Our Takeaways from a Series Win Over the Red Sox

The Pirates smacked Red Sox lefty starter Patrick Sandoval for seven runs in three innings to coast to an 8-3 victory and take the series over Boston. This game featured a fun two hour and 34 minute rain delay before finishing the final three innings. The Pirates had a bullpen game with Lake Bachar firing three scoreless innings to start and he was followed by Hunter Barco and then after the rain delay, Kirby Yates, Camilo Doval and Mason Montgomery. Jim and Doug recapped this one on the NS9 Postgame Show powered by Primanti Bros. You can watch or listen here:

Here’s my 3 takeaways from this win.

Mason Jar Has Been Incredible

After the absurdly long rain delay, the Pirates finished off the Red Sox with Mason Montgomery pitching the 9th inning. Since they were up 8-3, it was a non-save situation but Montgomery was nails again. He struck out Caleb Durbin to start the 9th, got Andruw Monasterio to line out to second and then pinch-hitter Eli White went down swinging. That took Mason just 11 pitches (9 strikes) and now since July 1, he’s pitched 15.2 innings with just two runs allowed and has 32 strikeouts in those 15.2 innings. An incredible 32 strikeouts! That’s 58 batters faced and he’s struck out 55% of them. In this 9th inning, he had a 71% whiff rate! Forget picking up Mason Miller at the deadline from the Padres, we pretty much have our own Mason Miller called Mason Montgomery. The dude has been nasty as a lefty pumping 99 and 100 in on hitters.

This season is toast, but with Montgomery emerging as a top flight reliever and under team control through 2030, Luke Weaver and Camilo Doval both controllable through next season, this back end of bullpen could be really good and that’s before they signed anyone for the pen next season. Considering where we were just a month ago, this sounds pretty good. I mean yowzers…

They Scored Seven Off a Lefty?

Well where the heck was this all season? The Pirates lineup, the one that folks complained about on Twitter before the game, knocked Boston LHP Patrick Sandoval around for seven earned runs in four innings. Brandon Lowe even had two hits to drive in two runs off of Sandoval. Bryan Reynolds and Esmerlyn Valdez did work Sunday with two hits each and Reynolds two big RBIs. And then there was Nick Yorke, who was called up before the game and had two hits and three RBIs. With the Pirates up 4-0 in the 3rd inning and the bases loaded, Yorke laced a single in center to score two runs and give the Pirates breathing room with a 6-0 lead. Yorke added on another RBI in the 7th inning to give the Pirates an 8-3 lead which was the final.

This game literally is about the ceiling of what this team could do against a left-handed starter. There were no home runs, but there were multiple doubles and timely hitting with singles. But it begs the question…where was this all season? Usually they look so inept at hitting a lefty. Obviously, Valdez being out of his cold spell helps significantly. He murders lefties and having him hitting the ball again is very promising.

This Series Left Me Wondering What Could Have Been

This was a nice series win no doubt. Against a good Red Sox team, who’s coming off being a team that went on one of the hottest stretches of my lifetime and the Pirates beat them around to take two-of-three. But what bums me out about all of it still is that it’s coming off losing the last seven series for the Pirates. We all know this team has talent. Most of it is young and there’s going to be bumps in the road, but if they had just fixed some things a little earlier and were a little more consistent, who knows where they could have been. Instead of being 9-16 in Paul Skenes starts, what if they were 16-9 in those starts? What if they had the third base position in the offseason and had a capable defender at third? What if Konnor Griffin wouldn’t have went down for nearly the entire second half? It’s a shame because series like this one shows you what this team could do. But they likely have put themselves in too big of a hole at this point. Hey, maybe they’ll put some wins together and put themselves back in the hunt, but I’m holding out hope for that. I just want to see them finish strong. I want to see how Valdez does this last month and a half and how Ashcraft and Chandler finish it out and even Skenes to that extent.

Let me know what you think in the comments…was this series win bittersweet for you and what are you looking to see the final month and a half?