out better. The way the Pirates managed Ozuna during the season made a bad situation even worse. Not a surprise there.

Of course, the unsolved mystery of the season is what in the hell is wrong with the pitching staff. This is a staff that has digressed more than anyone could have imagined. This staff was ranked the 3rd best pitching staff in all of baseball in 2025. This was a staff that pitched for the entire season under little or no run support. It was felt that if the Pirates could hit just about league average, or a little below that, they would easily make the playoffs. Despite this recent dry spell by the offense, they are still way above league average as an offense. They are 3rd in all of baseball in runs per game. The pitching staff this year is ranked 16th overall in a 30-team league. The bullpen has had many failures this year; they have blown 20 saves. League-leading Houston has only blown 7. They have more losses than saves, with only 2 other teams, the Angels and the Tigers, having done that. The one big issue seems to be control. So far this season, the Pirates have walked 437 batters; for all of 2025, they walked 473. Only one pitcher improved from 2025, and that is Braxton Ashcraft. He walked 3.1 per 9 innings last year and has dropped that to 2.2 this year. Jared Jones is exactly the same as he was in 2024, with a 2.9 rate for 9 innings. Gregory Soto is basically the same as he has been for his career, a 3.6 per 9. The rest of the staff has gotten worse, and some significantly so. None worse than Bubba Chandler. In 2025, he had the excellent rate of 1.1 walks per 9 innings; now he is at 4.8. Wow! Dennis Santana doubled the other team’s pleasure by walking 4.5 batters per 9 compared with 2.2 this year. Paul Skenes and Carmen Mlodzinski each walk a half a batter more per 9 innings than they did last year. The pitching staff has been hurt a little more from the long ball, giving up 125 so far this year, ranking them currently 9th. They gave up 153 last year to finish 3rd best in the league. The real mystery here is why? They cannot play the injury card as they can and do with the position players. This has been one of the healthiest staffs in all of baseball. It is easy to blame the new pitching coach, and I am not going to completely discount it. There has been a lot of chatter that pitching in the World Baseball Classic ruined Paul Skenes for the season. Now, granted, he was pitching real baseball in late February or early March, but he threw 8 and 1/3 innings and around 120 pitches total in the two games he pitched. If that is all it takes, then there is something wrong. Unless the Pirates come up with some new information, or if we hear a lot of negatives about the new pitching coach, which we have not, this decline in what was thought of as the best young pitching staff in baseball will most likely remain an unsolved mystery. I guess it wouldn’t hurt if one of the coaches just said, “Just throw the damn ball over the plate.” Could it be that simple? If there is a solution, the Pirates better find it fast. If they don’t, they will go through another September just being the spoiler.

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Pirate Morning Report: One Game Wonders

Final Score: Pirates 1 Mets 11

Why the Pirates Lost: After blowing out the Mets on Saturday, the Pirates reverted back to their old ways to lose their sixth series in a row. Jared Jones had a horrible performance, going only 3 plus innings and getting charged with 8 runs. He gave up 6 hits, walked 3, and hit 2 batters. The Mets unloaded on the Pirates for 11 runs on 15 hits and received 7 walks. The Pirate offense scored 1 run on 4 hits. For the entire game, they had one man in scoring position. The last 6 in the batting order went 0 for 19 with 11 strikeouts. Esmerlyn Valdez struck out 4 times in a row. Don Kelly managed poorly again. Jones had loaded the bases on a hit batsman and 2 walks. The fact that he was allowed to walk two was mistake number one. Then, with the bases loaded and the score 5-1, he brought in Mr. Low Leverage Evan Sisk. Of course, he gave up a bases-clearing double. He wound up giving up another run to make the score 9-1, and the game was over. He wound up bringing in most of his high leverage relievers anyway, after the game turned into a blowout. Why did he not bring one of them in when it was still a game. I guess Kelly thought the game was already over when it was just 5-1. Maybe he was right.

Key Moment Of The Game: From the outset, Jared Jones did not look good. Unlike Brewers manager Pat Murphy, the Pirates elected to go with Jones until the game just about got out of hand. Then they brought in a reliever who does not have high-leverage experience, and the game was history. The Pirates are barely out of last place and find themselves 5.5 games out of a wild card spot. More importantly, there are four other teams that are between them and the wild card. The Phillies and Diamondbacks are holding down the last two spots with the same record. If they play one game under .500 the rest of the way, the Pirates will need to have a record of 26 and 16 to just tie them. Baseball Reference gives them a 3.9% chance of making the playoffs. I think that is optimistic.

