◆NEWSPirates Notes: Keller, Pitching Pursuits, Lineup◆ROSTERSigned free agent RHP Enmanuel Nunez to a minor league contract◆STATPaul Skenes ranks 4th in the NL in strikeouts (200)◆STATNick Gonzales ranks 4th in the NL in batting average (.303)
◆NEWSPirates Notes: Keller, Pitching Pursuits, Lineup◆ROSTERSigned free agent RHP Enmanuel Nunez to a minor league contract◆STATPaul Skenes ranks 4th in the NL in strikeouts (200)◆STATNick Gonzales ranks 4th in the NL in batting average (.303)
After getting blanked by yet another left handed starter, the Pirates rallied and won Saturday after by tallying up 6 runs off the Cardinals pitching. Led by a Rafael Flores 3 run home run in the top of the 5th, the Pirates looked comfortable and in control all game. The Bachar/Mlodzinski worked well together for a solid 5 and 2/3 innings of work, and the bullpen afterward shut down the Cardinal offense. Watch Doug and Tyler break the game down in further detail here:
One of the biggest contributors to the Pirates falling out of the playoff picture was a putrid offense. The thing that noticeably dropped off was the home run production the team enjoyed for the first half of the season. Today, home runs win them the game with 4 RBI’s off the bat of Flores and Lowe. Flores is playing himself into a major league role almost exclusively from his ability to take pitchers deep, and Brandon Lowe is well on his way to clearing 30 home runs in a season yet again. The Pirates don’t have the contact skills to play like the Brewers; they need to keep relying on slugging and hitting bombs to beat the opposition like they did today.
Brandon Lowe hit his 28th home run of the season today and got to his 81st RBI. Lowe has been let down this season, as he is the only one who has consistently put forward game-winning performances all season. His ability to keep the home runs coming is something the 2027 Pirates cannot afford to lose. When you look at the roster for next year, you have to hope that Griffin is the truth and can replace his production. I prefer to have an elite middle infield by having those 2 start the season together again. Give him 3 years, let him choose his yearly salary, and everyone is happy. An .800 OPS with 30 bombs a season plus elite defense is simply not available much around the league. Especially as a 2nd baseman, you simply cannot do better than Brandon Lowe. Make him a pirate until he retires.
Mason Montgomery is Absurd
Since June 1st, Mason Montgomery has pitched 32 innings. Over that stretch, he has a 2.64 ERA, 59 strikeouts, a FIP of 1.39, and only 12 walks. We all talked in the offseason of how good Mason would be with control and this is the final result. He is developing into an elite reliever before our very eyes. He is so cool and reliable that watching him come in and close games out is calming, which is not what we got from closers earlier in the season. Today was no different, as he easily dispatched the Cardinals in order with 2 K’s to close out the victory. The 2027 Pirates need a lot of work to compete, but closer and the backend of the bullpen seem to be figured out quite nicely.
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The Debate
Should the Pirates DFA Jacob Gonzalez this offseason?
No comments yet — be the first to weigh in.
With Doug Ford and Tyler Sweeney.
Chapters
Key takeaways
1
Jacob Gonzalez was a bad trade, he's hitting with a .500 OPS and a weak arm, and he should be DFA'd this offseason, even after today's go-ahead RBI single.
2
Brandon Lowe, closing in on 30 homers with plus defensive runs saved, is having the best season by a Pirates second baseman they've ever seen.
3
Rafael Flores Jr. (7 HR in 77 at-bats, with every Pirates catcher combined barely ahead) should play every day at catcher, first base or DH, because his power can carry an offense for a week or two.
4
The bullpen is finally good, but it's inexcusable that it wasn't fixed months ago. It's an organizational failure, whether the blame goes to Cherington or Nutting, and it wasted a year when the team should have made the playoffs.
5
At five games under .500 in a year they should have contended, the 6-2 win is a meaningless 'one of 162' and the organization needs to clean house.
All right, what's going on beautiful people, this is the North Shore Nine podcast presented by FanDuel and you are listening to NS9 Live, powered by Primanti Brothers, where myself, Tyler, and with me is Doug, we'll be giving away some Primanti Brothers sandwiches here today.
