Dreams of Buctober Creeping in for Pirates

The Pirates walked off the MLB-best Philadelphia Phillies on Friday night, pushing their own record above .500 for the first time since late April with an 8-7 comeback win. 

After the game, second baseman Nick Gonzales, who delivered the winning hit—saying he was looking for “something hard and a strike” in the decisive at-bat—lauded his team’s ability to go blow for blow with one of baseball’s most dangerous lineups.

“I think it would’ve been really easy to fold after the first inning, especially going against the Phillies. But nobody here in the dugout, nobody in this clubhouse did that. So kudos to them. And kudos to the coaching staff, too,” Gonzales said. “The back and forth, especially against them, it’s pretty cool to do. It kind of shows that we can compete against the best.”

Compete against the best they did and, although any baseball writer, fan or player can tell you not to let one game get you too high or low over the course of a 162 game season, the thought of Buctober is starting to creep into the air.

The Pirates have won five games in a row, began the second half with a bang and, after a Mets’ loss, sit half a game out of the final wild card spot.

With 65 games left in the regular season, the trade deadline yet to come and a packed field around them, it goes without saying that the Pirates have a long road ahead of them before any postseason aspirations can come to fruition.

Nonetheless, first baseman Rowdy Tellez said players in the clubhouse don’t shy away from voicing those dreams, whether because of an ongoing youth movement not yet jaded by the grind of the big leagues or because they’ve legitimately turned a corner.

Dreams of Buctober

“We talk about it a lot. We’ve had a couple guys in here win some World Series. [When I was] with Milwaukee, we made it to the playoffs every year. Younger players, when they ask questions and want to talk through it, I always say, ‘There’s nothing more driving than getting to the playoffs,’” Tellez said. 

“Once you’re there, that’s all you want the next year, over and over again. A lot of us when we talk about that kind of stuff, it resonates with guys. We’re in a good spot. But just talking it game-by-game.”

Although careful to repeat that ‘game-by-game’ mantra, Tellez acknowledged that a gutsy win can serve as a crash course in grit for younger players.

“You can look at those things and say, ‘This is how you have to win. This is how September baseball is won.’ It’s gonna be a grind. It’s gonna be a fight every single inning, every single at-bat. You can’t give it up,” Tellez said. “When you look at the big picture, you struggle. But when you look at the small picture and take it at-bat by at-bat and learn from mistakes, I think that’s the biggest thing.”

It’s been six seasons since the Pirates last sat above .500 this late in the calendar year. With one of the toughest remaining schedules in the league, they’ll likely face an uphill battle to remain above that margin, much less make the playoffs.

That isn’t stopping them from dreaming, though, the hope a refreshing sentiment for a club—and fanbase—that’s seen decades of seasons lost before the second half began.