Pirates Didn’t Add a Bat. Now the Offense Has to Deliver

I was pretty adamant the whole month leading up to the trade deadline that the bullpen needed to be the Pirates' number one priority, that it was a real issue that needed to be fixed, and the Pirates are very active, this trade deadline, and they drastically improved that bullpen.

At the same time, though, there was a lot of logic in, hey, do you need to add another starting pitcher? Do you need to add to this lineup? Especially with all those struggles against left-handed starters and losing Ryan O'Hearn, the Pirates didn't end up picking up a pitcher or a hitter, and in the latter's case, this offense has not been that good in the second half of the season.

Good morning, and welcome to OffBeat here on North Shore Nine, presented by FanDuel. My name is Alex Stumpf, and this is a daily look at your Pittsburgh Pirates, who, that was a rough one on Tuesday. Jared Jones, not his sharpest. Nick Gonzales, there are issues in the field there, but it's the bats that I think is my real takeaway here.

Because this is a unit that, since the All-Star break, hasn't been doing so great.

Going into play Tuesday, they had a 644 team OPS in the second half of the season, and that was 26th in baseball.

The people who should be carrying this unit right now, like Bryan Reynolds, he has not had a good showing, batting just above the Mendoza going into Tuesday, 59 WRC+.

O'Hearn was having a rough go before he landed on the injured list.

Endy Rodríguez, he's been in a power slump.

They're looking for just, is he going to, get some extra base hits.

It's been a rough go of late.

They have scored 68 runs over 18 games, which isn't a terrible pace, and that's a small enough sample size that there are going to be stretches like this entire year.

It's concerning for me because this is coinciding with Esmerlin Valdez, who is in a 2-for-28 rut and wore the golden sombrero on Tuesday.

And it was just the quality of the bats.

He didn't really have it.

The eighth inning, the Pirates had two men on, down two runs, and they're 3-4 hitters up.

That was a legitimate chance to make it a ball game again.

And Reynolds, swing, call overturn for a strike three.

Esmerlin Valdez gets up there, and he doesn't swing in a pitch.

That's something that just struck me because he can't be patient.

He draws his walks.

He finds ways to get on base even whenever he's not hitting, and that's key for him because so much of his hits are going to be extra bases.

He's going to be in all or nothing in stretches throughout his career.

And if you can draw walks, find ways to get on base, supplement the OBP and the OPS, that helps a lot whenever you're between those stretches.

So it's not just a complete famine, feast and famine.

It's like, no, there are going to be high points, there are going to be apexes, but even whenever he's not hitting, he can find a way to contribute.

That's why, as a rookie, he's been batting fourth a lot lately.

And on the year, it's been a really good year.

I'm not panicking or anything with Esmerlin Valdez, but he did not look comfortable in a single at bat.

He was taking too many pitches, and he's been taking too many pitches.

In August, he has a 10% swing rate on fastballs in the zone.

10%.

And that's not just fastballs.

That's fastballs in the strike zone.

Those are pitches that are going to be called strikes if you don't swing at it.

It looks like a timing issue.

That he's just in between right now.

That he's not able to get the front foot down.

He's a hard worker.

I'm sure he is going to come out of this at some point.

Go to the lab, see what's happening.

That's fine.

Same with Reynolds.

It's a rough stretch.

Could have used a hit, especially in the eighth inning, but is what it is.

And this team, this lineup, I think will get better just through the merit of they're going to get healthier.

Spencer Horwitz is back.

Get his footing back.

Oneil Cruz should be starting a rehab assignment in the not-so-distant future.

Get him back at some point in mid-August, ideally.

And getting Oneil Cruz to this lineup is just as beneficial.

More beneficial than pretty much any trade the Pirates could have made.

That is a real big swing there.

But whenever you have these injuries and you don't supplement the roster, you look at the people who have been hitting all year.

And this is a game of failure.

Of course, a Bryan Reynolds and Esmerlyn Valdez, like Jake Mangum.

These guys are allowed to have cold stretches over the course of the year.

It's every hitter is going to have them.

But this is a team that very quickly has had its identity shift.

This went from a team that going into the year, it was, can they pitch?

Can they just get enough offense?

They just need league average offense with this rotation.

And this rotation has been disappointing.

But the offense has been great.

Especially in the first half of the year.

They had the most runs scored in baseball in the first half of the year.

I know we all know this, but it's just one of those things that look back at it 5, 10, 15 years from now.

Like, wow, they really did.

This offense was humming.

And they aren't right now.

It's a cyclical game.

There'll be some highs.

There'll be some lows.

You don't want the bat to just be on the shoulder, though.

