It was as if all of the frustration of the last few games had finally exploded down at PNC Park, as the Pirates showed no mercy to the visiting Atlanta Braves, putting up over a 10-spot on them en route to a win.
The win was a much needed bounce back after the Pirates found themselves on the bad side of history in their last two games. They became just the fourth team in Major League Baseball history to hit a grand slam in back to back games and lose both of them.
In both cases, the Pirates failed to add some late game run support, but the much bigger culprit was an ailing bullpen that either could not find the strike zone, or lobbed balls that were destined to get crushed by the opponent.
Neither one of those issues was prevalent Friday night, but Bailey Falter was the biggest reason why.
In Pittsburgh’s losses on Wednesday and Thursday, both Jared Jones and Paul Skenes each went six innings. While their performances, and the five-run leads the Pirates jumped out to should have been enough for the bullpen to win the game, they still found ways to hand it away.
Falter, however, went 7.1 innings, staving off anyone from the bullpen for as long as he could.
The lefty starter was making his 10th start of the season and coming off a career high 7.2 inning scoreless performance that was sadly ruined by that home plate call last week.
Falter went seven scoreless innings before things started to derail in the eighth. During the eighth, members of the coaching and medical staff walked out to check in on Falter. It was unclear what the possible problem for Falter was, but after a practice pitch he declared he was good to go.
Whether there was something wrong with any part of him or not, Falter stayed and tried to get out of the inning, but eventually allowed a three run homer to Ronald Acuña Jr. that broke the shutout bid.
He was lifted in favor of Luis Ortiz, who did not pitch in either of the last two games but failed to really improve the reputation of the bullpen. He surrendered another 2 runs in that eighth, but rebounded for a very quick scoreless ninth to preserve the 11-5 win.
The Bucco bats, meanwhile, just absolutely exploded in this game. Every batter who started the game made it safely on base in this game. Nick Gonzales had a career high 4 RBI in this game, including getting the party started in the inning.
Gonzales, Andrew McCutchen, and Connor Joe all had 2 hits, and Edward Olivares led the way with 3.
As for Atlanta, they were the ones with a harsh day on the mound. By the looks of it, the Braves sort of treated this game as a throwaway day for their pitching. A “try out of some new things and see what happens” type of day that definitely went awry for Atlanta.
Ray Kerr, who was called up today by the Braves, made his first start of the season. He previously made 4 appearances as a reliever.
In 4.0 innings, Kerr allowed 7 hits and 5 earned runs. He did get 6 strikeouts, but it hardly offset the damage the Pirates did. In the fifth, the Braves called upon Darius Vines, who was making his first relief appearance of the season. He previously started 2 games for the Braves.
He actually faired worse, allowing 6 earned runs in 3.0 innings that really saw the game get out of hand. Former Pirate Jesse Chavez pitched the eighth, and while he kept the Pirates off the scoreboard, he was fighting on almost every pitch as well.
The series continues tomorrow, where the Braves are expected to have a much more concrete pitching situation with the veteran and seven time All Star Chris Sale on the mound. The Pirates, meanwhile, will have Martin Perez out there, who will be hoping to bounce back from a rough last few games.
Make no mistake, this was a big time win for the Pirates. It was a huge momentum type game, one that they now need to build off of if they have any hopes of getting back to .500 anytime soon. The challenge against Sale and an undoubtedly pissed off Braves team won’t at all be easy, but the Pirates putting up a new season high run total is an encouraging sign.
It’s almost as if the Pirate offense was sick and tired of watching the bullpen blow it, and decided to score enough runs that there was no possible way a bullpen implosion could hand away a game again.
(Featured photo of Nick Gonzales by Brandon Sloter/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
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