Pittsburgh Pirates: Pirates still can’t get the elusive sweep

The Pittsburgh Pirates fell to the Chicago White Sox in the second of a brief two-game series, while still avoiding their first sweep of the season. 

The Pittsburgh Pirates fell to the Chicago White Sox in a close game by a final of 4-3. This game dropped the Pirates to 26-46 on the season and concluded a five-game homestand with a 3-2 record.

De Jong got knocked up early

Chase De Jong was only able to go 4.2 innings as he fell to 0-2 on the season. He gave up seven hits and four earned runs while getting six strikeouts. He allowed two early runs in the second inning when a Leury Garcia solo shot was followed up by an RBI double later in the inning by Tim Anderson.

After that, De Jong was fine until his ultimate demise happened in the fifth inning. In the fifth inning, Yasmani Grandal hit a two-run double to end De Jong’s outing.

Hayes continues to make his argument for ROY

The Pittsburgh Pirates could only muster up three runs today, and two of those were RBIs from Ke’Bryan Hayes. Hayes went 2-4 today with a walk and RBIs in the third and seventh inning. The only other run of the day for the Buccos came in the third, as Frazier had a groundout RBI right before Hayes got his first RBI of the day.

Bullpen had a great outing

Chasen Shreve, Duane Underwood Jr., Chris Stratton, and Clay Holmes all combined to have stellar outings in today’s game. They came together to pitch for a combined four and a third innings of scoreless baseball to keep the team in the game with a chance for a comeback that never was able to happen. As a whole, the pen was able to get more strikeouts than they did hits, 5 Ks to 2 hits, this game which is always great to see.

What’s Next?

The Pittsburgh Pirates are heading to Saint Louis to take on the red birds in a four-game weekend set. Thursday’s game will see two struggling pitchers take the bump. Chad Kuhl (1-4 5.66 ERA) will face off against Carlos Martinez (3-8 6.62 ERA).