Next Game: Tuesday night, Marlins in Miami. The Pirates are 2.5 games behind the Marlins who are trying to survive a 12 game losing streak. They have been 8-5 since the streak. Needless to say, the Pirates need nothing short of a sweep to improve their pathetic odds of making the playoffs. Even a series win on the road will not be good enough. After this they come home to face the Red Sox and the Tigers. Winning 8 of the next 9 games is also almost a must, because they go on a brutal 9 game road trip facing the Dodgers, Padres and Cardinals. You can see now why I think 3.9% is optimistic. Stay tuned.

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Pirates Morning Report: All Cylinders Firing

Final Score: Pirates 9 Mets 0

Why The Pirate Won: The Pirates’ pitching staff threw their first shutout since May 20th. It was their 7th shutout of the season. Last season, the Pirate pitching staff threw 19 shutouts. Last season, they held opponents to 1 run 24 times. This season, so far, they have done it 15 times. Bubba Chandler pitched a solid 6 innings, giving up only 3 hits and a walk. The offense came alive last night too, scoring 9 runs on 12 hits to go along with 9 walks. Of course, one time they had 2nd and 3rd with no one out and did not score. The Pirates wanted everyone to know that even on a good night, they could not situationally hit. But hey, a win is a win is a win. A much-needed win at that.

Key Moments Of The Game: The Pirates got off to a great start. Jake Mangum led off with a double. After a Brandon Lowe strikeout, Bryan Reynolds got an infield hit and Spencer Horwitz was hit by a pitch to load the bases. The Pirates got a couple of lucky hits. Nick Gonzales hit a little 63 MPH tapper between the pitcher and first base, driving in the first run and putting runners on second and third with two outs. Ronny Simon hit a cue shot ground ball off the end of the bat at 72 MPH right down the third base line for a double that made the score 3-0. It was right there that you felt that this was going to be the Pirates’ night. In the bottom of the fourth, the Pirates had four walks and three hits to score four runs. That made the score 8-0, and the Mets were never in the game.

Next Game: This afternoon, Mets in Pittsburgh. The Pirates will have to go up against another lefty in Sean Manaea in the rubber match today. The Pirates have lost 5 series in a row including 2 four game series. Endy Rodriguez apparently has another injury. It was a solid win last night for the Pirates. Today’s game can continue the momentum with a win. After today they will head to Miami to play the Marlins. The Marlins are right at .500 and are 2 games ahead of the Pirates in the loss column. A five game winning streak would be just what the doctor ordered. Can they do it? Stay tuned.

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Pirates Morning Report: Pirate Thinking

Final Score: Pirates 4 Mets 6

Why The Pirates Lost: Carmen Mlodzinski moved back to the rotation last night. Mlodzinski, out of the bullpen, has an ERA of 2.29. His ERA as a starter is 4.30. Twice he followed up an opener; in those situations, he pitched 11 innings and gave up 2 runs on 6 hits. The Pirates do not have much of a choice but to use him as a starter due to the injury to Mitch Keller. The fact remains, when he starts a ballgame, he is just not that effective. Why not go with the opener and then Mlodzinski? The Pirates’ thinking is baffling. The Pirate bats did come alive last night, getting 12 hits; they could only score 4 runs because of very bad baserunning that caused 2 outs and kept the Pirates from putting more pressure on the Mets. Joe Block kept calling the Mets last in the division, bemoaning the fact that the Pirates were going to lose to them. If the Mets had lost, they would have lost to the last place team in the Central Division. The fact remains, this was a game between two last place teams.

Key Moments Of The Game: The Mets were leading 1-0 going into the top of the 3rd inning. They had their own bonehead baserunning moment when, on a fly ball to left field, the runner on 2nd went all the way to third but did not retouch the bag, and the Pirates were able to record a double play. Francisco Lindor immediately stole 2nd base. The Mets followed that up with two singles, the first one scoring Lindor to make it 2-0. Marcus Semien took a 1-2 fastball on the inner third of the plate and drilled it into the left field seats for a 3-run homer, putting the Mets in front 5-0. The Mets added another run in the 4th after two were out. Evan Sisk hit a batter, who stole 2nd, and Lindor singled, driving him home. In the bottom of the 7th, it looked like the Pirates really had something going. They had scored 2 runs and had runners on 1st and 3rd with one out. Brandon Lowe popped out. Jared Triolo was the runner on 3rd base. He did not take a big enough lead at 3rd with the 3rd baseman playing way back. He was thrown out at the plate when he tried to score on a pitch that got by the catcher by about 20 feet. He would have scored if he had taken the proper lead. The play was not even close, but the Pirates challenged anyway, losing their challenge for the game. Those Pirates were thinking again. In the bottom of the 9th, an even bigger baserunning mistake was made. Jacob Gonzalez hit a deep drive off the Clemente wall, driving in the third run of the game, but then tried to go to second and was thrown out. The ball did carom off the wall right to the fielder, but the play was right in front of him. The Pirates were down by 3 runs. His run is meaningless. The Pirates still made it interesting, scoring a 4th run, but in the end, they lost their 4th in a row and 12 of their last 16 games.