I don't know.

There's something about watching the strikes.

He swung five times in his four at-bats.

And he struck out four times.

That means he took more cold strikes than he swung the bat.

That's an issue.

I need a young hitter, a young power hitter, to be aggressive up there.

Especially since, unless a lefty's on the mound and Bryan Reynolds is, batting right-handed, he is the source for right-handed power on this team.

They have some right-handed hitters.

Nick Gonzales has hit well, but he's not providing power.

Esmerlyn Valdez has to be the power for the righties on this team.

It was supposed to be Marcell Ozuna, but he, is what it is.

Valdez has picked it up.

And I really do think his emergence was part of the reason why Pirates maybe didn't prioritize the lineup as much as they did the bullpen come to the trade deadline.

The bullpen needed so much help.

And yeah, it would have been great to add a hitter.

they discussed a lot of different things.

Not all of them come together.

But you can't tell me that they wanted to squeeze him out of the lineup.

He's in a spot right now where it's like, look, you got a rookie who's swinging the bat.

He's taking good, and it's, good swing decisions.

He's being aggressive out there.

He's doing everything that you want a rookie hitter to do.

Reward him.

I know he was like in that second tier of prospects, but he wasn't, a real top prospect.

But he had that potential to be a real impact player, and he has been.

Foster that.

Nurture it.

Give him the playing opportunity.

I'm 100% on board with that.

I need him to swing the bat.

That's all it is.

And I don't want to be too critical because I do think this has been a really good season, and I think this is a stretch that he is going to emerge from eventually.

But whenever your cleanup hitter is going 20-something at bats and only has two hits and he's not swinging the bat, it's concerning.

Whenever Bryan Reynolds has a batting average barely over 200, over a roughly 20-game stretch, that's concerning.

Especially since Konnor Griffin's on the I.L.

Not going to see him to the end of the year.

Not going to see Ryan O'Hearn to the end of the year, probably.

No, still no Oneil Cruz.

They need these guys to still deliver.

Brandon Lowe, he's been swinging a better bat of late, but he had a long stretch there, too.

It's a team that needs to be led by its offense right now.

I wrote for Book Rule Bucks, how what the Pirates did to the bullpen was necessary because it's probably the bullpen that has to set the pace in the second half of the year.

Mitch Keller is out for the regular season, and I just don't see any path to him pitching again in 2026.

He's out.

He's out.

Paul Skenes.

Boy, is he not pitched well.

This is a big start for him on Wednesday.

This is one of those, hey, they added to the team.

You're supposed to be clubhouse leader.

You have to set the pace.

You have to pitch a quality start.

He hasn't done that lately.

And then you've got Bubba Chandler.

You've got Braxton Ashcraft, both of whom are going to set innings limits or innings highs.

This is a starting rotation that has a lot of question marks with it.

The bullpen additions were necessary for a multitude of reasons.

I think they're going to have a lot of games the second half of the year where you have to just go to the bullpen and be like, they're throwing three or four innings, maybe five.

Figure it out.

No, I think they do have a good collection of arms that they could do that.

Like Kirby Yates in the eighth?

This guy would have been their second best reliever.

He might have been their closer if he was here two weeks ago.

And now he's, what, their fourth or fifth best reliever?

Not a bad ad at all.

He had a pretty darn good debut.

The pitching, there are a lot of questions.

That makes the offense all the more important.

What we saw in the first half of the season, I think to some level is sustainable.

Maybe not to, they were going to be the number one offense at the end of the year.

But they aren't going to revert back to 2025, and they shouldn't just be an average offense.

This still needs to be a good team.

They still need to hit.

They have to find ways to win games 5-4, 6-5.

Instead of coming into the year where we thought it was going to be 3-2 or 4-3.

They need people in this lineup to step up.

And it could be Esmerlyn Valdez.

It could be Endy Rodríguez.

It could be Bryan Reynolds.

It could be Nick Gonzales taking that next step.

It could be Jake Mayhem getting back on track.

It can't just be waiting until Oneil Cruz gets healthy.

They didn't add to this lineup at the trade deadline, and I don't know yet if that will come back to Honto.

There is an obvious spot if they could have gotten another right-handed hitting outfielder.

Would have been real easy to see how he fit into this team.

But they didn't get one because they have a rookie who's been doing really good this year.

And if he gets the bat off the shoulders, I'm sure he can be that again.

Someone needs to lead the charge because this is a team that if they're going to be giving up four or five runs, you can't score one or two.

It's the offense and the bullpen that's going to be leading the charge.

And the bullpen looks like it's in a really good spot right now.

Let's see how the offense responds in turn.

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