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Pirates Takeaways: What are the Pirates Doing Using Wilson as a Starter?

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PITTSBURGH — When the Pirates announced Saturday night that Bryse Wilson would be the starter on Sunday, I’m sure a lot of heads were being scratched, or hair was being pulled out. Wilson and the Pirates staff have discussed moving Wilson to the pen and using an “opener” for him. 

The constant flip-flopping, shifting, and wondering where his place has to make Wilson a little queasy. It’s no secret that Wilson’s numbers suggest he would make a much better pen arm than a starter. 

In 13 innings, Wilson has been used as a reliever and posted a 2.08 ERA. The opponents batting average against Wilson is .351 as a starter and then .216 as a reliever. The question now is, what in god’s name are the Pirates doing sending Wilson out as a starter?

“I think that is something that we’re going to look at,” said Derek Shelton on moving Wilson to the bullpen. “We have to continue to explore what the best fit for [Wilson] moving forward.”

Ben Cherington hasn’t shied away from discussing the Pirates using “unique roles,” as he put it with their pitching staff. Dillon Peters has started, come in during high-leverage situations; same thing with Crowe, Bednar, etc. 

Wilson has discussed having a different mentality coming out of the pen instead of starting games.

“I feel like I had the same mentality coming into today,” said Wilson on keeping his bullpen mentality. “Edman gets a dribbler through, left a fastball down to Gorman, but then get the next three outs. I had that mentality in the first inning and throughout the game. Today just didn’t go the way I wanted it to.”

Out of all the craziness that was the 18-4 loss for the Pirates, the biggest takeaway is that they potentially could’ve avoided this loss by using an opener for Wilson. Like my dad used to say, “use the K.I.S.S. (keep it simple, stupid) method, it will never fail you son,” Indeed pops, indeed. 

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