3 Takeaways From The Pittsburgh Pirates Sweep Of The Texas Rangers

Starling Marte Is Pretty Damn Important To The Pirates

We are going to start the 3 takeaways with some big time analysis. Believe it or not, center fielder Starling Marte is very important to the Pirates. That’s right, when the team’s best player is on the field it makes the team better.

I know, crazy stuff!

Prior to the start of the series Marte was activated off the 10-day injured list on Tuesday afternoon. With Marte out, the Pirates went just 1-8. This included that ugly 8 game losing streak.

Marte was 3-for-11 with a home run, a double, 3 RBI, and a stolen base in the team’s two games in Texas. He also played his typical Gold Glove defense in center field. Getting Marte back could not have come at a better time as the team was missing both his bat and his glove.

After sweeping the Rangers, the Pirates are now 13-5 when Marte is in the starting lineup this season. When he is not? Well, they are just 1-9.

Over the course of the past two seasons this has become Marte’s team. He is the team’s longest tenured player, their best player, and their most important player. In order for the Pirates to compete for a postseason berth this season they need Marte to be on the field and be at his best, and their performance with compared to their performance without him through the first month of the season just further solidifies this.

Keone Kela appears to be back on track

Entering the season the Pirates figured to have one of the best bullpen back end duos in all of baseball in Keone Kela and Felipe Vazquez. From the get go this season Vazquez has been dominant as you would expect. Kela, however, got off a to a rockier start.

Through is first 8 appearances of the season Kela owned a 8.10 ERA and a 7.91 FIP. In these 8 appearances he pitched 6 2/3 innings and racked up 8 strikeouts, but the major issue was that he had allowed a trio of long balls. After this slow start, Kela has found his shut down form once again.

On Tuesday night Kela pitched a scoreless bottom of the 9th inning in his return to Texas. This made it 5 consecutive scoreless appearances for Kela. In these 5 appearances, he’s allowed just a pair of singles, a walk, and he’s struck out 3.

Most importantly, Kela’s nasty curveball appears to be back. Early in the season Kela was struggling with control of his curve and it appeared he was battling a release point issue. Well, Kela and pitching coach Ray Searage appear to have fixed this issue. In his last 5 appearances, especially the previous 3, his curve has had wicked break.

Getting Kela back on track was vital for not just the bullpen but the team as a whole. Especially with Nick Burdi on the IL and Richard Rodriguez continuing to struggle. Luckily, it appears Kela has righted the ship from his early season struggles.

The Andrew McCutchen Trade Is Looking Like A Great One For The Pirates

On January 15, 2018, the Pittsburgh Pirates franchise changed forever. On this cold winter day general manager Neal Huntington traded outfielder Andrew McCutchen, who is a member of the Pirates’ Mount Rushmore, to the San Francisco Giants.

At the time of the trade many people, myself included, ridiculed it. The way I viewed it trading McCutchen wasn’t the issue. He was slated to hit free agency following the 2018 season, ace Gerrit Cole had just been traded, and it was clear the Pirates would be looking to rebuild in 2018, even though that team went on to surprise many folks by finishing with a winning record. The issue was that the return for McCutchen was perceived to be poor.

In return for one of the best, most important players in franchise history the Pirates received reliever Kyle Crick and outfield prospect Bryan Reynolds. Well, 17 months after the trade Huntington is the one who looks smart.

Last season, Crick was a key member of a strong Pirate bullpen. Crick posted a 2.39 ERA, 3.14 FIP, and a 25.5% strikeout rate in 60 1/3 innings pitched last season. So far in 2019, he has picked up where he left off at in 2018.

Through his first 8 innings pitched this season Crick has allowed just 6 base runners while striking out 8. Outside of a 4-run outing against the Diamondbacks last week, and poor defense had as much to do with the runs he allowed as anything else, Crick has not been scored upon this inning. This includes a scoreless 10th inning in Tuesday’s victory and a scoreless 8th inning on Wednesday.

Reynolds has now joined Crick in the impacting the Pirates in a positive way boat. After slashing .302/.381/.438 with a 128 wRC+ at Double-A Altoona last season, Reynolds started the 2019 campaign with Triple-A Indianapolis. When Marte went on the IL on April 20th Reynolds was promoted from the minor leagues, and he looks like a player that will never be sent back to Triple-A.

30 plate appearances into his MLB career Reynolds is slashing .414/.433/.724 with a 206 wRC+. Against the Rangers, Reynolds broke a 3-3 tie with a solo home run in the 11th inning on Tuesday night and he hit a 3-run double to break a 1-1 tie in the 4th inning on Wednesday.

During his 11 days in the Majors Reynolds has already hit 6 doubles. This puts him second on the team in doubles behind Josh Bell (9).

Both Reynolds and Crick played a big role in the Pirates sweeping the Rangers. And, with each game, they continue to make the McCutchen trade look like a good one for the Pirates. Six years of control with Crick and seven of Reynolds in exchange for one season of McCutchen is looking like a hell of a steal for the Pirates.