Make sure we drop a hashtag, raise it in here.
Pirates win this one, 6-2 over the Arizona, good lord.
Can you tell I've been on the golf course a little bit here?
Got your Cardinals, got your Cardinals, the Arizona Cardinals, the St. Louis Cardinals.
They were once the St. Louis Cardinals.
Here, get up.
There we go.
Well, all right.
Pirates beat the Cardinals, 6-2.
Drop a hashtag, raise it to be entered into the Primanti Brothers sandwich giveaway.
Doug, after last night where we just ripped this team up and down, are you feeling better where maybe you won't rip this team up and down today?
Tyler, I feel no better.
Even in a win, even in a win, they just drive you crazy.
They frustrate you so much.
I put, I tweeted out that they allowed the most unearned run of all time, today.
Early in the game, nobody was running when they should have been running.
Like, I'm not necessarily talking about stealing bases, but like a hit and run.
we were going station to station, right?
Like, we, one of the fastest guys in baseball.
And, he's getting stuck at second after a single.
And just stuff, again, a team that needs to win in the margins that completely ignores the margins, right?
Because the margins aren't quantifiable.
And Ben Cherington pays attention to nothing.
That it cannot be completely, torn down and dissected.
And, yeah, it's a win.
We won a game.
We needed a win.
It's always good to win against the Cardinals.
But, dear Lord, I'm mad after this win.
I feel like I'm irritated after every win.
And there was enough in this mess that definitely irritated me.
And part of that was on the umpires as well.
Because I actually need to give old, where's that, comment in here from Paul Ski Five Cents.
That the Cardinals talked the umpire into Cruz's infield single being a foul ball.
Yeah, that was, the umpire did put his hands up right away.
But it was the wrong call.
Playing simple.
There were just enough little things that, there was that.
Doug, I'll be honest.
I'm just not in a great mood in general.
And drop your hashtag raises.
I'm sorry here, guys.
We're going to hang through this.
And I'm happy the Pirates won this game.
But I might be a little bit grouchy right now.
At the same time.
But understandable.
You know what just pissed me off?
Like, Carl Majenski challenged the pitch.
And I saw his stupid little smirk.
And his stupid little smirk just made me want to punch him.
I'll tell you part of the reason I'm irritated.
He pitched an inning where three consecutive errors were made.
And he got out of it.
And I want to give him kudos.
But F you, dude.
I don't like you.
You know what I'm saying?
I'm so mad at you.
You're one of the reasons that this season got sunk.
Because your selfishness, your immaturity.
You know what I'm saying?
I don't want to give him credit.
Yeah.
he did a great job.
And, yeah.
I'm pissed.
I'm still mad at him.
And I don't, I don't want to celebrate his achievement.
No, I'm not.
I am not giving you credit for pissing on the fire that you started.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And no, he didn't start the whole thing.
But you know what?
He didn't.
He was definitely over there.
Oh, there's a fire going.
the fact that he's pitched so poorly that when our starter went down, we couldn't, we could count on him to be a starter.
Right.
After, the whining and the moaning and threatening to talk to his agent.
Oh, we.
Your temper tantrum.
And, listen, I understand athletes are concerned with themselves.
They're concerned with getting their money.
I get that.
But you have to at least give lip service to gee, I really want to win guys.
And, that stuff.
give us something.
Fake it.
It's fine.
But, for him, he's just right.
Look, this is going to hurt Bob potential earnings.
And so I don't want to do it.
It, at time when again, this season was still, there was still some hope.
So.
Yeah.
Doug, you can be mad about that part.
I'm more mad about the part where he refused to be a real reliever for a significant amount of time when this team needed a real reliever.
And I have a list of people I want to punch in the nose, right?
I grew up watching Candelaria and Rick Russell and Rick Roden and Jim Rooker and Bert Blylevin and, Tom C.
All these guys, like just expecting pitchers to go seven innings, and just watching a new guy crowd out every couple innings is, I guess it shouldn't bother me.
