Everything Goes Wrong for the Pittsburgh Pirates in Series Loss

Up and down weekend for the starting pitching

JT Brubaker started for the Pittsburgh Pirates on Friday night. While he allowed 3 earned runs in 5 innings pitched, it was not all Brubaker’s doing. He was plagued by some poor defense in left field by Ka’ai Tom, a problem that would also plague Pirate pitchers on Saturday night.

With better defense, and some better umpiring, there’s a good shot that the lone run Brubaker would have allowed would have been the solo home run he surrendered. Despite this being Brubaker’s worst start of the season thus far, he still owns a 2.63 ERA, 3.90 FIP, 4.4% walk rate and a 26.5% strikeout rate in 27.1 innings pitched in his 5 starts this season.

Saturday night the 1st inning woes continued to plague Trevor Cahill. After allowing 4 runs in the 1st inning, Cahill settled down and allowed just 1 run across the next 4.1 innings of work. On the season Cahill has now allowed 11 runs in the 1st inning this season. Outside of the 1st inning he has allowed 9 earned runs. This gives him a 4.24 ERA, more than good enough for a 5th starter, outside of the 1st inning this season.

It might be time the Pittsburgh Pirates consider using an opener on nights Cahill is slated to pitch.

Sunday afternoon Wil Crowe turned in a strong start for the Pirates. Unfortunately, due to one bad pitch to Harrison Bader it did not appear that way. That bad pitch to Bader resulted in a 3-run home runs. These were the only runs of the game in a 3-0 Cardinal victory.

Crowe allowed just 3 hits, walked 4 and struck out 2 batters in the start. He also pitched a career high 5 innings in the start. However, it was not enough as the Pirate offense was non-existent in the loss.