Oneil Cruz, Pirates offense ignited by benches clearing skirmish vs. Nationals

The start of the 2025 season for Pittsburgh Pirates fans has not been what most probably hoped for. They came into Wednesday with a 6-12 record and in last place in the NL Central already and have an ownership group that seems to be more interested in pissing off their fans than actually figuring out how to put a decent product on the field. Still, one of the things the Pirates do have going for them is that Andrew McCutchen is still around.

McCutchen is revered in Pittsburgh and commands the respect of any room he walks in. He chose to spend the last years of his career with the Pirates and everyone loves him for it. So, when Nationals starter Jorge Lopez went way up and in on McCutchen after already hitting Bryan Reynolds, things escalated quickly.

Near brawl with Nationals seemingly woke up the Pirates offense

There are some speculating that a previous homer that McCutchen hit off Lopez that he celebrated a little bit could provide some history as to why Lopez did what he did here. It looked like it was going to be a pretty calm thing at first, but then Lopez and McCutchen started jawing at each other and benches ended up clearing.

For the Pirates, this worked out pretty well. After the incident, Pittsburgh loaded the bases and Oneil Cruz, who hasn't exactly been off to a banner start this year, cleared them with his first career grand slam. Cruz definitely took his frustrations out on that poor baseball as it left his bat at 105.2 mph on a line to right field and that was more than enough to put Washington away.

It is nice to see Pittsburgh still showing signs of life during what could easily turn into a very rough season. Other teams may want to take note that the Pirates are very, very beatable, but they aren't going to just let other teams push them around. This is especially true when it comes to franchise legend like McCutchen.

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