They're not doing it mid inning.
But.
Are they not?
Well, some of them are.
Actually, yeah.
You're right.
Bachar came out in the third after getting it out.
Who'd they go to?
You're a guy.
You're a guy.
You're a guy.
You're a guy, Doug.
Yeah.
I better not go to spring training because he walks by quite often and I might get in trouble.
I might get my, I'll get my ass whooped, but that's fine.
I'll take that to get one good cheap shot in on him.
Hopefully, he'll be in another.
Doug just really.
Hopefully, he'll be in some other spring training facility then.
Yeah.
But yeah,.
You're in the mood to punch someone.
I am.
Magentsy does.
comes in.
He goes 3.1 innings.
He gives up one unearned run.
And like I said, dear Lord, error.
one of those errors was a like surefire double play.
If your center fielder on your high school baseball team would have done that, he'd been running laps.
you would not have tolerated that, right?
Yeah, he'd be back in the dugout.
He'd be doing some burpees or something.
He'd just be back in the dugout.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's the stuff where Billy Martin comes onto the field and tells Reggie Jackson to get into the dugout.
And then they fight in the dugout stuff.
You know what I'm saying?
That was so bad.
Cruz had a decent day offensively.
Some weird stuff on the bases.
nothing bad.
He just didn't run.
I think he might be hurting a little or something because he had no – like, he wasn't going to steal and he wasn't going to try to stretch anything out.
But just, again, just a very pirate-y thing, you know.
But to Maginski's credit, and I hate saying this, he did get out of it.
He just – he got the two outs that he needed to get after that and, held them to that just one unearned run.
But I would agree.
I would agree.
I do think Carmen Mlodzinski gets a good bit of credit for what he was able to do today.
And just go to some comments here.
Actually, Cy Lin P.A. here says, might be the worst post-game show in a win ever.
Just to address this real quick.
This team is five games under .500 in a year where they should be in a playoff race.
And I'm not giving them an ounce of credit for winning a baseball game that just fell into their lap today.
They're dog shit.
They should be shit on every chance we get.
They're a joke.
I don't give a shit if they won 6-2 today.
They're five games under .500.
They're trash.
This organization is garbage.
Garbage.
You're all a bunch of losers.
I, and yes, we're giving away sandwiches today.
It should be positive.
Yes, they want a baseball game.
Happy for the people.
This is one of those games that you just win because you play 162 games.
They didn't do anything to impress anybody today.
They're in this spot because they have pissed away so much, so many games this year.
I'm not going to sit here and gloat about winning.
A game against the St. Louis Cardinals.
It's a 1 of 162 win.
We talked a lot early in the year about the 1 of 162 losses.
Well, guess what?
They're at the point now where it's a 1 of 162 win.
They're a trash team.
Everybody needs fired.
They need to clean house.
But thankfully, we get to give away some sandwiches today.
And look, if they win 12 in a row, you and I can come back and we'll do another show and we'll say, gee, we were wrong.
okay, we were wrong.
I don't think we're wrong.
I think this is a meaningless game.
I think every game they play now will be meaningless because they play in a meaningless fashion.
They're not going to do anything smart, right?
They're going to wait until the last week of September and say, oh, let's give Curtis a start.
You know what I'm saying?
Instead of like, why is it?
Just bring them up here now.
Yeah.
Like, if you want me to talk positive about a bullpen game where I have nothing to be excited about because nobody here that through today is useful going forward.
Like Bachar's two and two and a third inning.
That's okay.
Cool.
Sure.
Evan says don't care.
Kerr Mlodzinski, he can get the hell out three weeks ago.
More than three months ago.
Gregory Soto.
I got that wrong.
When you asked me who came in after Bachar, I said Carmen, but it was Sisk.
I'm just.
Yeah.
Because I'm convinced that Sisk is not a good pitcher.
People keep telling me he's a good pitcher.
Every time I see him, he just, he stinks.
All right.
I've let this thing get off the rails enough here.