Next game: Tonight, Mets in Pittsburgh. The Pirates blundered their way to another loss last night, but the bats did seem to wake up just a touch. If it were not for the base running miscues, they might have been able to pull the game out. I would say we are down to about a toss up of seeing meaningful games in September and that is an optimistic view. Oneil Cruz played in AAA last night which is good news. Now if they had just picked up a starter at the deadline. Robbie Ray would have been so nice. Although the way the Pirates think they may have put him in the bullpen.

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Pirates Morning Report: The El Foldo Continues In Pittsburgh

Final Score: Pirates 2 Brewers 5

Why The Pirates Lost: The Brewers looked focused and poised while the Pirates looked dazed and confused. This is obviously a team that has never played meaningful games in August and does not know how to do so. For the third consecutive game, the Pirates could only score 2 runs. In those 3 games, they got just 14 hits and struck out a whopping 34 times. Nick Gonzales, who is making a great case to become strictly a DH, has a -11 in defensive runs saved at 3rd base. Yesterday, he could not keep a ball in front of him that was hit right at him allowing an insurance run to score. He got doubled off base twice on line drives that were right in front of him. Endy Rodríguez got thrown out going from 1st to 3rd with nobody out in the 4th inning. In the top of the 9th, he got called out on strikes and challenged a pitch that was practically right down the middle. Get him a pair of glasses. I have seen better play and decisions by the Bad News Bears. The whole organization looks like it is literally choking their guts out all over the field. The new bullpen additions have these looks on their faces that make it seem as though this is the last place on earth that they want to be. Who could blame them after watching these last 3 games. Even the Pirate broadcast booth made a Freudian slip that shows the Pirates have no chance. When Matt Capps was talking about Dustin May coming to the Brewers, he said that May has to be excited coming from a team not in the race to the division leaders. May came from the Cardinals, who are ahead of the Pirates right now. I guess that means that the Pirates are not in the race either. The first true statement that has come out of the booth all season.

Key Moments Of The Game: The Brewers were ahead 2-0 going into the top of the 4th. Brandon Lowe led off with a home run to make it 2-1. Bryan Reynolds walked. Endy Rodriguez singled to center, with Reynolds STOPPING at second. Spencer Horwitz hit almost the exact same hit to center field. Rodriguez rightfully hesitated going to second. Once the ball dropped, Reynolds was able to score to make it 2-2. The Pirates would have had first and second with no one out. Rodriguez tried to go to third and was thrown out by a mile to make the first out of the inning. All the momentum was lost. In four pitches, there were two more outs to end the inning. Gary Sanchez hit a solo home run in the bottom of the 5th. With two outs, the Brewers had a double and then the ball that Gonzales could not keep in front of him, and the Brewers had a 4-2 lead. They added a run in the 6th just to make it look like they were still trying, even though they knew they did not have to with the Pirate offense in shambles.

Next Game: Tonight, the Mets in Pittsburgh. I woke up this morning, and it looks like the Pirates ended all the suspense and named Carmen Mlodzinski as the starter against the Mets. The Mets will not be a picnic. They have no chance at the playoffs and will be freewheeling it instead of taking a bunch of called strikes. Winning all three games is a must for the Pirates. Please someone tell Brandon Lowe the games are important. There are only 45 left to go. The Pirates do have one big hope. The game tonight has a pretty good chance it might get rained out. Maybe Don Kelly can argue about it with Bob Nutting. Stay tuned. Oh, by the way, the Pirates are in last place. There are only 8 teams in baseball with a worst record.

