Perrotto: Pirates Mistakes Take Shine Off Encouraging Homestand

PITTSBURGH – The Pittsburgh Pirates have become watchable.

That isn’t a high compliment by any means. However, they have played a better brand of baseball since manager Derek Shelton was fired on May 8 and bench coach Don Kelly was promoted to replace him.

The Pirates are 7-9 since the switch. They were 12-26 before.

That hasn’t put the Pirates into contention. However, it’s at least progress for a team that once seemed destined for 100 losses – and still might reach that dreaded level.

However, the Pirates still make too many mistakes. That is why they turned what would have been an excellent homestand into an OK one with a 6-5 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday at PNC Park.

The Pirates fell behind 3-0 in the first inning, aided in part by center fielder Oneil Cruz’s throwing error, but rallied to take a 5-3 lead on Adam Frazier’s two-run double in the seventh.

The Pirates couldn’t hold the lead as Ryan Borucki gave up three runs and three doubles in the eighth inning as the Brewers pulled ahead.

The left-hander made an egregious mistake when he threw an 0-2 pitch to Caleb Durbin right down the middle of the plate with two outs. The rookie third baseman connected for a two-run double that tied the game.

Brice Turang followed with an RBI double that was the game-winning hit. The Platinum Glove second baseman had only one hit in his previous 19 at-bats.

“He’s trying to go down,” Pirates manager Don Kelly said of Borucki’s plan on the 0-2 pitch to Durbin. “Just left a pitch up out over the middle. Durbin didn’t miss it. I know he’s frustrated about it. He’s had a good year up to this point. A pitch that he didn’t get down.”

Tommy Pham made an even more egregious mistake in the bottom half of the eighth.

Pham drew a leadoff walk and moved to second on a balk. One out later, Oneil Cruz was intentionally walked. However, Pham got picked off second base as the tying run by pitcher Abner Uribe, and Andrew McCutchen struck out to end the threat.

It was a terrible blunder by Pham, a 12-year veteran.

“We need to be better there,” Kelly said. “Just something that we need to clean up and be better at, especially in that situation late in the game.”

It left a bad taste to finish an encouraging homestand. The Pirates took two of three from the Cincinnati Reds at the beginning of the week, then were on the verge of winning three of four against the Brewers before the fateful eighth inning.

It would have been the first time the Pirates won back-to-back series since last July. That’s a long time.

“It was a tough loss today,” Kelly said.

While a 5-2 homestand would have been nice, 4-3 isn’t so bad in the context of the Pirates’ overall of 19-35.

“We’re in every game,” said Frazier, who had three hits. “We keep moving forward and we’re growing as a team. Everybody is playing pretty hard together, and we have more room for growth. As long as we’re in every game, we give ourselves a chance. We just got to keep cleaning things up and take it one game at a time.”

Frazier is right. The Pirates need to clean things up.

Until then, they can’t make real progress.