The Pirates did win this 162 to reel this thing back in.
me in particular about how bad he is with runners on base.
He's like, Oh, I'll show you.
I'll show you, sir.
I'm also bad when the bases are empty.
No, we're going to do, Doug.
We're going to gloss over the pitching.
Cause it's just going to piss me off because I have to look at this thing and see Carmen Vajinsky, stupid name in here.
We're going to talk a good bit about hitting here because Brandon Lowe, you talked last night and we discussed a good bit about like Ben Cherington made some moves
this off season that he does definitely deserve some credit for Brandon Lowe being one of those Brandon Lowe comes through the home run today, just getting into the whole thing.
Brandon Lowe has been a godsend to this team.
And then once again, he comes through, we're closing in on 30 home runs on the season for the sky.
This is remove everything else.
One of the best second, it is the best second base season I have ever seen as a, out of a Pittsburgh pirate.
Yeah.
Yeah.
definitively, I think it's the best second season from a second baseman that I've ever seen from a pirate.
And, I've been watching them since the 27 world series.
So, or 25 world series, take it back.
So yeah.
this is it.
This has been great.
And he's been good defensively.
He's not great, but he's plus defensive run save.
he's been everything we wanted and more.
yes, he does get into some slumps, but I think that's baseball now.
And, do we've got to read Michael's other.
Well, get there, Doug.
Okay.
Well, he's getting anxious and he sent him my kid to Ivy league college.
So it's important to me.
since you brought it up there, I guess we'll just go ahead and give a shout out to Michael B losers.
They're all a bunch of losers.
Had to hear that out of my mouth again.
We need a t-shirt.
We need a t-shirt.
The way they looked today was horrific.
And it's your seven.
They are fundamentally inept, just embarrassing.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Sure.
Buddy.
We're giving away sandwiches.
It's very unusual.
It's very rare.
So, very rare since the all-star break.
So.
But Brandon Lowe, he did give them a one, nothing lead there in the first inning.
again, it's a shame it's happened the way it has where it's for not.
Yeah.
But it has been, it's been a Reggie Sanders type of season.
That was a fun season.
We started the year sweeping the Cincinnati Reds at their brand new great America small park.
That made me so happy.
They beat us at the first game of PNC park, but we won the second game.
We beat them the first three games at great American ballpark.
I still, and it's a sad thing, but that's one of the most joyous things that's happened in this century for the Pittsburgh pirates, a sweep in the first three games of the season 50 years ago.
His 28th of the year.
I don't believe the pirates have had a 30 home run center since Josh bell, Josh bell 2019.
Sounds right.
What happened in 2020?
That is sap this team of all offense power skill.
what was the, what happened?
I can't.
Oh, that's right.
Ben Cherington came in with his process.
Cardinals started up there in the third, the pirates were able to take the lead there in the fourth inning.
I also don't want to, I also just don't want to watch Jacob Gonzalez play baseball at all ever again for this team.
Yeah, I, sorry guys.
I haven't, I got nothing for you on that one.
Like, I don't want to watch this guy play anymore.
I think he stinks.
He does stink.
The way there's no stop is exhaustingly atrocious.
If I have to watch him side swipe another baseball, have a weak ass arm across the infield and hit with a 500 OPS.
Yes.
He singled in a run.
Sure.
Good for him.
Jacob Gonzalez was a dog shit trade that shouldn't be on this team anymore.
He needs to be DFA this off season.
That's my two cents.
Sorry.
Ditto.
I got nothing else.
I got nothing positive for him.
I don't enjoy watching him play this sport.
I don't want to watch him on this team anymore.
It was a terrible trade.
God, not for you.
Yeah.
He's not good.
and then Rafael Flores extended the lead with a three run home run.
Rafi is a guy.
I think Doug, that you got to see a good bit more out of here.
You got to try him out.
This home run also made me angry though, because it's his seventh home run of the season.
And Henry Davis has eight, Rafael Flores has been up for like 23 minutes.
He's already, has almost the home run lead amongst the catchers.
I say, and it's like, so with every good thing Flores does, I'm like, damn it, man, we need a catcher.
and Andy's hurt makes me mad.
