The Pirates completed a sweep of the Minnesota Twins on Sunday after a 9-2 drubbing. The Bucs are now winners of three straight games. The season of yo-yo results continue as the Pirates continue to exist slightly above .500 since the start of the campaign. The offense continues to impress, scoring more than 5 runs in every single game against a poor Twins pitching staff. Pittsburgh moves to 32-28 on the season and a half game out of the final wild card spot in the National League. Watch Doug and I break down the game in greater detail here on the NS9 Postgame Show powered by Primanti’s Bros:
Braxton Ashcraft Dominance Continues
Every time Braxton Ashcraft takes the mound, I try to make a note to not write about him like I have every time he pitches. Braxton then looks like a certified ace and leaves me with no choice but to acknowledge his dominance. Ashcraft pitched a marvelous six innings Sunday with a line-drive homer being the only blight on his stat line. He finished his outing with 11 strikeouts, 24 whiffs, and accomplished all this on 80 pitches. He found the perfect combination of missing bats and being efficient, only throwing 20 balls all game. His ERA has fallen to 2.77 on the year and, with every start, shows that this is not a fluke run. Only three pitchers in all baseball have thrown more innings than him this season as well.
Ashcraft has inexplicably been the best pitcher on the staff this season when he shares a locker room with Paul Skenes. They’re going to need to rest him during the dog days of summer to ensure he’s healthy for a playoff push because he has been that valuable in his first full season as a Major League pitcher. He is by far the most underrated starter in baseball.
86-Win Pace Feels Frustrating
After today’s victory, the Pirates are on pace to win 86 games over the full regular season. There are multiple factors to why this doesn’t feel as good as it should: The rest of the division is winning, the NL is very good, and we aren’t used to watching a team compete for a playoff spot. Regardless, I am thrilled with how the Pirates are performing this season. The bullpen is the easiest part of the team that can be fixed at the deadline, and the team passes both the eye test and the metrics test. The offense can score in boat loads, and Ryan O’Hearn coming back and immediately hitting a home run was great for the depth. The starting pitching remains very good, and so my plea to Pirates fans is this: Enjoy this ride because this is a good team even if they have extremely frustrating losses. The bullpen will continue to give us headaches, the offense will have nights where they can’t drive runs in, and yet the talent here is good enough to make the playoffs and to make some noise when we get there.
The Pirates Offense is For Real
The Pirates scored a total of 25 runs over the course of the Twins series and remain top 5 in all of baseball in terms of runs scored. We have managed this despite Ryan O’Hearn being out for a significant period of time and getting less than nothing out of Marcell Ozuna. Losing Konnor Griffin to the IL does hurt, but reports say he should be out for a small amount of time. There is enough depth and talent here to maintain such a torrid run-scoring pace and has allowed for guys like Reynolds and Cruz to have very good seasons. Reynolds looks extremely relaxed and no longer feels pressure to chase pitches to create offense. Cruz has quietly raised his OPS back to the .800 range and is on pace for 30+ home runs and 40+ steals. There is a fun combination of speed and power around this team as well, making for a pleasant viewing experience. Every time we watch this offense play, I cannot believe we as a fanbase survived watching last year’s offense do nothing.
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