Ben Heller hasn’t been a Pittsburgh Pirate for very long. Just 2.0 innings, to be exact.
And yet, it’s hard to think of a Pirates tenure that has been so brief and so disastrous at the same time.
Heller originally arrived in the Pirates organization when he signed a minor league deal with the team in December. The veteran righty had just 50.0 major league innings to his name, salvaging what he could out of a career that was marred with injuries.
In his major league experience, Heller had a 2-0 record, 3.06 ERA, and 46 strikeouts. Last season in the big leagues for Atlanta, he pitched 18.2 innings with a 3.86 ERA and 16 strikeouts.
In 14 of his 19 appearances for the Braves last season, Heller held his opponents scoreless.
So, he was an interesting name to keep an eye on when the Pirates signed him and stashed him with their Triple-A affiliate. Heller was no stranger to Triple-A baseball, but this go around saw a very up and down tenure with Indianapolis.
He had tremendous strikeout numbers with Indy, but suffered with the long ball, giving up 5 home runs in a 4-game stretch while with the Indians.
However, his whiff rates were insanely good and his 34 strikeouts in 18.1 innings meant that he was essentially earning 2 strikeouts per inning. Despite the noticeably high 4.91 ERA for minor league play, those strikeout figures were still very enticing.
I did a deeper dive on Heller back before he was called up, which goes into more detail on his Triple-A statistics and what the future held for the 32-year old.
None of that success at the Triple-A level has translated to the major leagues this year. In 2.0 innings pitched for the Pirates, Heller now stands with an ERA of 49.50, giving up 12 runs (11 earned), and a 5.00 WHIP.
Opponents are batting .600 against him, and remarkably, Heller had hit more batters with a pitch (4) than he has struck out batters (3).
In his Pittsburgh debut against the LA Dodgers on Thursday, Heller was sent out for the fifth inning after a subpar Bailey Falter outing saw him done after 4.0 innings.
Heller hit the very first batter he faced as a Pirate, and it never got better after that. Giving up 4 hits and 5 earned runs, he turned a 5-4 game into a 10-4 blowout at the hands of the Dodgers. The biggest gaffe was this three run blast by Mookie Betts that ultimately put the game out of reach.
Though Falter was assessed the loss due to the Pirates trailing when he left the game, the loss really fell on Heller’s shoulders. Pittsburgh ended up losing 11-7; an Oneil Cruz homer that scored three runs was ultimately moot thanks to Heller’s nightmare outing.
As the third out finally happened, Heller walked off the mound with his head hung low. Yes, this was an awful first impression, but surely things can’t possibly be worse in the next outing, right?
Fast forward to today. After putting together a bullpen game the day before that actually worked surprisingly well, the Pirates were a little bit short-staffed in the relievers department as they looked for the sweep of the visiting Minnesota Twins.
Jared Jones had a bit of a subpar outing, by his standards, and the Pirates did what they could to get through the game. Tied at 4-4, Aroldis Chapman came into the game as only one of the team’s two active relievers who did not appear in the game yesterday.
Now, should it have been 4-4? That’s a different conversation. But Chapman pitches a scoreless ninth, but the Pirate offense goes down quickly to send the game to extras.
With no real other options, the Pirates sent out Ben Heller, who was tasked with keeping the game as close as possible.
Heller gave up a line drive single to the first batter, which scored the automatic runner from second. That’s fine, the guy from second is almost always going to score. It’s an unearned run, it’s whatever.
Heller then proceeds to hand out three free bases; two of which came on a hit by pitch, and the latter of those scored a run to make it a 6-4 ballgame.
A double, three singles, and another hit by pitch later, and Heller had somehow turned a 4-4 tie into an 11-4 blowout.
The Pirates dugout looked to be seriously getting Edward Olivares ready to go out and pitch as a position player instead. Honestly, Olivares might have been more effective.
Unfortunately for the Pirates, Heller or a position player was really their only choice. No one else in Pittsburgh’s bullpen was fresh; so many arms in there have pitched in three of the last four games or four of the last five games.
Heller was their only rested reliever, being forced to put up a 45-pitch outing.
So, after two games where Heller was the biggest reason why the team lost, what happens now?
It’s so hard to make a judgement on a player after just 2.0 innings. But, how can the Pirates possibly trust this player after what they’ve seen from him? Pittsburgh should have had a perfect 6-0 homestand. Instead, because of him, they only went 4-2.
I’m genuinely not sure he makes the team’s trip to St. Louis. You could maybe, and just maybe, disregard his first start. You can’t move past how awful this tenth inning was.
Pirates general manager Ben Cherington said on his weekly radio show that the team called up Heller in part because Heller had an opt-out clause in his minor league contract, and there was another team that was going to give him an MLB opportunity.
“It was pretty clear that we were gonna lose him if we didn’t select him,” he said.
Now that we’ve seen Heller hand away multiple games to Pirate opponents, that decision certainly isn’t aging well. At this point, it might be best to lose him, assuming that other MLB team still wanted to give Heller an opportunity.
Designating Heller for assignment seems like the only real option for the Pirates at this point. Jose Hernandez, and Ryder Ryan are both options as a replacement, and both have had previous major league experience this season.
Ryan has 13.0 innings of experience with Pittsburgh this year, pitching to a 3.46 ERA. In Triple-A, he has a 3.77 ERA in 14.1 innings pitched.
Hernandez has less time in the majors this season, pitching 5.1 innings with a 3.38 ERA. In Triple-A he has struggled largely, racking up a 7.71 ERA in 14.0 innings.
Daulton Jeffries is also an option. Though he has pitched in the majors this season, it was for his old team, the San Francisco Giants. In 4.2 innings he surrendered 9 earned runs, which is better than Heller, but not by that much.
Jeffries has been given a Pirates jersey this season, appearing as the team’s extra player back during that double header in Detroit. However, all of his experience within the Pirates organization has come in Triple-A, with a 7.80 ERA in 15.0 innings.
On a personal level, I do feel bad for Ben Heller. But he has found himself on a very bad side of baseball history, and with a bullpen that is still shaky, he just simply can’t be here.
Heller went into today’s game with an ERA of 45.00. His season ERA is now HIGHER after today’s game. At the end of the day, that’s the most damning stat of them all.
Fifth Avenue Sports 
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