Flores should be playing all the time.
I don't know how good he is.
Honestly, I don't know that he's that good, but he's got power.
He can play catcher.
not great.
He can play first base.
That versatility could come in handy.
And if he can tap into that power, he might be something.
At the very least, otherwise that trade looks like it, sunk this season.
Cause if we wouldn't make that trade and we had bed and are in the bullpen, maybe we'd be in a much better place than we are now.
Yeah.
And I will say at the least with him, I think he's gotten better behind the plate.
it's still not where you need it to be, to be a, an everyday catcher.
No.
that's the problem.
He can't play catcher every day yet.
But 77 at bats, he's got seven home runs in an eight 59 OPS.
Yeah.
Our catchers combined.
Yes.
And unlike Henry Davis, when you talk about Flores, it's a guy that can carry your offense for like a week at a time because he has that pop to be able to do that.
It is.
When Esmerlyn Valdez did that earlier in the year and we saw Brandon allowed to it, we saw Ryan O'Hearn do it.
When you have that type of power and that ability, you can carry a team for a stretch.
Yeah.
No.
And I see he does have that ability.
Yeah.
He can do it as a pinch hitter.
Right.
That's what I'm saying.
Like he, if you can get a little more consistent, he's a good guy to have on the roster.
As I said, he can give you some position flexibility.
He can pinch hit for you.
And like I said, he can carry you for a week or two.
And you need that, right?
You need it.
Because again, baseball and that was a very inconsistent game.
Guys go on heaters and they go into slumps.
And, to have somebody that like, for two weeks, light it up.
I sound like I'm petitioning to bring back Jack Swinski, but I'm not because he hadn't had a heater in quite a long time.
But anyway, yeah.
Floor should be playing every day somewhere.
Catcher, first base, DH, somewhere.
Because, let's see.
And, yeah, of course, then at the end of the season, I'll say, August and September baseball doesn't matter.
So I don't know, but he should still be playing every day.
Absolutely, Doug.
But yeah, you need to give him, and at that point, we're looking at probably close to two months of, like, real run as a major league baseball player and getting close to every day at bats.
You at least have a bit of an idea with him, I think.
And, you're, it's still such a small sample size.
But, the power's real.
Yeah, for sure.
I like what we've seen behind the plate.
Incrementally.
Like, I like that he's gotten slightly better.
Again, I don't like the karma agency challenge to pitch.
Annoyed me.
But, even with that, I think he's gotten better framing-wise.
I think challenges have been good.
What's our bullpen coach's name, Jordan?
That's the catcher coach, Jordan Comedina.
Comedina, yeah.
look, he did a great job with Henry.
And it looks like he's making improvements with Rodfield Phillips Jr.
So, there's reason to believe that he can become a better catcher, that he can be better behind the plate.
And, Doug, on that note, like, go back to Jacob Stallings.
Like, Jacob Stallings was not a strong defensive catcher.
No.
I will say, the Pirates seem to have done a very good job over these years of developing these guys behind the plate to become, at least serviceable, and even in some cases, good.
They were afraid to play Henry an inning.
They wouldn't let him come in and catch for an inning that first season he came up and was playing right field and just looking awful.
They were keeping him as far away from home plate as possible.
And for him to make this improvement is a testament to him, but also this coaching staff.
So, yeah.
And it looks like, Andy was getting a little better.
Pedro, or Pedro, I always want to call him Pedro, Rafael Flores Jr.
he's looking like he's making a little improvement.
And it's a hard position.
There's a lot to work on.
So, good job.
Imagine what we'd be saying if Pedro was on this team.
Real quick, got to give another shout out to our guy, Michael B here.
Thank you.
He says, new GM trade Reynolds.
I say yes, sucks too much.
We'll see.
That's an answer I don't have right now.
I don't know.
I don't either.
I'm torn about that.
It seems like a very pirate move.
He's making a decent amount of money.
If you could make an old-fashioned baseball trade and just get another outfielder that's maybe a little better defensively, what have you.