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Pirates Morning Report: Brewers Shut Down Pirates

Final Score: Pirates 2 Brewers 4

Why the Pirates Lost: For the second consecutive game, the Brewers shut down the Pirates’ offense. They held the Pirates to three hits and struck them out 14 times. At one point, the Pirates struck out eight times in a row. I read opinions that the league has caught up with Esmerlyn Valdez, who has only had five hits in his last 45 at-bats, striking out 22 times. Not swinging at pitches has nothing to do with that. In his last at-bat on Tuesday and his first at-bat last night, he swung at only one of seven pitches in the strike zone. In his next two at-bats, he took two out of five in the strike zone. It is pretty sad when the good news is that he swung and missed three times for his last strikeout. He was not alone, as every starter struck out at least once. Pretty bad, considering some of them only had 1 or 2 plate appearances. Paul Skenes did his best Bubba Chandler impression, going five innings, giving up three runs on only two hits. He walked four and struck out six, throwing 93 pitches to get through just five innings. His mound opponent, Kyle Harrison, threw only 69 pitches to get through five before he had to leave the game with leg cramps. In those 69 pitches, he threw only three fewer strikes, 50 to Skenes’ 53. The Pirates are 2-5 on this road trip as they continue to spiral their way out of playoff contention.

Key Moments of the Game: Not only did Paul Skenes walk 4 batters, he was constantly working from behind. In the bottom of the 4th, after striking out the first batter. Skenes walked the next two batters on 11 pitches, throwing only 2 balls in the strike zone. During the second walk, Endy Rodriguez showed that Skenes is not the only one who does not know where the ball is going. Rodriguez threw the ball into center field when the runner tried to steal 2nd. The Brewers had 1st and 3rd with one out and had not put a ball in play. Christian Yelich doubled on a 3-1 count to drive in the 1st run. Skenes got ahead of Andrew Vaughn 1-2, pitching him away and getting him to chase on a sweeper. He then went inside, and Vaughn was able to muscle it through a drawn-in infield into right field to knock in the other two runs. The Brewers added an insurance run in the 6th, which they did not need to win 4-2 for the second straight game.

Next Game: This afternoon, Brewers in Milwaukee. At least we won’t have to wait up until 10:30 PM to see the Pirates lose today. For the second consecutive Milwaukee series the Pirates will not face Jacob Misiorowski. If they had faced him today I think he might have struck out all 18 to 21 batters he would have face. Don’t look now ( at least not on a full stomach) but the Pirates are now only a half game out of last place. They are 4.5 games out of the Wild Card. Not only that but there are now 3 other teams between them and the wild card berth. I hope someone asks Brandon Lowe when the games are going to become important. In my view, the answer may be never. The Pirates finally cut ties with Marcell Ozuna. When you look back on this, his signing may have started the whole downward spiral. Maybe the Pirates will be able to see the ball better in the daylight, but I doubt it. Stay tuned.

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Pirates Morning Report: Offense Losing Aggressiveness

Final Score: Pirates 2 Brewers 4

Why The Pirates Lost: The Pirate offense continues to have problems. They did hit 2 home runs but only got 3 other hits all singles for the rest of the game. In the last 13 games the Pirates have scored over 4 runs just 3 times. Their record is 4-9. Jared Jones just had a so-so start giving up 3 runs in 4 innings of work. He gave up 2 home runs and 8 hits. He had to throw 83 pitches to get through the 4 innings. Wilber Dotel went two innings and gave up a run on 3 hits. In the final 2 innings Yohan Ramirez and Kirby Yates held the Brewers scoreless. Not a bad pitching day for the Pirates but not good enough to get a win.

Key Moment Of The Game: Trailing 4-2, the Pirates got something going in the top of the 8th. After Jake Mangum struck out Jared Triolo was hit by a pitch. Brandon Lowe singled to right center field moving Triolo to third with one out. Bryan Reynolds swung at two balls out of the strike zone and then was called out on strikes. The worst was yet to come. Esmerlyn Valdez with the game on the line did not swing at a pitch. He took 3 called strikes on the 2nd, 3rd, and 5th pitch of the at bat. This was the only time in the game that the Pirates had a runner in scoring position and the 3rd and 4th batters in the lineup failed miserably. The Pirates are 2-4 on this road trip. They need to win the next two in order to have a .500 road trip.

Next Game: Tonight Brewers in Milwaukee. The strange season of Paul Skenes will continue tonight in Milwaukee. The Pirates will go up against another very good left hand pitcher Kyle Harrison. The bats remain cold in this critical stretch for the Pirates. Despite all the positives vibes from the bullpen pickups, the Pirates are reeling at the moment. Will the offense be able to find itself again? Stay tuned.