Pirates’ blowout win over reds came with a ridiculous Ke’Bryan Hayes wrinkle

The Pittsburgh Pirates spent the better part of the last week looking completely stuck offensively. Then they ran into the Cincinnati Reds pitching staff on Saturday afternoon and suddenly looked like the 1927 Yankees without needing to hit a single home run.

Baseball is ridiculous sometimes.

Just days after getting swept by the St. Louis Cardinals despite scoring 18 runs in four games, the Pirates erupted for a 17-7 demolition of the NL Central-leading Reds at PNC Park. They scored five runs in the first inning, four more in the second almost entirely through walks, then piled on another five-run inning in the fourth for good measure.

By the end of the afternoon, every hitter in Pittsburgh’s starting lineup had driven in at least one run for the first time since Sept. 16, 1975. And somehow, one of the funniest stats attached to the game had absolutely nothing to do with the Reds’ historically awful control on the mound.

The Pirates recorded 13 hits in the first four innings alone. That was more hits than former Pirates third baseman Ke’Bryan Hayes — now manning the hot corner for the Reds — currently has on the season.

You genuinely could not invent a harsher piece of timing if you tried.

Ke'Bryan Hayes catches a stray as Pirates finally break out offensively vs Reds

Hayes has become a constant topic of conversation in Pittsburgh despite no longer even playing for the Pirates, largely because national writers and Reds fans spent much of the offseason insisting a change of scenery would magically unlock his bat. The implication was that Pirates fans had simply been too hard on him, too impatient, too negative about a player whose elite defense supposedly outweighed the offensive frustration.

Instead, Hayes has continued to look like the exact same hitter. Meanwhile, the Pirates — a team endlessly mocked for their offense over the past week — just hung 17 runs on the first-place Reds while barely swinging in the second inning.

That inning alone perfectly summed up the chaos of the afternoon. After loading the bases, the Pirates watched Reds pitchers issue four consecutive RBI walks to Nick Gonzales, Marcell Ozuna, Spencer Horwitz and Konnor Griffin. Cincinnati issued seven walks in the inning overall, tying a major league record. At one point, the Pirates were essentially scoring through the revolutionary strategy of simply standing still.

After the panic surrounding the Cardinals sweep, this was the exact kind of response the Pirates needed. The offense suddenly looked patient, aggressive when necessary and relentless top to bottom. Pittsburgh finished with 19 hits and 11 walks, with six different players recording multi-hit games.

Griffin continued looking completely unfazed by the major leagues, finishing 4-for-5 with a triple and missing the cycle by a home run. Brandon Lowe stayed scorching hot. Ryan O’Hearn, Gonzales, Spencer Horwitz and Marcell Ozuna all contributed throughout the afternoon.

Most impressively, the Pirates scored 17 runs without hitting a single homer. That almost feels harder to do in modern baseball.

Even Carmen Mlodzinski’s outing somehow reflected the weirdness of the game. He allowed three early runs and didn’t exactly dominate throughout, yet still struck out a career-high 10 hitters and managed to get through 5 2/3 innings while receiving a standing ovation walking off the mound.

It was that kind of day.

The Pirates have now scored 15 or more runs twice before Game 35 for the first time since 1896, which sounds less like a baseball stat and more like something discovered in a history textbook next to grainy black-and-white photos of players named Pud and Cap.

A few days ago, Pirates fans were wondering whether this offense was capable of consistently supporting one of baseball’s most talented pitching staffs. Now the Pirates have scored 28 runs in two games against the first-place Reds.

Baseball changes quickly. But the funniest part of Saturday might still be this: the Pirates had more hits in four innings than Ke’Bryan Hayes has all season.

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Follow