Maybe, a right-handed guy type thing to help that side of the offense.
I'm 100% with you on Cherington, of course, firing him.
Today is a good day to fire Ben Cherington.
I was waiting.
I've been waiting to find out when that's going to come up again.
Oh, it's coming.
It's always coming.
But, yeah, Reynolds, I feel bad for Reynolds.
Reynolds has been here so long.
He's suffered so much losing.
I'd like to see him be here when they actually, if they ever actually win.
It's hard to believe they will.
But if, I would love to see him get his shot in a pirate uniform in a playoff.
Yeah, it would be nice.
But it seems like in order to get there, he won't have to, or they need him to not be the focal point.
Yeah.
Oh, for sure.
Yeah.
With that being said, moving on to the bullpen here, Doug.
Bullpen doesn't suck.
No, it doesn't.
No, it doesn't.
It's nice.
Like, today's one of the first times I'm like, okay, we got this.
It's 5-2.
We've got this.
And I haven't felt like that in a long time.
I'm scared to death all the time.
And.
Yeah.
And I'm doing it again here.
Doug, I'm doing it again.
Yeah.
If this would have been fixed months ago.
Different story.
Yeah.
Like, it is absolutely inexcusable that we can sit here and feel so comfortable with this bullpen right now.
Because it is.
It's a good bullpen right now.
Right.
And you didn't go trade for Mason Miller.
You didn't go trade for these untouchable type guys.
You got, Dovall.
They were ready.
They were ready to run him out of Yankee Stadium.
You got Yates, who's just a gentleman.
And I don't know if it was Bob Nutting who just refused to allow them to spend more money.
I don't know.
Or if it was Ben Cherington who just wanted to hang on to what they had for so long.
I don't know.
I don't know who this was.
Because both those things see equally plausible.
Right.
Bob Nutting obviously doesn't want to spend any money.
And Ben Cherington waits too long on everybody.
he just keeps thinking that the moves he made are perfect.
His process is exactly right.
And these guys are all going to, raise to the level that they should.
And he waited and waited too long on Santana.
Breaks my heart to say.
Waited too long on Isaac Mattson.
Waited too long.
We just waited too long.
And here we are.
And it's one of our great problems as fans and, podcasters that we don't really know who to blame.
Did Donnie make that move or did Ben Cherington direct it?
Did Donnie set that lineup or did Ben Cherington?
Did Ben Cherington wait too long or did Bob Nutting handcuff him?
it's, so what we need to do is get rid of them all.
Correct.
But we were, we said it so many times before they waited until the trade deadline to make any move.
And I'm even referring to just collecting human beings who can throw a baseball.
They did not do that, which leads me to believe it was a Bob Nutting issue.
Where they just had no more money to spend to collect these guys.
Yeah.
But either way, it's an organizational failure again.
And they wasted a year that they should be in the playoffs.
And now they are not, they will not be.
No, they're not gonna, they're not gonna be close.
The season, ended in July sometime.
And yeah.
And I see, I don't know.
It's easy for me to believe it'd be Cherington.
Cause Cherington has no sense of urgency and he's waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting.
And then, okay, well, I have to do something now because it's the deadline, but I don't want to do anything.
Cause I really believe in these guys and I believe in my moves and I believe in my analytics and my processes.
And with that being said, let's give away sandwiches.
Absolutely.
I guess he was right about Montgomery.
but, again, make sure we drop that hashtag race it here.
As soon as I can remember how to do this whole thing.
So you got to like that.
The people have to like, and they have to subscribe and come here to vent.
are we going to do sick off, sicko sound off tomorrow?
We should.
Well, I am not available tomorrow.
Oh, wow.
All right.
And, I think I might be the only one available to buy them.
So make sure we drop the hashtag race it here.
first winner of our Primanti brothers giveaway here is going to be JL Sheldon.
Congratulations, JL Sheldon.
Yeah.
Make sure we send our.
Email associated with a Primanti brothers account to northshord9 at gmail.com.
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Should the Pirates DFA Jacob Gonzalez this offseason?
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